Europe - Mediterranean Cruise Reviews

I sent the attached to NCL, but was very surprised to hear nothing back. They must not care if comments are negative.  I also have comments regarding Air Canada, but I will send those directly to the airline. Below is the letter I sent to NCL.

To Whom It May Concern:

Re: Norwegian Cruise (Spirit) – September 18-30, 2015

Room 9566 (Mary S. Riolo)

I took the general survey yesterday, but it did not allow enough room, so I am sending this to you as well.

To start, I want to tell you that this is my 4th cruise, but the 1st with Norwegian.  I travelled with 5 other family members and for 3 of them, it was their 1st cruise.  We all purchased the ultimate beverage and dining package and requested and received balcony rooms.

Positives:

Boat was clean and had many restaurant/bar options.

Food was the best we have ever eaten on any cruise line (for the 3 of us who have cruised before and for the 3 newbies – they loved it).

Staff were friendly and courteous (except for one hostess in La Trattoria, but that was handled by your cruise manager).

Arrival/departure times were pretty much on target.  Getting on and off the boat was easy in all ports.

Had to make a medical emergency stop on the way to Venice, but it was handled efficiently and quickly and we docked in Venice on time. Impressive.

Daily drink specials were delicious.

Our restaurant experiences were all excellent and we ate in several of the restaurants for dinner – Shogun, Le Bistro, La Trattoria, Cagney’s.  We frequented Le Bistro and Cagney’s several times – staff were phenomenal as well.

Our steward Derek, (room 9566) was amazing. Not only was he very friendly and courteous, but able to answer all of our questions (unlike many of the staff at the service desk), and kept our room spotless and comfortable.

Shows were very good.

Events in the The Galaxy of Stars were fun and entertaining.

Negatives:

When we began to shop for a Mediterranean cruise, we were convinced to go with Norwegian because the agent not only gave us a good deal, but assured us that our rooms would be together and that the dividing panels between our balconies could be removed so we could have one big balcony to sit out on altogether.  This vacation was a long time coming for us, and we lost two members of our family in 2014, so it was very important to us that we were together as much as possible.  When we arrived at the ship and saw that the panels had not been removed, we inquired and received 3 different answers from 3 different people. Bottom line, we were not able to have the panels removed, which was very disappointing to all of us.  This was a HUGE factor in our booking with NCL and we felt we had been misled.

We had a continuous problem with our toilet in 9566.  We had to make several calls throughout our stay and by the time they sort of fixed it, we had been on the cruise for 10 days! My guess is they were unable to fix it entirely, but did not want to admit it.

We purchased the unlimited beverage/dining package, but were never told that it did not include water or coffee (from the Café).  We found it utterly ridiculous that we could not get bottled water or a café mocha without being charged.  We were told if we put liquor in the café mocha, there was no charge.  It made no sense since liquor is far more expensive than coffee and water that these two items were excluded from our package.  For the tours, you had staff selling bottled water for $4.50/bottle, but as soon as we got on our tour buses we were offered free bottled water.  Do you really think that this makes sense?

Bar service was slow all over the boat.  On the first day at sea, when you had everyone on board, there was only one bartender making the drinks at the upper bar by the pool (we got up early to get chairs right by this area so we could get our drinks quickly). He was extremely fast, but when you have dozens of people coming up to order drinks, and only 1 person making them, we had to wait a long time for our cocktails.

Went to change American dollars to Euros at your desk and found out you charge a $10 commission – ridiculous.  Fortunately, I did not have to utilize it after all and was able to change my money in the ports with no commission.

The staff at the service and shore excursion desk are not as knowledgeable as they should be.  We often found them unable to directly answer our questions, or try to ‘go around’ it and did not get a straight answer.  One or two of them even seemed to get frustrated by our inquiries and that made us a little concerned.

Most of the tours were very good.  However, one tour in particular stood out as bad…Istanbul.  Our tour guide ‘Lily’ seemed to be very knowledge, but it became clear she was not in the mood to take us around and was only out for herself.  Here is what happened…

She told us we would not be able to go into the Blue Mosque because of the holiday, but when we returned we found out that the tour bus right before us got to go in.

She took us to a different mosque, which was very beautiful, but when you spend all this money and expect to see the famous Blue Mosque, it is disappointing.

She took us next to St. Sofia and the museum, but after giving us information, just left us to go around to wherever we wanted and said she would ‘take us’ to specific vendors to buy souvenirs, which she later did.

