My Pearl Review - 10/23/11

[ESMBDS]

This is a review of my sailing on the NCL Pearl on October 23, 2011.

 

I’ve been cruising since 1988 and this was my second NCL sailing. Previously, I did a 4 day sailing on the Sky last year. I am 42 and cruised with my 40 year old friend, also a moderately experienced cruiser. Two young at heart middle aged girls! We booked the cruise directly with NCL and got a fabulous rate for a balcony guarantee. I also received $175.00 in on board credit for having cruised with NCL and for having cruised in the past year. What a nice surprise that was! I didn’t care so much for the itinerary for my part, I could happily stay on the boat for 7 days (which, as you’ll soon read, we pretty much did!).

 

I live in South Florida and prefer to drive myself to the port. Parking there is so easy and, for me, I hate waiting for someone to pick me or hate that that they’re waiting for me for whatever reason, so we left my car in the parking garage. It’s $20 per day. I also hate picking people up, lol, but I do it. I prefer to get to port early, but in this case, in all the years I’ve been driving to downtown Miami, I missed the exit, got back on I95 and wound up in the express lane almost to Broward County. Our bags were taken by a porter as soon as we got close to the terminal. The line to exit the terminal was double wrapped around the building. I texted with some of my Cruise Critic friends who got there early and were inside. Apparently there was a problem with the prior sailing, so boarding was delayed. We weren’t informed of the delay by anyone from NCL. We were outside for about an hour (in the hot South Florida sun!) before the line started to move. Once we got in, it took about another 1 ½ hours before we were actually on the ship.

 

We had lunch at the Garden Café (happy, happy, washy, washy) which was packed. I liked that the Garden Café had multiple stations of the same item, so if you wanted a burger, for example, there were several places in the area to get one. Everyone’s taste is different, so I’ll just say that the food I had (other than Cagney’s, which was excellent and the Mexican Café, sorry forgot the name, was awful) during the entire cruise was okay, nothing special. There was nothing I could say that I just loved, other than my meal at Cagney’s, which was delicious – better than your local steak place, but not on the level of a restaurant like Capital Grille. We ate breakfasts at the Garden Café, dinners in the main dining rooms and ate at 2 of the specialty restaurants. We had lunch at the Great Outdoors or Garden Café and late night snacks at the Blue Lagoon lounge which had finger foods, sandwiches and chicken wings.

 

I love to play craps, but only played for one night for some reason. Probably because every night we were at the shows. The casino reminded me of Chuck E Cheese – the coloring I guess.

 

Noodles, the comic was hysterical. We really enjoyed “Oh What a Night” – the tribute band to the Jersey Boys, and saw the SCTV improve comedy troupe twice . The night of their show prior to “The Quest” was an adults-only show and we had a great time. If you have never done “The Quest” you must, even just to watch it. “Sharkbait” was a crazy juggling/magic duo that was fabulous. The shows were in the Stardust Theater. I didn’t get why the seats were so low to the ground! There was never a problem getting a seat and we usually got to the shows about 20 minutes prior. We played trivia a few times and had a blast at the “White Hot Dance Party” in the Spinnaker Lounge. My friend was in the “Minute to Win It” Show and we had a blast there too. We signed up for the Murder Mystery Lunch with SCTV.

 

The ship left on time and our first port was the private island. The seas were choppy a

and the tender was rocking. A lot of people got off, but I thought it was fun, actually. The SECOND we set foot on land, the sky opened up and we huddled in one of the little tents/huts selling tshirts and other merchandise. We stayed there for about an hour before the rain let up. We decided to go back to the ship, but the tenders weren’t running so we stood out in the drizzle for about a hour. We spent the rest of the day on board.

 

We spent the next day at sea and the chair hogs were in full force. We finally found two lounges way up top in the quiet section. I would have preferred to be by the pool or the area right above the pool, but it was packed. I was content to sit with my book in this so-called quiet section and while most of the people were quiet, there were two couples on either side of us yapping up a storm. It wouldn’t have been so bad if I was able to understand them (lol) but I didn’t know the languages. Anyway…

 

We signed up for the river tubing in Jamaica through NCL. I’ve been to Ocho Rios a few times and had no desire to see the falls again. This tour was a blast and the guides could not have been nicer.

