JimCo

I read that a B4 family balcony sleeps 4 instead of 3 on a BA but does this mean that the room will be more crowded with an extra bed? Looks like the cabin sizes are the same. Any particular reason why people would prefer one over the other (other than the extra bedding)? 

Thank you. 

No I wouldn't waste a dining credit on JR either if it's a $10 flat fee but for some reason I want to say that I read or was told that JR is a la carte and not a flat fee on Liberty so that certainly makes a difference.

I apologize if this has already been answered on other threads but when I did a search all I could find was a ton of discussion on Johnny Rockets milkshakes and whether or not they are included in the drink packages or using the ultimate dining package at JR.

My question is how does it work when you use a 3-5 night dining package (not the Ultimate dining package) at Johnny Rockets specifically on Liberty?

The fine print says that you get a $35 food credit at a la carte venues which I've read is how Johnny Rockets on Liberty is currently operating. So does this mean that I can order $35 worth of food at JR in place of using one of my nights at Chops or Giovanni's?

Thank you.

I asked RCI about this and all they could tell me is that selection will be "limited" with the Deluxe drink package on day one out of Galveston due to Texas Alcohol Beverage Control law and could not provide any specific brands.

My friends drink Coors Light and I would like to find out what brands of vodka and whiskey/bourbon are available on day 1. I'm not too picky and I'm sure I'll find something to my liking no matter what but I was wondering if anyone could give me specific beers and spirits that were offered on day one of your Liberty cruise out of Galveston.

Thanks!

I just got my cabin assigned to me and the cruise is about 90 days out.

I'm extremely thrilled with my cabin assignment and location so I'm wondering if cabins ever get changed once assigned or if I can relax knowing that this is the cabin assignment that I will keep for the cruise.

Thanks.

Hi JIMco,

 

Thanks for the review. Were the FOD meeting well attended? Also did they have any specials in the Star bar.

Shamefully, we only caught one FOD meeting and that's only because we just happened to be in the Star Bar at the same time they held their meeting.

Not only were we a big group of 9, it was a mixed straight and gay group so FOD meetings weren't exactly on our agenda.

We did see a couple of guys in that group walking around in Costa Maya as well.

There was also a big lesbian group in the Star Bar one night along with maybe two men having some type of meeting. Different than the FOD people I saw.

One of them even brought a baby in a stroller into the bar which I found a little odd but no big deal I guess.

No drink specials at the Star Bar but I never asked either since I had the drink package. That bartender could make a mean martini though!!

This was my first NCL cruise so I only have CCL experiences to compare it to. It was also my first time cruising out of New Orleans.

We stayed overnight before the cruise at the Marriott by Harrah’s and I highly recommend it. Excellent service and excellent buffet breakfast in their restaurant (around $20 – great price for the quality food). Don’t remember exactly how close to the terminal it was (couple of blocks?) but we all easily walked to the terminal with our bags on wheels. No taxi needed.

Both embarkation and disembarkation seemed much faster and smoother than I remember on my CCL cruises out of Galveston. My cruise mates who routinely cruise out of NOLA said that this was the norm for the NOLA terminal. We did self-assist getting off the ship and one thing I noticed different on NCL was that the atrium bar was open and people were drinking bloody marys and mimosas even on disembarkation morning. On CCL I remember sitting on Lido deck waiting to get off and although you got breakfast that morning, the bar and registers were closed and passengers just sat and sat waiting to get off the ship. But no drinks for me anyway as I had a 6 hour road trip back to Galveston ahead of me.

I had a balcony room on deck 9 and my balcony looked a little smaller than what I had on CCL but it didn’t bother me in the least. Next to the bed was a chair that unfolded into a single bed if needed. On CCL it was a sofa wide enough to sit two people but there wouldn’t have been space in this room for that so I know the rooms are a little smaller. My room steward was ok but nothing above and beyond. I always tip $20 cash on arrival to establish a good relationship in addition to the pre-paid tips but he still was just ok at best. He was Filipino and with the recent events going on in the Philippines, I wondered if he wasn’t at his best because of that. Understood.

