Princess lover back from NCL

[cruisetrail]

I had posted that I was going on a quick last minute NCL cruise and asked for opinions last week. One poster had asked me to let them know what I thought of it.

 

Well, let's begin by saying, It sure wasn't Princess! We did find ourselves comparing things to Princess over the course of the cruise. Went in with low expectations and I'm happy that I did!

 

I have always said that the crew on Princess is the best. I had no idea just how good they really were. Most crew members on Princess smile, all say hello and interact with guests and seems to really care about those of us cruising. I can say that while this is the norm on Princess, not so much on NCL. I don't think I have met as many crew members that didn't bother smiling, say hello, offering to help or even acknowledge that I was standing in front of them. Many of us on the sailing said the same thing. Most of the crew just seemed like they really didn't want to be there. More than one told us how they were leaving when their contract was up as they didn't care for how senior staff treat them.

 

I brought some wine on, was upfront and told them I needed to pay the corkage fees. Did that and walked on with the wine. First suitcase delivered no problems. Second suitcase did not arrive. On my door was that "you have been called to the "naughty room" come and get your bags. So my first impression of NCL, you have wasted my time and made me wait on another line and get my bag. I was thrilled as I watched my undergarments rummaged through right in front of others. Thrilled when all the dry-cleaned clothes that I paid good money for and carefully packed was somewhat shoved thing back and forth trying to find I don't know what and were now wrinkled. What was in the suitcase, NOTHING BUT CLOTHES! I asked what they possibly could have thought was in there and they had no answer.

 

Food, ate in Cagney's steakhouse which was the same price as the Crown Grill. Not even a close match. You should be able to cut through your filet with a butter knife. My husband had a hard time cutting his meat with a steak knife! Where you can order as many sides as you wish at the Crown Grill, here you got 2 small portions of sides per person and were not allowed more than that. I asked at the Italian restaurant if I could have a 1/2 order of the pasta (it was an entree) for my appetizer and then the entree and was told 'No, sorry one entree per person. The french restaurant was the best out of the bunch.

 

The cabin was not exactly clean. I had to wipe down the back of the bathroom wall when we boarded with hot soapy water. The picture that was hanging had I don't know what all over it. Once again, this was clearly not a princess ship. As I didn't even see our cabin steward until last night which was the last night of our cruise, it was hard to ask for something to be cleaned.

 

Did the pub crawl on the first even gin and the games they played was certainly not something I have ever witnessed on Princess. It involved people on their knees and bananas or guys seated with a bottle of beer with a straw in it between their legs with the girls on their knees in front of them sucking down the beer as fast as they could. Many seemed to enjoy themselves but there were some of us who just watched.

 

Now I don't know if this all holds true for NCL across the board, or it's just on the shorter sailings so hopefully what we experienced isn't the norm.

 

We met some great people, still had a nice cruise and I did enjoy myself. Both hubby and I were fine with the fact that we were getting off the ship this morning. 4 nights on there were enough.

 

Sorry to all of you who love NCL, I have hopefully not insulted you too much.

 

Next time, Princess here we come!!!!

 

No doubt, Princess offers a much better quality product than NCL.

But note that you have chosen the worst of the worst NCL ship for your cruise.

[Tatka]

I'm with my future son-in-law who works at Port Canaveral. He checks in the food etc that is being loaded on the cruise ships. He said that all the cruise line use Fresh Point for their produce but NCL, they use Global and it's much cheaper. All the food they get is cheaper

 

Guess that explains the food!

 

Well, then it does not translate into the quality.

 

I won't call Carnival's or RCCL's food better. Especially in quality.

 

I can say, that NCL's food choices are not very imaginative ... but on the last 3 NCL ships we sailed ( Spirit, Dawn, Jewel) every day in MDR there were choices of lamb, pork, beef and salmon + other selections. Even on Princess it wasn't always a case, Princess is great with seafood selection. Carnival's meat was usually tough.

[rdsqrl]

. . . Mostly a lot of women drinking and dancing together, which we don't like because they take up too much room on the dance floor, but they were having a ball, so good for them. The Wheelhouse on Pricess is almost always reserved for couples dancing, sometimes even observing line of dance. ;)

You could not be more wrong. The Wheelhouse dance floor is most certainly NOT reserved for couples. Nor is any other dance venue. Having been up and dancing with a group several times, I'm very sorry to see this kind of post and I hope your disparagement of uncoupled women (or men, as the case may be) having a good time isn't as overt in person.

