Pride of America (is that even an NCL ship??) Review with PICS!

[willowvacay]

We are leaving cold country in a little more than 2 weeks and can hardly wait for some sunshine!!! Thanks for the review. I'm enjoying all your photos. We have a balcony cabin on the port side and are looking forward to seeing the Napali coast too. 2 off topic sort of questions. What is in that hula Pie it looks amazing, Dukes is in our game plan for our pre cruise stay. Also your Shave Ice looks good too. Ice cream in the bottom and the shaved ice on top with the syrup flavoring? Sounds Yummy.

 

I have no idea what's in the hula pie. Its a chocolate crust and a chocolate ganache on top. It has macadamia nuts in it. The center is kinda ice cream like. We love it and may have ordered it again at Duke's in Kauai :)

 

The shave ice can come with ice cream. I usually get mine without but Ive had it both ways and its great either way!

[willowvacay]

Thanks for the great review and awesome pics!!

I am so looking forward to our 1st trip to Hawaii. We are from NY so are stopping at Disneyland for 3 days on the way. I hope this helps with jet lag.

5 nights at Aulani, 1 night in Waikiki before our POA cruise:D

We choose the free night in Waikiki for the NCL promotion. It does stink that their is no drink promo!

Thanks

Kerri

 

It sounds like you have an amazing trip planned! I hope you enjoy it!!

[willowvacay]

We walked to the Old Lahaina Luau and checked in. I forgot my printed out confirmation so I was worried I would need it but no worries because they had me on the list. I had my confirmation email pulled up on my phone just in case. This luau has great reviews on trip advisor.

 

 

When you walk in they are serving mai thais and non`alcoholic fruit drinks.

 

When one makes a reservation here there is a choice to be front row or not front row. Front row is seated on the ground so keep that in mind if you are traveling with someone who has limited mobility, is elderly, or pregnant as it may be hard to get up and down from the ground.

 

 

After check in they encourage you to walk around and check out some vendors they have on site. They are selling locally made wares. There is also a band playing.

 

[willowvacay]

They encouraged people to come over and watch them dig up the pig. Clearly this was a popular thing to do. The bar was open and there was a waiter so one can either go to the bar and pick out his or her own drinks or have the server bring them to the table. They have a nice looking drink menu and my husband said all the alcohol drinks were good. The non-alcoholic lava flows were amazing!

 

 

The sun began to set and the food was served (buffet style).

 

The performances began after everyone had been served

 

 

 

After the luau ended we walked outside and our fabulous cab driver was there as promised. We hopped in and took our $75 cab ride back to the port! We had a great first day in Maui.

 

We have been to another luau in Maui in 2012. We liked that luau too. We are split as to which one is "better". I liked old Lahaina luau better. I thought it was set up nicer and the food and drinks are better. My husband liked the one at the Hyatt in Lahaina better because there were fire performers.

 

From 2012:

[willowvacay]

The next morning we woke up and were still in Maui. This day we had planned an excursion through the cruise line with a Maui Beach day. It didn't start until 1030 so we did the usual and got up and went to the fitness center and then had the back of the ship buffet breakfast.

 

We met out at the pier for the beach day excursion. This was a trip to Wailea Beach. This is the beach is where there are several fantastic Maui hotels.

 

Here we are at the pier in front of the ship waiting with the rest of the excursion crew. We rode a bus that sat probably 20 people.

 

 

The bus took us to a place in between the Four seasons and the Wailea Beach Resort (a Marriott)

 

 

 

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After a delicious lunch we headed back to the beach to our spot.

 

 

[willowvacay]

We had a great afternoon at the beach. We headed back to the bus at the appointed time (I think 330 or 4).

 

 

 

We had dinner plans at Teppanyaki which is inside the bigger Asian restaurant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

As usual, Teppanyaki was a fun dinner/entertainment and the food was excellent! I have never liked the way the green cake looked but it even tastes good! After dinner we went to one of our cruise favorites...the Newlywed game. After the Newlywed show we headed to bed to get ready for another day and a new Island. On to Hilo!!

[canadianbear]

Loving your review & especially the photos. It's been years since we were in Hawaii and your posts bring back special memories. One day in the future I hope we can do this cruise. Thanks for taking us along!

 

 

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[Retiring cajun]

We did this cruise 3 years ago! Usually cruise with Princess but liked POA for Hawaii. Great trip. Ship was fine.

 

 

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[willowvacay]

The next day we were on the Big Island in Hilo. We had a cruise excursion booked. On our normal cruises we don't usually do excursions through the cruise line. One of the reasons is we don't love being part of a herd of 50 people or so. Also we don't usually enjoy superfluous stops at random sales sites. Shore excursions guy told us this was the most basic tour of the Volcanoes National Park. We had our usual outdoor buffet breakfast. Then we headed to the theater for our assigned meeting place for the tour. When our group was called and we got onto a large tour bus. We headed out and the guide was nice and informative.

