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Norwegian
Dawn
Eastern Caribbean

Joyce Lambert
Age: 37
Occupation: Insurance Claims Analyst
Number of Cruises: 1
Sailing Date: January 3rd, 2006

This was mine and my husband’s first cruise and I can tell you my expectations of cruising were pretty much shot after going on this cruise.

Embarkation Process:

I was pretty upset by how disorganized this was. I called prior to leaving the hotel to go to the pier and was told that they were not going to let us check in or board the ship until 2:00 p.m. So we waited and got to the pier around 1:30 p.m. When we got there we seen that there were already 100’s of people checked in and waiting in line. When I asked where to check in they told me that they were done with early check in and I would need to wait until I got on the boat. So right off the bat we were given misinformation. So we then waited in line until about 4:45 p.m. when they then started boarding. Once they began boarding the check in process when quickly and our luggage was delivered to our state room within 45 minutes of being on board ship. Which I thought was pretty quick.

Cabin:

Well being our first cruise, obviously didn’t know where the best place to have a cabin is. I left this up to our travel agent. Well we were on the 8th floor and the very front cabin. The cabin itself was pretty spacious, we had a picture window. There were 4 of us, and we had 3 twin beds and a bunk bed. Storage space was adequate. The bathroom area I did have some complaints about. The shower was bigger than I expected, however there was a separate toilet area, and literally you were touching the walls when you were in there. There was no room to move at all. I believe smaller than an airplane bathroom.

As far as being in the front of the boat, this was not the best selection. Leaving from New York, we hit very rough water and the first night and day of the cruise, you could feel the boat going up the wave, and then slamming down. It sounded like a loud explosion every time the boat hit the water again. If I ever cruise again I will definitely get a room in the middle of the ship.

Our cabin stewards were wonderful. They let us leave my daughters bund bed down, instead of folding it up every day. One thing I was a little upset about was they didn’t do any neat animal designs with the towels and I did hear from other passengers on the ship that their stewards did, so I don’t know if ours was just lazy or inexperienced!

Public Areas:

We were very pleased with the upkeep and appearance of all the public areas. The swimming pool area was nice; however I feel the swimming pool was kind of small for a ship that carries almost 2500 passengers. All the restaurants and bars were clean, and service was absolutely wonderful.

Entertainment:

Entertainment I was pleased with. They had a comedian, ventriloquist, singers, juggler and a magician. They have their famous “Bollywood” show which I thought was absolutely wonderful. My younger daughters really enjoyed that as well. Entertainment in the bars was good as well. They did a few different game shows like Family Feud, Newlywed Game, and who wants to be a millionaire.

They also had bingo sessions on board as well, which I love bingo, but I paid for two sessions and decided it was a rip off. They charge you $49 for a power bingo machine which has 12-24 cards in it, and one of the sessions was just a one game coverall for the jackpot in 51 numbers or less and if it went over the 51 numbers you got a consolation prize of $200 which I though was terrible for the amount of money they collected. The other session you played 6 games with prizes of $200 a game and then the last game was a jackpot game of $2000 in 51 numbers or less and just didn’t seem worth it.

Food:

Here was my biggest disappointment. I was looking forward to the freestyle cruising, and not having a set dinner time. That was the good part. The bad thing was the selection of food. The Garden Café which is the buffet, had a different theme last night, and most of the stuff on the buffet was so spicy I didn’t care for it. I felt I could get a better buffet at a restaurant around home.

We didn’t go into any of the specialty restaurants that charge a cover charge, we figured why pay more if we didn’t have too. Plus the few people we spoke to who did go into Cagney’s the steakhouse on the ship were very disappointed in it.

There are a few other restaurants that there is no cover charge at but does require reservations, and we did especially enjoy Aqua & The Venetian. We went to Aqua a few times for dinner and got a very tasteful steak there both of the nights. The service was wonderful. The Venetian was a lovely restaurant for breakfast, it definitely beat the buffet. It was nice to have eggs made to order, instead of just scrambled or fried ones that looked like they had been sitting out there for a few hours.

I just expected more of a variety of food on the cruise line. I was upset that there wasn’t much of any seafood. I thought we’d see more shrimp or crab on the buffet, and there was basically none. We did get lobster one of the nights, but that was it.

Destinations:

Our first stop was St. Thomas, and we absolutely loved this stop. I enjoyed all the shopping; the only problem there is the taxi drivers, constantly asking to take you back to the ship. After a while gets a little annoying but this isn’t NCL”s fault.

Then we stopped at Tortola. Tortola is a small island, with lovely beaches. We didn’t go to Virgin Gorda but did here from other passengers that we should have. We didn’t want to spend the extra money.

My favorite spot was St. Maarten. Absolutely gorgeous. We went to Orient Beach, which was great except for the few people who took advantage of the clothing optional rule!

We then went to Puerto Rico. We went on the Rainforest motor coach tour which for the money I thought was a complete rip off. We really didn’t get to see as much of the rainforest as I would have liked, and the coach drove us thru some of the dirtiest places in Puerto Rico. My husband is so turned off by Puerto Rico; he said we’ll never go back.

Our last stop was supposed to be Great Stirrup Cay, but that got cancelled due to high winds. We ended up docking in Nassau, which would have been better if there wasn’t already 4 other cruise lines stopped there. The island was very crowded, could barely get thru the straw market so many people.

All of our planned excursions except for the rainforest were cancelled. The party raft we were going to go on was not ready, then we signed up for the Wacky Buggy Ride because we were told you had to be 25 to drive and 8 to be a passenger, well come to find out the our 1 seaters, so our daughters couldn’t go on with us. Then snorkeling at Great Stirrup was cancelled when we didn’t go there. So that was kind of a bummer for our children.

Speaking of children, the kid’s crew program they have for the kids is wonderful. The counselors are all great, and kept the children busy from 9:00 a.m. – 10:00 p.m. if you wanted them to. There was no extra charge for the children to be in this and they got a free t-shirt out of it. The kids met a bunch of other kids from around the world, and exchanged email addresses to keep in touch. One note though, if you have a daughter that is 12 and one that is 13, they can’t be in the teen program if you want to keep them together they would need to be in the 10-12 year old group which is what my children did and had fun. The only downside to this is you have to sign them in and out of the group every time they go, and some of the pick up times would interfere with the other shows going on and I would have to leave the show early to go and pick them up. With the teen program they can come and go as they please.

All in all the cruise was okay. I will definitely cruise again, just not with NCL. I also won’t go for 10 days out of New York City!
 

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