Paraveina

If you did not do a loop the ship would have been in Nassau in time for a late dinner :D

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk - Jim

Why wouldn't they just go slowly instead? Doesn't looping waste diesel?

We went to the Kennedy Space Centre and I must say, it was far more impressive than I was expecting. It's almost like an amusement park and a museum had a baby. As recommended, we did the bus ride out around the VAB first, and then headed to the Atlantis experience, planning to go to the special IMAX showing afterwards. Our bus guide had told us to take the other door if we needed to save time in getting to the shuttle experience, but we forgot in our excitement. If you're tight on time, DON'T FORGET THIS. Go in through the gift shop instead of the main doors and you'll be on the bottom floor where the shuttle experience is, without having to stand through the movies upstairs. We looked at the time and decided we'd rather do the shuttle experience than see the IMAX film. Luckily though, we headed over to the IMAX building to wait and they hadn't started yet! Wendy Lawrence came in to talk to us before the movie started and she was great. Also, the tour guides and bus drivers understand us tourists all want to see the gators and helpfully pointed them out when we drove by them.

The morning we got to GSC I overhead another passenger tearing a strip off a crew member because she hadn't read any of the messages in the dailies about reserving a tender. I felt bad for the crew member because she really had no standing to be mad - it's clearly written into both Day 2 and Day 3 (page 2). We just waited awhile to head over to the island, although we didn't stay long. It's very nice, but I'm just not a fan of getting sunburnt. I totally understand why they sometimes have to skip this port now - it's the tender boats. On the way back the waves were quite large before we got to the sheltered side of the ship. Oh, there's a shuttle to take you to the lagoon. We didn't know about it on the way over, but we took it on the way back. Once you get off the tender boats, there's a path to the left that leads to the shuttle road.

When we got up on the Nassau morning, I looked at the Navigation Channel and it showed we had done a big loop in between GSC and getting to Nassau - does anyone know what that was about? I was woken by the shaking of the the ship as it stopped to do its spin in the harbour and let me tell you, GET UP TO SEE IT! It's amazing how the ship can spin on a dime. We were supposed to be there with three Carnival ships (Splendor, Magic and Pride) but one of the Disney ships showed up as well. We had planned to see what Senor Frogs was like that afternoon but it was a zoo with 5 ships in port. We started off the day with a taxi to Fort Fincastle, and walked to the Public Library (no pictures allowed, donation suggested), the Pirate Museum and straight past Senor Frogs after we heard the wait time. I lucked out in finding Vanilla Rum at the Tortuga Rum Cake shop (don't have it at home) and after a bit more souvenir shopping we headed back to the ship. The cold cloths they provide is a very nice touch, as is the required washy washy on the way onto the ship.

Side note: I love the washy washy team! Norwegian really seems to take cleanliness seriously and I felt much more at ease than I did on the Glory, because I always saw people stopping to use the sanitizer stations or the sinks.

I was at the Officer Q&A on Saturday and the Chief Engineer was supposed to be there, but he was not present. They did, however, talk about the 4 DGs (plus the emergency one), so 4 + 1.

I wonder what the problem was?

Also, did anyone else on this past sailing notice the loop we did between GSC and Nassau? I saw it on the Navigation channel the morning we got to Nassau.

The google drive link took me to my own page--good in that I did not know I had a page, but not in that I can't see what you are posting.

 

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OK, try this: https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B0SUO1ksQSonQmVsN3NESEdhUGc&usp=sharing

Thanks so much for all of the info!!

 

Can you get into the spa at the door by 14136? We're a few doors away and it would be great if we could get in and out of the spa there.

 

6 more days for me!!!

No, it is an unmarked door and it comes from the treatment rooms hallway. I thought it was silly too, that they don't have a special spa entrance for the spa cabins.

Are the bathrooms on the Breakaway equipped with grab bars near the toilets and in the showers (not just in accessible rooms)?

In my cabin (14114) the toilet was between the shower and the sink counter - no grab bars. The sink was the length of the wall though, so that might be some help. Or perhaps by opening the shower door you could grip onto the shower wall, although that would be an awkward angle.

I just got back from the Breakaway and I wanted to write a short review on my experience. I think the ship has already been extensively covered by many reviewers, so I'm not going into every single detail. However, one thing I will mention is that I'm a plus sized woman who's just on the edge of "fitting" into society. My hips fit into a size 24 in most brands, and measure 54" around. One thing I worried about before the cruise is how comfortable I'd be in various chairs around the ship, and if I know my fellow fluffy anxiety sufferers, I'm not alone! So I walked around 678 place, sitting in various chairs to gauge fit and comfort. The only places I encountered chairs that weren't comfortable for me was Cagney's and the theatre. In Cagneys, the chairs have a very low slung arm. If the arms had been higher, my hips would have been able to spread out to the sides a bit. As it as, the arms pinched my hips and thighs while I sat. It wasn't painful, but it was annoying. In the theatre, I had no discomfort, but was lacking in arm room. I used to be able to tuck my elbows in closer to my sides when I was smaller, but now when I sit my elbows stick out slightly. I ended up crossing my arms so as to keep them off the armrests entirely. Also, the arms are very short and I found my boyfriend would always want to rest his arm across the cupholder.