On a side note, I thought that the captain acknowledging the large number of Filipino staff onboard and having a fundraiser on the ship was a nice gesture. I can’t imagine having to continue to work with a smile and a good attitude not knowing if your loved ones back home are ok.

Another difference is on room service. On CCL I had smoked salmon, capers, and bagels delivered every morning. This was not an option on NCL. Only cereal and pastry type stuff for room service breakfast. No biggie as I adapted by going up to the buffet on 12 and getting it myself. To my surprise they also had pickled herring next to the salmon so I was in heaven every morning. The eggs benedict (another “cruise” item I always have to try) in the buffet was excellent as well. The bacon was plentiful with no one there to monitor how much you took like on CCL. I never ate in the dining rooms for breakfast.

The dining options are probably the biggest reason NCL won me over. I’d be more than happy to take a CCL cruise again in the future but they just can’t beat NCL’s restaurant options and their “no need to dress up” policy. Even in Le Bistro (French) or Tsar’s (more formal back dining room) a collared shirt and pants of any kind (khaki or jeans) will do for a guy.

Dinner options:

Buffet on deck 12: Yes with all our available options we shamefully did this one night because we were tired and lazy. But you know what? It was actually really good and I’d do it again!! They even have Indian food and I could smell the curry. Never tried it but it looked good.

Moderno Churrascaria: Brazilian steakhouse $25 upcharge and worth every penny. They keep slicing different kinds of meat for you to try all throughout dinner.

Cagney’s steak house: I had a filet mignon and it was every bit as incredible as you’d expect at a nice steakhouse. $30 upcharge and you can order as many sides as you want. Don’t get the “Au Gratin” side though. It has nothing to do with Au Gratin potatoes and was bland and dry. The chicken wings for an appetizer were my favorite appetizer. Service was a bit slow but I’m on vacation and in no hurry. This would have been my favorite restaurant by far except Le Bistro beat it out with their service.

Le Bistro: French restaurant and was by far my favorite. Ask for Pelagia!! Best server ever!! We all wrote comment cards on her and mentioned her in our feedback reviews to NCL. She kept bringing things for us to try that we didn’t even order so that we could experience it all. I got a filet mignon here as well and it was as good as Cagney’s. $20 upcharge. Don’t eat here the first night because you will want to eat here every night and won’t experience the other places. Believe it or not, the best menu item was the chicken. Chicken of all things!! I can’t remember what it’s called but it’s chicken with some brown sauce. Be sure to order one for the table for everyone to try. The following day at 11:00 (last sea day) Le Bistro is open for “Jazz Brunch.” She invited us to join her again for brunch so she waited on us again and did not disappoint. Excellent buffet style and you can order menu items. We ordered steaks again and brunch was only a $15 upcharge! Great price for what you get.

Tip: Definitely make reservations for Jazz brunch. We got there right before 11:00 when they opened and there was already a long line to get in. There were 9 of us and we got in right away because we had reservations. Many dirty looks from other passengers as all 9 of us passed them up in line. Someone in my group even witnessed a man giving false cabin numbers trying to steal someone else’s reservation!! The person whose cabin number he was trying to claim as his to get a table heard him talking to the hostess and called him out on it!! Good for her. People are so ruthless.

Mama’s Italian Kitchen: My least favorite but not horrible. Despite the multiple CC bad reviews on this place I had to try it myself. Calamari was good. Pizza and lobster fettuccini not so much. It’s a shame because the place itself is cute and cozy. $15 upcharge and as others have pointed out, for $5 more you could go to Le Bistro.

Teppanyaki: Hibachi grill type restaurant. This was a pleasant surprise for me. I went reluctantly because others in my group wanted to eat here on our last night together. My attitude was that there’s a Benihana in every city so why bother eating here? And I do not enjoy having someone throw food at me to catch in my mouth as if I were a trained seal at SeaWorld. I know it’s fun for kids but we were an all adult group. Having said that, I walked away really enjoying my experience and would eat here again on another cruise. Yes it is like a Benihana but I thought the quality was excellent, our chef very talented and entertaining, and my favorite was actually the disgusting looking green tea cake and ice cream. Yes it is green on green but wonderful!! And I’m not much of a dessert eater normally.

