aimathy

The water there was not your traditional Caribbean blue, which I had read alot about. It can get cloudy from the tannins from the mangroves that are nearby. There was some sea grass, but they had people raking it, and the sea grass in the water was not a problem at all. The place itself was beautiful and they were attentive and fantastic all day long.

Next up was lunch. Wow. I think this was my favorite meal of the entire trip! They had a buffet type set up where you got fresh baked tortillas (you watched as they made them!) and then added on what you liked. They had marinated skirt steak, chicken, pibil (pork) and fish in butter sauce...along with cotija, fresh salsas, pico de gallo, crema and hot sauces. They also had a bean soup. Everything was fresh as could be and simply delicious. I had to take a picture! :)

We were also treated to some fresh coconut water. The girls loved watching him cut them open. They didn't like the taste as much...but it was fun!

By the way, my poor DD gets red and flushed from heat. I promise she was thoroughly sunblocked and protected! :) They also had wifi which was nice to get back in touch with home. The Oreo drink was divine, try it if you go. We spent the rest of the day just enjoying the good weather and company. I would recommend Maya Chan VERY highly. It was the perfect beach day!

On to the good!! Our next port was Costa Maya. We had made reservations to go to Maya Chan, a beach club in Costa Maya that we read about on tripadvisor and cruise critic. It turns out that the owners were on a b2b2b cruise on the Dawn, so we were able to meet with them right on the ship and then head on out. They were in our van on the way to Maya Chan and they were fabulous. They told us all about the area, the government, their process in owning the beach club, what they do....it was really a great and informative ride there. The ONLY downside? You'll read reviews about a bumpy road. OH MY WAS IT BUMPY!! Apparently, it's always bumpy...but it also had rained in a few weeks, what it normally rains in four MONTHS, so the road was very much washed away and had potholes (well, LAKES) in the road. I felt bad for the cab driver!

Anyway, the reward at the end of the bumpy ride was this:

And this:

And this:

As soon as we got there, their son came up and showed us around. We had a beautiful little spot right near their main palapa/building which was perfect. It has a bed (yes, a bed), lounge chairs, palapas for shade and toys for the kids. They brought out a round of rum punch for everyone, with just punch for the kids and my pregnant sister....along with delicious chip with fresh guacamole and salsa. YUM! This was an all inclusive resort, so we were sure to take them up on some fun cocktails and beers, while the kids had smoothies, water, juice....you name it. We had a blast lounging in the hammocks and floating chairs and while away a beautiful sunny day!

So I'm going to try to mix some of the bad with the good. It makes it more palatable when something not as great is followed by something wonderful, right?

The room. Here's where I know people will disagree. This is just my lowly opinion. I know that many of you get awesome amazing rooms (I saw them with my own eyes as I passed open doors around the ship). I am very certain that you will say "I have NEVER had that problem on NCL!". Well, you're right...because you probably never had a two person inside room on NCL! :D Since my very wonderful, amazing parent paid for my daughter and I to join them on this trip, we had an inside room. I have been on many cruises and have only had a balcony once, on my honeymoon. I know my way around an inside stateroom! And this is another area that I felt like NCL really paled in comparison to comparable rooms on other cruise lines.

Our room felt very worn and very old. Was it horrific or unlivable? Of course not. Do they update rooms often on most ships? No. I know that. But this room just felt like they could care less if your room was nice or not. I know we were low men on the totem pole....but really, it was hard not to notice how used the rooms really felt. I don't want to drone on about what was wrong, but the quick list would be hairs in the shower, on vanity and on floor upon arrival; chipped vanity and shower, crusted dirt/debris all around base of shower frame, chipped wood on desk, streaks of dried crusty dirt on desk, taped together remote, stained sheets, tv that faced the floor instead of forward, missing hooks on wall, stained toilet seat.

I know, I know. Impossible right? It's not. I have pictures for all of these things, but don't think that posting 15 or more pictures of this will make the point any clearer. I'll post a few so you know I'm not making this up, but long story short, this room just felt like an afterthought. One day I'll make it to the big leagues and get the robes and butler and balcony....but in the meantime, it doesn't feel very good to hand over your hard earned money and then feel like you got the bottom of the barrel. As I said before, we've sailed in very similar rooms on other ships and did not have this problem. I know (again) that the NCL purists will jump in and say "oh get over a few hairs and some stains"....but really, if this were YOUR room for the week, would you think it was great? Probably not. And, yes, it could've been worse. I get that and we slept well, got showered and changed in our rooms with no issue, so overall, it was ok. Here are some of the pictures:

I think you get the point! Our room attendant was good, not great. He smiled and said hello when we saw him, but that was about it. My sister's attendant was extremely nice and always went out of her way to say hello to the girls and ask how their day went. Most of the rooms attendants in the hallways were very pleasant and friendly.

