Another 11/5 Jewel Review

[kuchick]

I've been reading with interest everyone else's reviews, but I thought I'd add my thoughts as well.

 

Embarkation: Easy enough. We waited about 45 minutes to an hour, I'd say, after we arrived at about 1:20. It was about the wait I'd expect with everyone trying to get on a cruise ship.

 

The Cabin: We were in 8621, the last cabin on the end on the starboard side. We had a picture window, which I was happy about. The cabins are pretty good-sized. There was certainly adequate room for my husband and me and more than enough storage space (although we seemed to be light packers compared to most people we saw!)

 

The Cabin Steward: Our room was kept very clean and neat and we were initially very impressed with our steward and his assistant. However, one morning we left for breakfast and then returned a few minutes later because we forgot something. When we got to the cabin, the door was left ajar, but no one was inside. I looked up and down the halls and around the corners, but our steward was nowhere to be found. This was very worrisome to my husband and me. Our valuables were in the safe, of course, but we still didn't like that any random person could have just walked into our room and taken whatever they wanted. We saw our steward and others leave other cabin doors ajar while they popped around the corner or whatever numerous times. Obviously this makes things more convenient for them, but it seemed to be careless to us. We alerted the reception desk, but I'm not sure what was ever done about it.

 

The Shows: We enjoyed most of the shows. The Jean Ann Ryan company was great. We really enjoyed the Band on the Run show; Le Cirque Bijou a little less. The dancers/contortionists in the Bijou show are wonderful, though! I can't imagine how they do that. My husband and I joked that they must do nothing else on the ship except work out, not eat, and perform the shows! He developed a little crush on a couple of the dancers. Very good looking girls! Edge, a general entertainer type, was quite fun. Charles Bach, the magician, wasn't so great. Pretty cheesy. The crew show was fun. Some duds, some great ones, plus the "debut" of Fountains. I'll leave that as a surprise for those of you travelling on upcoming cruises.

 

The Activities: Frankly, our favorite activity was napping, so I can't say a lot about this. But we did do the team trivia, which was fun. Almost won! We went to the casino for about 5 minutes, lost and then won it back, so we decided to walk away even steven. The dailies always had a lot of things going on, but most didn't really appeal to us. I will say that they said there were several hundred children on board, and we hardly ever saw any, so the kids' program must be great! We did enjoy watching karaoke. There were some real characters partcipating in that. In case the main perpetrator is on these boards, I won't mention his name, but there was one passenger who was killing the whole thing with his self-appointed status as master of karaoke.

 

The Cruise Director Staff: We were a little confused because for the first few days, Kanani was on the PA system introducing herself as the cruise director, and then Mike showed up and called himself the director. But then we realized that Mike was indeed the CD and Kanani was assistant CD or whatever. I saw in someone else's review that they hardly ever saw the staff, and I don't know where that person was...We weren't very involved at all, and we were still able to put together several faces and names...Kanani, Paul, Mike, and my husband's favorite, Chelsea.

 

The Ports: We didn't arrange any excursions in San Juan. We wanted to leave one open for exploration. We walked around the old part of downtown quite a bit, looking for souvenirs, etc. We found an Internet cafe where it was 20 minutes for $2. We found similar deals at the other ports. My advice would be to skip the Internet cafe on board and just wait for the ports. Unless it's an emergency, we found that most e-mail checking could wait. (Or in my husband's case, fantasy-football-move-making.) We ate at a little cafe in SJ that was rather forgettable.

 

In Antigua, we did the Jeep excursion ($69). It turned out to be more of a SUV excursion, except for our vehicle which was benches in the back of a pickup truck. It sounds more uncomfortable than it really was. In fact, we were in the best vehicle of all of them, since ours was open air. The tour takes you through old sugar cane plantations. Our tour guide, Ira, was great and told us a lot of interesting stuff about the island. We got some island fruit and some Wadadli beer...the beer of Antigua! After the tour, we ate at Hemingway's restaurant, which is on the second level of a building near the main shopping area. Go check it out! Service was slow (island time!), but they were apologetic and took care of our beers (more Wadadli!). The jerk shrimp salad is TO DIE FOR! It was seriously the best thing I ate the whole cruise. Which is not to say the food on the ship wasn't good. But this was just really, really, really good salad. We really liked our Jeep excursion and recommend it to all. It's pretty bumpy, though, so bear that in mind if you have back/neck issues or are pregnant.

 

In St. Thomas, we did the Champagne Catamaran and Snorkel ($69). We pre-booked this and the Jeep excursion via the website and we found that very convenient. The tour takes you from St. Thomas to St. John, where you snorkel and swim to the beach. If you don't want to snorkel, they have a little boat that they can take you straight to the beach on. We really enjoyed the snorkeling here. Lots of interesting fish. Jellyfish, too, though, so look out! On the way back, they go a little slower so you have time to enjoy the food and drinks and scenery. The crew of the boat were great, but I don't remember their names, unfortunately. This was the highlight of the cruise for us, and we highly recommend this excursion.

