My wife and I have been on a handful of cruises consisting of Carnival, RCCL, and NCL. We chose a Hawaiian cruise because we have been to Hawaii three previous years, each time visiting a respective island for a week, and we felt that a cruise would allow us the perfect amount of time to do the remaining things we didn't have time for before on each island. Therefore, what was most important to us was the itinerary and the amount of time the ship was at each port. We chose NCL b/c they fit this criteria plus the price was the cheapest of all the cruise lines for a balcony AND we like the freestyle dining concept. We HIGHLY recommend spending a little more for a balcony on this type of cruise. It's completely worth it.
First, let me start off by saying that the Pride of America is one of the LEAST impressive ships of NCL's fleet. It's obvious when you walk on the ship that it's one of their older vessels. But again, we didn't care b/c we had our balcony, a perfect itinerary, and freestyle dining which works perfect for us. We didn't spend any time on the ship except to eat, sleep, and shower. That's it. So as far as shows and activities on the ship go, I can't comment on any of that. Besides, who in the hell goes on a Hawaiian cruise to spend a lot of time on the ship anyway? That defeats the entire purpose for visiting the Hawaiian islands.
EMBARKATION/DEBARKATION - We can't comment on this b/c we were one of the last to embark and one of the last to debark. We rolled the dice to save $300 on our flights from Chicago to arrive in Honolulu 1.5 hours before the ship set sail and we made it with some time to spare. As far as debarkation, we booked a hotel at the Waikiki Sunset the Saturday the cruise ended, so we were in no hurry to leave the ship.