garbailian

I was on the Dawn last week and the shows were all good including the Haines Magic Show and Elements. The Second City performers were fun to watch. They had a Circus performance that the kids put on themselves after marching around the ship cheering and singing and looked to be having fun. I had the UBP and never had slow service except at the Venetian on the first night. It was my fault though as I found out later that you need to let your waiter know you will need a drink server to wait on you. A few times the server did not come fast enough so the waiter took charge and got us drinks himself. I loved the fact my wife, who doesn't drink really, was able to try some drinks without feeling bad for paying for them and then not liking them. The Roasted Almond was her favorite and she had several during the cruise. They had several free tasting during the cruise but we did not do the paid tastings. They did offer free wine for everyone if there was a delay getting seated for dinner which occurred twice. The band at the Spinaker lounge was entertaining but I can only take so much Pat Benetar being screamed out (before you laugh, my son is a drummer in a Heavy Metal Band (now you are laughing) so how could Pat Benetar bother me? You will have to hear it for yourself)before I would shuffle off to Pearly Kings for an ice cold New Castle draft. The crew was always friendly and talkative if you greet them first. My room was always perfect and my wife loved the towel animals each night, which made her happy, which made me even more happy.

AllAmericanAmy gave a very accurate description of what occurred on 12/6. Andre was on the PA at least every ten minutes giving updates. People don't realize how vulnerable a cruise ship is and the overwhelming task it must be to keep one safe. Our ship was under surveillance the entire time we were in a port of every single stop until we returned, ON TIME!!!, including New Orleans. That cop waving at the ship when we left was there to make sure the ship was safe on departure, he wasn't just being friendly. Did everyone see the guys on top of the roofs at some of the ports with binoculars? Customs has a job to do. I would rather be delayed an hour than have some kind of security breech because of complacent measures. I had breakfast at 8:30 am and then got in the walk off line at 9am. The line started moving about 9:30am and there were some delays through Customs, not Norwegian's fault. They were cleaning the ship and restocking while we were leaving. I was through customs, walked to my truck, loaded the bags and left the Julia Street parking lot and was out of the Port area and heading up I 10 at 10:45 am exactly. My job in the military was Logistics, which included load planning ships and the movement of troops to and from an area of operation. The job these cruise lines do is very impressive and organized. The one thing I agree with is that there needs to be a sign at the entrance to the terminal directing new arrivals to the processing lines. Once we got pointed in the right direction everything went as anticipated from start to finish, with the exception of a security delay. As for the people who had priority debarkation, I wish that hadn't happened to you. That would be rather annoying since you paid your hard earned money to have that level of service given to you but did not receive. I had a cheap room on the 9th deck and got pretty good service for what I paid. M2C