Star/Mexican Riviera Question

[jenjes3]

Hi, husband and I love cruising. We usually sail with Royal Caribbean. Some friends of ours love the freestyle dining. Now we are thinking of sailing Mexican Riviera in October of 2006. We are thinking about Vision of the Seas (Royal Caribbean) or NCL Star... Any thoughts would be appreciated.

 

How is the Star? How is the service with Freestyle dining? how are the ports?

Thank you for your help.

 

Karen

[cking2]

My family and I had a pethouse suite on the Star last December. It was great and we enjoyed the freestyle concept. I will admit that I found the food choices on the buffet to be somewhat....how shall I say it...different. The other venues were very good, and we ate at all of them.

 

later

 

Rick

[budgetED]

I've cruised the Mexican Riviera 3 times....once on the STAR and twice on Carnival.......loved it each time, but prefer the 8 day NCL itinerary which doesn't include Mazatlan (least favorite anyway), but includes Acapulco and Ixtapa......great ports! The ship is gorgeous with great entertainment.i think i just sold myself on another cruise!!:D

 

you'll have an absolutely wonderful time!

[budgetED]

u asked about the ports.....on the STAR itinerary, Acapulco is first....the riviera's first famous port...its heyday was back in the 70s but has made a resurgence in the tourism field......lots of beautiful hotels, the cliff divers, great restaurants, beaches and all water activities.

Next is Puerto Vallarta, one of Mexico's safest cities (although we felt very safe everywhere). PV is beautiful.....u can do the zipline canopy tour, shop throughout the "malecon" (sea walk area), snorkel, beaches, jungle- there's a cool place called EDEN where they filmed scenes from Predator...u can slide down the rocks where the water pools and is very cool and refreshing...and eat/drink in the open air restaurant. You can go to Mismaloya beach. Lots to do.

Ixtapa/Zihuatanejo are not yet the tourist boomtowns that the other major ports have become, but thats exactly what I like best about it. They have great beaches in the bay and its a really nice way to spend the day shopping/eating/people watching....My wife and I decided we must go back there on a package sometime.

Cabo San Lucas is a very Americanized, gorgeous beach city....great restaurants too, beautiful scenery (Land's End, where the Pacific Ocean and Sea of Cortez meet). The beaches get paked with people...u can parasail, jet ski, glass bottom boat.etc) Good shopping too...we had a very nice lunch and spent the day at the beach parasailing (not me, my daughter), banana boat.so much to do! you'll love it!

 

I MUST GO BACK!!!!!!!!!!!

[fozzyfoz]

Hi, husband and I love cruising. We usually sail with Royal Caribbean. Some friends of ours love the freestyle dining. Now we are thinking of sailing Mexican Riviera in October of 2006. We are thinking about Vision of the Seas (Royal Caribbean) or NCL Star... Any thoughts would be appreciated.

 

How is the Star? How is the service with Freestyle dining? how are the ports?

Thank you for your help.

 

Karen

 

Hi Karen, we have done the Mexican Riviera on both the Vision of the Seas (May 2005) and just did the NCL Star last week. We have done RCCL 2x and last week was our first time on NCL but we wanted to try it for the freestyle option (which we really liked) and also for the variation is ports. We enjoyed both so I will let you know the differences for comparison:

 

- Vision ports to Cabo, Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta and is a 7 night cruise

- Star ports in Acapulco, Zihu/Ixtapa, Puerto Vallarta and Cabo and is an 8 night cruise

 

- Vision has dining room, buffet and hamburgers/hot dogs/pizza in the adult pool area as only dining options - no Johnny Rockets or specialty restaurants - and offers early or late seating options for dining room where you will sit with the same people for the duration of the cruise

- Star has 2 main dining rooms (Aqua and Versailles), the buffet, and several other specialty restaurants, diner and cafe to choose from. A few of the specialty restaurants have a cover charge ($10-25 pp depending on which one you go to) but some of the others are included in your cabin cost. On the Star, dinner begins at 5:30 and last seating is 9:30 and you can pick and choose when and where you want to eat (you will need to make reservations for the specialty restaurants and possibly the dining room if you want at a specific time - othrwise the dining rooms are first come/ first served). The diner style eatery is open 24/7 and the buffet has late night snacks (hot dogs, eggrolls, salad, desserts) from 9pm-midnight also if you find yourself hungry later at night. On several days during the cruise they set up a bbq on the pool deck mid-afternoon with ribs, dogs and burgers, etc as an additional option.

 

The casino on the Star is laid out better and has more tables, definately a less crowded feel. They also have a private room for texas holdem poker if you're interested in that. The casino on the Vision seemed to have more slots but the table game area was small and crowded.

 

Plenty of bars/clubs and standard theaters in both. Since the Vision is a smaller ship it had a more cozy feeling. We would run into the same people often and chitchat. On the Star we saw a few familiar faces but not as often since it was a larger ship. Also, Vision holds 2400 pax and Star holds 2200 pax (bigger ship but less people).

 

Both ships are fine, just depends on which ports you want to visit (and if you want an extra night on board) and which amenities appeal to you more.

 

If you have more questions, just let me know (I didnt want to make this a long book to read).

[fozzyfoz]

left this part off, sorry....

 

We love Cabo and Puerto Vallart and you get to do both on either ship. On Vision we also had Mazatlan which was interesting (taking a ride in a pulmonia was fun - sort of a cross between a gold cart and a taxi - speeding thru town with no windows and the stereo blasting). On Star we had Acapulco which is the only place we didnt like - very dirty and the only place we felt unsafe. Seemed to be the worst place for beggers as well - they'd even come in the restaurant trying to get you to buy chicklets and give them money. And many other pax were discussing their distaste for Acapulco during the rest of the week so it wasnt just us. The cliff divers is a big draw in Alcapulco but Mazatlan also has cliff divers. Zihu/Ixtapa was nice because it's not a big tourist trap - Zihu is still old style fishing village with little markets. It is a smaller (but also dirtier) area than Ixtapa which is only a 20 minute taxi ride away. There are good shops in Ixtapa and great lunch spots, and the usual hotels along the beach about 5 minutes away from all the shops.

 

You cant go wrong with either cruise (unless you just hate Mexico) but it does depend on what you are interested in doing. That being said, we are considering an Alaskan cruise (since they sail from out from our home town in Seattle/Vancouver area) and both ships do that sailing as well. We would definately pick the Star over Vision because we enjoyed freestyle better and felt there was more to do onboard that we enjoyed than available on Vision.

[7SeasLover]

We just sailed on the Star in September on her way from Alaska to the Mex Riv. We stayed in a mini suite. If I could have, I would have been a stow-away and kept going down the coast! Alas, I had to get of the ship and go to work so I could spend more money on more cruises!

 

You will love the Star. I've sailed on Royal and like them too. I would pick NCL over any cruise line provided they go where I want to sail. I love the freestyle, (I love Cagney's! Surf n Turf!) and I enjoy the overall care NCL offers. If I have occasion to complain (twice in 30 years) NCL always responds in a positive manner and always gives me either a room credit, or basket of fruit and wine, or other token. NCL is the best in my book! And not just when I'm a penthouse or suite guest, of course, that's always pleasant too!

:)

[CRUZIN TOM]

ED still trying to get your email for the pictures of our sail fish last year.

 

tom and theresa:)

[budgetED]

Tom..... email me at toughbeat3@yahoo.com

and thanx