Norwegian Epic Cruise Reviews - Reviews

This cruise ship is too big for my liking. It began with getting onboard. We waited in line for Two hours to get on. Their were only five security stations with two of them reserved for priority guests which allowed only haven and suite guests to go through. Once on board, it was almost impossible to get a drink. Too few bars open and no waiters. This improved somewhat as the cruise went on. The large atrium made for a very noisy area. The only quiet places were the specialty restaurants which were good, especially La Bistro. The pools were too small for the number of cruisers on board. The food was good and there were a lot of choices. Do not get a balcony room on the eighth deck. It is open to the above decks and the balcony gets litter from above. The reason we took this cruise was because it went out of Port Canaveral which is close to home, less than an hours drive. We have been on Ncl cruises before on smaller ships and enjoyed them much better. We wish NCL would have smaller ships going out of the port.

The Epic was new to its docking port and to the islands, so not everyone knew their jobs / or had it down pat.  A lot of the crew members were being trained on this cruise.  This was okay, but in the garden café, they kept dropping things and making a lot of noise.  My husband is tall and the beds were way to shot, his feet hung over the end of the bed (we have not had this problem on other cruises).  But the staff was very friendly and the ports were fun.   One member of our party got bronchitis in the middle of the cruise and the medical staff was wonderful!! They had him fixed up quickly and he did not miss the rest of the cruise.

I am handicapped and the bathtub was way too high for my damaged spine, I requested a handicap room when I placed the reservations.the metal strips at the doorways jarred my spine, not mentioning what it did to my undercarriage of my new expensive scooter. I could not go on any of the excursions, There were steps I couldn,'t take even the tours because of my scooter. On your Island I couldn"t go because of the tenure steps and not enough room for people that must be in the shade due to medications on the Island. Many older folk came right back and said I could never make it.

 The drink package was ridiculous.The fact that everyone in the room had to buy it for one person to have it. If I took a drink it would kill me. I have Cir, of the Liver, Diabetic and can not touch a drop of liquor,.Wasn:t fair to my daughter.

 The ones that made our cruise worth wild was Bradley our room attendant and the animals he made on our bed at night. He was kind enough to bring my scooter to me cause there was not room in our room for the scooter. Jr. Chapman head bartender in the adult section, Enjoyed the dueling Pianos. 

 It was too long a Cruise for me to just sit around. I will go back to the 5 day cruise.

 I was terribly upset at the parking fee that we were charged when I had my handicap placket my handicap license plate, my ramp for the scooter. When I called in I was told there would be no charge as long as I had the equipment to get my scooter out of the van. This is our 6 Cruise but I believe it could be the last for Norwegian.

A packed ship!   After a long line for boarding we headed for the fun in the sun.   Overall we had a good time but the front desk kept bothering us, mostly during dinner as to our onboard account and we would have to go and rectify that before we could finish our meal.

The ships crew tryed their best but most of them were new.

By the way the coffee at the coffee bar is not included in the drink package, either is bottled water. 

Be carefull at Great Stirrup Cay.  There are alot of unseen rocks in the water, someone dived in and had to be taken off the beach in a gurney as he couldn't move.

Where do I start? Having been on 23 cruises, this ship is by far the worst design I ever encountered. Most ships, after the initial boarding the crowd tends to spread out. On this cruise we felt the crowd the entire trip. The layout just seemed to have everyone in the same place all the time The cabin had the toilet on the left, the shower on the right and a tiny sink that was actually mounted on the counter top inside the dressing area,

.With the anytime dining, we waited 30-40 mins. to be seated, the staff was not friendly at all. Seemed like they just wanted us to eat and move on,

You needed reservations for all shows, and several times our reservations were "lost" and we were turned away.  There were 8 in our group and we were all disappointed. Many other cruisers experienced the same and worse problems. The pre-paid drink tips was a rip-off. Drinks were hard to get unless you went to the bar to get them.  They had upchare items on the menu in the main dining rooms and their specialty restaurantts were Ala-carte. (40-$60) I could go on but since I will not cruise with them again, why bother.

