Having cruised with other cruise lines in the past we decided to give NCL a try. We were travelling with another family - 4 adults and 3 kids. We did a lot of research prior to booking and the Getaway seemed to have everything we would want from a cruise. A lot of entertainment for the kids and plenty for the adults. At the time we booked, the drinks or dining package were included. We opted for the dining package as we're not big drinkers. It proved to be a great choice!

We had booked a mini-suite with what we thought was a large balcony. However, on speaking with NCL a couple of weeks after we booked, we realized that we had actually booked a small balcony so paid for the upgrade to the large balcony. At that time we were told that they couldn't give us a stateroom, but that we would be guaranteed the large balcony. The stateroom would be released to us closer to our departure date. We also bought the birthday package for our kids who were celebrating their birthday on the ship. We requested the cabin to be decorated on their actual birthday, but were told that it had to be done on the day of departure so that was fine.

As we live in South Florida we drove down to Miami on the Saturday morning. We opted to park our car at an off-site parking lot which was half the price of the cruise parking lot. There were shuttle buses that took us to the port and picked us up after the cruise. Read more