Star November 8-15th Short Review

[ehschief]

We got off the Star this morning and want to tell you how much we enjoyed our trip. We booked this last minute and had an Oceanview room on deck 5.

 

After reading some comments we were concerned if we made a good choice.

 

First off there were comments about how rude the staff was.. well must be a different crew, we found the crew to be courteous, efficient, friendly and caring. Our room steward was terrific, the dining staff in all the restaurants could not have been better. We ate in the Versailles most meals and all the wait staff we had met at other meals acknowledged us.

 

The food itself was better than average with somethings excellent.

 

The shows were great, we went to most of them.

 

We played Bingo and of course lost.

 

We only did one tour , Stone Island in Mazatlan, and it was perfect.

 

There were somethings that needed improvement, as always why do they charge so much for photos, if they were cheaper they would sell more.

 

All the Blackjack tables were $10.00 minimum so we didn't play, we go to have fun, not to make a fortune.

 

Once in a while there was a smell of sewer gas in the halls, nothing serious.

 

Please ask any questions and I will be happy to answer.

 

BTW- we brought alcohol and sodas with us and it wasn't taken away, but other people say that theirs was, so I guess it is just random.

[hello]

Great that you had such a wonderful time -- thank you for your review!!

[Leafpeeper]

We sailed the Star a couple years ago when they went to Alcapulco and Ixtapa--which happens to be my favorite Mexican port. No wonder since "From Here to Eternity" was filmed there.

 

If NCL goes back to that itinerary, we would book this cruise again in a heart beat. We love sailing NCL because of all the different restaurants. We also enjoy the movie theater on Star and Dawn. Since we sail during the winter months, we feel you need to go to Alcapulco to find the hot weather. Cabo and Mazatlan are comfortable, but Ixtapa and Alcapulco have the warmer temps for swimming that time of year. I'd love to see NCL add Manzanillo to that itinerary too. I'd be happy to drop Alcapulco and add Manzanillo instead.

 

We'll keep watching NCL's future cruises to see if they change itineraries again. I think Carnival is the only cruiseline to sail to Alcapulco on a weekly basis. Next time we head to the west coast we will probably book the Carnival cruise unless NCL brings back the Alcapulco itinerary--if only for winter.

[NEW 2 CRUISIN]

We got off the Star this morning and want to tell you how much we enjoyed our trip.

 

There were somethings that needed improvement, as always why do they charge so much for photos, if they were cheaper they would sell more.

 

 

AMEN!

 

I can't figure it out either. With most of the population having digital cameras these days, you'd think the Photo Centers on the ships would compete a little better for my sale!

 

As it is, we don't buy any pics at all now. If they were a more reasonable $5 (or even $10!) for a 5x7 with maybe a special offer of 5 for $20 or $30 on the last day, we'd buy every one of them!

 

We've actually had much better pictures taken by fellow cruisers we asked to take our picture than by the ship photographers...for FREE!

 

Oh well....they'll learn someday.

 

Glad you had a nice trip on the STAR....so did we!

 

:)

[soazlaney]

I'm glad you had a great experience on the Star. We had a wonderful time on her in January of this year. So far the Star is my favorite ship. We found everything to be clean and we were more than well cared for.

Happy sailing.

[HLP]

Thanks for posting the review,its a relief to us future Star cruisers.

 

Since you ate most of your meals in Versailles, were there any nights

that the menu didnt look appealing to you. I guess Sunday was the

optional formal dinner with lobster. This would be helpful for planning

my optional pay rest. nights.

 

Thanks again

HLP

[NW Pacific]

How was disembarkation? When the Star first started the Mex Riv this Fall people were complaining about the long lime to get through immigration (while still aboard) before getting off the ship into the baggage area. Since then I have noticed people saying that they just had to give their custom paperwork to someone in the baggage area as they were leaving. So what experience did you have. What time did you get off and if you flew back home via LAX how long did it take you to get there? Thanks

[lasnev]

First off there were comments about how rude the staff was.. well must be a different crew, we found the crew to be courteous, efficient, friendly and caring. Our room steward was terrific, the dining staff in all the restaurants could not have been better. We ate in the Versailles most meals and all the wait staff we had met at other meals acknowledged us.

