My non-haven, non-posh Epic TA review

speaking of taste, did you try the potato skins with crab. i was shocked it was real crab, not the fake red and white kind. we ordered a few more

Nope, for some reason that never made it onto our plates. Hubby and I usually order different things and then trade halfway through, that way we each get to try more. But even doing this there was WAY more food on this ship than we could try.

I am enjoying your review, and your writing style is refreshing. You tell it like it is ("phone booth toilet" - hilarious).

 

In January, we sail on the Epic for the first time, and any helpful hints are appreciated. Re: coffee pot - I was planning on bringing my own favorite coffee and the 4" filters. Would that work?

 

The constant complaining from other passengers really irritates me too. I love your solution. I plan fully utilize the drink package!

No, the coffeemaker in the poor people's cabins is a single cup that uses a pre-filled round pillow-looking pod of coffee grounds. Not like a Keurig cup and a normal filter wouldn't work. Maybe someone here has figured out a workaround??? I have faith in you, Cruise Critic-ers. If someone has reverse engineered a solution, they've posted about it here.

Love a review that me smile, thank you.:D

We bring Starbucks instant via packets....use the hot water from the coffee maker. Easy and tastes great.

We bring Starbucks instant via packets....use the hot water from the coffee maker. Easy and tastes great.

The Via? That's actually a great solution and takes up hardly any room. I am currently drinking what is possibly the most traveled coffee ever. Grown in Sumatra, roasted in Amsterdam, purchased by myself in Barcelona, traveled across the Atlantic and flown from Florida to Indiana. A bit of a waste of valuable suitcase space.

Great review! Husband and I travel similar to your style. Having trouble committing to a large ship but there are more options on them. Celebrity is my favorite line right now.

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I'm really enjoying your non-haven non-posh review. I may have missed it, and if so I apologize, but what cabin were you in?

I'm really enjoying your non-haven non-posh review. I may have missed it, and if so I apologize, but what cabin were you in?

10296. Standard balcony B6 category, I believe. Port side, aft.

I like to start my day healthy and then crash and burn on booze and bad decisions.

Ah a woman after my own heart! Your husband is a lucky man. :) Looking forward to reading the rest of this.

Squish, your review was incredibly helpful to me in planning this trip. And also so entertaining to read! I see that you're booked on the Escape now. The District Tap (and the waterfront) calls to me but I'm afraid we'd never leave to see anything else!

Really glad my review was useful! I feel a bit the same about the Mojito bar on the Escape- we have the ubp this time around so it will remain to be seen if we spend the whole cruise downing mojitos!

Enjoying your review so far!

I'm going on the epic in February, So Thank You!

I had made absolutely no plans for the evening, no dinner or entertainment reservations.

I do this a lot. So I enjoy seeing other folks that do too.

I will normally get some sort of dinner package and the rest of the days I play it by ear.

It makes it tuff some times when you are with a lot of friends and or family.

That is part of the reason I like NCL the main dining rooms on all of my cruises were always hit or miss or I could not even tell you what I ate not bad but not great.

Indykitten, thanks for your review! I am enjoying it very much. There do seem to be a lot of Haven reviews, not just this ship, but others too, and for me while intersting, they have little relevance, as I will never see the inside of Haven on NCL nor similar on other lines. So I am enjoying your perspective.

I was booked on Epic a couple of years ago, but unfortunately had to cancel, then went back to Carnival for a couple of cruises, but am now looking forward to Escape next year, and Epic has always been on my list ships/bucket list.

looking forward to more of your review.

Really enjoying it and will be following. On there in May

Indykitten, thanks for your review! I am enjoying it very much. There do seem to be a lot of Haven reviews, not just this ship, but others too, and for me while intersting, they have little relevance, as I will never see the inside of Haven on NCL nor similar on other lines. So I am enjoying your perspective.

 

i'm doing a balcony sailing 2 months after a haven sailing. i cannot wait to read my own review on the comparison ;)

i'm gonna slap my head and say WHY did you blow all that money the first time OR slap my head and say whey didnt you rob that bank to do haven again? :eek:

Day 3

Breakfast in the buffet again. This time we went downstairs to La Cucina to eat. Which I selfishly hate to even say because it was blissfully quiet and calm. We actually ate breakfast here every day, which is not what I'd planned. I thought we'd switch it up with a few breakfasts in O'Sheehans and Taste, but honestly we fell in love with the view. We'd sit just above the bridge, looking out over the bow. We settled into a routine on the ship. Breakfast and coffee here, reading, watching the ocean for hours. There was a core group of us that were there everyday, although it definitely became more popular and louder as the cruise went on.

