Sun - Just got back :)

[loriandjason]

Hi all,

 

Just got back from the 2/4 sailing on the Sun. It was my 7th cruise, but my first on NCL. We enjoyed it very much. The staff was very friendly and professional. The food was very tasty and the variety was great. We will definately sail NCL again. At first I wasn't sure about the Freestyly way of cruising, but after a couple of days of getting used it, we really enjoyed it.

 

I wanted to give you some tips on this ship, in case if you're sailing on it sometime in the near future:

 

1. Bring your own hair dryer. The one in the bathroom is Ok but there is an outlet on the desk and I wish I would have brought my hair dryer. I like that because then after I shower, I can then move to the desk to dry my hair while hubby showers next. It's just seems more efficient.

 

2. We had a "superior inside room" and it rocked!! Lots of storage space -- we didn't even use all the shelves or hangers!!!

 

3. Our room didn't seem to cool down very well, so I left a friendly note for the room steward and they left us a fan and that helped tremendously. If you experience a warmer than usual room, leave the bathroom door open -- it helps with keeping the room cool.

 

4. If you meet Kadek -- he's bar server -- be sure to tell him that Jason & Lori say "hi." He is totally awesome -- remembers your name & what you order. We ordered drinks from him at the pool bar on Monday afternoon and Tuesday night, we stopped by a different bar & he not only remembered our names, but what we ordered. Needless to say, we always went to that second bar (his assigned bar for this past week) to get drinks from him.

 

5. We thought the cruise director was pretty lame. Not very funny and we thought she was kind of full of herself. Not that the CD's in the past have been a focal point of our cruises, but it does make for some good entertainment if they're good. She was not.

 

6. The embarkation & debarkation were way slick. No problems what so ever.

 

7. As an fyi -- for anyone going on the Cayo La Flora snorkeling excursion in Samana, DR -- be aware. It's not a "usual" snorkeling experience at all. The crew was Italian and only knew enough english to tell us how to get in & out of the water -- which is a long story & not pleasant. They didn't watch over the group nor did they inform us on the strong currents. The only good thing that we got out of this excursion, was a couple of hours in the water with the sun.

 

That's about it. We never had to wait in line to eat in the main dining rooms. On Wednesday night, we decided it would be fun to try a specialty restaurant. We didn't have reservations, so we went to the Italian restaurant first and they didn't have an opening until 9pm (too late for us). Then we went to Le Bistro and they got us in right away (it was about 6:45pm). The food was awesome there!!!!!!! It was good all over the ship, but I was extremly pleased with it in this restaurant.

 

Have fun on your next cruise!!!! We had an awesome time and really liked NCL --- will definately sail with them again!

[macfamily]

Thanks so much for the prompt review! Glad you had a good time. We're leaving a week from today and can hardly wait!

[Nickymjw1]

Thanks for the review! Did you go to Tortola and St. Thomas also? Any suggestions for there?

 

And what about Stirrup Cay Bay? Was it operational?

 

Thanks,

Nicky

[asoutherngal]

Did they give any explanation for not going to Great Stirrup? Sounds like you had a great time--we leave on 2/18 on same trip and are looking forward to it!!!

[lswaaley]

We are on the Sun on the 5/10 Repo from San Francisco to Vancouver (3 day) We are also in an inside, anything else you can suggest besides for the hair dryer.

[bobby'sgirl]

We were on the Sun last summer to Alaska. Enjoyed the Italian restaurant and La Bistro. Loved the Free style dining, met some interesting people. Would love to cruise again but have other commitments at present. OP glad you had a great experience:)

[harrysop]

Hi all. I also just got back from sailing on the Sun. It was my first with NCL after Celebrity '94, Dolphin '96, Carnival '02, Carnival '04. Unlike Lori, I will never sail with NCL again. I am in the hopitality field and I thought a lot of the staff was indifferent or almost rude. One of our party tried to order from the wine list an offering and was told at two different places that they didn't have it even after checking. We later saw a bottle of it at the Sports Bar and we did purchase a glass. Not just this incident, there were others. And I am not a person that wants to be pampered, but it was the way they responded to you. If something was wrong they didn't try to correct it that hard. More like, if you don't like it, go somewhere else! I wasn't that impressed with the food either, it was good but nothing jumped out at me. One night the main dining rooms had the same menu as the buffet from the night before. Pacific Heights (free but alternative) was very lacking in imagination and taste. We ate at the steak place East Meets West on the last night. One of the draws to that restaurant is whole lobster. We were told after being seated, and not before, that there was no more lobster. I can understand running out. But if that is why you were there, you might want to be told from the hostess so you could decide if you wanted to stay. The steak I had was very good, but I still don't like the idea of having to pay for better food than you have already paid for. I thought the drink prices were high, if not outrageous. The hair dryer is forced air through a flexible tube. If you have slices in your tube like mine, you lose drying power. It is also mounted on the wall facing away from the mirror with not a long enough tube. I had a balcony for the first time, and I don't think I will ever cruise again without one. Our cabin seemed small though, compared to the Carnival, especially the shower section, and I don't know if that was because of the balcony taking up space or not. Like Lori said the cruise director was lame, as were the activities. I didn't even know there was a cruise director till the last night or so. I always heard from assistant cruise director Rick or Chris or whatever his name was. But my biggest complaint was the Super Bowl. Poor quality feed, which can be excused, but the feed was Latin American. The best or second best part of the Super Bowl are the commercials. We had no US commercials at all, and the live feed was again Latin American with Spanish graphics. The audio was ABC but that was it. No cheerleaders to take pictures with, no contests during the game, not much of anything. I asked why no American feed and they said because of the area we were in had to be Latin American feed. We did Carnival last year same location and had an American feed. Again the response was, this is our way, sorry. I would think with 80% Americans on board they would be more in tune to what Americans want.

