Norwegian Getaway Review
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We cruised on NCL Getaway late November 2018 to the Western Caribbean from Miami. My wife and I are in our late 50’s and traveled alone for a quick relaxing “getaway” (groan!). This was our 25th cruise and 5th on NCL. Overall we enjoyed the cruise and the ship but we’d read the reviews and were prepared for the few problem areas (crowded buffet and crowded main pool).
EMBARK/DEBARK – We had the smoothest embarkation & debarkation ever. We drove to Miami and parked in the parking garage near the ship after dropping our luggage with the porters. Parking at Port Miami was $22 per day, $154 total, paid by credit card after the cruise – in a secure covered garage. We arrived at 11:30am and were onboard within 15 minutes. First problem was the Garden Café buffet was packed as people were sitting there waiting for their rooms plus the buffet area is somewhat small for the 4,000 passengers. We tried O’Sheehans, the free sports bar, first but it was packed and there was a 20 min wait. We should have gone to the sit-down restaurant as it was not crowded. Cabins were available at 1:30pm and the lifeboat drill was at 3:30pm. We sailed at 4pm.
For debarkation we chose 8:15am departure and our colored tag was called a few minutes early. You could stay in your cabin until 9am and breakfast was served until 9am in multiple locations. We walked off the ship, picked up our bags, and walked thru customs & immigration without any lines – amazing! You do not need a customs form now unless you exceed your customs limits.
Cabin Review
Spa Balcony Stateroom
We chose a spa balcony cabin, 14122. It seemed to be longer than other balcony cabins on other ships as we had a full size couch although the room was slightly narrower. It had a lot of shelves next to the closet and around the desk so we had no problem stowing our clothes. Our large suitcases easily slid under the king bed. Our room was clean and we had a good cabin steward. The bathroom was slightly larger than normal for a standard size cabin – also plenty of shelves. Only drawback with the shower is they have liquid soap so if you like bar soap, bring it. Our room had a medium size flat screen TV but there wasn’t much to watch. One channel for kid’s movies and one for grownup movies which had some of the most unheard of movies I’ve ever seen. I believe their goal is to make you purchase movies which run $9. The room had two 110v outlets by the desk. Our excursion tickets were on the desk as well as 2 bottles of water and a bottle of sparkling wine since we were returning Latitudes reward members.
Port Reviews
Miami
Didn't tour, just drove to ship and parked. Getting there and parking was easy.
Harvest Caye
This is the new NCL off-island at Belize. We walked around for a bit but didn’t stay long as you have to pay for everything – cash (dollars) or credit cards, not key cards. Went to one restaurant and had a drink, good prices, food seemed reasonable but we went back to the ship for lunch. Seemed to be plenty of loungers available by the pool and the beach – no charge for those. If you wanted a covered lounger or a cabana at the pool or beach there was a charge. They rented snorkeling gear but the beach didn’t seem very good for it, I didn’t see a reef offshore. Basically just a stop to lie in the sun, swim, and relax. Kinda like a non-moving cruise ship except no free food or drinks.