We left for our cruise in a blizzard that began a 31-hour trek to get to Hawaii, after seeing four different airports over two days! Glad we booked a hotel for two days before and would highly recommend the same---to catch your breath on the time difference, and to see Pearl Harbor, North Shore, etc. BEFORE the cruise, rather than the same day you are trying to catch a flight home. Now... the cruise. Easy embarkation, but only because we were traveling with relatives who were Lattitude members. When we checked into our cabin, it was fine---clean and in good repair. My sister's next door, however, had leftover food in the minibar (and nothing else stocked), a broken bottom drawer in the desk/TV stand with ball bearings still left on the floor, grime and dust on the shelves in the bathroom and cabin and no bedspread on the bed----in general, it was disgusting. They were later told that the "regular" cabin steward had been off that morning and things must have been "overlooked." (Two days later in the cruise, a strangers clothes were found ontop of their bed and they freaked out thinking someone had been in their cabin while they were ashore---turns out they were clothes left by the previous occupants the steward had "found" and thought they were theirs!! YIKES!) The staff on this ship were either young, "green" kids who were friendly enough, but completely UNTRAINED and clueless; or snobbish kids who were obviously disgruntled by the whole concept of work and talked openly, everywhere, infront of passengers and other co-workers about "how much longer they had before they could complete their contracts and were counting down the days." One morning a boy from near our home town was clearing dishes and we commented about living in a nearby city, his reply was, "Too bad for you, huh?!" This was the Slide of America alright, and if NCL doesn't get their stuff together with this staff, it's business is going to slide right out of their pockets!

The food was mediocre, nothing outright bad, but nothing that impressed us either, with the notable exception of the Italian restaurant. Hint: we booked it for 8:30p.m. on the first night and sat by the window as we were pulling out of Honolulu harbor---a beautiful sight for our dinner! We ate at Lazy J's--fair, but no better than an Outback Steak House on a busy night. Freestyle Dining was nice for the casual ability to eat whenever we were ready, but the dining rooms seems disorganized and there was no sense of "team" between the waitstaff/servers/bussers. The shore excursions were the best part of the trip, no question. If you want to whale watch, Definitely take the Sunset Cruise excursion in Maui. We probably saw at least 60 whales and were told this time of the year is the peak for sightings. Would I take a NCL cruise again? I'd like to think I would give them another chance and just hope that the young, untrained all-American staff was what affected the service and quality of this cruise and that it would be like that on all of them. We have traveled on Carnival, Celebrity and Royal Caribbean. My sister and husband have done those three, as well as Princess, Holland American, and other NCL ships. Hands down, this was by far the worst of all ships in any line.