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LONG: 4 days left of my Sun cruise here is my review part 1

ohioNCLcruiser

By ohioNCLcruiser,
in Norwegian Cruise Line

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ohioNCLcruiser Great Review Rare

ohioNCLcruiser

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Greetings,

 

I’m currently on the Norwegian Sun and because my twitter isn’t working I figured I would post part of this review now. This was my first cruise without the parents and the longest cruise I have taken. The previous longest was the 11 day Norwegian Wind Hawaii cruise.

 

Pre-cruise:

 

I flew into San Francisco the day before the cruise. I was flying on Continental Airlines from Cleveland to Houston then onto San Fran. My flight to Houston was on time but the connecting flight was about two hours late due to bad weather conditions. Pretty much everything after 11am was late. This is the exact reason why I always tell people to fly one day early to the port. Once I landed into SFO I met my friend and we took the BART train from the airport to Fisherman’s Wharf area for $5 then a $10 cab to the hotel. We stayed at the Radisson Fisherman’s Warf. This hotel was around $220 but it was in the perfect location. After checking in we just walked around the Wharf area because the weather was so bad and it was raining. Around 4 pm we were walking down the street and I suddenly heard a “James?” and it was Larry and Richard (Addictedtwo) so we met them. It’s always nice to meet people in the street. I walked back to the hotel to change for dinner and found a group of people struggling to get their keycard to work. We stood there for a few seconds then offered our assistance. Suddenly one said, “Are you James?” and it was Monica and Tonya (stillfloatin and slotprincess) from cruise critic and their friends. The cruise wasn’t starting till the next day but we already met 5 people. Around 6:30 pm we headed over to Scomas (spelling?) restaurant for dinner with some cruise critic people. When we went into this restaurant you could tell it had some history. Big Green from Cruise Critic, Bud and Pat were waiting and immediately called us over. Monica and Tonya stayed for drinks but it was just Bud, Pat, James (travel partner) and myself for dinner. The restaurant was great and it was really nice to meet Bud and Pat, both great people. (Thanks for the great dinner!!) After we went up to Ghirardelli Square for ice cream then called it a night.

 

In the morning we woke up really early so we would see the Sun cruise past. After we went on a very nice one-hour walk (but very easy walk) down to the Golden Gate Bridge. We couldn’t have had better weather. Not a cloud in sight and it was the perfect temperature out. After taking some pictures we walked back to the hotel and took our luggage and just walked to the cruise ship (around 4 blocks.) We ran into Richard and Larry (addictedtwo) and Monica and Tonya again.

 

We arrived at the pier around 11am and they started check in about 10 minutes later. While we were waiting to check in about four other cruise critic people walked over to say hello. Check in was a breeze and we were on the ship in about 15 minutes with our Champagne in hand exploring our home for the next 19 days.

 

 

 

The Ship first impressions:

A few people on Critic Critic said the Sun is their favorite ship and the crew is the best. It’s a nice ship, but I wouldn’t think of it as a “favorite” and I actually even enjoyed the smaller Wind and Dream more. The ship wasn’t bad, it just was normal and wasn’t my favorite but I liked it. One area I did like was the aft stairs above the 7 Seas Dining room. There is a large stained glass window that goes up two decks with open stairs that go up from deck 5 to deck 8. Its painted a bright white color and you wouldn’t expect it to be there but it was nice. The atrium was nice but not as nice as the newer Dawn’s atrium. The ships showing its age but was always cleaned very well. I did really like the pool area. I thought it was a nice design with a very large bar tucked behind it. The ship has deck 6 where you can walk around the entire ship and it has great views. The only annoying thing is from 8 pm till 8 am they cut off the front section so you can walk in a U shape or you have to cut through the ship to the other side. No big deal but its nice to be able to walk around the entire front of the ship. The ship also has a nice Observation lounge on deck 12 forward but it was always empty. It’s a popular reading spot during the day.

