Norwegian Cruise Line
NCL Pride of Aloha Cruise Review
Maui to Maui

Robert Bates

Dear Customer Relations:

I am writing to you as a last resort to hopefully resolve some of the Extreme anguish and disappointment that we found with your Cruise – Pride of Aloha. We sailed from Maui on December 24, 2005 and cruised until December 31, 2005, but if I could have gotten off your ship in any of the ports and flown home I would have, it was that bad. This being my first cruise, I didn’t really know what to expect but my boyfriend has been on several other lines and places and thought it would be a great vacation for us. We save all year and since we visit Hawaii at least once a year I agreed.

To start with we boarded the ship in Maui around 3pm and promptly went to our room. We noticed that the air was on but thought that it was an automatic air conditioner as we could see no way to turn it down. We went and got a bite to eat and explore the ship, getting back to our room in the evening for the night. About 2am we both woke up freezing, my boyfriend put on his jeans, a sweatshirt, and a heavy jacket just to try and keep warm. There was no one to assist us and that early hour and the fact that we were coming in to port did not help. They said there should be a knob in the air, there was no knob. We got up around 6 am and went downstairs to the reception desk. By this time my throat had swollen up from being in the freezing room all night and I had lost my voice. We told the front desk and they said "We are so sorry about that”, not offering anything to us. So we asked to see a supervisor and a Daniel Hirsh came to assist us. He was polite but said that he could not put his ship to blame for me getting sick. (funny I was fine on my flight over and before I boarded the ship and before we turned in for the night). My boyfriend said that a “sorry” was not acceptable and thought we should be compensated since there were no available rooms to move us to. He said he could comp us a meal voucher for the specialty restaurant of our choice 20.00. (we later tried to use that meal voucher and were told that there was a waiting list 9 deep and with only 2 nights left would probably not get in. We did finally get in but half the food on the menu they didn’t have and we walked out. The Sushi was Terrible, uneatable and the chef did not know what he was doing) It wasn’t the greatest offer but we accepted. The air conditioning did get fixed at around 8:30am.

After staying on board the ship in Honolulu, because I was too sick to get off, we arrived in Kauai where we had planned two excursions on our own. One being a Tube ride down the mountain, but due to the fact that I was still sick and feeling worse we had to try and cancel this trip. It had a 24-hour cancellation clause and because we were not sure how I would feel we didn’t cancel it on time. We went back to the boat and he took my straight to the doctors. We explained the situation and told them that we wanted to be seen and said he didn’t feel we should have to pay considering the circumstances. A nurse walked up to us and pointed a finger in our faces and smugly saying, “there is no way you will be by a Doctor if you don't want to pay”. We asked if they could phone Daniel and they said yes and they would also clear it with the Captain. About 5 minutes later they phoned me in and we assumed it was cleared by the Captain to be seen. The doctor said I had Laryngitis and gave me Penicillin. Funny I didn’t know you prescribed that for Laryngitis but I am not a doctor. We didn’t sign anything nor were we asked to so we left. Next morning on our door is a bill for a dr’s visit, plus the medication. We took it down to Daniel, who said, “I didn’t authorize a free visit”. We asked why we were called in then and he couldn’t answer that. He decided to waive the visit but not the prescription, which we still didn’t sign for. We said ok and found that Norwegian had charged us twice but we were only there once. He then offered the Maui Luau and told us if I was feeling up to it, that NCL would pay for it since we lost out on our excursion at our expense. We showed Daniel the recipt, and he said "NCL cannot cover that expence since it was not booked through NCL. We NCL." We said "we never asked to be compensated, but we at the same time wanted him to know we lost 180.00. We accepted and decided that things might be turning around after this. Despite Daniel saying that “there is just nothing that wi!
ll make us happy”. Not true, we just wanted to have a nice time.

That didn’t last very long, as my boyfriend was taking a shower on Tues night and the shower broke. Upon looking at it, we found it was being held together with tape. Called down and they said someone would be up but as they were coming into port we would have to wait. We went downstairs and found that you REALLY did have extra rooms because they offered one to us for a shower. (Funny, we couldn’t move when the air was broke). We went about the day when my boyfriend was more than half way coming into the buffet, the automatic door slammed shut on his hand. It was cut (yes , Bleeding) and bruised. We found a lady in a White Uniform, thinking she had some authority and she basically looked at us like “what do you want me to do”. She did offer us ice though and that finally came about 15 minutes later. Good thing it was not more serious. However he was asked if there could be anything done, to which he replied " A drink wouldn't hurt" He was given 2 drinks. We went back to the room where we found a second bill for my doctor’s visit. So we went back down and spoke to Daniel again. He said it was taken care of and to ignore the note. We came back that night and told the front desk on Wednesday and said we would take you up on the offer of the Luau. Then said that Daniel would get that set up for us. Thursday came and went and we actually had a great time on Kona. Friday morning we received a call from Daniel telling us that “the Vendors can't give you the Luau for free and neither could he”. He said he could still arrange it for a cost of $50 a piece from us. We said no but he assured us the additional 90.00 he asked for was just for transportation. We said no thank you and asked to speak with someone above him. That is what is says to do in your manual. We got the gentleman above him (sorry I don’t remember his name), only problem with speaking with him was that he sat behind closed doors with Daniel and got his side of the problems first and didn’t even seem interested in what we had to !
say. Al
l he could say about the Luau was that “Daniel made and mistake and would be talked to”.

We met some people on the boat that were late for their cruise because of transportation problems, had a girl at the ship blow cirarette smoke in their face and just because they met the Captain at picture night and were asked “how is it going”, got a many comps and freebies. I unfortunately was sick that night and could not go anywhere.

I hope after reading this you can see that this was and extremely disappointing cruise at every aspect. Your brochures and web page look and sound great but when you get there, it is an entirely different story. Your workers were understaffed, and seemed at times to be VERY stressed at times. Your management didn’t care and because of that your clientele (us, your paying customer) suffered. I have never been treated so poorly in my life. Would I book another trip or tell my friends about you?, you will really have to show me why I should, because after this experience I am more inclined to tell people to avoid your all your cruises.

I would appreciate a response to this at your earliest convenience.

Thank you