adivineeternity

My boyfriend and I just sat on Deck 15 until about 11:30, when he went downstairs, asked if we could get off, then came up and got me and our stuff. We signed up for the last debark time, anyway, but hated the lack of information being passed along to passengers. Coupled with the limited areas where we could sit and wait comfortably, it was the one legitimately frustrating part of our week. We got off the ship very quickly and then it was maybe 15 minutes from joining the line until we walked through customs.

My BF and I were on the same sailing and ate at Cagney's the first night. We had 0 issues with service there, or any of the other places we ate (no MDRs as we each got the UDP free with a promo when we booked, but the specialties, Garden Cafe, O'Sheehan's, and a la Carte venues were all fantastic). We also ate outside every opportunity we got because we weren't bothered by the wind and LOVED how empty the waterfront on deck 8 was because it meant more space for us. We weren't terribly interested in the pool, although we did spend a couple of hours on Tuesday going down the slides.

I'll be writing up my own review slowly if you are curious about my own experiences, but it's interesting seeing someone whose experience was so different from my own.

Can't wait for your Review. Ship - Destination - Days?

We were on the Breakaway to Bermuda, 9/21-28. I'm working on photos now. I have a bit over 63 GB of photos and videos to go through, so I'm taking it one day at a time right now.

Looking forward to your review..so far this sounds like this is going to be a good one! :)

 

 

Rochelle

Haha, thanks. I almost told my boyfriend to move over in bed last night because I was afraid the ship was going to rock me right out of it.

Then I realized I was being unreasonable and the ship is a lie. There is. no. ship.

Sadly.

Staying home from work today for a doctor's appointment and, quite frankly, I'm glad I said I'd need today off because I woke up coughing and choking and can't quite breathe right. FUN. Second trip this year that I've ended with some sort of respiratory something. BUT I'm hoping to get day one written and posted, pics and all.

I have a crazy case of post-cruise depression right now, so it is time to start writing my review!

I'm going to start off what will probably be a very lengthy, picture-intensive thread of stories and madness with a little bit of background information, which is relevant to our experiences on-board and in-port. I am 26, my fabulous BF is 31, and neither of us had ever been on a cruise before this, nor had we been on an extended trip together. Weekends away here and there and that’s it, although we do live together and thus are quite used to each other in that sense.

We appreciate good food, places that are not over-crowded, common courtesy, and anything beautiful. We do not appreciate large crowds of obnoxious people, unnecessarily and excessively slow restaurant service, and the hours between 3:00-10:00 AM.

I take my own pillow with me every time I leave the house with the intention of spending at least one night because 99% of pillows available give me intense headaches (yayyy, neck support), I am the lighter packer between the two of us in all things except shoes and toiletries (crazy hair monster enough of a tip for you?), and we both do photography and love to write. I also do video. There will be plenty of these in this review if you hang in here with me.

He sunburns if he so much as thinks about the sun (Irish blood). I went on the ship thinking I'd be fine if I reapplied sunscreen regularly, despite a history of burning like crazy in the more southern portions of the country. I have asthma and a dozen other bodily stupidities that make life less comfortable than I'd prefer, but I get by and managed fine with most aspects of the trip.

Prior to this trip, I had spent more than 6 years of my life outside of the country (Air Force brat) and knew what cars look like outside of the USA and selected other areas in the world. He spent two hours in Canada looking at Niagara Falls from the good side and used to be able to list that as his only international experience.

We also both swear (a lot) by nature and probably shouldn't complain so much about petty things. He’s demonstrated strong preference for very comfortable travel while I can sleep soundly on a cot or the ground without batting an eye.

That said, I’ll be starting my actual review tomorrow! I still feel the swaying of the ship and am nursing whatever it is I got on the ship, which means I need to sleep.

Here is the only picture I have handy right now. Creme Brulee from Le Bistro:

It was delicious and one of my favorites from the cruise, dessert-wise. I had them bring it up to our stateroom so I could enjoy it a little later, once the other food I got had settled a little and made room. I enjoyed almost every single thing I ate on the ship this week (the exceptions are so petty and stupid I can barely remember them).

Today! I'm leaving in, like, 20 minutes! Aaahhh!

Tomorrow! I sail tomorrow! Aaaahhh!

