A Fantastic Week On The Gem 11/13/10 (Long!)

[Coastalbreezes]

This was our third cruise on NCL (previously on the Jewel and Dawn). I traveled with my 19 year old son and we chose this itinerary because we wanted to sail out of New York simply because of the convenience to where we live.

 

EMBARKATION

It took us only 2-1/2 hours to get to the port from Rhode Island, arriving around 10:15 a.m. on Saturday. Paid, parked, and discovered many hundreds of excited people already there and in lines inside the terminal. We had an AE penthouse and I presumed there would be separate check-in lines for our category. We asked several different terminal employees; each one gave us a different answer, sent us into different lines, and ultimately we ended up back in the Disneyesque, zig-zag lines.

 

An announcement was made that the Coast Guard was on board for a full inspection and boarding would be delayed. Around noon we made it to the front of the line for our ship ID photos and to present the credit card. After that, we were escorted to a separate lounge where we met our concierge, Ruth (more about this wonderful lady later) who gave us our cabin keys and where we waited for an hour or so to board. We had an option to be escorted on board, but went on alone. I think it was around 1:00 when we finally got on this beautiful ship and hoped we could have lunch at Cagney’s (one of our perks), but were told it would not open until after the CG inspection. We made our way to the Garden Café and very much enjoyed a chicken curry lunch.

 

After lunch, we explored the ship and took lots of photos before it got too crowded. Beautiful details were evident everywhere and we were impressed with how lovely and clean everything looked considering how fast they turned it around since they had just returned from Venice.

 

Muster drill was as easy and smooth as could be. We were delayed over 2 hours and did not sail until nearly 6:00 p.m. but the lights of Manhattan were beautiful to watch as we sailed down the Hudson.

 

PENTHOUSE CABIN 8132

 

I will admit we did try to “sneak” to our cabin a couple of times, but no matter which way we went, employees blocked the way. We were initially told 2:00 p.m. but were not able to get in until 3:00, but our luggage was there when we arrived – nice!

 

I must immediately mention our butler, Jose, who was there when we arrived. All week he was so good to us – bringing canapés, chocolates, fruit, and cheese/crackers every day around 4:15 p.m. We also had a gorgeous flower arrangement as well as a complimentary bottle of champagne. Our cabin was all the way aft with a balcony overlooking the ship’s wake as we sailed. It had two regular chairs, one lounger and two tables. We sat out there a lot. Also in general, it was very spacious – lots of drawers and closet space (closet was accessed from either side, which was nice). Separate dressing area with a well-lit vanity (also with more drawers) and make-up mirror and hair dryer. Our full bath had a huge tub/shower, ample sink, a toilet area with sliding door. No complaints at all – it was our first time all the way aft and hopefully not our last. During the entire week, I only heard music from Bliss underneath us one time. It wasn’t very loud, but I could hear it.

 

A few minutes after meeting Jose, our cabin steward, Carlo arrived. There is not enough space or words to say how great a young man he was. He treated us like royalty all week always smiling, always asking if we needed anything, and was especially patient as my son had a tendency to sleep very late and I was always worried that Carlo would get mad if we didn’t give him time to make up the cabin. But he would just laugh and ask Mike to find him when he woke up. We knew in advance that the cabin had only one queen sized bed and we asked Carlo if we could get a rollaway for my son and it was there and set up in less than ½ hour. Also, our TV was broken for the first two days, but Carlo stayed on top of things and got it fixed for us.

 

FOOD/DINING

 

We availed ourselves of our concierge’s offer to make dinner reservations for the week. Typically we enjoy trying all the alternate dining venues, rarely going to the main dining rooms,. By the end of this trip, we wished we hadn’t spent the extra dollars for some of the surcharge restaurants. My (very subjective) thoughts on the ones we dined at (we did not try La Cucina or Orchid after meeting people on board who said it wasn’t worth the upcharge):

 

Teppanyaki: Excellent! Great show by the talented chefs and delicious and plentiful food. We ate there twice, it was so good. Shrimp were a bit on the tough side but the steak and chicken were great. The only bad: $5.75 for a 3 oz. Sake…a bit pricey for 2 sips.

 

Le Bistro: Also excellent! Again, we ate here twice. Don’t miss the escargots, onion and mushroom soups, filet, swordfish, duck or lamb. The chocolate fondue for dessert was memorable.

 

Cagney’s: One of our perks was to be able to eat breakfast and lunch here daily. Breakfast and lunch were fantastic. My favorites here included the eggs benedict, asparagus salad, ahi tuna burger and shrimp cocktail. On the other hand, our experience for dinner wasn’t so great. Service was painstakingly slow (and it was not crowded by any means) and my son’s strip steak arrived looking like a flattened piece of shoe leather. When I reacted and questioned why it looked like that, I was told that the chef had to butterfly it to get it to medium rare. I have eaten in some of the finest steak houses around, and have never, ever had that response. Our waiter offered to bring something else, but my son said no but did not eat the steak. I was kind of surprised that they did not take the $25 charge off since he really didn’t eat. I admit to not challenging the bill.

