Loyal to Royal and looking at Hawaii ... hElP

[paroyalcruisers]

My wife and I fell in love with cruising last year during our fourth year anniversary. Our first was a 9-night eastern caribbean on Grandeur. Next weekend, we're going on a short 3-nighter just because we don't have another trip booked. Now we're looking at Hawaii. What I've found is some ships from Vancouver and Sand Diego, but nothing from inside Hawaii. We just want to fly there, then get on a cruise ship.

 

We've never cruised with anyone other than Royal, but the options may be limited in Hawaii. Any suggestions.

[MDSue]

As far as i know only NCL can do this. Something about the ships registry.

[Sue L]

It is because of the Jones Act which basically states that if you are a foreign flagged vessel (which 99% of ships are) and leave from a US port you must go to a foreign port before you come back again to a US port. This is the reason RCCL ships leave from CA or Ensenda to Hawaii to get around this rule. NCL had a couple US registered ships but even one of those didn't succeed because if they are registered US then they must follow all the employment/payroll rules of the US and it couldn't make it.

[Arizona Cruz Chic]

Only NLC America does Hawaii 7 day cruises because their ship Pride of America is flagged as an American ship and does not have to visit a foreign port. Its 7 days to/from Honolulu visiting the islands and giving you overnight at Maui and Kauai.

 

NCL use to have 3 ships for just Hawaii but is now down to just one because the ship must employ Americans.....Americans can't handle the job its too much work! :eek:

 

It is a great way to see Hawaii if you only have one week. I suggest doing at least one or two days pre cruise.

 

I suggest you visit the NCL boards and read the reviews and ask questions there.

 

Some of the posts are very honest and will give you a good idea of what to expect.......some are very negative while others are positive.

Do you homework!! ;) ;)

 

 

BTW.....welcome to Cruise Critic! :)

 

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[Cruise_Couple]

I suggest the San Diego - Hawaii cruise especially if you like sea days (we prefer them to port days). I believe there are also Ensenada - Hawaii and Vancouver - Hawaii itineraries.

[cruisecrazymama]

My wife and I fell in love with cruising last year during our fourth year anniversary. Our first was a 9-night eastern caribbean on Grandeur. Next weekend, we're going on a short 3-nighter just because we don't have another trip booked. Now we're looking at Hawaii. What I've found is some ships from Vancouver and Sand Diego, but nothing from inside Hawaii. We just want to fly there, then get on a cruise ship.

 

We've never cruised with anyone other than Royal, but the options may be limited in Hawaii. Any suggestions.

 

Just my personal opinion, but Hawaii is better experienced as a land vacation. DH and I spent two weeks and visited three islands. There is truely so much to see and to do. With the schedule ships have to keep, there just isn't enough time to really experience more than a small taste of what the islands have to offer. NCL pretty much have the market cornered over there. We are hooked on cruising as well, and rarely ever choose a land vacation over a cruise, but Hawaii trumps cruise everytime.

Whatever you choose to do. You will have a truely wonderful time in Hawaii. Aloha:D

[lovesublime]

Just my personal opinion, but Hawaii is better experienced as a land vacation. DH and I spent two weeks and visited three islands. There is truely so much to see and to do. With the schedule ships have to keep, there just isn't enough time to really experience more than a small taste of what the islands have to offer. NCL pretty much have the market cornered over there. We are hooked on cruising as well, and rarely ever choose a land vacation over a cruise, but Hawaii trumps cruise everytime.

Whatever you choose to do. You will have a truely wonderful time in Hawaii. Aloha:D

 

I have to say I totally agree with this. As much as we love cruising we would never cruise Hawaii. Hawaii is just so special that it deserves more than a 7a to 9p port call in it's beautiful islands. I'm willing to cruise ANYWHERE except Hawaii. Just a note, Carnival does do a 12 night Hawaii to Vancouver during the months of May and Sept-I do believe. Someone correct me if I'm wrong on that.

[LAnn]

I've spent time in both Maui and Honolulu on various occassions and would probably never have gone to Hilo and Kauai if not for the NCL cruise. I don't know if I'd plan to spend extensive time in Kauai because it is the wettest spot on earth, and it was in fact raining when we were there. But it is a breathtakingly amazing, beautiful place with huge peaks and valleys, and I'm so glad we spent a day there (hiked in the rain to wateralls). We visited Volcanoe National Park in Hilo and that was an incredible place as well. After the ship left port, we saw red lava spilling into the ocean at night from our balcony. The itinerary on that NCL cruise cannot be beat!

 

LeeAnn

[LAnn]

I just wanted to add, if you were to do the NCL cruise, you can combine it with a land vacation. We spent a few days on either end in Honolulu (a highlight was visiting the Polynesian Cultural Center) but if you were really ambitious you could also hop a flight to other islands as well.