My parents had a balcony. Balconies are definitely lovely! It was fun to go in and watch the world go by and we especially loved it in the ports, to watch people getting back on the ship. Another downside for all of us non-smokers, was that you can smoke on the balconies still and most of the time you were smelling smoke from someone else. Again, that doesn't bother some people and some are smokers themselves and love that as a perk....but it wasn't our cup of tea, as they say.

And PS:

I'm sure I'll clarify this more at the end of my review....but we had a great vacation! I don't want people thinking that we hated everything. The things that weren't my style on NCL did not ruin our trip or make things "terrible". The ports were awesome, the company divine and we made the best of what we didn't love. What can be so terrible about sunshine, sand and the open sea? That being said...more to come next time!

We finally got up to where the tubes were waiting for us. This is another reason that this company was great. Most other companies had their customers carry the tubes with them for the whole 40 minute trek. That would've been rough. Thankfully, this company has them waiting for you at the beginning of your tubing. Also, other companies only go through one main cave. We walked up a bit higher on the trail and got to go through and extra cave. A nice perk!

My daughter was too young to do this through the ship for some reason, but I had researched this ahead of time and knew that she was plenty big (and a full swimmer on top of having a life jacket) to do the excursion. However, we had a choice of having her in her own tube or her sitting on my lap. We had her sit on my lap. I know she would've been sliding down in the hole during the float and it would be hard to help fix her. I'm glad she sat on my lap, even though it was a bit harder for me!

Sadly, I don't have any pictures of the actual tubing. I had my iPhone to take pictures, which is in a waterproof case and in a baggie. However, when we got to the tubing part, I realized that trying to hold on to my DD AND the phone was going to be a challenge. I chose to hold on to my kid. :) Plus, one slip or one elbow from her and the iPhone would've been at the bottom of the river as an offering to the Mayan gods. I can tell you though that it was very cool to float through the caves, hear the stories about how the Mayans used the caves and see the stalactites and stalagmites.

Once finished our tubing, we changed at the bathrooms (there was a little "village" at the end with crafts, pig tails and other vendors for lunch and bathrooms) and got back in the van for the short ride to their lunch site. It's a road side stand where we paid for our trip. It also had a little gift area, but it was mostly big picnic tables. They served us a seriously yummy lunch of stewed chicken on the bone, coleslaw and rice and beans.

Thankfully the ride back was better than the ride there. They served a wonderful rum punch with lunch. I only had one glass but they packed a gallon of it for people to drink on the way home. It was fun to see the rum punch take its hold on the other people...so maybe the ride back was better because there was more chatting, or we were all just tired, or he drove slower? In any event, we got back safely and again, with plenty of time for the tender and smiled at what a wonderful time we had.

Well folks, I have to end it there for now. I'm a bit cross eyed right now, and the natives are getting restless. We are set to get a FOOT OF SNOW today. UGH! I am so thankful for our time away, but boy do I hate cold and snow. These pictures are helping to warm me up! Feel free to ask any questions and hopefully I can finish some more of the review tonight or tomorrow.

The shows were very well done and overall they were enjoyable. The Tim Kaminski shows were very funny, as were the Second City shows. They weren't top caliper, but for a cruise ship, we really liked them. I didn't see many of the other shows because we were always stuck at dinner. We did see part of the Bollywood show, and although it was well done....we all thought it was quite odd that none of the leads were Indian! My Mom, sister and I did the Murder Mystery luncheon on the last sea day. It was $20 a person and it was okay. It wasn't really the best murder mystery, but it was something nice to do together that day. The chicken they served for that meal was incredibly flavorful and moist...so yay for the chicken! :)

Our next port was Belize. I booked a tour independently through cavetubing.bz with Vitalino. It was another excellent adventure for the four of us that went. It cost a fraction of what they were charging for the ship tour and it included (a delicious!) lunch. We were picked up at the port gate by our driver and walked a short distance to our van.

The day was overcast and it was going to rain most of the day. I'm glad that it was on this day, because what better day to rain than the one where you go to the rain forest? Overall, I have an A++++ to this company and loved the tour. I'm not usually a worrier, I like being away from the crowds and I love planning excursions. However, one thing about this excursion that scared the $% our of me is that on the way there, they kidded around about how the speed limits were "suggestions", how there's no police to check speed etc. No problem. I've been in Jamaica and other countries where they drive like crazy people. I've been in cars that pass other cars on bends, go too fast etc. Live like the locals, right? Well, the ride there scared the bejeezus out of me! We were going seriously fast (my Dad estimated 85 at least) on a one lane each way road, in a light rain. I couldn't wait for that part to be over. The drive was an hour long and it was a long, long hour for this Mommy!