Kudos to Kadek, he was a charm. He was so happy during the cruise to get off the ship to talk to his family form Fiji, he hadn't talked to them for three weeks. Also the piano player Marcus, and the singer Don Dunn. Two of the brighter spots.

The freestyle dining is probably more of an incentive for couples. Usually groups dining together will all go at the same time so set dining times wouldn't make a difference. I think the freestyle concept puts more difficulties on the kitchen than set dining times, and I think it showed in the quality. Hope this doesn't sound like sour grapes, just expressing my opinion. Harry.

[Tinkerbell]

Were you late getting into all the ports?

[fern]

what is all this about superbowl? I presume this is like the FA cup In th UK or the top bullfight where we are in Spain, but if that is the case why go on holiday to watch it on Tv?

Surely that cannot be a first priority.

When I am on holiday the last thing I want to see is sport from home or home is where I would have stayed!!!!!

[electricron]

If you had came here first, many would have told you thay NCL usually picks up the International feeds on TV Sports. You wouldn't have been surprised.

 

And I agree, Freestyle Dining is much more convenient for smaller families. Never-the-less, large groups can be accomodiated easily, if you take the trouble to reserve a table, even at the main restaurants, earlier in the day. By the way, that's exactly what is being done with traditional dinning aboard ships, except the other cruise lines force you to do so.

 

NCL's cabins are usually smaller than Carnival's cabins. But they are usually laid out with pllenty of storage space.

 

I can't believe these three reasons are sufficent to say one will never cruise with NCL again, but to each their own....

I hope your next cruise is much better, even if it's on a different cruise line.

[iancal]

Just got back as well from 02/4 sailing. First Norwegian cruise-have been on RCI, Celebrity, Crystal, and Princess. I enjoyed freestyle very much. The food was fine. We ate in the dining room, Adegio, and Pacific Heights (twice). We really liked the service in Pacific Heights. We also liked Las Ramblas, the tapas bar. Overall, we would select NCL again-as long as the price and itinerary corresponded to our wants. We liked the entertainment. Couldn't care less about the cruise director or the hairdryer (we actually had a spare on in the closet of our balcany cabin). Good value for money, excellent embarkation and debarkation (could be the best ever of the mainlines that we have been from this perspective). We found the staff to be great-very accomodating. Much better staff team than we had on the Sun Princess last year. We took our first cruise ship excursion in Tortola. It was just OK but really my fault for not getting something arranged with a local company via the web. Cabin was fine, we were on deck 9, forward. Lots of storage space. Great cabin steward. There were a few things I would have liked to see different on the ship but I put that down to personal preference vs. criticism. Overall-great cruise. Also heard many complaints on the Samana tours-mostly lanuguage and even more disturbing safety issues. We were not on any of these tours and can only hope that someone who was will bring it to the attention of Norwegians management team. I am certain that they will review it.

[loriandjason]

To answer some of the questions from above. 1) Did they give any explanation for not going to Great Stirrup? Yes, we didn't go to their private island due to weather. When we left Miami last Saturday, it was raining fairly hard and was very windy. The waves were too high to be able to tender to the island so they chose to go to Nassau instead and made that decision in the middle of the night. 2) Were you late getting into all the ports? No, we were not late getting into any port. We didn't get into Nassau until noon or so (I think) but that's understandable being that the ship wasn't planning on stopping at this island. All other arrivals were on time. 3) Did you go to Tortola and St. Thomas also? Yes we did. On Tortola, we did the Landrover 4x4 excursion on Tortola. We thought that we would be driving but we actually rode in the back of it. A little uncomfortabe but fabulous views. At first, we were disappointed that we weren't driving, but after riding in the back and seeing how people drive there, we were just fine with riding. Very steep roads and relatively sharp turns. Fabulous views and we had a great guide. His name was "Eazy" (probably not spelled that way, but it was the way it was pronounced). He brought us to a private beach were there only 12 of us and it was awesome. We also got rum punch -- very yummy!!! On St. Thomas we just bummed around. As an fyi.....if you're looking for cheap rum, go to KMart. Not kidding!!!! We stopped into it just to see what it was like and my DH is a rum fan. He found Cruzan Spice & Cruzan Rum Creme, which we don't have available here in MN and it was cheap!!!! To compare prices, here we pay about $11 for a bottle of Cruzan, there we paid $5.

