NCL WIND review: SF to Vancouver April 27 to 30

[idreamofparis]

This was my first cruise and I'm very grateful for all the tips and info I got on this forum. Thanks, everyone!

Here's my review of the 3 day repositioning cruise from San Francisco to Vancouver.

 

Thumbs up:

• Le Bistro: exceptional service, filet mignon and chocolate fondue
  
• Jean Ryan Dance Production show
  
• Comedian-magician was hilarious—perfect comic timing and interaction with audience.
  
• Friendly, efficient multi-national crew—everyone was great!
  
• Delicious Moussaka in the Terraces restaurant
  
• Cheese Blintzes w/ cinnamon pear sauce for a la carte breakfast—ordered it twice!
  
• Chocolate dessert pastries for room service
  
• Comfy duvets on the beds
  
• Huge windows throughout the ship
  
• Freestyle cruising! Yay!

Thumbs down:

• There was no Chocoholic buffet!!!
  
• Missing the only stop (not NCL’s fault, there was way too much wind in Victoria)
  
• The Comedian on the first night seemed unprepared and not funny.
  
• Most of the food was mediocre, except at Le Bistro (we didn’t eat at La Trattoria)

Recommendations for NCL:

• Offer more organized activities on at sea days.
  
• Find ways to reduce lines for the bbq buffet--maybe have guests line up in four different lines to identical stations
  
• Post the hours of the Book Nook at its location
  
• More board games for at sea days
  
• Post contact info for the cabin steward inside the cabin
  
• Put a good map of the ship in the welcome packet
  
• Offer more fresh fruit in greater variety after two weeks in drydock in California, there was mostly melon and pineapple and rare appearances of grapes, strawberries and papaya; Sliced fruits and veggies should be available at all times.
  
• Offer hard cheeses and not so much American cheese food. As a Norwegian-American who grew up in Wisconsin, I was aghast! This is Norwegian Cruise Line, after all.
  
• Offer soft dinner rolls and other fresh breads at dinner.
  
• Offer snacks like popcorn, chips, pretzels, etc. at the bars.

Recommendations for cruisers:

• Bring stuff with you to keep you busy on at sea days—don’t count on activities being provided for you.
  
• Be well prepared for windy conditions.
  
• Pack light—really light! I didn't use half the stuff I brought.

[lswaaley]

I am on the identical 3 day from San Francisco to Vancouver on the Norwegian Sun on May 10, the Sun just went thru the Panama Canal yesterday.

 

Can you give us an idea of what the food was like in the normal restaurants. We are going to eat in the specialty restaurant 1 night and then the normal restaurants the other 2 nites.

[Ilandguy]

The Wind is in good shape for her age. She was booked fully & really cant accomodate all its passengers inside when the weather is inclemant.Way too crowded! This ship is best suited to warm sunny days when passengers are outside on its expansive decks. The buffet was very over crowded & noisy not to mention the poorer quality compared to others.Good to great food in the other dinning rooms with limited menus. La Trattoria was our groups favorite. Our group loved all the entertainment both comedians made us all laugh. The ladies in our group had some issues with the lack of toilet paper in several public washrooms at different times. There was a change in staff on this cruise so I'm sure many issues will clear themselves up with time. All staff were very friendly & helpfull. With the excellent pricing this cruise provided excellent value & enjoyment but all else being equal I chose another larger ship with an indoor solarium next time.

[Druke I]

I certainly agree with those comments about some of the ship's shortcomings.

 

We were on the Wind when she was still Windward (before the stretch job), and thought she was a well laid-out ship.

 

We were on her sister, Norwegian Dream (former Dreamward) after the stretch, into the Baltic, 5-99. We thought they had created a ship that was crowded, with poor traffic flow, and inadequate Lido eating area. They had just gone to Freestyle Dining, and we didn't think it really worked well on this ship.

 

Perhaps it was too new a concept to work well - still many bugs to be worked out.l

[scdreamer]

We were on this cruise, too. There were definitely some glitches that needed attention, and the weather wasn't the greatest - but of course that's not NCL's responsibility - however, a cruise is a cruise ... and if I'm not cooking and cleaning and going to work every day, I'm pretty much a happy camper no matter where I am.

 

We thought the ship was a little crowded inside, but probably if we could have been out on deck a part of the time, it would have been less congested inside. Again, that was weather-related, and not NCL's fault.

 

Definitely could have been better board games available for the days when no one could be out on deck - we tried to play Scrabble, and half the tiles were missing in the three boxes we investigated before giving up. The games all looked as if they were left over from someone's 1954 summer cabin.

 

As far as the meals went - we ate at Le Bistro the first night out and enjoyed our dinner very much. The other two nights we made reservations at La Trattoria (no charge) and thought the food was also very good. On the second night, the menu at La Trattoria was the same as at the two dining rooms, but on the third night it was different.

