Sun Review 3/22

[titangas]

Well, let me preface that I am not one to normally write a review, but I have benefited from many a review on here that I thought it was time for me to give something back to CC. This will probably be lengthy and I will try to break it down into categories.

I will try to be fair and objective. Overall it was a fabulous trip, but there were a few opportunities that could have been better.

I took lots of pictures but I cannot figure out how to add or incorporate them in the review.

 

When: Norwegian Sun - March 22 - 29th

Where: Tampa - Roatan - Belize - Costa Maya - Cozumel - Tampa

Who: My 16 year old daughter and myself (dad)

Cabin: 6001 -- cat OBX

 

Embarkation: We flew in the day of the cruise on Southwest Airlines, the flight was scheduled to arrive at 9:15 AM and actually arrived a little early. Picking up luggage was a snap and we walked right out of baggage claim and into a cab. When we arrived at the port it was a mob scene of guests disembarking (it was a little before 10:00 AM (when we disembarked it was nothing like this - I am guessing they were a little delayed). We were about 15th on line waiting for them to open up doors to go through security. After going through security we were told to sit and wait until they were ready to start checking people in. It was not long and we were the first to check in with our agent, who had some computer difficulties, but all in all a smooth process. We were told that they would probably start boarding about 11:30, so we left the port and walked around. Most of the shops were closed as it was early Sunday morning, but we stretched our legs and killed some time.

We were the first boarding group and after a quick tour of the ship, we headed to the MDR for a nice sit down lunch. My initial impression of the layout of the ship was that it was not laid out well, a little difficult to get around and felt very compartmentalized.

 

After lunch we went to cabin (will review later), switched into our suits and enjoyed the pool until it was time for the muster drill. We were able to go to the observation lounge when we passed under the bridge after we showered and before going to dinner.

 

Dining: We had the UDP from the freestyle choice promo. I do not drink much alcohol and neither my daughter or I drink soda.

 

We ate in a specialty restaurant every evening.

 

Teppanyaki - We ate here on the first and last night. Both nights the service was fantastic, the chefs routines, jokes and show were almost identical -- pretty well rehearsed. The location felt a little cramped as it was tucked in a small interior room with only the double door opening to see out of, a little claustrophobic feeling.

 

Loved the beans in the pods to start, something I have never had before and we have eaten in many different hibachi restaurants.

We did not care for the Miso soup, and I usually do, something at the bottom (tofu?) made the broth cloudy the minute you touched it.

The salad was more of a cole slaw, different than other hibachis, but very light and very tasty.

We both had the seafood (lobster, scallops, calamari) the first night - very delicious. Our table was a little dead and we conversed only with the couple right next to us.

On the last night I had the filet/shrimp combo and my daughter had the scallop/shrimp combo. We both wanted to try the shrimp as it looked delicious the first night and it did not disappoint. My daughter is a scallop freak and loved them, so had to get them again. ** Highly Recommend**

 

 

Le Bistro - We also ate hear on two nights. The second evening (sea day) and on the second to last night (Cozumel).

 

The first time we were given one of the very comfortable booths. Our server was very attentive and friendly - one of the best on this cruise.

I had the escargot as I always do (awesome) and the Rack of Lamb.

My daughter had the asparagus and the Lobster.

The the chocolate fondue for two - for dessert.

We both left very pleased.

The second go round the food was equally awesome. I had the escargot, onion soup and the lobster. My daughter had a scallop appetizer and the Fruits de Mer (seafood pastry) and we had to do a second go round with the chocolate fondue.

Our service this time was probably the worst we had all trip, not terrible, but the waitress was slow, had to flag her down to refill water a few times and on the original order she said the escargot would take some time and inquired if I would want the soup first. I told her sure, but we ended up waiting awhile before getting any food and then the soup/escargot showed up together.

 

La Cucina -- Incredible location and atmosphere. It is a long galley with only booths facing the sea or window side tables. Our server Gede was the most pleasant we had all trip. You could really tell that he enjoyed his job. The Calamari was cooked perfectly. My daughter ordered a pasta dish, but wasn't feeling great, so she left me early. I stayed and thoroughly enjoyed the Osso Bucco, that literally fell of the bone with a touch of the fork. No dessert just a nice cappuccino as I enjoyed the view.

