Norwegian Escape Cruise Reviews - Reviews

The people made this cruise...the passengers, the entire crew (entertainers, social staff, the "wait" staff, etc, etc). Should be a comment in the brochure about the 45-minute ride on the tender going into Belize. Would recommend this cruise if you don't mind the contrasts of rich & poor in Honduras & Belize.

Really an awesome ship and amazing crew. Had such a blast on this trip cant even wait for the next one to come. Ship was beautfual and just so much fun.

The Escape is a beautiful ship. The shows were great and we enjoyed all of the restaurants, complimentary and specialty. The Garden Café was great for a quick breakfast, lots of choices and very tasty. Embarkation was fairly quick and easy to get onto the ship. An area for improvement would be in the pool area. It's quite crowded and hard to get a good chair by 10:00 AM. Sadly, lots of chair hogs. The nightly entertainment in the Atrium area is very fun to watch and a great way to spend time waiting between dinner and a theater show. We truly enjoyed our vacation and look forward to sailing again.

Loved the ship! So much food, activities and shows on the cruise that'll keep you busy all day. There are water slides, rope course, mini golf course, shuffleboard and a lot of other activities all day long. They also have parties at night and unlimited food!

THE CRUISE WAS HORRIBLE THE STAFF WAS ARROGANT NOT CARING,THE CASINO WAS THE WORST RUN CASINO I HAVE EVER BEEN IN

SMOKING IS STILL ALLOWED IN THE CASINO,THE DINING WAS TERRIBLE WITH ADD ONS IN THE MAIN DINING ROOM.THE SPECIALTY RESTAURANT WERE ALL ALA CARTE,FELT LIKE WE WERE BEING NICKELED & DIMED AT ALL TIMES.COULD NOT GET A SEAT AT THE ADULT POOL THEIR POLICY WAS NOT ADHERED TO ON RESERVING LOUNGE CHAIRS,CHILDREN WITH DIAPERS ALLOWED IN THE HOT TUB ALSO WITH FOOD.WILL NEVER CRUISE WITH NORWEGIAN AGAIN.

Nice cruise, good food with big verity of restaurants, lots of things to do: Spa, Pulse Fitness workout, Karaoke, movies, stores, big water slide, basketball court, Ping pong tables, free raffle tickets to win great prizes, beautiful Art paintings to bid on, Rope Course, plenty of activities for Families and Kids.  Outstanding entertainment!   Also NCL is the only ship(at least 3 ships that I've been on) I could find with solo cabins so a single person doesn't have to pay for two people to travel alone plus you can meet others in the Studio Lounge for the Solos gatherings.  Nice folks on this ship and the employees are kind, honest, sweet, also hardworking.  NCL is my favorite Cruise line!  So glad the Epic will be returning in the Fall to Port Canaveral, Florida so I can jump on board and enjoy life with more fun! Thank-you NCL.

My husband and I celebrated our 50th anniversary with our family: 4 children and their spouses and our 7 grandchildren. We loved the variety of activities for each of us. Of course, if you asked my husband, Ping Pong was his favorite.

Escape offered free style cruising so we didn't have to worry about formal nights. Every night was cruise casual for us. If we wanted to dine n any of the specialty restaurants, they were there for our use. 

On July 31 through August 6, 2016 I took my 21st cruise aboard NCL's Escape.  Having experienced 11 cruises with NCL I can accurately state that the Escape is a modern, floating marvel sailing from port to port.  The ship itself consists of several different venues in an attempt to provide a little something for everyone.   However, it is the main pool area which is a failure aboard this vessel.  Sandwiched between the water slide section and the children's  water park is the adult pool area commonly referred to as the "chlorinated soup pot."  The smallness of the pool and its surrounding area made it difficult to have any poolside activities or even to dance when the bands were playing.  That, combined with the difficulty in obtaining seating by the pool, was extremely disappointing even with the distribution of cold towels and strawberry smoothies by the NCL staff.

