Norwegian Epic Review

My least favorite ship out of over 40 cruises

Review for Europe Cruise on Norwegian Epic
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DIDISEVEN
10+ Cruises • Age 80s

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Sail Date: Nov 2021

I waited to write this trying to be fair and take the Covid protocols into account but even without Covid this ship is like a mish/mash of other ships. Bits of this and that...you soon start feeling you've been on the ship before. Deck, two tiny pools and massive slides etc. for kids. Naturally Cagney's, La Bistro, La Cuchina, were at their best as always. O'Sheehans was the only place with table service for lunch while in port. The lobby continuously ran NCL commercials, the same all the time every day showing beautiful young people on board ready for love and even the families they show were hardly old enough to have the pro-model children...THEN...look around and where were they on the Epic? If it wasn't for the loyal seniors this cruise would have not happened. Yet in the commercials not one walker, or scooter, cane, or senior citizen. It was as if they don't want the world to know its us keeping the ships afloat...so to speak. These massive ships are not remotely like ships once inside. You could convince me I was in a giant floating suburban shopping mall. As they get bigger and bigger its really only the stateroom that increase in number and reduce in size.

Any designer will tell you the key word to design is FUNCTIONALITY....At first the staterooms looked appealing but when using one....and I was alone, they don't function. You enter into the bathroom, toilet on the left, shower or tub on the right and then comes a sink as small as a salad bowl with a huge mixer tap blocking the use. this area is mock hardwood floor, From there you have an uncomfortable banana shaped couch (third bed) and then twin beds that can NOT be separated. There's a curtain you can separate the bed area from the walk in bathroom. Privacy is at a minimum. There is an attractive padded stool in front of the vanity/desk BUT it is too low to function and it compresses and in two weeks I fell off it four times. Razor plug didn't work and was never fixed during the two week sail. I made a mistake bidding on an upgrade to a Club stateroom, identical only with a Bathtub. I am 84 and had to step up and over more than two feet to get in and it was worse trying to get out. A person my age should have been warned. The permanently together twin beds were very comfortable but I wasn't sure if my stateroom was a Bathroom with a bed or a bedroom in a bathroom. Didn't like it as a solo...can't imagine two or three jammed in there. No back street Internet Cafe would be as useless and badly designed as the EPIC. Chairs too low, in the library so don't speak, no room for the papers you using. Impossible! This was, after many transatlantic cruises more like a two week boat ride. Some of the Antigen testing went wrong at departure and took nearly two hours. PCR tests leaving in N.Y. were very well done but leaving the ship...nobody told the Taxi companies in New York we were there and there were NO taxi's which after being made to stand freezing on the deck for an hour to get off we then stood another hour in the taxi queue. Easily 80% seniors and not a good start to the day considering we had to line up for an hour at the airport. From start to finish this cruise was endlessly lining up for everything. Not up to NCL standards by any means and the smaller NCL ships are now booking at outrageous price. Start of Covid a two week Trans Atlantic from N.Y. to London was solo, balcony about $4500. Canadian...Same deal same boat, same itinerary this coming April $18,000.00 U.S. Give me a break!

Cabin Review

Very attractive but simply does not function especially when they want to jam 3 people in a narrow room where the bathroom isn't separate...strange cupboards and closets, some only 6 inches deep. Couch/third bed, hard and dreadful to sit and watch T.V. Even sitting on the bed was not comfortable, NO chair...foot stool, attractive but too low for use at vanity/desk...if you didn't land dead center it compressed and tipped you off on the floor. Sink way too small, like a salad bowl....looked nice but didn't function. The designer broke the basic principal of interior design...no matter how good it looks, it it doesn't function then the design fails. Not good to share unless you have intimate knowledge of each other.

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