We did a 17 day cruise with a pre cruise land tour. We were on the Getaway in December from 5-22, 2021 in a mid ship balcony out of Italy. We chose this cruise to replace our canceled cruise to Tahiti from the beginning of Covid. We were excited about Europe. We stayed two days in Rome prior to the cruise and loved Vatican City. The testing prior to boarding at the terminal was confusing. They herd you together after the testing with no social distancing enforced. On the cruise itself there was no social distancing at the comedy shows, smaller venues, casino, Atrium or anywhere else, except the main theater. Little to no music on the pool deck, had to make some noise just to get them to turn on some music. Very few games played with the passengers. They did have two to three games such as newly wed game. Lots of Trivia. I have cruised many times on NCL and remember when they would have games around the pool area and always tried to entertain the guests. These game were free, fun and entertaining. These days seem to be long gone. All the entertainment now is on a pay as you play basis such as bingo or deal or no deal, etc.

Very disappointed in their safety measures they did not enforce the mask requirements and had hundreds of people lined up in the casino nose to tail and shoulder to shoulder at 8 AM for their third party testing. They barely touched my nose with the swab. Doing this almost guarantees a negative test. I told them I did not feel well as the testing was being performed and was ignored as if I never said anything. I knew if I got Covid on this trip, it was from NCL forcing us to stand in these long and crowed lines in tight quarters. Have learned since our return the Getaway was taken out of service and canceled their scheduled outings.

They also are great at charging taxes on your free drinks while in port. Even after we left port, still charged port tax on drinks. I asked why the casino was open if we are still under port authority. No answer. Food quality was poor. We were not allowed to serve ourselves at the buffet. As soon as we were at sea it was serve yourself. Does Covid not transmit when in international waters? Why is it not safe to serve yourself when someone is watching but as soon as there is no oversight it becomes safe. Read more