Our Children gave us the cruise as a 40th anniversary present.....we had no idea what to expect as we had never been on a cruise before. When we arrived at the ship we were in awe of its size and beauty, once on board we walked and explored the ship, met some of the crew and visited the garden café.....our departure time of 4:00 pm allowed us to acquaint ourselves with the ship before we actually left the port of NY. Once we were underway we marveled at the smoothness and quietness of the ship, it was smooth sailing all the way to our first port of call. As we cruised thru the north Atlantic, we enjoyed the many eating choices on board, sampled some of the ships on board activities and later in the evening took in our first of many shows that the ship offered. The next seven days were filled with eating, shore excursions and fun on the ship, the crew treated us like we were important, the ports of call were fantastic and we had, without a doubt, the best vacation we have ever been on. We were so enamored with our cruise that we already have made a deposit on a future one....we will be cruising with NCL once again and we will definitely be sailing one of her Mega-ships....the Escape was as much the star of our cruise as the ships crew was.....we are in love and can't wait to cruise again!!!!