NCL Star Trip Report 2/28-3/6 Monkeys, Sloths, Dolphins, Aborted Medevac, Oh My!

[PyrHeaven]

Welcome to the review of my most recent cruise on the NCL Star 2/28-3/6.

 

A Little Background:

We are a family of 3 - I'm 28, my husband is 31, and my son is 5. This was my 9th cruise (7th with NCL). I've also cruised Carnival and Disney. We booked this cruise in December as a Christmas gift. We always tend to spend our money on vacations instead of things. Memories are much more valuable :D When we booked, we got the Pick Two Promo and chose the UBP and SDP (4 Meals). Originally booked an inside, but when prices dropped on balcony cabins about 2 weeks prior, we upgraded. We were able to keep all perks. WOOHOO!

 

Pre-Cruise:

We arrived the day prior (as always), and stayed at the Intercontinental Tampa. I was able to get this hotel on Hotwire about a month prior to sail date for $109 (including tax!). A pretty good deal. We arrived late (our flight got in around 9pm). I called for the shuttle to pick us up, and they were there within about 10 minutes. It was about a 10 minute ride from the airport to hotel. No complaints about the hotel at all. It was very clean, and well kept. The rooms had a nautical theme, which I loved and thought was quite fitting! We ordered pizza from WestShore Pizza, which was OK. Not the best, but not terrible either. We were quite tired, so retired to bed by about 11:00pm.

 

Embarkation:

The next morning, I woke up about every hour from 4am to 8am. I was just too excited to sleep! While DH and DS were still snoozing away, I checked my phone for the nearest Starbucks which was right across the street - about a 5 minute walk. I picked up some breakfast, and returned to the room. There is also a pretty large mall across from this hotel, but didn't have time to check it out since it was closed when we arrived.

 

We checked out of our room at about 10:30am, and asked the valet guys outside for a taxi. They said a shuttle was coming to take us to the port in a few minutes. It was $10 per person. This was slightly higher than the cost of the taxi for the 3 of us, but ultimately decided to go for it since the shuttle was there already by the time we were done talking about a taxi, and the taxi - was not. The shuttle driver was kind of crazy! Weaving in and out of the traffic lane, looking at his phone....I was rethinking our plan to take the shuttle!!! Luckily, we all arrived in one piece. The porters grabbed our luggage right away, we tipped them, and we were off to the cruise terminal!!

 

The lines in the terminal weren't too bad, however, I do want to point out that the Bronze and Silver Latitudes line was longer than the general check in line! Luckily, I will be Gold on our next cruise with NCL. The cruise couldn't have been too bad then, if there will be a next time, right? :) :p

 

Embarkation really was a breeze. We arrived at the port at a little before 11am, and we were on the ship by 11:30am! This is the fastest we have ever gotten to board a cruise ship, so we were impressed!

 

Here is a picture of us waiting to board:

 

Once onboard the ship, our very first stop was our embarkation photo. We did end up purchasing this photo (our one and only), and I will attempt to share later. I am currently finishing up my vacation in Florida visiting my Mom, so I'll need to get home to a scanner to get that one uploaded.

 

Our next stop was to get Alex (DS) registered for the kids club. He was the first one to register!! We were excited - we beat the rush! Later on, we found there never would be a "rush", as there were not very many kids on this sailing at all. In fact, we noticed the clientele was much older than we are used to. We thought it would be close enough to Spring Break that we would have some Spring Breakers on our cruise, but if we did, they never came out of their rooms. :p We have never taken a cruise in the winter before (we usually go in the Fall), so we decided this was a result of all the "snow birds" in Florida. Of course, this had no affect on us or our cruise at all - just an observation.

 

Off to the buffet we went!! We were sitting in the buffet by 11:50am! It was not too busy yet, which was perfect. My first impression of the buffet - I don't like the setup. Our balcony cabin was AFT, so we would always use the AFT entrance. There was only one. The second one was closed. It seems as though they keep it closed permanently. Our favorite spot to find a table and have less of a line at the buffet was in the "AFT" corner where the doors were closed. There wasn't much on the buffet that looked appetizing, but we did manage to find a few things we liked. We aren't picky eaters (my son is - but more on this later), but nothing looked very appetizing. We chalked it up to being "the first meal", ate, and moved on to explore the ship. Of course, had to take advantage of that UBP right away, and I enjoyed Sangria at lunch and Cherry Lime-Aide (Drink of the Day) as we were waiting for our room to become available. Both were pretty delicious. Note: There is 7% sales tax on drinks (even with UBP) while in port. They do have signs out at the bar when this is in effect.

