As the title states, we sailed each ship during it's inaugural season, and enjoyed each one to differing degrees. Norwegian is renewing it's fleet, which is great, but there appears to be a slight shift in their policies as well, so this review will highlight the ones we noticed.

GETAWAY 2015: We sailed in February, the best month in our eyes, weather-wise and fellow-cruiser-wise. The Dining package was open ended, no set amount of meals. We made reservations most times, but also found that we were accommodated, and quickly, when we did not have one. Great! The restaurants were not swamped, and the experience was great. Food great, service great. The cruisers seemed to be an average age of 40 or 50 years old, very well-behaved, no sloppy dressing seen, very nice! No real mayhem on the ship other than the central pool area every day, which we avoid like the plague! Spice H2O was a blessing, but still it was quite packed to capacity every day, and we sadly had to eventually play the "save a chair" game every day. Our steward Marcel from St. Lucia was fabulous, and we became friends. All in all, our best cruise ever, having sailed three different lines.

ESCAPE 2016: The first complaint here came right out of the gate - we are Bronze Latitude members, and were supposed to have priority boarding, which, I took that to mean just that, "we board first." We sailed specifically WITH Norwegian because we enjoyed all the things mentioned above, and wanted to start building points up WITH them. I was then notified that Norwegian now does set boarding "appointments", 11:30 to 12:30, 12:30 to 1:30,etc., and the earliest I could board was 1:30. NOT cool. When arriving at the terminal, I asked where the Bronze Priority line was and was guided to one. It was the same line as everyone else! So we board and then discover that march is NEVER a good time to cruise unless you have children. The ship was swamped. Mistake noted, "NEVER sail later than February 28." To be fair, the following conditions probably apply to ALL cruise lines during this time of year, but I will note them just the same, as ship policy should be adjusted/monitored a bit better. There were children running, in the buffet, in the halls, late at night and during the day. There was door slamming galore, late at night as well, as the Teen Club curfewed at 1 a.m. I believe. There were french fries on the elevator floors, popcorn scattered on the atrium floor, kids pushing all the elevator buttons, kids were roaming in Spice H2O and playing in the water grotto, which is SUPPOSED to be adults-only....you get the picture. NOT a Norwegian only problem, again, and they did issue a written page of suggested conduct with our first daily papers, but it did no good. The problem now was "how quickly do these things get cleaned up/cleared up?" Also, the adult clientele seemed to be much younger, less disciplined. (We had a group of obviously drunk patrons yell-singing a Jimmy Buffett song roaming through the ship.) So the adult crowd during THIS particular week seemed to have "missed their Carnival cruise." Read more