Great first cruise! Disappointed about service in some standard dining and in Bayamo. Overall good but some polish needed. O'sheahan needs work. Wifi is spotty at best. Cagneys and Le Bistro are top notch. Bayamo is ok, can't understand why the extra charge. Food not as good as the other specialty restaurants. Teppanyaki was lots of fun, but service was off. Watched chef argue with service staff. He was right, but shouldn't have too. Thermal suite was well worth the cost. Cabin steward, Kindick Mustafa, was spot on. Bartenders were outstanding, had old school standards! Activities were fun. Entertainment was fantastic. Howl at the moon was great, did it twice. Choir of man was the best. Must do! Also, Deal or no deal in the Atrium was a great time, plus might make some money. Our first cruise was awesome, some room for improvement, but nevertheless will consider another cruise in the future. Read Less

We chose this cruise because of the extra "Free at Sea" perks and my friend had been on this cruise two years ago. The entertainment was excellent. We saw "The Choir of Man," a magician, and "Howl At the Moon." We also did the Wine Lovers luncheon, which was fantastic and definitely worth the extra fee. We sampled six wines, while dining on a fabulous fancy lunch. Norwegian's Freestyle Dining is perfect! Dine when and where you choose. One of our dinners was in the Supper Club, which required reservations, but was complimentary, and the menu was fixed. The entertainment was very good-. As a part of the speciality dining package (one of the Free at Sea perks), we selected Cagney's Steakhouse, La Cucina, and Teppanyaki, and the food at each was excellent. One dinner was in the Manhattan Room (a main dining room) and was fantastic! Breakfast and lunch were at the main dining rooms Taste, Savor, which were also excellent. Disembarkation was a nightmare! It took about two hours to get off the ship. We selected the last group to leave the ship, thinking that others would be off. BIG MISTAKE! Most the others were still getting off and the line was winding through the Manhattan Room FOREVER! I highly recommend selecting one of the first groups, even if you don't have an early flight! Read Less

The Escape was fun and easy to maneuver. The staff was very kind. The food was great. I especially enjoyed Moderno Churrasco, all you can eat meat. The garlic steak was my favorite but all was tasty and cooked to perfection. I always love the pineapple at the end. Taste and Savor were great places to dine with the family for dinner. We didn’t wait long to get a seat any night. O’Sheehans was a great place to get wings, burgers and fajitas. The buffet was clean and had many food options. Lots of chairs for all on the pool deck. We were able to trade in pool towels often. Drinks were great from the bar. Everyone seemed to love the hot tubs. Fun Minature golf. Kids loved it. They also loved to arcade. The casino was very smoky though. There must have been a lot of smokers on the boat. Read Less

It was my first time going on a cruise, and it has been a great experience overall. Cleanliness: The ship is very clean. I found staffs cleaning public area at least once every hour. The stewards would clean your room as requested by simply pressing a button by your stateroom door. We had ours cleaned twice a day. I also looked forward to the towel animal on our bed every night. Shore Excursions: I was hesitated to get the shore excursions at first, thinking that it would be cheaper for me to arrange my own itinerary, but I'm glad that I added them. NCL prepared all the transportation, so there was nothing to worry about during vacation. For Port Canaveral, we chose Kennedy Space Center. We read reviews that it is not enough time to visit everything, but we found that it worked out fine if you researched on what you want to see beforehand. My husband and I downloaded the Kennedy Space Center app ahead of time, so we already knew which part we wanted to visit and got to see everything we planned. Our second stop was Great Stirrup Cay, but our ship could not stop there due to high winds. Nevertheless, NCL refunded us for our shore excursion immediately without delay. The captain also notified the passengers promptly, sent out an updated agenda in less than one hour, and stopped for an extra day at Nassau. For Nassau, we chose Aquaventure. They were not many people on the weekday, and you definitely have time to go on all the slides. It is also a plus that the staffs greeted all passengers with towels to clean our hands and refreshing drinks by the ship every time when we came back from shore. Food: The food were simply amazing. I'd highly recommend getting the speciality dining package to try a variety of food, just be prepared that the waiting time can be lengthy at times. Read Less

