Quieter dining room on the Pearl?

[hayesktrm]

I thought I read somewhere that one of the dining rooms on the Pearl was much quieter. Could someone tell me which one that was? My father is a bit hard of hearing and wears a hearing aid, so places with lots of background noise are annoying to him. I would like our dining experiences to be as enjoyable and relaxing as possible.

 

Also, are either of the dining rooms open for lunch on the first day? We all prefer the dining room to the buffet.

 

We leave in exactly 2 weeks are SO excited!

[ute_fan]

The Summer Palace will be open for lunch on boarding day. We prefer the dining room over the buffet, too. As far as which one is quieter, my guess would be Indigo. It's capacity is smaller than the Summer Palace -- about 300 as compared to 550. The Summer Palace also seemed much more open than Indigo, so I'd imagine the sound would carry more there.

 

My suggestion would be to tell the maitre'd in Indigo that you have someone who's bothered by noise, and ask if you can be seated in the area over by Le Bistro. There's a gate that divides Summer Palace from Le Bistro, and most of the time (except for one crying toddler), it was fairly quiet when we were seated back there.

[odblnt]

The Summer Palace will be open for lunch on boarding day. We prefer the dining room over the buffet, too. As far as which one is quieter, my guess would be Indigo. It's capacity is smaller than the Summer Palace -- about 300 as compared to 550. The Summer Palace also seemed much more open than Indigo, so I'd imagine the sound would carry more there.

 

My suggestion would be to tell the maitre'd in Indigo that you have someone who's bothered by noise, and ask if you can be seated in the area over by Le Bistro. There's a gate that divides Summer Palace from Le Bistro, and most of the time (except for one crying toddler), it was fairly quiet when we were seated back there.

 

I second ute_fan's comments and suggestion. DW & I ate in that corner with Tideone and his DW. There were even ship's officers eating back in that corner.

 

Pete

[cinnam0n]

Indigo is definitely a quieter, more intimate restaurant than the Summer Palace. Dinner at The Summer Palace seemed exceptionally loud to us, more so than large dining rooms on other ships we have been on. It is fine during lunchtimes, though. Indigo was never open for lunch on our cruise.

[kb996]

I would have to go the other way and say that 2 weeks ago Summer Palace was much more quieter and calmer then Indigo.

 

2 days into the cruise they designated Summer Palace as being the only restartaunt where you COULD NOT wear jeans at dinner. I think this sent more people running to Indigo. We ate there once and it was crazy with kids running around. The rest of the nights we ate in Summer Palace and there were very few people there.

[KeystoneCruiser]

2 days into the cruise they designated Summer Palace as being the only restartaunt where you COULD NOT wear jeans at dinner. I think this sent more people running to Indigo. We ate there once and it was crazy with kids running around. The rest of the nights we ate in Summer Palace and there were very few people there.

 

 

Hold the phone....this is an important tidbit of information. This the first report that we have gotten that NCL has begun to designate one dining room for no jeans. I wonder if this is a trend that is begining across NCL or if this is another one of those times where one of the ships does it own thing. Could this be another example of inconsistancy of the rules enforcement??

 

Interesting though, when they designated one dining room to be no jeans, very few people ate there. Sounds to me as if comfort is winning out over tradition.

[ute_fan]

That is interesting information about jeans being disallowed in the Summer Palace. I think that is a wonderful idea. As much as I like not having to dress up in formal attire, I wasn't a big fan of the decision to allow jeans in the dining room.

 

Like Keystone, I'm wondering if that is an individual ship move, or if it will be put in place fleet wide. According to what we were told at the meet and greet, they're trying to standardize the dress code throughout the entire fleet. Be interesting to see what future returning cruisers have to say!

[kb996]

Unfortunatly, I didn't see any of the ships officers later in the week to ask about this. I don't know if it's fleet wide or not. Based on these comments I started a new thread on this, so we should be seeing if it is fleet wide.

 

Still, had a GREAT time on the Pearl! The staff and food was excellent!!

[hayesktrm]

Wow, thanks for the great tips. I will definitely ask for the corner by Le Bistro. We'll have to see about the no jeans rules and go from there.

 

We'll be heading to Summer Palace on the first day for lunch!