The last stop, a rug market and jeweler – she insisted that we would have to go into the rug making demo, and it would only last 15 minutes, and then down to the jewelers.  We ended up being there close to an hour (felt it was rude to leave in the middle of the rug demo, and jewelers who were trying to sell us stuff).  When we finally escaped (yes, I said escaped), we found we only had 20 minutes left to shop.  This was an all-day tour and she left us only 20 minutes for shopping. My guess is that she receives some sort of commission for taking us to these particular vendors. In all honesty, to my knowledge, no one bought a rug or jewelry because we had such a short time to shop in the market around the corner, and aggressive sales people are actually a turn-off.  And truthfully, we found the prices outrageous.  When we finally went to the market to shop, having such a short time, we had to rush thru to try and make our purchases.  We were ‘attacked’ by many vendors.  I have travelled to Europe before and I know some salesmen can get very aggressive, but we have never seen anything like this.  One of them actually chased us to our bus – very scary.  And, my cousin was cheated out of $40.00.  She purchased 3 small rugs at an agreed price of $40.00.  The salesman took off with her money, and then another one came by and took all the rugs out of her bag saying they were his rugs to sell and she couldn’t have them. Obviously a setup by these two salesmen to get money out of the Americans. Upsetting to say the least.  Could not wait to get out of Istanbul.  Found Kusadasi so much nicer and the sales people were not pushy, very helpful and gave us some great deals.  We ended up purchasing what we wanted there.

Overall comments:

As a whole, we had an amazing time (spent an additional 5 days in Italy after the cruise to visit family).  However, I cannot honestly say that any of us would take a NCL cruise again. We would definitely consider a Mediterranean cruise again, maybe with some different ports, but not necessarily on NCL. The food was the one great thing you had going for you, but the rest was a little disappointing.  We had many friends and family who could not wait for us to return to tell them what we thought as they want to do a cruise next year.  We will be honest and forthcoming with this info and let them decide who to go with.

I hope you will take these comments into consideration to improve service a bit, and consider including water and coffee in your beverage packages.

Greatest itinerary! Can't pick a favorite place, loved them ALL! There's so much history in each one of them. It's well worth taking tours, and paying that much more. It's a one in a lifetime trip. The ship and activities/shows were disppointing.

We enjoyed a fantastic 12 day Mediterrean cruise from Barcelona to Venice on the NCL Spirit in Sep 2015.  We had been planning to take this type of cruise for over 5 years for a significant wedding anniversary and two things caused NCL to win over the competition: - The ports of call, and 12 days vs 7 gave us a broad coverage over the entire Med region vs just a Western or Eastern focused 7 day cruise. - The fact we'd taken a "budget FL cruise" on NCL 20 months earlier and were quite satisfied in all aspects.  We are not experienced cruisers having taken only 2 cruises in 1998 and 2006 prior to these last 2 on NCL.

The good: - Other than Barcelona and Venice where we elected to arrive 2 days early and leave a day late, we took NCL shore excursions in 5 of the other 7 ports.  We had good luck with all the guides and equipment.  On our first excursion to Florence there was an accident on the expressway causing our bus driver to divert onto side roads.  We got to the ship with at least 30 mins to spare but had we been on our own that would be been worrisome; note if you take NCL based excursions the ship WILL WAIT for you, probably worth the 20-30% premium you pay over outside groups. - We did our own walking tours in Toulon, France (having had a few other trips in France in years past) and Mykonos. We did our own tour by trains in Naples following guidance in the Rick Steves cruise book, it was a little confusing but we made it work saving us $70 in cab fares in a low risk venture to Herculaneum, the smaller version of Pompeii ruins. All this worked well because we had FANTASTIC weather in all ports, sunny, no rain in the daytime and really only 1 sorta rough sea morning sailing into Naples.  Be ready for a LOT of walking and climbing in Rome, Athens & Ephesus and be ready for HUGE CROWDS at all major sights surprising for so late in the season. - Food quality and service in restaurants and the cabin were great.  We ate most dinners at the Windows and Garden restaurants, which have the same menu and the upper right entrees change nightly.  We ate 3 dinners in the Shogun oriental restaurant recently added to the "no upgrade charge" regular dining, and with typically lower calorie food too.  Some breakfasts were in the Raffles buffet but at least 4 when we had time were in Windows for a quieter higher quality experience. - Because we joined cruisecritic on our 2014 FL cruise and were part of a meet and greet group, we had a special meeting of a couple dozen cruisers with the captain and officers.  That gave us the option to get a tour of the bridge with the captain, very interesting if you enjoy a view of how things work.  As NCL Latitudes members we also got an invite to a larger scale (200 people or so?) meeting with wine, food & prizes - nice touch!

