Norwegian Cruise Lines
Norwegian Spirit Cruise Review
Bahamas

Steve
Age:  44
Occupation: Unknown
Number of Cruises: 2
Sailing Date: August 13th, 2006

Let me begin by saying that I was concerned by the reviews that I read on this site prior to travel on the Spirit. But…glad my family and I were able to enjoy the cruise and found most of the complaints not evident on our trip.

We flew to NYC on Sunday, hired a taxi to the pier and practically walked onto the boat around 12:30pm, minor wait for photographs – seems to be what the cruise ships love to do. Our room was not ready until 2pm, so we got lunch, explored the boat, signed up for shore excursions and specialty restaurants and then headed to our rooms.

The room - The room was decent sized, having traveled Europe quite a bit, this room was not much different then top hotels there. Not sure who said the closet space was not enough, they must have packed their entire closet with them. My wife and I had room for about 20 items to hang, along with shelves for storage – bring some extra hangers to hang more – plenty of room. There could be more drawers for storage. The room was clean and had a great balcony. The bed already had the extra foam on it and it was fine from a comfort perspective. The stewards kept them clean, and the kids in the attached room loved the towel animals.

The food - Lots of complaints in previous reviews – again think they were a bit critical, it was fine. Raffles was good for breakfast and lunch, for dinner we ate at either the main dining rooms or one of the specialty restaurants. The only so-so meal was the lasagna. Service in the main dining rooms varied from outstanding to slow – most of the time it was good. We loved the freestyle dining as we have 2 kids with us and like the flexibility. Oh…by the way – the coffee was hot and decent, no Starbucks here, but it was good. The best deal on the boat for drinks is the 6 beers for $18…we had a beer in NYC on our return and it was $7.50 at our hotel…so not bad on the boat. Wine was in the mid $30s for a decent bottle.

The excursions - These went off without a hitch, went to a water park in Florida and swimming with the Sting Rays in Bahamas – both were without any issues and were enjoyable. The private island was also great, we went out around 10am and had no problem getting chairs and rafts, again different then what had been reported.

The shows were pretty good. The magician and ventriloquist were very funny and kid friendly, missed the Second City. The Liars Club on Thursday was hilarious, but not kid friendly and the final show on Friday evening had some technical issues and was only ok.

The kids club – This was fun, the kids enjoyed themselves, but given the other things we did they only used it a few times.

The staff - Our experience was that they were very helpful and friendly.



 

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