has anyone sailed on NCL?

OK...I know this site is nearly exclusively Regent with a few Silversea and Seaborne thrown in for good measure.

And, before the comparisons to the three cruiselines mentioned above begin...Yes I know NCL isn't even close to Regent. We have 3 cruises down with Regent and one on reserve for late 2008.

Here's our situation. We are wanting to sail this June with our three children (13, 6, & 5). Regent won't be the right cruise for us due to price and age of our children.

With that said, we are seriously looking at a 6 day cruise out of New York going down to the Bahamas.

Does anyone have any experience with NCL?

Thanks,

Jan

Jan - JoAnn (crusinfanatic) was oh sooooooo helpful to me several months ago when I was thinking about a cruise for my granddaughters - not Regent etc - it did not work out but she was great!!! Maybe she'll reply to you when she sees your post -

Hi Jan,

Leonard and I just returned from an NCL cruise in Hawaii. While we had a fantastic time and the itinerary was wonderful, I don't think we'd sail on that line again. You can see our "mini" review in the Port of Call forum in the "Hawaii" thread.

The level of service was disappointing, but we spent a lot of time in port so it didn't impact our vacation as much as it would have if we had multiple sea days.

The kids would probably love it though since the pool area has several game areas and is always hopping. The children we saw on the ship seemed to be having a lot of fun.

Holland America sails out of NYC during part of the year, but I don't think they're here in June. Princess also has some cruises to the Caribbean out of NYC in the summer months. That may be worth looking into as well.

Cunard also has a few short sailings in the summer...one for Memorial Day and one for July Fourth. Last summer they sailed to the Bahamas, but I think the line may be doing New England this summer.

Good luck with your decision!

Andrea

Hi Jan - its JoAnn, referenced above by Joanna.

Why don't you PM me and if I can give you any info that would be helpful will be glad to do so.

You might also look into RCI which sails out of Port Liberty, and as Andrea mentioned Princess sails out of NY. They both have really great programs for the kids/teens. In your situation NCL certainly could be the perfect match, but as Andrea said, and I was going to mention a couple of people on this board have sailed NCL in Hawaii, and it might just work for your particular situation. RCI and Princess are 10 days, so if you are looking for a shorter cruise without flying to Florida, then it may be the one. Its definitely a totally different environment, but if we were doing a family cruise with kids and grandkids, we'd be looking at one of these, just as Joanna was.

When we took our kids and grandkids for a 7 day cruise we went on the Disney Magic. We had to go to Florida of course. It was 5 years ago and the grandkids still talk about it and email kids they met on that cruise.The 7 day cruise is the best because it gives the kids a chance to get to know other kids. We took 12 of them

We were on the Norwegian Dream out of NOLA in 2004.
If it was not for meeting with some people from cruise critic and they having a butler suite the cruise would have been awful.
50,000 ton ship with 1,880 on board compared to Regent 50,000 ton and 700 hundred on board kind of tells you what it was like with out going into many details.
Oh and after I say this DW family is wanting me to look into Norwegian Pride of America Hawaii cruise around March 1st 2008. Will see. I too would like to hear comments about it.

I'll be on the Pride of America this November, Jim, and will tell you all about it. Luckily, we'll be in an owner's suite. It's going to be a far cry from our Silversea and Regent experiences, no doubt - but we're going to make the best of it!

Oh great! I will look forward to your report. :app:
I told Jan B that we will have to look at a suite on this cruise if it actually happens. Others can have inside cabins if they want. :ohmy:

On our one and only cruise on NCL we went in with VERY low expectations - thus it wasn't too bad. The food was better than we expected.

We chose NCL because the itinerary included Kiribati in the South Pacific. But a propulsion problem prevented us from getting there.

Our balcony cabin was small and the shower unit VERY small - it wasn't a problem for us but must have been for many of the other passengers.

Jim - if you're going to do NCLA, you HAVE to do a suite if you're looking to get any level of service. Andrea didn't care for her butler, we loved ours, so it's hit or miss. We'll have to see what Kristin says about hers.

Jan - I'd probably agree about RCI or Princess as a better choice, going out of the NY/NJ area. Is the Crown Princess still going out of NY? My sister and my BIL went on that for their honeymoon and had a great time (albeit it was their first cruise so they had nothing to compare it to) ;)

Masaki

We sailed on the NCL Dawn out of New York during the winter of 2006.

Not good. We ate in the speciality restaurants ever night after looking at the main dining room menus during the day. For us this was the worst cruise that we had been on .

We learned then that you get what you pay for..