- Neither bad or good but this type of cruise really has people from all over, maybe 20% US, 20% Canada and the rest from all over EU especially UK, Spain & Germany, also Far East & Australia.  Just be accepting of the language differences, we enjoyed the mix!  There were some kids and babies but generally lots of couples and probably most over age 50 but plenty of younger persons too. - The Spirit is the oldest of the NCL fleet being built in 1999 and refurbed in 2013.  Our 8th floor window (non balcony) room was fine - everything worked.  We did not notice other problems around the ship, but other than two sea days we were on the go every day in port.  If you want a mega liner with water slides or rock climbing get a different boat. - Supplement your washy wash alcohol cleanings with good hand washing. We also carried hand sanitizer on shore and an advantage using shore excursions is they have deals with merchants to use their restrooms free vs paying a euro in some places for public WCs.  Note Turkish excursions are required to have a merchant sell job, but there are ways out of that.

Not as good: - The NCL shore excursions can be expensive, by our definition anything over $200 per person is pricey, $100 is OK.  Budget a lot for these, don't be tempted to blow all your budget on a balcony or suite when what you want on a cruise like this is to see the sights. - We enjoyed the theatre entertainment especially the Beatles act & Magician, and the rest was just OK, something to do at night since we are not into drinking a lot before bed.  We did visit the Champagne Charlies piano bar a few times for some soft rock and jazz but didn't go to the dance club nor casino.   - Booze has gotten crazy expensive but a few ways to save:  Get the drink of the day if you must have a mixed drink. NCL offered wine prebuys on boarding day, starting at 4 bottles for $22 each (vs $30+ at restaurants) which they'll cork for the next day and you can actually take with you to a bar too.  We were also able to buy 2 wine bottles onboard at Barcelona from a store after we'd cleared security, apparently OK other than they told us we needed to drink it in our room.  Another trick we've learned is buy a coffee or wine in the port shop right before you board for cheap and get a WIFI paswsword to do some quick emails and photos home, much better deal than ship prices for satellite internet.  One more tip: bring an insulated mug to get larger free ice teas or morning coffee. We were disappointed that since our last cruise NCL now charges $8 extra for morning room service coffee & rolls that used to be free. - Do NOT book airfare through NCL if you want to do an arrive early leave later plan.  They charge a LOT to make that change.  If you arrive 2 days earlier and get travel insurance covering airline problems there is very little risk booking your own, which was also a lot cheaper than what NCL had offered for this EU trip.  Tip: having used Amsterdam many times for business travel we transferred through there fine on way to EU but on way home passport and security had a HUGE backup, perhaps normal in this post 9/11 world.  Give yourself at least 2 hours of connect time for a mid day flight in AMS as all flights are full & if you miss it you'll have a tough time even moving to a later flight.

The trip was fantastic.  The ship was very good.  They took excellent care of our room.  Balcony was great for the sound.  Twice a day they checked and made up our room.  The food was way better than I could have expected.  The entertainment (Shows) were pretty good.  Not much other activities because we were so busy at different ports.  On and off the ship went smooth.  Drinks were a little pricey, those could come down in cost.  The ports of call were great.  We really loved them all except Istanbul Turkey.  It was fine, but nothing spectacular.  All the big attractions were closed due to holiday.  Oh yeah, take Euros.  You will need them.  The ship exchange is ridiculous and most exchange places get you pretty well too.  

Norwegian Spirit's crew gave us the trip of our lives even under the most difficult circumstances.  We have been planning this trip for over a year.  Unfortunately our traveling companion had a heart attack the third night out of port.  The onboard Doctor saved her life and made sure that she received the best possible care at a Rome hospital and continued to follow her recovery.  The Embarkation Clearance Officer contacted us the next day and offered to allow us to use their phone to keep in contact with our friends and encourage them.  That is customer service.

In addition to the excellent customer service, the Shore Excursions were fantastic, the food the best the activities we participated in were great.  My next Cruise will definitely be with Norwegian

Great  food and service, enjoyable excursions, beautiful sights in all the cities. the entertainment was good, easy on and off.......................................................................