However, once we go there, it was all forgotten because we had an AMAZING time. First, we trekked about 35 minutes through the rain forest. The guides were amazing at showing us the flora and fauna of the area. If you do this trek, bring HEAVY soled shoes. The rocks they warn you about on the path are no joke. I rented water shoes from them and they were too thin soled. So you've been warned!

The craziest part of the hike was that they found a tarantula and got her out of her hole for people to hold. I HATE spiders. Hate them, so how in the world did I think it was a good idea for me to HOLD one?? I don't know...but it was a bucket list sort of thing. Of course, the moment they put it down on my arm....it started running up my arm! Eeek! Thankfully, he blocked it and then it just sat there. My big proud moment:

Dad's turn:

I seriously can't think of one thing to critique about Little French Key. It was really just that great. The workers there were super attentive but not intrusive and went well out of their way to help out. One of our little ones did not like the lunch, and they made sure to get us something for her since in our rush to get off the ship, we forgot to take some snacks with us. My sister and I got massages that were wonderful and inexpensive (especially compared to the ship!). My DD even made sand castles with the massage therapists daughter, even though they didn't speak the same language. A smile talks every time!

I thought the island was beautiful, but when the sun came out? Oh my goodness, it was heaven.

So, if you ever get a chance to go.....do it. You won't be disappointed!!

After all that happiness, we went back to the boat with time to spare and got ready for another night aboard. Our dinner wait was obnoxiously long again and we started to realize that anytime dining really wasn't....becuase we spent the rest of the trip having to coordinate how to "do" dinner. What time would we run to get a beeper? What time would be least crowded? Would that work with our schedule? Could we wait until 7:30 until dinner without the kids losing it? Should we feed them first but then have them wiggling at dinner? Should we wait in one spot or walk around? How much longer was it going to be? We really didn't want to do the buffet for dinner, since it seemed like we were missing out on a "nice" dinner. I won't say more about the dining, but again, that was really a very big reason that we didn't enjoy Freestyle Dining. I know many of you were fans, but it just didn't work for us.

I have to be honest. I found the ship to be pretty boring at night. I'm not a big drinker, I don't gamble, I have kids to keep track of.....but that being said, when my daughter was in the kids club, there just didn't seem like there was much to do. My sister and her husband felt the same way. A few nights we watched the early show and then went to dinner afterwards, so that took up our whole night until I had to pick up my daugther on the nights she went to SA. But on the nights that we really WANTED to do something, we just couldn't seem to find much that was good for us. Comparing the Dailies for each night...the activities were very repetitive. There were gambling tournaments, the one main show (which was VERY hard to fit in by the way with the long waits! We would wait so long that we were in dinner for the first show and it ran into the second dinner. That was disappointing.), piano and guitar players in lounges which wasn't really our style and karaoke. The late night stuff (after 10 which was usually one party of some sort) was out for us, since we had to put the kids to bed. Again, I'm not saying there wasn't anything to do or that it was terrible...but there was never a sense of "yay! let's go do that!" for the grown ups at night, and we had that on other cruises. Maybe it was due to the lower key clientele at night, but there just wasn't much nightlife for people our age.

Even activities on sea days were odd. The chess and checker pieces for the large playing board and the golf equipment for the small driving range were locked up for hours and only had certain hours they were out. Why not leave them out all day? Shuffleboard was often locked up. On most ships that is practically a 24/7 activity. And in the library you could only check out books for 2 one hour sessions each day!! So on sea days, you had to plan when you could get a book. That was incredibly odd and inconvenient. Again, horrible? Trip ruining? Awful? No. But it just made the ship feel sorta locked down on sea days, the days that most people are looking for something to do.

When they were out though, they were enjoyed by many:

Lunch was delicious!!! And it was also included in the price. It was a combo of chicken, shrimp, beef and a lobster tail....along with rice and beans, yucca chips and super delish salsa.

We walked over to another part of the island that had a beautiful palapa area and wooden boardwalks, surrounded by water. There were tables and soft lounging chairs and we enjoyed our delicious lunch there.

They give you a short tour when you arrive so you know what you can find on the island. We walked through their small zoo area and saw some very interesting animals, including monkeys and jaguars. We even got to hold the monkeys later on.

We were told that they're all rescue animals and they all seemed to be very well cared for and clean.

I know that you could add on snorkeling, but we didn't do that. However, we saw people snorkeling out at the reef and in by the dock and mangroves and they all seemed pleased with what they were able to see. There's a two story building, and you could even jump off the second floor into the ocean. It looked fun, but we didn't give it a try this time around!

We had a very relaxing day, just splashing around, kayaking (included) and eating. :) Two drinks were included with price of the trip, but the bar's prices were reasonable if you were having more than that. Try a Monkey Lala....they're similar to a mudslide but with a banana twist. They also had WiFi under the bar area, which was a nice perk.

