We are seasoned cruisers who decided to take our Daughter, Son-in-law, and two grand-kids ages 8 and 6 on a surprise cruise for school vacation. We chose the Jewel due to the embarkation port being within driving distance, and the fact that it was a Nickelodeon cruise. We booked last minute and got great rates making the trip affordable during school vacation week ( when we checked last fall the rates were out of our range and quite a bit higher than "usual"). We also felt the Jewel was the right size ship for their first experience - not too small but not so huge that they would be overwhelmed. The kids/grand kids are not big "beach" people and prefer pools so we knew we would spend a lot of time on the ship and less time in ports and we planned accordingly.

Embarkation and Parking - NYC was an easy port to get to by car coming from MA ( 4 hour drive) and parking was a breeze. I heard people comment on the cost of parking ($245/week) however for our family to take the train or bus would have cost much more than the parking and price of gas so we felt it was an economical way to arrive and we didn't have to worry about packing for TSA approvals! We arrived in the parking area about 10:20 am and we were checked in and boarded by 11:30 am. Note: because our port of exit and entry is US the small children did not need passports - certified birth certificates were accepted with no question - the adults all have passports so no issues there. On line check in makes the process go very quickly as well as long as you have all your paperwork with you.

Staterooms - Because this was a last minute booking our options were limited and we were inside forward in "family" staterooms - Daughter, Husband and two kids chose one cabin and DH and I the other (would have been more comfortable with one of the kids with us but they both wanted to be with mommy and daddy). Cabin space was fine for two, okay for three, but very crowded for four - extras were stored in our cabin - but we are campers with an RV and 5th wheel so we are used to small spaces LOL. Our cabin person was okay - he did seem to be confused with the number of people and quite often we were shorted towels in the 2 person cabin (and yes we were registered as 2 and 4), he also was very bad at bed making and our bottom sheet was never all the way down the bed (picky but it bothered me that I had to remake the bed every nite). We had some issues with getting service - the safe was closed in cabin 2 upon arrival and it took until Sunday nite to get someone there to open it so it couldn't be used until then. By day 3 the shower door was sliding back and forth in cabin 2 all nite and we requested repairs. We left for the day and it was removed to fix it - that took over 24 hours to get back and to come back from a beach day with no shower door was not nice - no offer was made to give us another cabin (there were empty ones near us)to use for just that day - trying to get 6 people thru one shower for dinner was tough and what would have happened if we didn't have two cabins? I did make my frustration known at the front desk, but feel that NCL did not do enough for our inconveniences. Read more