My husband and I thorougly enjoyed the cruise! Our mini suite with a balcony was large enough and nicely appointed. The ship seemed huge, and lots of people seemed lost lots of time. Carry the little map of the ship with you.
We enjoyed the freestyle dining and thought the food was good overall. We paid the surcharge and dined one evening in Le Bistro where the food and service were excellent. The chocolate fondue was to die for. However, my husband wasn't thrilled with the upcharges in the selected restaurants so we usually dined at Aqua which was fine. We dined one evening at La Trattoria where my pesto linguini was good but my husband's spaghetti was just so so. We didn't like the lack of atmosphere there because it's a section of the Market buffet area that they have attempted to separate with screens. We enjoyed Endless Summer one evening and liked the location above the Atrium. We enjoyed the free room service in the mornings so we didn't have to dress to go to breakfast to get coffee. The room service selection was limited, but we sometimes went to second breakfast like the Hobbits. My husband liked the ice cream every day from 2:00 to 4:00. I enjoyed the wine tasting for $10, $5 of which you got back if you bought a bottle of wine. It's neat that you can buy a bottle of wine any time, and they'll keep it in their cellar to use on future nights in any restaurant.
We were fortunate to have good weather so we made it to every island. We were a few hours late getting to Maui because of a medical emergency during the night. (We understand that bad weather and emergencies can change a trip drastically.) We followed much of the advice of other cruisers on this website and rented a car (before we left for the trip via the internet, much cheaper than Norwegians' offer of a Budget car once you are onboard) in every port. We stuck with Dollar because it was cheaper. They had a convenient shuttle waiting for us in every port and shuttled us back to the ship at the end of the day. They provided maps and info at every location. We upgraded to a convertible when we could, and that was worth it in the beautiful weather. We took other cruisers' advice and did the helicopter tour on Kauai with Safari Helicopters (booked before we left via internet, much cheaper than the ship's helicopter excursion and cheaper than booking Safari when we docked). In each port, we hit the ground running and saw all we could, usually doing 2 or 3 things while people on the ship's excurions had time for 1. The lines to book excursions on the ship were often long, and we were glad we had done our homework beforehand.