Next up was trying out the Kids Club "Splash Academy". My daughter loves the kids club on every cruise we've been on. I am happy that she gets to do so many fun activities while we can read or explore the ship a bit. She was looking forward to the kids club SO, SO much and was going to be in the 3-5 aged club "Turtles" with her cousin who was 3. She was excited to spend time with her cousin there. Overall, our kids club experience was good. It wasn't great (Carnival) and it wasn't awesome (RCCL and Disney). And honestly, there was one incident that was really disturbing to me, but I'll get to that.

One very big reason that the kids program may not have been stellar (because again, I'd heard great things) was that there were only 40 kids on board. 40 on the whole ship!!!! They told me that they had 600 a few weeks ago over Christmas break! Yikes! So one problem is that there were only 7 children TOTAL in her age group, and that includes her and her cousin. With only 4 other children available to go, there were almost never any other children her age in the kids club. So the counselors were always combining groups. I get that it's hard to have a group for each age when it's slow, but honestly, I wasn't crazy about finding out that she spent hours with 8 to 12 year olds at times. Thankfully, she seemed to always enjoy it and that's what matters....but she definitely didn't love it the way she has loved other clubs on our other cruises. Here are some pictures of some of her Splash Academy Fun:

Unfortunately, her cousin did not like the club at all (and she goes to daycare/preschool every day and has since she was an baby) and never wanted to go. Our hopes of them having a great time together in there were dashed. Again, my daughter generally liked it and still asked to go every night. She went four of the nights and had fun. However there were two things that as a Mom, I found very unfavorable.

The first was that since there were always so few kids, I'd often ask how many children were there when we arrived, so my DD could decide if she wanted to go. There were almost never any children her age. Instead of saying "that's fine! We have so many fun things to do!" or anything to really make her feel excited about it, they always seemed to try to convince us to come later. And in fact, on the last sea day the woman even said "well there's only 11 year olds in there, so you can just come back tonight for our pajama party". Now, I understand that when there's so few kids, you can't do group games, things have to be altered a bit etc. However, if you can entertain 60 3-5 year olds on a sea day....don't you think you could pull out some crafts and books and entertain ONE? They seemed very disinterested in making the effort at times. And honestly, my daughter is so easy going and well behaved (and thankfully they told me that too!) and so excited about "school" type activities that could have done almost anything and she would have been happy to do it.

The worst though, and scariest in my opinion, is that one night I came to pick up my DD. I handed the woman my cards and gave her my password (which I THOUGHT was a nice security touch) and as I was doing that a little girl walked up to the gate. The woman working there was distracted but I heard her say "where's my Mommy?". I wanted to reassure the girl so I started saying that she would probably be there soon. Before I knew it, the woman opened the gate, the girl walked out in hallway and we were both standing there as the little girl walked out of the room. I thought maybe the counselor was going to take her somewhere, but she sat back down at the computer desk and started typing. After a moment, she looked at me like "why are you still here?" and I told her I was waiting for my daughter! I realized in that minute that she thought that girl WAS my daughter so I ran out of the room and found the girl ready to go down the stairs! The counselor got her and apologized and went to get my daughter, but OH MY GOODNESS, that did not instill confidence in me! I can't even imagine what would've happened if the girl was quicker etc. Again, I know that things happen and mistakes are made but that seemed like a fairly big one when you're talking about a child's safety.

On to something more fun! The day was our stop in Roatan. I booked us a private excursion to Little French Key and it was AMAZING!!!! It was probably our very favorite excursion of the whole trip. We met their representative outside the gates and they loaded us into a van to get to Frenchy's 44 restaurant where we took a small boat to the island. It was simply paradise.

Our weather wasn't the best. It was partly cloudy and drizzled a bit, but we got some sun in too and even the weather couldn't detract from our awesome day. It cost us a fraction of the cruise excursions and was a million times better. No crowds, great location, great price. I very highly recommend it!! The pictures can speak for themselves, but there was very little that I would change about this day.

The one huge pet peeve I had though, was that there was nobody there, ever, from NCL to enforce the rules. The biggest rule was that there should be no non-potty-trained children in the pool. I'm not an over worrier when it comes to germs...but seriously, poop (or traces thereof) in the pool can cause some wicked stomach issues. That is not what I want for vacation! There were many, many parents who brought in infants, toddler and young ones into the pool. Some at least had on swim diapers, but there were a few small babies that had on regular diapers under the suits. ICK. Now I've seen people bring little ones into pools on other cruise lines, but the difference is that there is usually somewhere there to enforce the rule and tell them to go out. (And yes, on many lines that is still somewhat lax, but on here it was non-existant.) In fact, the assistant captain seemed to be onboard with him family and HE brought his baby into the pool! Oh well. Thankfully nobody got sick and hopefully they chlorinate the pool well.

