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Getaway-Report card- Jan 15-22. Western Caribbean

Manbo

By Manbo,
in Norwegian Cruise Line

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Manbo Great Review Rare

Manbo

Posted
Posted

Food Grade A

By far the best food we ever had on NCL. We sailed with first time cruiser friends and they were also very impressed with the food. La Cucina was our only specialty restaurant, all other dinners were at either the Tropicana Room, Savor or Taste. We loved them all.

Condition of the Ship A

Everything was very clean and in good repair. This was the first cruise where I experienced public restroom doors being propped open. I think it is a good idea! Reduced spread of germs!

Entertainment B

We loved Burn the Floor, Million Dollar Quartet and the Comedian Scott Henry. Sabor Latino was great, as was Alis & Pedja. Howl at the Moon was good, but it was more about the money and less about the music. It got old pretty quickly. We really enjoyed Island Notes and Aliah Sheffield but they both need to improve their connection with the audience, however they are very talented and we were frequently at their shows.

Check In C

We went through the platinum line, and were on board within 30 minutes of arrival. It took our friends about 1 hour.

Service D

It was difficult to get a drink and generally I would spend way too long standing at a bar hoping to get waited on. Extra hard to get a drink at Spice H2O. Wait staff was somewhat slow at every meal. Our tables were often out of creamer, water, butter, etc.

The safe in our room was broken when we came aboard. It took 3 days to even get someone to look at it. Our friends never got their disembarkation flyer and as rookies, they needed it! Our room steward was pretty forgetful and if you tried to call him, it was frustrating as you couldn’t leave a voice mail.

At two ports, there was no washy-washy as you came aboard which I thought was odd.

It seems that the staff is overworked and spread too thin. Probably the least friendly staff we encountered.

The ship D

This is probably our least favorite NCL ship. The pool area is way too small and as a result, very overcrowded.

Spice H2O didn’t have the small pool like on the Epic and we were disappointed. Instead they have a silly water feature which nobody used.

The entire ship seemed narrow to me. It was difficult to walk through the buffet area and O’Sheehan’s.

Our balcony was about 4’ deep, way too small. In Cozumel, we were docked right across from the Dawn and you could see their balconies were considerably deeper and more inviting.

 

Disembarkation F

A complete zoo. We did easy walk off and headed for the gangway by 7:45 and it was after 9:00 before we got off the ship. While waiting in these long lines, the cruise director continued to make disembarkation announcements releasing additional passengers to leave the ship. Our friends, who had a forward cabin had a harder time and stood in a mass of angry passengers from 7:45 until 10:00 AM, much of the time stuck inside an open elevator as they could not move off the elevator due to the mass of passengers trying to get off the ship. It was total chaos. With only a few crew members on hand to try and manage this process, no signage, and announcements which were not broadcasted into the cabins, it was too difficult to know where to get off the ship.

It was very disappointing way to end a great week.

 

Overall C

My wife and I had a great time and we would sail an “Away” class again, but it would be our last choice. I would never recommend this ship to a first-time cruiser.

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NUPDCOP

NUPDCOP

Posted
Posted

Great review to hear - sounds like you are down to earth people and I really think this is what more people need to see for reviews - yea I get it we spends lots of money on these trips and want everything to be great - but sometimes they just are not. We have to make the best of them and go from there.

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www3traveler Holiday Sharing Rare

www3traveler

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Posted
It seems there have been many complaints about the debarkation process recently. NCL needs to get its act together. Not a good last memory for a vacation!

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Most of the time problems with debarkation are in the terminal with the Custom people. Norwegian has NO control of what is happening inside the terminal.

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zqvol

zqvol

Posted
Posted (edited)

The disembarkation problems are all caused by the passengers. Everyone wants off right now, and they all start lining up early. With a little patience and after a leisurely breakfast there is no problem getting off. It is that way on every ship, the problems seem worse on the "away" class ships because they are so big. If you want to fix the problem you have to make some changes.

