Our first cruise on NCL was more than 20 years ago. I was perusing some of the cruise sites and found this one for what I felt was a price we could turn down. We booked and got some nice on-board credits. The Houston/Bayport cruise terminal is less than and hour and a half from home. Don't know why we haven't done this before. The Jewel is a nice ship. There is evidence of ware and tare here and there but overall she is in good shape. We enjoyed every aspect of the ship except our cabin. We tried a couple of the specialty restaurants. They were good. The dining room and buffet were good also. Our most pleasant surprise was the entertainment. All the shows were excellent. The ship didn't feel over croweded.
The cabin was small but we didn't spend much time there.