We're sorry we strayed Celebrity, PLEASE take us back!!!

[jt1120]

Oh how they try to trick you! Oh how they entice you with forbidden fruit! And now, we have erred against our beloved =X=! We have bit into the apple and now are ashamed. Why, why, WHY did we do it? Whyyyyyyyyy? :(:(:(:(

We had been talking about cruising to Bermuda this year, when, lo, appearing in the inbox is a harmless looking offer, granting us a FREE weekend cruise aboard the NCL Sky if only we book passage on the NCL Breakaway bound for Bermuda. Is it fate? NO!!! Do not be tempted by the likes of them! But no, we gave in to temptation and now wonder if our beloved =X= will ever welcome us back onto their precious gangways. Will we ever taste of the hallowed waffles again?

For us, cruising is the greatest experience in the world, so if someone offers us a BOGO, that’s a bonus, right? Not so fast. Not that everything was bad on the Breakaway, it’s just that the NCL product is not for us. In full disclosure, we’re professed Celebrity snobs, so you probably know where this is going.

It was great to at least see our beloved Summit in port next to us, taunting us with her beautiful lines, ship-shapely curves, and promises of few announcements. But we just HAD to be greedy.

Let’s talk about the NCL Breakaway. She’s a BIG ship, but I think that NCL has tried too hard to do things that other ships don’t do, and in doing so took their eye off the important stuff. For one thing, the pool is WAY too small for the gazillion people on the ship. They thought that a rope-climbing course would be more entertaining. The ropes took up the space where another pool would have been much more utilized. Other issues include the extremely uncomfortable seats in the theater. For a ship that is only a year old, the seats I sat in were almost unbearable. They felt cheaply made and not very cushy for the tushy.

Much has been written about 678, the atrium area of the ship. BIG fail here as the cigarette smoke from the casino permeates the entire area, making it most unpleasant. Yuck! Too bad they can’t enclose the casino (or make it smoke-free, but that is NOT going to happen, of which I will discuss more later). We loved the multi-colored chandelier though. We have several pictures with it in the background. Nice!

Our cabin was very nicely appointed. It was a standard balcony cabin in all aspects of the word, EXCEPT for the less-than-average size of the balcony. If you picture your average sized balcony, take the chair, turn it sideways, and that is the width of the Breakaway balconies. I didn’t measure it specifically but this was a big disappointment. And even if you plan to enjoy your mini-balcony, you get smoked out by NCL’s dated smoking policy. I’ll gripe about that later.

The food was another disappointment. Our first night we dined in the Manhattan Room, which is one of the three main dining rooms. The food was horrible. We’re trying to figure out if they make the dining room food of lesser quality so you are more apt to go to a specialty dining room where they can charge you. The food was either cold, flavorless or just unappetizing. Same with O’Sheehan’s pub, although the prime rib there wasn’t too bad, just needed seasoning. Worst food we’ve had on a cruise. Conversely, the specialty restaurants we went to were very good. Also, the buffet food was pretty good throughout the cruise, so if you don’t want to pay more for your food, you might be better off going to the buffet every night. Also, the Chef’s Table was fantastic but way overpriced. We’ve done a CT on Princess, Royal and Celebrity, and in every instance we were given a recipe book. I guess NCL doesn’t do that either, though they charge the same as the others. The chef said he’d send the recipes to our cabin, but never did.

The entertainment got pretty high marks from us, possibly even better than you know who. I don’t want to say it too loudly or else it might seal the deal and we’ll never be allowed back on =X=.

The service was just ok. On Celebrity, everyone who meets your gaze (and even some that don’t) greet you. Not on NCL and we really missed that. It makes us feel like everyone is appreciative of our patronage. It took two days before we even met our cabin steward, though on Celebrity they pretty much greet you when you first enter your cabin.

All in all, NCL doesn’t work for us. We don’t like the whole Freestyle experience. Though many people did dress up on one night, it was only about 30% of the total. Very sad. We like formal nights and I hate the feeling that I am the dressed up oddball when formal nights used to be one of the great traditions of cruising. I also have to complain again about the smoking policy. Most of the other lines have eliminated smoking from balcony cabins and wish that NCL was as progressive in their policy. I’m all for a person’s freedoms, but when it encroaches on my freedoms, I get upset.

