POA - Aug.22-29

[KeystoneCruiser]

We were on the 8-22 to 8-29 sailing of the POA. As I stated before I left, I was both apprehensive but optimistic for our cruise. I felt that I was well armed with information gleaned from previous passengers to weather anything the ship threw at me. I thought some of the negative reviews may have been over the edge, boy was I wrong.

 

The ship is every bit as bad as these recent reviews have indicated and I have a new found respect for those that have written them. Don't attack them, in my opinion they are right.

 

First, the ship itself: it is a beautiful ship. Very nice decorations. The Blue Hawaii was a personal favorite of mine with its vibrant colors. Even the main atrium where the Palace restaurant and the reception and shore desks are are pretty. They kept much of the older wood background in the atrium, but with the new Hawaiian murals, they have made it look wonderful. The Palace restaurant was the most pretty of the restaurants in my opinion. Don't miss the Outrigger Lounge on Deck 11 at the front. Great place to sit and enjoy the view, especially at night. Hint: don't miss the front outside deck area of this lounge. Many people don't realize that you can get out there. There is a door leading to this secluded deck area near the front left of the Outrigger Lounge.

 

The staterooms are small as has been reported, but adequate for a ship that is basically transportation between islands. There is no reason to make a fuss about the staterooms, that is part of the ship's design and it can't be changed. I will say that the rooms appear to not being cleaned adequately. We had a room with a big window and it was streaked. There were crumbs on the floor of our cabin when we arrived and it took me three days of requests before it was vacummed away. (finally had to go to the reception desk and register a complaint) As I have said before, the thought of used sheets nauseates me, so I stripped our beds as soon as I arrived and put the linens in the hallway. Went and found a room steward and told him what I had done and that I wanted the room made up with fresh sheets. He grumbled but before long he and another steward arrived and put fresh sheets on the bed. I don't know if my sheets were clean or not, but after reading others reviews I decided why take a chance. I saw our room steward only one other time all week but our rooms were made up each day and then turned down at night. There was also an odor to our bathroom. I went ashore in Kauai and bought some air freshener and it was much better. Again, that could be the fault of poor bathroom air circulation due to ship design (the bathroom fogged up easily when showering or shavin, so I am not blamming anyone there either but perhaps the room stewards could spray each bathroom with a disenfectant spray between cruises to help.

 

Entertainment was wonderful. A highlight of the cruise. Don't miss the production company, the Jen Ryan Company, wonderful. Another of the best suggestions that I got before this cruise was to skip dessert in the main dinning rooms, go up to the buffet and grab desert and a beverage and take it to the theater to enjoy while waiting for the show. (Thanks Jeconnk). They usually offered to bus our tray in the theater after we were finished. Hint: Make sure to get to the theater early as it fills up fast. Stay away from the balcony, the railings tend to limit your view up there. I also found the swivel chairs to be more comfortable than the couches.

 

Did not use the kids club or the internet cafe.

 

I found the lounges to be a little pricey for the drinks you got. It got to the point where we would just bring our own drinks from the buffet to save money. Some were noisier than others. Captain Cooks Bar and the starboard side of the Blue Hawaii tended to be not as quiet as they were in main traffic areas.

 

We booked our own shore excursions or rented a car for a lesser price than the ship offered, so I can't comment on the ship's excursions.

 

Embarkation and Debarkation were a breeze. NCL has these two areas down to a science. I echo another posters comments about not buying a lei in the lobby of the pier, they will give you a free one upstairs just before you board. As far as debarkation, the only thing I wish is that we had gotten our tags earlier in the week.

 

I will end this part of the review here and return later to talk about the area that is seriously lacking on this ship, the food service and service in general. Bye for now. Beth

[Traveler39]

From your review it seems to me that you enjoyed the ship and was reasonably pleased with your cruise.... I realize that you started your review with an opening paragraph that hinted at the problems of the ship which you will discuss in your next review... Thanks for being honest and giving it to us like it is... the good with the bad... We hope the ship is improving and reviews will show this improvement....

 

Be as specific as you can with your concerns at this point.... I understand that top management of ncl was on the POA the same week that you sailed her....

[cruise182]

Beth please report back...... do you think there has been any improvment? Sorry that it wasn't better. I guess things haven't gotten that much better after all.

[Host CMLA]

I guess things haven't gotten that much better after all.

