LeesaB

Since as you say you don't need to be located within the Haven, I'd say go for the H6, but on a level that gives you a larger balcony.  Going down one deck to 12 is a HUGE balcony, or if you'd like your view to be closer to the water, deck 9 is the largest of the H6 balconies. 

No worries about the wind while sailing from the aft.

Sounds amazing and exhausting!

I agree that it's strange to hear the bed sizes differently, but I've been watching a LOT of youtube videos on these suites and I know there were at least 2 that said it was king sized (of course never videoing when the bed is down for confirmation).  Then I kept looking at pics people would post and it looked more queen sized so I thought maybe there was some strange way you could maybe have the queen parallel to the room but could do *something* and make it king sized (or thereabouts) if it was oriented perpendicular.  Like I said, it was confusing and I was trying to think how the discrepancy could be accounted for.

Maulers2000, that's exactly what I needed to know!  Thanks! 

Ugh... nothing worse than making tea with coffee water.  Make sure you bring vinegar on board to clean your requested coffee maker multiple times. 

We're in this room next year but will have 2 14 year old boys who don't sleep well right next to each other.  Personally - get over it, but looking at reasonable options.

I've heard/seen multiple people say the living room bed is king size, and I've heard/seen multiple people say the living room bed is queen size.  Which is it?  Or can it magically become either?  They would be fine if it can be king size, it's when they try to share a queen that it turns into "don't touch me" city.

I've also seen in a YouTube vlog (from 2015) where the couch was fully "couched" again, but there was a second bed set up directly beneath the tv (maybe twin size, maybe cot size).  So there would be about a foot an a half or so between the couch bed and cot bed.  Does anyone know how this was achieved?  Did/would NCL provide a cot?  Would the family have brought it on?  Would a twin size air mattress fit in that area?

Thanks to everyone, and yes, I am a planner.

So... they've really made Vibe 3 times larger than it was?  That seems... strange considering everything I hear is that it's never full.

Do you actually SEE anyone hanging out in Vibe?  There's certainly no one in that photo.

I don't know about a lot of NOLA-specific locals, but I imagine anywhere you cruise you'll have quite a few people who were well able to drive to the port, so Louisiana-Mississippi-North Texas-Arkansas-West Tennessee people.  Southerners.  Generally we're polite until we get drunk, then we either get really nice or really mean.  Pretty much like everybody else, but with a southern accent.

Now - getting to the port can be a huge pain in the butt, especially if there's a Carnival cruise loading at the same time because it's a tiny road that leads to both ships (and of course, Carnival's first).  Highly recommend that if it looks at all backed up and you don't have a ton of luggage you instead get out at Convention Center Blvd and Julia St and take the elevator at Julia Street up into the building, which is both the outlet mall and the NCL cruise terminal (looking at the building, mall's to the left, cruise terminal's to the right).  It makes more sense when you get there.

Pretty!  Loving all the pics

Chankanaab's great.  The buffet was ridiculously overcrowded though; if we go again we definitely won't do that and just buy food from the place outside.  It does get busy but it's big so it never felt crowded.  We liked wandering through their "Mayan Village" area; it was a nice shade break.  Decent snorkeling though you do have to climb down a bit to get into the water - I would think it would be an problem only for moderate to severe mobility issues though.

Bottom line: tons of stuff to do, cheap, safe.

Following!  You missed my parents in Skagway by a day (they're on a Princess cruise).

Love the sense of humor (and the pics!).

I've stayed at the Grand Wailea Resort on Maui and the Grand Hyatt Kauai Resort and both have great pool systems.  I do think you'd have to rent a room for a day to get access, and whoa that would be expensive.  That said, the snorkeling on Maui was fantastic and a doors-off private helicopter tour in Kauai was almost a religious experience, it was so amazing.

Is there a resort on the Big Island that you can stay at for a night or two before or after the cruise so you can get the resort experience?  The resorts are great but to miss out on what each island has to offer...

I'd say it's like avoiding going to a brand-new restaurant for a few weeks so they can get the kinks out.  Hopefully by the time you get on board they'll have a better handle on things.

Oh gosh, you all just THINK you have a detailed packing list, LOL.  Here's mine:  What to bring on a 7-day cruise

Mind you, this is with a few days in the port town to vacation there as well, and the toilletries and medicines really don't take up that much space when you're using travel bottles and only taking a selection of meds.  My toilletries fit in a 6x6x2 hanging bag and the meds easily fit in a quart size ziplock.

Obviously we don't pack only in carry on sized bags (snorkel gear takes up a LOT of room).  Also - this is tailored to 4 people, and obviously cruising to where snorkeling is appropriate.

7 minutes ago, BNBR said:

 

You can get room service with any class of cabin...

