mn star's review of The Star: 4/18-4/25/04

[mnstar]

We returned home yesterday. I took the afternoon off today to take a nap, but then I when I glanced at this board first, the reviews from the week before, they woke me up to at least get started on my review...

My dh and I were on the 4/18 sailing of The Star. It was our first cruise, our first time in Hawaii, and our 25th Anniversary was on Wednesday, the 21st. I am 51yo and my husband is 57yo. We didn't book until January, in part because we have an adult child with some speicial needs who lives with us, so we had to work out arrangements for her for while we were gone.

We booked our cruise through cruisevaluecenter.com, but we made the arrangments with David Hauser, by phone. Both of us have past and present medical issues that somewhat limit our mobility, so for this and other reasons our trip, including our itinerary seemed to be different from many/most of you. We viewed this trip as a once in a lifetime experience (not to be repeated) so we tried hard to look for all the positives, and overlook the negatives.

Our overall impression: we had a very good time on The Star and on our vacation ~ not perfect, but nonetheless enjoyable. In many ways, it seems amazing, but obviously our experience was different than those of you on The Star just the week before.

Precruise: We were fortunate to be able to fly non-stop from Minneapolis to Honolulu via NWA on Friday (not booked througanta Monica. h ncl). We booked two nights at the Radisson Prince Kuhio through our TA. This hotel worked out fine for us. We were surprised that the hotel is still in the midst of a renovation, but they did a good job of minimizing the impact. And like many of the streets in Waikiki right now, those in front of our hotel were torn up too.

With the help of many from this message board, we settled on dinner at Tiki's Grill that night. It was a great choice! (We booked it on-line ahead of time, and the folks at Tiki's really liked that too. At 8pm, the wait was two hours.) It was just a couple of blocks of walking to the restaurant on the beach. The Waikiki area reminded me of Santa Monica. At Tiki's, we met two college students who are best friends of our son's. They loved it too, we all had fish and some Lava drink. It was a fitting first night in Hawaii.

Saturday morning found us awake before sunrise. So, we fixed the coffee in our room that they had provided, and we watched the sun rise over Diamondhead. I had called ahead and requested to be as high up as possible (to avoid the noise,) we wre on the 21st floor. We figured he'd see lots of beaches and people in the coming week, so we were happy with the mountain view. (Thanks again for those suggestions.)

At 6:30 we jumped in a cab and headed over to Duke's for their breakfast brunch (again we had made reservations by phone ahead of time.) We walked along the beach first, met another couple and took turns taking pictures of each other. Then, ate "along the rail" at Duke's, right at the edge of the beach. We lingered over coffee, watching all the people go by. Then, we passed the International Marketplace Shopping Center ~ just a bunch of kiosks selling tshirts and jewelry. But, there was a Crazy Shirt store right there, for anyone interested.

Then, we caught another cab over to the Aloha Tower, where we were to meet the bus that would take us out to The Polnesian Cultural Center. This was the first of several tours we arranged through Tom Barefoot's Tours. What we first learned was about "Hawaii time," it seems to be kinda. sorta, about the time you expect. While we waited we started our shopping at The Red Dirt Shirt Store at Aloha Center. As for the Polynesian Cultural Center: we had "Ambassador's" tickets, which meant we were part of a small group tour, maybe 10 people. Almost everyone seemed to be on this plan. We had lovely guide from New Zealand/Australia, and we really enjoyed the very personal tour. It was designed to show us a little bit of everything, because it's not possible to see it all, but that meant we missed seeing most all of the exhibits. In retropect, we would buy a basic admission ticket, and do it on our own . The man from Samoa was the best! The laua was the worst (but convenient.) Rachel, our guide, casually asked if any of us were celebrating an anniversary, so of course I offered up that it was our 25th. Well, it turned out that Rachel's boyfriend was the host at the Marquesas show, and my dh ended up on the stage chasing down a "wild pig!" I laughed til I cried.