 

The food itself was better than average with somethings excellent.

 

The shows were great, we went to most of them.

 

 

Well! That is the "same" Star we were on on Sept, 27th. Glad you had a great time.

[Clay Clayton]

Welcome home and thanks for relieving my mind. We leave next Saturday with some first time cruisers and I was beginning to worry that they would get a bad first impression.

 

Couple of questions if you don't mind:

1. What time did you board? How long was the wait? If you had it to do over again, what time would you head for the ship?

 

2. Just in case you don't answer NW Pacific's question - did you do express departure? what time did you leave your room, what time did you have your bags and were ready for transportation?

 

3. Any 2for1s in the Specialty restaurants?

 

4. What was the one best thing you did while on the cruise?

 

5. What was the one worst thing you did while on the cruise?

 

 

Thanks for any and all advice!

Clay

[SSRJen]

Thanks for the quick review. We are heading out on the Star in a week. Please post your link to the dailies when you have them scanned. This is our first NCL cruise and we are very curious of the current offerings!

Thanks!

[newmexicoNita]

We got off the Star this morning and want to tell you how much we enjoyed our trip. We booked this last minute and had an Oceanview room on deck 5.

 

After reading some comments we were concerned if we made a good choice.

 

First off there were comments about how rude the staff was.. well must be a different crew, we found the crew to be courteous, efficient, friendly and caring. Our room steward was terrific, the dining staff in all the restaurants could not have been better. We ate in the Versailles most meals and all the wait staff we had met at other meals acknowledged us.

 

The food itself was better than average with somethings excellent.

 

The shows were great, we went to most of them.

 

We played Bingo and of course lost.

 

We only did one tour , Stone Island in Mazatlan, and it was perfect.

 

There were somethings that needed improvement, as always why do they charge so much for photos, if they were cheaper they would sell more.

 

All the Blackjack tables were $10.00 minimum so we didn't play, we go to have fun, not to make a fortune.

 

Once in a while there was a smell of sewer gas in the halls, nothing serious.

 

Please ask any questions and I will be happy to answer.

 

BTW- we brought alcohol and sodas with us and it wasn't taken away, but other people say that theirs was, so I guess it is just random.

 

Glad you had such a great cruise. Yes, I agree the pics are totally out of line. We rarely buy any of them. At the most, we purchase one and that is only if DH can't resist. I don't even care about checking them out.

 

Nita

[OceanDreaming2]

Welcome home and thanks for relieving my mind. We leave next Saturday with some first time cruisers and I was beginning to worry that they would get a bad first impression.

 

Couple of questions if you don't mind:

1. What time did you board? How long was the wait? If you had it to do over again, what time would you head for the ship?

 

2. Just in case you don't answer NW Pacific's question - did you do express departure? what time did you leave your room, what time did you have your bags and were ready for transportation?

 

3. Any 2for1s in the Specialty restaurants?

 

4. What was the one best thing you did while on the cruise?

 

5. What was the one worst thing you did while on the cruise?

 

 

Thanks for any and all advice!

Clay

 

 

I can answer some of your questions...

 

1) We boarded around Noon. Short lines and they moved fast. Rooms weren't ready til 2:00. We ate at Versailles and thought the food was great!

 

2) We did not do express departure since our flight wasn't until 1:55. We wanted to stay until the very last minute!

 

3) If you have a coupon book, the first night is 2 for 1 in any speciality restaurant. I don't recall this deal was offered during the cruise.

 

4) The one best thing we did was take an upsell to the Garden Villa! (Don't even ask me how much for the upsell - the guys negotiated the deal and won't tell!)

 

5) Worst thing? Having to leave the ship!

[sunsfan]

Hi I am also just off the Star so I will try to answer some of your questions.

We drove over to LA from Phoenix so we got to the terminal around 11 am. They let us right in and gave us a group # ticket. When they called your ticket you went to the counter and checked in, and then went back to the waiting area where you could sit and have juice, water coffee etc. Then they called your number a second time for boarding. It was very organized and we were in Versaille's having lunch by noon.