 

Moderno -- The Salad Bar was WOW! -- probably should have just foregone the meats and eaten just from there. I did not eat a lot because I wanted to save room for the meats.

Once we flipped the card to green, the meats came way to fast for our liking and we felt rushed.

I passed on the sausage and chicken, as I wanted to make sure I had room for the good stuff. Our favorites were the pork ribs and filet. Th grilled pineapple and the fried bananas or plantains were also highlights.

No dessert.

 

Cagneys -- One word to sum it up DISAPPOINTING.

 

My daughter had the shrimp cocktail and seemed to enjoy it.

I had the lump crab salad, which was just okay.

My daughter and I both ordered Filet Mignon medium rare (she ordered the 5 oz). Her steak came out beautiful while my steak did not drip an ounce of juice as it was cut and had barely any pink (let alone red) in it.

We called over the waitress to show her that we both ordered medium rare and the difference in the two. She seemed confused and had to ask someone for help, who then agreed and took my steak back.

The second one came out borderline raw. The center was cool and red. I don't mind a rare steak and often cook it that way at home, so I didn't send it back, but it was less than rare by pretty much any standard. (we did get chocolate covered strawberries in the room the next day)

I did enjoy the Cagney's fries and my daughter raved about the roasted mushrooms.

For dessert, we had the Fudge Brownie and Oreo Cheesecake. Both were ridiculously large portions that we barely made a dent it, but they were tasty.

 

Overall, I just didn't see how it warranted a higher cover charge than Teppanyaki or LeBistro.

 

Breakfast -- Moderno is the place to go for sure. Ate there by myself one morning. They have a waffle/omelette station made to order. And of course my lox (salmon) for my bagel. The one drawback was the coffee in the portable pots sometimes were not hot enough.

 

We did eat in the MDR twice for breakfast and the service was exceptional. The Eggs Benedict were pretty bland and lacked any real taste - a disappointment as they are a cruise favorite and tradition of mine.

 

I did not eat in the buffet for breakfast other than sitting with my daughter who slept in the last sea day -- but it seemed to be the only place I felt the ship crowded.

 

Other DiningWe did not order room service at all, except one breakfast the night before on an early port day.

It came late and they did not have the strawberry yogurt we asked for, so the substituted peach. I mean peach of all flavors, pretty much the only flavor neither one of us would eat.

 

My daughter ate in the sports bar once with friends she made on the ship and said the wings were very good.

 

Lunches were in the MDR on sea days, nothing very memorable in a good ot bad way, but very relaxing, uncrowded and service was fine.

 

Cabin

I was initially worried about our cabin. I booked an OBX as a guaranty but was immediately assigned cabin 6001, which is the most forward cabin on the promenade deck. Although it was categorized as "obstructed view" the large porthole window lined up perfectly with the oval cutout on the other side of the jogging track, so the view was great.

 

We did have to close the blinds at times as during the day people could walk by and look right into your cabin. I did startle a few as they peered in only to find me staring back at them:).

The room was very quiet at night as the jogging track in that area is closed from 8pm to 8am, but we were surprised on the morning of first sea day to the pounding feet of runners coming around the track.

 

One nice thing about the room location is that it is out of the way and off the beaten path, so we did not run into many people down near our cabin. It is also very convenient to the elevators and the deck 6 and 7 public areas. The art gallery does store its works in a room that you need to pass to get to the cabin. There were several times we had to climb over boxes to get through to our room and often they would be moving art in and out and there would be literally 50-100 pieces of at stacked up around the hall on both sides.

 

The cabin was clean with plenty of storage space. I am a big guy so the bathroom was a little tight for my liking, but I knew that going in and managed just fine.

 

Edmund our cabin steward was fantastic. He knew my daughter by name on first meeting and it made her day. he brought us extra pool towels that my daughter appreciated very much. Our room was always made up by the time we went back, and always turned down when I returned from dinner and I do not usually stay out late.

 

To be continued .....

 

[theloo]

Looking forward to hearing more about the Sun!

Edited April 3, 2015 by theloo

[debnjoe1438]

Love Moderno 's for breakfast. Thanks for the review so far.

