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Norwegian Epic

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Paris

I wish I would’ve googled this ship before we booked, but I guess I gotta learn somehow.  This was our first cruise with Norwegian and everyone was ranting and raving about how great everything is. The only thing they had going for them was embarkment and disembarking, that was super easy as long as you know what you are doing.  Our room had a hull balcony,  which is fine because I knew what those are like prior to seeing the room, but once we got into unpack…wow.  The room was very crappy (take a look at the pics). The carpet was stained, the shower leaked, the fridge barely kept the water cold, the wood around everything was peeling, garbage in the lighting plastics, broken hangers and grossness on the bathroom privacy curtain.  My husband informed the attendant about the leaks, but they were never fixed.  My husband went around and fixed minor things for me so I could sleep at night, ie: rattling door and loose handles.  

We had only one night of good food and that was because we had to pay for it. The buffet and all the other included restaurants were so-so.  The food was always brought to you cold and the waitstaff took forever with drinks (more of a bar issue). You always had to wait in a line at the bar if you wanted a soda and some of the staff were just plain rude.  The coffee was always cold and the toasters only half worked.  Seating was always limited and always plan on taking the stairs because at least one of the elevators were always out of service.  

Most of the excursions were awesome except for one which had a very misleading description and they only refunded me 15.00 which was hysterical.  I was definitely not the only one who complained.  FYI.  That was 4x4 self drive jeep in the Dominican Republic in amber cove.  Don’t do it.  Do something else.  

Can’t say much about the shows, but the drinks were good and not many kids so that was a plus.

Totally disappointed 

Saint-Tropez

This was our 4th Norweigan ship and cruise. Out of 20 cruises sailed this was the worst ship we have ever been on. The  venues for the shows were small, the layout of the ship was noisy, and the food was cold or overdone, more often than not. The entertainment was repeated and not that great of quality. A large casino , but prices of buyins were high so tables sat empty a lot. Speciality resteraunts were fair, but the best was La Bistro, where the service and food were excellent. Tappinyaki, was good , if you like that style of food presentation. Cagney's food was overdone and cold. We were served two chocolate lava cakes that were ice cold in the middle. Open air resteraunts made it very noisy. Games were often crowded as they offer them in such small venue areas. Art shows had the same problem. If you have seen one art show on a cruise, you have seen them all, they offer about the same thing on each cruise.

Ports very good, ship not so good

My wife, a friend, and I just completed the 12 day Mediterranean Cruise on the Norwegian Epic which left out of Rome on November 8. 

My wife and I have been on NCL a couple of times in the past and had a great experience - wish I could say the same for this trip. 

The Epic can hold over 4500 passengers; but, there are only 2900 on board (just over 1/2 capacity). 

Below is a list of issues encountered so far. (-) indicates a negative issue, (+) indicates a positive issue, and (i) indicates information only: 

1. (Negative) Excursion ratings: There are 3 ratings, Easy Moderate, and Challenging. There really should be more — a. On bus with picture stops only, b. Total of level 1 to 2 miles walking in short bursts, c. Level 2 to 5 miles walking with no more than 1 miles at a time, d. Extreme walking / hiking / stairs 

2. (Negative) 11/08 at approx noon: Our group was called to board. Rooms are not yet ready (so, why boarding if nothing is ready ? 

3. (Negative) 11/08 just after boarding: Enable the WiFi, enter requested information (last name & birthdate). Received error, account information does not match. We have the unlimited WiFi package. Tracked down the Onboard Internet Cafe and were told WiFi is not yet operational. Required information has not yet been downloaded to ship (from corporate ?) 

4. (Negative) In the NCL App, My Plans page, itinerary map is wrong - shows going around Italy with last port being Venice; BUT, itinerary list below the map is correct. 

5. (Information) NCL App should have a search feature for locating places on board. 

6. (Negative) At restaurant (O’Sheehans), our friend ordered sparkling water. Waiter thought she wanted a bottle, which is not covered by drink package. After some questioning, found out she could get by glass. Why did waiter not tell us that right away

7.  (Negative) Excursion desk computers were down; so, could not adjust our excursion plans. 

8. (Negative) While wondering on board, trying to find wife (no internet, so could not message her to see where she was), manager at Spa took our information and noted frustration with room not ready and internet down. Said she will have management contact us during cruise. As of end of cruise, no contact regarding issue. 

