sjl1222

We are sailing the Pearl thru the Canal and I have a couple of questions. My husband can not drink alcohol due to medications, does any one know if they have non alcoholic wine and beer?

If we make a reservation for 2 in the regular dining room (thinking of first night) will we be given a table for 2? Have sailed with Princess and they seem to have a lot of tables for 2.

To echo others, you don't really need a reservation. We told them table for 2, but we don't mind sharing each time, and we always got a table for two. Wait was never longer than 15 minutes.

How quiet was your stateroom? I am looking to reserve this cruise, and it would appear looking at deck plans, that your Stateroom was under La Cucina Thanks

I stayed in 11618, and only one night there were a lot of scraping and banging noises above us. I didn't notice much the other nights.

Being in an aft cabin did you feel much motion??

 

 

 

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This is a pretty old post, but I just got back from this cruise and stayed in 11618. We had fairly calm seas and I didn't feel much at all in the stateroom. I'm not sure if this was just in my head, but I seemed to feel significantly more motion in the front of the ship.

Which restaurant did you get Indian food? Thanks - good review!

At the buffet on deck 12. It was delicious!

Hard to say. We went the last week of June and there was a cold front. Pools were never used, only hot tubs. Balcony was too cold to use at sea. Locals talked a lot about how it was unusually cold that week, so it could vary.

This was my second Alaska cruise (my fourth overall). I went two years ago on the same route with Princess, so that cruise is still fresh in my mind for comparison. Overall, I think Norwegian did a much better job for a few different reasons.

Firstly, I was really impressed with the ship itself. It was very clean, and I don't take this for granted. Keeping that much ship clean takes a lot of hard work. The layout of the ship is simple and thoughtful. It was very easy to navigate, and though we only used them once, the elevators were smooth and fast.

Some of the rooms on the ship were just beautiful. In all my cruises I don't remember just looking around a room and being impressed with the carpet, furniture, art, and ceilings so often. The Summer Palace dining room is gorgeous. Lotus Garden is also a nice space, and the dresses of the servers in the Garden were beautiful. If I didn't have a balcony, I would have spent much more time in Spinnaker Lounge. It is a huge lounge up top on the front of the ship, with large windows giving a panoramic view. There is quite a bit of seating to relax and watch the ocean, but because it's such a nice space, the seats can be a little hard to get.

We stayed in a minisuite with a balcony (11618). It felt pretty spacious, the steward did a great job, and I appreciated having a balcony even though the wind was almost too cold to enjoy it much. It was very nice on glacier day though, and pulling in and out of ports. I probably saw about 20 whales just from the balcony alone. I did really like the shower. Tons of water pressure. I thought the location of the room was nice. We could access all three staircases quickly, and my favorite thing about the ship is on deck 11.

While we're still on the ship itself, the coolest thing about the ship is the bridge viewing room on deck 11. I've never seen this before on a ship. It's a room with large windows looking right into the bridge. You're standing behind the captain and officers. You can see the computers, the beautiful view, the controls. In the viewing room itself, they have computer screens where you can see what the officers see, such as two radars and two informational panels showing details about the engines and the course. There's maps on the wall and a fantastic model of the Pearl.

Entertainment and activities were just okay. One thing I appreciated about the Princess cruise was that we had a wonderful naturalist aboard who did several lectures. NCL didn't have that, just a couple short documentaries. Overall I wasn't too interested in much on the schedule. There was a magician and a pianist/comedian, both were great, but the overall daily activities I felt were pretty bland. The trivia and name that song were geared toward the older crowd, which I totally understand.

I didn't book any excursions through the ship, so I can't really comment on that. I booked independently, but I can recommend the train in Skagway and a seaplane through the Misty Fjords. We took Southeast Aviation for that one and the flight was incredible.

Service was pretty hit or miss. Bartenders as a whole were not friendly at all. On Carnival, I loved talking with the bartenders and hearing about where they're from and what the cruise world is like. On this ship, I was lucky if they even said one word when I walked up or ordered. Other staff were pretty friendly though.

The servers in all dining areas seemed understaffed. Service was slow everywhere, and refills were almost nonexistent the whole week. In the buffet area I often had to push dirty dishes to the side of the table to use it because there were no busted tables. Everyone seemed to be working hard, maybe just a little overstretched.