[abbyar]

Can't wait to hear more! We're sailing the same itinerary on Star next February.

[House_Atreides]

Following your review, we sail on 4.19 :)

[titangas]

 

I will finish the review with thoughts on the ship, entertainment and disembarking after I go through the port stops.

 

Roatan

 

We booked the Zip and Dip tour through Victor Bodden.

First off the port at Roatan has to be one of the most scenic and pleasant to they eye I have ever seen. Port side faced the port. There were a group of locals is costume, playing drums and dancing as soon as we began to dock and continued as we waited to be cleared. There were several of us on the promenade deck at the rail watching and enjoying.

 

After we walked off and took a picture with the local group, it was very easy to find where the local tours meet. If you go straight ahead and then to the right there is a strip with all the tours and taxi companies.

We were supposed to depart one hour from scheduled dock time, but we decided to check in with Bodden and then see how much time we had to walk around port. There were only 2 other people scheduled for the group, so we were told to stay and wait and we would get going early.

 

We were picked up by Victor himself in a fairly new four door pick up truck. It was a little tight but he was very knowledgeable and gave us a lot of local information on the way to his place. My daughter zip lined and I chose to just hang out and watch. She loved it and thought it was fantastic. We then toured his Monkey business part. We felt a little rushed and it was a little sad seeing the Capuchin Monkey's in the cages, but we were allowed in them and they were very friendly, sitting on our shoulders and eating seeds from us. They also had parrots and lemurs that you could go into the cages with and spider monkeys and toucans that you could view from outside the cage.

 

Victor then informed us that we would be taken to the beach by someone else. I cannot remember his name as he was not very personable and didn't talk much. We rode in a van that was a lot more comfortable for the 4 of us.

We were given wristbands and taken to the Bananarama resort. By this time we were hungry so decided to eat when we first got there. The menu was limited and the food was just okay. The resort had changing stalls which I used. My daughter used the restroom and said it was disgusting.

 

The weather was fabulous and the beach gorgeous. We were able to get two loungers in a nice front row view of the water. Nobody bothered us while we were laying, but if you walked along the sand, or even sat at the edge of the water - local vendors were all over you. The water was crystal clear and warm, we spent a good deal of time in the water and laying on the platform out in it. We did enjoy some fresh coconut water right out of the shell, they were 2 for $5, delicious, refreshing and the same price we paid for bottled water at the restaurant. The resort also had live music playing up on the edge of the restaurant and the beach. When we were dropped off the driver told us that Victor was going to pick us up at a specific time. It turns out a different driver picked us up and this time we were 4 people in a huge bus that probably held 40 people.

 

When we arrived at port we walked through the shops. I purchased a nice colorful beach bag for my wife at a reasonable price. I also bought a large bottle of vanilla for $4, 2 lbs of coffee (which is really good, as I am drinking a cup right now) and a few personal items that we forgot to pack.

 

I would love to get a chance to go to Roatan again and next time I think we would try and focus on going snorkeling.

 

 

[ravenjls]

Thanks for your review...looking forward to reading more!

[dgparent]

Thanks for the review - we are on the same sailing starting tomorrow - taking the same flight you did leaving RDU at 7:10 on Southwest, hopefully everything goes smoothly

[titangas]

 

Belize

 

It was a busy day with 5 ships in port.

We had our excursion booked through cavetubing.bz

 

We were at Dazzles about 15 minutes before they were giving out tender tickets. Surprisingly there were not that many people that were there and we easily got tickets on the first tender.

 

It seemed that at least half of the guests on the tender were on it because had yellow NCL excursion tickets. The tender was quick and painless and the worker who talked about the lifejackets and procedures was quite entertaining. He said that it was customary in Belize that in case of an emergency that the crew and captain get off first.

He then paused and said "just kidding, we are not Italians."

 

We exited the port area and immediately and easily found a representative from cavetubing.bz who escorted us down the street a bit. They immediately offered us a bottle of water. We waited no more than 10 minutes for them to get a group together (26). Most of our group ended up being from a Carnival ship except for 4 others from the Sun. I was cool with this as they had an earlier time to be on board, so I felt really good knowing we would be back in plenty of time. During this time we took some pictures of the sea and my daughter bought 2 bamboo bracelets for $5 from a nice woman.