My boyfriend and I will be arriving hopefully no later than 10 am on Sunday. We're planning on using that time to take some pics of the ship in port. We want to be sure we beat the crowds getting onto the ship.

Looks like you are about to cruise ---3 days !!!!!;)

I am! I spent my day at work not even pretending to work. Like, it was obvious i didn't care. I have a cruise. That's what i care about.

I'll be boarding my first cruise on Sunday and have a balcony thanks to the insistence of my boyfriend. He decided the extra cost of the balcony was worth it for both of us, giving me little say (I would have been fine with an OV). He is also far more likely to spend a bit of time each sea day on said balcony with a book because he prefers his own company to anybody else's, except for me. I love to read and I love to have my me-time, but I can go out and socialize far more readily than he can. I'm far more likely to meet people and set up social type things while he just sits in the background and gives me the "yes dear" smile and nod before turning back to his book.

This means one thing to me. I'm going to have to start tracking prices for cruises on the Sky. Get a cabin for cheap enough and it won't matter that we'd have to fly to the port! Plus another cruise! I see no problem with this if I'm ever in a position to do that.

I feel your pain, excited to see the getaway in 5 days!

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

I don't even mind that I have to be at work because that's just life. I just happen to strongly dislike my job to the point that I regret taking it and switching from my old job (which I also disliked). Customer service is a horrendous field to be in for any amount of time.

5 days, 18 hours, 5 minutes until James and I are supposed to be at the port waiting to board. The majority of a full workweek lies between me and the Breakaway right now and I am about ready to set this entire building on fire.

Check your confirmation. In the upper right, it should say "DINING." If it says this, you should be good to go. At the restaurants, you will have to sign a copy of a receipt which gives the price and then a reduction of 100%.

My reservation on the ncl website says UDP under amenities and I've reserved two nights in specialty restaurants and it's not charged me for either of them. Not sure what confirmation you're referring to, but I booked through a different agency than most. Apparently military people don't travel enough and need an agency to encourage them to get out and travel more? I don't claim to know, but the discounts are nice.

Cool story, brah.

J/k. This is good to know. I'm a naturally suspicious person, so I'm probably going to check my bill daily next week and keep careful track of every expense on-board, even moreso now that I have read this. My boyfriend and I got a promotion for a cabin upgrade that we used to get a balcony at oceanview rates, which then made us eligible for free UDPs (had to book balcony or higher for this). I'll be checking for the stickers, which I wouldn't have known about otherwise.

So far, everything has gone smoothly. We had one tiny glitch that was entirely on me with regards to final payment in June, but I resolved it less than five minutes after it happened. Here's to hoping this luck continues for me and, better yet, spreads to others. Less stress is always ideal.

7 days! This time next week, I'll be boarding or already on the Breakaway!

I've been packing with the bundling method for years. Working on teaching it to my boyfriend. I'll be using it when I pack for our cruise in the next few days. Oddly, as the girl I am the one who has less trouble packing light. BF, on the other hand, would be challenged beyond words if we decided to do an extended trip with lots of moving around.

What is funner than printing Edocs ?????? :)

I had to have my boyfriend print ours cause I have no printer access at work and we don't have one at home. I filled out the luggage tags, though!

AAAHHHH! Single digits now! I'm down to 9 days until I board the Breakaway!

I would do the single digit dance, but it's 1:15 in the morning and my boyfriend is lying in bed asleep right next to me.

I shall just imagine doing it, instead. That still counts, right?

My best friend and her family lost their house and most of their belongings to a fire started by lightning. You are very lucky. I'm glad everything is okay, for the most part.

I've always been classed as ENFP with excessively strong extroversion. I have also done a lot of reading about the E vs I traits because I had a number of people who were very surprised to learn I'm so heavily extroverted because I happen to love reading, writing, and other activities more commonly stereotyped for introverts. It makes a lot more sense when you understand what it all means, so I'm glad I looked into it.

I love my alone time, I need it to make it through the week, but I can't have too much or I shut down entirely. There's a lot that I could mention here from the last few years of my life, but I'm on my phone. My energy almost always comes from the people around me, which honestly has its drawbacks.

I have actually spent a lot of time explaining to people what extrovert and introvert really mean so they can understand that introverts can be just as sociable as extroverts and extroverts can be just as quiet as introverts (like me, often). There is no mutual exclusivity in these things, it's about the energy and where a person draws it from.