The spa has One Size Fits All robes. Sadly, the one I tried on at first fit my upper body fine, but gaped open about one inch at the front down around my hips. I went to the desk to ask if they had any plus size robes available and the attendant with red hair went to check for me. She came back and handed me another One Size Fits All robe - turns out they vary wildly in size and when they find bigger ones they try to keep them separate for this very occasional. She requested I keep it for the duration of the cruise and return it on the last day. I had intentions of doing so and kept it hanging in the closet. One day though, I left it lying on the couch and my room steward "helpfully" returned it to the laundry for me.

For people with accessibility concerns, I took a measuring tape with me so that I could measure the doorway and hall width. My cabin door (14114) measured 24" across and the hallway was 44" wide, but you lose 4" with the handrail, leaving you with 40". The room stewards have their cards in the hall for hours at a time also, which cuts the available space in half.

I had the Thai Poultice massage during my trip based on how good the ball felt during the spa tour. I mentioned the specific areas I have knots, but I don't feel like anything was changed based on that information. For example, I had a knot in my right foot that day, and a few through my right shoulder and neck. I'm almost positive she spent equal time on both sides of my body even though I had given her that information upfront. I felt about 5 knots release in succession in my right shoulder and she immediately moved on to my head. Perhaps that's normal, but when I get a massage at home they customize my treatment a bit more.

They definitely have a hard sales pitch at the end - don't go if you have insecurities you're worried about. I was in a good mood at the end of my massage, but after she told me I had varicose veins and she needed me to commit to using various products on them. I declined, and looked in a mirror later to see what she was talking about - I could see some veins on my upper thighs, but my skin is so pale I can see veins on my wrists and even across my chest. Regardless, the whole thing put a damper on my massage and I left feeling annoyed rather than relaxed.

On my way out I asked if I could exit on Deck 14 so I could check out where the "secret" door was. The one I came out was across from 14136.

I wasn't able to get pictures of the menus every day (I don't carry my camera everywhere) but I can confirm that on my sailing prime rib was served in O'Sheehan's and the buffet the first day and the second last day, and in the main dining rooms on the last day. Also, check the menus in both Taste/Savor and Manhattan before you decide where to eat, because a few days they had the same menu, but a few days they were different.

For dinner, we ate at O'Sheehans, Teppanyaki, Taste, Savor, Cagney's, Buffet, Savor, in that order. A tip for Cagney's: we went at 6:00 PM to watch sailaway from Nassau and were seated by the aft window. I'm 5'6" and the others in the party are 5'4", 6'2 and 6'3". The tall guys had no problems at all, but the other woman and I had our views blocked by a giant frame running the length of the window horizontally. If I stretched up and craned my head I could see, but sitting normally cut off the view entirely.

I think the best service we received was in Cagney's and Teppanyaki, but O'Sheehan's also had amazing service. The only place we really felt service was lacking was in Taste, where the wait staff didn't ask us if we wanted drinks and we had to ask for them ourselves when we noticed (after our appetizers arrived). Also, the assisstant was practically tossing the plates onto the table, enough that the placemats moved from the force. However, they were the exception to the rule, because we loved our waiter and assisstant waitress so much in Savor that we requested to sit in their section again when we returned the last night.

Here's the link to the dailies that I scanned: https://drive.google.com/?authuser=0#folders/0B0SUO1ksQSonQmVsN3NESEdhUGc

If I can think of anything else I'll write some more later on.

Yes, the menus please! Or at least the always available options :) Are the always available options the same or different in all three dining rooms? I had heard they were making the menus more different.

Are you planning on bringing home duty-free alcohol? Because you'd need a checked bag for that.

I'd like to point out those menus are numbered 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14. They probably only apply to that particular sailing, from what I've read on these boards.

No I haven't yet had the pleasure. I haven't seen much of Saint John since I was 3 (and a ton of things have changed since then ;)). On our cruise to the east coast, we grabbed a rental car and headed for Gagetown. So pretty well the most I seen lately of Saint John is the highway.

 

But as I said if you research your City bylaws you will probably find it covered in there, the same as Ottawa's is.

