We were on a weeklong sailing from Port Canaveral 3/16-3/23 - stops in Tortola, St. Thomas, and Great Stirrup Cay (the last of which didn't happen due to "weather" - I'll touch on that later).

To preface this review, I was aware of the...issues from previous cruises so I went in with low expectations. This was also my first cruise on NCL (I'm mainly a Royal cruiser and a fan of Celebrity) so I was a little wary on that front as well. I'm glad to say that despite certain less-than-ideal situations, my group still managed to have a really good time. My main motivation in writing this is to (hopefully) give others who are going on this ship a little reassurance that they can still have a great vacation. It truly is what you make of it and sometimes you have to just take a deep breath and remind yourself that it could be worse - you could be at work or something dreadful like that!

Embarkation: It was not as fast as I'm used to. We spent about an hour total in line - first outside, then for security, and then there was a long line to check in in the terminal. Our check-in guy was good, but my friend, who went to someone else, had a problem with hers. They gave her a room key but when we went to scan them to get on the ship, they told her she hadn't checked in yet. Which obviously she had because she had her key card. That took about 15 minutes to clear up and I'd never seen that happen before. Read more