 

Food and Restaurants:

 

The two main dining rooms on the ship were the 7 Seas and 4 Seasons dining rooms. Both were nice but looked almost identical. You won’t notice different themes like the Dawn’s Venetian or Aqua or the America’s Liberty and Skyline dining rooms for example. The only real difference was the 7 Seas had the stricter dress code with no jeans allowed. I was always happy with the food in the main dining rooms. I never had a bad meal and never had a cold plate. The Caesars were always fresh and the chilled fruit soups were always excellent. So far we have had 16 different ones! One nice thing about this cruise is we only have around 1,500 passengers when the normal is 2,100 so we never had to wait for a table.

 

The buffet was small but it always worked. I really enjoyed most of the food. A few times the food was a tad salty but I never had complaints. They had an ice cream bar next to it also with a great outdoor area. The buffet was about the same as the other Freestyle 2.0 buffets with the Pasta station, Wok station and large salad bar. We were always greeted by name from the wonderful host each night and we would chat about the different ships or any other NCL news. The Executive Chef in the buffet was on the America for a while so it was great to catch up with him.

 

Las Rambles was the free Tapes bar and they always had some kind of music at night. It was great if you just wanted a light snack. During lunchtime they had soup and sandwiches.

 

East Meets West Steakhouse. I went to dinner here one night with Russell and Michelle (Ronin) and had a great meal but the restaurant was literally empty besides us. The specialty restaurants were almost empty for the entire cruise so I was really surprised to not see any 2 for 1 nights. Oh well. I had the 10 oz Fillet and it was wonderful followed buy the cheesecake. The service was ok but not nearly as nice as my experience with Cagneys on the Dawn and they were not afraid to show us when it was time for us to leave. Good food and worth the $20 cover charge though.

 

Room service:

 

Great new menu and always arrived around thirty minutes. Always pleased no complaints here and can’t beat the free price!

 

Housekeeping and the Cabin:

 

The first day they forgot to do our cabin. We called the front desk to have our beds turned down and separated and they rushed someone to do it. After that night we have had no complaints. They were both really nice and kept our ice bucket always filled.

 

We had cabin 9138 called a Superior Inside Cabin. This cabin is by far the largest cabin I have ever had on a cruise ship, much bigger then my balcony cabins on the Dawn and the Jade. It’s a sideways room with two large closets and about 10 other storage things. Look at my flicker page for photos. One thing is make sure you bring a surge protector with five or six outlets. The cabin has one US plug and two 220 Volts but that’s it. Our inside cabin also came with a coffee maker, mini bar and a tv but no internet connection port. We also had a full size couch.

 

Bar notes:

 

I never saw the free drink hours for Casino at Seas players in the casino. I asked the Casino Manager about this and he said they did that experiment for three months and it didn’t pay off so they stopped doing it. They had a few times when it was 2 for 1 prices including buckets of beer but this was the only cruise I have seen this. I’m guessing it was because of the low revenue on the longer cruise and I wouldn’t expect to see this on the Sun’s shorter cruise. I really didn’t get a lot of drinks from the bar but I did go to the Margarita and Martini tasting with some friends I met on the ship. Each tasting was $15 and they also had Wine, Beer and some others also. The Margarita tasting was good but only four people showed up and you need at least five. They were about to give us a free Margarita for showing up but at the last minute a 5th and 6th person showed up. The tasting was done by one of the ship’s Head Bartender and he made three different ones. The Golden Margarita, Tequila sunset and some blue one. They gave us nuts to munch on and it was worth the money and you made new friends. This was held in the Las Rablas Tapas Bar. Later on in the cruise I went to the Martini tasting in the Windjammer Bar. The tasting was fun and they made five different ones. They started with the original dry Gin martini, followed by a Cosmo, two other fruit ones then finished with the Chocolate Martini made with chocolate vodka and Godiva. The tasting was a great deal and a lot of fun. Note: You will drink a total of 10-15 oz of Martinis so do not drink anything before you go! A party showed up already drunk and after the tasting they ordered one full Martini. It was sad/funny at the same time because this woman just started crying. Too much is still too much even on a cruise ship! The Bartender and I had a great chat because he use to work on the Pride Of Hawaii as part of the 15-25% international crew. He really misses it and said the Hawaii’s crew was much nicer and more respectful then some of his international coworkers. I gave a $5 tip so the total was $20 but considering they charge $9 for a single martini it was still a good deal and it was a fun way to kill two hours.