[threeofus]

We did an NCL cruise through the islands as well. While you miss spending a lot of time in one place you get to see many of the islands - and they are all different.

We absolutely fell in love with Kauai - but would hate to miss Maui and also loved seeing the volcano national park in Hilo - so although a land vacation is great --- a cruise vacation gives you a nice island feast.

 

Sometimes your ship is your destination and sometimes the destination is more important. This is one of those times. NCL has a lot to offer - the freestyle is nice casual way to cruise and Hawaii is a casual destination. It works.

 

Do I like RCL better - yes - but did we have a great time? Yes it was a wonderful experience and we are so glad we did it.

 

Hope you enjoy yours as much.

 

 

By the way...we spent three days at the Hilton Hawaiian Village in Honolulu - so we feel we had a little of both.

[pjbrock]

We too love Royal Caribbean but were not interested in 4 days of cold choppy seas from the mainland to Hawaii. Went on the NCL just in the Islands- fabulous trip. We were on the Prid eof Hawaii bit all the Pride ships are simnilar. Great experience and we loved it.

[horsefeathers75]

RCCL has just came out with their Sept 2009 sailing which is a 12 night cruise which leaves from British Columbia has 5 sea days and then does the 5 Hawaiian islands and you fly home from Honolulu. This might be something you are interested in. It is on the sister ship of the Granduer so you should know the layout pretty well. I have done the Granduer twice and the Majesty once and they are pretty nice ships. However I have recently done the Voyager and Radiance ships and it would be hard to go back to the Vision class.

 

Personally I am disappointed with the Hawaiian sailing because I have a group of people turning 50 and we were going to make the October Hawaiian cruise our Hawaii 5-0 for this special occasion. Because all of us have done the Radiance and Voyager lines of RCCL ships, none of us are happy about them using a 12 year old ship for this cruise since they used the Serenade and Radiance ships for the 2008 Hawaiian sailings. Even though we are diamond members with RCCL, we are looking into doing the Grand Princess for Hawaii.

 

However if you have only done the Granduer, I think you would be very happy with the Rhapsody.

 

Enjoy.

 

Debi

[gmadvm]

we are loyal to royal but wanted to get married in hawaii and incorporate a land trip in as well. ncl was the only way we could have done it. as much as i would have liked to take a month off from work to make the trip from the mainland. :) i read all the reviews and was prepared for the difference between rccl and ncl, but we still couldn't help but make comparisons even with our lowered expectations. the itinerary was great, and we spent all our time off the ship. we were so busy that we were exhausted at night and honestly didn't take part in any of the evening activities. the biggest problem we had was making dinner reservations and the truly abysmal service. getting up at 7am to stand in a long line to make reservations for dinner every morning was not fun. and the servers were truly apathetic. they would be standing off to the side talking while the tables in the buffet needed to be cleared. we never saw any supervisors. but we got what we wanted out of the trip, mainly transportation to all the islands and the night sailaway by Hilo. it made us appreciate royal all the more. our cruise on voyager 6 months later felt like coming home, and upcoming jewel will be even better as she is our favorite ship. good luck. you'll enjoy hawaii however you get there.

[phoenix1181]

Just my personal opinion, but Hawaii is better experienced as a land vacation. DH and I spent two weeks and visited three islands. There is truely so much to see and to do. With the schedule ships have to keep, there just isn't enough time to really experience more than a small taste of what the islands have to offer. NCL pretty much have the market cornered over there. We are hooked on cruising as well, and rarely ever choose a land vacation over a cruise, but Hawaii trumps cruise everytime.

Whatever you choose to do. You will have a truely wonderful time in Hawaii. Aloha:D

 

I agree completely! IMHO, seeing Hawaii via a cruise ship is similar to -- If it's Tuesday, this must be Belgium. I love Hawaii and have enjoyed many land vacations there but I have no interest in cruising the islands. You can't possibly appreciate all Hawaii has to offer if you're running around trying to see each island in 12 hours or less.

 

Hawaii needs more of your time than a cruise offers. Take a couple of weeks and see it on a land vacation. You will be able to see, and enjoy, two or three islands during that time.

[bigsky]

I'm a cruise nut! Actually, that's my license plate. :D

We went to Maui last yr for our 25th anniversary. I fell in love with Hawaii!! We'll actually vacation more in Hawaii than cruise now. I still enjoy cruising, but there's so much to see in Hawaii.

We had a condo on the beach in Kaanapali. Was so nice to wake to the beautiful beach in the morning...lay on the beach....explore...and best of all, have dinner on the beach and watch the sunset, and not have to hurry back to the ship.

We spent 8 days in the same place which wasn't enough. At least a few more days would be better. Soooooo relaxing! So much to see.

 

Personally, I would never cruise to Hawaii. JMO...

If you want any info, feel free to email me at jlsbfam@centurytel.net