Norwegian Jewel Cruise Reviews - Reviews

We had a wonderful time. The food was, of course, great and it had one of the best production groups we've seen on a cruise. The hotel director, Stephan, and the Captain were at several events and often visible, very involved. Mexico has some great stops and we'd do it again (for the 3rd or 4th time for some of my family).

Great over all. Some food and service so-so. Two heat servers, cocktail and dining room. Food in O'Sheehan's was not good. Need to be revamped. Could also use a better variety of freestyle dining.

Everything was nice except the restaurant Chin Chin.  Worst Chinese food in the world.  They need to find a read Chinese cook. ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

Entertainment was outstanding, but food was just fair and rather disappointing.  Service was very good and all ship staff was competent and helpful. . 

Staff overall demeanor and conduct were just outstanding, particularly housekeeping services, TSAR's restaurant staff and food servers and the entire entertainment crew.  What a fabulous experience!!!!

They need more movies instead of same two over and over

Food was good. We enjoyed the four special dinners in our package.

Weather was great the whole week

We thought it was the best time that we have had. We met lots of new people, had great food and entertainment. We will definitely do it again.

Love all the great customer service that we received from all the crew.

Thank you for making my birthday a memorable!

Lucy

I knew ahead of time that "The Jewel" had been renovated and was looking totally forward to it.  I definately wasted My $$$ by booking a "Balcony Suite". Well let Me explain...the remodeling in Our Cabin was as odd as anything I could have ever imagined.  The 3rd sleep space is a bed that drops from the ceiling okay thats fine but, it drops down in front of the balcony!  Go figure.  So in the evenings when We came in for the night the Steward had let all the beds down and with the drop down blocking the balcony I couldnt sit outside and have My Tea before retiring for the evening.  Then, in the mornings I enjoy early rise, coffee, and the Sunrise.  In order for Her to sleep after 6:00am I just sat on the side of the bed with no "beautiful" view.  In order to enjoy Youre balcony since the remodel You would have to stay in the cabin during the day!  Makes No Sense To Me.

This was my first cruise on Norwegian Cruise Lines.  It was a good trip, relaxing and enjoyable.  We were on the Jewel which is one of the smaller ships.  My husband really liked not having to get too dressed for dinner.  I made reservations for dinner before the cruise, so we did not have any issues getting a table.

We loved our Mexican Riviera cruise.  The Vallarta Adventure Zip Line was unbelievable, although not for the faint of heart.  Snorkeling in Cabo and the Stone Beach excursions were just right for us.  The ship was clean and the entertainment was fantastic.  I highly recommend the Ultimate Beverage Package!

Really ticked when arrived at ship and told it was no longer "legal" to bring canned soft drinks aboard - had taxi go out of way so we could purchase.  Zero notification from NCL, but we are only Platinum.  Purser's Desk personnel were less than helpful on the two occasions we had to interact with them.  While the wait staff were all very friendly, the service in regular and the two specialty restaurants we used was slow.  Regular dining rooms the food was nothing to get excited about. Room steward and other wait staff were fantastic.  Spa staff were very nice as well.  Overall, we were really disappointed in NCL and almost wish we did not have two more cruises booked with them.  There were two really great shows and the captain was an incredibly humble and delightful man.

Gary Thrailkill, NCL #224535085

Staff was great, staterooms very clean. However, food was terrible. Not just the buffet but the specialty dining as well. Food was extremely salty and buffet offered alot of curry & stew like options. Spoke with many guests that agreed the food was terrible.  Also, myself, mom & sister got very sick from our stomach, don't know if it was the food or water used to make our coffee. My mom was in bed the last 2 days of the cruise.

We had already booked a 15 day Hawaiian cruise but decided to cancell it as we ate afraid of the same thing happing again. Our cruising days are over.

As much as I like cruising, the last cruise we took on the Norwegian Jewel was horrible. We were supposed to travel to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, Mazatlan, Mexico, and Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. However, 2 days before our cruise we were notified that they canceled Mazatlan because of routine maintenance. If it was routine, you would think that they would have known about this much sooner. The maintenance took so much longer than they had originally thought, that the day we were supposed to go to Cabo, they made an announcement that they were canceling that port as well. Out of 3 ports, we only went to one, which was Puerto Vallarta. Everyone on the ship was angry and there was a bad vibe the rest of the time. Then they tried to insult us by offering 50 dollars per cabin, not person, to make up for it. People were so angry that they were signing petitions for refunds and everywhere you went you heard from angry people. They finally agreed to refund 25% of the price of your cruise. This really was not much when yo think about traveling expences and time everyone took of of work to just stay on a ship ond not go to the ports we paid to see. To top it all off the food was horrible and the wait staff was often unfriendly. 