Have you read this review? http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=74635 This thread makes it sound like things are better. It's a tough call to form an opinion on the reviews we've seen. For me, I think things will really seem better when the reviews are more middle of the road and not really really bad. Does that make sense? For example, when the reviews come back solidly around a 5 or 6 out of 10 and then hopefully they go up from there. Right now the reviews seem to be too far apart to get the best idea of how things are.

 

I do think it's encouraging that Beth found the service to be the big problem and not several things. I look forward to reading the rest.

[mrmac]

I had experienced clients on the same cruise and they were incredibly disappointed and angry. According to them, embarkation was not a breeze. They were left out in the sun for 2 1/2 hours while immigration went on board and removed 200 crew members, according to other crew. Then they lost more crew in Kauai when they jumped ship. Dining room took 3 hours to get a table since half was roped off due to no service personnel. All this was on the TV news in Maui and front page headlines in Hawaii. New crew were brought on in each port but they were untrained. It was a week of chaos, frustration and ineptitude. Their list of complaints goes on and on.

 

They did receive two apology letters during the week along with a 50% reduction in the resort fee, 20% off a future cruisefare (they'll never cruise NCL again) and a $50 per person cabin credit. But nothing but a full refund will soothe these folks.

 

This product is not ready for public consumption!

[PTWcruiser]

Damage control... Got into TV and newspaper.. Saw the Management walking the ship...Rumor have it ... High price Lawyer was sailing the cruise and got mad.. Called home to raised hell.... Rumors... :(

[PTWcruiser]

Not Ready for public consumptions!!!! We heard and experienced the same story....A refund will never happen...Maybe an invitation to re-experience the crisue after all the bugs are fixed...free of charge and I may reconsider sailing NCL on their otherlines.

 

BTW, the 20% discount, from my understanding, is not across the board. It's a discount equal to the amount the cruise passenger paid for their cruise and to be applied torward their future voyage w/ NCL.

:(

[Traveler39]

Have you read this review? http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=74635 This thread makes it sound like things are better. It's a tough call to form an opinion on the reviews we've seen. For me, I think things will really seem better when the reviews are more middle of the road and not really really bad. Does that make sense? For example, when the reviews come back solidly around a 5 or 6 out of 10 and then hopefully they go up from there. Right now the reviews seem to be too far apart to get the best idea of how things are.

 

I do think it's encouraging that Beth found the service to be the big problem and not several things. I look forward to reading the rest.

 

I agree with Cecilia's comments here... It may be a slow gradual trend of improvements... The reviewers are still finding many of the same problems but there may be a spark of improvement here and there... Only time will tell.... Every week is another opportunity for ncl to get this ship in shape...

[lemrehtor]

I had experienced clients on the same cruise and they were incredibly disappointed and angry. According to them, embarkation was not a breeze. They were left out in the sun for 2 1/2 hours while immigration went on board and removed 200 crew members, according to other crew. Then they lost more crew in Kauai when they jumped ship. Dining room took 3 hours to get a table since half was roped off due to no service personnel. All this was on the TV news in Maui and front page headlines in Hawaii. New crew were brought on in each port but they were untrained. It was a week of chaos, frustration and ineptitude. Their list of complaints goes on and on.

 

They did receive two apology letters during the week along with a 50% reduction in the resort fee, 20% off a future cruisefare (they'll never cruise NCL again) and a $50 per person cabin credit. But nothing but a full refund will soothe these folks.

 

This product is not ready for public consumption!

A lot of rumors, but we were never given any real facts. Spoke with the hotel manager (who claimed he came on ship on 8/22 also). He made it sound like workers just walked off in general. No way to really know.

 

They claim things will get better, but should the passengers pay the price for them to experiment??

[Michael Ho Ho]

mrmac,

 

Immigration came onboard an American Ship and removed crew members???

Hardly.

US Immigration does NOT board American ships sailing domestic routes. Why should they?

All crewmembers on POA are US Citizens - certified by US Coast Guard and FBI background checks.

 

You need to check your facts before spreading rumors like this.

[margu1241]

Actually, I don't think that 100% of the crew has to be American. It is a high number (I can't recall exactly, but think it may be 90%). That leaves 10% that immigration might be interested in. Still, it would be nowhere near 200 crew members, but there might be a few. I had some wait staff that were not US citizens on 7/18 cruise.

Patty

[Traveler39]

mrmac,

 

Immigration came onboard an American Ship and removed crew members???

Hardly.