Later, we were ready for our first night of "Freestyle Dining". We were excited about this because we thought it would be really nice to just show up when we were ready to eat, and not to have to follow a schedule of a time to be there. It sounds awesome. We heard great things about it. However, it was a DISASTER on this trip. On this first night, we had no idea what we were in for. We got to the Venetian stand, the area was MOBBED with people and chaotic as could be. It was around 6 pm, which we thought was on the earlier side and were handed a beeper and told to wait....for 60-75 minutes!! So we waited. And waited. And waited. At the 70 minute mark we checked in to be sure they didn't forget us. They didn't. But we still waited. We finally sat down after an hour and 25 minute wait. With 2 small children and 5 hungry adults, this was unpleasant to say the least. After being seated, we waited 20 minutes for the waiter to come with the menu. All in all, our dinner process lasted 3 and a half hours. We were reassured from the hostess before we were seated that "it's always like this the first two nights". Well, why?? If you know that it's this unpleasant (and it was....there were many upset people that night) and disorganized, then why not find a solution? However, we tried to reassure ourselves that if it's only on the first night or so, the rest of the week should be a breeze. I wish that was the case!

Every single night that we ate in the main dining rooms, except our last, we waited at least 40 minutes for a table. Every time. I think the consensus between us all is that this was hardly "Freestyle" and carefree. We tried to make reservations and were told that they were only for groups of 10 or more. Then they said they would consider it, because of the kids, but all of them were for 5 pm, which was just too early considering the time we got back to the ship from our ports. Overall, it was a stressful process each night and not how we wanted to spend time each evening. One night we got so tired of waiting, and the kids were hungry and cranky, that we ate at the Blue Lagoon. Another night, we tried La Cucina.

Now here's where I know people will say "well, WE never had that happen on NCL". And you know what? I believe that. If it were THIS bad every single cruise on every single ship, nobody would sail NCL! So was it a fluke? Again? Perhaps. We thought that maybe since the crowd was a bit older, they maybe didn't splurge as much for specialty restaurants and therefore, the crowd never spread out among restaurants and caused backups in the main dining room. Every single specialty restaurant (except the Teppanyaki one because it's so small) was "all green" (free spaces) for every time slot for every night. So clearly, people were not using the specialty restaurants.

But I think this became a recurring theme throughout the week....was it always like this? Was it just random bad luck that we faced some of the issues we did? Who knows. But the dining wait was seriously something that made most of us say we'd rather do set dining on another boat than wait that long every night for dinner. Perhaps if we didn't have children with us, and we could wander more leisurely, or have some drinks in a bar, then the wait would seem better. But for our family, it was really just a very unpleasant part of each day.

However, I will say that the food in the restaurants was very, very good and we fully enjoyed our meals. The Dawn's food in the main dining room was FAR better than Carnival (as most of us would expect) and it was on-par if not exceeded Disney and RCCL in our opinion. We preferred Aqua over the Venetian. It seemed more restaurant-y and not so much cruise ship dining room. They never seemed to have any unique dining choices like on some other ships (escargot, quail, buffalo, ostrich etc) but what we did have was always yummy.

The Blue Lagoon was a favorite quick stop for the wings. My daughter loves hot wings and would've eaten them for every meal, given the opportunity. We got them on two days for lunch (to go! Just ask and they'll serve them on a plate with a lid!) and as an appetizer one day when we ate our full dinner there. They had a nice assortment of comfort food and a great view to boot.

The staff in general on the boat was excellent. They were pleasant, friendly and always made an effort to smile at the kids or interact with them. I always feel a bit bad to know they're all away from their own families (and that they don't get paid enough!) but we were very pleased with the crew in general.

Our next day was a sea day. We were surprised that there were so many empty chairs by the pool for a sea day, in the morning. Again, maybe it was the crowd, but at least it seemed pleasant enough. We whiled away the hours at the kids pool (we never made it into the "regular" pool!). We had lunch by Topsiders bar where they barbeque every afternoon. We had some very tasty grilled beef to make gyros with tatziki sauce.

Hi All!

I want to start my review by saying Thank You to all the fabulous Cruise Critic readers and writers out there who write reviews, give advice and help make everyone's trips even better by helping us be prepared. I love reading the reviews of others, and I get so much information and so many tips. I read a lot about the Dawn before I left and was thankful for the things I learned about the ship before we got there. I will try to finish the review as soon as possible, but with snow days (yuck!) and kids at home, I may have to do it little by little!

This trip was an extended family trip. My parents went (60's) as well as my sister, her husband (30's) and their daughter (3). My youngest daughter (5) went with me....and my poor husband and other two kids stayed at home and missed out on the fun this time!