9. (Positive) 11/10 update: The spa manager saw me sitting by excursion desk and stopped and ask if I had found my wife. 

10. (Information) 2600 of 29xx passenger are American. Why no US Dollar to Euro exchange (ok even if a fee was involved or an ATM that dispenses Euros. 

11. (Negative) 11/09: Daniel Ka Magic show (Spains Got Talent) children level of magic (all in standard magic books), except last mentalist trick. 

12. (Negative) In main restaurant, juice is from concentrate (not fresh squeezed). Cruises are supposed to be 5 star resorts - what 5 star resort does not have fresh squeezed juices ? 

13. (Negative) Big screen in Atrium, when showing excursion info, does not give enough time for someone to completely read what is on screen before it changes. 

14. (Negative) Excursion process is really bad. Excursion group sizes extremely large. Everyone goes to the Epic theatre, sits where ever room, and excursions are called one or more at a time. Those groups called are then funneled through one hallway and given a sticker with a number for which bus to board. Huge bottleneck at point of giving out stickers.  Plus many passengers ignored instructions and excursion staff allowed them to. 

Need to learn from Princess Cruise line - they give bus # tag when entering theatre / sitting area and have each group sit in an area together. Going out of theatre to gangway is in row order per group. 

15. (Negative) NCL personnel confused group 26 versus group 26A (Excursion number 1118SG) - gave 2 of the 3 of my party bus 26 and me 26A. After checking with  the person who had a list, told us all to go on 26. By then bus full and had to sit in very back on a crowed seat. 

16. (Negative) Fir above excursion: 3 of my group were first to get up when 1118SG excursion group called yet when we got to bus, bus was already full — looks like everyone went  when non-SG (1118) was called. The crew member controlling who was going when should have denoted difference between SG and non-SG group and SG should not have been given stickers until group was officially called. 

17. (Negative) continuing with excursion 1118SG: Extreme vibration on sound system on bus made it impossible to understand guide !! Guide was r not nice when told about the bad sound system !!! She refused to talked loader or turn and face passengers. Result was most in back of small bus could not hear the guide entire time while on the bus (approx 2 hours of tour)

18. (Negative) 11/11 breakfast at O’Sheehans Bar and Grill. Ordered American breakfast with bacon ; but, was delivered with sausage. When I mentioned wrong (2x), waiter just ignored. 

(Positive) Manager, Alexandria (recently promoted), was circulating, stopped to ask how everything was. I mentioned bacon situation. She had bacon sent to table and switched waiters. 

19. (Negative) 11/12, 930 AM (+1 hr time change), Taste restaurant closed for breakfast at 9:30. They knew people would be getting up due to time change, so, why closed so early ?

20. (Negative) 11/17: Two many “big” events at same time resulting in nowhere for ppl to sit - Beatles in Cavern club, Latin Flavors in headliners, Queens of Rhythm in Epic.   Note: IMHO Beatles is way bigger than subpar Queens of Rhythm - Beatles should be in Epic !!

Many issues on Norwegian Epic

We first sailed on the Epic in 2016 and had a great time. The entertainment in particular was brilliant and the staff were great so we looked forward to returning for a 12 night European cruise this year. The deterioration was obvious from the minute we got on to the ship, no welcome from a crew member and glass of fizz. The entertainment, which had been so good before, was the biggest disappointment; an empty Speigel Tent, a comedy club with no comedians; only one main theatre show; no Epic band and virtually invisible entertainment staff (who only actually appeared when they were trying to sell you something). Thank goodness for the duelling piano show which was great and was outside the influence of the usual NCL constraints elsewhere on the ship. 

Nothing appeared to be well organised, particularly things like tendered visits. I visited the customer services desk to ask how I could leave the ship at around 10 am after seeing that all of the tender times showing on our cabin screen said a12 o’clock departure time to be told that this wasn’t possible and I would just have to pick a tender number at random. When the tenders were actually called within minutes they were calling tender 10 as no one was turning up to leave. You’d think this was the first time they had ever done this. 

After a delayed docking at Livorno due to poor weather ,the only way to leave the port was by using a local bus service with no other options on offer. After a two hour wait many passengers were getting back on the ship due to a total shortage of buses. NCL must have known this was going to happen. Again, it’s not the first time they have docked here. 