This was our first cruise and it didn't quite meet our expectations. Don't get me wrong, we enjoyed many things about the cruise but based on how cruises have been explained to us and what I've read, it fell short. The excursions, shows, activities, entertainment, stateroom and overall ship was beautiful, however, the food was sub-par and the customer service was less than acceptable. There's a ton of passengers, and not enough staff. They seemed overworked, unhappy, and not very eager to please.  Therefore, that energy becomes infectious and uncomfortable. We are on vacation and should be welcomed with a happy demeanor and a positive vibe. It also took forever to get served at the restaurants and though the menu was impressive the food was not very tasty. At this point I'm not sure if I'll take another cruise, but if I do, I'll try a different cruise line.

My family and I have gone on over 50 cruises, most of which have been on NCL. This was the worst ship we've ever been on.  Completely disappointed. The staff doesn't want to help in any way, when something doesn't work out, they play the blame game. I've never been on a ship that you need to make reservations to see a show or to get a tender off on the island. So by the time you make a reservation, everything is sold out. The ship is very big, which is fine, but the layout is horrible and doesn't have much entertainment, especially if you can't get into a show. So everyone is crammed in the casino or sheehans. The slides only work half the time and the pools are wayyyyy to cramped. My sister stepped on glass by the pool and cut her foot opened, there shouldn't be glass anywhere near the pool and all they did was throw a dirty towel on the ground and left it there. Not very hygienic, especially when you are barefoot. If you have a problem and need to go to guest services, you can hear each other because it's located in the same atrium as the game shows. Horrible experience. The food was TERRIBLE, dishes piled up so high that we actually had to move tables (there were 6 of us) the workers were  just talking to one another. One of their workers got sick on our table. This must be the ship which holds all the rejects. I'm sad that we did our back to back cruise on this ship. 2 weeks we wasted on the vessel.  DONT BOOK THIS SHIP!!!

Relaxing by the pool while everyone else got off..waterslides were fun.  Ship was clean and staff was friendly and helpful. Loved all the shows ,except for( pricilla queen of the desert did not like the homosexual  agenda )the icomedians and magician. We're great...

We enjoyed the variety of places to eat and the outside entertainment in the evenings.  We were disappointed not to have been able to see the comedians because the reservations were full.

Big ship and plenty of passengers.Long lines for everthing. Reservatins a must  for shows and restaurants if you can get one. They fill up fast. Cruise geared toyounger generation, under 50 group. Crew was newish. We enjoyed our time together on ship. May take cruise on smaller ship. Ports and island a waist of time. Long lines.

What a surprise, and not in a good way, to discover we were on a gay cruise with x- rated shows.  

The room was not clean .  Long black hairs in the shower, dust on the floor.  The room and the Bathroom had a foul odor.  A pine tree hanging scent, as used in cars, was placed in the bathroom when we complained.  The commode would not flush, we reported this to housekeeping with no results & found out from another passenger what to do to fix the problem.  The food was not terrific.  The staff in the "Taste restaurant" were very pleasant & accommodating, The staff in "the Manhatten restaurant seemed stressed, non friendly & no one smiled.  The garden buffet had the best food.  Will not be sailing with Norwegian again.

Everyone had numerous problems with this cruise. I was with 8 friends and we have loved our other cruises. There were only 2 wheelchairs available for embarkation and we had a wait of 1 1/2 hours to get a chair. I was at guest services at least 6 times with problems from being double charged for my $13.50 gratuities for me and my cabinmate, and with attempting to get our cash back that we put extra on our onboard accounts to use in the casino and in port. My special needs scooter, which I rented, barely fit in my balcony room and to move around, you would have to climb on top of the sofa to get around the chair. I couldn't do that and the room steward said to try putting the special needs scooter in the hall. Three different times Imhad problems with people trying to damage the scooter or yelling at me because they couldn't comfortably get by my scooter in the hall. Most of the time, I told the room steward to take it away and used my cane and had to limit my activities because of mobility problems. I developed cellulitis on Dec. 1st and had to go to the medical center for an antibiotic. I was charged $913.50, which was charged to my credit card. They do not file insurance. Upon debarkation, the crew member was going to quick with me down the ramp, attempted the sharp right turn and would have flipped me over but I caught myself and now have a possible foot fracture. The radiologist has referred me to a foot surgeon. I had asked my travel agent for a handi-capped room and they were booked up. He suggested that I check with guest services. I had no luck with guest services but observed a (seemingly) able-bodied person bragging about getting moved to a handicap-capped room after she was in a cabin. I must admit,the upscale dining restaurants were fabulous, as well as the shows. You need to book them well before your cruise date to obtain them. 