US Immigration does NOT board American ships sailing domestic routes. Why should they?

All crewmembers on POA are US Citizens - certified by US Coast Guard and FBI background checks.

 

You need to check your facts before spreading rumors like this.

 

Michael... When you read a post with numbers and specifics it usually mean that those "facts" are the opinion of the poster and not facts.... We hear things, we see things and we form opinions.... Do not get so upset and attack a poster on C.C. who is giving their opinion....It is hard to state facts and data to support those facts..... Can you in this situation?

 

For example... We all know that the crew is not 100% American citizen... That has been written in many post and in some detail for months that a certain amount of non US Citizen are allowed by law... See?

 

We are all gathering information to help both the passenger and NCL come to grips with the many posted concerns and problems of this ship, the poa....

 

What is important on that cruise is that some crew left the ship for many reasons and the ship is still working short handed....That seems reasonable...It seems to be happening a lot on many of the poa cruises...

 

It is possible that ncl was using maybe 20% or more non USA citizens on that cruise... I do not know and I can bet that only a hand full of ncl management know the truth... the facts... Let us all work together to improve the conditions of the poa....

[Globaliser]

Actually, I don't think that 100% of the crew has to be American. It is a high number (I can't recall exactly, but think it may be 90%). That leaves 10% that immigration might be interested in.

IIRC, all who are not US citizens must be at least Green Card holders and the maximum percentage of those is 25%. Presumably these workers' immigration status had been checked before they were employed. I'd therefore find it difficult to imagine why immigration would have any reason to get involved when the ship has never left the US. It would surely be as odd as seeing immigration boarding the Staten Island Ferry to check that crew's immigration status. Not impossible, but very odd.

[KeystoneCruiser]

Sorry about the delay in the second half, but things came up and I didn't have time to sit down to compose what I wanted to say, but here it goes:

 

The crew deserves all the credit they are getting. Most of the ones still there are hard working and are trying their best to give you a good cruise. The problems are there are not nearly enough of them and they can only work with what they are given and that is where the problems lie.

 

If I can think of one word that would sum up all of the problems with the service on board the Aloha, it would be: "FRUSTRATION." The passengers are frustrated by the slow service, the lack of crew, the low quality of food, etc. The crew is frustrated by the shortness in staff, the long hours they have to put in as a result and the complaining passengers. From the news reports we have been reading, the TA's are frustrated with NCL for not improving the product, the Hawaii tourism people are frustrated with the negative comments from the passengers for fear it will hurt their tourism. I also do believe that NCL is frustrated by the fact that the America sank, the Aloha is not shaping up as quickly as planned and they are having serious staffing issues. Frustration can turn into unhappiness and unhappiness can turn into nastiness, etc. Like so many other passengers, I witnessed other passengers taking out their "frustrations" on crew members as well as crew members taking out their frustrations on other crew, etc. The most important thing to remember is NOT TO BLAME THE CREW. They really can't change what they have been given, voice your complaints to the people who can do something....the officers on board and/or NCL corporate.

 

I also believe that all of this negative publicity in news organizations are helping the POA. It is forcing NCL to admit there are problems and to come up with solutions. I also think the 20% credit and refund of the service charges are attempts by NCL to put an end to some of the talk of lawsuits. (Yes there was someone on the last night passing around a petition on board asking for our names and addresses if we would like to be part of a class action lawsuit against NCL, we did not sign it.)

 

Now for the food and food service: I am almost hesitant to make these comments because so many posters on this board get attacked when they claim the food was bad but here it goes:

IN MY OPINION it was the worst cruise food that I have ever suffered through. IN MY OPINION, it was the poorest quality of food I have ever been served. The buffet food was hideous and so after the first couple of days I only went up there for desserts. The eggs were runny, the bacon was mostly undercooked and the beverage stations always seemed to be out of something. In the restaurants, it was the same thing every night except for a few entree changes. The food was usually cold by the time it got to you and was very bland. The wait times between courses were ridiculous. Two to two and half hours to be served dinner is unacceptable to us. We paid for a cruise to enjoy what the ship had to offer, not to be sitting in a dinning room. I tried to order the filet mignon one night in the main dining room and the waiter told me it wasn't available in that room and when I said that I had read the people on an earlier cruise had got filet in the main dining room, his reply was: "that option was only available for the repositioning cruise."