The food wasn’t great this time either. Apart from the specially dining rooms and O’Sheehans, the food  was only ever luke warm. 

We chose to have breakfast in Taste restaurant and on almost every day they had ran out of some of the breakfast cereals. On more than one occasion I left the restaurant and went up to the buffet restaurant to bring back boxes of cereals. The staff thought this very amusing but still failed to come up with the goods on the next day. 

We booked the premium drinks package with our holiday after checking twice that lattes, cappuccinos, etc., were part of the package, they weren’t, neither were sodas from a can or water. We didn’t want alcohol all the time but apart from the horrible machine generated soda in a glass full of zero-cost ice, there wasn’t an alternative. It’s as if NCL are trying to encourage everyone to become an alcoholic. 

This was our 7th cruise with NCL and sadly it will probably have been our last.

Sad reflection of it’s former glory 

Malta (Valletta)

Just completed 11 day European cruise (Spain, Italy, France) on NCL Epic, with three overnight stays- Barcelona, Rome, Livorno.  The itinerary was good and the overnight stays were great.  However, NCL is a very substandard cruise line and the Epic is also a substandard ship compared with any other we have been on.  We have done a dozen cruises on Holland America, Princess and Royal Carribean.  NCL is substandard in virtually every area, except the crew, which was good and every bit the equal of HAL, Princess and RC.  The food is substandard, including the two main dining rooms Taste and Manhattan, and the Lido (called Garden Cafe), except that several of the specialty dining venues, including the Brazilian Steak House, Teppanyaki (Japanese at the table cooking), and Sushi restaurant, were decent, but they cost roughly $60 per person.  The ship is a joke, with poorly laid out rooms, the smallest swimming pools you have ever seen, 4000 passengers, with everything small and substandard.  You will believe me and understand if you go on this ship.  NCL management is horrible.   They have the worst ship app I have ever seen (and many other people I talked too, including programmers on vacation, thought the same).  They have you fill out all this info on the app before the cruise starts and then never even use it, checking everyone in manually, thus causing a 2 hour delay in boarding.  They need to get a clue from a cruise line like Princess which has gone to using electronics, with wearable devices, with check in time  at boarding of 20 min versus 2 hours for NCL.  We ran into dozens of people who were first time on NCL.  Without exception, every one said they would never cruise on NCL again, for the exact same reason we won't.  I wouldn't believe reviews saying NCL is good based on our experience and dozens of other people we talked to on this cruise.

Good Crew, Substandard Ship, Very Poor Management

I just returned from a 12 day med cruise on the Norwegian Epic and sadly it looks it age.  It’s definitely in need of a fresh look and update.  Most disappointing of all is the odd bathroom design of separate sink/shower/toilet adjacent to the front cabin door with zero privacy.  The food on board is ok, buttress in some of the specialty restaurants. The main dining room service was uneven and the food good but certainly not great.  Embarkation was a total NIGHTMARE with long lines and not a single NCL representative in sight to offer any direction to the hundreds of passengers waiting in long lines outside of the terminal.  If you’re thinking about investing in “Priority Access” to try and mitigate the long lines, don’t waste your money.  There was absolutely no indication it made the slightest difference.  The NCL sponsored tours were disappointing with the expected routing of bus loads to “local” stores to shop on the way to your intended destination site.  If large crowds, long lines, mediocre food and tons of nickel and dime fees are your thing, this is your cruise.

Disappointed 

Rostock (Warnemunde)

