The Epic is a weird ship. I didn't find the onboard experience on this sailing to be as enjoyable and meeting the standards I'm accustomed to on past NCL sailings.
(Warning: Long but thorough review ahead, as NCL's post-cruise survey was only a small set of multiple choice rating style questions)
Our room was not ready when we arrived, despite showing up at our pre-designated embarkation time. No big deal; we ended up putting our luggage in the closet to let our room steward clean. When we returned, the room was made up, but no welcome package/freestyle daily was available explaining the ship or instructions for accessing the unlimited wifi package I had purchased (I managed to figure it out from being on previous sailings). These documents did not arrive until well after dinner, which is unusually late.
Our cabin steward was no where to be seen, but I bumped into him on 2 occasions. On previous NCL cruises, the stewards would make an effort to introduce themselves to us, to ensure we have everything we needed, to figure out our dining schedules so they know when the best time for making our room up, etc. For the first 3 days into the sailing, I didn't even know who our room steward was. On the 4th day, we returned to the room to find him in the middle of cleaning it (the assistant steward told us in the hall that the steward was in the middle of cleaning). It wasn't a problem, but we entered the room just to put our bags down. It was the perfect opportunity for the steward to formally introduce himself to us; unfortunately, he did not and kept his back facing us the whole time while making the bed, despite us apologizing for interrupting him on his work, and mentioning that we're just going to put our bags away in the closet. I found this quite rude actually, that we weren't at least acknowledged.
The second time I bumped into our room steward was in the mid morning of either day 5 or 6. He had knocked on the door, and again he did not introduce himself and only asked if we still needed our room to be made up that morning, as he was "off" (as in off-shift). He did offer to stay a bit over his shift if we required (we didn't), which was a nice gesture.
On every cruise we had ever taken, this would be the first time we didn't tip our room steward something extra (additional to the daily gratuities charged by NCL), considering the steward did not even make the small effort to introduce themselves and at least tell us their name, despite having every opportunity to do so, especially during the 2 times we had seen each other. I only knew his name by haphazardly spotting it on the cabin tv while flipping channels, and confirming it by quickly glancing on his name tag when he knocked on or door. I chalk this up to a lack of training for the crew staff on this ship.
The lack of training extended into the main dining rooms. We didn't eat at any of the specialty dining restaurants, as we're spoiled with similar options readily available in our hometown. We ate in the Taste main dining room every day for breakfast and almost every day for lunch, and in the Manhattan Room every evening for dinner. We only visited the buffet on 2-3 occasions, strategically in an effort to stay away from the crowds due to COVID concerns. We ate at O'Sheehans only twice: once for lunch when Taste was closed early (more on that below), and once for late night dessert. We also ate at the Shanghai Noodle Bar/Restaurant twice for 2nd round dinners.
Of all the meals we had on board, there were only about 2 or 3 meals where nothing went wrong. All other meals, something wasn't quite right. This was in complete contrast to my last NCL cruise just a couple of months ago to Alaska, where every meal service was fantastic.
One of the biggest training issues I experienced was the hosts/hostesses who bring you to your table in the main dining rooms. It's pretty much "restauranteering 101" to know your table numbers, as a first to-do list when you're new to the job if you're to work as a host, waiter/server, busser, etc. We were brought in circles on multiple occasions in an attempt to locate our tables, despite many of the hosts/hostesses having a table map in their hands for easy reference. This carried on even towards the end of the 7-day sailing, to the point where we knew the table numbers better than the staff just from dining so often in the restaurants.
On 3-4 occasions, we were not even provided with a glass of water promptly after being seated (at least a 15-20 min wait on these occasions). On day 3, our waiter was no where to be seen for 20 mins after we'd been seated, and we were informed by the assistant waiter that our main waiter had not shown up yet when we ask him where our waiter was. This was troublesome given that we had a show to catch that night, and we ended up having to place our order through the assistant waiter. Waters were barely re-filled during service, but this got better as the sailing went on.
The kitchens were severely backed up and slow on most nights. On day 2, we had a show to catch at 7:00pm (more on the shows later on in this review). We informed our waiter prior to ordering, and was ensured we would make it. We always ate right when the dining rooms opened at 5:30pm. The mains on this night didn't arrive until 6:30pm. We were forced to wolf down our dinner, place our orders for dessert at the same time our entrees arrived, and rush through dessert, all within 20 mins, since doors were closed to the theatre promptly at 7:00pm for the show. The kitchens in the main dining rooms got better after about day 4.
