We did not enjoy this cruise at all and wanted to post this for other's consideration in booking a cruise. For the record, my husband and I have taken approximately a dozen cruises, primarily on HAL and Royal Caribbean, and one on Celebrity. This was our first and last cruise on NCL for the reasons discussed below.
On the positive side, I thought the observation lounge was beautiful and it ...
We decided to take the Cruise because the Bliss has the Racetrack, and we booked our cruise almost a year in advance, and were told there would be ample ability to drive go carts and that there even was an unlimited race package.
The whole process on the NCL site is convoluted and a bit crazy, all from not having much information to requiring you to pay on the spot or possibly get your cruise ...
We've done 15 or so cruises previously and this was our first time on NCL. We have a lot of mixed emotions. I will add some up front context to set the table as someone in a different life circumstance may feel differently. We are a mid-40s couple without kids. Shame on me for booking this trip during spring break...I get it. I was thinking about work and not about hundreds of screaming kids or ...
We booked a large suite in the Havens and there were many problems with the room including the fact that all the windows on the balcony were so badly fogged up that you could not see through them. The 2 A/C units were clogged up and not working, as well as the showers were not draining. The food in the Havens restaurant was fabulous but the other restaurants around the ship were very average. ...
The Bliss had the itinerary we were interested in. Wasn't a good experience.
At embarkation there was standing room only in the terminal, I get that. But the lady escorting Haven guests yelled (yes, yelled) at us every time she walked by to move out of the way. She said we couldn't stand in the side aisle. There was no where to go, the terminal was packed.
The food in the main dining ...
Just got back from a cruise (L.A. - 2 sea days - Puerto Vallarta, Mazatlan, Cabo, sea day, L.A.) on the Norwegian Bliss with wife and two teenaged daughters. It was all of our third cruise on Norwegian (we'd been to Alaska and another from New Orleans to Cozumel, Roatan, Harvest Caye, Costa Maya), so we had some level of expectation. We were in two balcony staterooms on deck 15, mid-port. ...
This was my second cruise, the first was with Princess, this one was on the Norwegian Bliss. The Bliss was a pretty ship, decently clean and spacious, although there were spots that definitely showed the ships age - peeling paint in spots, chairs in restaurants with cracked seating pads (in one restaurant every single seat was beyond worn, and the majority were cracked and split).
The rooms: ...
Even the engineer in our group wasn't completely wowed by the canal, we've cruised other canals, know how they work...other than the history and kinda cool engineering of recycling the water it wasn't that exciting and made us wonder why it was a "bucket list" thing for some. There are other smaller canals around the world that are much more fun to navigate because there are sights along the way, ...
Nightmare starting at arrival at Port of Miami and basically sitting (or standing due to lack of chairs) in a human warehouse; given numbers without explanation when we checked in. Little did we know that thousands of people would be waiting for their number to be called because they were yelling that they were running behind in getting people from the previous cruise ship. That's at least what ...
We picked this specific itinerary, and because Celebrity does not do a FULL transit, in the winter. We did do a Princess Cruise in 2020 but did not like it at all.
Having not sailed with NCL since 2018 (previously 6 cruises), (we did 3 Celebrity, and 1 Princess in between), we definitely noticed the cut-backs, and the nickel and diming that NCL has been accused of.
Embarkation was a ...