carohs

It's not, per se. We don't eat at the same time at home every day either. I was comparing to DCL who also has two specific seatings. If you had asked me prior to cruising what I thought would work best for us, it would have been anytime all the way. We enjoyed our time on NCL! But if I reflect back on our different experiences, between the two cruise lines, we found that we in fact did enjoy set dining, and late set dining at that (grumbling tummies notwithstanding, of which soft serve ice cream was found to be the best remedy), more than anytime. I can't quite explain why it worked better (for us) and other than experiencing it ourselves, I wouldn't really be able to understand it either.

I like anytime dining in theory, but being on the ship it didn't feel as "freestyle" as I had expected. For one, you never know who your wait staff is going to be. Some are comfortable making special requests but I am just not. Nor am I willing to wait for that server to become available or plan my dining time for when they're on shift. To me, that would defeat the purpose. The other thing I noticed is that I more often than not would plan dining around activities rather than when I felt hungry. Several times we felt we didn't have time for the MDR and went to the buffet instead. Other times we went to the MDR but would feel rushed to eat because service took longer than expected. We also had perfectly timed experiences. The point is that trying to plan dinner with evening activities didn't feel so "free" to me because I prefer to have a meal in the restaurant for dinner (especially with the kids and having the extra help with napkin, refills, didn't like their plate, etc). On DCL the evening activities are planned around the fixed dining times with the main activities repeated so those dining have a chance to attend at the 2nd showing or vice versa. When I didn't have to "plan" my dining time and I could simply show up, walk to what I know is my table, and there's already water and a bread basket for me, that felt a lot more relaxed to me than anytime dining. Of course, I know I'm on the NCL board and people's opinions here are generally different than this.

It's always over so soon and before you know it. Thanks for taking us with you on the Dream

I always look forward to cruising but we haven't been on a Disney ship in two years. Maybe I've been slightly let down by the other lines or something because I haven't been looking forward to this next one as much as I have in the past. Thanks for the review and the reminder of where DCL shines over other lines. We sail in under a month again, and it's helping to remember the little things that really do make a difference. PS DH is 6'3" and hasn't complained about the shower height. He either fits under fine or he's just that used to slouching for showers when we travel.

It's harder to do a live when you've got littles. I hope on this board every once in a while but it's mostly quiet. I'll be following along tho whenever you get a chance to update.

The ports are all near the airports except for maybe Kona. We rented at every port and also used GuideAlong

Have you taken a look at the seat map of your flight to get an idea of seats available? I've booked basic econ flights before and have been assigned seats together as long as I remember to check in at the earliest possible moment.

OMG NOOOO. So much head shaking. However does your wife/SO put up with you?

Adding that a vegetarian meal with protein is not a difficult ask. It should be a standard option on the menu everyday.

Wow. I had really been keeping my fingers crossed for any kind of redemption from NCL but sadly no. They appear to have made things 10 times worse trying, nee failing, to make anything right. I can completely understand why you have said good riddance to the Jewel. Really I don't know how you had the patience to wait an hour for anything I would have gotten fed up long before you did. You have a great attitude and it's been wonderful to follow along with you and your dad.

Yikes, yikes and more yikes! I have to say I'm really dismayed by the contrast in experiences between the two weeks. It seems again that NCL is great as long as everything goes as expected, but when it doesn't they just have such a poor response and inadequate resolutions.

Love these! Especially the one with the tongue sticking out. I hope you don't mind if I download it and use it to texts raspberries at people (ahem, DH) when they say something annoying. Thanks for doing another live; it's always a pleasure to follow along.

Spoiler alert: bag made it to the ship.

From what I remember I bought their so called messenger plan so I could communicate with my mother in law through the app. Immediately thereafter I started getting texts notifications and found I was able to freely communicate with other android users but not DH who has an iPhone. I had an S22 then and used the messenger app. I can't recall if pics went thru, but I don't think so tho. This was about two years ago on the Jewel, haven't tested again since.

