We just returned from a week on the Norwegian Star on the itinerary that left out of Venice and stopped at Kotor, Corfu, Santorini, Mykonos, Argostoli and Dubrovnik. I choose this itinerary specifically because of the no sea days and the many different ports we were going to visit. A few days before the cruise we did receive an email that we were no longer going to visit Kotor due to the Venice port master only authorizing ships to leave Venice at a certain time. I completely understand this issue however I was frustrated that we weren’t at “least” warned of this ahead of them. Further research into this issue shows that this ship has been canceling Kotor for months and Venice has been having problems. Again, all good information that would have been nice as a disclaimer.
The day of embarking I though was incredibly easy. We stayed in the AC hotel Venezia which was access the street from the people mover train . I’m not a huge fan of taking public transportation but this was so easy and literally the first stop is labeled cruise terminal. We were through check in and bag drop off and in our room all within 30 minutes . Having been to multiple Royal Caribbean and Carnival cruises this was my first time on a Norwegian and I was very impressed with the stateroom. More specifically the bathroom. We had an ocean view room but nothing fancy but the bathroom had tons of room as far as cruise ships go! Also, I had a full vanity and as a woman this was amazing although a bit more light wouldn’t have hurt.
Now this is a smaller ship and we knew that going in so there wasn’t a whole ton of stuff to do. In terms of the actual boat, we found the following “Pro’s” which were; the very first night performance of the aeriest love duo group, the magician performance, dinner at moderno was excellent and we love gambling so the casino was great for us. We also loved the couples game shows that they did in bliss. Staff was super friendly and nice and great service in most places. I did have several cons however. I typically love buffets, it’s actaully one of my favorite parts about cruising however I thought that the buffet on this ship was pretty bad. Not every day and every meal, but overall It’s like they were “trying” to hard. Also, in general I didn’t find the food as satisfactory as RC was and that was disappointing for me. The sushi as well which I was so excited about was horrible as well as the service. What’s the point of having a rolling belt with no sushi on it? The majority of the shows were not for me either but I guess that’s just a matter of taste. I was also really frustrated that there were several errors on the daily sheet that basically alluded to the fact that things were free like wine tasting but when you get there, they aren’t.
I had read on a previous review that NCL has a lot of upcharges and boy they weren’t kidding. You will pay extra for literally everything! It got really annoying and frustrating after a while. Also,
Literally half of the activities every day had some type of fee. Also It felt like there was a lot of bait and switch activities. Like for instance come guess the weight of this statue and then be downstairs at a certain time but wait we need to go through an hour long art auction to see if you won first! Annoying
In reference to ports, the biggest concerns my research showed was tendering to the dock. Also, as you may have read the port times are VERY short. I empathize very because some of the stops were almost
Laughable in time. Since every port is different I’ll describe them each.
Corfu: we were docked directly here and we ended up doing the 4x4 tour through the ship which surprisingly was the best tour of the whole shop! You need to be able to drive a manual comfortably to do this and It was a great way to see the whole island in the short amount of time!
Santorini: this was the port I read nightmares about so i came prepared. I didn’t want to waste a second as this was the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen. We were tendered this day and knowing that , i had my husband wake up early to get a tender ticket. You don’t have to have one but if you want to get off the ship at a decent hour after docking, you need one. The tendering took about 45 min even though we were group 3, then the cable car to the top which you have to do took another hour. So by the time we got off and met our private tour, it was 2 hours after we began the process of trying to get off the ship. Same situation with going back down, took another hour. This isn’t really NCL’s fault, not much they can do. There are just SO many cruise ships docking and only a couple cable cars. BE prepared. There is no way around the wait. You’ll be lucky if your at the top in less than 1.5 hours.
Mykonos: Another tender port but this was different and was incredibly quick. We were off in about 15 minutes. I think due to the late night in Santorini departure and the early Morning here the only people that would have been up early are the people with excursions. Here we had a private snorkeling tour.
Argostoli: we were docked here. Easy off in less than 5 minutes. Not a whole ton to do here in port and a short time. Cabs are easily accessible. We did take a cab and visit a small winery called Gentilini which was amazing! Highly Recommend although they are now closed for the season.
Dubrovnik: this port frustrated me because they kept changing the times. We arrived at 6:30am and back on board time was noon! What are you supposed to do at a port stop when it’s pitch Black?? Literally Nothing, i would have loved to spend more time here but this felt like ten minutes and with no possibility of booking a tour we liked (we are not game of thrones fans) we just walked around and went wine and beer tasting.
The majority of port stops were amazing especially Santorini. The biggest complaint I heard the entire time was how short the port stops were and I don’t disagree. In my opinion they could have cancelled one entirely in an effort to make the other ones longer. We also arrived about an hour early to most
Ports. Back on board is 30 minutes before departure. It just got frustrating after awhile having to constantly wake up at 6am, it’s vacation and sometimes we want to sleep in and not wake up at 6am to walk around for an hour.
Crowd wise, it’s definitely a different vibe than RC. It felt like Majority were over 50 however I did see some people in the middle age bracket. Virtually no kids (that I saw) as it’s October and kids are mainly in school.
The atrium area is very small which is what’s to be expected on a small ship but what bothered me the most was the horrific playing from the band that plays all day and all night. Omg It was horrible and we literally held our ears everytime we had to walk past.
Overall we had a great trip however I struggled with a 3 or 4 star rating on this. I think overall I would give It 3.5. There are a lot of things that NCL could control that could make this cruise an easy 5 and of course some things they can’t.