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My wife and I wwas on the same cruise as some of the more negative reviews here, but our experience was completely different. This was the first cruise for my wife and I, so our expectations were pretty high, and they were definitely met on the Norweigan Sun. We had a balcony stateroom on deck 8 and spent a good deal of our time on our balcony, taking advantage of our own private ocean view. Everyone told me that I should take an interior room since "we wouldn't be spending any time in our room anyway", but I can safely say I won't sail again without a balcony room. A big part of a cruise is being near the ocean for me, we left our balcony door open 24/7! Fresh air, cool breeze and great sleeping and napping. Awoke one night at 2 am to find another cruise ship to starboard fully lit up and gorgeous, and awoke another night to enjoy a short, but wild thunderstorm. Loved it.
First night out was kind of rough on the sea, my wife ended up in bed nauseous and missing dinner, but Bonine soon set her straight and she was fine for the rest of the cruise.
We both thought the food was very good, the wait staff being very helpful, kind, attentive and occasionally very funny. Have to say the staff was the most pleasant surprise as they were all professional, courteous and kind. I'd think it would be hard to be so nice several months into your contract, 9 months away from home with no days off, having to be exteremely nice to everyone all the time. They performed without fail. Kudos especially to our room steward Rey...who left us "towel animals" without fail every night, and they always had eyes! Rey was prompt with replacing towels and giving us whatever extras we asked for.
Room was comfortable and spacious enough for us. The balcony was our getaway and private paradise.
Food was quite good at both "free" main restaurants, good enough that we never visted the buffet restaurants after the second morning. Mahi-Mahi, filet mignon, salmon, and the chocoholics night (oy). The only time we ate off ship was on Nassau (see below) and in Puerto Rico (also below). Never had to wait more than a minute to be seated, another 2 minutes to get menus and 3 more to have our orders taken. never more than a 10 minute wait to get our food either. Again, here our experience differed greatly with other guests posting here.
Spent a couple hours in the casino, at penny slots (casino not our thing) but had fun more than doubling our $20 input before losing it all after more than an hour of playtime. Bingo too, no winnings (everyone say "Ayn"). If you want to hit the pool, I suggest going at 7am. Got a hot tub to ourselves for an hour and empty pool as well...very relaxing.
Neither my wife or I are big drinkers, but the drinks we did have, though expensive, were tasty and hit the spot at the time. If you want to go cruising on the cheap, try to avoid over indulging in alchohol.
I could go on and on, I will summarize our port stops below. Needless to say we will be back, having actually put a $250 down on our next trip with Norweigan. We are totally converted cruisers now!
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