I booked this cruise 1.5 years ago for 2 main reasons. I want to travel on the new ship and I liked the itinerary very much. During this time 2 destination ports were replaced but it still was interesting.

We started at Civitavecchia where the embarkation was fast and friendly. We arrived a day before the cruise and spent a night in a hotel near the port.

In the beginning, I found that the ship was new and very beautiful but different from all traditional Norwegian vessels. Usually, good food is the strong side of Norwegian. But on Viva, the buffet was much smaller and the choice of food seemed disappointing. The food court also didn't look promising. We were really afraid that we could have problems with food. But magically we didn't. We always found sits in the buffet and in the food court, and we frequently had breakfasts and lunches in the Hudson main restaurant that was above my expectations. We also had dinners a few dinners on Hudson and others in specialty restaurants. Those were great, despite sometimes some dishes we oversalted, the others were tasty and the staff solved all the problems. Read more