 

I will not blame the crew for the food selection or quality, that is strictly the fault of NCL. I think NCL could purchase better quality of food for the Aloha, they have enough other problems that will take longer to solve, this is one they could solve now. As for the buffet wait times, there is no way to solve that problem due to the design. HINT: if you are brave enough to try the buffet, I suggest that go to the rear of the ship to the "Lanai" area. (outside dining) Those two lines seem to have less people using them.

 

As for the slow service, that can only be solved when and if NCL can hire additional crew. The crew will flat out tell you to your face (when no officers are around), that they are grossly understaffed and it doesn't appear that the low staffing issue will go away anytime soon due to people leaving, recruiting going slowly and the mandatory merchant marine/coast guard training that new hires have to go through. How in the world they plan to staff two ships next summer is beyond me.

 

One of the things that I learned from previous passengers was to go early to dinner to avoid the lines. 5:15 was our target since the restaurants opened at 5:30. I found many others used this strategy as well and even more did as the week wore on. If you were not there by 5:45-6, you could count on waiting. As a result, we often found ourselves rushing back from shore to get to the restaurants on time. We even cut some trips short and avoided the free shuttles on occasion just to make it back so we wouldn't have to wait. That is what diminished my vacation in Hawaii and is my biggest gripe about this ship. I built my vacation time around my desire to avoid the problems on the POA.

 

There you have my whole review. The most important thing that I can tell future POA passengers is to read all the reviews, positive and negative and LEARN from them. Pick out some ideas to make your trip better like we did. (getting to dinner early & skipping dessert in the dinning room and getting it at the buffet to eat in the theater, were the most helpful). Finaly, don't bash those who have bad things to say about the POA, let's hope that postings like that serve to help NCL improve the product. Just because someone is negative does not mean they have an "agenda" against NCL and just because someone is positive for NCL does not mean that they are "NCL rah-rah's" (as someone called them) Everyone is intitled to their opinions and no two opinions may be the same. Respect is deserved for both sides because only together can we be helpful. Thanks Beth

[Traveler39]

Keystonecruiser... A very honest and quality review.... Read and Heed... Anyone that does not now know that this ship is very short handed with crew has not been reading C.C.

 

The crew is doing the best it can and it is ncl that needs to hear from us and hear from us often.... This company is not providing a nice cruise ship nor a good cruise experience.... Based on the reviews and opinions of most posters...

 

Thanks for your time to post this review Keystonecruiser and can you tell me when you were on the ship?

[orderby]

KeystoneCruiser,

Thank you for your frank and fair review.

Orderby

[Zeno]

KeystoneCruiser: nicely detailed reasonable review.

[Traveler39]

We were on the 8-22 to 8-29 sailing of the POA. As I stated before I left, I was both apprehensive but optimistic for our cruise. I felt that I was well armed with information gleaned from previous passengers to weather anything the ship threw at me. I thought some of the negative reviews may have been over the edge, boy was I wrong.

 

The ship is every bit as bad as these recent reviews have indicated and I have a new found respect for those that have written them. Don't attack them, in my opinion they are right.

 

First, the ship itself: it is a beautiful ship. Very nice decorations. The Blue Hawaii was a personal favorite of mine with its vibrant colors. Even the main atrium where the Palace restaurant and the reception and shore desks are are pretty. They kept much of the older wood background in the atrium, but with the new Hawaiian murals, they have made it look wonderful. The Palace restaurant was the most pretty of the restaurants in my opinion. Don't miss the Outrigger Lounge on Deck 11 at the front. Great place to sit and enjoy the view, especially at night. Hint: don't miss the front outside deck area of this lounge. Many people don't realize that you can get out there. There is a door leading to this secluded deck area near the front left of the Outrigger Lounge.

 

The staterooms are small as has been reported, but adequate for a ship that is basically transportation between islands. There is no reason to make a fuss about the staterooms, that is part of the ship's design and it can't be changed. I will say that the rooms appear to not being cleaned adequately. We had a room with a big window and it was streaked. There were crumbs on the floor of our cabin when we arrived and it took me three days of requests before it was vacummed away. (finally had to go to the reception desk and register a complaint) As I have said before, the thought of used sheets nauseates me, so I stripped our beds as soon as I arrived and put the linens in the hallway. Went and found a room steward and told him what I had done and that I wanted the room made up with fresh sheets. He grumbled but before long he and another steward arrived and put fresh sheets on the bed. I don't know if my sheets were clean or not, but after reading others reviews I decided why take a chance. I saw our room steward only one other time all week but our rooms were made up each day and then turned down at night. There was also an odor to our bathroom. I went ashore in Kauai and bought some air freshener and it was much better. Again, that could be the fault of poor bathroom air circulation due to ship design (the bathroom fogged up easily when showering or shavin, so I am not blamming anyone there either but perhaps the room stewards could spray each bathroom with a disenfectant spray between cruises to help.

