shield022 Posted May 21, 2009 #1 Share Posted May 21, 2009 We are going on the Pride of America in April 2010 and currently have a AE Penthouse suite booked. It is $2,200 cheaper for a quad balcony cabin. I realize this is a port intensive cruise and we will basically use the cabin to sleep, shower, etc... Would two adults and two 9 year old children have enough room in a quad balcony cabin or shall we stick with the penthouse suite? (178 Sq.Ft vs. 504 Sq. Ft.) The butler and suite perks are not that important to us because of no sea days? Anyone who has stayed in a P.O.A. quad please reply? Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hacmangum Posted May 21, 2009 #2 Share Posted May 21, 2009 we have had our two kids 14 and 8 at the time in our balcony room with us on Royal Caribbean with no issues. I cant imagine the NCL balcony quads are much smaller. Yes, it is NOT the most relaxed and roomy space but it serves the purpose. Especially for the Hawaii cruise- if you are like us, we do not plan on spending much time on the ship other than eating and sleeping! So, my vote would be to save the money- I have been doing my research and have found to do the activities we want at each stop- it is going to be more $$ than I had planned and typically spend on a normal 3 or four stop cruise. Good luck with your decision. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phillycruise Posted May 22, 2009 #3 Share Posted May 22, 2009 I see your dilemma. This is a port intensive cruise and you may not get the most out of the Penthouse if you are not around to use it. The money saved could be used for some amazing shore excursions. Even with all that in mind I'm tempted to say, blow it and keep the Penthouse! My personal problem with the balcony quad apart from the space is the hard uncomfortable convertible sofa that would serve as the kids' beds. On our last NCL cruise nobody wanted to sleep there and the kids ended up with me in the main bed and poor DH had the sofa! Has anybody got any experience of the convertible sofas on POA? Are they comfy??? If you want more space it may pay to do a little research on other cabin options as this worked for us... We are going to the Big Island for 1 week at the end of June. We couldn't decide whether to spend our second week on another island or do the POA cruise. After pricing up decent hotels the POA seemed to be good value for money. I have two girls aged 11 and 9 and was worried if space would be a little tight in the balcony quad. Anyway it worked out that it was cheaper for us to get two BI (balcony guarentee) cabins than the quad balcony!! We took this option for the space and the beds. We were reconciled with the fact that you run the risk of the two cabins being on different floors and at the end of the day the family would split up and my husband would sleep in a cabin with one daughter and I would be with the other. This was worth it to us as at least we will all get a proper bed to sleep in. As it happens we were assigned 2 BA rooms on deck 10, 4 doors away from each other. The total cost for the two rooms was $5000. I'm sure you'll have a wonderful cruise whatever you decide!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BLK03GT Posted May 22, 2009 #4 Share Posted May 22, 2009 I'll answer from a different perspective, we spent a total of maybe an hour not asleep in the room on our cruise. As you mentioned, you simply aren't in the room period, except for sleeping. The time we were in the room we spent on the balcony. We had the fold out sofa in our room as well, I did pull it out just for fun. Was it as comfortable as the bed, nope. Was it adequate, yes indeed. I know when I was younger I would sleep anywhere to get to go to Hawaii. Save the money for great excursions, your kiddo's will remember them far longer then they might remember a cramped room. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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