[Love.II.Cruise]

Oh yea, forgot to add that while at the sail away party up on deck, there was a couple having sex right in the hot tub in broad daylight. Needless to say, we didn't step foot in any of the pools!

 

WOW! :eek: Seriously? I would have taken pictures and video and sent that to NCL headquarters in disgust!

 

At a minimum, I would have printed out pictures from the internet area and tried to figure out where their room was to post the pictures for all to see!

[Tatka]

Wow. What about simply telling pool officers about this "accident".

 

By the way what about people who do not leave jaccuzies for hours at a time? I am still trying to convince my mom, that it is safe to use them. She only sailed twice. Both times om CB. :)

[Keith1010]

Wow. What about simply telling pool officers about this "accident".

 

By the way what about people who do not leave jaccuzies for hours at a time? I am still trying to convince my mom, that it is safe to use them. She only sailed twice. Both times om CB. :)

 

I would be careful how long to stay in the hot tubs not because of germs but because of the temperature.

 

Keith

[latebloomer56]

Thank you for not bashing NCL, but giving a review of your experiences. I am a fan of the NCL product, being platinum with their line. I have typically enjoyed excellent service from all of our cabin stewards. Dining is different with the freestyle concept. You don't get as personal with the wait staff, this tends to lend itself to faster turn around in the MDR. We like trying the different venues and rarely go to the pay restaurants (we do love the French restaurant and that is a complimentary dinner for platinums) We have usually found the staff to be exceptionally friendly and courteous. We do feel the entertainment on NCL is among the best out there. But, out of all my NCL cruises, my least favorite was on the Sky. It is a big party cruise and not like my other NCL cruises. Different itineraries can have a much different feel.

 

I am also emerald on Royal Caribbean and do enjoy their product as well. They are different experiences. We have done both traditional dining and anytime dining, it depends on what we feel like, itinerary etc. All in all, we feel that we have received excellent service from RC as well.

 

I am looking forward to my first cruise on Princess next month, Coral Princess Panama Canal. I expect to have a wonderful time and to compare products for myself, as many times it is truly different strokes for different folks.

Thank you for this. We love Princess as they go where we want to go :D. That said we heard how great the suite passangers were treated on NCL and went to book it as we want a home port trip next year. NY is close enough as we are on the east coast. Got an awesome deal on the DOS on Gem. Who knows maybe we will bounce back and forth.

You will love Coral Princess, we did this trip a few years back. As I've said before we have been lucky with the folks on this line. Though have enjoyed home port trips on others. Now if Princess was to sail out of Boston more often that may be a different kettle of fish :D.

Have a wonderful trip, Laura

[cruiselvr1]

I would be careful how long to stay in the hot tubs not because of germs but because of the temperature.

 

Keith

I have to agree. I keep our hot tub hot, and check the chemicals constantly. My DW and I found Princess hot tubs nice and hot.

[Tatka]

I would be careful how long to stay in the hot tubs not because of germs but because of the temperature.

 

Keith

 

 

She was actually concerned about something else. :) You cannot drink all thar beer and stay there for hours. Something gotta give. Lol.

[Minoushka]

I love Princess and have always been treated right by the staff However I am very much an EPIC cheerleader I was treated ROYALLY by everyone on this ship I absolutely loved it in Caib ,Med and TRANSAT BEST CREW ever best trip ever

Hope you will enjoy all future cruises

[love2cruisegal]

Thank you for not bashing NCL, but giving a review of your experiences. I am a fan of the NCL product, being platinum with their line. I have typically enjoyed excellent service from all of our cabin stewards. Dining is different with the freestyle concept. You don't get as personal with the wait staff, this tends to lend itself to faster turn around in the MDR. We like trying the different venues and rarely go to the pay restaurants (we do love the French restaurant and that is a complimentary dinner for platinums) We have usually found the staff to be exceptionally friendly and courteous. We do feel the entertainment on NCL is among the best out there. But, out of all my NCL cruises, my least favorite was on the Sky. It is a big party cruise and not like my other NCL cruises. Different itineraries can have a much different feel.

 

I am also emerald on Royal Caribbean and do enjoy their product as well. They are different experiences. We have done both traditional dining and anytime dining, it depends on what we feel like, itinerary etc. All in all, we feel that we have received excellent service from RC as well.

 

I am looking forward to my first cruise on Princess next month, Coral Princess Panama Canal. I expect to have a wonderful time and to compare products for myself, as many times it is truly different strokes for different folks.

