We are a couple with 3-year-old child. Previous cruise experience was limited to a four-night Carnival from New York to Canada. The Pearl 5-night suited our schedule and budget and we liked what we had heard about this new ship.

Embarkation: We flew to Miami the night before and stayed at the Hampton Inn Airport S., which was nice. Next morning lounged about, took our son to the hotel pool, got an hour extension on noon checkout, and had hotel call taxi to leave for pier about 1:30. Boarding was painless and fast.

Cabin: We had an outside cabin on deck 4, the lowest customer deck, which was nice and quiet except for one port day when the route to one of the gangways went down our hall. Cabin had two single beds each side and a pull-down bunk that the steward made up each night. It was quite adequate for our little family of three. NCL did a good job of putting as much as possible in terms of storage, etc. into it and we did not feel too cramped although it was a bit smaller than the equivalent on Carnival. What I liked least was that there was a porthole instead of a proper window - I think this was because it was so close to the water level, looked like windows were bigger on deck 5 and above. Steward service the whole cruise was polite and effective. Read more