Carnival Freedom or NCL Pearl

[jtdlmc]

I have found a NCL itinerary that fits our schedule. So now I am juggling between Carnival Freedom 6-day Western or NCL Pearl 7-day Eastern (the NCL is a few hundred $ more). I had initially chosen NCL because of the Freestyle Dining, but have since found out Carnival has a form of anytime dining. There will be myself, DH, DD19 and DS9 in a balcony cabin. I've gathered alot of info from these boards about the Carnival dining options - poolside, buffet, main dining room, midnight buffet, chocolate buffet, etc.

 

What are the free dining options on NCL Pearl?

 

Does NCL have kid's clubs running during port days so that parents can leave the kids there if they don't want to get off the boat?

 

What is the configuration of NCL 4 person balcony room - sofa bed, fold down bunk?

[TravlGrl]

We toured the NCL Pearl this summer. What a beautiful ship! We loved the bowling alley and the buffet (it had a much nicer variety of food compared to the previous 10 ships we've either sailed or toured).

 

Regarding the NCL kid's club, on port days it runs from the time the ship departs port until 10:30 p.m. Here is a link (scroll down to All You Need to Know) --

http://www.ncl.com/nclweb/cruiser/cmsPages.html?pageId=FreestyleFamilyFun

 

If you'd like to see the slide show we created for the Pearl, it's here. If you skip ahead to 2:06 minutes, you can see a category BB balcony cabin, but I don't recall if it was for 4 people.

[jtdlmc]

Thanks TrvlGrl! Great slideshow.

[Cruzaholic41]

In general, Carnival offers better food selections than NCL in the free dining venues. But that's about where the plusses end for the C. Freedom over NCL's new Pearl.

 

Without a doubt, I would go with the longer cruise on the Pearl. The ship is just so much prettier than the C. Freedom.

 

I think the quality of your cruise would just be better on the Pearl.