 

Great Stirrup Cay didn't really excite us that much. We opted to wait until all the tender ticket holders had made their mad dash, and ended up with cold food from the buffet. We found a less populated area to sit on the beach, but it paled in comparison to the beaches of Antigua and St. Thomas, so we were a little let down.

 

The Food: Generally, I would say the food was good. On the advice I had seen here, we booked reservations for the fee-based specialty restaurants as soon as we got on board. We literally stumbled upon the reservation area in Tangos when we were going to our room, so we just decided to make it. We did 6 p.m. reservations for each night since it was half price. Why not? We did Le Bistro Sunday night, Chin Chin Monday night, and Cagney's Friday night. We tried to "freestyle" it and just walk into Mama's on Tuesday night, but to no avail. We made a reservation at 9 for Saturday night instead. We also tried Tango's, but it was full for the night too, so we made reservations for Wednesday night at 8:30 and ate in the main dining room.

 

Le Bistro was great. Couldn't get my husband to try escargot, but we really enjoyed everything else. They still had fondue on the menu, so we got to enjoy that. Yummy! Our filets were both delicious. No problems there at all. The caesar salad was a problem though. It was available in every dining room, buffet and restaurant on the ship, and it was terrible across the board. The dressing is flavorless, and you can tell they leave it around, because it always showed up slimy, soggy and room temperature. I gave up on ordering it.

 

Chin Chin is also great! We liked it so much that we went back and booked it for Thursday night again. Try the chinese chicken salad (liked this one so much, I got the recipe for the dressing!), the duck appetizer, the teriyaki salmon, the peking duck, the lo mein and the singapore noodles. All great! Joy was our server the first night and was so nice. We wanted to go to the show, so we said we'd skip dessert, but she insisted we come back and have dessert after the show, so we did.

 

The Main Dining Room (Tsar's, in this case) was a disappointment. Our server was pretty bad...very slow and brought us the wrong dish a couple different times. My pasta puttanesca was good, but my husband didn't enjoy his always-available chicken. He said it seemed like it had been "available" since the night before. We didn't enjoy the main dining room at all and wished we had just gone to Blue Lagoon.

 

Blue Lagoon was a good option when you didn't want to do the buffet. We ate a lunch and a breakfast there. Both were good.

 

Tango's was pretty good, but also pretty bland. Not really one of our favorites. I had fajitas and my husband had a carnitas burrito, which were both tasty. With a little tweaking, this could be as popular as Mama's.

 

I was really looking forward to Cagney's, but left a little let down. We had clam chowder and crab cakes, which were both good, but nothing spectacular. My husband had the t-bone and I had lamb...both were good but were rare at one end and medium well at the other. Maybe a faulty grill? Service here was very good. The cheesecake and chocolate fantasy desserts were both very tasty.

 

Mama's was pretty darn good. My husband didn't like his pizza (very soggy), but I loved my pasta, and we both loved the antipasti cart, the calamari and the bread, olives and bruschetta topping they put out on the table. We eschewed dessert here, as we were too full.

 

We did the Great Outdoors only twice. We just aren't buffet people. However, I did fall in love with these cute little tuna sandwiches they have.

 

Disembarkation: We did the Express Disembarkation and it was so great! Quick and easy! Actually, a little too quick and easy. We had so much time at the airport afterward that we didn't know what to do with ourselves. Oh well...better to be early than late!

 

Overall: In general, a cruise is what you make it, and we enjoyed ours because we made it relaxing. We weren't really there to do a million things. Just some things and relax the rest of the time. I can see where the Jewel may be lacking for some people who like to do things every minute. The crew was very friendly, in general, if not a little wet behind the ears, but I did hear that there were quite a few new crew members on board. One thing we did not like at all was the pressure to purchase alcohol. We aren't big drinkers, especially when it is as pricey as NCL's drinks are. A few times we went to events like the Star Seeker (guest talent competition) and didn't want a drink and received a few dirty looks from servers. I just felt like that was out of line. There are many reasons that a person would not drink on a cruise, and I feel that those people should be respected and not feel pressured. But that was just a minor thing. Overall, we had a great time!

 

I'm happy to answer any questions. Sorry for the long-winded post!

[patches123]

Great Review! I appreciate the time you took to be so detailed. We sail on 12/3 and are very excited. I am going to print your review as we sound alot like you in things we like and don't like.

[Cruisin' Patty]

Thanks for reviewing so quickly, we go out Nov. 26th.

[DrWally]

Thanks for a very, very helpful review and the time and effort. I will be doing my best after our cruise also. It's so useful to have up to date information as the crew, ship, weather, etc can change so frequently.

 

Wally

[melissa89n]

Great, great, GREAT review! Thanks so much for posting it!!!

[Scotch]

Thanks for the review. I keep forgetting to ask some questions on the other recent review threads -- I remember now!

 

1) Was the half price cover specials only for dining by 6 pm? I've read some older posts where people mention 6:30 as the last time (as that would be our preferred time to eat).

