Norwegian Jewel Cruise Reviews - Reviews

This ship created everlasting memories for my significant other and I. Endless entertainment. Delicious food. Couldn't ask for a better time. The ports were beautiful. I felt pampered the entire trip.

Impressive staff onboard the NCL Jewel.  Cleanliness is of the utmost importance.  The crew makes this ship shine!  Wonderful to see everyone smiling!  And so many dining and drinking options, which one to choose?!

THE FOOOD WAS EXCELLENT.

SERVICE WAS SUPERIOR

TWO PORTS INE, BUT HONDURAS WAS FOR THE PITS--HARBOR IS CHOPPEAND A FEW STRUCTURES WERE BUILT TO SELL THINGS.  NEW HARBOR BEING BUILT TO REPLACE THIS ONE-UNTIL THEN NO RETURN!

Our whole family loved the cruise!  We enjoyed the food, the shows and Splash Academy.  The only thing we would change would be to add a shallow end (3 ft or so) to the kids pool as the kids could not touch.  This was our first cruise but it won't be our last!

Wife & I have been on 30+ luding 4 other Norwegian cruises. Embark/Debark - Very good. ROOM: Had standard balcony, near front of ship. Small room, but adequate. Best bathroom layout. Ample shelf/drawer/closet storage. SHIP LAYOUT: Confusing. FOOD: Disapointed. Main Dinning in the Tsar's Main - Poor choice of items to chose from. No shrimp cocktail or lobster unless you go to the expensive pay to eat restaurants. The least amount of fish available of any ship I've been on. Service slow to adequate. Friday night had the prime rib, a little tough. The Azura Main Dinning experience was terrible. Very noisy, poor lighting (somewhat dark). Ordered steak which turned out to be sliced roast beef. Very slow service, waiters seemed confused as what to do. Only ate there the first night. GARDEN CAFE BUFF: Had 5 stand alone oblong islands with food on both sides. Found myself going back & forth  and back & forth to the islands to see whats available. Very little fish available. Cruise-ocean-fish --- duh? Since Head Chef was from India, had lot of curry dishes on one of the islands. Seems to have reserved the best food for the pay to eat restaurants. Deserts were better than average. Had good ice cream, very few cookies available, you had to hunt to find them. Hint - Look on the sandwich stand in another room.  Best meat was their hamburger patty. ENTERTAINMENT: Enjoyable. PORTS: Very enjoyable. Easy on/off ship.

We had an awesome cruise experience last trip as we were updated to Platinum latitude level on this ship we received lots of awards and won drawings in the latitude member party.  We received 3 champaign, 3 wine, 3 free special restaurant dinners, one NCL big album book, neck lace, free laundry, and etc.  We enjoyed our every dinner with bottle of wine or champaign to celebrate our Valentine's day and Chinese New Year holidays on ship day and night.  Thank you so much.  

However, reverting on booking of the cruise, on Norweigian website it was listed everybody would receive $25 per cabin on board credit (for inside cabin).  After on board, I checked the statement it was not posted.  I was told since my booking was by travel agent I needed to talk to my travel agent after return.  So Brian Dick:  Could you please kindly see to it if we can get this back?  Thanks so much.  :) :)

 "The internet service on the ship is expansive ,slow and there security is very old. in this day and age the it they use is just not up to date in any way shape or form. for example going to my bank was a 18 minute task which cost $14 because most bank online systems will let the jewel's server open until it check to be sure there is no malware, new servers have this covered, so don't pay the $55 for 100 minutes on board its a ripe off and they no it wait till you go ashore and pay a couple of buck at the inter net café if you real have to go on line

My wife and I celebrated our 20th anniversary on The Norwegian Jewel.  The trip was outstanding.  We loved the different stops and enjoyed Roatan the most.  We will definitely be back for a second visit.  The cruise staff was spectacular and treated our anniversary with the celebration that it deserved.

My wife and five children enjoyed our cruise experience on the Norwegian Jewel very much!  The ship was clean and the staff was friendly and helpful.  We loved the activities for the kids and the nightly entertainment was very good.  Our experiences in Cozumel, Belize, and Roatan were extremely fun and memorable.  We loved something at each place!

Our only complaint is that the food was just average.  They could definitely improve there.

If I had wanted to take a tour of poverty stricken areas I would have stayed home. I wouldn't recommend this cruise to anyone. The cruise may have been in the Caribbean, but it certainly wasn't what I was expecting. No crystal clear water, no white sandy beaches ...just shanties and dirty streets. WOW! What a disappointment. You should advertise the cruise as a tour of third world countries ...It ain't what I thought I was paying for. This was my last Norwegian cruise.

We have been on 16 cruises and this one ranks way up there. The food was really good , plenty of restaurants. the only complaint about norwegian is the inside cabins are too small

  Room was clean on the surface, but the carpet really needed a super cleaning.  Our room staff person was super.  Totally accommodated our needs.  Food was adequate.  Not super like bigger cruises, but good.  Swimming pools and hot tubs were altogether.....no separation from adult, family and kid sections...so was noisy but doable.  Great entertainment.  Fun clubs, music and activities.  Super easy to get in and out of Houston Bay harbor.  much easier than Galveston.  Thanks.