 

Our rooms were ready by 1pm. As soon as the announcement was made, this is where we headed. Our room was just fine for what we needed it for. It seemed a bit smaller than what I'm used to, but did the trick! We had a note about the Zika virus on our bed. We also only received $35 in OBC from our TA, but it was supposed to be $70. I made a quick phone call to Guest Services and all was OK - we had $70, but it just wasn't printed on the little amenity card. We also ordered a chocolate cake online a month or so ago, and it was supposed to be in our room upon arrival, but it wasn't. Hmmm. Oh, well. Maybe it will be delivered later :D

Edited March 11, 2016 by PyrHeaven

[PyrHeaven]

Zika Letter:

 

Our Room:

 

 

 

[PyrHeaven]

The muster drill was short and sweet. We were in Versailles. It was literally the shortest muster drill I've ever been to - 2 minutes maybe? Fine by me!! We got back to our room, and a few minutes later heard a knock on our door. It was our room steward, Mark! We was great throughout the whole cruise. He introduced himself right away, and asked if we needed anything. The only thing we were missing (besides our cake, but I know this isn't the responsibility of our room steward) was an additional pool towel, so we asked for 1, and he brought it back within a few minutes, along with a child size life vest. He also asked us how we would like Alex's bed turned down at night, as the couch can be a "mini" bed which allows for easier access to the balcony door. This was perfect for us! Mark was outstanding throughout our whole cruise. Always greeted us by name. Alex ADORED him, and thought he was just awesome (because he was). He asked if we had gotten our bags yet, and we hadn't.

 

About 10 minutes later, he came knocking with all our bags in hand. I unpacked, then took Alex swimming at the kids pool - he just couldn't wait any longer! It was COLD (the water and the wind), so we only stayed out for about 30 minutes.

 

 

 

 

 

While we were gone, DH managed to lock the safe with our stuff in it without resetting the lock - DOH! Luckily, a quick call to guest services, and they called someone out to reset it. They were there in about 20 minutes. Of course when they arrived, DH was out on the balcony, and I had to look like the idiot that closed the safe without changing the code. :rolleyes: The officer said to me, "Now make sure you follow the instructions before you close it again". "Yes, sir"....haha!

 

About 2.5 hours into sailing, we went under the bridge. The sun was setting, so we got a few nice shots from our balcony.

[gymbomb]

Looking forward to reading more :) do you know if movies on demand were available on the Star?

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[PyrHeaven]

 

 

We didn't book a specialty dinner the first night, so the plan was to head to the buffet. We wanted a quick dinner, because Alex wanted to head to the kids club for the Welcome Aboard Party that started at 8pm. The buffet did NOT look appetizing. Nearly all the same stuff as lunch. There was nothing Kid Friendly except Pizza, which Alex had for lunch. This continued to be a trend throughout the whole cruise. I do have quite the picky eater, but it wouldn't be that difficult to throw some chicken tenders or mac and cheese on the buffet once in awhile!! More on this later.... We decided to head to O'Sheehans. No kids menu, but they did offer hot dogs, fries, and burgers. Of course my picky eater doesn't like hot dogs or burgers, so fries it is. It took 40 minutes just to get our appetizers, then another 10 for our main entrees. DH didn't get his salad until AFTER the main course. I was not thrilled with the speed of service, although I'm sure it was quicker than the main dining room. We ordered nachos, Mexican chicken sandwich, cheeseburger, chili dog, poutine, and a Caesar salad. I do have to say that my Mexican Chicken Sandwich was delicious!! Disclaimer: My opinion on food may not be the best, as I recently had brain surgery that destroyed all the nerves that allow me to smell. I have no sense of smell - zero - and therefore, my taste and opinion of food is quite altered. Many things have little or no taste at all, so when I find something a little bit flavorful, I get excited!

 

After dinner, we headed straight to the kids club to drop off Alex. I wasn't TOO thrilled with the person checking in the kids. She was lacking enthusiasm, and wasn't even acknowledging Alex when he was talking to her. He was telling her to write his name on his name tag as Alex - A-L-E-X (He spelled it for her - he's 5, so he's into spelling his own name), and she still wrote Alexander. I was told at registration that if I had iconcierge, they would take that number instead of giving a location, as we didn't know where we would be the WHOLE time he was in the kids club. When asked where we would be, I said the theater, then I also wanted to give my iconcierge number. The check in person ignored me when I said something about it, and started talking to someone else about something completely different. I mentioned it again, so she wrote it down (unwillingly it seemed). She probably threw it in the garbage for all I know -- she didn't even note whose number it was. First impression of kids club was not good (but don't worry - it gets better, and Alex had a blast!!).