It's really not. We rented from National and from the port to the car was all within a mile or two. Since we aimed to be off the ship shortly after docking, we found plenty of taxis readily available. Because the POA has the same schedule every week, there's also lots of Uber drivers too at that time. There's two ports that have an overnight. In Maui you can chance parking at the mall that has signs that say no overnight parking but many reports say they weren't ticketed. Or do a one day rental or park at a nearby ish hotel for $25. In Kauai we found plenty of street parking available. It's extra steps, but there isn't really any extra prep other than simply booking your reservation online. We did National because of being able to sign up for their club where you can skip the counter and go straight to the car. Other agencies have similar programs I think. Most days from getting off the ship to being on the road only took 30 minutes, even in Maui where it's a 10-15 min walk just to get to where you can catch an Uber. We're a young ish family so the extra steps was worth the time upfront to be able to detour, eat when we were hungry, stop or not stop at a rest area for bio breaks (without the tour crowds and lines to go with it), pull off the side of the road if we saw a fruit stand or to take a picture, leave a site quickly or spend more time there. We weren't rushed and did/saw exactly how much we wanted that day. When an excursion can cost from $100 - $200 per person, easily, times 4, the car rental starts to seem more appealing too.

As a family of 4, it was worth the hassle of renting a car and saving the cost of booking excursions. I also hate being on someone else's timeline, as it goes with groups of people. If it was just two of us, an excursion may make more sense, you just have to look at the description to make sure it includes transportation to and from the ship. The amount of time it took us to get into to the rental counter and on the road was barely more than the amount of time it usually takes to get to a group meeting point wait for everyone to arrive, check in, walk to bus, load up, etc. YMMV. For us, it didn't seem like a hassle but there is something to be said for having a tour bus right there as you get off the ship with a guide. Choices are great 👍

I booked a car at every port. We did road to Hana and a beach day in Maui. We saw VNP on the big island, them on Kona day drove to a coffee farm and the painted church. In Kauai we did book excursions, but directly with the operators. We used the rental so we didn't have to worry about Uber and took the chance to see Waimea canyon too.

We booked this fall for a 5N on the Magic too! Hope y'all have a wonderful cruise.

I'm soo not a planner either but I found I had a lot of fun just looking at the options and picking my favorite excursion at each island. The anticipation of going is half of what's great about a vacation. There's live trip reports if you look up POA on here too. Something I did is look through the NCL excursions and then price it out on Viator too. We used the GuideAlong app along with the rental car, but having a digital or live guide is recommended for sure.

We did it last October and had a great time. Weather was great, not too hot or cold. We did it as economically as we could, with an inside room and car rentals. I really don't know how much more or less we would have spent on land but we hit all the major stops and felt like we made the most out of the 7 days. The ship was okay and the food was mostly slightly less than okay but all edible. Service was standard, nothing really exceeded. It was so nice to only unpack once and not have to make a decision on which island to visit. We never missed the balcony since we spent so little time in the room. When we were in the ship we made the most out of the drink package and found ways to rest and relax. Much needed after being out and about all day. It was a really good balance. I don't know that I would say oh yeah it's so great everyone should do it, but we walked away happy with zero regrets. For us, it was for sure the right decision. We travel with kids, and an added bonus they got to spend time in the kids club rather than hang with mom and dad 100% of the time being dragged around sight seeing. They got to recharge their way and never complained while we were exploring. They still sometimes will say, "remember when?"

I like these options! I'm considering the airtag wrist bands for the kids. Some advertise as water proof, even. Are the medallions themselves water proof? Asking because inevitably the kids will forget to take off the wristbands before going swimming.

I encourage mine to order off the reg menu, app as entree or share with mom. It's never been a problem in the MDR, but I'd hesitate to pay for an extra specialty dining for them.

I'm of two thoughts. 1 - because of inflation, etc prices generally will go up so book as far out as possible, especially if you're specific on cabin choice. 2- FAS air promo is baked into the price, and the reason price drops close to sail date is they no longer include BOGO air with FAS. If you're not using NCL air, may be better to wait. Full disclosure, this is purely a hypothesis I have not tested nor gathered data on.

I disagree this is all OPs fault. How many times have I read on cruisecritic someone complain about their booking only to be advised over and over they should have used a TA. While I'm slightly OCD about knowing things like why one cabin is $20 more expensive than another (or whatever the price difference may be), it's not unreasonable for someone to rely on the expertise of a TA in guiding toward cabin selection. The thing is, life lesson to be learned, even field experts are human too and can lack knowledge or make mistakes. I heart cruisecritic for this, since a discussion like this allows for dissemination of information about things one may not have known to ask about.

Hi 👋 following along. I appreciate the kid updates too, since we cruise with our 10 and 8yo.