We’ll take our freebie NCL Sky cruise but that might be the last time that NCL sees us on one of their ships. We can now only hope that =X= will forgive us our transgression and welcome us back with open arms. Maybe. <sigh>

[tteettimes]

Three things

1.live and learn

2. You get what you pay for

3. Forget it...don't sweat the regret

[miched]

If NCL is not to your liking and considering the extra cost involved for the free cruise I wouldn't go. Why waste the time and money?

 

You will still have the transportation costs, drinks, gratuities and etc. Not worth it to me epically if I didnt like it the first time on a fairly new ship.

 

🍸🍻🎂💰

[kenevenpar]

ROFLMAO:eek:

 

Not sure we would like freestyle either. Thanks for the comments.

[20pluscruises]

Welcome back from the darkside :)

[Cruising89143]

At least you tried it which IMHO is the only way to know if a cruise line will meet your needs. NCL was my first cruise 28 years ago. They hooked me on cruising. We also cruised on the Norway in 94 and then again twice a few years ago and while they were nice enough I feel that RCI and now X is MUCH better and NCL is not the same NCL that started my cruise addiction. I put NCL slightly ahead of Carnival for ships only but both of those cruise lines do not make my short list. Better options for my overall cruising needs. Thanks for the review.

[BEAV]

Open your wallets, and =X= will forgive all........

[wwcruisers]

Joel & Christine -- Welcome back -- all is forgiven ;)!

After all, you still have to go back for another cruise on that "other" line :eek: -- you've clearly been punished enough! :p

Edited June 26, 2014 by wwcruisers

[hcat]

We've had thoughts about straying but find Oceania and even Azamara beyond our budget

At times we enjoy Royal C but hated Oasis...Not sure about HAL or Princess and have enjoyed Cunard.

 

Glanced at the Norwegian site and felt it would not be for us..,, we did not like cabin decor, freestyle dining model and casual dress code..,this review adds to our relectance to book w/Norwegian

 

so for now it is X all the way...AQ and Blu....with hopes it is not changed to be like the others.

[gem lady]

jt1120,

I can certainly feel your pain. We were sucked into a NCL partial music charter on the Pearl in February. (Very expensive) It was a Sixthman production and the music was fabulous! Then there was the issue of being on the Pearl....filthy, filthy, filthy! It was really disgusting and I am really not hard to please, but I couldn't believe what a disaster this was from embarking to disembarking and everything in between. This was our first cruise on a line other than Celebrity. The best part of this cruise was that we took a little 4 day on the Connie prior to the Pearl. I don't know how old the Sky is, but if it is of the same era of the Pearl, BEWARE. Wild horses could not drag me on a NCL ship. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Just booked a Silhouette cruise for April today. Now I have something to look forward to for the next nine months.

[wallie5446]

Welcome Home!

 

In May of last year I did a poll asking if people would cruise Celebrity just for the quality of the product. http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1845752

13% said 'NO' :eek: I guess from here forward we can count ya'll in the 86% that said 'YES':)

[We're The Groupnors]

Our first cruise was on NCL in 1996, and our experience was very similar to yours, especially with regard to the food. It's nice to know some things never change.:rolleyes:

[C 2 C]

The best and most memorable cruise we ever took was on NCL to the Middle East with three days in Israel. The worst cruise experience we have ever had was the same cruise. We have never returned to NCL but memories of the ports we visited will be with us forever. (As long as I have a memory that is.)

[budisal]

Hcat ...... I think you'd like HAL. It's a little more staid than Celebrity, but the food and service is similar. We did an NCL cruise to Alaska 10 years ago and it was fine, but I think they've slipped a lot since then. Their older ships are now beginning to look quite old. We've sailed a lot with HAL and enjoyed it. We've booked a southern Caribbean cruise on Celebrity for March and are really looking forward to it. But, don't be afraid to try HAL. You might like them. PS: we like Celebrity's itineraries better than HALs.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Celebrity Cruises]

We look forward to having you back on board. Don't worry, we won't hold it against you! :p

[cpj]

Oh how they try to trick you! Oh how they entice you with forbidden fruit! And now, we have erred against our beloved =X=! We have bit into the apple and now are ashamed. Why, why, WHY did we do it? Whyyyyyyyyy? :(:(:(:(

We had been talking about cruising to Bermuda this year, when, lo, appearing in the inbox is a harmless looking offer, granting us a FREE weekend cruise aboard the NCL Sky if only we book passage on the NCL Breakaway bound for Bermuda. Is it fate? NO!!! Do not be tempted by the likes of them! But no, we gave in to temptation and now wonder if our beloved =X= will ever welcome us back onto their precious gangways. Will we ever taste of the hallowed waffles again?