 

The next two stops were supposed to be Grand Cayman and Cozumel but because of Rina, we were re-routed. They announced, pretty much as soon as we got back on the ship, that we would have a day at sea, then go to Nassau then have a day at sea before heading back to Miami. It would have been nice if we could have stayed in Jamaica another day or gone to a port not in the path of Rina, but that didn’t happen.

 

We took a taxi over to the Atlantis because my friend had never seen it. Of course, all you can do is walk around the lobby and the shopping area outside, because you have to pay to the see the grounds and pools. Having stayed there previously I was not interested in paying to have the privilege of looking around the resort, we so took the taxi back to Bay Street, wandered around the straw market (which really suffered damaged in a recent storm) and went back to the ship. Nassau was packed be cause the day we got there, the Dream, Sensation and Allure were also there.

 

I get dressed for work every day and am fortunate to attend many functions each year where gowns and formal attire are necessary, so I wasn’t interested in getting dressed on vacation. I would say how we dressed in the evening was the norm: Capri pants, jeans, nice tops. I’d say we were vacation casual. There were many people who got dressed, maybe just to get the formal pictures done. It looked odd to see a couple in a tux and gown sitting at table with people who were not. That, however, is the essence of freestyle dining!

 

Like I mentioned earlier, we had dinner most nights in the main dining rooms. We normally had dinner around 7 or 730 and then headed to the shows. We never had to wait for a table. Some nights we sat alone and some nights with others.

 

The staff encourages you to make your specialty reservations early and we made a reservation for Cagney’s for Monday night. The place was pretty much empty (4-5 tables taken)and as the week progressed, I noticed there was never a wait for the specialty restaurants (there are screens all over the ship alerting you to wait times in all the dining areas). The shrimp cocktail was delicious and they were huge. My New York strip was cooked perfectly and the truffle fries were adequate. I didn’t care for the lobster bisque. The chocolate monstrosity I had for dessert was scrumptious!

 

We met a great group of girls our age from New York and joined them for dinner in the Mexican restaurant on the last night. I’m glad the fee for this was only $10.00 as the food was awful and the service was terrible.

I had no interest in the hibachi restaurant since I go frequently at home and nothing on the French and Italian menus appealed to us.

 

We were in 8020 forward. A hike from everything. Our cabin was right over the Stardust Lounge and we never heard a peep from there. Of course, we weren’t in our cabin all that much. I couldn’t believe how small the bathroom was. I can see how a larger person would have a problem in the toilet area. Our cabin steward, Maria, was a sweetheart. We saw her a few times and she was nothing but nice to us.

 

The cruise director’s staff had the friendliest people! We had a blast getting to know Joey, Ash and Terrence (from West Virginia - if he’s reading this – okay Terrence, I know it’s VIRGINIA – just kidding) and the guests were encouraged to meet with the performers after the show. Everyone we met was super nice.

 

The ship was clean and in good shape. My only real complaint was that I frequently smelled sewage in our bathroom. I mentioned it a few times to Maria, but nothing was done by maintenance.

 

This was a decent cruise at a decent price. The food was adequate and the entertainment and staff was excellent. I would cruise NCL again. I put down a deposit for a future cruise. I would like to do the Western Med on the Epic next summer.

 

Happy cruising!

 

Stacey

[Jokelady]

This is a review of my sailing on the NCL Pearl on October 23, 2011.

 

I’ve been cruising since 1988 and this was my second NCL sailing. Previously, I did a 4 day sailing on the Sky last year. I am 42 and cruised with my 40 year old friend, also a moderately experienced cruiser. Two young at heart middle aged girls! We booked the cruise directly with NCL and got a fabulous rate for a balcony guarantee. I also received $175.00 in on board credit for having cruised with NCL and for having cruised in the past year. What a nice surprise that was! I didn’t care so much for the itinerary for my part, I could happily stay on the boat for 7 days (which, as you’ll soon read, we pretty much did!).