The Epic was a nice ship. We enjoyed the cruise over all. The crew were great. The casino was large with lots of choices. The food was as good as on any NCL ship. The cabin bathrooms were very small and inside the cabin was a weird configuration. This particular cruise was completely booked so at times it did feel crowded. Tortola, St Thomas, and Castaway Cay were great stops. I did hear from others that the boarded later then us that port canaveral was slow to get everyone on board but we did not experience that as we got there early. Overall a great cruise. Would I do the Epic again? If it was doing an itinerary I wanted and was at a price I wanted but the bathrooms was a big thing for me. 

Well; ...* Food was marginal. Lots of food but....some not fresh , some under cooked, meats, chicken, fish, etc. .  Some had no flavor, some even smelled bad and could not be eaten (chopped meats like salisbury and burgers) All came frozen originally and sat overnight or longer before serving. People wasted a lot because of this. Others also complained, specially men in bathrooms, passing loud gas and blaming the food. This happened on two different evenings at two different locations.  You don't get to hear about this often, I never had before!.  This lower quality foods are served even in the fancy restaurants, even when charging a 'supplement'.  What makes them 'fancy' is the service provided by the excellent crew acting as waiters and servers.  

*Drinks; charged extra $ for soda, water bottles, etc. could not bring even unopened soda or water onboard, Customs made us actually throw those away.!!.  ( so we had to buy them from NCL ). Even fast food restaurants provide a soda fountain for customers to serve themselves to save on employees, while NCL gets to charge that extra cash for having a crew member serve it to us.  Different strategy. The Wine and alcohol drinks are overpriced while mixed drinks are coming from a pre-mixed bucket. 

*Cabin; weird, 2 people could not walk around each other, it's a 'modern' rounded furniture setup with very bad lighting, like from Ikea. Sink was the size of my open hand, splashed all over while the faucet has a raised stem to control the flow that pokes you in the right eye when washing face!. Had to use a washcloth, even a Dr. friend had to do the same. Cabin smelled of body odor from previous guests, housekeeping sprayed some masking smell juice but later smelled bad again. It was mostly those old pillows, asked for different ones but the next night, they smelled the same nasty way. Made up my own pillow with an NCL towel rolled up and a t-shirt as a pillowcase. Put those smelly pillows in the closet to keep the odor down in the cabin. It was that bad!. 

*Smoking section on open deck 15 was always messy and filthy. Rest of ship was 'shipshape'.

*Captain ran the Epic aground by drifting towards your own Great Stirrup Cay while raising anchor. ended right by the entrance for the tenders, made a mess of the sand and grass bottom there, used the bow thrusters to turn the bow to windward, away from the entrance while pushing away with both props ( which he was sandblasting away) and blowing out the sand from underneath.  Have pictures of this. I am a Captain also and I would have had the forethought of the wind or currents, even on a very calm and windless day as this was, pushing the boat towards the shallows, specially with all the other navigators and shipmates he has on the bridge to help. Bet he could not handle my personal cruising sailboat, handling sails and lines and anchor chain on his own, imagine navigation without all those electronic gizmos... bet he could not have!.

*Kelly told us we could bring one bottle of wine per person, but forgot to tell us that NCL has 2 young guys charging $15 each bottle to go past the gate!. $$ is the motivation again.

*Picture with the Captain;.. so, we get all dressed up, beautiful gold dress and tuxedo for me, pose, smile... young girl flashes picture in a hurry and glare on my face ruined the moment and the expensive photo. Cannot repeat that moment, would have to get another cruise, dress up all over again, stand in line and hope for a better photo ?. 

Lots of people, as expected, always in the way, as in the shopping malls, elevators always filled, good for NCL busine$$. 

*Parking; Oh, $128 to park a small car out in the sun for 7 days for the seaguls to practice their skills. Abusive... no, not from the seaguls; but NCL should not be competing with Disney to see who can get higher prices. $$.

*Crew; Absolutely wonderful group of well mannered, courteous hard working and polite young people wishing to help and make us content, and they do. They are the ones that keep the passengers wishing to come back and keeping everything spotlessly clean, kitchen, walkways, chandeliers, walls, above and below decks. they give 12 hours a day, split in weird shifts to accommodate us passengers and they work 7 days a week, hard work, but always smiling and pleasant, all of them. That's what makes... ' a cruise ! '.. it's their service toward us. They are a big asset to the corporation, they all make our time there and our money spent, feel more acceptable. 

