Thoughts, Impressions of the Pearl Panama Canal 14 day 9/26/09

Marzbar71 · #1 October 14th, 2009, 11:32 AM

This my review/thoughts/experiences from the 14 day Panama Canal cruise on the Pearl from 9/26/09 to 10/10/09. This was my first NCL cruise. I traveled with a friend. We are both female; I’m in my late 30s and my friend is in her early 40s. We were on deck 4 in cabin 4547 – inside cabin forward near the bank of elevators. I’ve been on 4 other cruise but the only 2 recently were both on the Carnival Inspiration so any comparisons I make will be based on that ship alone.

I would say the majority of passengers were older, retired people. This was something I had figured going in. There were only 30 kids on the whole ship I heard. Most younger people were from England and Australia.

Friday, September 25: We flew to LAX and landing about 30 minutes early. We got our bags and checked in with Super Shuttle (I had tried several times to rent a one-way car with Enterprise but they wouldn’t let me). We only waited about 10 minutes before our shuttle to San Pedro picked us up. We checked into the Crowne Plaza (booked on Priceline for $75). In our first room the AC didn’t work, but they were very responsive and moved us to a new room. We ate at Nikko’s Pizza and the Green Onion for lunch and dinner and then used the hotel shuttle to go to CVS to buy 12 packs of pop.

Saturday, September 26: We took the hotel shuttle to the port. Two NCL ships were going out the day so there was some slight confusion at first which line was for which ship but not too bad. We weren’t able to check our pop so we had to carry it on. The check-in process went very smoothly. Once we got on the ship we went to find lunch. As I read here on CC, many people tried to tell us that Summer Palace wasn’t open even though they had told us on shore that it was. I ignored them and of course, it was open and we had a nice leisurely lunch. We were able to watch them loading the supplies onto the ship from the windows which was interesting.
We got into our room about 1pm – very basic inside cabin (compared to Carnival – the Carnival rooms have a slight edge on space). We met our steward and asked him to make the one bed into two and empty the fridge. This was done by the time we got back from the muster drill. We unpacked (the shoe hanger door thing was a lifesaver!)
We ate at Mambo’s that night with a 2-for-1 special. My meal was good (Roadhouse Burrito) but I didn’t care for the dessert (chocolate cake with caramel topping). Went to the show that night – comedian David Naster. It was pretty entertaining.

Sunday, September 27: We were at Sea this day. Got acquainted with the ship, did some activities like trivia, etc. Had breakfast and lunch at the Garden Café and Dinner at the Summer Palace Dining Room (penne pasta with chicken and broccoli – yum!) The show that night was Sea Legs with the Jean Ann Ryan Dancers. The show was OK, but I didn’t care for the set-up of the StarDust Theater that much. The rows were difficult to get in and out of. On the Inspiration, the main theater is set up more as benches with very wide walking areas. I felt bad for the bar servers trying to get drinks to people in the middle of rows. Went to Bliss for Karaoke that night after the show.

Monday, September 28: Cabo San Lucas. This was the only port we had to tender – thank goodness! There were also 4 other ships in Cabo that day so it was very crowded. We had breakfast in the Garden Café – which I have to say was a wonderful buffet – the best by far I’ve ever had on a cruise. I loved all of the fresh fruit and ate so much pineapple. After breakfast we went to Bar City to get our tender tickets. Once we got off the tender and on shore, we walked around the city a bit. Very hot that day as well. We had booked the Deluxe Coastal Cruise through the ship. It was a nice two-story boat with seating both in shade and in sun. It was free drinks on the boat so we had one margarita that was very strong and then switched to water or 7Up. They also advertised chips and salsa but we didn’t get that until the last 30 minutes of the ride. We were on the boat about 2 hours. It took us to the Arch and just toured the area. It was OK but we probably could have done much better just hiring a small boat on shore to take us to the Arch. We had dinner at Indigo that night.