I have always cruised NCL and wanted to treat my daughter and grandson to an awesome experience. Prior to this The largest NCL ship I had traveled on was the Breakaway, The Escape is just a larger version of the BA. Unfortunately, as with all NCL ships the pool areas are still small and seating in those areas is difficult. In addition, the "casino Smoke" situation is the same if not worse. I still love NCL for all its' other attributes. Fantastic food, best crew and staff on the ocean, entertainment, and always lively and fun. The itinerary for this cruise is my least favorite but it worked for the time my grandson was able to miss school. Port Canaveral had a new excursion listed this time called ICON Park. I highly recommend this trip. Perfect day off the ship, not rushed, and relatively reasonable. In Nassau we did Blue Lagoon Island which I have done many times before. It keeps getting bigger and better. Absolutely excellent excursion and something for everyone. Read Less

I chose this cruise because it was an easy ride to New York port. Also it was going to the Bahamas. We had a great time. I don’t know why I see a lot of negative reviews. We had a mini suite with balcony. It was not very big, but no cabins are. We did not hear any noises from other cabins. The food was very good, but service a bit slow. Being a large ship, it was sometimes crowded in areas but no where to what I expected, so not too bad. Pool is a bit small. We were able to see all the shows we wanted to see without a problem. We sometimes had to wait for an elevator, but we made a game out of it. It is what you make it. Either you go to have fun and do so, or you let little things ruin it. I would do this cruise again. If you want perfection, I don’t know what vacation would fit. Read Less

Love NCL. Family loves to travel in the Haven. Beautiful ship. Fantastic staff. From the moment we arrived at the pier every employee had a smile and was eager to get our vacation under way. We were on the ship in less than 45 minutes. We were in a 2 bedroom villa, room was beautiful, clean. Chris our butler helped us unpack right away and we were off having a drink and lunch before 1:00pm! The shows were great especially Choir of man! Unbelievable talent. After Midnight was very good also. Plenty of activities if you want, plenty of quite also. Therma Spa was nice and relaxing. Gym had plenty of equipment. Slides are fun... Howl at the moon wasn’t as good as it has been in the past. Cagneys was a bit disappointing. Moderno, Margaritaville,Food Republic & Tempanaki all excellent.... Our staff at the Haven I cannot compliment enough. Read Less

I didn’t choose this cruise it chose us. Based on my availability and the itinerary and we wanted to give NCL another go, the Escape was our only option. The specialty dining was Disappointing to amazing. LaCucina was terribly disappointing from the waiter to the food selection the temp of the food to taste. Wouldn’t recommend and won’t eat their again, was a waste of a specialty dinning. Bayamo was better with a good menu a knowledgeable staff and great tasting food. Would recommend and would choose it again. Cagneys.....excellent from the second you walk in, great menu, knowledgeable staff with good recommendations, food was hot, delicious and left full! HIGHLY RECOMMEND THE HAVEN.....our concierge (Adrian) was by far the best that the NCL team has to offer. 19 years with NCL and it shows. Was super knowledgeable about everything and I mean everything from the ship, to the shops, to the entertainment, to excursions. He was friendly, fun, social, sweet, helpful, accommodating and got to know our entire party (14 of us) Haven or not. I would choose another NCL cruise to wherever he was concierge simply to cruise with him again. Our Housekeeper (Gina) was my next favorite thing about our cruise. She was a doll, another over the top, go out of her way NCL A+ staff personnel. She couldn’t do enough for our entire party as they all came to our Haven suite often. She was beyond sweet and helpful. Friendly, caring and accommodating. She saw to us like a friend.and I cannot say enough about her. The two of them made the price of the Haven suite otherwise worth the money. The cruise itself nice. Didn’t get to see great stirrup Cay for the second year in a row, beginning to think it’s a non stop on this itinerary. The rest of the cruise, food was good, service was good accommodations were nice entertainment was ok. The magician was terrific. Other than that it was a “good “ cruise. Not terrific, I wouldn’t do it again. Hoping that the staff we got attached to goes to another destination that we like and than we would cruise NCL again. Read Less