The following day we took another tour from our hotel out to Pearl Harbor (Enoa Tours long tour.) We liked the tour guide's commentary and that we could ask the questions that we wanted to hear the answers to. We were thrilled not to have to navigate the roads, especially when on Sunday then was a triathon with staggered start times that closed all the roads in and around Waikiki. Consequently, we missed the ncl bus from our hotel to the ship. Fortunately, they took our luggage anyway. Our bus driver/guide, stopped at our hotel so we could grab our carryon bags, then maneuveured through traffice to get us to the ship about 2:30. Later than we'd planned, and even as crowded as it looked, we were in our cabin with 30 minutes.

Finally... the cruise begins!

The cabin: we had a BD balcony cabin (the smallest.) It was small, but we expected that. We loved the balcony, especially in the mornings. Best suggestion we got: the over the door shoe holder. This helped keep everything in place. It still took a choreographed effort to move around, e.g., when we were both getting dressed at the same time. We packed what we wanted to, three not too full medium sized suitcases instead of the two we probably could have gotten by with, but we had no concerns about the weight of the suitcases on the way home. Tha cabin was always the "right" temperature to us. I tend to get cold, but the restaurants were a little bit cool, but not cold.

Our cabin stewards: we had three instead of two, because Joe-Al was moving on to the Leo. They did remember our names, but they were soooo nice, it seemes like they just wanted to know us so they could get an "extra" tip at the end of the week. The one thing we asked for was fresh ice at the end of the day. Joe-Al refused, saying he put it out in the morning, after that we had to call room service. After we did use room service (more on that below), we set the dirty dishes in the hall to get rid of the smell, but my half full iced tea glass kicked around for three days, because the room stewards wouldn't touch it (finally, dh insisted on dumping it out himself) Our impression was that the room stewards don't do much, just make beds and put out towels. oh yes, and ice in the morning.

Shore Excursions: we ordered them ahead by phone, and insisted that ncl send us a confirmation by email. This is when, as some of you know, ncl inserted my TA's email adress for mine, so all that day and night we got all of the agency's confirmations from ncl. There was a confirmation every five minutes. So, wen my TA says they do alot of business with ncl I believe them, no wonder we got such a good rate! We did the volcano tour at Hilo, the platation tour at Maui, and the Fern Grotto tour at Nawiliwili. We were glad for the convenience of the tours, and the commentary along the way. The volcano tour provided more than enough stops. The Plantation Tour was basically a waste, but my dh is from a farm family, so he wanted to do that one. We liked the river ride at Nawilliwilli. Because of the change in the intinerary we went back to Rose at Tom Barefoot's Tours, and they custom designed a Lahaina tour: we took a helicopter ride through Alex Air (they're the ones with two way communication with the pilot) then Hapa Papa tours met us at Hana and drove us from there. It was a great day! Rose also arranged for us to do the Fairwind Snorkel out of Kona. We caught an early tender at 7:15, then took a cab the K bay to meet it. The cab driver agreed to pick us up there at the end of the trip. We added the ncl Cultural History tour on the last day. No trouble booking it on the ship, and it was a great tour, the best of the week! Best of all, ncl got us and our luggage to the airport at the end of the day. Our biggest complaint about ncl excursions was having to put up with the mindless banter of the staff, while we waited in the Stardust Theatre for our tour to be called. The time could be spent productively, telling us about the island we were visiting, even what to buy, whatever... That reminds me, ncl has established relationships" with certain vendors, and they shamelessly promote them, which made for a useless "shopping meeting" on Monday morning while at sea.

Seasickness / rocking ship / weather: we were surprised at how little the ship rocked all week, and we had a forward cabin. The only time we noticed it was when we left Hilo on Wednesday night. But, the ncl snorkelling boats at Kona were very rocky, according to those we talked to. The Fairwind wa a 60 foot catamarran, and some folks, especially kids, did have trouble with motion sickness.

We did both have "the patch." This requires a doctor's prescription, but was not covered by our HMO, for us it was $25/pp. We really slept great, the slight movement of the ship helped. We never noticed when we got on shore, perhaps because we were in port almost every day.

As for the weather, we were very lucky, other than a couple of sprinkles now and then, that was it! A couple of things we learned: "partly cloudy" in the midwest means some sun and some clouds, in Hawaii it means a little bit of everything. As for the webcab, it seems to point out and upward toward the clouds at the higher elevations. Usually, it was sunny at our elevation, and the rest of the way around the 360 degrees, that the web cab didn't show.