Sure, but you save 8 bucks each time you do it in The Haven... 😉

If you try to book something with NCL and they give you static about needing an adult in each room, I would quote the Guest Ticket Contract, which is much more clear than anything else I've seen on their website:

Looking at the lists of benefits people are posting and commenting on, I do want to add that

• White tablecloth in-suite dining

also includes breakfast, which on port days when you need to get off the ship fairly quickly is fantastic.  (Just ignore the "white tablecloth" part of that particular benefit.)

This is a great question, and I just went through the same Haven-or-not question myself for my (next spring, I'm a planner) next cruise.

1.  We don't get to take "real" vacations all that often, so I'm ok spending what we need to in order to make sure it's an enjoyable experience. 

2.  I'm very much an introvert and neither I or my husband deal well with crowds.  Short periods of time are ok, but dealing with crowds for an extended period of time has been known to trigger panic attacks in me.

3.  We (family of 4, 2 teen boys) were originally booked in an aft balcony and an inside.

4.  Prices changed a bit and I just rebooked us in the Aft Penthouse suite at approximately $4K more than the two cabins.  The 2br suite is the ideal setup for us but I can't justify $6.5K more than two cabins.  So it looks like my cutoff is somewhere in the "more than $5,000 more" range.

This will be our first large ship experience and from what I've heard it *can* be rather crowded in the public areas, even more so on a Caribbean itinerary like what we'll have.  So while we'll have to figure out how the boys will sleep in the living room without killing each other, it's completely worth it to me because I'm SURE that we'll be able to enjoy this vacation, whereas I was worried I wouldn't without those, well, places to go hide from all the people.

That said, we sailed on the Pearl last year and I had no problem being outside the Haven.  It's smaller and known to not be as crowded as the large ships.

I'm not made of money so I certainly couldn't afford to do this on a regular basis, but for my first experience of a large ship and to see what it's like, it's worth the extra expense.  I may decide that it's not necessary afterwards, who knows?

54 minutes ago, Love2CruiseMore said:

I did a search for 2 bedroom family suites and found this info, hopefully some of you are still checking the boards.  Thank you to all who posted photos or links to floor plans!  I’m wondering if there are any magnetic walls in these suites?  I bought magnetic hooks to use to create a clothesline to dry things that we hand wash in the sink.  It looks like the suite only has wood panel walls...not sure if I should bring my hooks?  Can anyone share if there is a clothesline in the shower or a place to create a clothesline?  We are on a two week cruise, I know there will be laundry service offered for a fee but we plan to wash our workout clothes after use.

Thanks for any info!

I know there's a clothesline in the master shower; can't remember if there was a second one in the 2nd bathroom.  We had so much room we never tried to see if the walls were magnetic.

Belatedly following along.  Looks like you're having a great time!  And it seems the patches either worked or you're going with the other time-tested hangover cure... more alcohol.

Sounds like you've already gotten a lot of good advice but thought I'd add my 2 cents anyway.  😏

$5 bills are your best friend, followed by 10s, 1s, and 20s.  Drivers - if they drove carefully, didn't make me feel like we were going to die, or helped provide narration during the drive/engaged with my kids, then I'll give them anywhere from between $2 and $10.  Depends.  Tour guides - Again quality highly dependent here.  I've given anywhere from between $5 and $40 (for a really fantastic tour).  If I know that it's something that's going to stick in my memory forever and the quality of the tour helped make it so, then they get a great tip.

For the rest of the people you interact with, just evaluate how helpful they were to you/your family and tip accordingly.  If they have a communal tip jar then it certainly makes it easier.

Traffic can be a pain getting to the port.  You're right, it wasn't very well thought out.  NOLA cruise port is a bit different from some other areas in that it is literally mixed in with other stuff.

The next time we cruise from there I'm booking a spot at Fulton Place Parking, dropping kids and luggage off at the back entrance to the cruise terminal (Julia Street) and then parking and walking the two tenths of a mile extra.  Plus you can get covered parking there.

Will be following along as well!  Loved cruising out of New Orleans.

Second the recommendation for The Native Choice for Mayan ruins as well.  The Mayan Experience tour that they offer is outstanding.

Looking heavily at Mr Sanchos for our trip next year, so be verbose on that writeup!

You could look at the mini-suite with large balcony on Deck 8 as well.  It's open to viewing from lots of other balconies, but it is huge.  And I think comes with loungers, chairs, and a table.

If you are at all interested in Mayan ruins, then I cannot recommend enough the Mayan Experience Tour through Native Choice at Costa Maya.  The ruins were really impressive, our tour guide was super informative and entertaining, and then we toured a village of Mayans (descendants?  actual Mayans? whatever) and stopped at one of their homes to tour how they live, get a tortilla making demonstration, and ate a fantastic lunch they prepared. 

While I love playing at the beach, it's not something I want to do at every port.  This tour though - I'll remember it for the rest of my life.

As a small note - if you do end up going the passport or passport card route, take a look at the website that lists locations where you can apply.  When I had to renew my son's passport last year I was very pleasantly surprised to see that a number of local libraries have now become official application centers.  Overall a much nicer experience than the post office was.