I will give a warning that this review will be fairly long (7-8 typed pages) but very detailed. Sorry for the English spellings  it is the way my Word Document is set up.

Background: I am a single female early thirties who is an American but currently living and doing a job assignment in Australia. I met up with my friend who is also in her early thirties and single. She lives in South Carolina. This was my very first cruise and this was her second (previous cruise was a 3 day cruise to the Bahamas when she was in high school so we both considered this our first real experience with cruising). We are friends from when I lived in South Carolina as well and we both were looking for a break after long months at work and picked the Mexican Riviera cruise because it was out of LA (which is a good middle distance between SC and Australia) and because it always looked like nice ports to stop from the Love Boat. We went with Norwegian because we liked the itinerary including Acapulco and an extra day for less money than some of the other cruises. I was even happier with the decision when I learned about the freestyle dining as I am a very picky eater and I liked the idea of eating when you wanted and the many options. We did the Mexican Riviera cruise on the Norwegian Star departing on Friday Oct. 13 (I knew there would have to be issues when departing on a Friday the 13th).

Documents: My only complaint on this is that it was 9 days prior to departure before we got our documents with cabin assignment and my friend got her flight schedule, which she had purchased through the cruise line. To me this is just a little too close and I think NCL could have done a better job getting our info sooner especially with the air flights. Also, I did the pre-register once I got the info and read that it was mandatory to pre-register 14 days prior to departure. That is kind of hard to do when you don't have your booking number until 9 days ahead. Read more