 

You will love the Coral and also the Panama Canal. We were on her last year and loved the ship and the cruise. Have been on her sister, Island, to Alaska and loved that also.

 

Enjoy!

[Tickled2Trvl]

We did the 4 day cruise on the Sapphire last December (I think it was mid-Dec, preholiday) and it was NOTHING like the cruise described above. It felt very much like every other Princess cruise we've been on (we've been on 10). It didn't have any of the party animal feel that is often described on short cruises on Carnival in the same region, for example.

 

I think the 3 and 4 day cruises on the Golden and Sapphire are going to be a great opportunity for professionals who work a lot to get away and still enjoy the superb Princess service and food. :) Can't wait to go on a few of these myself!

 

katherine

 

We have also done the 3 or 4 day cruises along the west coast and never experienced the over the top party atmosphere noted by the OP. And I don't think it was just the "age" of the fellow passengers. We had a blast and partied pretty late. Met wonderful fun folks and would do another 3 or 4 night Princess cruise in a minute.

[Host CJSKIDS]

I love Princess and have always been treated right by the staff However I am very much an EPIC cheerleader I was treated ROYALLY by everyone on this ship I absolutely loved it in Caib ,Med and TRANSAT BEST CREW ever best trip ever

Hope you will enjoy all future cruises

 

I really do wonder if a lot of what we saw has to so with the ship we were on. I have heard that the Epic was a nice ship.

[Crown Cruiser]

Carolyn,

 

My family and I sailed on Pride of America last year in Hawaii. While we has a great time (how can you not - you're in Hawaii??), and I do think that a cruise gives you good value to see 4 different islands during one trip, I never thought of the trip as "going on a cruise", just staying on the ship for transportation/meals.

 

We all agreed that Princess had nothing to worry about - we wouldn't be sailing NCL again any time soon!

 

PS - we also cruised the Islands on the old Royal Princess - now THAT was a cruise!!!!

[Cruisin' Chick]

You could not be more wrong. The Wheelhouse dance floor is most certainly NOT reserved for couples. Nor is any other dance venue. Having been up and dancing with a group several times, I'm very sorry to see this kind of post and I hope your disparagement of uncoupled women (or men, as the case may be) having a good time isn't as overt in person.

 

I'm glad that I wasn't the only one who wondered about that post. If people are dancing, why would they be taking up room no matter who they are? To quote from a Seinfeld episode: "Not that there's anything wrong with that." I guess the poster would be aghast if he/she went to a high school dance where the girls dance with each other because the boys don't feel like it or are same-gender couples. And besides, no one is checking cabin IDs at the door to make sure any pairs walking in are "married couples."

 

WOW! :eek: Seriously? I would have taken pictures and video and sent that to NCL headquarters in disgust!

 

At a minimum, I would have printed out pictures from the internet area and tried to figure out where their room was to post the pictures for all to see!

 

When I got back home from one cruise in which there were some under-aged kids acting up (they were from the same extended family -- the parents decided to camp out in the casino and not supervise their young ones -- none of the other kids onboard were misbehaving), I thought I should have taken out my camera and shot some incriminating photos, print them out at the photo dept. and post them by the elevators. But maybe with the couple mentioned above, they may actually love the "exposure." At least, you can give the photos to a ship's officer so they can decide if they want to take some action.

[Cruisin' Chick]

I told my hubby about the pub games mentioned and he felt they were over the top too. I think on the prude-non-prude continuum, we're not at the completely prude part, but the word that came to my hubby's mind was "misogynist." I've been on some Carnival cruises and didn't care for the lip-sync contest in which contestants were given a banana to use as a "microphone." Or the stuff your bathing suit with ping pong balls contest. There's a difference between something being fun and something being unclassly.

[Tatka]

Carolyn,

 

My family and I sailed on Pride of America last year in Hawaii. While we has a great time (how can you not - you're in Hawaii??), and I do think that a cruise gives you good value to see 4 different islands during one trip, I never thought of the trip as "going on a cruise", just staying on the ship for transportation/meals.

 

PoA belongs to NCL America, as far as I heard it's completely different experience.

[nwwinelady]

Since you are going on Princess next month, please know that there is much misunderstanding about "Anytime Dining" on Princess or other lines. DH and traveling companions and I now always choose Anytime and have always been able to get and request the same servers. You get the best of all worlds... sit with whoever you like; dine whenever you like; choose your Server(s); and get the same menu used in the Traditional Dining Rooms which are just like the Anytime Dining Rooms.

I hope you will have a great time!