 

View of the POA from the tour bus window.

 

Like many cruise tours we had to stop at some place where they were trying to sell stuff. This time it was a candy store. It was an ok stop because they had a bathroom I could use but I didn't really need a 30-40 minute stop at a place to buy candy.

 

After the candy stop we headed back to the bus to head on to the purpose of the tour: Volcanoes National park.

 

First stop: lava tube

 

 

Then on to an overlook.

 

those tiny dots at the bottom are people

 

[willowvacay]

Then up to the Jagger Museum

 

 

 

We stopped at another steam area.

[willowvacay]

We headed back to the ship after the tour. It was a good tour. Probably not great. Had we planned for a private tour we may have seen a few more things and a little less candy shop ;)

 

Once we got back to the ship we headed to the aft pool to hang out. We got to see a rainbow!

 

 

We headed in and got ready for dinner. We had Lebistro. Oops. I mean we had "Jefferson's bistro". Their menu was the same as Lebistro. We had the Steak for 2. I had French onion soup, Ben had escargot, and we had Crème Brulee for dessert. It was just as good as all the times we've had Lebistro.

 

Ben with his escargot

 

We went to the magic show in the theater. It was a magic/comedy show and had crowd participation. It was entertaining.

 

 

After the magic show there was a lava flow drive by. As in, the cruise ship got relatively close to the shore where you could see lava flowing into the ocean. If your expectations were correct this was absolutely amazing. If you expected the giant cruise ship to pull up right next to the shore and be really close to the molten lava, you would be disappointed (we heard some people complaining about this the following day at breakfast...seriously, you gotta consider how big the ship is and how close it can reasonably get to shore). Anyway, this was amazing. You could see the lava flowing into the water and occasionally there would be big splashes of molten lava. Pretty cool if you ask me. I had high hopes of seeing lava on the big island and luckily this drive by fulfilled that wish for me. There was narration by the onboard Hawaii Cultural ambassador. We loved it. I took some pictures, but I don't have a giant zoom lens on my fancy camera. Ill post one to prove that we were there, but you cant tell much from the pic. Sorry, next time ill get my tripod and a zoom lens and try to do it some justice.

[Retiring cajun]

Great review! Congrats on baby to be [emoji1348]. We didn't have lava flowing when we took this cruise in 2015. Lucky you:)

 

 

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[D&N LUV 2 TRAVEL]

Thanks a lot for taking the time to provide a detailed review with great pics.

Looking forward to your review of the rest of your cruise.

We are soooo looking forward to this cruise in a few weeks.

 

One question with regards to curling irons. Are you allowed to bring them on board ?

[willowvacay]

Great review! Congrats on baby to be [emoji1348]. We didn't have lava flowing when we took this cruise in 2015. Lucky you:)

 

 

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Thank you so much! We felt very lucky to see the lava!

[willowvacay]

Thanks a lot for taking the time to provide a detailed review with great pics.

Looking forward to your review of the rest of your cruise.

We are soooo looking forward to this cruise in a few weeks.

 

One question with regards to curling irons. Are you allowed to bring them on board ?

 

 

I don't know the answer about a curling iron for sure but I did take a hair straightener which I think is basically the same thing and didn't have any issues.

[Sten0127]

Thank you so much for doing this review. I am really enjoying it so far. We get on the ship in 5 days, so it's making me that much more excited!

 

I'm curious about your thoughts on Kona now. The only excursion we have booked through the ship is the beach excursion in Kona. I did that to have an easy, relaxing beach day since our other days are so full and to not have to worry about picking up tender tickets. Any information you can give on that would be very helpful.

 

Thanks again for taking the time to do such a great review and congratulations on your new little one :)

 

Cheryl

[holidayhelen]

Can you give me an idea of the timing for the 'lava sail by'. Thanks

 

Also enjoying the review and the photos. Thanks

[we b cruzin]

Love reading your review. Looking forward to more.

[willowvacay]

Can you give me an idea of the timing for the 'lava sail by'. Thanks

 

Also enjoying the review and the photos. Thanks

 

 

Thanks for reading along. I think the lava thing was around 9 or 930. We went to a show which started at 730 or so and when it finished we went out to deck 6 starboard to get a spot near the rail. I was glad we walked out of the show a minute or two before the crowd because it was already crowded on the deck. It was nice because they turned the lights off so you could see better. One could see the light from the lava a long way off and it took a little while to get relatively close to it.

[willowvacay]

Thank you so much for doing this review. I am really enjoying it so far. We get on the ship in 5 days, so it's making me that much more excited!