For us, cruising is the greatest experience in the world, so if someone offers us a BOGO, that’s a bonus, right? Not so fast. Not that everything was bad on the Breakaway, it’s just that the NCL product is not for us. In full disclosure, we’re professed Celebrity snobs, so you probably know where this is going.

It was great to at least see our beloved Summit in port next to us, taunting us with her beautiful lines, ship-shapely curves, and promises of few announcements. But we just HAD to be greedy.

Let’s talk about the NCL Breakaway. She’s a BIG ship, but I think that NCL has tried too hard to do things that other ships don’t do, and in doing so took their eye off the important stuff. For one thing, the pool is WAY too small for the gazillion people on the ship. They thought that a rope-climbing course would be more entertaining. The ropes took up the space where another pool would have been much more utilized. Other issues include the extremely uncomfortable seats in the theater. For a ship that is only a year old, the seats I sat in were almost unbearable. They felt cheaply made and not very cushy for the tushy.

Much has been written about 678, the atrium area of the ship. BIG fail here as the cigarette smoke from the casino permeates the entire area, making it most unpleasant. Yuck! Too bad they can’t enclose the casino (or make it smoke-free, but that is NOT going to happen, of which I will discuss more later). We loved the multi-colored chandelier though. We have several pictures with it in the background. Nice!

Our cabin was very nicely appointed. It was a standard balcony cabin in all aspects of the word, EXCEPT for the less-than-average size of the balcony. If you picture your average sized balcony, take the chair, turn it sideways, and that is the width of the Breakaway balconies. I didn’t measure it specifically but this was a big disappointment. And even if you plan to enjoy your mini-balcony, you get smoked out by NCL’s dated smoking policy. I’ll gripe about that later.

The food was another disappointment. Our first night we dined in the Manhattan Room, which is one of the three main dining rooms. The food was horrible. We’re trying to figure out if they make the dining room food of lesser quality so you are more apt to go to a specialty dining room where they can charge you. The food was either cold, flavorless or just unappetizing. Same with O’Sheehan’s pub, although the prime rib there wasn’t too bad, just needed seasoning. Worst food we’ve had on a cruise. Conversely, the specialty restaurants we went to were very good. Also, the buffet food was pretty good throughout the cruise, so if you don’t want to pay more for your food, you might be better off going to the buffet every night. Also, the Chef’s Table was fantastic but way overpriced. We’ve done a CT on Princess, Royal and Celebrity, and in every instance we were given a recipe book. I guess NCL doesn’t do that either, though they charge the same as the others. The chef said he’d send the recipes to our cabin, but never did.

The entertainment got pretty high marks from us, possibly even better than you know who. I don’t want to say it too loudly or else it might seal the deal and we’ll never be allowed back on =X=.

The service was just ok. On Celebrity, everyone who meets your gaze (and even some that don’t) greet you. Not on NCL and we really missed that. It makes us feel like everyone is appreciative of our patronage. It took two days before we even met our cabin steward, though on Celebrity they pretty much greet you when you first enter your cabin.

All in all, NCL doesn’t work for us. We don’t like the whole Freestyle experience. Though many people did dress up on one night, it was only about 30% of the total. Very sad. We like formal nights and I hate the feeling that I am the dressed up oddball when formal nights used to be one of the great traditions of cruising. I also have to complain again about the smoking policy. Most of the other lines have eliminated smoking from balcony cabins and wish that NCL was as progressive in their policy. I’m all for a person’s freedoms, but when it encroaches on my freedoms, I get upset.

