murzick

Castro1n3, please reserve two beach chairs for us on Sunday, Feb. 18th. We look forward to meeting you and please put our name on your board. Thanks!

Hello ,

We are too planning to go to Vigie beach on Feb 18(we are on Gem)

I already reserved chair with Castro. May be we can take taxi together,it is only 2 of us as well.

Marina

Praying for Puerto Rico and all the Caribbean islands being affected by the hurricanes. I saw this and thought it should be shared. I hope it helps someone.

"100% Puerto Rico is without light. The antenna of emergency management and the NOAA NWS National Hurricane Center have collapsed. Some cell towers have fallen and many radio stations are off the air. If anyone knows of any person needing assistance, call the (787) 777-0940. WIPR Radio is receiving emergency calls. Share this on your status please outside Puerto Rico..."

Thank you

Hi,

I am planning cruise to Bermuda on NLC Dawn. We cruised on NCL before but never used Drinks/Specialty Dining packages.

What exactly included in drinking package? Only alcohol drinks? Does it included specialty coffee or fresh juice as well?

Other question regarding dinning package: we are planning to travel with other couple ,can we used our dinning package to pay for them ? Like we will be using 2 dinners out of 3 in one restaurant for two times in one day.

Did anyone have similar experience?

Thank you for help.

Sorry for delay response I didn't have time to check messages.

it look like a lot of confusion regarding reservation for MDR .

Tre reservation can be done on NCL web site the same way as you do other restaraunt reservation or you can do on board or even before the boarding ship at the restaraunt reservation's table.

Originally I did one reservation for first night only on NCL web site but this reservation was listed ,after I upgraded our cabins.I was a little upset because I made my mind so when we were waiting to start the boarding I went to ask if it possible to made reservation and we just did it.

You can make reservation for any night and almost for any time without any problem . I did first for first two nights and later reserved a couple more times already on the ship . I like this opinion a lot ,for our family it was much easy to make our evening plan.

Have a nice cruise

The MDR was open for lunch for embarkation day, but on the previous cruise, we loved the Blue Lagoon so we decided to check out how it loooks now that it was redone.The new O'Sheehan's is great, it's located on deck 8 on both sides, and has much more space and an upgraded menu as well.

I like all improvements that were recently done on Gem, such as: new carpets in the hallways, the new furniture in the Spinnaker Lounge, and the updated Moderno restaurant that located now on deck 13 overlooking the pool.

Yes, Gem is not brand new ship and shows some wear and tear but she is extremely clean and the crew takes good care of her.

I’m not a big writer – so this is a short review of our cruise on NCL Gem from January 2 to 12 from New York.

We are a couple, around 50 years old and traveled with our 20 year old daughter and her friend. We chose this cruise because it was from New York, so we could easily drive down from Massachusetts and the timing was perfect because of college winter break. Originally, we booked two ocean view cabins on Deck 8, which I upgraded on December 30th to two family balcony cabins on Deck 9 Forward, close to the elevators. We had a great and easy accessible location and great balcony cabins. They are spacious enough and balconies are very nice. We had connected room so we could open the door between two balconies to make one big one, but we never did it.

We were at the pier at around 10 AM on January 2 and by noon; we were having lunch at the new O’Sheehan’s Bar and Grill. After they had announced that all the rooms were ready, we dropped off our bags and went to see us sail away and made gorgeous pictures of New York. It was cold, but it was a clear, sunny sky and the sunset was beautiful.

I made reservations for Grand Pacific for the first two nights, right after registration, while we were waiting. It was great because we didn’t have to wait any extra time. I absolutely recommend it, especially if you party is made up of multiple cabins because you make a reservation for one room number and it’s for any amount of people. I reversed more nights later on during the trip. It was easy for us because everyone know what time we ate at. We liked dining in Grand Pacific and we tried Magenta once as well; both restaurants had good service and the food was over all very good. We tried a few of the specialty restaurants, such as Orchid Garden, Moderno and the Italian restaurant and we loved them all. We normally ate between 7 and 7:30, when most people were at the show.

We went to a few of the shows at 9 PM. The kids loved Second City and I really enjoyed the Acrobatic show. All the shows were well done and interesting to see , depending on your preference and taste.

We had very smooth sailing the whole trip. The weather was nice for most of the cruise, with the exception of the first and last days, which were seasonably cooler than the rest of the time. But we enjoyed the great weather on the islands and three very good days at sea. We spent most of our sea days by the pool, getting tan, relaxing, listening to music and just over all enjoying the warm weather and sun.

We did independent excursions on all the islands and we have a great time. It was our second cruise on the Gem and I will do it again, if the opportunity comes.

Prior to my cruise, I read every thread about the cruise and all the islands. I read many good tips and ideas that I decided to use; such as the reviews I read of Stanley’s tours. I found the info about Stanley tour on this board and decided to call him.

Pro: I called him and he was very polite and easy to made arrangements. I asked to have a private tour four 4 people – a short tour around the island and some beach time. We called the day before the tour to confirm a time and meeting place. He promised to meet us at 9:00. We had a tender so were around 10-15 minutes away from the port.

Con (the unplanned part): Stanley picked us up and told us that there would be another family (of 3 people) from another ship. We made a couple of trips around the area to find this other family. We drove around for an hour. This was a huge disappointment for me as well as my family because none of us planned on wasting time for finding another family that we did not even know were going to be there. If I had known, I would have at least had different expectations or different arrangements.

We did a 1.5-2 hour tour around the island; stopped at Mountain Top and had great banana daiquiris and took great pictures of Magen Bay. After that, he dropped us off at Secret Harbor Resort after 12 PM. We were on NCL Gem and had the last tender at 5:15 PM and the other family was from NCL Getaway that left the port at 4 PM. So we didn’t have much of a choice and had to leave the beach before 3 PM – also unexpected.

About Secret Harbor Resort and Beach: It was a very nice and small harbor, with calm, clear water and a lot of fish swimming around. The beach itself was nice, it wasn’t long or wide but had a lot of natural shade and a bar where you could buy drinks and food.

After Stanley dropped off the other family of pier, we asked to be dropped of by the Synagogue and we walked to the ship by ourselves.

Over all, we had a great day in St. Thomas, we enjoyed the island and the beach, but we wish we could have spent more time at the beach or visited other beaches as well.

Hello,

You are absolutely right, I am checking price for Jan 02 from NY as well from September and price was rising a bit and suddenly it jumped almost twice.

I was hopping to upgrade but I don't think it possible now.

We are going on Gem on January 2nd .Where can I check if we have tender at Tortola because I try to book excursion on my own ?

Thanks.

Hi cruisers,

Two years ago we took Bernard's tour.it was good but nothing special.Our family are couple with 2 young adult kids (20 years old).

We are coming back to St.Martin this winter and I want to try Twin Island tour.

Does anybody try both of these tours and can compare?

Your help and input will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you very much for all your help.

After I posted I checked time difference by myself as well .

So if you are going now until November : the time on the ship and local time are the same on all British Virgin Islands and St Martin.

After time change in November they are all hour ahead of ship time.

If you are still confuse as I was before check website : worldtimeserver.com

Happy cruising everyone.

Thank you all:)

Please help I am very confuse with time,when ship in port what time we should use ship or island?

I want to book dolphin swim and not sure if we will have enough time to do it?

The swim is going to start at 10 am local time I think ,we need to be at back on ship by 1pm ship time?

Thank you for help. :)