My sister and I gave our Mom a Hawaiian cruise for her 85th Birthday. We brought along her three 20-something grandchildren to make it a family vacation so there were six of us. We booked the Pride of America for its July 27th sailing. I will try to keep this short (since others have given incredible detail) and mostly about the ship and its service. Hawaii is incredibly beautiful and everyone should see it at least once!

We had booked the cruise before I found this site and after reading some of the reviews, I was a little apprehensive about how this trip would be since there were so many comments about surly/unfriendly/indifferent staff and lack of cleanliness of the cabins and the ship in general. However at 85 our mom has some difficulty walking (bad knee arthritis) and we thought this would be a good way for her to see more of Hawaii (she has been to Oahu) without having to walk too much if she wasnt feeling well. We were more than pleasantly surprised.

We flew into Honolulu from Los Angeles on Saturday afternoon and went directly to the pier. She truly is a beautiful ship! I had called NCL the day before and asked for a wheel chair for my mom so she wouldnt have to stand for so long since I had read that embarkation can take some time. The wheel chair was waiting for us right at the entrance and Tony (her driver) was wonderful!! He was full of information, very kind and patient  especially full of information!! With Tony giving us tips and suggestions, embarkation went quickly  not more than 25 minutes. He took us up to the Skyline Restaurant for a late lunch which was very tasty. Read more