We chose the NCL Escape for our 46th cruise on March 31st. We were overdue for a getaway. It had been over 13 months since our last cruise. We usually do 2-4 per year but family issues have interfered with vacation time. We enjoyed our time on the Escape, however RCCL remains our preferred line largely due to their loyalty program which does a very good job at rewarding past passengers far better than the loyalty programs on other lines, even with similar status. Embarkation This could not have been better or faster. As platinum members, we had a dedicated queue and we were first in that line. The agent was quick and courteous. We had all of our documents in order (that helps immensely, of course) and we were told that boarding had already begun even though it was barely past 11 am. Parking the car to being on the ship was less than 20 minutes! Insane. Vibe Beach Club We rarely have been able to get passes to the Vibe Beach Club. They are always sold out. We have been on the Breakaway 5 times and the Getaway once and have only been to the Beach Club once. We were thrilled to get a pass this time, even at $209/pp. However, in the final analysis, it probably wasn’t worth it because the first and the last days we were still too far north for the weather to be warm enough to really use it to its fullest. Fortunately, the casino proved generous enough to pay for the entire cost of the Beach Club for the week! Specialty Dining Package We bought a 3-night Specialty Dining Package, which is very typical for us. In all of the nights that we have cruised on NCL, we have dined in the MDR less than 5 times for dinner. The Specialty Restaurants are definitely our speed. As platinum members, we get 2 additional dinners as well. We had one dinner ashore and one dinner at the supper club (more on that later) so there was no time for the MDR once again. Moderno was good, La Cucina was very good, as was Le Bistro and Teppanyaki. Cagney’s, well, I think its over-rated. We did not go to Ocean Blue this time around. This is the first time that we passed on it. We are New Englanders so there is no reason to over-pay for seafood that I am sure is no better than what we get for half the price anywhere here. Even with the dining plan, they upcharge everything on the menu at Ocean Blue! The 2 best restaurants are the two newest ones. Pincho’s Tapas Bar and Food Republic. We went to the latter twice and had insanely good food at both places. Both places are a’la carte pricing and lunch can easily run over $40-$50. Service at the Specialty restaurants was ok, but not top notch. At Le Bistro, for example, our entrees took a long time to arrive, while a neighboring table got their food before us. We eventually told the server that we had to rush dessert and skip coffee in order to catch the show. That should happen. Free Dining The Garden Café on Deck 16 lacked variety for lunch. At breakfast, all of the staples were there and we never went up there for dinner (they advertised some interesting feasts, however, such as seafood night, grill night, etc), but at lunch, there never seemed to be a featured item. O’Sheehan’s has the same 4-5 items daily, thankfully there was Pincho’s Tapas Bar and Food Republic but most of you will not want to pay for them. We did 3 lunches with them, one with O’Sheehan’s, one with Margaritaville one ashore and one at the Garden Café. On the Breakaway and the Getaway, there is the Speigel Tent and the Magic Castle, but on the Escape there is the Supper Club, which is half a for-fee dining venue and half free dining. It took us a few days to figure it out. They have a number of shows there at 6pm and 8pm along with a free (fixed menu) meal. The meal is nothing to write home about (but certainly something to write Cruise Critic about!), a simple salad, meat/vegetable dish, dessert. Period. It’s not bad. I guess that NCL certainly gets to control their food cost/consumption here. If your were to rate 1-2-3-4 the Specialty Dining, MDR, Garden Cafe and Supper Club, the latter is unquestionably last. Specialty Dining must be (and better be) the best (#1), The Main Dining Room should be #2 because you are getting served and if you don’t like something the manager will make it right and/or give you something else. The Garden Café must be the #3 because of the sheer volume of food. Even if it isn’t that good at least you have plenty. Then surely the Supper Club is the poorest choice. We didn’t hate our meal. It’s just that there wasn’t much (but enough for us) and it was ok (luckily I like beef). Oddly enough, it seems to compete with the Specialty Dining Packages. We have, in the