Trans-Atlantic cruise from Barcelona to Miami : October 26 to November 9, 2014

We have just completed our seventh cruise on the Epic, bringing us to 21 cruises with NCL. This one was a 14-day trans-Atlantic reposition cruise from Barcelona to Miami with ports in Funchal, Madeira, Portugal, Saint Maarten, Netherlands Antilles, and St. Thomas USVI. Having been to all three of these ports over our years of cruising, there was nothing really new in each for us to see. That said, we did enjoy our time spent in each port regardless how much time we were off the ship. Sometimes it’s nice just to be on a ship with just a handful of passengers.

Check-in at the Barcelona cruise terminal is usually fast and efficient. This time, it was chaotic and disorganized. We arrived at the time indicated on our eDocs, but there was no one to direct people where to check in. There was only one (1) check-in window for over 500 Gold/Platinum Latitudes guests. After a few minutes they decided to open up more windows. That done, we had our boarding group number and we waited only a few minutes to board the ship. We headed to Garden Café for a light lunch, the chaos at check-in forgotten, and we met some crew members we know. The time passed quickly and we were soon in our stateroom. Read more