Tuesday, September 29: At Sea this day. Slept in a bit then played the Progressive Trivia contest in the Spinnaker Lounge. Every Sea Day we had Progressive Trivia. You had a team and they passed a tropy around. You got to keep the trophy until the next sea day and you could decorate it, etc. Difference from Carnival in general: On Carnival they give out prizes, ships on a stick. But on NCL you get signatures on an activity card that you turn in on the last day for t-shirts, etc. Either way is fine, but we didn’t even learn about the activity cards until later in the cruise – there wasn’t a lot of explanation about it.
That afternoon we found one of our favorite places on the ship – the padded lounge chairs on Deck 7 underneath the tender boats. Great place to read and snooze in the afternoon/early evening. This night we had dinner at the Blue Lagoon – had fish and chips – good.

Wednesday, September 30: Acapulco. We didn’t do any tours in Acapulco and we probably should have. The area within walking distance of the ship is not very nice. It was also very hot so we didn’t stay on shore very long. We were back on the ship for lunch after sending a quick e-mail home from the internet café right off the ship. My friend went back out after lunch and walked to the Fort and she said it was nice.
Had dinner at Summer Palace again that night and went to the show. It was a magic show that I thought was just so-so. Then we went to play Jeopardy in the Spinnaker Lounge. My friend and I were a team and we won! Woo Hoo!

Thursday, October 1: Huatulco. We book a tour through the ship that was early so we got room service breakfast. Not a huge selection and we were missing a couple of items but nothing big enough to call since we had to get off the ship as soon as we docked. We boarded a bus for a city tour. We had some time to shop in the downtown area. It was a very cute little town. Then we got on a boat and went through many of the bays. Went by where there is a blowhole but the tide was wrong for it to work when we went by. Also went by a very unusual stone face in the rock. All in all, the city part wasn’t worth the cost of the ship tour – we could have taken a taxi easily, but the boat ride was very nice and we didn’t see a lot of people offering boat rides at the dock. This tour was also very long and we got back to the ship just in time to leave.
Tried the casino for the first time – penny slots and won a little bit. Had dinner at Summer Palace. Didn’t go to the show that night but played The Weakest Link in the Spinnaker Lounge and I won! Later was the Fiesta Party on the pool deck. They played some games and there was some dancing.

Friday, October 2: Puerto Quetzal. We didn’t book any tours for this port. They all were very long and long bus rides. So we slept in and played trivia in the morning before heading ashore. They had a very cute marketplace right off the ship but that was about it for that area. We ran into some friends we had met from England and shopped with them for awhile then hit the beer tent! We tried the Guatamalan beers and enjoyed them very much! This port had the nicest area right by the ship.

Saturday, October 3: At Sea. We finally won Progressive Trivia with our friends from England. Had dinner with them as well at La Cucina with the 2-for-1 special at 6:45 and closed the place down! But we tried to get to bed early for Costa Rica the next day.

Sunday, October 4: Puntarenas. I booked a zip lining tour through the ship. Had to meet the bus very shortly after docking. It was a about a 40 minute bus ride to the place and then we got our gear on. Then about a 15 minute walk to the first zip. We did I think 8 zips and then a 15 minute walk back to the bus. They had sent a photographer with us but unfortunately when we got back, the power was out so they hadn’t been able to down load the photos. At first they were going to send us the disks and trust us to send them money. But we decided that would be a pain and we just all gave them the money and trusted them to send the pictures. Turns out, the power came back on later that day and they sent our disks back with the last tour. Very good service. I was glad I booked this through the ship as the drive was pretty far.
Walked around the market at the beach briefly to buy some postcards and that was it.
Our Progressive Team decorated our trophy that evening while watching Dancing with the Pearl Stars. This was so much fun to watch!

Monday, October 5: At Sea. Slept in again and then hit Progressive Trivia and we squeaked out a 2nd victory! Then I went to the StarDust Theater for a short movie about the Panama Canal. Sunned, read and dozed the rest of the afternoon. Met our English friends for dinner at Indigo then went to the show which was Sharkbait. This was one of the best shows we saw the whole cruise, other than maybe Second City which was one of the first nights but I didn’t write down which night.