Chin Chin: Your typical Asian fare. I did not eat here (too many options) but some in my group did and they loved it. They liked the a la carte sushi as well.

Azura: Regular main dining room. Did not eat here either but others in my party did and gave it good reviews.

Tsar’s: Back dining room. Russian themed place, not an actual Russian restaurant as someone tried to tell me earlier. We ate here the first night of the cruise because Azura was too busy and backed up.

Tip: Even though this is the more formal dining room, the hostess at Azura told us to go there because it’s the same menu and people either forget or don’t realize it’s there in the back of the ship the first night. Or they don’t want to “dress up” but you don’t have to dress up on the first night so even shorts were ok that night. Azura was crazy and crowded but when we walked over to Tsar’s it was quiet and calm with plenty of tables.

I ordered the surf and turf and the lobster was incredible. The steak was an insult being served on the same plate as that wonderful lobster. The steak was tough and leathery (and I order my steaks bleu rare, not cooked to shoe leather) and it was still bad. Had this been a “pay upcharge” place, I would have sent it back it was so bad. But since it was dining room fare included in the cruise, just enjoying the lobster was fine. The service was wonderful and I got too full to finish so the waiter offered to bring my dessert and leftover lobster to my room!! I felt lazy and tacky doing this so I initially declined his offer and said I could carry it to my room myself but he kept insisting. So I let him do it and tipped him cash upon his arrival. It was a nice gesture.

Room Service: We ordered some late night room service a couple of times and it was good as well .The $5 pizza is fine if your expectations aren’t too high. It’s just plain ole pepperoni, veggie, or cheese. That’s it. Don’t try to compare it to your local neighborhood Sal’s or Gino’s around the corner. It won’t taste like that.

As you can see, it’s impossible to experience every dining option on a 7 day cruise even if you did something different every night never revisiting anywhere.

The Ports:

Cozumel: Mr. Sancho’s again. I was the only one in my group who has done this before and I sold it on the others. They all loved it. It’s different now than last time I was there. They now have a buffet in addition to menu items but it was still great as always. Still only $45 for all-inclusive (same price as in 2009 last time I went). Best bargain in Cozumel for all-inclusive in my opinion. Cozumel was also the only port that didn’t get rain.

Belize: Rain rain rain. We were booked for cave tubing and zip lining but cave tubing was canceled due to the rain and high water levels. The zip lining was great and I was actually happy about the rainy and overcast weather because it was nice and cool for zip lining.

Roatan, Honduras: My partner wasn’t feeling well so we opted out of the scheduled excursion which was Little French Key. The others in my group claimed it was the best excursion of all and raved about it. There were monkeys and tropical birds and they said the food was incredible and even included lobster. We took a cab later that day when he was feeling better to the restaurant part of it and had conch. It was very good. But we didn’t take the ferry over to the Little French Key island like they did.

Costa Maya: Another rainy day and we just walked around the port and shopped. This was port #4 in a row so we were pretty exhausted by this time to do much else.

The much debated about “Ultimate Beverage Package”

After reading page after page of opinions about the UBP, I can finally add my own comments about my experience with it.

I read everything I could about it because I couldn’t decide whether or not to get it. I’m one of the “drunks” that gets referred to here and my partner is not and I would have to buy it for both of us.

I’ve read and enjoyed everything from “It’s a great deal” to “We probably just broke even” to “You’d have to drink like 7 drinks a day and what kind of a person drinks that much” and so forth.

I can see it on both sides because my partner could never drink 7 drinks a day on all 7 days of a cruise but I most certainly can without question.

There seemed to be other people in this situation where two shared a cabin but only one of the two would get their money’s worth out of the UBP.

I bit the bullet and decided to purchase it and I would do it again. The reason being that by purchasing it for my partner as well, if he wanted to try those drinks of the day and those fancy colored cocktails, he could do so without feeling like he wasted money if he didn’t like them. If he didn’t like a particular drink, he could just order a different one. Some of those tropical drinks might look pretty but don’t taste as good as they look.