 

Entertainment was wonderful. A highlight of the cruise. Don't miss the production company, the Jen Ryan Company, wonderful. Another of the best suggestions that I got before this cruise was to skip dessert in the main dinning rooms, go up to the buffet and grab desert and a beverage and take it to the theater to enjoy while waiting for the show. (Thanks Jeconnk). They usually offered to bus our tray in the theater after we were finished. Hint: Make sure to get to the theater early as it fills up fast. Stay away from the balcony, the railings tend to limit your view up there. I also found the swivel chairs to be more comfortable than the couches.

 

Did not use the kids club or the internet cafe.

 

I found the lounges to be a little pricey for the drinks you got. It got to the point where we would just bring our own drinks from the buffet to save money. Some were noisier than others. Captain Cooks Bar and the starboard side of the Blue Hawaii tended to be not as quiet as they were in main traffic areas.

 

We booked our own shore excursions or rented a car for a lesser price than the ship offered, so I can't comment on the ship's excursions.

 

Embarkation and Debarkation were a breeze. NCL has these two areas down to a science. I echo another posters comments about not buying a lei in the lobby of the pier, they will give you a free one upstairs just before you board. As far as debarkation, the only thing I wish is that we had gotten our tags earlier in the week.

 

I will end this part of the review here and return later to talk about the area that is seriously lacking on this ship, the food service and service in general. Bye for now. Beth

 

I believe that it is good to read both reviews together to see Both the points of concern and good points of the Pride of Aloha

[richtersl]

...for presenting such a detailed review. I think future POA travelers need to bear one thing in mind that you said very, VERY well:

If I can think of one word that would sum up all of the problems with the service on board the Aloha, it would be: "FRUSTRATION." The passengers are frustrated by the slow service, the lack of crew, the low quality of food, etc. The crew is frustrated by the shortness in staff, the long hours they have to put in as a result and the complaining passengers. From the news reports we have been reading, the TA's are frustrated with NCL for not improving the product, the Hawaii tourism people are frustrated with the negative comments from the passengers for fear it will hurt their tourism. I also do believe that NCL is frustrated by the fact that the America sank, the Aloha is not shaping up as quickly as planned and they are having serious staffing issues. Frustration can turn into unhappiness and unhappiness can turn into nastiness, etc. Like so many other passengers, I witnessed other passengers taking out their "frustrations" on crew members as well as crew members taking out their frustrations on other crew, etc. The most important thing to remember is NOT TO BLAME THE CREW. They really can't change what they have been given, voice your complaints to the people who can do something....the officers on board and/or NCL corporate.

Despite the problems you encountered, you still seemed to have had a nice time.

[beachgal]

Beth,

Thanks for your report of POA. Even though you didn't do excursions through the ship, can you tell us which ones you did and what companies you used? I'm planning to do mine independently, too. Thanks!!

[lemrehtor]

Good review. The whole problem is staffing.

 

I had a great time on the land excursions. That's the only thing that saved the vacation.

Be sure to check the bill. They double and triple taxed the fares. It took me almost whole week to straighten it out.

[CRZGRL]

Could you please tell me what night formal night is? Is there a Captain's cocktail party? Also, when is the Latitude cocktail party? If you bought the Romance/Anniversary/Honeymoon package, when did they have the party? Is there a CC party on Pride of Aloha? Is there an art auction? Also, are there nights for costume? Someone mentioned a white linen night. We are sailing for Valentine's week - Feb. 13th sailing. It is filled to capacity, and the rates are sky high, just a few inside and suite cabins remain. Hope they get a lot of crew for this sailing!:D

[PTWcruiser]

Kind of browsing thru the web and ran into this link.

 

http://www.cruiseblogger.com/nf40714.html

 

60 hrs week??? $2900 / month base. After tax, it's not much. Avg. $12 an hour. Wondering what drive some of the crews off the ship... Would having 2 staffs rotating off the ship through port help???

 

 

nite

PTW