bobbycruiser

For me, it's my room card on a lanyard, my camera and a drink at all times:)

Devils Advocate here.....what if you go ashore, lose your passport/have it stolen, AND you are late to the ship? Then you are in a wooooorld of hurt I assume?

NCL doesnt really do anything at all. We boarded the Gem last year on St Patricks day and other than the few green shirts on passengers here and there, not much else.

I'm gonna keep my fingers crossed for good sea days, last year in March we had a few pretty rough days on the way down then sailed back into NY during a pretty significant storm. I just wanna be in a pool!!!

What about the age demographics on most of the ships, whats that like?

Literally different on every sailing. You could do the same ship on back to back cruises with the same exact itineraries and have 2 completely different experiences. I was on the Dawn a few years back and by 10pm, it was near impossible to find any good activity. The weekend cruises on the Sky are usually fun til the wee hours and like someone above me said, 1 nighters are almost always party ships!

I couldnt agree more....Some nights, all I wanna do is soak in the hot tub for a little while with a drink in hand.

If it is a ship I have not yet been on, I take a walking tour and try to get a feel for the layout as quickly as possible....although there are times that even after a week on board some ships, I still have no clue where the hell I am. Lol. And then, like most people, food and drinks!!!

How's the food? I know food is a very subjective thing, everyone has different tastes, but in your opinion, is it just OK, or very good. Our last cruise on Oasis I thought the food was pretty good, but nothing that blew me out of the water. CCL is by far the best food at sea that we've ever experienced.

 

Just wondering how NCL stacks up in this area. One thing of note that I'm excited about is the hand scooped ice cream in the buffet! Sounds awesome!!:)

For me, thsisvaries. The food was awesome on the Dawn and the Gem, but the Sky was lacking a little bit. I am not at alla foodie, I just love food in general though. There is always something that I can eat:)

I love the overall ambiance and quality of passengers. NCL is very "middle of the road" with everything. In my eyes, they do everything just as well or better than any other line, and they do it in a very unique manner. The sjhips are all modern and fun and the fun is never over the top, insanely drunk college kids style. Haha.......well, maybe the Sky on the weekend cruises;)

Carnival supposedly has the "fun ships" but I find NCL to be the most fun I have ever had on a cruise.

Pools are usually open til 9 or 10 i believe, Hot tubs sometimes open til 12. I have read some places that people say the hot tubs stay open 24 hours, but I have yet to see that.

That's the best part... This Photo was taken with my phone, A Windows Phone (Lumia Icon). Love what phones can do these days.

Get the hell out of here!! I think I should definitely be upgrading soon then. 17 days til I cruise. I just prefer my waterproof point and shoot for beach days.

So what is the rationale for extra tipping over what is applied? 15% is plenty and the extra good service is implied. Don't beat me up on this, just explain. Thx.

The rationale is that the server won't get exactly 15% of that. We pay 15% on the $64.00 a day. So anyone who drinks more than that value will technically not have paid enough to cover that 15% tip. I usually give extra tip to the bartenders and servers who I encounter multiple times if they are good. But technically, the tip is already included.

This picture makes me think that I REALLY need to invest in an SLR camera.

I love these photo reviews. And even more than that, I love that you still enjoyed your cruise even though everything wasn't perfect!

My favorite time is anywhere between January-December:D

Bingo!

Nice night for sailaway but pretty windy and cold!

Bon Voyage :D

 

 

~Robin

Every Day at Sea is a Great Day

Yea, I'm about 35 minutes from Manhattan and its windy and 27 degrees here. I hope anyone on deck has that UBP so they can get toasty!

Yea, she is backing out now. I hope I get an earlier departure in 19 days when I sail on her! Although leaving the harbor at night would be very photogenic.

If you were to pay for each package on its own, the beverage package would be HANDS DOWN the better deal. Now all you have to do is drink about 2 or 3 drinks a day to get your moneys worth.

On the Gem it was the second to last night last March. I won't miss the quality of the food, but I will miss the displays and getting there early enough to snag a few chocolate covered strawberries;)

To my knowledge, all NCL ships have a White Hot Party on every itinerary. Sometimes it is inside and sometimes it is outside (weather permitting). It is also typically on a night with a sea day the next day.

I did not know this. I was under the impression that the Gem would dock in Tortola on 2/24 when we stop there. It's already a short port stay so that tendering makes it even shorter. Semi disappointing.

We will be arriving in San Juan on the NCL Gem on Saturday February 21st. We have been to Old San Juan a few times but would like to try maybe jet skiing.....But here is the catch.....we don't dock until 3pm. Any suggestions, ideas, or any info at all would be very helpful.

You do NOT have time to do Disney, or Seaworld or Universal......They all require much more time that you will have. Orlando is about an hour away....and it takes about 30 mins. from parking to the actual parks! You need DAYS to do those parks!

 

You could go to the space center....or to a beach....

Agreed. I do Disney every year in September and have gone for about 9 straight years now and still feel like we miss out on some things. And with travel time, and time to get inside. Just never seemed like a great excursion idea out of Port Canaveral. Although that port does leave a lot to be desired in the way of excursion choices.

Is this a serious thread? You like tendering better than docking? So if given the chance you would prefer to tender at every port I would gather. I would think that you are definitely the exception rather than the rule.:D

Yes, it was a serious question. I genuinely love getting on the small tender and being that close to the ship and when coming back just being in awe of how big the ship really is.

My questions should have been this....."Assuming perfect weather conditions, and that the wait time was next to nothing for a tender, would people still prefer to dock rather than tender?"

Thank you to everyone who replied with their input. Sorry it took me awhile to reply we were having computer issues..

 

Soooo I'm guessing the Ship names and ports would have been helpful...DuH! LoL!

My husband and I will be celebrating our 15th wedding anniversary this year and wanted to do something exciting. What better way than to go on a new adventure...Right? Here goes...

 

The older ship we have been on already is the Carnival Liberty. She will be leaving out of Puerto Rico and visiting all new ports for us.. St. Thomas, Barbados, St. Lucia, St Kitts and St. Maaten . As a bonus, since we have never been to P.R. leaving from there will also be a new experience. That makes a total of 6 new places to visit. Now I'm all about an adventure but maybe I 'am biting off more than we can chew on this one.. After all it is a vacation and maybe jus maybe its to many ports and we will need a vacation from our vacation...hahah!

 

The NEW ship would be NCL Getaway going to ports we have visited several times.. Great Stirrup Cay:), Ocho Rios:), Grand Caymen:) and Cozumel:D ! With Cozumel being our most favorite place EVER!! We love it there.

 

NCL also has the all NEW Escape (Inaugural season) sailings as well. Going to ST. Thomas, Tortola and Nassau...and outta those ports the only one that excites me is ST. Thomas......Am I wrong on this?

 

I'am still up in the air on this one. My husband really doesn't care. His only input was that he really don't care to go to Nassau. What a big help right! Gahh!

 

Any info or past experiences at ports would be greatly appreciated!! Thanks in advance!!

With all that being said, I would probably go for the ports. The Mega ships are cool and extravagant and all, but that is a pretty awesome itinerary if you ask me.