We saw so much wildlife. Lots of dolphins and pilot whales along the Spanish coast. What I think was a pod of north atlantic right whales. One morning I'd been reading for a couple hours and when I looked up an entire pod of small dark dolphins were crossing in front of the bow. I'm like "look, dolphins!". My husband, annoyed, had been watching for hours and nothing, I glance up from my book and they magically appeared. Later on, in the middle of the Atlantic we'd see hundred of flying fish, popping up out of the water and flying 10, 20, 30 feet before splashing back in. I really wanted to see a larger whale breach but maybe another trip. I'm told Alaska is the place to go for that. Although we are headed to Hawaii soon during migration season, so fingers crossed.

Too engrossed with my dolphins and book, I totally spaced the cabin crawl. Dangit I wanted to see some of that sweet, suite life. Next time.

Maybe half the time we'd have lunch in the buffet. Mostly, again, because of the view. We tried O'Sheehan's for lunch a couple times and Shanghais. Never made it in the noodle bar as it was always packed. But really we just wanted the view. Also I wanted (needed) the vegetables. The constant restaurant food of a vacation can be fun for a while but ends up wearing me out. And most of the menus were lacking on the veggies. The buffet had an awesome salad of the day station where it they would toss together different ingredients for you and most days it was delicious. The regular salad bar was also good. So I used the lunch buffet as a way to get in my veggies. There was also a marinated veggie dish with in the buffet some days that was delicious and I may have to recreate at home.

On day 3 we had a strike of luck and met someone (at a bar, obviously) that would become a good friend. We made lunch plans to meet up with her and her husband on day 5.

It was dress up or not night and I was psyched! I'd stuffed a cocktail dress into my little suitcase and by golly I was going to wear it! Unfortunately our afternoon siesta lasted a bit long and we just made it into the Manhattan room to see the end of the Burn the Floor, uh, floor show. Dinner lingered and even though we skipped dessert I missed meeting the captain. My fault for taking too long to get fluffed up, as my new Aussie friends would say, like a dollybird. Live and learn.

I know people love NCL for their casual freestyle approach to dress codes. I almost never get dressed up at home (I wear a uniform at work) so it's a treat for me to dress up a little and go to dinner. Our usual resort routine is to play until mid afternoon, go back to our room shower/nap/whateves and then throw on a casual dress and go out to dinner. I discovered that my appetite for this is exactly 8 days. After 8 days if we didn't have specialty dining reservations I was like, "eff it, lets go to the buffet". I did enjoy being able to eat wherever and whenever we liked, this was more like the resort style I was used to. Not sure I would have liked "traditional cruise style" with assigned times and table. This would be fine if you enjoyed your table mates or potentially disasterous if you didn't.

I think we wandered around, had a few drinks and listened to some music, wore out early, missed the Night Out party and fell asleep early.

Indykitten, I am loving your reviews. You make laugh. . I am cruise in 80 days, I want some information

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Haha I pushed the wrong key. I am looking for information on The Vibe????

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Haha I pushed the wrong key. I am looking for information on The Vibe????

 

 

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I believe Vibe is called Posh on the Epic. It's a private area you have to have a keycard to access. Since our transatlantic had very, very few kids on it, I didn't see the need for a private adults only area. Technically Spice H2O is supposed to be adults only during the day, and it's public.

There are two elevators in the Great outdoors. The port one goes up to Posh, you have to have a special keycard to get up there. The starboard one goes up to deck 18 which is also quiet and nice. Just not, as I would assume....posh.

But I'm sure someone who's used it can give you better info!

No, the coffeemaker in the poor people's cabins is a single cup that uses a pre-filled round pillow-looking pod of coffee grounds. Not like a Keurig cup and a normal filter wouldn't work. Maybe someone here has figured out a workaround??? I have faith in you, Cruise Critic-ers. If someone has reverse engineered a solution, they've posted about it here.