 

 

Entertainment: The entertainment has been a hit or miss. I enjoyed the shows by Jean Ann Ryan Company and some of the other entertainers were great some were boring. I really enjoyed the German Juggler. He was funny and kept the show going the entire time.

 

Ports of Calls:

 

I just want to talk about two of the ports of call for now.

 

Los Angeles:

We docked at the San Pedro cruise ship terminal in LA and I was very excited because I have always wanted to go see the Queen Mary because of my huge fascination with Ocean Liners and the cruise industry. We docked at 2pm and were only in port till 7pm. The two of us and Judy (Iguana from Cruise Critic) jumped in a cab and it cost around $22 to get to the ship. The second I boarded the ship I could tell this ship has a huge history and its defiantly haunted! We did the $22 dollar “do it yourself walking tour with Ghost tour” and it was great. The ship still has some great original rooms with the original décor. You can picture the rooms full of first class passengers or troops during the war. The ship is full of secret hallways and stairs that just feel creepy. Walking around the outside decks was great and they still sound the ships original horn every few hours. After walking around we went to take the ghost tour. I was VERY disappointed with this. We thought it was just a walking tour to the rooms where ghosts were spotted (such as the swimming pool) but it was more like a Disney themed ride. They had fog machines, strobe lights etc but it made it really hard to see the actual rooms. The Queen Mary hit another ship during a crossing and cut the ship in two and I think around 300 died on that ship. We went down to the Boiler rooms but because they wanted to do the effects show they had all the lights in the room off. I had to keep taking flash pictures just to see the real size of these massive boiler rooms. It’s a good tour if you like the special effects but if you want to see the actual rooms it’s a horrible tour. I really want to come back to the Queen Mary with a friend who is also into the ships so we can spend a few nights there and really explore the ship. The best sight was as we were leaving. Right as we were driving back to the ship the sun had set so the ship was all light up. It looked great and I’m looking forward to going back and staying there. We took a cab back to the ship and it was $25 but it was a nice Lincon Town Car so it was very relaxing.

 

Acapulco:

I really don’t see what all the hype about Acapulco is about. I found the city to be pretty dirty. Some of the private villas looked great but I wouldn’t stay on the main beach. We took a tour that was a lot of fun. We went to this Shotover Jet speedboat ride through this lake area. It was very jungle-like with some openings only being as wide as the boat and you had to duck. The boat went up to 55 MPH and did several 360 spins. It was a very thrilling refreshing ride and as soon as I’m home I will post the pictures. This ride lasted around 30 minutes and it was a blast. The boat held 8 people and everyone was from Cruise Critic so we all knew each other. Thanks to Richard and Larry (addictedtwo) for organizing this! After the boat ride we went and watched the Cliff Divers. The show was $3.50 usd to watch but was interesting. They had around 15 divers from 8 years old to adults. The show started with them climbing up the cliff then they would jump one at a time. After the divers we drove up to this large church on top of a hill and got some great scenic pictures. After we headed back to the ship. We were docked till 11 pm so we decided to walk down the street to the store to pick up some soda. When we started walking we were immediately swamped by people trying to sell us random items, gum, cab rides and a few other sleazy things Acapulco offers. I started to just say no thanks but learned just ignoring them worked better. The most difficult part of the day was trying to cross the 6 lane street to the store. A car almost hit my friend but after waiting a few minutes we crossed without problems. It’s much easier crossing halfway between the lights then at the lights. We picked up some Coke ($3 usd for 4L) and went back to the ship. At 4 pm I met up with Russell and Michelle (Ronin from Cruise Critic) from Australia and we headed down the street to go have $1.50 Coronas. It was enjoyable and very relaxing. We only drank these without Lime to avoid any chances of getting sick. Remember if your drinking a blended drink or even a drink with ice cubes the ice is their tap water and you could get sick. (Thanks to my friend Mike on the Pearl for giving me this warning from his mistake!) After a few hours we went back to the ship. Some local singers, musicians and dancers boarded the ship and had a large deck party before sailing away. About 8 of us from cruise critic went on Big Green’s aft penthouse balcony for a beautiful sail away party from Acapulco. Thanks again Bud and Pat for this. It was a perfect end to the day.