 

I live in South Florida and prefer to drive myself to the port. Parking there is so easy and, for me, I hate waiting for someone to pick me or hate that that they’re waiting for me for whatever reason, so we left my car in the parking garage. It’s $20 per day. I also hate picking people up, lol, but I do it. I prefer to get to port early, but in this case, in all the years I’ve been driving to downtown Miami, I missed the exit, got back on I95 and wound up in the express lane almost to Broward County. Our bags were taken by a porter as soon as we got close to the terminal. The line to exit the terminal was double wrapped around the building. I texted with some of my Cruise Critic friends who got there early and were inside. Apparently there was a problem with the prior sailing, so boarding was delayed. We weren’t informed of the delay by anyone from NCL. We were outside for about an hour (in the hot South Florida sun!) before the line started to move. Once we got in, it took about another 1 ½ hours before we were actually on the ship.

 

We had lunch at the Garden Café (happy, happy, washy, washy) which was packed. I liked that the Garden Café had multiple stations of the same item, so if you wanted a burger, for example, there were several places in the area to get one. Everyone’s taste is different, so I’ll just say that the food I had (other than Cagney’s, which was excellent and the Mexican Café, sorry forgot the name, was awful) during the entire cruise was okay, nothing special. There was nothing I could say that I just loved, other than my meal at Cagney’s, which was delicious – better than your local steak place, but not on the level of a restaurant like Capital Grille. We ate breakfasts at the Garden Café, dinners in the main dining rooms and ate at 2 of the specialty restaurants. We had lunch at the Great Outdoors or Garden Café and late night snacks at the Blue Lagoon lounge which had finger foods, sandwiches and chicken wings.

 

I love to play craps, but only played for one night for some reason. Probably because every night we were at the shows. The casino reminded me of Chuck E Cheese – the coloring I guess.

 

Noodles, the comic was hysterical. We really enjoyed “Oh What a Night” – the tribute band to the Jersey Boys, and saw the SCTV improve comedy troupe twice . The night of their show prior to “The Quest” was an adults-only show and we had a great time. If you have never done “The Quest” you must, even just to watch it. “Sharkbait” was a crazy juggling/magic duo that was fabulous. The shows were in the Stardust Theater. I didn’t get why the seats were so low to the ground! There was never a problem getting a seat and we usually got to the shows about 20 minutes prior. We played trivia a few times and had a blast at the “White Hot Dance Party” in the Spinnaker Lounge. My friend was in the “Minute to Win It” Show and we had a blast there too. We signed up for the Murder Mystery Lunch with SCTV.

 

The ship left on time and our first port was the private island. The seas were choppy a

and the tender was rocking. A lot of people got off, but I thought it was fun, actually. The SECOND we set foot on land, the sky opened up and we huddled in one of the little tents/huts selling tshirts and other merchandise. We stayed there for about an hour before the rain let up. We decided to go back to the ship, but the tenders weren’t running so we stood out in the drizzle for about a hour. We spent the rest of the day on board.

 

We spent the next day at sea and the chair hogs were in full force. We finally found two lounges way up top in the quiet section. I would have preferred to be by the pool or the area right above the pool, but it was packed. I was content to sit with my book in this so-called quiet section and while most of the people were quiet, there were two couples on either side of us yapping up a storm. It wouldn’t have been so bad if I was able to understand them (lol) but I didn’t know the languages. Anyway…

 

We signed up for the river tubing in Jamaica through NCL. I’ve been to Ocho Rios a few times and had no desire to see the falls again. This tour was a blast and the guides could not have been nicer.

 

The next two stops were supposed to be Grand Cayman and Cozumel but because of Rina, we were re-routed. They announced, pretty much as soon as we got back on the ship, that we would have a day at sea, then go to Nassau then have a day at sea before heading back to Miami. It would have been nice if we could have stayed in Jamaica another day or gone to a port not in the path of Rina, but that didn’t happen.

 

We took a taxi over to the Atlantis because my friend had never seen it. Of course, all you can do is walk around the lobby and the shopping area outside, because you have to pay to the see the grounds and pools. Having stayed there previously I was not interested in paying to have the privilege of looking around the resort, we so took the taxi back to Bay Street, wandered around the straw market (which really suffered damaged in a recent storm) and went back to the ship. Nassau was packed be cause the day we got there, the Dream, Sensation and Allure were also there.