Tuesday, Oct. 6: Panama Canal. They were starting to sell t-shirts and souvenirs for Panama Canal at 6am on the pool deck so I got up there around 6:30. Well, they hadn’t opened yet and I’ve got to say this whole operation was messed up. I know they got the shipment on the boat in Costa Rica so they really should have had one of everything on display during the sea day the day before so we could see what was available and pick out the shirts, etc that we wanted. They had shirts hanging up but you couldn’t see them. All in all it was a disaster. And given the amount of smalls and mediums left over in the shop in later days, they didn’t order sizes very well.

Anyway, we started going through the first locks at 8am and got through them about 9am. After watching the first lock from Deck 7, we walked around the ship and had a fairly normal day. Went back out to watch us entering the Caribbean around 4:30pm.

My friend got an email that her mortgage application was approved that day so we and our English friends went to Le Bistro to celebrate. I had escargot and the duck confit with foie gras. Then we went in a little late to the hypnotist show. It was pretty funny. Then we played some gin rummy in Bar City.

Wednesday, October 7: Cartagena. We took a ship tour called Colonial Cartagena. We drove to the large Fort and took pictures then toured the home of Nunez (a 4 time president). Then we went into the old walled city where we visited the Inquisition Museum and did some shopping. I found things to be the most expensive in Cartagena of all of our stops.
All in all, we probably could have just taken a cab to the old city but we did hear of some people getting charged 20 or 30 dollars for the cab ride. I think our whole tour was 50-something.

Thursday, October 8: At Sea. This was our only bumpy day, but it wasn’t too bad. I was still able to sit out in the sun for awhile. Had dinner at Mambo’s with our friends with the 2-for-1 special again. Had fajitas this time and just had ice cream for dessert. Then we went to a game in the Spinnaker Lounge called The Quest hosted by Sharkbait. We teamed up with some other friends we had met and had a team of 7. You had to bring things or show things to the judges. Like a business card, or a man wearing lipstick, etc. We managed to do all of the quests but our table was kind of far back so we didn’t get up there very fast, which got you more points. But we had a blast. I really regret not having my camera that night!

Friday, October 9: At Sea. Back to calm seas. Played our last Progressive Trivia which came down to a tie breaker but we lost. Turned in my activity cards for 2 t-shirts and 2 can cozies.
Had dinner in La Cucina with the 2-for-1 special with our friends again. Played some more gin rummy and called it a night. Had to have our bags out before we went to bed so had to pack

Saturday, October 10: Miami. We had a late flight out of Miami so we booked the Everglades tour that dropped us off at the airport. So we had to be in the StarDust Theater at 8:45 am. Our disembarkation was delayed but once we finally got there, Customs was very simple. There were several other ships also there so it was quite crowded. We picked up our luggage and got on our bus. It soon became apparent that the AC wasn’t working. So while we did our airboat ride and alligator show, they sent a new bus. Got to the airport around 2pm and got checked in for our flight. I don’t know if all airlines were like this, but the check-in at American was very disorganized. You had to get in 3 different lines to check in – and not much signage to help you out.
Got back to Chicago to greet 41 degrees – vacation was really over!

Overall impressions:

Cabins: Like I said, I think Carnivals were slightly bigger but these had a fridge which was nice. The shoe organizer made a huge difference.

Ship: I loved this ship. It was very clean (not to mention our hands!). They were very diligent about sanitizing hands both coming in and out of the restaurants.

Staff: Other than our requests the first day, we never really saw our steward. He took care of everything while we were out. The dials by the door were nice to let them know to make up the room to do not disturb, etc. The cruise director staff was good as well. The cruise director, Julie, was a lot of fun. DJ Patrick and Joe Peach were probably our favorites – and maybe Angel too.
Captain Lars was very personable if you ran into around the ship and his daily announcements were a highlight of our day – especially the shopping report and how much his wife spent at each port.

