Just got back from Alaska cruise on Norwegian. We took our granddaughter on her first cruise, and did not have particularly high expectations, having read some unflattering reviews from other cruisers. We were pleasantly surprised. We normally take Regent cruises and were uneasy about everybody on Norwegian hustling us to spend money, and the possibility of overcrowding and bad food, bad service. It's true that the employees on Norwegian try to sell you stuff, but they are very friendly and not really aggressive about it. They were uniformly polite and eager to please everywhere we went, and treated our granddaughter like a princess. We had booked a couple of shore excursions that had to be canceled because of bad weather, and they fell all over themselves to help us arrange alternative trips. (Btw, late August is pretty likely to be cold and rainy in Alaska -- we knew this, and took serious rain gear, and warm fleeces, hats, gloves, etc.) We decided to take this trip at the last minute, and the Picasso suite was the only balcony suite available; it turned out to be absolutely worth the money. Great bathroom (better than anything we've ever had on Regent), fabulous linens, somewhat silly decor, but who cares? We had access to Cagney's for breakfast and lunch every day, and our concierge, Patrick, steered us to the best seating for shows, most of which were quite fun. Andrew, the butler was always prompt, and Guillermo, the steward, was a gem, making funny towel animals to delight our granddaughter every night. Our granddaughter, at 9, turned up her nose at the kid's programs -- 9 year olds don't want to be in a program with 5 year olds-- but she loved the shows, the pool and slides and played bingo like a champ. All in all, a solid 4 star experience. I withhold a star only because the food was definitely mediocre, often not much better than your average college dorm. Don't go for the food.