 

I get dressed for work every day and am fortunate to attend many functions each year where gowns and formal attire are necessary, so I wasn’t interested in getting dressed on vacation. I would say how we dressed in the evening was the norm: Capri pants, jeans, nice tops. I’d say we were vacation casual. There were many people who got dressed, maybe just to get the formal pictures done. It looked odd to see a couple in a tux and gown sitting at table with people who were not. That, however, is the essence of freestyle dining!

 

Like I mentioned earlier, we had dinner most nights in the main dining rooms. We normally had dinner around 7 or 730 and then headed to the shows. We never had to wait for a table. Some nights we sat alone and some nights with others.

 

The staff encourages you to make your specialty reservations early and we made a reservation for Cagney’s for Monday night. The place was pretty much empty (4-5 tables taken)and as the week progressed, I noticed there was never a wait for the specialty restaurants (there are screens all over the ship alerting you to wait times in all the dining areas). The shrimp cocktail was delicious and they were huge. My New York strip was cooked perfectly and the truffle fries were adequate. I didn’t care for the lobster bisque. The chocolate monstrosity I had for dessert was scrumptious!

 

We met a great group of girls our age from New York and joined them for dinner in the Mexican restaurant on the last night. I’m glad the fee for this was only $10.00 as the food was awful and the service was terrible.

I had no interest in the hibachi restaurant since I go frequently at home and nothing on the French and Italian menus appealed to us.

 

We were in 8020 forward. A hike from everything. Our cabin was right over the Stardust Lounge and we never heard a peep from there. Of course, we weren’t in our cabin all that much. I couldn’t believe how small the bathroom was. I can see how a larger person would have a problem in the toilet area. Our cabin steward, Maria, was a sweetheart. We saw her a few times and she was nothing but nice to us.

 

The cruise director’s staff had the friendliest people! We had a blast getting to know Joey, Ash and Terrence (from West Virginia - if he’s reading this – okay Terrence, I know it’s VIRGINIA – just kidding) and the guests were encouraged to meet with the performers after the show. Everyone we met was super nice.

 

The ship was clean and in good shape. My only real complaint was that I frequently smelled sewage in our bathroom. I mentioned it a few times to Maria, but nothing was done by maintenance.

 

This was a decent cruise at a decent price. The food was adequate and the entertainment and staff was excellent. I would cruise NCL again. I put down a deposit for a future cruise. I would like to do the Western Med on the Epic next summer.

 

Happy cruising!

 

Stacey

 

Thank you for the review. I will be on the Pearl in March. Glad to hear you had a decent time and you had enough fun to put down a deposit for a future cruise.

 

Kathy

[ESMBDS]

You're welcome! I hope you have a wonderful time. Of course, you will miss hurricane season :)

 

Stacey

[mr&mrscruiselover]

Great review, thanks for sharing.

 

Sherri and Clay

[LaCal]

Great Review.....Did you get in the Casino any other time?....We Love Craps as well and cant wait for Next May to Alaska on the Pearl...

 

Thanks

[ESMBDS]

I only gambled one night. As much as I enjoy playing craps, I never got back there. :(

 

Funny you mentioned Alaska, we're about to book next summer too :) Probably July on the Jewel.

 

Happy cruising!

 

Stacey

[Big Tiger Fan]

Thank you for taking the time to write your review of your recent cruise on the Pearl. We are taking the PC cruise in April and are reading as much as we can about the ship. We have only been on one other cruise, so we aren't really up on what to expect. However, most of what has been said about the Pearl has been positive.

I am not looking forward to the small bathroom, though. I need room to spread out my stuff. I have also been wondering about using the pool areas. Last cruise it was way too cold to even stay outside; so, this time we will want to get some sun. Hope we can find chairs.

Is there a forward observation room...like the Spinnaker on the Jade? We enjoyed that space immensely.

Thanks again.

[Susie51]

Thank you for your review. We will be on the Pearl in Sept. in a mini-suite. Will the bathroom be about the same size as the bathroom in an inside cabin on Jewel? It worked out just fine for us in March.