past, bought 7-night dining packages (before being platinum members). If we had done that, we would have missed out on the show at the Supper club that we did see which was excellent. I wonder how good the shows that we missed were? If we had seen those shows, we would have had to forfeit one or more of our Specialty Dining vouchers for the sake of a show and a mediocre meal. Breakfast in the dining room was our choice about half the time. I like that NCL has a choice of 3 specialty breakfast items. They seem to have discovered that breakfast goes beyond “2 on a raft and a cup of joe”. One of the items was Waffles, Bacon, Poached eggs and Hollandaise. The choices change a bit and they are a bit imaginative but they aren’t quite as tasty as they sound. Entertainment The show that we saw at the Supper Club was Flashback Four and it was excellent! Also outstanding; Choir of Men in the theater. We saw that twice! A+! We skipped out of After Midnight. We were not entertained. You might be though. There were many comedy shows but we only saw one of them. The shows at the theater and the Supper Club mostly require a reservation, which further complicates things. Sometimes, you just aren’t ready to make plans like this while on vacation. However, it appeared that we were going to miss After Midnight and Flashback Four because they were both over-booked as far as the Box Office showed. However, we got into both shows easily on standby. Easily. NCL Smartphone App So, NCL finally has a Smartphone App, similar to RCCL’s App. Their previous one has been a joke, especially when compared to RCCL’s. Big problem though. It doesn’t work. You can’t view items that you booked on your phone or on your stateroom TV. Everyone had this problem. I can’t be sure if it was broken just this week or if it isn’t ready for prime time. Basically, it’s still useless. Too bad. Excursions We only did a bus transportation to Epcot Center. Our plan was to go to the World Showcase and have an early dinner/late lunch in Italy and that is exactly what we did. We have done this type of thing before. You certainly don’t get a lot of time at any park. If you were with a little kid, it probably would not be very satisfying, but for us, it’s a nice diversion from ship life for a day. The organization for excursions on the vessel was outstanding. The meeting place was in the Manhattan Room. Tours were called promptly. No hustle and bustle. Very organized. All told, it was an expensive day. Bus, park entrance, dinner in Italy, but we knew what we were getting into. It’s been said before, and it is true. NCL does have a lot of add-on costs that sharply raise the price of a cruise. True, they are optional, but if you want to eat well and you want to avoid basic cheap hotel food, it will cost you. Drinks are expensive. We booked the Escape because we had one last CruiseNext certificate. The cruise did not disappoint. However, this is our 46th cruise and our Diamond level with RCCL gives us far more perks than Platinum with NCL does. With that in mind, we will continue to favor RCCL. Read Less

we booked the escape a week and a half before the cruise and we did not know what to expect. Some of our friends loved the ship others hated it. SURPRISE we loved it. SO much to do on this ship much more than its sister ship breakaway. We love dancing and every night we danced from 7 till 11 without stopping. There are 4 bands on the ship all great they took turns playing. They were all great but we especially loved the Funky Duo and the Classic Tones. There was all kinds of music we love Latin dancing and we were not disappointed. There were two shows you had to reserve ahead of time the Choir of Men which was excellent so much fun and After Midnight which was also great. There are comedians in Levity make sure to reserve the shows as soon as you get on the ship so you don't have to wait in stand by lines.There are the dueling pianos on every other nights instead of the comedians. Then there is the Supper Club ;presenting different fun acts most of the time it is free so again sign up the first day if you think you might be interested. We actually just showed up before the shows started and sat in the back and just watched the shows. So much to do on this ship. Only disadvantages were the H2O which is outside and in bad weather was pushed into a smaller area inside and the fact that the Atrium not a humongous space was used for many acitiviies lots of noise and kids when the material is adult material. Food was very good. We love the fact that O'Sheehan's Bar and Grill is open till 4AM. Overall a wonderful experience Read Less