My favorite part of the cruise was the way the staff treated me, considering everything we went through. What could be improved is corporate needs to take the ship off a cruise to preform maintenance. We found out a few days before we left that  we were going to miss our stop in Mazatlan for some Maintenance. We ended up sitting in Puerto Vallarta for over two days because the maintenance didn't go as planned. We left after midnight and didn't find out we were going to miss Cabo San Lucas until after 9 am the day we were supposed to go there.The crew was great and made sure people had fun but Corp. needs to do something different. There were many pissed off people.

This is the second time CruiseOnly asked me to review the cruise, which I completed and submitted.  Please see below copy of my previous response.

Unfortunately, I suspect you will not post or share my comments.  Damn!

My current response represents approximate half of the issues I have to address.  This presentation I believe is adequate to make my belief and position clear.

I have been on 6 previous prising 3 with Royal Caribbean, 2 with Princess, and one (1) on Norwegian Star.  My current seventh cruise was on Norwegian Jewel (Banana Boat).  I paid for stops at three (3) ports.  Due to poor maintenance prior to the scheduled cruise Norwegian Corporation choose to schedule an over night stop at Puerto Vallarta and skip stopping at Mazatlan port and then stop at Cabo San Lucas.  This schedule does not meet my satisfaction in any way and when I expressed my dislike of the schedule to Norwegian Corporation they expressed absolutely no care or interested in fairness to their customers.  Unfortunately, they expressed that same attitude to Cruise Only staff that was attempting to assisting me to achieve at least some satisfaction.  No luck!

Amazing, I was VERY through in researching all of what Norwegian claimed to offer or provide aboard ship.  Unfortunately, upon boarding the vessel I discovered I had been deceived and cheated and conditions just continually got worse.  Just to start,  follows a short list of some of the misleading I found:

1.         I printed their (Norwegian Corporation) published "Norwegian Jewel Dining Info". Dining info sheet indicated that both Tsar's Palace (referring to Cuisine as "Continental" and indicated "No" Surcharge) and Azura (referring to Cuisine as "Light Modern Continental" and indicated "No" Surcharge) posted exactly the same dinner menus with a number of  charges for some of menu items.  I would describe as "No damn difference in the main dining room menus or descriptions! Aboard the Norwegian Star I found NO charges indicated on the main dining rooms menus and on the Star the main dining rooms had different selections on their menus (I found Star much better, consistent and enjoyable than the Jewel).

2.         The "Norwegian Jewel Dining Info" indicated that Le Bistro Surcharge was $20.00 per person.  Upon getting onto the ship it turned out to be $24.95 per person.  Oh well, cheated again.

3.         The " Norwegian Jewel Dining Info" indicated that Moderno Surcharge was $20.00 per person.  Yep! Turning out to be another cheat - $24.95 per person.  Damn!

4.         Wow! I then found that there was a $6.00 cost for a rather small bottle of water onboard that I can regularly get for about $1.00 on shore.  Then told that I could not bring a bottle of water onto the ship.  This is a serious screwing!  I do not drink any alcohol beverages, I do not drink any coffee, I have heart problems I have to be aware of, I have diabetes and have to be careful about getting enough of water and I have a long list of medications I have to take every morning and evening - and my doctor is very clear - I have to drink a lot of water.  Thanks a lot for offering "free" coffee and $6.00 a bottle for water.  Nice going.  Please note: I did not run into this problem while aboard the Star - I was allowed to bring water aboard.  What is going wrong?

5.         Garden Cafe.  At first I mostly ignored the poor food and bad preparation.  Let me be clear; some of the food was NOT properly prepared and way to many of the selections offered that should be hot (or at least warm) were COLD!  Some of the examples:  I selected a serving of egg Benedict and added the necessary Hollandaise sauce.  Took one bite and pushed it away.  Went back to try another serving.  I felt (placed my hand on) the recently filled pan of Hollandaise and found it still cold.  I felt (placed my hand on) the pan of gravy just placed on the grill and found it totally cold.  I found myself VERY angry and demand the staff person that just placed the pan of gravy remove it and return it filled with a hot gravy.  I said the same regarding the Hollandaise.  I then turned and found a few steps away an Assistant Maitre' D.  Since that was my third day of the same experiences I had with all the complimentary food being served, I explained to the Assistant Maitre' D that I considered most of the complimentary food bad and poorly prepared.  I did not consider the waiting staff or waiting staff supervisors at fault but was very clear that the Food and Beverage Direction and the Head Chef should be held responsible.   The Maitre' D apologized and I personally noted some corrections appeared quickly. 