There's so much to do on the Norwegian Jewel, too much to list all.  The shows were the most amazing we have ever seen and we have been cruising since 1999!   The "specialty restaurants" are up to par with exclusive restaurants on land.  The personnel are extremely attentive.  All of the personnel work very hard to make your cruise enjoyable.  The one disappointing factor was the commode not working properly, but the problem was resolved in less than 15 minutes. 

Understaffed and unengaged! The entertainment "Cirque de Bijou" and cruise director Silas were top notch. I do not think children under 18 04 21 should be allowed in Spinaker Lounge after 10p.

Loved the cruise, very relaxing!! Wish it was longer. The room steward was so friendly & asked us everyday if we needed anything or how our day was going. Room 8532 was a balcony room, which was great, loved to be able to sit out & enjoy the view. Also out of 3 ports, we were on the side where we could see as the ship came into port, great experience. The food was really good. The waitress in Azura, noticed my husband bought me a rose, she asked why & we said our 40 th anniversary. She surprised us with a song & a beautiful cake....wonderful surprise. But we always love cruising on Norwegian ships, they really take good care of us. This is our 6th with them. Will definitely go again with them.

MY wife and I wanted a cheap getaway so we opted for an interior cabin. Our background: We sailed 3x with Carnival, 3x with Princess, 1x Holland America, 1x with Royal Caribbean, 1x Disney and was our first time on NCL. 

+ Boarding process very good and no long waits were experienced. (Top Notch.)

+ Ships decor nice... Stylish 

+ Inside cabin was compact but surprisingly well laid out. No issues and was acceptable. 

+ Best bathroom shower and sink for an interior state room - Shower door was a great plus - no flimsy curtain here and the sink was large and faucet was high with plenty of hand room.  

+/- Toilet on angle that doesn't allow leg room to wall and you have to sit slightly side saddle on an already small opening.  (Not as bad as the inside cabin Royal Caribbean toilet.)

- Experienced Slow service in sit-down restaurants. 

- Coffee tea cart virtually non existing - only once for the 7 day cruise.   

+ Good OJ and more selection for the included drinks 

+/- Food variety at buffets seems to be less as cruise progressed.  There was still plenty of food and we always found something to eat, but we rate the food the lowest of all previous cruise experiences.

- Sit down restaurant food and all deserts seemed like presentation took priority over taste. 

- What no lobster? (It appears that it's only offered in the specialty restaurants.)

- Cookies please!   (Cookie availability was hit or miss... mostly miss.)

- Simple hearty deserts please! Stop the foo-foo fancy-tasteless ones. The coconut cream pie and banana cream pie were very good but only had them available once.  

+ Good quality ice cream in the soft-serve machines.

- I love my ice cream but I don't like it when they have to get it for me and they don't know how to make a cone.  Causes backup and a line.   Machines were often down and it seemed like they were trying to ration the ice cream as the cruise continued.

- Cakes dry - Bread and muffins not very good.

+ Main production shows were excellent very talented singers and dancers 

- Other entertainment and activities were mediocre at best and sparse on the final sea day. 

+ Love the NCL concierge app!!!  Just wish that it listed all ship activities vs just the main ones.

Bottom line:  We would recommend NCL and we will probably sail with them again.  If we do sail with them, it would definitely be based on a lower price.

One other thing to consider if leaving from the Houston port... ground transportation seemed excessively expensive.  for the two of us... $80 from IAH airport to Hobby Hotel - 25min drive, $50 Hobby hotel to cruise port - 15min drive, and $90 Cruise port to Airport.  (For $100 we ended up taking the Houston Highlight tour - worth the $10 extra bucks since we had a 7pm flight.)  Our ground transportation totaled $230 not including any tips.

Outstanding service, good food and fun ports of call. The shows were OK but would like to see more verity. Ive been cruising for 20 years and the shows all seem to be the same.

We got a good price up front. Then the add on start  Most everything one might purchase on board is very expensive . The food was a disapointment

The price upfront was good ,Board ship then all the prices sky rocket .the food was not as good as we have had on other cruises ,The buffet was OK all other dinning at the higher inn dinning rooms was not very good .The food portions were very small, The waiter staff most of the time was only so so at best. The young women that was our cabin person was VERY good at all times . We enjoyed all outing when off the ship .

Our connecting flight to get to Houston departure port took off without us as gate attendant provided inaccurate information.  We drove 4 1/2 hours to arrive in Houston at an extra cost of $200.  We truly enjoyed our Balcony cabin.  Our room was beautifully cleaned throughout our stay.  We found the smoke from the Casino to be overpowering on some days even on the top level of the ship.  My husband was quarantined for 24 hours having reported one symptom, as requested by the medical staff so we missed our excursion, however, the cruise staff returned the excursion payment.  We truly enjoyed the excursion to the private island with the animal sanctuary.  Awesome baby crocodile, iguanas and kapuching monkeys!

Loved Loved the ease getting in & out of the Houston port.  Also, getting on & off the ship was well   organized and easy. Crew was friendly and helpful. This was our third cruise. I would rate Norwegian #3; Holland #1 and Carnival #2.  My reason for the #3 rating is that our stateroom was not ship shape.  Our carpet was not clean (not nasty, just not clean); room was dusty and shelves in bathroom were not real clean.  I would like to suggest having a movie theater with movies each night for those that would like something to do besides the shows and/or the ability to choose DVDs to watch in the privacy of your room.