My husband and I celebrated our 45th wedding anniversary aboard the NCL Breakaway. This was our third NCL cruise. We have sailed on Celebrity, Carnival, Royal Caribbean, Azamara, Princess, and Holland America. I still can't decide whether or not this was a good cruise for us. First the good...Sailing from NYC. PH suite with Haven access. I would never choose another cruise without Haven access. This was by far what made this trip OK. Some of the perks were escort to the cabin, Jungle fantasy show, and disembarking. The Haven restaurant is good, but portions are small and the menu does not vary. The overall service we received was good, but I'm not sure if this was because we had the "silver' sea pass indicating suite. We ate at Taste, La Cucina, Moderno, and Teppanyaki. We did make reservations, but had to change some and it was no problem through the concierge. The shows were OK. We saw Rock of Ages, Burn the Floor, Howl at the Moon, and Second City. In the theater, there is a section roped off for Haven guests. This was very convenient. We had an excellent butler who tried to anticipate our needs. We are low maintenance so our needs were easily met. Our cabin was decorated for our anniversary which was a nice touch.

Now for the bad...the suite 11106 forward was configured poorly which made it seem cramped. The best feature was the bathroom with 2 sinks, a separate shower, and a soaking tub. In my opinion, there was a lot of wasted space. Getting to the closet was a joke since it was so close to the bed. There was ample drawer space. The balcony was awful! 32 sq. ft. (yes, 8x4). In order to sit on a chair you had to place it sideways. Our cabin was port side so we were able to watch the fireworks standing on the balcony. Kids.... I am a retired teacher so I'm used to seeing and dealing with kids. That being said, I knew this ship would have a lot of kids because of the time frame, but not only were there 1200 on board, but it felt like they took over the ship. Every venue was very crowded and caused us to leave and not enjoy some of the activities. This was especially true in the Atrium. It seemed as if the staff was told to cater to the kids. Lesson learned-we will never travel on an NCL ship in the summer again. Chef's table...we were so looking forward to attending this event. It was extremely disappointing. The food was just ok. The chef was informative, but just seemed to be filling time between courses. At $99 per person plus tip, we expected it to be great. We have attended other cruise lines chef's tables and this was inferior by far and the most expensive. Decks 6,7,8. This is a poor ship design. All entertainment venues and restaurants are on these decks (except the buffet, which is not even worth mentioning). The smoke from the casino is evident and it was crowded all the time. There are only 2 elevator banks, forward and aft, making it a long wait most of the time, and an even longer walk to our cabin. Bermuda is beautiful, but been there and done that several times.

So...I still can't decide whether this cruise was good or not. There were some good and bad points. Would we choose NCL again? Yes, probably, for a longer cruise with Haven access and not during school vacation time.