 

 

  • Do away with self walk off.
  • Stagger the times
  • Delay boarding of the next cruise until 1:00 at the earliest
  • Delay sail away by a couple of hours.

If they do these four things disembarkation all of a sudden becomes much smoother.

Edited by zqvol
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Dina7

Dina7

Posted
Posted

NCL really needs to get its act together with disembarkation on their Away class ships. This is the common complaint that I read about in many reviews. Blaming it on customs being backed up is NOT an excuse. With the large number of passengers trying to disembark, NCL is most certainly aware that it backs up. They need to stagger the passengers more or fix their disembarkation procedure period! Not looking forward to this part of my upcoming Breakaway cruise, that's for sure.

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BostonGal35 Great Review Rare

BostonGal35

Posted
Posted

Getaway is our least favorite ship. we will never sail her again. We said we would not sail Escape either, for fear it would be the same, but now that she's coming to NYC, we may end up trying her.

 

odd, becuase we really like the Breakaway. But service was the biggest complaint for us on Getaway.

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packer99

packer99

Posted
Posted
The disembarkation problems are all caused by the passengers. Everyone wants off right now, and they all start lining up early. With a little patience and after a leisurely breakfast there is no problem getting off. It is that way on every ship, the problems seem worse on the "away" class ships because they are so big. If you want to fix the problem you have to make some changes.

 

 

  • Do away with self walk off.
  • Stagger the times
  • Delay boarding of the next cruise until 1:00 at the earliest
  • Delay sail away by a couple of hours.

If they do these four things disembarkation all of a sudden becomes much smoother.

 

Totally agree with this. We were on the Escape. We picked a very late afternoon non-stop flight. We had a leisurely breakfast and walked off about 9:15-9:30. And we had our bags out the night before so we had was carry on. So much less stress.

 

I believe too its the impatience of people. You really think the process will go fast with 3500 of your closet friends, with the majority also carrying bags?

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UnaPalomita

UnaPalomita

Posted
Posted
It seems there have been many complaints about the debarkation process recently. NCL needs to get its act together. Not a good last memory for a vacation!

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

 

Legit! We are doing a Breakaway ship Sunday for the first time. Why is de-embarking so awful compared to the Jewel/Gem ships?? We were going to do self walk off but maybe waiting for a color and the last grouping is a better idea??

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UnaPalomita

UnaPalomita

Posted
Posted
This ship is "narrow", and I swore I wouldn't sail her again ... and yet, here we are. Booked for next May :D

 

I've been looking at some RC trips, but they don't offer the same great itineraries from NYC! I guess I am stuck with NCL too :D:D That is unless we start flying to Miami..

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Luma001

Luma001

Posted
Posted
Food Grade A

By far the best food we ever had on NCL. We sailed with first time cruiser friends and they were also very impressed with the food. La Cucina was our only specialty restaurant, all other dinners were at either the Tropicana Room, Savor or Taste. We loved them all.

Condition of the Ship A

Everything was very clean and in good repair. This was the first cruise where I experienced public restroom doors being propped open. I think it is a good idea! Reduced spread of germs!

Entertainment B

We loved Burn the Floor, Million Dollar Quartet and the Comedian Scott Henry. Sabor Latino was great, as was Alis & Pedja. Howl at the Moon was good, but it was more about the money and less about the music. It got old pretty quickly. We really enjoyed Island Notes and Aliah Sheffield but they both need to improve their connection with the audience, however they are very talented and we were frequently at their shows.

Check In C

We went through the platinum line, and were on board within 30 minutes of arrival. It took our friends about 1 hour.

Service D

It was difficult to get a drink and generally I would spend way too long standing at a bar hoping to get waited on. Extra hard to get a drink at Spice H2O. Wait staff was somewhat slow at every meal. Our tables were often out of creamer, water, butter, etc.

