Hi Everyone,

Thanks so much for your words of comfort regarding the loss of our photos, cameras, and computers. We could care less about the gear since it’s replaceable and we have our data backed up in various places. It’s the loss of the photos that’s heartbreaking.

We’re coming to terms with it though and were up half the night preparing our insurance claim. It’s a good thing we’re organized because I have pretty much every receipt, serial number, and a photo of each piece of equipment that was taken. Of course, we also have to start a dialog about the intangible costs and what The Kahala plans to do to compensate us. We’ll see how that goes.

Anyway, I hope to write up my full trip report later this week but here are some of the highlights.

Hawaii is probably one of the most beautiful places on Earth and you really feel connected with nature on the islands, especially Maui and Kauai. We wish the islands were closer to New York! The flight is a killer from the Northeast. In hindsight, I should have used our frequent flier miles to upgrade to first class instead of going for the free tickets. Live and learn.

Len and I had decided that we wanted to do an inter-island cruise in Hawaii so we could get a sense of each island and then determine which one(s) we’d return to for a longer vacation in the future. This was a terrific approach for us and I’m glad we did it this way. We just wish other cruise lines were offering this itinerary!

We had to select Norwegian Cruise Line America since they’re the only line doing inter-island itineraries. (We couldn’t afford the extra time to sail to Hawaii from the mainland’s west coast.) NCL is certainly one of those lines that nickels and dimes you at every turn and the level of service is nowhere near what you’ve experienced on Regent or Silversea, etc. That pretty much goes without saying and we understood that fact when we booked the vacation.

We had a terrific time on the cruise but I think that had a lot to do with our attitude going in. We basically booked the best cabin available at the time (#10000 forward, deluxe penthouse suite) and lowered our expectations as much as we could. We were there for Hawaii and not the Pride of America.

We were determined to have a good time and this truly was one of our best trips ever. Every day was pretty magical. I doubt we’ll ever get on an NCL ship again but I would recommend this itinerary to people who want to sample the Hawaiian islands. I’d add the caveat that the recommend would only be for a penthouse cabin since those perks made it a bit easier to avoid the icky parts of NCL (the long tender line for Kona, extended breakfast room service menu, priority embark and debark, etc.).

We did peek into some of the inside cabins and they are tiny! There is also a pretty awful smell on deck 6 forward. If I had a cabin there, I would have been screaming. The Aloha Cafe is a complete mad house. The ship is huge so you really don't get to meet that many people (more than once anyway) and the service is less personalized.

The American crew wasn't as bad as we had heard but the staff at Lazy J.'s Steakhouse certainly lived up the name.

Deluxe Penthouse Suite
It turns out, the cabin we selected was a gem with lots of room and the forward location was amazing! It’s a great feeling to have the same view as the captain! We got to sit on our balcony (the entire length of the bow) and watch dolphins swim past and enjoy the ever-changing scenery. This was especially advantageous when we sailed Kauai’s Napali Coast. It was awe-inspiring and I’m so glad it was just Leonard and I sharing the experience over a bottle of wine and not us on the pool deck with the masses. (The pool area is way too boisterous for us. While a band by the pool can be nice, it’s just too crowded and noisy up there to do any real relaxing.)

Oahu, Hawaii
We stayed for one night pre-cruise at the Marriott Waikiki on Oahu. We had a terrific dinner at the Kuhio Beach Grill. This is a buffet and Len doesn’t generally go for that sort of thing but this was a nice one with crab legs and shrimp, several roasted meats (including the best prime rib I’ve ever had), and island specialties. It was a nice way to unwind after the 10-hour plane ride.

The hotel itself is in a nice location but the rooms are a bit uninspiring. It was a typical convention hotel. There is an NCL desk right at the hotel so you can check in and have your luggage picked up directly from your room. This is the first problem we encountered with NCL. Even though our travel agent had arranged for the transfer, we didn’t appear on the list. I showed the clerk our confirmation from NCL and she just seemed bewildered. We finally worked it out but we didn’t dare check out of the hotel until the bellman came to pick up the luggage and I basically followed him downstairs to make sure the bags ended up in the NCL pile!

Earlier on that first morning, we headed to Diamond Head and did the hike. I’m glad we did this so early in the morning (we got there at 6:30 a.m.). It was hot already and I can’t imagine people doing that hike in the mid-day sun.

After that, we headed to the Aloha Tower Marketplace to do some shopping and have lunch. We originally had reservations at Alan Wong’s Pineapple Room for lunch but changed our minds. We stumbled across a Hawaiian food blog and saw a post about Makina Chaya. It’s an Asian buffet with Kobe-style Wagyu beef at lunch (and real Kobe at dinner), crab legs, sushi and sashimi, vegetables, soups, etc. It was a great way to sample so many different Asian dishes. It was a bargain for

Around 1 p.m. we walked over to the Pride of America that was located just one or two piers away. Since we were staying in a penthouse suite, we were able to check in at a special desk and were taken to a small area with a few chairs and were offered a drink. One of the butlers came down to greet us and give us an invitation to meet with the concierge over refreshments from 1:30 to 4 p.m. We went right up to our cabin from there…the entire process too maybe five minutes.