My brother in law was supposed to run in the Disney Marathon, but wasn't able to due to an injury. We spent one day in Disney before our cruise and then headed to Tampa. We've gone on Royal Caribbean's Freedom of the Seas the past few years after his marathon, but chose NCL and the Dawn this time to change things up and see some new ports. We were excited to try something new and were looking forward to some of the things that make NCL unique.

I know that posting reviews are important. I like finding out ALL that I can before a cruise and these reviews are such a huge part of that. I like to think that I represent "the common cruiser" in that most of our cruises have to have budget in mind (we have three kids and normally it's five of us, so expense is something we always have to factor in) and we usually wind up with inside cabins since we aren't in the rooms much and save the savings for excursions. Kids activities are important to us as well. So with that in mind, I feel like I'm writing this review for that demographic of families/budget minded cruisers.

Why do I feel the need to explain that? Well, because to be honest, our trip wasn't really our best. I know how passionate people are about "their" cruise line. I know this is posted on the NCL forum. I am not trying to stir the pot, or say "EVERYTHING was terrible" (don't you hate those people? It's sun! It's sand! It's a drink in our hands!). However, based on other cruise lines we've been on (RCCL, Disney, Carnival and Princess), we just didn't love this cruise. There was good. There was bad. There was awful. But what I DO promise, is to write as objective as a review I can....because THAT is helpful. If you are a "Suite Life" cruiser, or a Haven cruiser, or a beautiful balcony with butler cruiser....then you probably won't be able to relate to my review. I have SEEN those rooms from the hallway and I drool!!

That being said, here goes!

I worried about the embarkation process in Tampa since the Dawn had so many issues with that as of late. Thankfully, we got to the port around before noon and were on the boat very quickly. There was a small stand outside the building where they were selling cases of water for (I think!) $5. The money went to the Kiwanis club or a charity....but my parents bought a case and it was well worth it! That's just a quick tip in case you don't want to lug a case of water TO the port with you. You can get one there!

One thing we noticed as soon as we got on line to check in is that the demographic was VERY, VERY much to the older side. We didn't see ONE other child until later that night on the boat. There were no children, I didn't see anyone in their twenties and my sister and I (30's and 40) looked like the young uns on the boat. I know the kids are back in school and it's right after the holidays, but we cruise this week every year and we have never seen such such an older demographic. Perhaps it was a fluke, perhaps there had been an AARP special or something, but it was just odd. It wasn't a bad thing, but it definitely changed the feeling of the boat overall. The plus side is that there were lots of people to ooh and ahh over our little ones. We were checked in quickly and on the gangway in no time.

The embarkation area was festive with balloons and the ever-lively workers giving friendly "welcome"s to all. We stopped for a quick bite to eat at the buffet. Our girls LOVED the little "Kids Cafe" area where everything is child sized. We had to stop there many times throughout the week!

Afterwards, we were excited to check out the T-Rex Kids Pool. I will have to say that this was one of the very best parts, for us, on the Dawn. The slides and pools were PERFECT for our 3 and 5 year olds and they had a blast there. They would stay for hours if we let them (and on the sea days, we WERE there for hours!) and they were very enjoyable overall. I know many people ask about this pool beforehand, so hopefully these pictures help you see the layout of the area.

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We did the catamaran Celine twice and LOVED it both times!! Highly recommended!

Chuck, I agree and in hindsight I wouldn't have wasted that time. I'm very middle class as well and BECAUSE of that, I had a hard time knowing that I just lost all those clothes and was hoping they would help in some way. It appeared throughout a large part of the conversation that they could do depending on circumstances. Lesson learned. No more boat laundry. And hopefully a few more people now know it's not worth the risk too.

Dalgirl, I didn't wait until the last night to deal with this. The clothing is returned on the last sea day and by the time they were rewahed, it happened to be the last night of the cruise.

It definitely wasn't sunblock. If it was it would've been on spots that come into contact regularly w it, like necklines, arm holes etc. These were random splotches in random areas. And as I said before, I checked everything before I sent if in because I knew they wouldn't pretreat for stains.

Again, I'm logical and reasonable and understand that things happen. I certainly didnt go stain things to get free money or waste time for fun. :). I honestly wrote this to just let people know what would happen IF they ruin your clothes. I understand all the people who say it has never happened to them, or they only send in what they can bear to part with. However, if you're doing a B2B cruise and fill a whole bag with your clothes that you need for the second leg, will you REALLY be happy to lose all those clothes (or even half!) and not be able to get replacements? Probably not!

Thank you for the suggestion about the Goop. I will have to try that!