 

Let me know if you have any other questions...

 

~Lori

[Nickymjw1]

Hi, thanks for the review. Did you go to Cayo Levantado? How was that? Did you do any excursions there?

 

Thanks,

[jogr]

Harrysop, if the Superbowl viewing meant that much to you, you should have booked your cruise at different time/date.

 

Your other complaints wouldn't bother me in the least. I can't wait to cruise NCL's!

[jasondre]

Did you set your watches to Island time or did you stay on Eastern Time? I would like to know because I am trying to plan a vow renewal in St. Thomas and need to know what time to get picked up at the ship? So, if the cruise line says we'll be there from 8am - 5pm that would be St. Thomas time right? Not Eastern Time.

[NW Pacific]

When we boarded (in Miami) we were instructed to set our clocks an hour ahead. When we docked in Nassau we were told to be back on board on Ships time, not local time. So I figure we were always one hour ahead of eastern time. Thursday night (02-09-06) we had to set our clocks back an hour.

[vsp441]

It looked like the Sun was in port late in Tortola, but I was judging it by the bridge cam. Or were you actually there until 8:00 PM.

[jasondre]

When we boarded (in Miami) we were instructed to set our clocks an hour ahead. When we docked in Nassau we were told to be back on board on Ships time, not local time. So I figure we were always one hour ahead of eastern time. Thursday night (02-09-06) we had to set our clocks back an hour.

 

Ok, thanks. So, I guess 8am will be St. Thomas time. Thanks again! :)

[arenee]

Can you clear up Cayo Levantado for me? I know we tender. Do we tender to Cayo Levantado or Samana? It is my understanding one is on the mainland (Samana) and one is an island accessible by bridge (Cayo Levintado).

 

A previous poster indicated that unless you had booked a shore excursion through the ship, you could not go to the beach. Do you know if this is true every week? There isn't a public beach that can be accessed without booking an excursion through the ship?

 

Also, did you happen to notice the size of the kids pool? I have a 4 year old and a 7 year old. Both are very good swimmers. Is the kids pool more of a wading pool?

 

Any information would be greatly appreciated.

[Michaelw5]

How was the entertainment? Was there anything special for Kids. We are bringing our 4 year old. he is starting to look foward to it. I hope it is a good for him and us.

 

Mike:p

[cat55]

We actually tendered to the mainland, so I believe that would be Samana. I did notice a bridge to an island close by but we did not go there. The closest beach was Cayo Levantado Key and the other beaches are quite a distance away from what we were told. The beach was closed that day because another cruise ship rented the whole beach and only if you had an excursion could you go to this beach. We basically got off and walked around. There is not too much to see but we did do a little shopping at the open air market. Most everyone did not really care for Samana unless they had an excursion. I am sure if you toured around it would be a beautiful island but the initial mainland has quite a bit of poverty.

 

As far as the kids pool, it was pretty small but it was fresh water and not salt water.

[TWINKIE1]

Hey Cat55!!!!!!!!!!! How's Brooke, Ashly Sure Misses Her Already. Were Getting Our Pictures Back Today.

 

Vikki

[cat55]

Hey Twinkie1 (vikki) we are trying to adjust to this cold weather. I have been dragging my feet ever since we got home. Brooke misses Ashley too! We are working on downloading the pictures and will send them to you. Great to meet you and your family!

[TWINKIE1]

TRY EMAILING TO vdeets@hamiltoninsurors.com. It's suppose to warm up tommorow to about 50 not too bad. Were dragging here, can't seem to get enough sleep and I still feel like I'm on the boat, very dizzy which is causing me to have a hard time at work focusing. Ashly said this morning find out if Brooke and her family are going on a cruise next year and maybe we can all go. I told her I'll find out. Might try Royal Car.

[bubbachief]

I agree that Samana was a bust. Very little to do in the town and as someone said, Cayo Levantado was not available because another ship was there.If NCL continues to stop there, they need to work with the locals to improve the excursions. This was our 3rd cruise with NCL, second on the Sun in the last year. I was not as impressed with this trip as the one a year ago where we went to the Western Carribiean(sp). I guess the combination of weather and stops was disappointing. I feel the food was not as good as well. All in all, I would give it a 4.