2. We did do express departure. People started lining up very early and by 7:30 you could not even get to the floor they were disembarking from. AVOID THAT! We just went up one deck and waited in the java cafe area until people started getting off. We were off the ship maybe 10 minutes after those folks who stood in line all that time. It was quick and easy.

3. You will have a great time on this ship, staff is very friendly.

[meiyakim]

so when did they ask you if you'd like the upgrade over the phone a week or 2 in advance at the pier?

[momof3cruisers]

I was also on the Star this last week and could not agree more about the staff. Our room steward did seem to be just putting in his time, but the room was always ready when we returned to it, just the basics and he did act like we were over reaching when we asked for more lotion in the bathroom. That was odd. If you are in the Spinakker, keep an eye out for Anna--she only has two weeks left but is just delightful!

 

We got the luggage tags for the last group to leave the ship. It went quite smoothly and quickly. We did wait in a bit of a line when they called our color, but not much at all. Getting through "customs" was odd. I was traveling with my sisters and two of us had passports, which the woman did not even open and the other had a birth certificate which the officer did not even open. Never had that happen before.

 

We ate in Cagneys the first night and used the coupon from the booklet that was mailed. Other nights we did room service, or one of the main restaurants. One of our party did eat in Endless Summer and she said it was okay. (Room service note, don't order the grilled cheese. It's not actually grilled, more like they made a quick pass over the pan!)

 

I loved the ship and staff. The food could have been a bit more exciting but it was all good with the exception of the Mahi Mahi one day at lunch. Seating was always quick, once in awhile service was slow but we were having a good time so that was not a big deal really. I would say my one complaint is that I think all the pay extra restaurants are silly. One or two I could see, but to have so many of them was rather dumb to me. Especially when they were often pretty close to empty.

 

As for the shows, my one big suggestion would be to go to the preview of hte Chinese Acrobats early in the week and SKIP the show on the last night. It was awful! Just bad bad bad. The crew show, however, was hilarious and we wished it would have gone on for another hour.

[iTinKso]

All the Blackjack tables were $10.00 minimum so we didn't play, we go to have fun, not to make a fortune.

BTW- we brought alcohol and sodas with us and it wasn't taken away, but other people say that theirs was, so I guess it is just random.

 

Thanks for a great and positive review - we will be going soon and it is good to know in advance that we won't be playing Blackjack!

Were you able to board with wine without paying the corkage fee? We would like to talk a couple of bottles of Tobin James wine which don't look to be on the Wine List but am not sure about the corkage fee upon boarding...

 

[OceanDreaming2]

Thanks for a great and positive review - we will be going soon and it is good to know in advance that we won't be playing Blackjack!

Were you able to board with wine without paying the corkage fee? We would like to talk a couple of bottles of Tobin James wine which don't look to be on the Wine List but am not sure about the corkage fee upon boarding...

 

 

You may be able to bring your wine onboard the ship and not pay a corkage fee. But, if it's that important to have YOUR wine, why worry about a $15 corkage fee?

[ehschief]

I will try to answer most questions from my perspective, although we live in Utah, we have a second home in Southern California so we stayed there the night before, and the night after because the roads we take were closed due to the fires that our home is really close to. Prime time shuttle picked us up at 11:20am and we got to the dock quickly and it took about 10 minutes to board, very easy.

 

We disembarked in 10 minutes, the people doing express check out did wait in lines, but we had breakfast in the Versailles and left the ship at 9:30, it took about 5 minutes, no checking of passports.

 

As said previously the food was good a few things better, servings were small so you could try several things, I am not a sauce person nor do I eat pork products so I can't really give a good report of each meal, but what was good was the lobster, the seafood pasta and the lamb, both served on the same night.

 

I put wine in our suitcase and nothing was ever said, I brought on soft drinks, no problem and we put other booze in our suitcases with no problem, just lucky I guess.

 

It seems that others have a different opinion of the the shows, I like dancing so the shows to me were great, the 2nd city show was good, we liked the juggler a lot.