Food: I was quite happy with the food. The only category that didn’t thrill me were the dining room desserts, although my friend raved about the banana cheesecake. But I had ice cream several times and that was fine. I enjoyed the ice cream (both hard and soft-serve) in the buffet. We discovered about half-way through the cruise that around 4pm the Great Outdoors put out scones, jam and cream. Yum!
The one thing I missed from Carnival was the free lemonade, but that’s a pretty minor thing. There was a chocoholic buffet one night but we didn’t make it.
The only specialty restaurants we tried were Mambo’s, La Cucina and Le Bistro. The first two we only did because of the special and the third was a special celebration. Without the special, we wouldn’t have done the first two and I thought they were about the same caliber as the MDRs. Le Bistro was nice just because of the whole experience and the room was very nice. We often shared a table and had wonderful table mates when we did this.

Entertainment: I gotta give the edge to NCL on this one. The shows were good. Like I mentioned before, the theater set-up wasn’t very accessible. But other than the main shows, the other things like game shows, the Burlesque show in Bliss, etc were very fun. We missed the White Hot Party and the Toga Party though.

Tours: We booked all through the ship. The only ones I’m glad we did were Costa Rica and Miami. The rest of them we probably could have booked something independently on shore. But I had never been to any of these ports and felt more secure with the ship this time. If I ever go back to any of these places, I’ll know the lay of the land better.

I think this is probably long enough! But if you have any questions, I’ll try to answer them.

Padme · #2 October 14th, 2009, 11:58 AM

Thank you for the great review! It sounds like you had a fun trip. As you were going through the Panama Canal, was there someone who was there to explain what you were seeing, history etc? We are considering a canal crossing and would like some narration on the trip through.

Marzbar71 · #3 October 14th, 2009, 12:15 PM

Yes, they did have someone over the loud speaker during the Panama Canal explaining some things. But honestly, he got kind of annoying after a while. He would repeat the same facts about 5 times. But he did come on at some points to tell us about wildlife visible, etc.

The movie they showed in the theater the day before was pretty informative as well.

swedish weave · #4 October 14th, 2009, 01:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Padme

Thank you for the great review! It sounds like you had a fun trip. As you were going through the Panama Canal, was there someone who was there to explain what you were seeing, history etc? We are considering a canal crossing and would like some narration on the trip through.

If you want to enhance your canal trip, read the book "The Path Between the Seas" by David Mccullogh before you go.

gummyvites · #5 October 14th, 2009, 01:52 PM

Thanks for the great review. I would LOVE To do a Panama Canal cruise someday. We were actually on the other NCL ship (Star) that departed the same day (9/26). We were also in Cabo on the same day as the Pearl, when there were a total of 5 cruise ships in port. What a zoo! Three of them were Norwegian ships, so my daughter and I kept joking about it being a ship reunion.

Thanks for sharing your review!
Karen

Marzbar71 · #6 October 14th, 2009, 01:56 PM

We had some people from the Star on our excursion in Cabo! It was a little crazy there that day!

4 cruisers · #7 October 14th, 2009, 02:09 PM

Thanks so much for the review! What a good read to start out my rainy day here in So Cal! I hope we get to do that cruise one day too~

STARFISH*4 · #8 October 14th, 2009, 03:25 PM

THANKS for the review...sailing on the STAR to PC in dec....LOOKING FORWARD to this very much--did you ENJOY going thru the CANAL?

Marzbar71 · #9 October 14th, 2009, 03:52 PM

Yes, the Canal was very interesting. We lucked out with a slightly overcast day so it wasn't as brutally hot as others have said.

The first lock was the most fun - watching the ship rise up in the canal to meet the level of the first lake.

Going under the Bridge of the Americas was pretty cool too. On the other side, just seeing the breakwaters for the Caribbean was pretty exciting.

STARFISH*4 · #10 October 14th, 2009, 04:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marzbar71

Yes, the Canal was very interesting. We lucked out with a slightly overcast day so it wasn't as brutally hot as others have said.

The first lock was the most fun - watching the ship rise up in the canal to meet the level of the first lake.