O'Sheehans did not fair much better. The first time we ate there, it was because the Taste dining room had closed early, despite it being advertised as being open that day on the freestyle daily until 1:30pm, and it was only 1:15pm. Apparently, other diners were disappointed having been turned away because the Norwegian App advertised it as being closed at 2:00pm that day. Because of Taste's early closure, O'Sheehan was packed that day and lineups for lunch was an hour long wait. After being finally seated, again no water or waiter presence for at least 20 mins, food then took at least 45 mins to arrive. My mushroom soup was completely forgotten (I didn't bother with this error considering the negative experience already at that point). My hot dog was completely inedible; it tasted like nothing, as if it was thoroughly washed with water to rid it of any flavour it may have had at one point. I almost questioned whether I had caught COVID (didn't) and had lost my sense of taste. After that experience, we decided not to eat any regular meals at O'Sheehan on this sailing, which was a shame because on our previous NCL sailings, O'Sheehan's was a staple for lunch. The only other time we visited O'Sheehan's for late night dessert, the carrot cake I ordered turned into a raspberry cheesecake. By that point in the sailing, I had given up on getting the order corrected and just ate the cheesecake instead (mind you, it was actually a pretty tasty cheesecake).
In the buffet, we only ate there strategically when it was less crowded: twice for lunch on two port days (Taste did not offer lunch service those days), and once for late night dessert. My main criticism for the buffet was cleanliness. I did not see any staff regularly wiping down the food stations, etc. and washy-washy stations were only present at the entrances to the buffet area. There were no washy-washy stations within or near the main seating areas. This was concerning, as I witnessed guests eating off their plates while still in the buffet lines, and one guest even licking his fingers after getting sauce on his hands when scooping an item onto his plate, and then proceeding to use the tongs again immediately (I just don't get people sometimes).
I will say that food quality overall was decent. There will always be some dishes that could use some work (e.g. a mousse with too much orange flavouring), or wasn't executed perfectly (e.g. a runny panna cotta that wasn't set long enough, or a steak that was overdone, etc.), but this is normal and wasn't a huge deal for us. You could say that we definitely had more hits with the food than misses.
Scheduling and communication on this ship fell short though. If shows are scheduled at 7:00pm, then dinner service should start at 5:00pm (or showtime should be pushed back half an hour), to allow for a 2-hour dinner service. The slow kitchens didn't help in this regard.
While we found the shows entertaining (Burn the Floor & Priscilla: Queen of the Desert), ticketing needs to be better communicated. I read previous reviews prior to sailing that tickets/reservations are needed for the shows due to COVID, but later reviews mentioned they weren't necessary. The Norwegian App also noted that reservations aren't required. I guess that we were lucky to have secured tickets for the showtimes we wanted, and the only reason being that we decided to tour the ship immediately after embarking, and one of the first areas we happened to walk past was the ticket booth. I just saw a line-up and was wondering what it was for, then found out it was the ticket booth for the theatre, so I joined the line up right away. Had we not been coincidentally walking past the ticketing booth so early upon embarking, we would not have known that reservations were required for the shows. This was not communicated anywhere until much later in the cruise, and we overheard many other guests venting their frustration/disappointment about this.
Communication issues didn't end there. We were notified by the Cruise Director at the end of the theatre show on Day 3 that we were going to arrive at our first port late, given that the ship left New York late. We ended up going to guest services afterwards, because we had an early excursion booked and wondered how the new arrival time would impact our scheduled excursion. Guest Services had no idea whatsoever of the new arrival time. Their entire department was not notified at all. Why would the new arrival time be announced first at the end of a theatre show, to only those in attendance but not to the staff/crew? I have no idea. I first presumed it had been announced on the speakers ship-wide, while we were in the middle of watching the show, so it was announced exclusively to us after the show to ensure we didn't miss the memo, but nope; that was not the case.
To make matters worse, when we did arrive at our first port, the Cruise director kept making announcements telling guests not to clog the stairwells/hallways to the gangways until he had made the announcement that the gangways were open. After waiting well past our new excursion time, and not hearing any announcements (except for the same ones telling guests not to clog the stairwells until they are open), we decided to head to the gangway. Long behold, the gangways were open the entire time and loads of guests had already stepped off the ship. We ended up having to take a later bus to our excursion, and our last excursion stop (the one I was most looking forward to) became a 30 second photo opportunity from the bus, because we had to rush it back to the ship. We conferred with other guests, and no announcement was ever made indicating that the gangways were open despite the cruise director kept repeatedly saying so in his earlier announcements.