 

We never had to wait to eat, whether we went early or late.

 

We did not like the buffet, we call it the trough, because people are so sloppy with the food and taking so much food and not eating it is really disgusting. On the chocolate buffet night we saw people taking 3 and 4 plates of stuff, I don't understand why, it is not like there wasn't enough to eat.

 

I did not save the DAILIES but there was a lot to do, we did the Margarita tasting on the first Sea Day and it was fun, we played in the Blackjack tournament, played some trivia, it was hard to do everything.

[iTinKso]

You may be able to bring your wine onboard the ship and not pay a corkage fee. But, if it's that important to have YOUR wine, why worry about a $15 corkage fee?

 

Some cruisers say you can only bring on wine if it isn't on the Wine List - I was just wondering the probability of being charged a corkage fee rather than pay $35 dollars or more for a bottle of wine...we may just have to invest in Lava Flows ;)!

[COCat]

Glad you had a nice cruise.:) We were on the Star last December in Mexico and had a grat time. We sail on her next November through the Panama Canal, can't wait!:cool:

[COCat]

Glad you had a nice cruise.:) We were on the Star last December in Mexico and had a great time. We sail on her next November through the Panama Canal, can't wait!:cool:

[DDMau]

COCat

 

We did the Panama Canal on 10/3/08 on the Pearl and had a great time and we can't wait to go back. We are setting it up for 2014 when the new locks are open.

Between now and your cruise try this www.pancanal.com it's the web cams in the locks and other links, our family watched us go thru.

 

Now back to the Star all the reviews above sound just like ours back in 2005 really glad to hear NCL the Star and her Crew are still a great ship to travel on.

[WhenIsOurNextCruise]

I can answer some of your questions...

 

1) We boarded around Noon. Short lines and they moved fast. Rooms weren't ready til 2:00. We ate at Versailles and thought the food was great!

 

2) We did not do express departure since our flight wasn't until 1:55. We wanted to stay until the very last minute!

 

3) If you have a coupon book, the first night is 2 for 1 in any speciality restaurant. I don't recall this deal was offered during the cruise.

 

4) The one best thing we did was take an upsell to the Garden Villa! (Don't even ask me how much for the upsell - the guys negotiated the deal and won't tell!)

 

5) Worst thing? Having to leave the ship!

 

Even in the GV, you couldn't get into your cabin until 2:00? Were you in 14000 or 14500? Are you posting a review - would love to know what you thought of the perks!

[OceanDreaming2]

Even in the GV, you couldn't get into your cabin until 2:00? Were you in 14000 or 14500? Are you posting a review - would love to know what you thought of the perks!

 

We were originally in a mini suite, but our cruising companion (best to call him "the Negotiator" worked out a deal we couldn't refuse). So we moved on day 2 of the cruise. Because it was a "deal", the bar was stripped but the GV was awesome. 3 suites, a huge LR/DR with piano, flat panel TV, laptop, table for 8, large wrap around bar. And the outdoor area was terrific, too. Our own hot tub, sauna, another table for 8 plus a table for 4, benches, lounges, etc. and that was just on the main level. Then you have another area up top (deck 15?) which is totally private.

 

It was a total blast -- and a once in a lifetime experience! I'll be posting a review once I come back down to earth! :D

[WhenIsOurNextCruise]

We were originally in a mini suite, but our cruising companion (best to call him "the Negotiator" worked out a deal we couldn't refuse). So we moved on day 2 of the cruise. Because it was a "deal", the bar was stripped but the GV was awesome. 3 suites, a huge LR/DR with piano, flat panel TV, laptop, table for 8, large wrap around bar. And the outdoor area was terrific, too. Our own hot tub, sauna, another table for 8 plus a table for 4, benches, lounges, etc. and that was just on the main level. Then you have another area up top (deck 15?) which is totally private.

 

It was a total blast -- and a once in a lifetime experience! I'll be posting a review once I come back down to earth! :D

 

Sounds like a wonderful, relaxing, luxurious vacation! Can't wait!