Enjoying your review very much so far Indykitten. I've done the Epic once before and am headed out again on Nov. 19th. I should be finishing my packing now as a matter of fact! :rolleyes:

Here is that work around you were looking for:

Coffee Pod Replacement Filters for Coffee Pod Brewers - Make Your Own Disposable Pods - 200 Pack By Simple Cups https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00A89H6X2/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_In7kybC560JTF

I won't need them this time, we are sailing in one of those suites complete with Nespresso machine. :D

Day 4 - Tenerife

Up early and a quick breakfast in the buffet. Tried to watch as much of the docking as we could. Got off the ship quickly and a had a bit of a panic moment when we turned the wrong way. 10 minutes late but we met our tour, and thankfully were not the last to arrive.

We actually found this tour from the roll call page and it was fab. Such a short time there but we took a mini bus up to the top of the volcano. Going to the top of Mount Tiede was amazing, it looks like the surface of mars. Surreal. Wound our way down and stopped at a little town to look at buildings and architecture. Weather was perfect, warm but not hot. And none of the overwhelming humidity we'd have in Puerto Rico a week later.

I think this was the part of the cruise that was hard. I would have loved 2 days, 2 weeks, 2 months in Tenerife. The culture of Europe but the relaxed attitude of the islands. Without the grit that the Caribbean has. Someday.

Back on the ship and too spent for anything but the buffet. Was this seafood night? Can't recall. One night during the first week we walked in and there was a WALL OF SHRIMP and cocktail sauce. Actually better than the shrimp cocktail at Cagneys. Cocktail sauce was too sweet for me, I like mine with horseradish but that's a personal preference. Shrimp was amazing and I think I had an entire plate for dinner.

I will say, one small complaint was about the info in the Freestyle Daily. I wish they'd list the dinner specials for the buffet and O'Sheehans every day. It would make it soooooo much easier to plan. Otherwise I'd have to remember to look at the little table signs in the morning in the buffet. And we never did have dinner at O'Sheehans. Once I saw a sign saying it was prime rib night but any other night it was too much trouble to hunt for the info. Maybe a screenshot of the menus and specials on the TV? The first week I was all about weighing my options for dinner. By the second it was like, ugh, deck 6 is awfully far away to go look at the dining room menu....

Did not get picked for the Officers dinner. Bummer.

Day 5

Went to the How to Run a Floating Hotel Q&A in the morning. Very entertaining and informative if you're interested in how the ship runs. Several people wanted to question/complain about corporate policies, itineraries, etc. I thought, "you know they just drive the ship, right?". I get it, people aren't happy about how much the internet costs or that there aren't enough cruises out of their home ports. But the captain can't really address that, now can he?

Discovered Spice H2O after lunch. And now I need a liver transplant. So we're not really pool people. A lot of resorts have swim up bars and we've been known to frequent those but I need some shade and Waves was too loud for us most of the time with the entertainment going on there. But Spice is in a quiet zone and the bar staff there is AMAZING. We would just sit there and watch them work (ok, and drink). They really hustle. I never thought a pool bar would feel like home but this was the bar that resonated with us. We were like Norm in Cheers. Met many friends there, adored the crew. You could find us there every day after lunch. I'm sure they were sick of us. The smoking sometimes bothered me, I do wish there were more non-smoking places outside.

Also discovered, I think on day 2, that most bars had Lagunitas Little Sumpin' Sumpin' in the bottle. We love craft beer, it's huge in the midwest, and we'd kind of reconciled ourselves to not being able to get any unless we went on the Escape. Finding this was a huge and pleasant surprise. Thank you, Beverage Director! Please keep stocking this. I think we drank every bottle on the ship.... Not that that kept us from from drinking cocktails and sampling all the European beers at least once. What's a vacation for, after all?

So I look over and we've almost missed our lunch date because my hubby is drinking fireball and cider with a Scottish couple. Ok, stumble down to O'Sheehans which is predictably packed. Find our new friends which ended up being the best part of our trip. Lovely people and really, isn't that what travel is for? I mean, that and the drinking, as indicated in the above paragraph.

I think we had dinner at Manhattan this night. One night in Manhattan I had a fantastic vegetarian risotto. So good that when it came time to switch dinners with hubby I didn't want to give it up. I begrudgingly did. Grabbed a cocktail and went to the see the hypnotist show. Meh. Not our thing. Others seemed to really enjoy it, though, so this was just personal preference. A few more cocktails and we were ready for bed.

how do you register to win the officers dinner?