That's part of why I like NCL's freestyle thing, too. My boyfriend is, as far as I can tell, more introverted than I am. He lived alone for years before I moved in and loved it. He still enjoys going out and socializing, but he's got limited capacity to do it and generally makes a point of avoiding large crowds. Last Christmas was great because he went to three Christmas parties in four days and was totally wiped out at the end of it. We had to skip his brother's because he couldn't do four in four days.

That said, it'll be interesting being on a huge ship (the Breakaway) for our first cruise. He's already planning his alone time with a book and a glass of water on our balcony. I'm trying to figure out when I'll have time to read with so much going on and so many people to meet. I'll make time because I need to, but I don't know how much...

If anybody else has tips, restaurants we shouldn't miss, etc. please feel free to let me know.

Haha, for my boyfriend and I the discussion started almost a year ago at various points as we talked about all the places we eventually wanted to go. He specifically mentioned Arizona, where I have been, and Bermuda, where I have not been.

Fast forward to mid-February - He mentioned wanting to go on a real vacation this year and we talked about it and decided Arizona would be pretty awesome. "Well, wait a minute," you say, "you can't reach Arizona on a cruise ship."

This much is true, but let me finish.

We started researching what it would cost to take a trip out to Arizona, figuring car rental, hotels, flights, food, gas, attractions, etc. and realized that it would be in the $2000-2400 range for the two of us. One day, closer to the end of the month, he brought up wanting to go to Bermuda again but that it would be cheaper to go on a cruise than it would be to fly there and stay in a resort or hotel.

"Ah, now we're getting somewhere." Yes, my friend, things are starting to make some sense.

So, I got online (99% chance I was at work ignoring emails and pawning phone calls off on my coworker when I did this) and looked at cruise prices out of Boston, Baltimore, and NYC. I confess, I REALLY didn't feel like working, so I looked at cruises to the Caribbean, Panama Canal, Bermuda, Canada/New England, and knowing me, probably Alaska and Hawaii, as well, just to waste as much time as humanly possible at work. After a bit of research (probably at least an hour or two), I texted le boyfriend and told him that, from what I could see, a cruise to Bermuda would actually run roughly the same as a trip to Arizona. So that night we did some more research to more specifically estimate the Arizona trip and then talked about it over the course of the next 24 hours or so.

"Get to the point. We know what you chose, clearly." Yes, I know you know what I chose, otherwise I wouldn't be here.

The following night, we looked again and decided that Bermuda was easier to save for because, once booked, the unknown costs would consist almost entirely of things like food and souvenirs. The rest would be easy to plan for. The conversation from that point went something like this:

Him: Okay, so let's go on a cruise!

Me: Cool. Here are our options for Bermuda.

*shows him Celebrity, Royal Caribbean, and Norwegian options to Bermuda*

Him: I thought there was a 6-night option.

Me: No, these are the options out of New York. The 6-day is out of somewhere else. There's also Boston.

Him: No. Boston is too far when we have Manhattan's terminal right there. (step two, establish where our port is)

Me: Okay, so New York sailings. These are still our options.

Him: Well, 5 nights seems too short. I still could have sworn I saw a 6 night option.

Me: You're hallucinating. That was out of some other city. If 5 nights is too short, that rules out Royal Caribbean. So Celebrity or Norwegian. Celebrity is slightly cheaper, but out of Bayonne-

Him: I don't want to go to Jersey. That's too hard.

Me: Fine. Norwegian. (step three, establish that he's all about convenience whereas I don't care and would probably still be speculating if it was entirely my choice)

Him: Cool. My mom sailed them and loved it, so that's who I wanted. (step four, establish that this would have been much easier if he'd started with that sentiment)

Me: So... when in September do we want to go?

Him: We have to get a balcony. Nothing else will be as awesome.

Me: ... ??????

*two days later*

Me: Babe! I found a great deal! I'm gonna book now.

Him: Okay, we'll talk about it tonight.

Me: *incapable of waiting, so books it anyway* Okay, I booked it! September 21!

Chesneygirl, your videos have inspired me to dive back into video on my upcoming cruise. I have my trusty 60D to aid me in this.

Thank you for the inspiration and gorgeous videos.