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After having previously sworn to never cruise from ugly/disorganized Port Liberty again after our experience in Dec. 2011, I decided that the itinerary and larger ship would be worth another try and planned an earlier arrival than in 2011. We got to the port around 11AM to find that most of the parking places to unload our luggage were taken by cars of people still departing from the cruise so that we had to go to the very end of the "warehouse"/port building which did work out OK. We parked the car and did go through the check in process relatively quickly and were on the ship by noon after waiting in the queue for the shuttle buses for about 15 minutes.
Despite our early arrival the Windjammer was pretty jammed up with few open tables visible; However, go completely aft and there will be a better chance to get a table. Food was good and service exceptional. Cabins were ready about 1:30 as promised.
The ship is dated but for the most part clean and very nice; particularly the Promenade which is very impressive and reminiscent of the Oasis although smaller. Richard Spacey is a great CD and he seemed to be more visible and talkative than when we first met him on the Oasis. We did not attend many shows so no comment here.
We did go to the Portofino one evening and agree with other reviews that it is indeed worth the extra price.
After the cruise was over the pain of Bayonne Cape liberty cruise port hit again: It was over a half hour wait in line on the ship for shuttles to arrive and load AFTER we were released from the waiting area to get to the port building and try and find our luggage. So many people carry off large pieces of luggage at this port that the shuttles are jammed and the entire process is chaos.
We would recommend Bermuda as a destination especially if you can avoid the Bayonne cruise port for starting the trip. Cape Liberty is a terrible example of what a cruise port should be and is best compared to those in undeveloped countries and probably is worse than those. For some reason debarkation at Cape Liberty is even worse than embarkation with one of our bags placed randomly in another group and no way to find it except for looking over the entire room............MARK YOUR BAG WELL so you can see it from a distance in the Bayonne terminal
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