Great 10-day cruise

Norwegian Jade Cruise Review to Caribbean - Southern

Cruises: 2-3 cruises
Reviews: 2
Helpful Votes: 65

Overall rating:

4.3 out of 5
Norwegian Jade

10 Night Southern Caribbean (Miami Roundtrip)

Sail date: March 22, 2019

Ship: Norwegian Jade

Cabin type: Suite

Cabin number: 11088

Traveled as: Family (older children)

Reviewed: 5 years ago

Review summary

This was our second cruise with NCL (third cruise overall). We will be trying another cruiseline so that we can see what differences are out there. The vast majority of our experiences were positive. Most of the shore excursions were GREAT. The nightly entertainment was WONDERFUL. I do recommend this cruise.

Embarkation

5 out of 5

Ship experiences

Food and Dining

4 out of 5
We brought our kids this time so opted out of the specialty restaurants. We felt the main dining rooms and buffets were alright, but not the greatest.

Grand Pacific

5 out of 5

Quite nice. The server showed us how to fold napkins and enjoyed interacting with our family very much. They sang for my mom's 80th birthday and gave her a cake.

The Great Outdoors

3 out of 5

Hours were not good. Food was over or undercooked. Busy and not a great flow set up.

Garden Cafe

4 out of 5

Went there a lot - washy-washy!

Jasmine Garden

3 out of 5

FREEZING cold - they could not control the air for several days there. Food portions were small and were not that great.

Alizar

4 out of 5

Food was fine. Service was slow.

Onboard Activities

5 out of 5
Teen lounge - Entourage - was a huge hit!

Art Gallery

3 out of 5

Very small - just a hallway really. I was surprised as we had quite a large art gallery with walls of works of art in the other NCL ship we cruised on. No place for an auction - which had to take place in a lounge on the other side of the ship!

Pool

3 out of 5

We need more than this pool. It was packed ALL THE TIME.

Jogging Track

5 out of 5

Our cross-country running son loved it.

Shore Excursions Desk

4 out of 5

Very helpful.

Basketball / Volleyball Court

4 out of 5

Good - in a place that got sun about 100% of the time so was hot at times.

Entertainment

5 out of 5
WONDERFUL!! We saw two shows featuring past America's Got Talent performers. Plus the regular crew was also very talented.

The Card Room

3 out of 5

We went there thrice. All three times it smelled of smoke - not because smoking was around, but because of the people inside. The doors were shut and there was no ventilation. We opted to play cards at the Spinnaker Lounge.

Spinnaker Lounge

5 out of 5

Nice and airy/open with great views.

Children's Programs

No kids that age

Teen Club

5 out of 5

All three kids (ages 14, 15, 16) LOVED IT!! Good job, Mousse!

Service and Staff

5 out of 5
They were all great/attentive

Ship Quality

4 out of 5
Pretty good overall.

Cabin / Stateroom

4 out of 5
Not that big for a suite. There was plenty of drawer/closet space, but not a lot of space to move around. The couch was very hard - and two of our kids had to sleep on it! Balcony was fine, but with four people in the room (it was supposedly set to accommodate four), it was tight quarters.

Ship tip

Smoking policy is not good. The entire 6th floor - often drifting up to the 7th and down to the 5th - smelled TERRIBLE. Smoking is allowed in the casinos and the doors are always open. This is where we had to go every night for our entertainment. It was most unpleasant.

Ports of call

Miami, Florida

4 out of 5
We went on an airboat to the Everglades. Our guide was - at times - difficult to understand, but the tour was great. One bad thing - two of our pieces of luggage were damaged by the handler when he put them underneath the bus. Very disappointed with this.

San Juan, Puerto Rico

5 out of 5
We went to the National Park on our own, and walked around all of Old San Juan. It was a very easy port to navigate and we ranked it as one of our favorites.

Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas

4 out of 5
The boat ride into town was fun. The return boat ride had the same pilot telling us all the same bits of information - nothing new! Sort of disappointed about that. The tram up to Point Pleasant was great.

Basseterre, St. Kitts

2 out of 5
Our excursion was a disaster. We (along with many others) complained afterwards and received partial refunds from NCL for this excursion. It was overbooked and didn't include what was listed to be included. Bad experience. The shore excursion team knew about it and had sent one of their members under cover for our excursion so I'm sure this group will not be hired by NCL again.

Bridgetown, Barbados

3 out of 5
Beach was beautiful, but the included drink was very watered down soda. Also, the bus ride to and from the beach was in total silence. We drove through a city and knew nothing about what we saw.

Castries, St. Lucia

5 out of 5
Amazing trip/tour to Soufriere and Diamond Falls. High marks for this excursion!

Philipsburg, St. Maarten

5 out of 5
Great excursion to BOTH sides of the island - two countries! We learned a lot and loved this excursion.

Disembarkation

4 out of 5
Fairly quick but luggage retrieval was a bit tediouss.
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