Going under the Bridge of the Americas was pretty cool too. On the other side, just seeing the breakwaters for the Caribbean was pretty exciting.

yeah the HEAT/HUMIDITY i am NOT looking forward to but all the EXPERIENCE of going thru the CANAL will be worth it.....
THANKS AGAIN for your review...this will be something i NEVER thought i would get to do and cant WAIT!!!

MrLee · #11 October 14th, 2009, 04:38 PM

I'm curious. Do you have to go topside to get good views or are there good views from the balconies?

theshireshihtzu · #12 October 14th, 2009, 05:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrLee

I'm curious. Do you have to go topside to get good views or are there good views from the balconies?

We were also on this very same cruise, although we caught the Pearl in Vancouver BC....so we were on 19 wonderful days

The views were great from Balconies.
We had friends in a forward Suite, we were in an Aft Suite so we were lucky enough to get great views.
I have not had time to post pictures yet, but plan to do so soon.
To OP, thanks for the review! Hopefully I wil get one done soon!

Marzbar71 · #13 October 15th, 2009, 09:49 AM

Yep, I had people tell me their views from the balconies were good. We had an inside cabin so we found that Deck 7 had good views and it was never crowded or anything. One of the cruise director staff told us that was the best non-balcony view.

newmexicoNita · #14 October 15th, 2009, 07:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marzbar71

This my review/thoughts/experiences from the 14 day Panama Canal cruise on the Pearl from 9/26/09 to 10/10/09. This was my first NCL cruise. I traveled with a friend. We are both female; I’m in my late 30s and my friend is in her early 40s. We were on deck 4 in cabin 4547 – inside cabin forward near the bank of elevators. I’ve been on 4 other cruise but the only 2 recently were both on the Carnival Inspiration so any comparisons I make will be based on that ship alone.

I would say the majority of passengers were older, retired people. This was something I had figured going in. There were only 30 kids on the whole ship I heard. Most younger people were from England and Australia.

Friday, September 25: We flew to LAX and landing about 30 minutes early. We got our bags and checked in with Super Shuttle (I had tried several times to rent a one-way car with Enterprise but they wouldn’t let me). We only waited about 10 minutes before our shuttle to San Pedro picked us up. We checked into the Crowne Plaza (booked on Priceline for $75). In our first room the AC didn’t work, but they were very responsive and moved us to a new room. We ate at Nikko’s Pizza and the Green Onion for lunch and dinner and then used the hotel shuttle to go to CVS to buy 12 packs of pop.

Saturday, September 26: We took the hotel shuttle to the port. Two NCL ships were going out the day so there was some slight confusion at first which line was for which ship but not too bad. We weren’t able to check our pop so we had to carry it on. The check-in process went very smoothly. Once we got on the ship we went to find lunch. As I read here on CC, many people tried to tell us that Summer Palace wasn’t open even though they had told us on shore that it was. I ignored them and of course, it was open and we had a nice leisurely lunch. We were able to watch them loading the supplies onto the ship from the windows which was interesting.
We got into our room about 1pm – very basic inside cabin (compared to Carnival – the Carnival rooms have a slight edge on space). We met our steward and asked him to make the one bed into two and empty the fridge. This was done by the time we got back from the muster drill. We unpacked (the shoe hanger door thing was a lifesaver!)
We ate at Mambo’s that night with a 2-for-1 special. My meal was good (Roadhouse Burrito) but I didn’t care for the dessert (chocolate cake with caramel topping). Went to the show that night – comedian David Naster. It was pretty entertaining.

Sunday, September 27: We were at Sea this day. Got acquainted with the ship, did some activities like trivia, etc. Had breakfast and lunch at the Garden Café and Dinner at the Summer Palace Dining Room (penne pasta with chicken and broccoli – yum!) The show that night was Sea Legs with the Jean Ann Ryan Dancers. The show was OK, but I didn’t care for the set-up of the StarDust Theater that much. The rows were difficult to get in and out of. On the Inspiration, the main theater is set up more as benches with very wide walking areas. I felt bad for the bar servers trying to get drinks to people in the middle of rows. Went to Bliss for Karaoke that night after the show.

