7/13 Wind Review

I'll try not to bore you with all the specifics and just concentrate on items of general interest. We thoroughly enjoyed this cruise. The food was good and sometimes very good, and service was generally above average in all respects.

We boarded around 2:00 with no lines at all. We were in a Penthouse Suite (our first time not in the interior bowels of the ship) and the extra room was great. I'm not sure that the price is worth the extra square feet IMHO, but the perks were nice like priority tendering.

I brought a bottle of wine on board in my checked luggage, and, sure enough, the bag was pulled by security, and I had to go pick it up later that night. I told them I was willing to pay the corkage fee and filled out a charge slip for $15. But, as a previous post also indicated, the charge never showed up on our account.

We didn't use the butlers much and rarely saw them except for the afternoon deliveries of canapes. The room stewards were fantastic, and we ended up giving them some of the tip we had reserved for the butlers. Valerie, the conceirge, was also very helpful. She came by the room to introduce herself and was always available. FYI, she will make reservations for you in the regular restaurants, but can only make them for the opening time slot or very late (8-8:30). But, we rarely encountered lines at the times we ate anyway.

The Four Seasons allowed shorts only on the first two nights, not the entire cruise as some posts led me to expect. But, I saw several guests in shorts or jeans in every restaurant throughout the cruise.

The entertainment was marginal in my opinion, but I've learned not to expect too much on NCL anyway, so it met my expectations. Perky Patty, the cruise director, tried to be a bit too perky for my taste, but my wife liked her.

We rented cars in every port except Kona. There appeared to be shuttles from every rental car company at all the ports, and, at least the ones we used (Alamo, National, and Enterprise) provided free shuttle service both ways.

In Honolulu, we visited Pearl Harbor (lines were very long at 8:00 when we arrived), Dole Plantation, PCC, Diamond Head, and drove around the north end of Oahu. Obviously, we had more than one day in Honolulu to do all that.

In Hilo, we drove around Volcanos Nat'l Park and visited the Mauna Loa macadamia nut farm.

For Fanning Island, we signed up for the Napoli Beach excursion and were very glad we did. There was not much shade on the regular beach, and it was rather warm. We also were the first off the ship at 7:45, which turned out to be a good decision. Not only was it a lttle cooler that early, but we were able to rent Hobie Cats with no waiting and sail for about an hour. When we came in, there were numerous people waiting for our boats. We then took out bikes, again with no waiting, and rode partway around the island (very neat scenary - I highly recommend). When we got back, they were out of bikes and people were again waiting. After relaxing under the palm trees in lounge chairs for a while, we tendered over to the regular beach for lunch. The regular beach was hot, crowded, and did not appeal to us at all.

For Kauai, we took a plane flight around the island. I had found this on ebay for around $170 for the three of us. The plane doesn't go much faster than a helicopter; you get the same views, same pilot narration, and you save hundreds of dollars. I think their regular price is around $300. The company is Air Ventures. We then took a boat trip down the Waimai river to the Fern Grotto, which was okay, but not as impressive as I expected. - just a bunch of ferns hanging off a cliff.

On Maui, we had intended to drive up to Haleakala crater, but it was very cloudy, and we were told that there wasn't much to see up there in low clouds. So, we took the road to Hana, which was not as scenic as I'd expected. We only went slightly further than Twin Falls, so perhaps you need to go further down to hit the really scenic stuff. BTW, Twin Falls requires about a one mile trek each way, and the falls are not really that outstanding. The day we went was also a bit rainy, which left the dirt trail on the muddy side.

For Kona, we used one of our Entertainment Book coupons to parasail two-for-one, about $65 for the two of us. That was an experience. It reminded me of sitting on top of a tall ferris wheel rocking back and forth in the seat.

I'll be happy to answer any questions.

Thanks for your review. Were there any bands or lounge music any where on board that wasn't big band type?

Hello,

Thanks so much for taking the time to write the review. We are going on the Wind in October and appreciate it very much.

Now on to the questions:

1) Do you think it is possible to do Pearl Harbor the morning before the cruise or would it be too stressful?

2) Was driving in Honalulu a nightmare? We live in the San Francisco Bay Area so we are used to traffic, but would it be better to do tours than drive?

3) Did many passengers dress up for formal night?

4) How did you find the ship?

5) If you could only do one excursion/trip which would it be?

Thanks for your help!

Theresa:)

If you kept your dailies from this cruise can you post them?

Thanks

thanks for the review we leave 9/24

Hello,

 

Thanks so much for taking the time to write the review. We are going on the Wind in October and appreciate it very much.

 

Now on to the questions:

 

1) Do you think it is possible to do Pearl Harbor the morning before the cruise or would it be too stressful?

 

2) Was driving in Honalulu a nightmare? We live in the San Francisco Bay Area so we are used to traffic, but would it be better to do tours than drive?

 

3) Did many passengers dress up for formal night?

 

4) How did you find the ship?

 

5) If you could only do one excursion/trip which would it be?

 

Thanks for your help!

 

Theresa:)

You could certainly do Pearl Harbor the morning of the cruise. That's what we did and still got to the ship in mid-afternoon.

Traffic in Honolulu didn't seem any worse than what I experience in Atlanta on a regular basis.

We dressed for formal night and ate at La Trattoria, which was advertised as being formal only, so everyone I saw was dressed up. Even a few tuxes. The main restaurants were optional formal that night.

This was our 2nd trip on the Wind, so I knew what to expect. She isn't the fanciest ship out there, but I have no complaints.

Our favorite excusion was the flight over Kauai. From what I hear, you can't see the Napoli coast or get a perspective on Waimai (sp?) canyon any other way.