We got to the room and were so happy with our choice of cabin. While the color scheme could have been a bit better, the layout was great…a foyer with a desk/computer area off to the side, a dining table and bar area with a cappuccino maker, a living room with a sofa and chair (horrible choice of furniture…not comfortable and very “Jetson’s”), a bedroom set off with French doors and a curtain, a huge bathroom with a walk-in shower with a one-way window overlooking the balcony plus a Jacuzzi. The cabin also had a huge balcony that stretched across the bow. There was a hot tub on the balcony as well. That was one of our reasons to book this particular room. We thought we’d really need to relax in the hot tub after our long days of touring.

The first thing we did was check out the hot tub. Hmmm. It didn’t appear to be working. We buzzed our butler and he made an appointment to meet with us to go over our questions later that afternoon.

We then went to meet the concierge. What a joke…completely useless. There were maybe eight other guests in the room when we arrived and he couldn’t even be bothered to personally greet us or let us know what he could assist us with. Everyone was reviewing various paperwork that the concierge obviously provided so I went to the (unstaffed) bar and started to pick up forms that were laid out. That’s when the concierge finally noticed us and he snapped at me for taking the papers. He had them in a specific order. Oh, excuse me. Anyway, after another five minutes he offered us champagne or water…not much in the way of refreshments in my opinion.

One of the forms he handed us was to make reservations at the restaurants for the entire week. I didn’t like the idea (who knows what type of food you’ll want to eat three days from now) but I also knew that the ship was at capacity and it would be tough to get reservations at the specialty restaurants. So, we filled out the form and assumed we had our ressies all set. Not quite. I’ll explain that in a second. We then left this “VIP” room with a few other semi-disgruntled guests who also felt the concierge was a lightweight.

We did the muster drill and then back to the room to meet with our butler. He was nice and energetic but we could tell he wasn’t going to be very proactive and we’d have to be very specific about our requests. I had a list of questions for him and he sat down with us to go over everything. My first concern was that the fridge was empty except for one bottle of water. He informed us that NCL doesn’t do the minibar thing but he could set us up with Coke products. Great, I drink diet Coke, go for it. (Later that night, I looked in the fridge and there was not a whopping 2 bottles of water and 2 diet Cokes. Okay then. The butler never did refill the drink supply…I had to ask every time…and there was never any ice in the bucket…just water.)

I thought it was pretty funny because every time I called the butler to have him bring up some sodas and water, he’d remind me how much each cost. Okay, well we managed to pony up the $5k for this room so I think I can swing a few more bucks for a six-pack of soda! But that shows the mindset of most passengers on the boat. It’s a very cost conscious crowd.

We enjoyed the rest of the evening and had dinner at Jefferson Bistro (one of the specialty restaurants with an additional cover). It was good but not outstanding.

Hilo, The Big Island
The next day we hit Hilo on the Big Island and did Akaka Falls and Volcanoes National Park. What an amazing way to spend the day…in a rain forest and then on the lava flows! It was great! When we went back to the room, we were looking forward to taking a dip in the hot tub. You guessed it. No one came to fix it while we were out. It would be an understatement to say I was aggravated since I reminded the butler that morning to get it fixed and had tipped him pretty generously hoping that would motivate him. Guess not. We called him and he said he assumed someone would have fixed it by now and Leonard pointed out that he should have made sure it was being done. We weren’t that confident in the butler so I went down to the front desk and spoke with the front desk manager and he had someone up in the room to fix it within 10 minutes.

Of course, it wasn’t a simple fix and the plumber tried to leave after 20 minutes for a dinner break. Len would have none of that and so he stayed and then called the electrician to help him. They fussed with it for about an hour and the result was they could sort of get it working but the switch was toast and they didn’t have another on the ship. The electrician said he didn’t think the hot tub had been used in quite a while from the looks of it. We questioned why this wasn’t on someone’s checklist for routine maintenance and he said that’s not the way NCL works. Okay.

While all the maintenance was going on, I started to review the materials that were left in the room while we were exploring Hilo. There was a sheet of dinner reservation confirmations but it was nothing like what I had requested. Wrong times, wrong restaurants, etc. I called the concierge and he said that they take the liberty of arranging your reservations so you can sample everything and not be disappointed. I calmly told him that I’m more disappointed by being asked to select restaurants and dining times only to be told that I’m getting what they want to give me anyway. Not much of a perk for the suite guests. I would have rather take my chances at the restaurant reservations desk because then at least if your first choice isn’t available, you can find out what else is and make the decision yourself.