Monday, September 28: Cabo San Lucas. This was the only port we had to tender – thank goodness! There were also 4 other ships in Cabo that day so it was very crowded. We had breakfast in the Garden Café – which I have to say was a wonderful buffet – the best by far I’ve ever had on a cruise. I loved all of the fresh fruit and ate so much pineapple. After breakfast we went to Bar City to get our tender tickets. Once we got off the tender and on shore, we walked around the city a bit. Very hot that day as well. We had booked the Deluxe Coastal Cruise through the ship. It was a nice two-story boat with seating both in shade and in sun. It was free drinks on the boat so we had one margarita that was very strong and then switched to water or 7Up. They also advertised chips and salsa but we didn’t get that until the last 30 minutes of the ride. We were on the boat about 2 hours. It took us to the Arch and just toured the area. It was OK but we probably could have done much better just hiring a small boat on shore to take us to the Arch. We had dinner at Indigo that night.

Tuesday, September 29: At Sea this day. Slept in a bit then played the Progressive Trivia contest in the Spinnaker Lounge. Every Sea Day we had Progressive Trivia. You had a team and they passed a tropy around. You got to keep the trophy until the next sea day and you could decorate it, etc. Difference from Carnival in general: On Carnival they give out prizes, ships on a stick. But on NCL you get signatures on an activity card that you turn in on the last day for t-shirts, etc. Either way is fine, but we didn’t even learn about the activity cards until later in the cruise – there wasn’t a lot of explanation about it.
That afternoon we found one of our favorite places on the ship – the padded lounge chairs on Deck 7 underneath the tender boats. Great place to read and snooze in the afternoon/early evening. This night we had dinner at the Blue Lagoon – had fish and chips – good.

Wednesday, September 30: Acapulco. We didn’t do any tours in Acapulco and we probably should have. The area within walking distance of the ship is not very nice. It was also very hot so we didn’t stay on shore very long. We were back on the ship for lunch after sending a quick e-mail home from the internet café right off the ship. My friend went back out after lunch and walked to the Fort and she said it was nice.
Had dinner at Summer Palace again that night and went to the show. It was a magic show that I thought was just so-so. Then we went to play Jeopardy in the Spinnaker Lounge. My friend and I were a team and we won! Woo Hoo!

Thursday, October 1: Huatulco. We book a tour through the ship that was early so we got room service breakfast. Not a huge selection and we were missing a couple of items but nothing big enough to call since we had to get off the ship as soon as we docked. We boarded a bus for a city tour. We had some time to shop in the downtown area. It was a very cute little town. Then we got on a boat and went through many of the bays. Went by where there is a blowhole but the tide was wrong for it to work when we went by. Also went by a very unusual stone face in the rock. All in all, the city part wasn’t worth the cost of the ship tour – we could have taken a taxi easily, but the boat ride was very nice and we didn’t see a lot of people offering boat rides at the dock. This tour was also very long and we got back to the ship just in time to leave.
Tried the casino for the first time – penny slots and won a little bit. Had dinner at Summer Palace. Didn’t go to the show that night but played The Weakest Link in the Spinnaker Lounge and I won! Later was the Fiesta Party on the pool deck. They played some games and there was some dancing.

Friday, October 2: Puerto Quetzal. We didn’t book any tours for this port. They all were very long and long bus rides. So we slept in and played trivia in the morning before heading ashore. They had a very cute marketplace right off the ship but that was about it for that area. We ran into some friends we had met from England and shopped with them for awhile then hit the beer tent! We tried the Guatamalan beers and enjoyed them very much! This port had the nicest area right by the ship.

Saturday, October 3: At Sea. We finally won Progressive Trivia with our friends from England. Had dinner with them as well at La Cucina with the 2-for-1 special at 6:45 and closed the place down! But we tried to get to bed early for Costa Rica the next day.