When booking our honeymoon we thought that the price of NCL outweighed the benefits of another more expensive cruise. In hindsight, they are cheap for a reason. The cruise started rough because of some storms which left people waiting in lines for up to 10 hours before boarding the ship. We were lucky and only waited 4 hours after our original check in time. Once on the ship we found out our balcony was one of the big port hole kinds and not a glass balcony that you could sit on and enjoy the view of the ocean, which was the reason we booked a balcony. We only had one port before two sea days, the only thing to do during the day on sea days was drink at the bar. The bartenders were honestly the highlight of the cruise. There were two big screens, one indoor and one out, both were broken so there was no entertainment in that regard. They did have bingo nights and games show nights… for an additional fee. A single card was 59$. The classes they had, like paint nights, only accommodated 15 people so it was impossible to get in. The water slides had weird hours and the pools were tiny, like 1/3 of a standard hotel pool. I never saw the adult pool even have water in it. With our package we only got 150 minutes of wifi total unless we wanted to pay an additional fee close to 300$. The tv only had maybe 6 channels, two for news, two for sports, one channel for tv shows and one channel for movies so you got what you got when you got it. As for the ports, all of the ports were great choices. Some of the days were really short or had us docking and leaving at weird times so you couldn’t get in tours that left early or got back mid afternoon. We only did one excursion with the cruise line and I do have to say it was a lot of fun. The excursions were just so expensive that we couldn’t justify booking more than one after spending 7,000$ on a cruise. Definitely a destination cruise. If you don’t mind not having free entertainment on the boat at night or on sea days besides cover bands and drinking, then this cruise line is for you. If you want to have fun on the boat itself I would look elsewhere. From talking to people on our ship they said customer service is less than sub par if there are issues, such as many passengers on our cruise having their luggage get left in the rain and then the Mediterranean heat leaving them moldy. Luckily we didn’t have problems that required contacting them. One of our friends is a sapphire member with NCL and said he will never cruise on the epic again, worst ship in the fleet.

Cheap for a reason

Ketchikan

Norwegian Epic from august 17-28 Mediterranean cruise 

Negatives: 

I’ve been on many cruises before and I wouldn’t recommend this boat

Sales person advised wifi was unlimited with our package.  They only give you 150 minutes the whole time.  You have to login, and we tested it by forgetting the network, we lost 30 min.  The guy in library said maybe they were doing an update.  They charged us $80 US for unlimited wifi for 2 days only! Per device! Even though we booked 4 people in one room, they have only 2 people in the room 150 minutes.

First sold raffle tickets for free cruises for a higher price, then towards the end they sold it for a cheaper price to get more sales.  They wouldn’t even tell us where to put our tickets to win, they just kept selling tickets. They also sold bingo cards for $5,000 draw, the first one to get full bingo won. Then they tell you they reached 74 numbers and then they can’t continue bingo and the winner won $100 something US.  The boat kept the 5k.

Sales person said with 4 people in a room, we would have a pull out bed.  They gave us a king bed and a bunk bed, my 62 year old father in law couldn’t sleep in the room because he couldn’t get up and down on a bunk bed. We had a 7 month old in the room with us as well.  

The boat advertises free drinking packages with your ticket purchase, then after you’re stuck paying a gratuity charge.  

Slides on this boat are barely ever open. 3 pools are tiny for the whole boat.  

The last day, where they disembark us, We’re suppose to leave by 8am then when there was a huge delay because the tide was high, the ramp was steep to go down and someone slipped and fell down the ramp. Luggage’s almost fell into the water.  The boat delayed 2 hours to disembark people.  They realized that it was dangerous that they had a steep ramp for people to go down, but blamed the rain, and that they were delayed because it was pouring outside.  They ended up raising the skids higher so people were able to walk down.  They lied and told us it was because of the rain.

They charged my 7 month old baby almost $1,000 Canadian for the time spent on the boat. He ate only baby food and breastmilk he couldn’t eat like adults.  Didn’t even provide any sleeping accommodations for him, like a small basinet or crib. 

Theatre room is smaller than expected.  For 3 days they had the same show from burn the floor and said not everyone could see the show, that’s why they played it 3 times.

The bartenders on the 15th floor deck are not the greatest at making drinks. 

The one Philippine lady at guest services (forgot to get her name) she has dark blonde hair and wears a ton of make up, she’s extremely rude and has a nasty attitude.  I don’t know why she has a job in hospitality. 

If you’re going through Barcelona and you order drinks on your free drink package, be prepared to pay taxes because that’s the law in Barcelona water.  But wait! The boat never discloses that to you.  

I talked to a bunch of people on the boat and they all had some poor things to say as well.

Positive:

Food was great, we had no issues with that. 

Majority of the staff were very friendly and helpful

Not a great ship

We selected this cruise for the itinerary and sailing date. We were celebrating our 40th wedding anniversary and we are a very active early 60 year old couple. I upgraded to an upper class balcony cabin, it's located just ahead of the rear stairwell. I mention this because in this ship that's the worst location we could have gotten. The main issue is the constant vibration while the ship is under power, severe enough that it affected my sleep due to the rattling and the movement. I have to say, this is our 6th cruise, second on NCL and we've never experienced this before. 