We chose this cruise for the destinations and weren't disappointed. The Service on board was excellent with a level of attention to detail that went above and beyond. The excursions were all nice with overall knowledgeable guides and good service. The vessel was recently "remodeled" however it's showing it's age; While the cabins have a very nice distribution which makes the most of space, the spa facilities were disappointing and the ship only had small 2 specialty dinning restaurants. Food quality was very good however all dinner options are formal so if you plan on taking long tours your only casual option may be room service. Overall a good experience

I loved the itinerary of this cruise and wasn't disappointed.  Ports of call were all different and worth seeing. Zuiderdam is older but well appointed and very well managed.  Our cabin was on deck 6 with balcony. we loved it. Our agent Melissa Lemke found the best location for us. Public places on our ship were clean and nice, restaurants were very clean, service was good and food was aplenty and varied. I even tasted some things I only read about before.  That to mention that I am not afraid to taste any food humans eat anywhere in the world. The buffet manager Helmi was really good.  It was always fresh food and good service there. At ports KK was always there for everybody always prepared, very informative and good natured. Her suggestions and directions always worked well.  It was a good cruise .  Thanks to Holland America and Melissa Lemke.  We will do it again . I forgot to thank Holland America for providing the opportunity to celebrate Jewish Holidays . It was unexpected and very nice. Thank you

I was very excited to be cruising for the first time on Holland America. I am not a first time cruiser but, I am a new-bee on HAL. I was excited about the ports in Europe that I would be visiting and also that I was going to get a taste of a luxury cruise line. All of my other cruises have been on Carnival. I was looking forward to better food, better entertainment, a luxury cruise-line atmosphere. I have to say that all that I expected was just fair. 

The decor outside the rooms and inside was no different than Carnival. It did not have any "Luxury" feel to it. The rooms were of comparable size with no extra amenities and we had to pay for laundry every day. There isn't even a place to iron. On carnival they have a laundry on each deck and a place there where you can iron clothes.

The entertainment schedule was disappointing. The only  up side to that was that because of the number of ports vs. the days of cruise, there wasn't a whole lot of time for entertainment at night. We ported 10 out of 11 days and were exhausted when we got back on for dinner. So, because the entertainment wasn't that exciting, I didn't really plan for any of it. I did go to one show and a comedy thing. Not much difference there either. It was just OK.

The biggest issue I had was the food. OMG! This is supposed to be a higher end cruise line and I thought the food would be outstanding. Not so much! The buffet was not very good at all. The variety of salads, breakfast choices, and dinner choices in buffet was far surpassed BY CARNIVAL. Carnival has a wonderful buffets with different things daily and lots of variety. 

You can get Italian that is upper scale but you have to pay an extra $10 per person and it is in the buffet. It is not a separate specialty dinning restaurant like most other cruise lines you go on. We paid the extra $10 to eat the Italian because we were bored of the buffet. And you might be thinking, "if you didn't like the buffet, why not just go to the formal dinning room every night?" Well, after paying $35 extra per person to eat at the steakhouse the first full day on the cruise and having a very bad experience, we realized that all the food choices might be a problem. The bad experience at the steakhouse just set the tone for the whole cruise. It is a steak house and both our steaks were cooked incorrectly and had to be sent back. The sides were OK and that was all we had to eat for a while. it took too long for the replacement steaks to get there so we cancelled the dinner and told them we were done and leaving. The manager then came over and was very rude and said we would not be charged for the dinners but you will pay for the caviar and walked away.

Since this was the highest end restaurant on the ship, we didn't think any of the other food would be much better. We were right. Main dinning was just OK. I got tired of only having Cesar salad every time I was in the main dinning.  There was one other salad choice and a soup. None of them were anything I liked. So I would always go back to the house salad(Cesar). They did have the same choices you will see on any cruise menu:frog legs, escargot, prime rib, lobster(2-3 oz.) on one night only, etc. Nothing was prepared that was out of this world great or that memorable. After the issues at the steakhouse we cancelled the other premium dinning reservations we had at Le Cirque so I can't comment on that them night, but it is held at the steakhouse and run by the same people so it wasn't worth chancing and a waste of money.

THE ONE really great thing on this cruise was the themed food nights on Lido Deck!!! They had: buy one glass of wine-get one wine for a $1 from 5-7 pm. And during the same time frame The Lido also hosted 4 different nights of themed food spreads: appetizers and main courses based on where we were at Port. We had Croatain, Italian, Greek and a Mediterranean night. This food was memorable. Thank god for it because on those 4 nights we ate there instead of any of the dinner venues. 

Instead of gaining weight on a cruise from too much eating, I lost weight on this one!

I doubt I will go on a Holland America cruise again. It would have to be a SMOKIN' deal. They offer a return cruiser discount and try to get you to book another cruise while on this one and give huge discounts but even that was good enough for me to consider it. it is up to you if you want to be your own judge of the cruise and not heed my advice. Everyone has different taste and interest. 

