I went with my family (husband, mother, and three year old daughter) on our first cruise ever on the Pride of America from December 16-23 and we had a fabulous time. I thought the ship was beautiful. My husband says it was one of the best vacations he's been on. We had two balcony cabins, which provided us the opportunity to step outside our rooms and watch red lava flowing from Mt. Kilauea into the ocean at night, and to view the Napali Coast on our last evening at sea. I'll review some key items point by point.

Embarkation/Disembarkation: It all went very smoothly. We went to board the ship around noon. There were no lines and we were checked in and on the ship very quickly. On disembarkation day, we lingered over breakfast and waited a bit after our color was called before we got off. We were in no hurry to leave -- we were joking about stowing away for another journey! It just took a few minutes to walk off the ship and collect our bags.

Service: We found the service, with a few minor flaws, to be exceptional. We were really impressed with how terrific most of the staff on the ship was. They genuinely seemed to care about doing a good job. One of the few areas service fell short that is worth mentioning has to do with flickering lighting in the bathroom of my mother's cabin. She telephoned once to report the problem and later went to the reception desk to report it in person, and after that simply gave up. I think, even if the maintenance staff were unable to fix the lighting at the time, they should have explained that to her. But I also need to stress that my mother never even mentions the lighting when she talks about our vacation -- it's all about what a wonderful time she had and how indulged we were on the ship. And as an example at the other extreme - on our evening in Maui, we were driving our rental car in the area by the ship, unsure of where to park, when we saw an NCLA crew member (identified by his name tag) walking away from the ship. We asked him where we should park, and he said he didn't know, but would find out. He actually ran all the way back to the security guards at the entrance of the ship to ask where we should park, as opposed to telling us to ask them ourselves! Talk about going the extra mile! Read more