We ended up changing some of the ressies but the concierge acted like it was a huge deal. In the end, we just focused on eating nice meals on island and skipped a big dinner on the boat a few nights.

Maui
The next two days were spent in Maui and we really fell in love with the island. What a gorgeous place! We hired a private guide on day one to take us down the Road to Hana. What a good decision. It was nice to talk with a Hawaiian resident and visit the less touristy areas. I’d highly recommend him: Steve Sargenti of Maui Custom Tours (www.mauicustomtours.com).

After a day in Hana, Len and I celebrated our 14th anniversary at the Feast at Lele in Lahaina. It was terrific! We had a front row table with a beautiful view of the sunset. The food was very good, a small intimate crowd, and the show was excellent. They also had professional photographers on hand and I’m so glad we had our photos taken since it looks like these may be the only photos of Hawaii we’ll have to cherish.

The next day we visited Haleakala Crater and then went to Mama’s Fish House for lunch for Len’s birthday. This was another wonderful experience! We had a table right by the window overlooking the beach. The service was excellent and the food was delectable. We ate way too much but it was the best meal of the trip and I’m glad we splurged.

Kona, The Big Island
Several people predicted that Kona would be our favorite port of call. While it was nice, I didn’t see the allure that so many people talked about. We drove up to Waikola Beach (I think that’s the correct spelling) and while the sand is very rough and rocky, we did see a lot of sea turtles so I was happy.

It was really hot on this particular day and we had burned the candle at both ends in Maui so we decided to have a quick lunch at a Vietnamese place and then go back to the ship a bit early to enjoy our cabin. We had been told by our butler that we could purchase wine on the island and bring it on the boat for a $15 corkage fee. Len decided to do that since the wine selections on the ship weren’t really to his liking.

We bought the wine, paid the corkage fee at the tender and went back to the ship. The clerk had given us a claim check and said to go to the front desk to pick up the wine after the last tender of the day returned to the ship. No problem. When we went to pick up the wine, we were told it would take 24 hours for delivery. That just wasn’t acceptable and we asked why this policy existed. We were basically told they were short staffed. Then why not let each guest hand carry their bottle of wine back to the boat itself?

The front desk clerk was not being help so we asked to speak with the manager. We were told to wait at the side of the desk and he’d get to us “in a minute”. Twenty minutes later we were still waiting there while he ignored us and chatted with other guests. Luckily, the front desk manager that had helped us with the hot tub problem walked by so I snagged him. He went down to pick up the wine himself. At least there’s one problem-solver on the ship!

The thing that really bothered us is that you really can’t get a good bottle of wine on the ship until after 5pm. We had tried to order a bottle of wine earlier in the cruise and our butler said “the cage is locked until 5”. Basically, you can only get their house wine during the day and once the evening bars open your butler then has access to the “cage” for the better bottles. Why don’t they just give the butler staff a key to this “cage” of wine? Another service issue that we found confounding and irritating.

Kauai
Our final two days were spent on Kauai. We again rented a car and did all the touristy things. I was over the moon because we saw two monk seals as Poipu Beach! Yeah!! Spouting Horn was also very cool. We did Fern Grotto and weren’t impressed. It looked very dated and the upkeep wasn’t great. We basically drove everywhere and spent time just enjoying the scenery.

On the morning of our second day in Kauai, I realized that I had to go to the bank machine and therefore didn’t leave our butler his usual tip. Well, wouldn’t you know we didn’t see him again after that!

We got back in the early afternoon and had lunch in the room (from the pool deck buffet). I left a note and tip on the table and figured the butler would pick it up shortly since he made a point of telling us many times that he comes into the room several times a day to “freshen it up.” Well, when we returned to the room later that evening, the dirty plates were still there and so was the tip. Oh well. His loss.

Oahu
On disembarkment day we went back to the Aloha Tower Marketplace to order a ukelele for a friend and then headed to The Kahala. When we arrived we thought we were in for a treat…right up until they gave our carry-on bags to someone else who left with them to go back to the airport.

We were beside ourselves because our whole lives were in those bags but what could we do but wait and hope that The Kahala tracked them down before we had to leave later that evening. (We were just using the hotel as a day room.)

We did end up doing Dolphin Quest and it was wonderful. While we were interacting with the dolphins, we didn’t think about our problem at all. I recommend this activity and give it two flippers up!

Of course, after we got out of the water we had to file the police report and spent the next hour in the security director’s office. What a fun way to end a vacation. Hey, this stuff happens and it just stinks that it happened to us but we just need to focus on how great the rest of the trip was.

We had a lot of magical moments and were SO relaxed and happy. That’s the important thing.

Now it’s time to start thinking about our next vacation spot…

Andrea