 

That’s it for now but only four days left of the cruise!

 

Also I have some amazing sunset pictures I can't wait to post as soon as I get home!

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S&B

S&B

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Thank you for that great review. Can you tell us about your captain of the ship? Will he continue to cruise around the horn? We are on the Sun in February from Buenos Aires to Santiago. :)

 

Thanks again.

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ohioNCLcruiser Great Review Rare

ohioNCLcruiser

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Thank you for that great review. Can you tell us about your captain of the ship? Will he continue to cruise around the horn? We are on the Sun in February from Buenos Aires to Santiago. :)

 

Thanks again.

 

I haven't met the captain but I know at the VIP party he told my friends he didn't have time to take a picture with them "because he had to go take pictures with the reqular passengers" so they were a little offended but I have not met him.

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Pool girl1

Pool girl1

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Hi Ohiocruiser: I am happy you are enjoying your cruise. I also was disappointed in Acapolco in 06. I was just plain nervous being there the one thing I really did enjoy were the cliff divers but like you said you get swamped when you leave the hotel. I must say though that the tour guide NCL had set up was excellent at getting us through the crowds of people. What an experience for you at your age. Being able to go on a cruise like this good for you. Now I have read a few times you might be working on the spirit good for you. Well enjoy the rest of your cruise I can't wait to read your full review.

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terrymtex01

terrymtex01

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Great to see you posting James.. I have missed you. Nice review so far. I agree about the Sun herself. It is a nice ship, but not our favorite either. I am sure some people wonder why the Star is our favorite as we have never been able to really explain it.

 

Hope the rest of your cruise is great and hope you make it back home safely. We have missed you and your postings. 19 days on a cruise?? BOY am I jealous.

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nunuc2000 "Live from...." Rare

nunuc2000

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Hi James... I thoroughly enjoyed reading your account thus far of your cruise on the Sun - my husband and I are booked for the same cruise, same ship, in Nov of 09. I was particularly interested in the room you have - we're actually booked in an II Superior inside "sideways" room as well, and I'm very curious about how it looks and how functional it is. You mention it being a lot bigger than previous rooms you've had... do you know the square footage of that room? I can't view Flickr photos for some annoying reason... is there some way for you to post the room photos elsewhere, or even in reply to the email I sent you a few days ago?

 

Hope the rest of your cruise is wonderfully relaxing and I'm eager to read the completed version of your rewiew when you get back. Have a safe trip home!!

 

Celine

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coka

coka

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Hi James, I am glad you posted part of your trip thus far...Looking forward to reading more! Do they have the same themed parties on the 19 dayers as they do the 7 dayers...or is the nightlife more tame?

 

coka

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jjb415

jjb415

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Hey James,

 

Thanks for posting your impressions of the Norwegian Sun. I was aboard her for the repositioning from Alaska to San Francisco in September and aboard the Norwegian Dream on her trip up from South America in April, so, I'm interested in hearing about the ship and the itinerary. I was aboard the Oosterdam when we passed you at about 3am on November 7, at least I think that it must have been you when I stepped out on my balcony for air, somewhere off Baja.

 

I'm glad that you are enjoying the trip!! :)

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