Otherwise, it was a beer or bloody mary here and there for him.

The freedom to order what we wanted when we wanted without wondering about running up the bill made the UBP worth it to me. I think it more than enhanced his vacation by being able to order freely without worrying about the cost even though he’s a light drinker at best. (I’m also sure that I drank some of his “7 drinks” in addition to mine a few days LOL).

The other 7 in my group all purchased the UBP and claimed that it was without a doubt worth it and that they more than broke even.

Yes it’s true that the “rules” are not consistent from bartender to bartender but I did get to purchase martinis with it (real ones with Bombay, not frilly Cosmo type drinks with fruit juice served in a martini glass and called a “martini”).

Only one bartender in the Spinnaker Lounge was a stickler with refusing to make you another drink until you’ve completely finished your current one and all the other “rules”. We rarely visited him.

On the alcohol list I received directly from NCL, Grey Goose was considered to be super premium and not part of the package. On the ship, however, every bar was including it on the UBP.

My favorite bar was Star bar right across from Cagney’s. Small, quiet, and intimate. Of course if all 9 of us were there it wasn’t so quiet. Kendampully was the bartender there every night we were there and he was excellent. He made the best martinis.

The other bartender to look for is Amalia. Sometimes she works in the Atrium and sometimes the bar all the way in the back of the ship at Great Outdoors. Excellent service and fun to visit with.

One suggestion I would make to NCL is to have a separate line for people who purchased it ahead of time. They kept trying to give their whole speech about all the rules to those of us who already purchased it ahead of time and already heard the whole spiel from our travel agents when we bought it. They could save a lot of time doing it this way.

The other issue is that it’s really not fair to people who already purchased in advance to have to stand in line behind people who hmm and ha about it asking 100 questions because this was their first time hearing about it.

I also want to mention is that this was the most child free cruise I’ve ever been on. I saw kids maybe 3 times the entire cruise. I always cruise when kids are in school so I don’t know if it’s a difference in cruise line or what made this one different.

And lastly my public service announcement:

To people who travel in groups:

Please don’t hold the elevator doors open for everyone in your party yelling out their names because they wandered away and aren’t paying attention when the elevator arrives. If you all need to stay together, then your whole group needs to stay by the elevators and pay attention.

It’s rude to hold other people up and it contributes to the elevators being delayed. We traveled in a group of 9 and made sure to never do that to other people.

I see that often on every cruise I’ve ever been on.

Just returned from a fabulous time on the Jewel, b2b out of New Orleans. First off, I thought I had made it home with the dailies, but can't find them anywhere. So sorry! This was our first experience at freestyle cruising, and I am a convert. Absolutely loved it. Were there a few hiccups? Absolutely, but we rolled with them. We did have to wait for about half an hour at peak times in Azura, but no biggie. Grabbed a pager and our free bubbly coupons and off to the bar we went. The ship is showing her age, carpets were a little stained in places, some chipped paint here and there, but certainly nothing earth shattering. Embarkation was a breeze, arrived to the port about 10:45 and were on the ship before noon.

 

Entertainment was good, really enjoyed all of the live music around the ship. Food was hot when it should be hot. Previous reviews about the desserts were spot on, not great, other than in the specialty restaurants. Cabin service the first week was ok, nothing special, but nothing really wrong either. We did find out that it was the last week of his contract, so that probably explained things. Next week was better.

 

This is probably the most visible I've ever seen senior officers when on a ship. They were everywhere and very approachable.

 

 

 

I'll be happy to answer any questions.

I just got off the Jewel yesterday as well. Just haven't posted my review yet.

You are right, this was my first NCL cruise but I've never seen so many senior officers out and about on the ship on any Carnival cruise I'd been on.

This cruise also had the least number of children on a ship I'd ever encountered on previous cruises (Carnival) as well.

Was your wait getting into Azura during the first night? We tried to get in and were told to go to Tsar's (aft dining room) because it had the same menu. Absolutely no wait to get into Tsar's, no crowds.