Another thing that really bothered me is that they refused to show me ANYTHING, anywhere that stated what their policy is regarding damaged laundry items. If a "policy is a policy", then I believe that it should be stated somewhere specifically. It wasn't. Someone mentioned it's in the cruise contract, I didn't see it, but even if it's in there, they never even used that to show me that they weren't liable in any way. The supervisor was extremely rude and just kept telling me "that's for our private records, it's not information for you to see". People may differ on what they find good customer service....but for me, that is NOT it.

garycarla - I would normally agree with you. A policy is a policy. However they never showed me anything that stated their actual policy.

Secondly, and most importantly....the desk agent herself is the one that perpetuated the illusion that they were going to try and work on something. It was never stated, this is all we do, period. The first hour was her "checking" on all other solutions. If they had a cut and dry response to every single issue, then that was not clear until the second hour of ridiculousness, when they claimed it was all they were willing to do for me.

Lol, SeaShark. Now that you mention it...they did look kinda oily. :)

Thank you to all of you who have replied, especially those with tips on how to get the stains. I think it is probably too late, but at least I have some ideas for other times!

I want to just clarify a few things. They did offer to rewash the clothing, and I did allow them to do so. This was before all of what happened in my original post. When the woman first looked at the stains, she agreed that they all looked to be of the same nature and that it "definitely looked like it happened in the laundry room, since they are all the same type of stain". She asked me to come back later in the night after they were rewashed. I came back, the stains were still there, and that's when the conversation happened that I wrote about originally.

I have also had laundry done on other cruise lines, and have had no problems. I know this is a fluke....but when it's this many items, and they were not stained by us, then I would think there should be a better response available.

I never "demanded cash" as one person wrote. I was very reasonable overall and a number of other solutions were offered, as I wrote previously. I understand they may not just dole out cash for every problem. But to offer so little, for something that was clearly their fault and cost ME money, was NOT good customer service in my opinion.

The desk attendant first said they could give me the $50 OBC. When I said that was unfair, we started discussing how much the items were worth. She wanted to know where I got them, how much each one was worth and gave a very strong impression that they were trying to remedy the situation. She asked me how much it was all worth and said "Let me ask my SUPERVISOR about that" and went in the back room. She came out and said that they could not give me the $150.

Then she asked "what would be an amount that you would feel was fair, that would make you happy?" after we had been discussing this for awhile. I said that I thought it was fair to get the two Life Is Good tees replaced and the 2 Disney tees replaced. I said that $75 seemed fair. (Don't forget, there were many other pieces ruined too that I didn't even ask anything for...) Why would she ask me this if they can't do anything?!? She said "Would 70 be ok?" (Like it was "Let's Make a Deal"!) I said yes. And she again, said that she had to go check.

Why in the world did they play these games if they were going to just say it was $50 OBC or nothing? She came back out and said that her SUPERVISOR said that she wouldn't do that. So I think that asking to see a supervisor after an hour and a half of this back and forth, cat and mouse game was not disrespectful at all. I didn't even know about speaking to the hotel manager or whomever else I could speak to...but thank you to the person that suggested that. I'll know now for the future.

The supervisor wanted me to sign a "Customer Discrepancy" form, which obviously means that what they're claiming, is different than what I'm claiming. That's why I knew that signing that and taking the credit will mean that I most likely will get nowhere with "corporate". She refused to write anything on there about how they agreed that the stains were caused by the ship's laundry. (They're no fools.) So this useless piece of paper states that I put clothes in to get laundered and that when I got them back they had stains. We all know that when I call, they will say there's no way for them or me to prove that the stains happened when they had the clothing. I will still try, but it was very, very obvious that she knew not to write down anything at all that would actually help me out. THAT is also not great customer service. They knew this happened in their laundry room and they knew they could do something to help my case when I went to someone higher up (since they said they could only do so much on board....I understand that). They basically just washed their hands of it and said too bad.

Finally, when I went to charge the picture in the morning on my sea card, everyone's cards were still activated. It was before 9 AM and everyone around me was using their cards to purchase pictures as well. So the cards were not cut off yet. So was it another "fluke" that mine was mysteriously deactivated before it should have been? I guess that's up to debate but to me it seemed like a pretty passive aggressive move.

I'm not someone that yells the customer is always right. I'm reasonable and I know that things happen. I understand this doesn't always happen. These were not delicate items, or dry cleaning items. They were t-shirts, overups, cotton pants and socks! (I didn't even put in our bathing suits because I was worried!) For those of you that always use it and haven't had problems, that's great. I never did either. I just wanted people to know that if they DO wind up having problems.....don't count on getting more than $50 credit. So before you put in clothes, if their value is more than that, I'd say don't do it.

electricron - Do you know where in the cruise contract it states that if they damage your clothing in the laundry, they are not responsible? I couldn't find that. Thanks!