To answer the other questions, I did not keep my dailies, but the dailies from a 10 day cruise were posted earlier on this site because I checked them before our cruise, so you might want to search for them.

In regard to the music played in the bars, I'll have to plead ignorance. We always hit the bars before dinner, and there was never any entertainment at that time in the bars we frequented.

Was on the same cruise and I found the hip hop comedians, the other comedian and the circus acts to be very good. I am a great fan of Royal Caribbean and will probably keep that as my first choice. I don't think I like free style as much as I thought I would. The dining room service was ok. There were times that room service seemed to be the only option for food and there really wasn't a lot to do on the sea days. It was worth the trip because my main objective was to see Hawaii and I loved it.

Joycruiser,

Which excursions did you do? Can you speak briefly about how you liked them?

Thanks,

Theresa:)

In Kaua'i we did the scenic tour, driver took us to her house(why?), tour was ok but we had to ask to stop at different places. She said she was new and I believe her. I think I expected to much at the Luau, it was a great experience but the food was soso. The show was very good though. In Maui we went to the Ocean Center and that was great. Maui is a beautiful island. We missed our dolphin tour in Kona because we were about 10 mins. late, but they did refund our money. If you have a late flight home or are staying on the island, the Big Kahuna Tour is awesome. You go so many places and the pineapple whip at the Dole Plantation was so good. I had to take level 1 tours because I can't walk long distances. The helicopter and ziplne tours sold out immediately so if you want to do those reserve them online, tickets will be in your cabin on the first day. I loved Hawaii!!!!!

I think I expected to much at the Luau, it was a great experience but the food was soso. The show was very good though.

Speaking of luaus, we did Germaines in Honolulu. After reading so many good posts about it, we were very disappointed. The food was okay, but the show was very campy in our opinion. Way too much time was spent on asking if everyone was having a good time (must have been asked a dozen times) and soliciting large groups of attendees to come up on stage and attempt to dance. Even the bus ride over and back was painful as our host lead us in songs, among other things. To add insult to injury (or vice versa in this case), I think they must have had a problem with sand fleas or something because my wife and I came away with multiple bites on our legs and never ventured away from the main area.

The entertainment was marginal in my opinion, but I've learned not to expect too much on NCL anyway, so it met my expectations.

I really appreciated reading such a clearly written review of your cruise on the Wind, and have only one small question. I thought that NCL had built a reputation for having fairly good entertainment on its ships, so I was a bit surprised by your comment (quoted above). My experience with NCL has mainly been on its larger ships, which presumably have more elaborately produced shows than do the smaller ships. A few earlier reviews of the Wind have commented on the deficiencies of the Stardust Lounge (seating, sightlines, and so forth), which must have a great deal to do with the enjoyment of the shows being presented there.

In my last post, I was too absent-minded to remember the point of my question: Was your less-than-enthusiastic comment regarding the Wind's entertainment related to problems with the Stardust Lounge? Apparently, it's not an ideal showroom.

Thanks!

You're right Professor, there are a large number of pillars in the Stardust which do block portions of the stage from many seats. My comment about the entertainment being less than ideal was based more on the quality of the performances. I'm sure you realize that this is just my opinion and that many people love the shows, but I did not particularly enjoy them. The song and dance troupe had an awful lot of two-person ballet in it, which was entertaining the first time the guy lifted the girl, but got old by about the 50th time. The shows also contained a rag-tag bunch of 2nd rate songs instead of top hits as if NCL didn't want to spend the extra bucks to clear the rights on popular numbers. Finally, the singers were just okay - nothing objectionable, but nothing that made you remember their performance.

The Wind is the only NCL ship I've sailed on (twice), so I can only compare their entertainment to other lines'. Perhaps it is better on NCL's larger ships.

We went to most of the shows on our Wind trip. The production shows were enjoyable--I much prefered the country-western show (and I am NOT a fan of country music) to the circus one. My DD and I counted at the Circus performance--the duet ballet couple performed enough times that the ballerina changed into 5 different "thong" leotards. It is hard to mix circus and ballet without looking odd.

I really enjoyed the one comedian who wasn't the magician. The comedian who was a magician wasn't really talented or funny. I also didn't care for the "vocal stylings" of Wes Epae. The Wind band was very good--we enjoyed listening to them in the Stardust prior to shows some nights.

Doeymeister, so you just filled out a slip with the intent of paying the $15 corkage fee and they let you keep your wine? I was under the assumption that they would hold your wine until the end of the cruise. Please let me know if that's not the case.

For any spirits other than wine, they will confiscate if they find it and return at the end of the cruise. For wine, you have a choice between confiscation or paying the $15 corkage fee. And as I said in my original post, I had read on this board where someone else also filled out a charge slip to pay the corkage fee on their wine and were never charged.

The funny part is that the wine I brought onboard was some relatively cheap Merlot I picked up in Honolulu, and it turned out to be pretty bad, so I'm certainly thankful that I was charged the extra $15.

Thank you for the review. I have one question. When the ship docked at Lahaina in Maui for two nights, Does the ship move somewhere else during the first at Maui or is it stationary at one place throughout he night?

Thanks

We were on the 10 day cruise, so we only had one day in Lahaina. I've seen your question answered previously though, so you might want to search this board.

Thank you for the review. I have one question. When the ship docked at Lahaina in Maui for two nights, Does the ship move somewhere else during the first at Maui or is it stationary at one place throughout he night?

 

Thanks

I was told that it stays moored overnight, but that the tenders stop running at the posted time. So, although it is there, you can not board. I was told by an NCL customer service person, so whether or not this is true is debatable!

Julie