We’ll take our freebie NCL Sky cruise but that might be the last time that NCL sees us on one of their ships. We can now only hope that =X= will forgive us our transgression and welcome us back with open arms. Maybe. <sigh>

 

I also strayed from celebrity and went on NCL Getaway and it was one of the best cruises I have ever been on. Ate at the specialty restaurants every night and the food was excellent. Also the entertainment was the best I've seen in quite a while. I also enjoyed the free style concept. Everyone is different and I have many good times on Celebrity and I would cruise with them again. It was something different on NCL and the ship was beautiful and eating on the waterfront every night was also a nice experence. I also would cruise with them again. All the cruise lines have dummy down the food in the MDR and Celebrity is no different. There MDR food is nothing like it once was and for a decent meal you have to go to there specialty restaurents. In the future your going to see more pay for restaurants on all the cruise lines.

[awhfy]

Our very first cruise was on the SS Norway, we enjoyed the total experience, hated the tendering, didn't know any better about the smoking. Then we discovered Celebrity & felt totally at home. Living in Colorado we don't cruise as much as we'd like to, but look forward to every second on a Celebrity ship. These next 8 months better hurry up!

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Scrappytraveller]

It amazes me how so many people think different = bad.

 

NCL's big ships have a lot of positives, and Celebrity's S class have a lot of positives. Both have negatives as well, though the cheerleaders for each line won't admit them.

 

I agree that NCL's big dining room is not great, but their (also free) smaller one is quite good. The select MDR on my last 2 celebrity cruises have been very disappointing. NCL has a lot more choice (with a bigger variety of price points) of specialties though.

 

Just depends on what matters to you most. If you spend your cruise comparing and looking for negatives, well...

 

(P.S. The smoking rules on NCL are definitely behind the times, Celebrity does win hands down on that one.)

[WestLakeGirl]

Agree, the smoking policy trumps everything

[Cruising89143]

It amazes me how so many people think different = bad.

 

NCL's big ships have a lot of positives, and Celebrity's S class have a lot of positives. Both have negatives as well, though the cheerleaders for each line won't admit them.

 

I agree that NCL's big dining room is not great, but their (also free) smaller one is quite good. The select MDR on my last 2 celebrity cruises have been very disappointing. NCL has a lot more choice (with a bigger variety of price points) of specialties though.

 

Just depends on what matters to you most. If you spend your cruise comparing and looking for negatives, well...

 

(P.S. The smoking rules on NCL are definitely behind the times, Celebrity does win hands down on that one.)

 

Different can be bad if you do not enjoy it. While each cruise line may have negatives it all comes down to what one enjoys in an overall cruise experience. It's obvious that the OP enjoys X much more.

[deelastcre]

We took NCL up on a good balcony deal on Epic. It turned out to be one of the most enjoyable cruises for us. I didn't like the service or the smoking policy, but my tiny balcony cabin, entertainment, and specialty restaurant meals were to my liking. My husband still talks about how much he enjoyed that cruise and the food. I think that he forgot that we ate in specialty restaurants four out of the seven nights. They were priced more reasonably than the X restaurants.

[ChasK]

For what it's worth, we've had two very enjoyable NCL cruises, both on ships much smaller than the Breakaway (the Dawn and Star). In fact it was the largeness of the Breakaway that resulted in us being booked on our first Celebrity cruise, also to Bermuda, on the Summit. The truth is our experience on both NCL trips was so good, we are hoping that Celebrity will be at least similar; based on this thread, I'm feeling good about the prospects.

-Charlie

[swedish weave]

We all have different likes and dislikes, but over the years, I have found that the name painted on the side of the ship doesn't necessarily make it good or bad. Pre-determined opinions have much more effect on your enjoyment of the cruise than the actual ship or service.

 

I had one unpleasant experience on Celebrity and haven't needed to go back. Over 40 cruises on NCL and 17 on Princess have all been pleasant, so that is where I look for my next cruises.

 

All cruisers make the crew and other passengers happy.... Some by coming --- Some by leaving !!! I hope I made those on Celebrity happy !!!!

Edited June 26, 2014 by swedish weave

[Cruising89143]

Agree, the smoking policy trumps everything

 

I agree. It's nice not having to deal with smoke in the casino.

[Christine Frances]

We took NCL up on a good balcony deal on Epic. It turned out to be one of the most enjoyable cruises for us. I didn't like the service or the smoking policy, but my tiny balcony cabin, entertainment, and specialty restaurant meals were to my liking. My husband still talks about how much he enjoyed that cruise and the food. I think that he forgot that we ate in specialty restaurants four out of the seven nights. They were priced more reasonably than the X restaurants.

 

What did you think of the Epic bathroom?