After constant visits to the customer service desk an alternate cabin was offered three days before the end of the trip to a much lower class of cabin and location. By then I had pretty much resigned myself to the problem and we decided to stay there. We went up and down the decks to the same location and could feel the vibration through out the port side only. I wondered if we were the only ones with this complaint because I got the impression that this is a known issue by the comments from the housekeeping manager. Additional negative experiences included the inattentive steward service leaving the door unlocked after servicing the room, the dirty balcony area upon embarcation with a balcony railing in bad need of refinish, TV and phone service being out for two days mid trip, did I mentioned the rattling? 

The wife and I had a real problem with the bathroom setup in the cabin, when we asked about it we were told all the staterooms were designed that way. If you're reading this and are considering this ship, pay attention to the schematics of the room, the bathroom and the shower are in the living area separated only by a sliding glass door, it is not a private room. It may be a problem if you are traveling with adult family members in the same cabin, the only bathroom privacy you get is a curtain next to the bed. Positive experiences included the restaurant service being ok for the most part, you could tell some of the staff was not the friendly type or showed little dedication, but this was sporadic. We've experienced much better service elsewhere, Holland comes to mind. The food quality at the buffet and main dining was very good, I mentioned this to my wife on several occasions. The entertainment was similar to our previous NCL cruise, which was good. The wife really liked the Burn the Floor dance show and we also enjoyed the comedian and the Beatles show. We opted for the specialty dining option but we're mostly unimpressed except for Le'bistro and Teppanyaki which were good and popular. A big disappointment was the Brazilian churrascaria as the cuts were dry and tough, not ready for primetime in my opinion. The Italian La Cucina option was ok just nothing special requiring an additional cost. We tried Cagney's on NCL before so we opted for Moderna brazilian place instead. For the most part the dining experience was good but we will rethink about spending extra for specialty dining at NCL. We do not partake in the drink programs but I did notice those that do had to deal with long waits for the drinks as most bars were staffed with just two bartenders and some with no barbacks to assist. Popular areas were overcrowded at the bars as you can imagine, not my idea of fun nor anything resembling the pictures featured on the ads.

The saving grace to this entire trip was the locations we visited. We went with NCL excursions, mostly to simplify things, being our first time overseas. I can say that the organization of the excursions team was on point, we deboarded and were on our bus pretty quickly with minimal issues throughout. The excursions were very informative and entertaining. Special mention to TJ on our visit to Sorrento as she serenaded us on the way there and back, awesome guide. Also on the tour visiting Savoca and Forza d'Agrò, The Godfather film locations, we got a history teacher as the guide. I wish I could remember her name but she was very informative and knowledgeable. Of course some were better than others but overall we enjoyed all of them. The only complaint was the heat and the crowds at the more popular places but that was our fault, next time we'll think about a better time to visit. As a last insult from the total experience with Epic, the disembarkation was a total nightmare. We arrived at Trieste with bad weather which appeared to be a total surprise for the apparently unprepared crew as they made constant announcements of delays that turned out to be as long as three hours. This made for a chaotic situation as you can imagine with over 4000 folks trying to disembark, people were lined up on the passage ways, some with luggage, seating on the floor, kids running around and most passengers basically losing patience. I'm sure flight connections were affected for some. Luckily for us we spent a couple of days in Venice and didn't have to worry about the whole ordeal, just the cherry on top of the cake of dissatisfaction.

Disappointment mostly but really didn't want to be.

We booked this cruise for my husbands 50th Birthday. Even though we had the unlimited beverage package we noticed there we were charges in my card everytime we ordered a drink. According to guest services it was a 10% European tax fee that every guest had to pay and it was not notified. After that, due to the amount of people complaining they put signs in every bar announcing the charge. They adjusted the ships route with no adjustment to the price so there was a free day at sea. For a ship that big we were expecting a much bigger pool but it looked like a pond and there was no music nor entertainment. All entertainment on board needed to be paid for, the free "entertainment" was awful. I have never seen so many people at the guest service desk every day complaining about the service. This was definetely not what i was expecting from Norwegian.

Overall Dissappointment

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