There's consider additional issues that I will include in my final report.

But continuing with issues, Norwegian guests were assured that the ship's repairs would be completed early enough that all guests were advised to be on board by 2:30pm on Thursday.  The guests were then advised to expect arriving at Cabo San Lucas at 7:00am Friday and would have until All Aboard call at 2:30pm to "Make Memories that Last in Cabo San Lucas".  Big joke!  Didn't leave until WAY too late to head for anywhere but last stop: San Pedro Port.

While I and all the other guests paid well for all what the Norwegian Corporation offered in their "wonderful" cruise we all got approximately one third of what we paid for.  And to show their great kindness and generation they offered a 25 percent of the fare paid for this cruise.  In my case, after adjustment as reflected on the invoice prepared by the Guest Services Desk I may expect a refund of $327.12.  The "generous" offer goes on from there but is all a damn joke.  Why?  Because each port visit represents one-third of the cost of the cruise that I, and all cruise guests, paid for.  Refunding 25 percent does not come clear to what should be refunded; 66 percent.  In my case that would correctly and fairly be approximately $1,791.00 and adjusted in accordance with charges indicated on the Service Desk invoice the refund should be $1,518.62.

It would be nice if they could quit lying, cheating and shorting their guests!

We were notified 3 days before sailing that our ship needed repairs and we wouldn't be going to Mazatlan, but would be spending an additional night in Puerto Vallarta. The ship was supposed to set sail at 3pm to Cabo San Lucas but was extended to 5pm. Due to difficulties with the repairs, our actual sailing time was 12:30am. Due to the extended time it took to complete the repairs, we did not get to stop in Cabo San Lucas.  Our trip was limited to stopping only in Puerto Vallarta. The ship wasnt very appealing, our room was hot and the only consistent friendly staff was the bartenders. There were 23 of us in our group and it was a nightmare trip. 

My family and I a party of 20+ were all aboard the vessel to celebrate a few very special occasions and were unable to do are planned events due to the change in the itinerary. We adjusted our plans and were prepared for the (1) change in our original itinerary but had no idea that we would only be going as far as Puerto Vallarta. {My husband and I were celebrating our 18th wedding anniversary and also we were celebrating (3) teens all graduating from High School this year and my grandson graduating from Elementary}. We have been planning this family event to celebrate our Anniversary for quite some time, and this planned event aboard the Jewel with the lack of the opportunity to see Mazatlán and Cabo San Lucas celebrating with our family was very disappointing.  Being that we had planned this event for months due to scheduling for this large group the dates for the occasion was ideal. We just feel that we could have made other arrangements to accommodate our celebratory events had we imagined that we would be stuck for 2 days due to maintenance somewhere much longer than what we wanted to be. In addition to me not being able to sail to the (2) destinations that we were scheduled and pre booked for. My stateroom heat did not work (on the coldest night at sea Sat 10/15), I had to request additional blankets to attempt to stay warm) and lastly the toilets were not operable (on several occasions the toilet just would not flush). We were also aware that a fire occurred aboard the ship and we were not advised of this at all. At this time based on the dis-satisfaction and disappointment of our planned voyage with NCL we would like to request a full refund for our entire party or at min 66% of the total invoice for each stateroom booked (technically we only went 1/3 of our booked trip). The following are a list with all the Names and State rooms for each person in our party aboard the Cruise

On Thursday October 6, 2016 we were notified that we were not going to Mazatlan we was going to spend a extra night in Puerto Vallarta and then head for Cabo San Lucas due to maintenance issues. I had no ideal we were going to spend almost five(5) night on the open sea. Even though I have been on cruises prior to this one I had plans at each port that had to be cancelled. We should have been compensated in some way that we did not have to pay for everything we want to try and enjoy on the cruise. NCL contract Art 6 sec. f states that in the event of cancellation of voyage due to mechanical failure of the vessel the Guest is entitled to a full refund. Being that we only went to one(1) port we should be refunded at least 2/3 of our fare.

My daughter gifted me this cruise in celebration of my 80th birthday and I was very excited about it. The cruise turned out to be a huge disappointment. The itinerary included three ports but we only stopped at one. Communication was poor and we had to rely on hearsay from other passengers to figure out what was going on.  

First time with this cruise, will come back again for sure! Only few suggestions, the restroom near casino need to be clean all the time, I believe too many people using it specially after the 7:15 and 9:15pm show. And One of the water machine in the buffet not good, people need water for their day trip all the time, I see lots people using the cup to get the water than fill up their own bottle,  I will suggest why not setup a ice water container for us to fill up our water bottle, that will be a plus! Just like the 2 ice tea container at the food court next to the pool. Thank You.