 

"workplace: means any enclosed area of a building or structure in which an employee works and includes washrooms, corridors, lounges, eating areas, reception areas, elevators, escalators, foyers, hallways, stairways, amenity, areas, lobbies, laundry rooms and parking garages utilized by an employee."

Yeah, so like I said - it's likely "technically" not allowed, but I doubt they'd ever try to enforce it.

Irregardless of smoking preference, I think this is curiously interesting! Based on some of the info here, why then does the casino close, or more specifically, not operate while in port?

By-laws prohibiting gambling and not wanting to comply with federal regulations about how much must be paid out (I'm iffy on the second part, a friend of mine who works in a casino tried to explain to me the rules on how much they're required to pay out and apparently cruises are notoriously lower than land based casinos, but a lot of it went over my head, to be honest).

Is that pedway system not owned by Saint John, if so there is your answer, it is an enclosed city public space. I'd have to bet that if you looked up your bylaws they have included that space in their write up.

 

Because technically it doesn't fall under the current ban for Canada or the ban for the province of N.B., so I'd bet the city has it somewhere in their paperwork.

Parts of it may be owned by the city, but other parts are owned by the private businesses the hallways run through (Brunswick Square, Market Square, etc.)

Have you ever been there? It's basically like walking through a closed mall.

Well, looking at Saint John NB Canada, there's a pedway system that connects several buildings together in the downtown area. Even when those businesses are closed, you can still walk through the hallways to move through the pedway system. Smoking is not allowed even though it is "closed".

I think you might have an argument to prohibit smoking in the closed casino while in port, but it would be a nightmare to police. Each city would have to enforce it separately, and each city would have to be contacted in the first place, they'd have to rely on self-reporting because they can't really go on the ship anyways, right? I don't think any city would consider policing it worth their while.

I haven't been on a Norwegian cruise yet, but I plan on mostly wearing jeans to the dining room. If the climate control is anything like it was on the Glory, it'll be too cold inside for shorts. But don't let anyone stop you from wearing anything allowed by the dress code - it's your vacation, be comfortable or dress to the nines as you wish!

Thank you for posting your review and especially for your experience at KSC. We booked that as well and it sounds like ti was a good idea. I am a nerd for history and science so I know I will be in heaven!

 

Thanks again for taking the time to share your vacation!

Me too! I'm currently reading Countdown: A History of Space Flight, because I apparently need to study for vacation.

The Space Center is a tough call - I really did not feel that we had enough time there, but still think it was certainly preferable to going to one of the major theme parks. If you are going just you and DH (no kids) you might be able to cover more ground that I could with my dd who tends to move slow and need a lot of breaks. Others will say that you can get a better value if you buy tickets yourself and take cabs to/from KSC, but remember that with the shore excursion you get an extra hour after KSC closes for a IMAX screening, so you get more time for exploring the other exhibits.

Thanks so much for all the info on this - I just booked the KSC yesterday and I was concerned that there wouldn't be enough time. This sorta confirms that, but at least there's the extra hour for the IMAX and OMG A REAL LIVE ASTRONAUT SQUEEEEE. So maybe it isn't truly a 7 hour excursion like NCL claims, but I think the astronaut makes up for that.

The spa is one deck up on 15. Very easy to get to.

Yeah but isn't there also an exit on deck 14?

NCL just posted this on their facebook page:

What about USB ports?

You know! That's just rubbing it in! :D

 

I recall memories of family vacations to Bar Harbor, ME and filling our coolers with lawbstahs from an outfit called Parson's. Now THAT was good eating. Those will always be lobsters in my book!

Haha I didn't think of that because I dislike seafood

Well...according to Wikipedia (because everything there is truth!)

 

before they were popular, lawbstahs were used as fertilizer. heck it was even considered peasant food and a regular item for prisons. :eek:

Yup, I live on the Bay of Fundy and one of my coworkers told me how he was poor growing up and had to eat lobster rolls and the rich kids got to bring Bologna sandwiches.

Until I joined this forum I didn't know there was any other type of lobster bedsides the ones crawling around in a tank at the grocery store/on my kitchen floor to terrify me as a child. I don't think I've seen anything less than 1.5 or 2 lbs either

Keep checking too, because although I got OBC on January 27th, it didn't show up until this week. I didn't even have a line item in the summary in the picture above.

Prior to today, My NCL wasn't showed my OBC (the 3 ships one) and now it is! Looks like they must be fixing something.

Teppanyaki is usually opened for lunch only on the last sea day- its our favorite time to go

LOVE the Gem/Jewel Enjoyed Breakaway. Better shows/entertainment on Breakaway, but miss Spinneker, bar b ques, great outdoors... both ships have good points...wish we could take the good from both ships and develop our own..???

Safe sailing

Is that something you can reserve before you go? I don't see the option on My NCL for that time frame any of the days.