Norwegian Dawn Review

First time cruisers and now already planning our next cruise

Review for Bermuda Cruise on Norwegian Dawn
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ExPatKiwi
First Time Cruiser • Age 50s

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Sail Date: Jul 2014

This was our first time on a cruise for my wife and I so we had no point of reference or preset expectations of what to expect and were a little apprehensive of what we were getting ourselves into too say the least. The Boston - Bermuda cruise was booked only 2 weeks out when the price for a balcony suite cabin dropped substantially and looked to be good value for money and also very convenient for us with embarkation from Boston, MA. The thought was if it was a disaster cruise then we hadn't wasted too much of our hard earned money on the vacation. Our cabin was located starboard side aft on deck 10.

On board the Norwegian Dawn we had a lot families and young adults (recent high school and college graduates), so as you could imagine there was a lot of late night party activity, particularly around the Oasis pool deck. This was really no different to any vacation resort location so it didn't overly perturb us, the ship is more than large enough to find plenty of quite areas to hang out. In general the passengers were from a broad cross section of society with the majority from New England and the Northeast, including a splattering of "Jersey Shore" types in the flesh.

The ship had plenty of restaurants, pubs, entertainment, show productions and activities on board to keep you occupied day and night. Some more experienced cruise passengers mentioned they didn't like the freestyle dining of NCL and preferred the traditional set time and table. We found the freestyle cruising very flexible. If we wanted a guaranteed table in a particular restaurant we simply made a reservation a day or so earlier, otherwise you can just wing it and try your luck. I will say we never ate in the Garden Cafe buffet, it was always busy and seemed to have that fatty cafeteria smell all the time. Instead for a breakfast buffet or light lunch we used the Blue Lagoon restaurant, it was always quite. We used almost all the specialty restaurants on board. However, the La Cucina restaurant was located next to Gatbys Champagne Wine Bar. Unfortunately, to get to La Cucina you have to pass through the smoked filled air coming from the Havana Club cigar room and the Casino. We opted to pass on eating there for that reason. We would highly recommend Cagney's Steakhouse, Bamboo, and the Sushi Bar though.

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