 

Off to the Welcome Aboard Show we went. I always like to go to these shows to get a little taste of what will be showing throughout the cruise. It was pretty cute. I liked the comedian and LOVED the Muscle Man, Yuri. It felt like a show straight out of America's Got Talent (a winning show). I was sad to learn that we never saw Yuri again. It seems as though he was supposed to perform the last night, but overheard he had to cancel and ended up replacing it with a variety show. I'm not sure why. I enjoyed a cosmo, as well as a long island before/during the show! Beverage servers were lacking, so I went to grab my own drink in the casino (closest bar I found to the theater).

 

We went to pick up Alex from the kids club at about 10pm, and it was a success! He LOVED it. He said he had a lot of fun, and requested to stay longer tomorrow night. :) He had his face painted and all

 

When we got back to our room, there was a note outside stating we needed to head down to Guest Services to verify travel docs. Not sure what that was about. I travel with my birth certificate and photo ID because my passport is in my maiden name, and I'm too cheap to change it. My Latitudes account is in my married name, which is the reason I use my ID and BC. I took all of our docs down to guest services (including my passport in my Maiden name, just in case). I couldn't hear the person at guest services because the band was playing some loud music in the atrium. He took my docs, made a copy of my passport, then sent me on my way. I asked him if everything was ok - he told me yes. OK then.......Back to the cabin I went to retire to bed for the evening!!

 

Well, that's it for Day 1. More to Come Soon! :D

[3Fluffies]

Bah, sorry about the pizza. As a Tampa resident, I can confirm there's better local pizza options. The Intercontinental is a great hotel - I stayed there while job interviewing. The Westshore Mall is nothing impressive, so you didn't miss anything. Better to relax and put your feet up to gather energy for the cruise!

 

Looking forward to more of your review!

Edited March 11, 2016 by 3Fluffies

[PyrHeaven]

Looking forward to reading more :) do you know if movies on demand were available on the Star?

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

Hi There! Thanks for reading!

 

Movies on Demand is not available on the Star. There were about 4 news channels (CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, BBC), 1 "TV Shows" channel with a variety of different shows on it, and 2 movie channels with newer releases showing. Also, a large number of Music "Channels" and the usual "Ship Channels"

[PyrHeaven]

Bah, sorry about the pizza. As a Tampa resident, I can confirm there's better local pizza options. The Intercontinental is a great hotel - I stayed there while job interviewing. The Westshore Mall is nothing impressive, so you didn't miss anything. Better to relax and put your feet up to gather energy for the cruise!

 

Looking forward to more of your review!

 

Food was food at that hour. It did the trick! I'll need to get your recommendation next time I'm in Tampa :)

 

Glad we didn't miss anything at the mall! Thanks for reading!

[gymbomb]

Hi There! Thanks for reading!

 

 

 

Movies on Demand is not available on the Star. There were about 4 news channels (CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, BBC), 1 "TV Shows" channel with a variety of different shows on it, and 2 movie channels with newer releases showing. Also, a large number of Music "Channels" and the usual "Ship Channels"

 

 

Thanks!

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Moobaby214]

Great review so far. We will be on the star in a couple weeks.

[Keith1010]

Enjoying your report.

 

Keith

[adcc]

Thanks for the review! We are on Star in 8 days and your review and pics has been helpful especially because we have a 5 & 6 year old and it will be spring break so could be very interesting!

[marathonrunner123]

Great review. Can't wait to read the rest of it.

[wildtky101]

I'll be on the Star next Sunday! Can't wait. Thanks for the review.

 

 

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[Oakman58]

You got me hooked. I'm really enjoying your review.

[Heather1972]

We're also on the Star in 8 days. More review. More review. :D

[flgirl1087]

Awesome! Can't wait to read mode

 

 

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[Lialovestotravel]

Enjoying your trip! We take our daughters in a month!

[mykindaparty]

Saving my place, good start on the review. Patiently waiting for more.....

[KirkNC]

Thanks for your report.

[BudMan79]

This is great so far! Will be on the the Star on April 10th. First NCL cruise for myself and my parents.

 

Could you put a regular small coffee filter and coffee grounds into the in room machine?

[dinkydee718]

This is great so far! Will be on the the Star on April 10th. First NCL cruise for myself and my parents.

 

Could you put a regular small coffee filter and coffee grounds into the in room machine?

 

We'll be boarding on the 10th too! Cannot wait!

Edited March 13, 2016 by dinkydee718

[PyrHeaven]

Great review so far. We will be on the star in a couple weeks.

 

Thanks for reading! I hope to have it completed before you sail :)

[PyrHeaven]

Enjoying your report.

 

Keith

 

Thank you for reading!

[PyrHeaven]

Thanks for the review! We are on Star in 8 days and your review and pics has been helpful especially because we have a 5 & 6 year old and it will be spring break so could be very interesting!

 

Awesome! Enjoy your cruise. I'm sure you'll all have alot of fun :)