Carol Pitkewicz

Age: 51
Occupation: math teacher
Number of Cruises: 12
Cruise Line: NCL
Ship: Pride of Aloha
Sailing Date: August 22nd, 2004
Itinerary: Hawaii

If you have read other reviews about the Pride of Aloha, nothing has changed. The ship is still extremely short staffed and the crew, though friendly and trying their best, are overworked and probably underpaid. Our complaints went unheard and every passenger had something to complain about. Our inside cabin was about the size of a shoebox. We were among those passengers who were switched to the Pride of Aloha from the Pride of America after it sunk. We should have known then that this cruise was doomed. Our cabin steward was no where to be found on most days and when we saw him, the best he could do for us was offer us towels if he had enough. The food was disgusting. We did not try the specialty restaurants because we heard they weren’t much better and I had no intention of giving NCL another dime of my money! The Crossing and Palace dining rooms required long waits and slow service. There was not a single meal where we actually received what we ordered because they always forgot one or more courses. The entrée was served about 20 minutes or more after the appetizer if you were lucky. The best example I can give of how horrible this experience was happened the night we decided to go to the buffet for dinner. Most of the serving trays were empty and it was only about 8PM. We came to a tray marked “chicken marsala” and scooped up some chicken. All that was in the tray was chicken bones. The chicken had been cooked away from the bones and had been taken by someone else and the bones were left for us. At that point, I was tempted to leave the ship but we had 2 more days and we had to get back to Honolulu to fly home. This was the worst cruise we had ever been on and NCL has lost our business!!!