We cruised on the Norwegian Spirit out of New Orleans May 22. This was our honeymoon and also our first cruise, so we were very excited. We arrived super early so had to wait around a bit but were on the ship by around 11:30.
The ship was beautiful; they definitely get you in the mood as soon as you step on board with the fun music and the fruity cocktails. We had lunch in Raffles and were very pleased with the selection and the quality of the food. Then we hung out at Bier Garten overlooking the pool, where we met Guillermo, who became our favorite member of the Spirit staff. He always knew us by name and we never got the feeling that he was being friendly just to get us to buy drinks, as we did with many of the other servers.
We got to our stateroom around 3:00. After reading countless reviews and information on cruises in general, I was expecting a tiny room with no room to move around. We were actually very pleased with the size of the stateroom and the balcony. It worked for what we needed. The stewards were very nice and friendly. Can't speak so much for helpfulness because we really didn't request any special treatment. They did keep our cooler filled with ice though, which was very nice!