*We as passengers, on several days, here and there, compared different cruise lines and all agreed that we were 'nickel and dimed' for shows, meals and drinks and excursions and everything on NCL much more than other cruise lines. Most said that Celebrity was best, Disney was supreme but expensive and that Carnival compared a little better than NCL for what we get, while comparing food, cabins, parking, drinks, shows, entertainment, excursions, etc.  Most said they would not return to NCL. That was the concensus of many on several different conversations with different people that had cruised many times before. As for us, we might try Celebrity next time, have been on Carnival several times and have cruised on smaller ships here in the US, South America and in Europe. All were better, even Carnival, at least we were not being forced to buy stuff while onboard and stiffing us on parking and many extras.  NCL left us with a feeling of getting into a big mouse trap and left very little space for we, the mice. The corporate side of NCL seems greedy towards taking advantage of the guests for their money and advantage of the crew for their need to please us.

Otherwise, the weather was good, Tortola and St. Thomas very nice still and the crew...just fantastic!.  Also, Kelly, who guided us with the ticket purchase, was very friendly and helpful.

You asked for a review and comments:  Hope you learned what others may not tell you.  Apply these pointers and minimize the defects to improve your fine ships and your brand.  No charge to you for this, my service and advise.      Gus Alvarez (813) 471-7042

PS, I'd bet that you are going some type of sales pitch at the end of this questionnaire or some way to keep getting stuff from us, email? home address to sell something?. Will see.

 The ship was very nice and updated. The rooms were very nice and clean. The staff was not real friendly or approachable. All the windows on the ship were very dirty could not see out of them. The food was very blah and the  buffet food was re-purposed for dinner and example would be Italian night the spaghetti sauce was soup and the lasagna was made out of taco meat from lunch.  We only ate in the main restaurant once simply because the staff was not very friendly or accommodating and the food was not very good either.  Norwegian is normally known for a much nicer experience however we enjoyed carnival better than Norwegian which is very unusual.  Our room was hot most the time and it seem like the staff very rarely got to it to clean and make it back up.  really just seem like the staff was all brand-new and nobody was really drive in the customer service experience on this boat.

i had so much funny this is the first time that i have been on a cruise by myself 

 had a ball if you are someone who alway wanted to go on a cruise and have problem getting someone to go when you want to go there a place on this cruise line .. i will say it again met lot of peoples enjoy all the show .foods ... didn't like Great Cay, Bahamas but everything else was great perfect...

This was our third Norwegian ship and we could not have been more disappointed.   The registration process was the slowest ever. We didn't get our luggage until close to midnight. Very unorganized staff. The food was not good. The tender process at their private Bahama island was a joke. It took over 4 hours for our group to be called to get to the island. We were happy to see a bartender from another ship, so it was nice to see a familiar face. We will continue to sail with Norwegian; however it will definitely be on a different ship. 

There were NO favorite parts of this cruise, it was awful from the get-go!!  We are Platinum cruisers on NCL and have even cruised on the Epic once before.  We were in line to board for nearly 2 hours without offer of water or seating. Our cabin was not ready when we boarded at 2 P.M.!; and when we entered the cabin there was a used washcloth and shower cap hanging in the shower and NO towels at all.  The entire cruise was very disorganized, the food mediocre, the staff not well trained.  I actually had a waiter in Cagney's who brought my steak back (I had stated it was quite over cooked) with a flashlight to try and convince me it was fine!!  If I itemized all the things that went very wrong I would be writing a book; suffice it to say "Save your money and go on a different cruise!!"

Pack your patience. NCL out of Port Canaveral is a little time consuming. Lots of waiting in lines. Lines for cabs and buses, transfers. Lines to get registered.

Boat is beautiful. Food overall is great. Not very many good options for diabetics needing sugar free options. Pack your own sugar free treats.

Tender boats to Jamaica weren't too bad, again, lots of waiting. Tender boats to Bahamas (NCL private island) bring LOTS of patience for this port. Tender boats took a solid hour minimum to get to shore. They didn't have enough beach chairs set out so many guests had to go find chairs up a hill behind a shed and haul them to where they wanted. Lots of angry guests.

Overall, food was great, treated well by staff, GREAT entertainment. Just lots of waiting on this trip.

27 one ever rated as poor. Feel ship was understaffed and this resulted  in general poor attituted by crew.  This review is  like the ship it will not accept the review unless it is at least 159 characters long.  Like many things on the ship no good idea why this is.