 

Tequila: another not great venue for us. I ordered the lobster tacos because I had read on these boards how good they were. Alas, the lobster was swimming in a very pungent crab sauce (which had an odd smell). After one bite, I stopped eating. Our waitress asked how everything was and my reply: “Not so good” to which she replied “Good! Enjoy!” and walked away.

 

On our next cruise, we will most likely eat dinner in the MDR and maybe one or two specialties. We were surprised, knowing that the cruise had sold out, how empty the specialty restaurants were all week (except for Teppanyaki you could pretty much just walk into any of them all week).

 

 

SERVICE:

 

Bar service: In the bar venues, the staff was fantastic. When you ordered a drink, it arrived very fast. The only difficulty I would mention would be communication. It seemed to me in several venues, the wait staff had problems with English. Example #1 is above under Tequila; # 2 was one night I ordered a Cosmopolitan with a splash of “grapefruit juice”. What I got was a “Grey Goose” martini and the server insisted that is what I ordered.

 

Dining service: when I go out to eat, I like to enjoy a cocktail or glass of wine before ordering. No matter where we ate, within literally seconds of being given the menu, we were asked if we were ready to order. After a while, it started to get me mad. Twice, I ordered a bottle of wine immediately after being seated, and both times it did not come until after the appetizers were served. Not a really big deal but when you add up the cost, it bugged me. Other than that, service was okay. Not exceptional, just okay.

 

Our concierge, Ruth: what can I say about this incredibly hard working woman? No matter what we needed (or thought we needed!), Ruth thought of it first! She got us priority tender tickets for GSC as well as for disembarking the ship. Every morning, she was available for any questions or to help in her Cagney’s “office” and was just an all-around terrific person!!

 

 

ACTIVITIES:

 

We participated in many of the organized staff activities such as trivia, progressive trivia, goofy golf, name that tune, and the scavenger hunt which was a blast. Did not do bingo (prices start at $40!!). My favorite show was the 70s Show – the music and songs brought back a lot of memories and I thoroughly enjoyed it. One of the best shows ever on a ship! The cruise activities staff were terrific and funny and we enjoyed meeting them all, especially Ruby, Sin, and Teal.

 

PORTS/EXCURSIONS

 

In Port Canaveral we had signed up for the Kennedy Space Center tour and it was worth every penny! We literally ooohed and aaaahed throughout the entire day and were so impressed by all that we saw. We would have liked more time to see it all (it was about

6 ½ hours that literally flew by!). If you have never been there and are even the least bit curious about our space program, do not miss this!

 

Great Stirrup Cay: my son signed up for the relatively new group jet ski tour and said it was fantastic!

 

Nassau: Five ships total in port that day so it was pretty crowded. We did not sign up for anything but just got off the ship, walked around, and ended up at Senor Frog’s just as it began to pour rain. And it rained for several hours. We had a delicious lunch then hung out at the bar and watched the dancing and mania that is only Senor Frog’s! Got totally soaked walking back to the ship, but no big deal.

 

 

OTHER THOUGHTS:

 

I have read many posts about how NCL is always trying to sell you something. We found that to be true, but if we weren’t interested, we said so and weren’t bothered again (with the exception of constantly being barraged by people trying to sell Lotto tickets in the casino and way too many pushes for future cruises, especially at the Latitudes party which turned into more of a selling future cruise party than anything else).

 

As VIPs we enjoyed a private cocktail party with the captain and senior officers on our formal night which was one of the highlights of the week. This is one of the nicest crews of any ship I have been on and the captain was delightful as were the hotel director and other officers.

 

I am not sure if all cabins have DVD players, but unless you brought your own, there were no DVDs available in the library. I say that especially for those traveling with young children because the TV stations were few: MSNBC, ESPN, BBC News, Fox News, E network, and one channel playing random old shows – no kids channels at all except in the kid’s eating area in the Garden Café. Oh, and if you wanted to watch a movie from the TV menu, it was $9.95.

 

Internet: I signed up for the 100 minutes/$55.00 and basically just checked my email (for work) every day. Some days it was slower connecting than others, but at the end of the week I still had 20 minutes left.

 

Casino: I had a gambling budget for the week and for the first time in years of at least winning back what I brought, ended up losing money. Nevertheless, I racked up enough points to get free drinks in the casino, but when point redemption time came at the end of the cruise, I was a little taken aback. On some other ships, points are accumulated a bit more slowly, but at the end, points convert – 1 point = $1. Not here. You had to accumulate 2500 points and that would only get you $25.00 off your bill. If you think you are going to cruise with NCL again, they hold the points accumulated for 18 months which is what I did.

 

Drinks: the martinis I had were good and a generous pour and with the 15% added gratuity came to around $11 – I’ve paid more on land. Wine on the other hand was a very measured pour (4 -6 oz) and was around $7.75/glass. You could order “house” red or white for around $5.25. Also there were beer buckets – buy 5 get one free for a reasonable price (I forget how much). My son got the soda card -- $50 for the week and he made good use of it.

 

We met many, many wonderful people on this trip (including some awesome crew members, those from our roll call at our Meet & Greet and some who will be new friends for life!). In general, the passenger mix was young families all the way to older singles and couples.