I just got back today from our cruise on the Dawn. I will write a review within the next few days, but just wanted to put this out there for others, to help them with their planning. I'm normally very level headed, and I usually hate "rants"....but I really want to spare someone from the same issue that I had with NCL.

On one day of the cruise, they run a $25 promotion for laundry, for all you can fit in a bag. I thought "hey! Great idea! I can get some laundry done and go home with less to do!". What a mistake.

I put in 31 items of clothing. Of the 31 items 11 of them came back with an oily appearing stain on each of them, some of them in many areas. 1 coverup had a bleach stain. And one pair of socks was missing the other sock. The woman I first spoke to at customer relations said that she could see the stains were all similar and they were not food based etc.

After I received them back (this is on Saturday, we left the boat on Sunday), they still had the stains. They said there was nothing they could do for me. The clothing was worth $150, easily. And that's not over-inflated prices. Some were Life is Good shirts which are more costly, others Walmart, some Disney Store etc. But it was all around $150.

I was extremely pleasant and understanding with them. Yes, things happen. But I'd like to get clothes to replace the ruined ones. They offered me $50 on board credit......for $150 worth of clothing. Not cash, not a check, an board credit....the night before we get off the boat.

So, trying to save some time (over 45 minutes had already passed in this conversation and it was my last night on the boat), I asked if they would just replace the 4 most important items. Not all 12 things.....FOUR. They said they would not give me money for them.

I offered to find them online with them, and let them order replacements. They wouldn't do that.

I offered to accept less money than what they were worth, just to replace TWO of the ELEVEN items. (The Life is Good shirts). That would be $60 for $150 of ruined clothing. They wouldn't do that.

There was a cat and mouse game of "I'll see what I can do" for over an HOUR with the woman. Finally, I asked to speak to a supervisor and she told me there was none. Seriously?

Eventually, when she realized I wasn't going away, she finally "found" a supervisor, whose desk was right inside the door.

Annoyed, but wanting to resolve something and enjoy my night, I even said I'd take onboard credit (that I didn't need or want....but it was SOMETHING) for the price of the 4 worst ruined shirts. They wouldn't do that.

They said they'd fill out a report for me and I could call their customer service. The form basically said that I sent in the laundry and "claimed" they were stained when I got them back. So no accountability from them. So basically, I'd call them, they'd say there was nothing they could do since there's no proof that the laundry room stained them, and that would be it. As if I intentionally sent in stained garments and then wanted to have "fun" arguing about it on the last night of my cruise!

After over 2.5 hours of obnoxious run around, they said all they would do is give me $50 on board credit. Take it or leave it. My 5 year old daughter was sitting watching karaoke with my other family members for 2 hours while this went on. I could've gone down in the morning to argue some more, but I was exhausted and apparently getting nowhere.

So yay. They beat me down. I took the OBC. After some charges I had on my bill already I had $10 left. I went down in the morning to buy a picture. My card had been deactivated!!!!! So they gave me credit, and then cut off my way to spend it?! So I had to go back online in the morning to go through everything to get the picture.

In parting.....I strongly, strongly do not recommend sending out any items for laundering. Yes, mistakes happen. But companies with good customer service DO SOMETHING about it. I still can't believe that they're allowed to ruin the clothing and just say "too bad". Hopefully, this doesn't happen to most items sent out....but if it does, and they're yours.....I think you'll find yourself equally frustrated and disappointed.

Just to let the worriers know (I was one of them!), we are onboard the dawn already with no wait. So they did fix something!

Wow, thank you very much, everyone! That was definitely informative and brought up some things I never would have thought of. You definitely helped make my decisions easier. :) Thanks again!

Great review. Thank you! We leave on the 12th on the Dawn. :)

Thanks! I didn't realize it was an up-front fee. So, I may not get many replies now that this is a question-within-a-question.....but if you're buying a fairly inexpensive bottle of wine ($15) and then pay a $15 fee on top of that, wouldn't it just be easier to buy one of their bottles? Can anyone tell me what they prefer and why? Thanks!

Thank you for a great, honest review. We leave on the 12th and we're excited! I am not happy about our (probable) long wait to board, but at least we know about it ahead of time, so hopefully it won't be too bad of a shock. Thanks again!

This is our first NCL cruise, so I just had a quick question. I noticed in the FAQ section, that it says you're allowed to bring wine or other alcohol on board. It doesn't say that there's a limit to the number of bottles you can bring. Then it mentions that when you consume the alcohol in a dining room, public area or STATEROOM you will be charged a $15 corkage fee.

How in the world do they know when you're drinking it in your room? Is this like a fun sleuthing game where they check your bags, your garbage and your hidden spots while you're not there, to see what was there before and then after? :) Can someone clarify their policy for me?

Thank you!!