Liquor on board: I read the message boards endlessly about this, but in the end we chose not to take anything on board. We saw none "confiscated" on Sunday or at any other port. We did however buy three bottles of Tedeshi wine at the Whaler's Store at the Lahaina pier. We made no effort to conceal it, because we figured if ncl kept it til Sunday, we didn't care, since we bought it to bring home. Well, when we put the bag through the xray machine, the guy checking it looked up at me and winked. Then, he said "Enjoy your coffee, don't drink it all at once!" However, on Saturday night we noticed a letter in the mail slot for the folks next door, the top of it said something about "bringing intoxicating beverages on board, per ncl's written policy." Whatever they may have been about, perhaps it was hit or miss, who got caught.

Our Romance Package: We ordered this because it seemed like a good value, champagne and chocoalte covered strawberries upon arrival, wine and a guaranteed reservation and no cover charge at LeBistro and appetizers that day too. This did provide us with some alcohol on board, so that was part of the reason we didn't bring any on board. The appetizers did not appeal to us (caviar and
raw salmon.) We booked our reservation at Le Bistro as soon as we arrived on Sunday, in fact we were the first on the list. Come Wednesday night, when we arrived they seated us at the entrance by the maitre d' stand and the kitchen. We asked for a different table, and then we were seated in the back, next to the serving stand where they tossed salads and flamed desserts. There was a very noisy group of 20 people who took over the restaurant, so we could hardly talk. the staff seemed most interested in the tip from that group, rather than in how our meal went, We were rushed in and oup in less than an hour! The folks next to us had to beg to have coffee before dessert. We both had the surf & turf as it was lobster night (we had to pay $5 extra for that). the creme brulee was wonderful, but my dh had a flamed dessert which he said was cold and had turned to sugar by the
time he got it. We had told ncl several times that the 21st was our 25th anni, but it went by unnoticed by them. Every other night the staff sang "let me call you sweetheart" while delivering a cake, but not for us. Good thing we did not count on them to have a happy anniversary! We did however get a startard note re a "honeymooners" champagne toast and cake at 9:30am on Monday. We would have felt out of place going to that.

Food: in general, it was quite good, but not great. Our tastes are simple, we're not into lamb, duck, pate, etc. I ate fish the whole week, except for the filet at Le Bistro on wed night, and then I had it again on Friday at Versailles, just to see ~ and yes, the meat is exactly the same in both restaurants. The only time I was not happy with the fish was a Endless Summer, i had the Rock Cod. The trout almondine at lunch in Versailles was great.

We ate at Aqua one night and it was as good as Versailles. Versailles was sometimes noisy, but we never waited anywhere anytime for a table. On Sunday night/Sailaway Day, we ate at the Teppanyaki table, which was fine. There were two other couples there, and no one at Ginza. It appeared easy to walk into specialty restaurants at any time. Mostly, we were on shore in the morning, then had a late, usually light lunch at Versailles upon our return.

One day when my dh wanted to try lunch at some place other than versailles, we checked out the poolside grill. It was 12:15pm and there were a few old hamburgers sitting there, and nothing else appealing, so we passed on that. The Market Cafe buffet was equally ininspiring, but then, I'm not one for buffets when I can be served. We tried room service for breakfast once. It was not that great, especially since we in a balcony cabin, could only order cold food. It arrived ten minutes late, but they called to say it was on its way. No problem for us, as we were already awake.

Another time I ordered a caesar salad and a chocolate mousse [img]http://messages.cruisecritic.com/infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif[/img] and iced tea, while my dh was at a noon movie. They said it would take at least 45 minutes, so I went down to the Shore Excursion desk to book the post cruise natural history tour (no line), and appearently they delivered it in only 20 minutes and I missed it. When I finally called about it, they resent it immediately.