Lastly, and for me, most importantly, the food. I've been on two Carnival cruises and one Princess cruise, and this Norwegian cruise had the best food overall. Princess was the worst (by far). The food is almost the most important part of a cruise for me, because you're basically eating all day long.

First the not so good. My least favorite meal the whole time was Cagney's Steakhouse. It is a paid restaurant. We went because a coworker treated us. We had a reservation for 8:00, didn't get in until almost 8:30, and didn't get our first app until around 9. Service was so slow, and the restaurant was dark, loud, and crowded. My appetizer was not good at all, but the bison steak was good. It did not come with toppings indicated on the menu though. Dessert was just okay. So many people love Cagney's, but it was a big miss for me. I didn't have any reason to go back since the food on the rest of the ship was so good.

The only other not great thing about dining on the ship was the cocktails. I had three or four cocktails, none of which were made well. And watching the haphazard way they were thrown together, the bartenders did not seem properly trained. I just stopped ordering them. Princess, by the way, had excellent cocktails. Back to Norwegian, I ended up just ordering wine by the glass. The red blend made specifically for Norwegian is delicious and less than $10 per glass. I love whiskey but the selection was awful so I stuck with the wine.

So enough with the negatives, because the overall level of food on this ship was outstanding. The dining room menu often had several things I wanted to try, and I was rarely disappointed with what I got. Not everything was great in the dining room, but everything was at least good, and many dishes were excellent. The risotto and the Cornish hen come to mind. The bread was always good. The desserts were always good. Overall, the dining room was better than Carnival and much, much better than Princess (I still have nightmares of the endless, soggy boiled vegetables they called sides).

For breakfast, we mostly ate in the dining room. I regret not discovering the poached eggs sooner. I almost didn't order them, because on earlier cruises I ordered poached eggs and got rock solid, old eggs with crusty Hollandaise smothering them. But I took the chance and ordered them on the Pearl and oh my God they were the most perfect poached eggs I've ever had. I even got poached eggs off the buffet one morning and they were perfect too! This made me one happy camper because I love breakfast.

I'll go ahead and talk about coffee here, another important one for me. The regular free coffee on the Pearl was good compared to Princess (seriously, the worst coffee I've ever had was the coffee on the Princess ship). The coffee on Norwegian tasted a little too smoky and cheap for me, but it was still drinkable and probably pretty good if you're not a coffee snob. On cruises I always end up at the cafe in the morning. I'm willing to pay $2 for good coffee, and the cafe here delivered. They didn't do drip, but they made awesome Americanos. They have Lavazzo espresso and I really looked forward to my Americano every morning.

Don't want to have a long meal in the dining room? Lotus Garden was pretty good. I enjoyed my noodle dishes, but not the orange beef. The sushi is extra, but very cheap and I thought it was pretty good. I had it for lunch twice. O'Sheehan's is pub food. I had a decent burger and wanted to try more but never got the chance.

Lastly, I didn't eat at the buffet much, but what I had was great. Breakfast was crazy crowded but the poached eggs on an English muffin were good. They had a crepe bar! A guy made fresh crepes to order which was very impressive for a buffet. The real star for me was the Indian food. I thought buffet Indian food would not be good, but it looked pretty good so I decided to try it. I was really impressed. It tasted like they made it from scratch. They usually had three dishes available with naan and a variety of Indian sauces. If you like Indian food, just eat lunch here everyday. For me, this was the best lunch available on the ship. They did have suckling pig (like, the entire pig) on the buffet one day, but I walked up just as they were closing down. I was sad I didn't get to try it!

And the best dessert I had on this cruise was off the buffet. It was in the glass dessert case, just labeled "flourless chocolate cake." You have to try it. I used to be a professional baker, and that might have been the best chocolate cake I ever had. I'm going to contact NCL to see if I can get the recipe. Also try the peach frozen yogurt, and the opera cake on chocolate night.

Overall, this was the best cruise I've had. Even with the negatives, the cleanliness and design of the ship with the high quality of food has put Norwegian at the top for me. I have a cruise booked with Celebrity next year (family chose that one), but I would highly recommend Norwegian and would choose them over Carnival or Princess.