My cabin was a spa mini suite located on deck 15 forward.  It had a balcony and offered unlimited access to the spa's thermal suites.  The bed was comfortable and when the gentle rocking of the ship was added to it, a fabulous night's sleep was guaranteed.  The rain head shower complete with body jets and the double sink area in the bathroom further complimented the accommodations. 

Nightly shows aboard the Escape although extremely enjoyable, represented standard cruise ship entertainment. 

There was a variety of delicious food choices in all of the restaurants and the  live musical features during dinner in the Manhattan Room greatly enhanced the evening meal.  The specialty restaurants of Le Bistro, Cagney's and Moderno although requiring a separate fee, all lived up to what was expected of them.  At Sugarcane's, the mojito bar,  the unique flavor of their raspberry guava mojito should not be missed. 

My three shore excursions were all acceptable and included a fun filled day at the beach:  Tabiyana Beach, Passion Island and Balmol in the Bahamas (prevented from going to Belize due to hurricane).

Traveling aboard the Escape is mostly a family fueled agenda with plenty of activities for the kids. I, personally, would have preferred to have had more adult themed activities in light of the lack of space at the main pool area.

In any event, an excellent vacation experience was had by all with unbelievably, new and fantastic memories being made aboard the NCL Escape . 

Thanks to the crew and staff for their part in making my dream come true.

During the last few days of the cruise, I wished that we had booked the Eastern Caribbean also & done it back to back. Due to weather, we were unable to visit Belize. Nassau, Bahamas was a great alternative. We recommend not waiting until the last night to look at your photos. Visiting the coffee shop in the atrium & having a different flavored macaroon with my mocha was a fun treat every day.

The Escape is an amazing ship. Having two teens on board there was never a boring moment. The food at the complimentary restaurants were delicious and the menu had something to offer for everyone. The staff was friendly and very helpful. If you ever get a chance to have Fritzie and Theresa as your servers, you will have the best experience you could ask for. We will definitely continue to book our cruises with NCL. 

We had a spectacular time!  We are a family of 9 and have been on 3 Norwegian cruises in the last 5 years.  This ship was new and beautiful!  For the first time we got a balcony room which was so worth the extra money! The food and drink never disappoint!  The Cruise Director, Tyler was awesome and all shows were amazing!  The only downfall there is you needed reservations for everything which we have never encountered before.  We used to get the itinerary and see what we were in the mood for as the day went on.  We were able to get into one comedy show which was great!  "After Midnight" which was phenomenal!!   And without reservations, Howl at the Moon was available every other night which made our trip!  Josh, Mike and Zach were AWESOME!!  And had a few guest stars along the way which was so fun!  We were disappointed that we couldn't go to Belize (which was the key destination for us) because of Hurricane Earl, but we had a ton of fun at the other stops!  Can't wait to book our next cruise!! 

we all had a wonderful time except when bad weather hit, no fault of the cruise line, and couldn't go to Belize.  Otherwise we had fun, great service and great food.

Only one problem, transient men taking your luggage and because you don't know who they work for and with all the chaos, you don't tip them and he ripped off my luggage tags and made a smart remark saying, you'll be lucky if your luggage gets onboard, to my husband and I didn't hear it. Because of that remark and no tags I was still looking for my luggage at 9:30 p.m.

Cabins were small for the price we paid. To many people very crowded. If you had dinner at 5:30pm not able to get kids to kids center which opened at 7:00pm not able to see shows which also started at 7:00pm, very poor set up..

I have over 30 cruises. NCL has a lot going on for everybody. Plenty to do even for old time cruisers. Brought  wife, daughter and granddaughters. Everybody enjoyed themselves. Nightly entertainment had lots of variety. Ship was beautiful and easy to navigate. Only negative was food was poorer than in complimentary dining rooms than on other cruise lines. Felt it definitely could use some improvement.

Favorite was the casual freestyle as well as the multitude of venues for entertainment and food, however,  O'Sheens meal of the day was an undercooked burger served by a waiter who didn't know the difference between cheddar, American or Swiss cheeses.

 The cabins too small and location of many balconies were horrific...right over the galley of one of the specialty restaurants which provided nonstop banging, clanking all night long, every night, as if it was right in our cabin. We had to change cabins on the 2nd day. 

