First of all we enjoyed this cruise very much. We were a group of 4 traveling me, my husband, my mom, and my sister (2 cabins). Our group were all veteran cruisers. We have cruised several lines before; Carnival, Princess, RCCL...this was our first NCL cruise and for the most part I enjoyed this cruise more than the others. Perhaps it was the port heavy destination of Europe...I'm not big on many days at sea so this fit nicely into my travel ideals. So let me just give a breakdown by port.

The Ship: Very nice and spacious. This was the first time I payed the extra money for a balcony room. For this trip it was well worth it. We spent a great deal of time sitting on the balcony. If you can afford it I definately advise it for Europe. We did a few speciality restaurants, Le Bistro, Tequila, and Cagneys. As you might expect If you don't mind paying the extra $, the food and service is better in the specialty restaurants than the free restaurants. But, the service/food was never terrible in the free restaurants like Magenta/Blue Lagoon/Grand Pacific just not outstanding. My only main complaint is concerning the buffet. There is only 1 drink/ice machine for the entire buffet. Other cruises give you more drink options like juices but w/ this cruise line at the buffet only tea/water/coffee and you have to fight the crowds at the 1 drink station. But, all in all have no other complaints. The ship is very clean and spacious with plenty of ammenities but on this port heavy cruise we really didn't have time to use all the ammenities.

Barcelona: We stayed 1 night prior to our cruise at Hotel 1898 on Las Ramblas. Las Ramblas had so much to see and do! Hotel 1898 was very nice although a wee bit pretentious...maybe too modern I'm a pretty simple gal. I definately advise an extra day or so before or after the cruise in Barcelona. This is a lovely city in fact one of my favorites of the entire trip. Since we had only 1 day in Barcelona I booked a private tour w/ Barcelona Day Tours. Kudos to Juan our guide he did a great job of showing us all the highlights of Barcelona in 4hrs. We saw La Sagrada Familia, Park Guell, Montjuic, and so many other things. However, for the rest of the trip we booked all excursions we took we did through NCL. Read more