After sailing in the Haven last year on the Norwegian Epic, we couldn’t wait to do another cruise and have the perks that made the greater cost of the Haven, worth every Penny. Sadly for a multitude of reasons, the Haven on the Bliss, left us feeling foolish for spending $25,000 for 1 less room, and a lot less amenities. Here is the comparison to the Epic. To Start the Haven pool is smaller, and is now being used by substantially more Haven rooms. Instead of a larger pool, they chose to make a seating area I. 6 inches of water, which no one utilized. In addition they eliminated 1 hot tub in the pool area. I was told that there were 2 hot tubs on the 19th floor, where anyone under 16 wouldn’t be allowed. A ridiculous rule, since there is no bar in the area. The observation lounge is indeed beautiful, with 1 major flaw: Due to the Blue and White Swirl carpeting, reflecting off the glass it reasonably hard to observe anything. The food in the observation lounge usually consisted of Marshmallows, Peanut M&M’s, Gummy Bears, Macaroons, and Cold Water with orange slices, while the Non-Haven observation lounge on the 15th floor had a wide variety of actual food.

As always the food and service in the Haven Restaurant was really great. However trying to get a preferred reservation at any specialty restaurants was impossible. On the Epic it was never a problem. On the Epic, we were escorted off the ship for excursions, and had a separate Haven entrance at every port. On the Bliss they never had either service. In total we waited over 3 hours in line getting back on the ship. Again if I wasn’t paying an extraordinary amount of money, this isn’t an issue. The water slides, Race Course, and Laser Tag, all of which Norwegian publicized heavily for the Bliss, had limited hours, due to the fact that there weren’t enough staff to man them effectively. So many kids and adults on the ship, never got to do any of those activities during the entire week.

With the itinerary consisting of almost 3 full days at sea, there simply wasn’t, enough to do on the Bliss, that was actually available. When we asked about the lack of amenities on the Bliss that we experienced on The Epic, we were simply told, “we don’t do that here”. Since there isn’t a separate fitness center in the Bliss Haven, why isn’t the Spa included for Haven Guests? So simply put we spent twice as much money for a 2 Bedroom Family Suite, on the Bliss, and basically had 75% less amenities than we did on the Epic. When we left the Epic, we felt that staying in the Haven was something that we would always try to do, but after leaving the Bliss I felt like we got cheated, and I doubt that we would ever book a Haven Suite again. I would search for another Cruise line that offers equitable amenities.