Norwegian Dawn Review

4.0 / 5.0
3,028 reviews

First time cruiser in love with the Dawn!

Review for the Eastern Caribbean Cruise on Norwegian Dawn
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mamaslutcow
First Time Cruiser • Age 20s

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Value for Money
Embarkation
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Additional details

Sail Date: Jan 2009
Cabin: Obstructed Oceanview
Traveled with children

We arrived in Miami on Friday evening and stayed at the recently named DoubleTree hotel (formerly Miami Mart Airport Hotel). The hotel, itself was very nice, but we had a few major issues. They provided a free shuttle from the airport, every 30 minutes, and there was only one woman checking in. So, every thirty minutes there was a new crowd of people to stand in an increasingly long and ridiculous line. Issue number two is that we didn't get our free cookies on check in (they ran out). This isn't normally a major issue, but after waiting in the line I really had my heart set on that cookie. Issue three was a big one - lukewarm showers at best. We did a survey in the elevator and this was a hotel-wide problem. Enough about the hotel.

Embarkation seemed speedy and efficient. As first timers it's hard to say if it was more or less efficient than others. I did feel like herded cattle, and I was constantly concerned about losing my group or possibly my daughter. Before boarding the ship there was a ridiculous line to have our photos taken. This did not interest us, so we walked past. That seemed to irritate the photographer. Champagne was nice, and my little girl felt special with her juice in a champagne glass. We went strait to lunch in the Garden Cafe.

We spent our first evening settling in and surviving the very rough seas. We dined at the Venetian (which we did every night thereafter) and it was fabulous. I was not used to cruise eating where you order as much of whatever you want. Huge fan of this. The service at the Venetian varied night to night, but the food was always very good. The dress code for dinner was supposed to be "no shorts, no tank tops, and no cut offs" (jeans were okay, which was different from what I had read), but even this was not enforced. It was only mildly annoying, made worse when those breaking the dress code were also loud and obnoxious.

Cabin Review

Obstructed Oceanview

Cabin OK

We had an obstructed ocean view cabin, and we were very happy with it. Our room was laid out differently than the typical cabins, and it was agreed upon by many of us that our room was far superior. When you walk in our beds were to the right and the bathroom and storage space was tot he left - it felt much more spacious than the other cabins. Our view was not all that obstructed, and I think the presence of the lifeboat in our view helped not get too seasick.

We had 6 total bags (3 check size, 3 carry-ons) and we managed to hide all of them away. The storage space seemed quite appropriate, but not overly generous.

We were on the 8th deck, and about 30 steps away from the midship elevators, which was fabulous. We were, however right across the hall from the crew elevators/room where all the luggage came from. It made the first and last nights a little noisy, but otherwise our location was very nice.

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