We ate breakfast at the buffet the morning we were arriving early at Hilo, and it was the only time we felt like we were on board with 4571 other people ~ I 'm sure they were all at the buffet at the same moment. Ugh! We also tried it on Saturday morning, again for my dh, by the time we got our food and found a place to eat (out by the pool) everything was cold! Other than that, we ate breakfast at Versailles, including on the morning of departure. We had a lovely. leisurely, breakfast, as always by the windows. Then, we headed back to our cabin to pick up our carryon luggage. So, we never felt pushed to leave the ship.

"Night Life" & bars ~ we can't comment much on this, since we are not late night people. We went to the two musical shows and the Cirque d' Asia. They were quite good. But, we resented that peoplewere allowed to come in for 30 minutes after the shows started, as it was very distracting and contrary to ncl "policy." Since we went to the early show, those who were late could have just waited until the late show. We would have liked to go to the Newlywed Game, but it was on when we were at the Le Bistro for our "wonderful" anniversary dinner. We never did catch it on TV, but we did enjoy seeing the daily 5pm show with Kieron on tv at our leisure. We made a point to go to the Talent Show at the Spinnaker Lounge on saturday night, after what we had read here on the boards. But, (no offense to the THREE participants) it just wasn't that great. While we waited for that to start, we saw the "Who wants to become a gazillionaire". It was funny, partly because of the participants, but also because of the staff person leading it.

The Spa: On Monday when we were at sea, I decided to get a hot stone massage. I called and talked to "Brian," who, I believe could sell ice cubes to eskimos. [img]http://messages.cruisecritic.com/infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif[/img] He "talked me into" getting a facial too. It was a lovely afternoon. (I was making up for a recently cancelled spa trip to Tucson with a girlfriend, who suddenly needed surgery.) I didn't feel especially pressured to buy product. That's the nature of that business, I did get some moisturizer which is supposed to tone down "high color." In my case, we skin has a constant red tone to it, making me always look sunburned. I LOVE it. In retrospect, if I had paid attention to the advice on these boards, then the proce would have gone down significantly as the week wore on. But, I just wanted to enjoy the sea day.

Service; Almost to the person, we found everyone to be kind and hospitable (Le Bistro being the exception.) The half a dozen times we stopped at the reception desk at the Atrium, the staff was always helpful and answered our questions quickly and efficiently. (Contrary to what we have read on these boards.) The one time we went to the excursion desk, there was no line and Elizabeth was pleasant and helpful.

Misc.:
1) The tap water on board seemed very good to us. We kept refilling our water bottles, unless we were on shore and wanted more, cold water.
2)

Our Favorite times: Number 1: On Saturday afternoon, we sat by the windows at the Spinaker (all alone) overlooking the cove/harbor at Nawilliwilli drinking Margaritas, just enjoying the fabulous view and recalling the highlights of our vacation. Number 2: the times we sat on our deck just relaxing and enjoying the views, especially on the day the passed by beautiful Molokai.

[Jeannette]

Thanks for the great review, MNStar!

We are also in MN and will be on th Star to Alaska in August.

[img]http://escati.linkopp.net/cgi-bin/countdown.cgi?trgb=000000&srgb=00ff00&prgb=800080&cdt=2004;08;08;16;00;00&timezone=GMT-0800[/img]
NCL Star 8/8/2004
NCL Norway 2002
Carnival Triumph 2000

[cruisingfromMN]

Hi MNStar, Thanks for posting your review. I have been watching the boards for your return and was thinking about you all last week? Glad you had a good time but wished your Le Bistro experience was better. Did you attend a CC meeting and if so, how was it? Did you get a chance to meet Eby and deliver the pictures for me? Looking forward to hearing. Thanks.

[mnstar]

Hi, Cruisingfrommn ~
My apologies! I was planning to send you a message off line, but then realized I must have deleted your email address.

The short answer: yes, we met Eby and he was pleased about your pictures. (PS ~ You are a lovely family!)

