Before I begin, I want to mention that I am a Latitudes Gold Member with one more cruise to complete before reaching the Platinum tier with NCL. I have sailed on most of the NCL fleet so I obviously like NCL, but the NCL Pearl was my least favorite.

Upon arrival at the port they had no record of our VIP status (Latitudes) with NCL so we joined the line to get on the ship. Embarkation was tedious and the people conducting it were extremely rude. This was without question the worst embarkation I have ever had with NCL. Once we finally got on the ship they offered us a glass of champagne or orange juice. My travelling companion who is also Gold on NCL wanted a mimosa so he asked for one of each so he could mix them and was told "no, you only get one"; not a pleasant start to a cruise we had been looking forward to for almost a year. When we got on the ship I went to reception to try and straighten out the Latitudes VIP issue and was told that I had no status due to the deck I was on. Later, after speaking to the cruise consultant we did receive some acknowledgement, but when we called reception later in the cruise to contact the concierge we were again told we had no status. Additionally, they never sent the chocolate covered strawberries or other treats to the cabin that are normally send to Gold and Platinum members during the cruise. The reception we received was not the same as what we received on other NCL ships. Basically you are only given VIP treatment on Pearl if you booked a suite or villa.

The pool decks on the Pearl are extremely slippery and there were several falls during the cruise. One in particular was extremely serious and required a helicopter to take the person who fell back to Miami. This required the ship to return very close to the Miami area but we were still able to make up the time. We had bad weather for much of the cruise and the seas were pretty rocky. Read more