 

I'm curious about your thoughts on Kona now. The only excursion we have booked through the ship is the beach excursion in Kona. I did that to have an easy, relaxing beach day since our other days are so full and to not have to worry about picking up tender tickets. Any information you can give on that would be very helpful.

 

Thanks again for taking the time to do such a great review and congratulations on your new little one :)

 

Cheryl

 

Thanks for following along! I should be finished with the review before you leave on your cruise hopefully. Work gets in the way some :) We cancelled the Kona excursion to the beach per the recommendation of the Shore Excursions desk man and ended up doing something totally different than what he suggested or we planned (bc what he suggested ended up sucking). It was a great day! That's next.

[willowvacay]

So the cruise has two days on the Big Island, but not an overnight. So you board the ship again in Hilo and the ship sails away to Kona. Kona is a tender port so that's something to keep in mind when making your plans. It was kind of cool because we got to ride on the life boats. We have tendered in a few ports before but haven't ridden the life boats so its always reassuring to know that the life boats can, in fact, be lowered to the water and they do work!

 

Our original plan for Kona was to do the Kona Beach day through the cruise line. It promised a beautiful beach and a relaxing day. You may remember from the beginning of the review where the gentleman at the Shore Excursion Desk basically told us we didn't need to spend our money on that excursion because there is a "great" beach right near where we tender in. We were skeptical so we checked with another Shore Excursions expert and he too confirmed that there was a beach at a hotel nearby and we would be just fine there. We took his word for it. FYI we won't be doing that again.

 

We headed down to the tender/life boat after back-of-the-ship breakfast and got right onboard. One of the latitudes rewards is a priority tender pass so that was a nice perk. Like all tenders it was a few minutes to wait to board everyone, a few minutes to shore, and then a few minutes to let everyone off in an orderly fashion. All in all I think it took about 30-45 minutes to get to shore (with loading and unloading). We hopped off the tender and set out looking for a beach.

 

The Shore Excursions people told us the beach was at the Courtyard by Marriott right in the port. Let me tell you: there IS a courtyard by Marriott in the port. However, I would not describe what is there a "beach". We have traveled all the way to Hawaii from near the east coast of the continental US. I will take a crappy beach over a day at work, but seriously??? This man made lagoon thingy is not what I had in mind for a day in Kona...a place I have never been to! Thank goodness for smart phones. I don't know what we would do without them..

 

We both jumped on the phones and started searching for nice beaches that would be nearby. Then my husband came up with a brilliant idea: Why don't we rent a car and drive around and find a beach and also see a few things!! We rented a car via the magic iphones and then hopped into a taxi to the airport. Once at the airport we had a rental car and were on our way within minutes! The taxi driver suggested Hapuna beach, and my iPhone confirmed that was the kind of beach we were looking for. We put the top down on the car and followed the phone's directions to the beach.

 

Hapuna beach is a state park. It cost 5$ to park. There are restrooms, a snack place, and a place to rent an umbrella and chairs. It ended up being just what we were looking for. The drive to Hapuna beach was nice because it covered a lot of the landscape near Kona.

 

 

 

 

We sat in our chairs and read our books and people watched and got in the water. You know, usual beach day stuff. It was a great time.

 

Some of the scenery driving back from the beach. Lava in the near fields and ocean and palm trees in the far fields. It was fantastic.

 

 

My favorite thing on the way to and from the airport to the beach was another lava tube. This one was more out in the open and it didn't have any signs or anything pointing the way.

 

 

[willowvacay]

We headed to the airport to return our rental car and took a taxi back to the port. Once there we did a little shopping in the stores around the port area and ate lunch at a restaurant overlooking the port. This served two purposes: 1. lunch because we were hungry and 2. we were able to watch the line for the tender. The line was really really long when we first got back to the port and we hung out in the restaurant until the line died down quite a bit.

 

The port in Kona

 

 

The lifeboats as tenders

 

When we got back on the ship the water was off so we couldn't get ready for dinner. We waited til the water was back on before heading to dinner. We had been out at the beach all day and really needed showers and who wants to eat dinner at a place with no running water where service staff and kitchen staff cant wash their hands or their utensils? Anyway, Cagney's let us come late and we had another wonderful dinner there. After dinner we went to the Frankie Valli show "Oh what a night" and it was really well done.

 

A night time pool picture just for fun.

 

The NCL logo on the smoke stack is different from normal NCL ships.

[trvlgrl422]

Thanks so much! Such a great review and photos. It's getting me so excited about my upcoming trip and now I know what to expect! Thanks again! Looks like you had a wonderful time!

[handbellplayer]

I am really enjoying this thread - thanks!

 

Can anyone help with a way to view the posts and photos without having to scroll and scroll right to see everything?

[kkwm]

Thanks for the review! Looking forward to reading the rest. We will be on POA in May. Curious about the cost of the taxi to the airport in Kona to pick up the rental car. Thanks!