The long answer: Almost the first person we "met" on The Ship was Eby! He was the wine sommelier / salesperson in The Atrium on Sunday afternoon. Of course (!) we bought wine from him, the whole while I am thinking, "boy, he sure looks familiar!" But, I didn't notice his nametag. A few minutes later, I said to my dh, "that was Eby!" So, we turned around and went back to talk to him again, even though we didn't have the pictures with us. He was soooo pleased! He suggested we meet up with him at the Ginza, where he was working evenings. He said he would give me his address for you. We ate dinner that first evening at the Teppanyaki table, but we didn't see him, probably because there was almost no one in the Ginza. Every evening after that we looked for him there, but never saw him. The Ginza was almost empty all week long, so that might have had something to do with it! So, finally, on the last night, I had to just leave your pictures for him at the maitre d' stand at Ginza. So, unfortunately, I did not get to take a picture of him for you, nor did I get to get his address for you. Our best laid plans were not quite meant to be.

Thanks, we did have a very nice time last week. Perhaps because it was our first cruise we had nothing to compare it to. But, we were determined to have a good time, no matter what! Or ALMOST no matter what!

As for the CC meeting, we agreed to meet the "sassycassie's" ahead of time, after dinner on departure night, after they celebrated their 25th at Le Bistro and we ate at Teppanyaki. We met at Gatsby's. We were the only ones there, as Roger Carr played the piano in the background. They are the most lovely couple! We enjoyed the several times we got together with them during the cruise.

The "official" CC meeting was Monday at 6pm at the Bier Garten. No one else came (Olson 1960 where were you?). Five of the top staff, all but the captain, stopped by to visit with us for a few minutes so that was nice. Then we wnt to Endless Summer with the Sassycassie's for dinner. A lovely time was had by all!

Thanks again for all your encouragement, cruisingfrommn! We were pleased to meet Eby, and glad to deliver your pictures.

mnstar (aka Susan Tofteland)

[bambam]

Susan,
Sounds like you really enjoyed yourself. Thank you for the trip down memory lane!! [img]http://messages.cruisecritic.com/infopop/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]

BAMnJAM
Carnival Imagingation '96
RCC Majesty '98
Sun Princess '00
NCL Star '04

Cruisin's not just an adventure, it's an Attitude!!
Proud member (x2) of the PPS - yeah!!

[cruisingfromMN]

Mnstar, Thank you so much for getting the pictures to Eby. My family was pleased to hear that you met him! He is a nice guy. Too bad about not getting his address. He did not want to give it out in March because of the uncertainty of his location due to the broken pod and the drydock situation. He has ours though and he said when they reached smooth sailing in Alaska that he would send us a postcard. Thanks again we really appreciate all your help.

[sassycassie]

mnstar:

Great review!! You put it down just right. We will try to do a review, too, but that will take awhile--have to get all our thoughts together, and it will take a few days to get some sleep, and unpack. As with every one else, took way too much stuff. At least the only thing forgotten was some after shave lotion, which we could easily replace at the ever present ABC store!!

It was too bad more folks didn't get to the CC get together we had on Monday. All the ship's big guns except the Captain were there representing NCL. The Hotel Director, the Cruise Director, the Food and Beverage Director, and the Asst. Cruise Director. Really, all the pax related officers were present. They were more than cordial, and spent considerable of their very valuable time talking to us and giving us real insight to how this very complicated cruise thing gets done. More on this in our review.

Mnstar--you folks were a major part in making this cruise enjoyable and really fun for us. These CC boards get credit for that--and, therefore, contributing a big part to our positive crusie experience.

Aloha All

Sassycassie

[sassycassie]

mnstar:

Your email domain is "overloaded" again. Is NCL still sending you all those TA confirmations?!? Wow. Will keep trying to send the email. Mahalo for all the good times and your welcome home.

sassycassie

[minnesota pam]

I'm glad you had a good time. Reading it made me want to do it all over again and do things we didn't get a chance to do.
Now, if only our spring weather here in Minnesota would get a little warmer.
Thanks for your review.

minnesota pam[img]http://escati.linkopp.net/cgi-bin/countdown.cgi?trgb=000000&srgb=00ff00&prgb=191970&cdt=2004;3;28;20;00;00&timezone=GMT-1000[/img]
Countin until heaven on the STAR TO HAWAII

NCL Sunward II 1986
Carnival Festivale 1989
NCL Windward 1995
RCCL Rhapsody of the Seas 1998
NCL Sky 2000
NCL Star 2004