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Norwegian Cruise Line
Norwegian Star Cruise Review
Mexican Riviera

Katy
Age: 55
Occupation: Retired
Number of Cruises: 3
Sailing Date: October 5th, 2006

We sailed out of San Pedro on October 5th. The Norwegian Star was not as nice a ship as we had experienced on our Princess cruises.

Food - The buffet food was so-so. We did not know in advance that to opt for most of the dining rooms we thought were included in "freestyle" dining would include a surcharge. The only dining room that was acceptable was the Versaille. Even there, the wait staff was not as attentive to detail as I have experienced on my Princess cruises. There were times that the items served were not as listed on the menu. I would have expected the wait staff to advise the diner of the substitutions before bringing the item to the table.

Ports of Call - We purchased a shore excursion in Acapulco that was advertised as 3 3/4 hours. The first 1 1/4 were spent getting to the boat that was to take us on a bay cruise and leaving the dock. The drinks were marginal, the food was not kept at good temperatures and we were afraid to eat it. The excursion was not worth the $65 we paid per person. At three of four ports of call we had to board tenders to shore. In Puerto Vallarta, they said that there was too much sand in the port to take the ship to the pier. There was a long wait to board the tenders. There was also a Princess ship that was docked at the pier. Why we could not dock, I'm really not sure.

The ship - NCL advertises several pools. The only pool that is really available to adults at no extra charge is a pool much too small for the number of people carried on the ship. Therefore, we did not use the pool as we had planned.
The movie theater has a terrible screen. It reminded me of watching movies at my small town theater in the 1950s. The seats in the main show theater are very uncomfortable. They are small, low to the ground and tend to tilt downward making you happy that their shows are only one hour long.

Unfortunately, while we were cruising a passenger went missing and we had to return to the area where it is thought that the passenger went overboard.

The crew did not seem well prepared to handle the end of the cruise when our ship returned late to port. We were advised to drag our luggage up to the 12th deck to go through immigration. We waited in line for a long time and then dragged our luggage back down to the 4th deck to wait in a narrow corridor for well over an hour before the FBI gave clearance to let passengers off the ship. We were not given assistance in rebooking our flight home. I have made several calls to NCL customer services. After long waits on hold, I have not been given any useful assistance on whether or not I will be reimbursed for my extra travel expenses or the basis for an additional charge that showed up on my credit card bill.



 

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