 

I have tried lots of cruise lines, but know that I am now forever hooked on NCL – we really love freestyle and are already thinking ahead to next year and where we will go!

 

I am happy to answer any questions you might have.

 

Tracy

[llam]

Thank you for the thoughtful balanced review. We will be on this lovely ship for the Christmas, New Years cruise and will remember your comments.

[knitlady037]

Thanks for the review! Will be sailing Gem soon!

[Coastalbreezes]

Knitlady and Ilam, I hope you have as much fun as we did!

 

Honestly, in my opinion, any cruise is a good cruise and it would take a lot of bad things for us to say it was horrible and reviews are totally subjective....I know some will agree with me and others disagree but each cruise is what you personally make of it. We really did have a great time and I hope you will, too!

 

Tracy

[DMH15]

Tracy -

 

Thanks for a great review. You gave specific details when something was not to your liking. That is most appreciated. Sometimes people post complaints without positives and their negatives are too vague. You are an example of how to write a review! Obviously, you like NCL and had a good time but took the negatives as "hiccups" and it's pretty obvious you are sharing those to help others.

 

I'm glad you had fun with your son.

[jtech4]

TracyE thanks for the review will be on this ship Saturday

[hotwingshot]

I live over in New Bedford MA. Thank you for the review I am also leaving saturday.

[jaldag]

Tracy,

 

Thanks for the great review. We will be sailing on the Gem this Saturday (11/27). We aren't lucky enough to have a suite on this trip but we are staying in Cabin 8634, one of the aft facing BA balcony cabins on Deck 8. Looks like we will be a couple of cabins away from the one you were in. So, we were just wondering--did you have any issues with noise coming from the Bliss Lounge below?

 

Also, any issues with ash from the ship's funnel coming down on your balcony? Finally, at this time of year, how soon going south was it before it was warm sitting on on the balcony? By Sunday afternoon?

 

Thanks for any additional info you can provide.

 

Be well,

Jim

[Coastalbreezes]

Tracy,

 

Thanks for the great review. We will be sailing on the Gem this Saturday (11/27). We aren't lucky enough to have a suite on this trip but we are staying in Cabin 8634, one of the aft facing BA balcony cabins on Deck 8. Looks like we will be a couple of cabins away from the one you were in. So, we were just wondering--did you have any issues with noise coming from the Bliss Lounge below?

 

Also, any issues with ash from the ship's funnel coming down on your balcony? Finally, at this time of year, how soon going south was it before it was warm sitting on on the balcony? By Sunday afternoon?

 

Thanks for any additional info you can provide.

 

Be well,

Jim

 

 

One morning I woke up and there was a little bit of ash on the chair cushions, table, and balcony floor, but it was more like a light dusting and easily brushed away.

 

As for Bliss, there was a late night DJ one evening and being a light sleeper, the thumping bass did wake me up. The rocking motion of the ship however, sent me back to sleep almost immediately. It wasn't like the music was blasting through the floor.

 

I hope you all have a wonderful cruise and I can't wait to hear your own thoughts about the trip. Have fun!

Tracy

[Laszlo]

Great review. My wife and I will be taking the same trip next year leaving 11/5 and staying in a stern suite. How were the temps? how long before you hit "warm" weather?

 

Thanks

[Coastalbreezes]

Great review. My wife and I will be taking the same trip next year leaving 11/5 and staying in a stern suite. How were the temps? how long before you hit "warm" weather?

 

Thanks

 

 

Temps not so bad, really. Our first and last sea days were definitely cooler. It really depends on Mother Nature -- I suppose there's always a chance it could be snowing on your way south :rolleyes:!

[jaldag]

One morning I woke up and there was a little bit of ash on the chair cushions, table, and balcony floor, but it was more like a light dusting and easily brushed away.

 

As for Bliss, there was a late night DJ one evening and being a light sleeper, the thumping bass did wake me up. The rocking motion of the ship however, sent me back to sleep almost immediately. It wasn't like the music was blasting through the floor.

 

I hope you all have a wonderful cruise and I can't wait to hear your own thoughts about the trip. Have fun!

Tracy

 

Thank you.

[Why Knot Me]

Thanks for your review.

 

Did you check with your butler for DVD's? On other ships (not the Epic) there is a DVD library that can only be accessed via your butler. Has this perk been discontinued? I hope not.

[Coastalbreezes]

Thanks for your review.

 

Did you check with your butler for DVD's? On other ships (not the Epic) there is a DVD library that can only be accessed via your butler. Has this perk been discontinued? I hope not.

 

 

Good point and I did not think to ask him.

 

It was not a problem for us as we were so busy, but I was thinking of families with small children who would not have anything to watch on the TV channels offered.

[bsblindab]

Good point and I did not think to ask him.

 

It was not a problem for us as we were so busy, but I was thinking of families with small children who would not have anything to watch on the TV channels offered.

I was on the same cruise..I have to agree with the TV situation and thankful I didn't have small children with us. I myself was disappointed with the TV selection..mainly for early AM and late night watching.. Was on the Pearl in August and they had a movie channel with no charge..so the $10.00 charge was a surprise to me