I am looking forward to Norwegian and Royal Caribbean next.

The Cruise was wonderful with only a few glitches. 

We were not told that we needed visas for Turkey beforehand.  Created some confusion and a hassle to get them done online.  Turned out that we were never asked for them.  At $20.00 each quite a lot of money for the Turkish Government.

Would like to see more "seminars" on board.  History, Arts, people etc.

The Port talks were only OK.

The ship was beautiful and clean.  My recommendation is to have a designated location for all night dancing/bar and an LGBT night located in a location that easy for people to chat and meet.  It was located in a location that was mixed with everyone and harder to figure out who to connect with.  Also, there were some stops that could have been skipped for overnight stays in places like Florence.  

This was my 10th cruise and it was disappointing to realize that MSC has a long way to go. The best part of it was the itinerary. Services at excursion desk were the worst. No one there knows what they are talking about. Tried to book the excursion with them in Turkey but they didn't have it in English just French and German. There would rather give you wrong information then say they don't know the answer. The ship is very plain. Bathroom was very small and the shower is tiny. Food is almost the same every day. No sandwiches just pizza 24 hours and it's the only place to get tea or coffe after 10 pm. Shows are just Ok. Dancers could be a lot better. Service in the restaurant was the best but the food could have a better variety. One thing that was nice no one was pushing to buy drinks at the pool and there were plenty of chairs for everyone. Overall it's the European line and it shows in their standards. People are not as friendly and they don't seem like they care. 

Everything was great.  Loved our room 13032, spacious,  the balcony was much larger than expected.  We ate mostly at buffet because the food was spectacular. ..so why change.  Your staff at the wave bar was fantastic.  Wish I remembered the name of the gentleman from Grenada.  You need to clone him....each day he was cheerful, friendly,  A SPECIAL THANK YOU TO HIM.....HE WAS WONDERFUL.  This cruise was on my bucket list..........no complaints.........all was perfect

Best Cruise I've had to date.  Was concerned about the size of the Norwegian Epic ship and moving/serving passengers.  They did an outstanding job!!  Crew was fantastic, food excellent and liquor premium.  Nothing bad to say at all about the cruise.  Looking forward to sailing on this ship again in the future when it changes destination.  Only issue I had was with communication between and Norwegian...a few months before the cruise I was informed that the ship would be in drydock longer than originally planned so they had to push my cruise forward to the next month.  I couldn't make that, so I rebooked for the month earlier.  Everything was fine.  Then about a month later I was informed my cruise was cancelled.  This was after I had to rebook hotels and flights (at a cost to me).  Turned out someone dropped the ball and didn't finalize the dates we worked out.  Everyone was very nice and helpful, but I was getting irritated and felt I was being jerked around.  Almost just cancelled because I was losing confidence that this trip was really going to happen.  After hours on the phone for a second time we sorted everything out.  Including my Ultimate Drink and Dining packages that got "lost" in the rescheduling.  Make sure you run hard copies of all your plans/agreements, because when you are rebooked it all goes away in the website and you only have access to your current plans. After all this....we went on the trip and it was fantastic!   Highly recommend this trip to anyone!!   

did not like the decor  or the low ceilings of the ship. you charge us 25.00 dollars a day then tell us the cabin person is not part of the up charge.

A week cruise and only one sea makes for a busy time.  This is a great way to get an overview of some of the great places on the Mediterranean.  However, each port stop leaves you wanting for more of the cities visited. With some much time in port and off the boat, the time on the Epic must be budgeted in order to enjoy all the Epic has to offer.  With the unlimited dining package, we ate a specialist restaurant every night.  

One major disappointment:  We love the thermal spa.  However on Saturday night,  after a late port day, we were told that the spa was closing early.  I ask the manager to contact me, but he never did.  

Did two pre-nights in Barcelona which were great and gave the group of 12 a chance to visit Montserrat; it's a must see.  If you need some relaxation time 7 day is too short, except for one day at sea you are on the move all the time.  Ship was clean, friendly staff.  However, not sure why they charge for entertainment.

Overall it was a nice trip, however, we wish the cabin space can be larger, especially for the bathroom.  The vanity is too short and the sink is way too small.  The amenities in the room is too minimum.   

I was nice to visit all the locations with only one sea day.  I find sea days mostly boring, but this trip was nice and I welcomed the sea day after visiting most of the cities in the western Mediterranean cities.

Great cruise, places visited were awesome, People were friendly and plenty of shops and sites. Wish we had more time at some of the stops. Did not rain one day during the cruise.