My husband and I had wanted to visit Hawaii together since I had cruised the islands on the Pride of Aloha a few years back when NCL was trying out the three ship concept doing basically the same itineraries. We looked at various ways to get the overview and experiences of as many islands as possible and decided that the POA cruise was probably the best way to accomplish our mission in the least amount of time. Other cruise lines offer similar cruises but much of our time would be eaten up cruising the Pacific to get to Hawaii or return. With this itinerary we were able to spend a few extra days before and after our cruise in Honolulu rather than on the open ocean. We feel we did accomplish most of what we set out to do, but would have chosen another cruise line had that option been available. Both of us have multiple cruises under our belt and NCL is at the bottom of our list. The previous cruise of Hawaii left a bad taste in my mouth because of the poor service on part of the largely American crew, required by law so the ship does not have to dock at a foreign port among other things from what I understand. The crew on POA was much better and very friendly this time, so that was a good thing. The entertainment was diverse and provided some great venues for aging boomers including musical tributes to the Eagles, Beatles, and Jimmy Buffett and a very visible and funny comic who kept it clean, which we liked. Among the disappointments were the food, in particular no spectacular desserts like we have enjoyed on other lines.....the signature cheesecake was pretty lame as was the pecan pie with chocolate ice cream. Most of the entrees were average or below leading us to believe that this cruise line has opted to save the really good dishes for their venues with cover charges. That goes against my cruise mantra that all meals are included in the original price. The tiny oceanview room with no sitting area and a postage stamp tv, well that was not so great either. I had asked the right questions and waited patiently while my travel agent called NCL to see if our room was one of the ones mentioned in the category we chose with a sitting area because that was important to us. We opened the door and there was no sitting area and we could not even prop up our pillows comfortably in bed due to the window. I guess NCL does not have accurate information to give out about their cabins. We knew that this cruise would be very busy with excursions and such, so overall, the room was not as important as if we had chosen to make the ship the focus of our cruise such as on a Spa type ship.

We did get a grand tour of Oahu, Maui, Hawaii, the Big Island, and Kauai and thoroughly enjoyed it.

We were a bit disappointed in the food and the room. Read more