 

2) Were the evening shows at 7:30 and 9:30 pm each night?

 

Thanks!

[Cosmopolitan]

Great review...pros and cons.

 

Thanks for posting:)

[packercruising]

Sure wish I could write comprehsive reviews like that! Great post! :) Could some of the negs be due to it being the first run on this itinerary?

[kuchick]

Scotch:

 

1) The Freestyle Daily said that 5:30 and 6:00 seatings were the only two that offered the two for one discount.

 

2) Yes, the shows were at 7:30 and 9:30. We preferred the 7:30 shows because they were less crowded and you didn't have to get there as early.

 

packercruise:

 

Yes, I'd say that some of the less positive issues were because this was the first sailing of this itinerary for the Jewel this fall. The kinks will work out, I'm sure.

[ute_fan]

Nice review. We were on the same sailing. I agree with you -- my favorite activity was napping! I had the worst time staying awake on this cruise -- mid-morning nap, afternoon nap, and often an after dinner nap before the show. There's something SO relaxing about the motion of the ship ;) .

 

I'm also in agreement with your comments on the service. It wasn't great on this cruise, but I think it will improve. It sounded to us like there were two different factors -- one being the first sailing of this itinerary this season, and the other being the number of new crew on the ship. One of the waitress told us 122 new crew members joined the ship in Miami. I think the total crew is somewhere about 1300 -- so about 9% of the crew was new this week. Many of the previous crew have been assigned to bring the Pearl into service, and I'd say there was a definite learning curve going on.

[amjdcm]

I enjoyed your review. I will print it and read it to my wife. We walk every evening, and talk about the cruise. I argee with you, a cruise is what you make of it, and my wife and I are very laid back individuals, so we should be fine with the ship.

 

You said that the dinner reservation desk is located at tango's, I thought it was at the front desk. Can you clarify for me.

 

THanks again for the excellent review.

[flvol77]

I enjoyed your review. I will print it and read it to my wife. We walk every evening, and talk about the cruise. I argee with you, a cruise is what you make of it, and my wife and I are very laid back individuals, so we should be fine with the ship.

 

You said that the dinner reservation desk is located at tango's, I thought it was at the front desk. Can you clarify for me.

 

THanks again for the excellent review.

 

Its at Tango's...they had all the menus for all restaurants so you could check them out...the line was small maybe 4 people when we went...of course that was one of the first things we did.

[kuchick]

flvol77 is right, it is indeed in Tango's. I think on other ships it is at the reception desk, but on the Jewel, it is available in Tango's the first day when you board, and most afternoons during the cruise. There were about 10 people there when we made our reservations on the first day, and no one waiting when we went back later in the cruise. I don't think most people know you can do it the first day in one central location like that unless they've sailed NCL before or have been visiting these boards.

 

I can't count the number of times I started off a sentence to my husband: "Well, the people on the message boards said..." This is such a great resource and I am happy to be able to contribute now that I've sailed.

[Scotch]

Scotch:

 

1) The Freestyle Daily said that 5:30 and 6:00 seatings were the only two that offered the two for one discount.

 

2) Yes, the shows were at 7:30 and 9:30. We preferred the 7:30 shows because they were less crowded and you didn't have to get there as early.

 

Thanks! I'm bummed that shows are not at 8 and 10 pm. If we sit down for dinner in the non-buffet restaurants at 6:30 pm (to fit my toddler's eating schedule) that rules out the 7:30 show as an option for us. Though if we skip dessert in the restaurants, maybe we can still make it out in under an hour?

[Cruisin' Patty]

For those of you just off the Jewel...I know you can buy post cards, but stamps too? And does the Jewel take your cards for you into the port stops to mail for you, or do you mail your own from the Islands?

[Cosmopolitan]

Thanks! I'm bummed that shows are not at 8 and 10 pm. If we sit down for dinner in the non-buffet restaurants at 6:30 pm (to fit my toddler's eating schedule) that rules out the 7:30 show as an option for us. Though if we skip dessert in the restaurants, maybe we can still make it out in under an hour?

 

You can advise your waiter that you are going to the 7:30 show.

 

You can have dessert after the show:)

[foursum]

Nice review. We were on the same sailing. I agree with you -- my favorite activity was napping! I had the worst time staying awake on this cruise -- mid-morning nap, afternoon nap, and often an after dinner nap before the show. There's something SO relaxing about the motion of the ship ;) .

 

I'm also in agreement with your comments on the service. It wasn't great on this cruise, but I think it will improve. It sounded to us like there were two different factors -- one being the first sailing of this itinerary this season, and the other being the number of new crew on the ship. One of the waitress told us 122 new crew members joined the ship in Miami. I think the total crew is somewhere about 1300 -- so about 9% of the crew was new this week. Many of the previous crew have been assigned to bring the Pearl into service, and I'd say there was a definite learning curve going on.

 

If you post the Freestyle Dailies would you please send me the link. Thanks

mshear@rochester.rr.com