Norwegian Encore Cruise Reviews - Reviews

Once in a lifetime experience, amazing mountains, glacier

Absolutely 💯 loved this cruise! It was very refreshing.

Top notch service. No Masks on the ship! No restrictions. Encore is the perfect design. Crew treated us like family. We'll be back soon.

Cruise was great. Loved the Encore. Will not go back to Alaska via NCL. The new ports were an inconvenience especially when you have cruise lines that will stop right in town.

This is an awesome cruise/itinerary with good ports of call. Unfortunately, a delay due to a medical emergency at sea which involved an RCAF air-sea helicopter rescue of one of the passengers, the cruise line skipped the Skagway stop. Icy Strait point was nice and it appears that there is a lot of development going on there -- will be interesting to see how that progresses in the future. Juneau was a nice port of call -- try the Mount Roberts tramway and hike the trails overlooking the city. We did the NLC excursion which you take a small boat into Endicott Arm, get up close and personal with the Dawes glacier, and then rendezvous with the ship in the middle of Endicott Arm. Highly recommend this excursion. Highlight of the cruise for us. The Ketchikan stop however was a disorganized mess. My understanding is NCL built their own dock outside the city which is where Encore tied up. The dock is 8 miles from the city. OK, so shuttle buses were provided -- for $8 for a roundtrip. Seems a little cheap on NCL's part not to provide the shuttle gratis since we could have docked at the port in the city. But the worst part was the chaos in the terminal. there were insufficient shuttle buses to handle the influx and the wait to board the buses was 1-2 hours depending on when you left the ship. Given that the ship arrived over an hour late and you could spend up to 3 hours waiting for and riding on buses, this stop was a complete waste of time for us. We understand that standing in line is sometimes unavoidable, but this was ridiculous -- I'm on vacation, I don't want to waste my time in a queue for 2 hours. I suggest NCL figure out a more efficient process to move passengers from their new port to the city of Ketchikan or go back to docking in the city. And our ship was only 60% full -- this situation will only get worse when they return to full capacity sailings. VERY disappointed in NCL. We will be avoiding Ketchikan on any future NCL Alaska sailings until this situation is improved.

An amazing Alaskan experience. I learned a lot about the history of how people not only survive but thrive in such wilderness. A lot of mishaps and apathetic with pompous, arrogant and unprofessional guest services but the cabin crews were above and beyond expectation. For Alaskan ports, I wish I have more time, there was so much more I wish I could do (helicopter to top of glacier, for example). Will definitely come back.

We will give NCL Encore an Encore! Something for everyone.

Cruise was great!! Cabin was spacious. Ship was huge, but a little more rocky than other cruises I've taken.

The ship was beautiful, lots of fun things to do. The ports were amazing. The staff & food were both mediocre. Perhaps because I have previously sailed Royal Caribbean & Princess where the service, staff & food was amazing.

I would not cruise on the Encore again. If you like Norwegian, try the Breakaway or Getaway instead. Overall, the food in the main dining rooms and buffet was good. We were a party of 8 and never had to wait more than 10 minutes for a table at dinner without a reservation (we only made a reservation the first night on the ship) We didn't go to any of the specialty restaurants, however many people on the cruise said that Cagney's was the best. We primarily went to Taste and Savor for dinner and never had an issue finding something we would eat (many times we ordered multiple appetizers, entrees or desserts). We did have dinner one night in the Manhattan Room and found it to be a little more formal. It was also dark and the service was slow. For breakfast and lunch, we split the time between the dining rooms and the buffet. The buffet had a variety of options, including a station for Indian and Asian selections which were great. At breakfast, there was an omelet station to get made to order omelets and eggs. The kids loved the soft server ice cream stations, pizza, and mac-n-cheese. My only negative is that there wasn't a formal night with a more fancier menu (surf and turf, crab legs etc...) The Go-Carts, Laser Tag, and Galaxy Pavilion are all additional charges. $15 for each Go-Cart Ride, $9.95 for each Laser Tag, and $8 for each virtual ride in the Galaxy Pavilion. We paid for 2 Go-Cart Rides, 2 Laser Tags, and 1 day session for the Galaxy Pavilion which was $49 for the day for our 15 year old. They do have unlimited packages for each or all, however they were expensive and not worth the extra money. Also, making reservations for the Go-Carts and Laser Tag didn't matter, because you still had to wait at least a half hour after your scheduled time slot. As for the Pools, both the adult and kids pool were small (and closed the first 2 days at sea) and there wasn't enough open deck space or chairs for the amount of people on this ship. If you didn't get to the pool area by 8:00 AM, forget about finding 2 chairs together. Choir of Man is definitely the star show on this cruise. Kinky Boots was just OK. The musicians were average at best and the DJ's should just stick to playing top 40 and Reggae. I'm an avid music listener and found that I only knew 1 out of every 5 songs they played the entire week on the pool deck. The MC's at the nightly parties were annoying and it would have been better if they just had the DJ. My 15 year old son and his friends joined the Entourage Club but found that there wasn't much to do there other than a single air hockey table, foosball table, and a few game consoles. And the daily teen activities (other than 1 game of dodgeball) were not very fun or interesting. How about planning a scavenger hunt, a tour of the non-public parts of the ship, more competitions etc... Service for the most part was good, but nothing to rave about. Never had to wait long at any of the bars to get a drink. The waiters were nice, but not very personable. I would much rather of had the same table and waitstaff each night at dinner to get to know them and for them to get to know us (know what drink we wanted each night, any dessert we particularly liked etc..). The room stewards did a great job of making sure our beds were made and turn-down service done each night when we got to our rooms. My wife was disappointed they didn't make any animals with the towels like they had on other cruises. All other personnel on the ship were friendly and accommodating. I would give 5 stars to the ship's cleanliness, however the design of the ship is poor. Too much space allocated to Vibe, Go-Carts, and Laser Tag and too little space allocated to pool and sundecks. Also, a sports court would have been a better use of the space that the laser tag takes up.

New Encore was the reason for our trip, last minute. Pool area downsizing was a big disappointment and loss of H20 was generally the big negative. Observation lounge was a huge homerun! New specialty restaurants were a surprise, Cagneys disappointed (!) Overall really enjoyed the ship and the crew.

I would not cruise on this ship again given the extra fees, lack of pool chairs/space, and cabin noise.

Worst NCL ship i have been on. I feel like they took everything good from the escape and removed it. Need spice H20 or a non-pay adult only area.

Loved the cruise and would probably go on it again. Since the ship is only 4 months old, I'm willing to give the crew a pass on my complaints. Norwegian is always a great experience and have always a perfect experience. I'm sure the crew and especially the kitchen staff will improve as it becomes more routine. I would still recommend it since an almost perfect cruise is still amazing.

Great ship, Good ports, And fair value for your money. Aside from a handful of issues, many of them avoidable if you are paying attention as a guest, it was a good time. It was my 1st cruise, and I'm definitely not opposed to doing another one.

Best trip thus far (5 so far). Can't wait for future cruises!

Overall, a super relaxing cruise. Exactly what we needed!

Overall I would do it again! There is always good points and bad points about anything we do, I just have learned to stay calm and enjoy life!

Nice ship and cruise, excellent food and drinks - a bit too many people - we liked the Hawaii cruise better!

Weather was great. Shows were not good. Except choir of man. Service on deck 7 terrible. People just not friendly. Not enough activity. And same shows all the time. No broadway shows.