The Garden Cafe was cramped, crowded, hot and felt very closed in whereas other ships offered a wide open, spacious back end of the buffet in the back of the ship. 

The elevators were snail's pace at best or never came, or just skipped the floor instead of stopping. 

The beds were far from luxurious and soft which matched the bath towels that felt like used sandpaper. 

I can honestly say everything about the cruise and the escape was top notch. My wife and I could not have been happier with everything about the entertainment, crew, and staff. 

Just as a point of reference, this was our 19th cruise, 4 of them on NCL. 

The Good:

Great food!

Beautiful ship. 

The Bad:

1) We have to pay for almost everything on this ship. Even on the main restaurant NCL is placing items on the menu for $25 to $30 per order. Lobster can only be had for an extra $29.99 charge.

2) No more free room service! 

3) Manhattan Room, the larger of the 3 main dining venues is so loud (live music every night) that one just can not enjoy a meal. This is not a subjective thing. IT IS LOUD, so one can barely hear the waiter and one's travel companions. 

4) Wait service is getting really really poor. Although the quality of food being is very good and staff were very friendly, the servers seem to be way too busy (not enough of them), so they aren't (or can't) be attentive. In two occasions our appetizers were completely forgotten. Once they brought soup and salad at the same time; on another occasion the wrong meal was brought to the table. Very often we had to wait a very long time between courses. The service just did not flow. 

5) We had a mini-suite, and by mini-suite NCL means nothing other than a bathroom with a bathtub/shower combination. Other than that, it was just as small (and very narrow) as every other balcony cabin onboard. 

6) The smallest balconies in the industry: We had already seen that on the NCL Getaway... On the Escape, they are just as small. 

7) Over 4300 passengers with double occupancy (in our cruise it was a lot more because there were too many family with many 3 or 4 in their cabins) for just one adult pool (which opens for kids after 5pm), and not enough loungers. NCL optimized the number of passengers without giving these same passengers any more deck or pool space. It makes sense for their coffers, and their passengers have to deal with very busy open deck spaces. Programing around the one and only adult pool was Carnival like, of poor taste and very loud. 

8) No more Capitan's Dinner or Reception. They just don't want to give their guests a single chance to have a free glass of wine! 

9) No Sauna or changing room facility off the gym. If you want to enjoy the steam room, you MUST pay for their spa packages, and you have to sign up for it for the entire cruise, not just for a day of two. 

9) New "NO OUTSIDE BEVERAGE POLICY" is too restrictive, and even though they claim it was implemented due to "security", they managed to allow wine, which off course they charge a "corkage" fee. It's is all so obvious! 

All in all, we managed to have a great trip among the 4 of us, but it was not much due to NCL. If NCL keeps it up, they will be another Carnival for us. That means, that cruise line you just take when there is not other choice and/or they had a great sale! 

Our family of 6 adults (3 couples) had a wonderful time aboard the Escape. Our 3 cabins on the 11 th floor were next door and we were able to have the balconies connected by having the steward open the partitions which allowed us to enjoy sail aways and mornings privately.  This was our first sailing with NCL and we were impressed with the food, service, entertainment options, and cleanliness of the ship.  The only complaint being there aren't near enough spots to sit on deck - in the sun or shade - and as is always the case, there are those who hold multiple chairs for those who are never there.  When someone finally comes up with a way to enforce the elimination of this aggravating behavior, it will be a great day, but I'm not holding my breath.

We were a large group of 18.  My favorite part of cruise destinations was Tortola.  This offered a new island to explore.

Also liked the 8 day cruise. I really felt like I had enough time to relax and enjoy the boat and its amenities during this time.

The large ship was well appointed, very nice cabins, and a good quality to the included meals.  However, evening reservations for "non-optional" dining in the main and auxiliary dining rooms , shows, and most of the ship's entertainment are necessary for crowd control.  There is only one small main pool and one kid's pool making deck time anything but enjoyable.  This ship is not conducive for a relaxing vacation.