On the next port day, the same thing happened. There was no announcement as to when the gangways were open. Many guests learned their lesson from the first day (that the crew could not be counted on) and just headed for the gangways regardless, for the rest of the sailing.
There was also confusion surrounding dinner reservations. I understand NCL's whole freestyle dining approach, but some guests were indeed able to secure reservations. I found this puzzling, as one guest tried to do that for the Manhattan room on the first day, but was rejected after being told about what freestyle dining meant (i.e. you just show up whenever you want). Later on in the cruise, once guests started to realize that showing up whenever they wanted meant waiting in line for hours before dining, they started making reservations which were then accepted. So there's some mix messaging there. Also, I personally think that if Freestyle Dining is to be offered, the ship needs to be capable of ensuring guests are seated within 20-30 mins maximum (and that's pushing it already). We were in line by 5:00pm consistently for dinner for a 5:30pm service, to ensure we did not have to wait 45+ mins to be seated and another 30-45+ mins for our food to arrive from the kitchen. Waiting for dinner has never happened to us in the Tsar's Palace dining rooms on other NCL ships we've sailed on.
We also weren't a fan of the ship's layout/design. I felt the venues were just not suited for a lot of the events that were hosted.
Dance lessons were hosted in the main atrium, where most guests are in lounge seats in front of the Starbucks. Games, including some that had disclaimers about some non-appropriate content for young ages, were also hosted in the main atrium for everyone to see (seems counter-intuitive).
Bliss Ultra Lounge was oddly designed, with the only bar in the middle, completely protruding into the dance floor, especially with all the people lining up to try and get their drinks. Each half of Bliss was therefore completely cut off from each other, so it felt smaller than it actually was, and it felt like you couldn't vibe with the rest of the room.
I was really looking forward to dancing during disco night in the Bliss Lounge, but what was advertised as a 15 min "warmup" party followed by 45 mins of open dancing on the Freestyle Daily, turned into a 50-minute "80's style" workout class to disco music by the assistant cruise director. The DJ was also horrible; the "press stop, then press play" kind when transitioning between tracks.
I understand that the Casino was a big design feature on this ship, purposely designed to be open concept, but cigarette smoke lingered into the center atriums and walkways around the casino. The ship needs better ventilation with better draw to curb the second hand cigarette smoke from getting into other areas. This, I believe, is a major design flaw by the mechanical engineering design firm when constructing the ship.
Headliners for the comedians was a nice little venue, but when we went there on the last comedy night of the sailing, it was all bar table top seating, oddly arranged in rows like a theatre. It was a really odd experience. The doors were also kept open, so you could hear everyone outside in the hallway shouting and screaming, which really distracted from the comedian's performance. Other sailings had the comedian perform in the lounge or in the theatre (which was oddly small for the size of the ship).
There was also no real party band on this sailing. I've always enjoyed the bands on all other cruises I've taken, especially after dinner where I could grab a drink, sit and enjoy the band play to wind down the evening. I really miss the Spinnaker Lounge, and wished they had a similar venue on the Epic.
I didn't go into the H2O lounge area, as I still saw the smoke from the exhaust stacks still blowing into this area of the ship. I know that this was supposed to be fixed with the recent renovations that took place just prior to our sailing, but I remained skeptical and didn't want to ruin my clothes with soot/oil stains after seeing how the smoke travelled on one of the port days, when looking at the ship from afar.
Based on this sailing, we would not be sailing on the Epic ever again. The combination of the weird ship layout, the design of the ship's facilities/rooms, the crew, and in general just the ship's overall culture/attitude, did not do it for us on this particular sailing. In hindsight, I'm glad we experienced the Epic on this particular itinerary, as we were originally scheduled to be on the Epic for our honeymoon on a Mediterranean cruise just right as the COVID lockdowns in Italy started back in 2019. I can't imagine the disappointment of being on my honeymoon, and having to endure the negative experience we just had on the NCL Epic.
We would still cruise with NCL in the future, given our previous cruises with them that we've thoroughly enjoyed; it was the reason why we bought CruiseNext certificates on our last sailing (not this one). We would just be avoiding the Epic like the plague.
NCL, if you're reading this, we know what the standards you've set for yourselves are. We've seen them on your other ships and sailings. Please ensure that the crew/staff on the Epic hold themselves to that same standard. The experience fell far below that standard for this particular sailing.