 

Our main guide Roberto was the best guide we had the entire trip, he was knowledgeable, friendly and humorous. We had a second guide on the trip named Sitka, who was also good. We learned a lot about Belize on the drive.

 

Their office was down the road from the site and we stopped for us to pay and some guests needed to rent water shoes. We would return there for lunch after tubing. We had purchased very nice Sperry water shoes before the trip and they were so comfortable that we both wore them on all 4 port stops.

 

At the site they had nice changing facilities to get into bathing suits and prepare for the experience. We had camelbak water bottles that we filled with ice and water on the ship that we took with us. After getting fitted with helmets and life jackets, we were on our way. We did have two more guides from the company join us at the site. When we arrived, because we had gotten out of the port area so quickly, the parking lot was empty and we were some of the first at the site.

 

We did not have to carry our tubes and saw several groups speed past us carrying them like they were being chased. Yes, groups carrying tubes (5 or 6) passed us on the hike, because Roberto took his time, not rushing us, explaining about all the different plants and surroundings along the way.

 

Unlike most we saw , our tubes had bottoms, back rests and cup holders and were very comfortable. We were strung together into 2 groups and we were side by side (7 rows and 6 rows). Each group had 2 guides. We had Roberto and one of the ones we picked up at the site. It was nice being right next to my daughter so we could talk about the sites as we were tubing.

 

There were some points that were very shallow and we had to have our "butts up" as the guides pulled us. Once again Roberto was fabulous, at least 4 or 5 more groups zipped past us as he took his time guiding us through the caves and showing us different formations. We actually ended up 10 minutes behind the other group on our bus by the end.

 

When the cave ended we saw groups getting out and carrying their tubes, they were done. Roberto explained that because we were VIV we would outside river tube fro about 20 minutes and then just have a short walk back, We had to cross the river 3 times on the hike to the caves and we tubed to the first place we crossed the river. The parking lot was jammed pack when we returned.

 

After changing, we were back to their office location for lunch. The lunch was quite delicious, but the portions were initially small. It was one piece of chicken, beans and cole slaw. I really enjoyed the food (especially the cole slaw) and had no problem getting 2 more helpings of everything. The meal also included water for my daughter and Rum Punch for me.

 

Roberto brought 3 gallons of Rum Punch back on the bus with us for the drive back to port and was quite the hit because of it. We did pass a big "cruise ship" tour bus broken down on the side of the road on the way. It turns out we knew some people on the ship that were on that bus, who were stuck for over an hour.

 

We were back to port with over 2 hours before all aboard, so we did some shopping and bought some gifts for the family at home. We then enjoyed the pool (quite empty) when we got back on board.

 

 

 

 

[AlaskaAtLast]

Hi John,

Nice meeting you at the meet & greet. Great review so far.

 

We did the cavetubing in Belize with cavetubing.bz as well and they were fantastic. I felt sorry for the people that were carrying their own tubes. Our guide was fantastic too - stopped to describe local trees and plants and even gave us the opportunity to try eating termites. I declined but my husband said they tasted kind of minty. LOL.

[Loucat]

Great review so far and hope to read more.

Costa Maya and Cozumel yet to come!

[BudweiserCouple]

Wondering if there is the upcharge for Modernos at breakfast??

[AlaskaAtLast]

Wondering if there is the upcharge for Modernos at breakfast??

 

No charge for Moderno's for breakfast or lunch. It's kind of a hidden gem that many people do not realize has food during those times. It seems like the masses coming from the pool deck head left to the buffet instead of right to Moderno's.

[pdmartyn65]

No charge for Moderno's for breakfast or lunch. It's kind of a hidden gem that many people do not realize has food during those times. It seems like the masses coming from the pool deck head left to the buffet instead of right to Moderno's.

 

Won't be such a well kept secret if you people keep spilling the beans!!! ;)

[House_Atreides]

Thanks for that and will remember that!

Great review!

[penelopemarch]

Thanks so much for the detailed review. I was on the same cruise with my family and am "reliving" my good time by reading about your experiences. Had a wonderful experience on the Sun. I don't think the weather could have been more perfect. Thanks again.