I worked in customer service 20 years. And it takes a lot for me to write a bad or a poor review. I always give people the benefit of the doubt because of working in the service industry myself but I know if I didn’t follow through on issues that my customers or patients had...I would not have a job. Really don’t know if I will ever cruise again.
Embarkation
4 out of 5
I think the whole process may have taken about 30 to 40 mins but I felt everything moved along very quickly due to the amount of people that were embarking at the same time.
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
3 out of 5
I will say I was not hungry once the five days I was on the ship. Lol There was so much food. The reason I’m not getting this section 5 stars is because The seafood was definitely not fresh, and my boyfriend received the runaround over a drink they had on the menus that every bar was out of and was told to try different bars to see if they had it there when I’m sure they knew they didn’t have to stocked on the ship.
Onboard Activities
3 out of 5
The Deal or No Deal was fun and so was the Bingo. I really didn’t do much other then that. The pools get very crowded extremely quickly I suggest waking up early and claiming your chairs by the pool.
Children's Programs
1 out of 5
I have a 14 year old and that had a teen lounge but she is an only child and felt uncomfortable going in by herself. The ship has activities for single people cruising to meet other single cruise passengers. I feel they should have an event for teens sailing without friends or siblings. This was her birthday present and I feel she didn’t enjoy it as much as she could be shit because she seemed bored the entire time on the ship being with myself and my boyfriend the whole time.
Service and Staff
2 out of 5
This is an area I want to give a five star as well but I can’t. Due to conflicting information once again. First it started before we even got on the ship. We had a promotion for my boyfriend and I had two nights of dining included at specialty restaurants. I wanted to get a package for my daughter so my boyfriend called and spoke to a representative and he was told we could purchase a two meal dining package for her. When I had called back a few days later we were told they didn’t offer a two meal dining package it was a three or a five. So I purchased the three and asked the representative if they had one meal dining packages because I would need to get one for myself and my boyfriend to equal three nights for each one of us. I was told that I had to do that after day two on the ship. When it came to that time I was told that I could not buy a single dining package because they didn’t offer it-we would have to pay normal prices, or purchased dining package of two, three, or five. What???? I was told that we could not purchase a two dining package that they didn’t even have it to offer the second time I called back which is why I purchased the three for my daughter. We were told that she was going to talk to upper management and get back to us and we never heard back from her. She never followed through. Next is housekeeping. When we arrived in the room the bed for my boyfriend and I was already put together. My daughters bed was not. That was ok because it was still early. We went and explored the ship went through their mandatory safety seminar, got a drink and went back to the room to get ready for my daughter‘s birthday dinner. After being out of the room for several hours the bed and still was not made up. I called housekeeping about the bed and some extra towels And they said they would put this as top priority and have it set for us when we came back from dinner. We get back to the room and the bed was still not made, and no towels-although the tip with a note that said thank you for housekeeping was take but nothing was done that we asked. I had to hunt down someone from housekeeping in the hall myself and ask for a pillow and a blanket and extra towels. The next day our housekeeper was super apologetic for the situation took responsibility for his mistake and did eventually make the bed up because she was sleeping on the sofa the first night and bring us extra towels. The other issue that we had was in the arcade. Ski ball machines were not working properly. The one machine was not giving any tickets out and the other machine the 5000 and 4000 we’re not registering and tickets were given based off of how many points you had. Also there was a fishing game that was not spitting out the correct number of tickets... if you won 50 tickets it was only giving 48. We spoke to guest services about the issue and they told us to go back up to the arcade and they said they would send someone straight up and credit us for the games that were played. We went out there and play different games waiting for someone to come out that never came. After about 30 minutes or so went by we called guest services and a gentleman came up not knowing anything about the situation that we just spoke to someone about. So we had to explain everything all over again. He checked out the ski ball machines and seemed to fixed them BUT when it came to the issue with the fishing game he was very reluctant to run a test on that so I swiped my key card played a game and showed him that it wasn’t spitting out the correct number of tickets that it landed on. It was like he knew of the problem but either didn’t know how to fix it or didn’t want to fix it. The final runaround that we had was over a drink that was listed on the menu that no bar seemed to have and we were sent by the bartenders from bar to bar to see if the other bars had the tropical Red Bull to find out on the last day of the cruise by the bartender that did not have it in stock on the ship. Lol why didn’t they tell us that in the first place? These are definitely things that we should not have had to deal with on our vacation. As a first time cruiser this did not leave a very good taste in my mouth and makes me have serious doubts about booking a cruise ever again. Especially with no region.
Ship Quality
4 out of 5
The ship was very well-maintained and I liked the layout of the shed.
Cabin / Stateroom
4 out of 5
The bed really wasn’t all that comfortable but the room was pretty decent the balcony was nice and the bathroom was bigger than I expected.
Ship tip
If they have any issues that arise don’t expect them to be taken care of. Be very nice to the blue-collar working staff members on the ship. They work very hard and we were thankful for everything they did for us. Management and upper management I have nothing nice to say.
The island was beautiful. We really enjoyed ourselves. Just know that when you’re off the boat food and drinks where your responsibility. I had no problem paying because the quality was well worth the price.
It took about an hour to get off the actual shop and that wasn’t too bad. Although once we got back into the Norwegian building there was a little confusion of where we had to go. Once that was cleared up. We went downstairs and was told to exit through the doors as long as we did the facial recognition with the passports. As we were walking up to the door and we were told by someone else that we were in allowed to go out those doors and then stood there for a couple of minutes until she walked over to the other people were telling us to go that way to then get the correct information to let us go out. #NoCommunication
Your management comment. I have to agree. I have seen very few happy managers on any cruise. They all seem like the are jerks and ignore the quests. I would hate to work for them. If the crew is required to smile they should too.
It's a shame that your kids had such a bad experience. However, when you go on a cruise in NOVEMBER, it isn't usually going to be filled with kids because school is still happening! A piece of advice, regardless of what ship you go on and no matter what time of year: if you have an only child, bring one of their friends with you. It would be 100% worth it for everyone for them to have a companion. It might cost a little bit more, but that's the best way to ensure that they're going to have fun without feeling awkward about being the lone wolf in the kids club venues.
I used to love Norwegian, I refused to cruise with anyone else... until I went on a Christmas cruise (where we paid triple the typical fare). The staff was rude, and looked miserable. It was so sad! And the my cousin got hurt because the elevators weren’t calibrated to meet the floor correctly... they tried to make us pay for bandages. I threw a fit and they finally helped up for FREE. This was 6 years ago so I don’t remember everything. But it was a miserable trip. I wrote to corporate and it took them 2 months to respond and offered us $50 of cruise cash that we could use on our next cruise, within 1 year. I haven’t cruise Norwegian since. I now cruise Carnival, I LOVE the Havana option. It’s like a private Oasis.
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