Sunday, October 4: Puntarenas. I booked a zip lining tour through the ship. Had to meet the bus very shortly after docking. It was a about a 40 minute bus ride to the place and then we got our gear on. Then about a 15 minute walk to the first zip. We did I think 8 zips and then a 15 minute walk back to the bus. They had sent a photographer with us but unfortunately when we got back, the power was out so they hadn’t been able to down load the photos. At first they were going to send us the disks and trust us to send them money. But we decided that would be a pain and we just all gave them the money and trusted them to send the pictures. Turns out, the power came back on later that day and they sent our disks back with the last tour. Very good service. I was glad I booked this through the ship as the drive was pretty far.
Walked around the market at the beach briefly to buy some postcards and that was it.
Our Progressive Team decorated our trophy that evening while watching Dancing with the Pearl Stars. This was so much fun to watch!

Monday, October 5: At Sea. Slept in again and then hit Progressive Trivia and we squeaked out a 2nd victory! Then I went to the StarDust Theater for a short movie about the Panama Canal. Sunned, read and dozed the rest of the afternoon. Met our English friends for dinner at Indigo then went to the show which was Sharkbait. This was one of the best shows we saw the whole cruise, other than maybe Second City which was one of the first nights but I didn’t write down which night.

Tuesday, Oct. 6: Panama Canal. They were starting to sell t-shirts and souvenirs for Panama Canal at 6am on the pool deck so I got up there around 6:30. Well, they hadn’t opened yet and I’ve got to say this whole operation was messed up. I know they got the shipment on the boat in Costa Rica so they really should have had one of everything on display during the sea day the day before so we could see what was available and pick out the shirts, etc that we wanted. They had shirts hanging up but you couldn’t see them. All in all it was a disaster. And given the amount of smalls and mediums left over in the shop in later days, they didn’t order sizes very well.

Anyway, we started going through the first locks at 8am and got through them about 9am. After watching the first lock from Deck 7, we walked around the ship and had a fairly normal day. Went back out to watch us entering the Caribbean around 4:30pm.

My friend got an email that her mortgage application was approved that day so we and our English friends went to Le Bistro to celebrate. I had escargot and the duck confit with foie gras. Then we went in a little late to the hypnotist show. It was pretty funny. Then we played some gin rummy in Bar City.

Wednesday, October 7: Cartagena. We took a ship tour called Colonial Cartagena. We drove to the large Fort and took pictures then toured the home of Nunez (a 4 time president). Then we went into the old walled city where we visited the Inquisition Museum and did some shopping. I found things to be the most expensive in Cartagena of all of our stops.
All in all, we probably could have just taken a cab to the old city but we did hear of some people getting charged 20 or 30 dollars for the cab ride. I think our whole tour was 50-something.

Thursday, October 8: At Sea. This was our only bumpy day, but it wasn’t too bad. I was still able to sit out in the sun for awhile. Had dinner at Mambo’s with our friends with the 2-for-1 special again. Had fajitas this time and just had ice cream for dessert. Then we went to a game in the Spinnaker Lounge called The Quest hosted by Sharkbait. We teamed up with some other friends we had met and had a team of 7. You had to bring things or show things to the judges. Like a business card, or a man wearing lipstick, etc. We managed to do all of the quests but our table was kind of far back so we didn’t get up there very fast, which got you more points. But we had a blast. I really regret not having my camera that night!

Friday, October 9: At Sea. Back to calm seas. Played our last Progressive Trivia which came down to a tie breaker but we lost. Turned in my activity cards for 2 t-shirts and 2 can cozies.
Had dinner in La Cucina with the 2-for-1 special with our friends again. Played some more gin rummy and called it a night. Had to have our bags out before we went to bed so had to pack

Saturday, October 10: Miami. We had a late flight out of Miami so we booked the Everglades tour that dropped us off at the airport. So we had to be in the StarDust Theater at 8:45 am. Our disembarkation was delayed but once we finally got there, Customs was very simple. There were several other ships also there so it was quite crowded. We picked up our luggage and got on our bus. It soon became apparent that the AC wasn’t working. So while we did our airboat ride and alligator show, they sent a new bus. Got to the airport around 2pm and got checked in for our flight. I don’t know if all airlines were like this, but the check-in at American was very disorganized. You had to get in 3 different lines to check in – and not much signage to help you out.
Got back to Chicago to greet 41 degrees – vacation was really over!

