My Hawaiian Holiday
Pride of America Cruise Review to Hawaii
7 Night Hawaii (Honolulu Roundtrip)
Sail date: February 24, 2007
Ship: Pride of America
Cabin type: Balcony
Traveled as: Couple
Reviewed: 14 years ago
Review summary
The staff on the cruise were extremely friendly, however, I totally dislike the free-style dining. However, since I have been on NCL before, I knew what I was getting into. If you are a first time cruiser and are looking for a fantastic shipboard experience, I would not recommend this cruise line unless you are traveling with at least 6-8 friends. On most cruises, you get to meet and become friends with the people who sit at your table for dinner. That is such a nice feature that doesn't happen with free-style cruising. You also get to know your table waiters which also doesn't happen with free-style cruising because you never see the same person twice. The food is below par in every dining room that is free (included in the cruise price). If you want to pay the extra cover charge and eat in the speciality restaurants, the food is superb! You also have to make reservations to eat at the speciality restaurants and you can't always get a reservation when you want it. The last time I did this tour around the Hawaiian Islands, they had barbeques out by the pool, which were fun, and they had craft sessions, i.e. lei making, which wasn't available this time. Last time they also had Bingo, which wasn't available this time. They had a couple of good comedians that I enjoyed. But the musical show had a lot of technical errors, bad lighting, bad sound...not very professional. I love cruises and have been on 8 of them but I would not travel on NCL again.Ports of call
Pros: Crew aware of sanitation issues and used preventive hand sprays.
Cons: Free-style dining.