The safe in our room was broken when we came aboard. It took 3 days to even get someone to look at it. Our friends never got their disembarkation flyer and as rookies, they needed it! Our room steward was pretty forgetful and if you tried to call him, it was frustrating as you couldn’t leave a voice mail.

At two ports, there was no washy-washy as you came aboard which I thought was odd.

It seems that the staff is overworked and spread too thin. Probably the least friendly staff we encountered.

The ship D

This is probably our least favorite NCL ship. The pool area is way too small and as a result, very overcrowded.

Spice H2O didn’t have the small pool like on the Epic and we were disappointed. Instead they have a silly water feature which nobody used.

The entire ship seemed narrow to me. It was difficult to walk through the buffet area and O’Sheehan’s.

Our balcony was about 4’ deep, way too small. In Cozumel, we were docked right across from the Dawn and you could see their balconies were considerably deeper and more inviting.

 

Disembarkation F

A complete zoo. We did easy walk off and headed for the gangway by 7:45 and it was after 9:00 before we got off the ship. While waiting in these long lines, the cruise director continued to make disembarkation announcements releasing additional passengers to leave the ship. Our friends, who had a forward cabin had a harder time and stood in a mass of angry passengers from 7:45 until 10:00 AM, much of the time stuck inside an open elevator as they could not move off the elevator due to the mass of passengers trying to get off the ship. It was total chaos. With only a few crew members on hand to try and manage this process, no signage, and announcements which were not broadcasted into the cabins, it was too difficult to know where to get off the ship.

It was very disappointing way to end a great week.

 

Overall C

My wife and I had a great time and we would sail an “Away” class again, but it would be our last choice. I would never recommend this ship to a first-time cruiser.

 

Couldn't agree more with your review. We had an awful time when disembarking, barely made our flight home, and our flight was after 12 noon.

The food was very good but the bars overcrowded. One thing I noticed was that the crew was very chatty among themselves, and would make you wait until they were finished talking. No fun at all.:(

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KarimaJ

KarimaJ

Posted
Posted
The disembarkation problems are all caused by the passengers. Everyone wants off right now, and they all start lining up early. With a little patience and after a leisurely breakfast there is no problem getting off. It is that way on every ship, the problems seem worse on the "away" class ships because they are so big. If you want to fix the problem you have to make some changes.

 

 

  • Do away with self walk off.
  • Stagger the times
  • Delay boarding of the next cruise until 1:00 at the earliest
  • Delay sail away by a couple of hours.

If they do these four things disembarkation all of a sudden becomes much smoother.

 

I'm not so sure about that. We took a late color tag since we had lots of time and even waited beyond that color since it was such a cluster. We just sat in one of the lounges and waited. The limited amount of water/juice that they had for people went fast and they never refilled the pitchers, not sure why. I heard from other that self walk off was awful too.

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Manbo Great Review Rare

Manbo

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Totally agree with this. We were on the Escape. We picked a very late afternoon non-stop flight. We had a leisurely breakfast and walked off about 9:15-9:30. And we had our bags out the night before so we had was carry on. So much less stress.

 

I believe too its the impatience of people. You really think the process will go fast with 3500 of your closet friends, with the majority also carrying bags?

 

The information flyer handed out the night before directed ALL walk-offs to be off the ship by 8:30!

I have seen college football stadiums clear out easier then the Getaway!

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Manbo Great Review Rare

Manbo

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Where does the line for disembarkation start? On which deck? We have a fairly early flight out of FLL (11:50) and knew we would have to get in line early to get off as quickly as possible.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

 

I believe deck 7, same deck as O'Sheehans.

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Manbo Great Review Rare

Manbo

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Since we are staying an extra night in Miami, I guess we will wait for most of the madness to subside before attempting to get off the ship. Where could we hang out as a group in the meantime? What are the breakfast options?

 

Savor was open for breakfast, not sure about the buffet.

I would wait outside if possible.

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