Overall impressions:

Cabins: Like I said, I think Carnivals were slightly bigger but these had a fridge which was nice. The shoe organizer made a huge difference.

Ship: I loved this ship. It was very clean (not to mention our hands!). They were very diligent about sanitizing hands both coming in and out of the restaurants.

Staff: Other than our requests the first day, we never really saw our steward. He took care of everything while we were out. The dials by the door were nice to let them know to make up the room to do not disturb, etc. The cruise director staff was good as well. The cruise director, Julie, was a lot of fun. DJ Patrick and Joe Peach were probably our favorites – and maybe Angel too.
Captain Lars was very personable if you ran into around the ship and his daily announcements were a highlight of our day – especially the shopping report and how much his wife spent at each port.

Food: I was quite happy with the food. The only category that didn’t thrill me were the dining room desserts, although my friend raved about the banana cheesecake. But I had ice cream several times and that was fine. I enjoyed the ice cream (both hard and soft-serve) in the buffet. We discovered about half-way through the cruise that around 4pm the Great Outdoors put out scones, jam and cream. Yum!
The one thing I missed from Carnival was the free lemonade, but that’s a pretty minor thing. There was a chocoholic buffet one night but we didn’t make it.
The only specialty restaurants we tried were Mambo’s, La Cucina and Le Bistro. The first two we only did because of the special and the third was a special celebration. Without the special, we wouldn’t have done the first two and I thought they were about the same caliber as the MDRs. Le Bistro was nice just because of the whole experience and the room was very nice. We often shared a table and had wonderful table mates when we did this.

Entertainment: I gotta give the edge to NCL on this one. The shows were good. Like I mentioned before, the theater set-up wasn’t very accessible. But other than the main shows, the other things like game shows, the Burlesque show in Bliss, etc were very fun. We missed the White Hot Party and the Toga Party though.

Tours: We booked all through the ship. The only ones I’m glad we did were Costa Rica and Miami. The rest of them we probably could have booked something independently on shore. But I had never been to any of these ports and felt more secure with the ship this time. If I ever go back to any of these places, I’ll know the lay of the land better.

I think this is probably long enough! But if you have any questions, I’ll try to answer them.

What a great and fair review: yes, Carnival cabins are larger and yes, I am sure the demographics were a little different than you have experienced in the past. The longer and more exotic the itinerary the older the crowd.

Thanks again,

Nita

newmexicoNita · #15 October 15th, 2009, 07:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 4 cruisers

Thanks so much for the review! What a good read to start out my rainy day here in So Cal! I hope we get to do that cruise one day too~

Rainy day in Calif, I know you are glad to have it, but we are sick of it here. We have had rain alost every day since the second week of Sept.

Nita

DoubleAK · #16 October 15th, 2009, 07:40 PM

Great review, pretty much summed up the trip for me as well.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marzbar71

Yes, they did have someone over the loud speaker during the Panama Canal explaining some things. But honestly, he got kind of annoying after a while. He would repeat the same facts about 5 times. But he did come on at some points to tell us about wildlife visible, etc.

The movie they showed in the theater the day before was pretty informative as well.

Wife and I got a kick out of the narrator. His style of speaking made him sound like a dull high school history teacher. He said 'contential divide' so many times we lost count! But I wasn't expecting a narrator in the first place though, so he was better than nothing. BTW, if you went to the bridge viewing room during the transit the narrator was sitting right in front of the window, looking bored.

Cubechick · #17 October 15th, 2009, 08:41 PM

Thanks for the review. LOL'd at your comment about Captain Lars and his daily report. Definitely a highlight and worth a smile if not a chuckle.

coka · #18 October 15th, 2009, 11:13 PM

Excellent review! Very detailed and informative. Some day...some day I get to go to Panama Canal!
I agree...Path Between The Seas is a must read!

coka