 

The staff on the ship seemed a bit harried ... we never even met our steward (!), and the waiters in the restaurants were so busy they could hardly keep up with their tables. Most were friendly, but none had the time to offer much more than basic service.

 

We thought the main buffet, located in the Sports Grill, was pretty mediocre at best. The dining area was very overcrowded, and the food didn't look very appetizing when we stopped by for lunch one day. We didn't stay, as there were absolutely no tables available.

 

At least half the slot machines in the casino were out of commission at any given time :( --- they said it was due to electrical problems.

 

We loved our cabin - it seemed much more spacious than the higher category cabin we had on Spirit last year. The ship has new carpeting throughout, and is very clean and comfortable.

 

Overall, we enjoyed ourselves on this short repo cruise, but I am glad we were not among the passengers continuing for another week to Alaska.

[idreamofparis]

Can you give us an idea of what the food was like in the normal restaurants. We are going to eat in the specialty restaurant 1 night and then the normal restaurants the other 2 nites.

 

Ok, here are some examples of the food I saw and/or tasted:

 

Breakfast buffet: whole fruit (bananas, apples, oranges), Danon(?) regular and light yogurt, unpalatable scrambled eggs (not well cooked and tasted grainy--could it have been powdered eggs?!), very crisp bacon, sausage links, fruit juices, excellent pastries (cinnamon rolls, croissants, danish, muffins), pancakes, boxed cereal and milk, fried potatos. Nothing imaginative was offered. Everything was pretty generic. Some "hot" food was not warm.

 

Pizzaria: the pizza was tasty if you got to it while it was freshly baked; hot dogs and hamburgers were fine, garlic fries smelled and looked great, but I didn't have any, salad bar was notihing special.

 

A La Carte lunch and dinner in Terraces: baked potato was ok and sour cream, grated cheese and chives were offered; Macaroni and cheese was mediocre (runny and bland) one night, but excellent the last night. (My DD is pregnant and has cravings.) Breaded wahoo (fish) was good. Flank steak with mushroom sauce arrived at room temperature, but it was replaced quickly. Soups: we had beef boullion, chicken broth with asparagus bits, and mango soup. All were just ok.

Chocolate mousse was bland and cocoa-y rather than rich chocolate. All pastries were very good. I ordered mango carpaccio one day and there was a hair mixed in. That can happen in any restaurant, though. The food in the non-specialty restaurants was not terrible, not great. Not memorable. I think that on my next cruise with NCL, I will choose a ship with more restaurants with different menus. I don't mind paying a surcharge for a specialty restaurant when the fare is as low as we paid for this trip.

 

Le Bistro: Wonderful experience! There were plenty of servers, all friendly and solicitous. The escargot was delicious. The spinach salad had an odd combination of flavors that reminded me of the smells of the farm I grew up on. The filet mignon was great, especially the presentation with the vegetables circling the steak and the sauce presented in half of a scooped out potato. The salmon was too salty, but everything else was spectacular. Don't miss the chocolate fondue. It nearly made up for the missing Chocoholic buffet.

[crhenderson]

We leave tomorrow on the Star repositioning. Can anyone tell me if they were offering discounts in the specialty restaurant the 1st night?

[electricron]

We leave tomorrow on the Star repositioning. Can anyone tell me if they were offering discounts in the specialty restaurant the 1st night?

 

Discounts at speciality restaurants may or may not happen on any NCL cruise. As soon as someone reports half price dinner specials, the very next week it seems that ship doesn't.......

 

So, once you're board, go and check it out.

[Don Haynes]

I always either bring a good book to read, or a few DVDs and a DVD player along, if necessary.

[scdreamer]

We leave tomorrow on the Star repositioning. Can anyone tell me if they were offering discounts in the specialty restaurant the 1st night?

 

On the short Wind cruise from SF to Vancouver, Le Bistro was half price the first night ... $10 for two people.;)

[idreamofparis]

On the short Wind cruise from SF to Vancouver, Le Bistro was half price the first night ... $10 for two people.;)

 

Did you have dinner in Le Bistro the first night and were charged $10?

 

Just curious, because the normal charge seems to have been $15 instead of $10. We were charged $15 per person when we had dinner at Le Bistro on Saturday night.

[scdreamer]

Did you have dinner in Le Bistro the first night and were charged $10?

 

Just curious, because the normal charge seems to have been $15 instead of $10. We were charged $15 per person when we had dinner at Le Bistro on Saturday night.

 

We were charged $10 for two people ... but we also left at $10 tip, so it was a total of $20. I am sure of that, because at the end of the cruise when we were reviewing our total charges, we had to go back and figure out why it was $20.

 

I thought Le Bistro was $10 per person on a "regular" night ... but I could be wrong. I seem to recall them really promoting the $5 per person charge on the first night. I didn't pay a lot of attention to the other nights, because we ate at LaTrattoria, and there was no fee there.