Awesome Panama Canal Cruise

Norwegian Joy Cruise Review to Panama Canal, Central America

Cruises: 2-3 cruises
Reviews: 2
Helpful Votes: 54

Overall rating:

4.6 out of 5
Norwegian Joy

15 Night Panama Canal - Eastbound (Los Angeles To Miami)

Sail date: February 24, 2023

Ship: Norwegian Joy

Traveled as: Singles/Friends

Reviewed: 1 year ago

Review summary

I truly enjoyed this cruise. I was not ready to go home.

Embarkation

2 out of 5
Port of Los Angeles needs to build better cruise ship facilities for NCL. Weather flooded the 'outdoor tent' onboarding.

Ship experiences

Food and Dining

5 out of 5
Beautiful main dining, buffet and specialty restaurants. Excellent wait staff. Food in buffets had fabulous choices, but food was not warm if you went to eat after the first hour of service. No problems with the restaurants. All food was great!

Onboard Activities

5 out of 5
Great variety of activities that we enjoyed. Trivial and chef demos were lots of fun. Poolside movies were good!

Entertainment

5 out of 5
Main Theater entertainment was great, music at other venues were awesome.

Service and Staff

5 out of 5
Our room steward was great, as well as all other staff we encountered. All helpful, respectful and personable.

Ship Quality

5 out of 5
Lay out of the Joy was great, all common areas were very clean; especially the public restrooms! excellent!

Cabin / Stateroom

5 out of 5
Room 10612, very comfortable, nice size and configuration. Ikomang our steward gave excellent service, room was very clean.

Ship tip

NCL provides a very well rounded experience and staff is excellent.

Ports of call

San Pedro (Los Angeles), California

2 out of 5
Did not provide a weather proof terminal, extreme weather forced it to relocate our check in-embarkation finally in a regular building instead of marque tents.

Cabo San Lucas, Mexico

4 out of 5
Nice port to visit

Acapulco, Mexico

4 out of 5
Not very walkable.

Puerto Quetzal, Guatemala

5 out of 5
Very good tour to Antigua

Panama City, Panama

5 out of 5
Good bus/railroad tour of locks and history.

Panama Canal Transit

5 out of 5
Very interesting travel through the locks, beautiful lake to traverse.

Cartagena, Colombia

4 out of 5
City is very congested, tour was interrupted by street vendors.

George Town, Grand Cayman

5 out of 5
Beautiful day to walk in port town and shop.

Miami, Florida Did not visit port

Tours were all full, we went from shop to airport.

Disembarkation

3 out of 5
Face to face customs was slow to process, long wait for ground transit to airport was difficult.

Traveler Photos

Our lead tug, at our final lock to the Caribbean Fuerte De San Diego Antigua Approaching Cabo San Lucas at sunrise
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