1st Time - Last Time

[debache]

I'm sure the Titanic passengers would beg to differ. :eek: (That was inappropriate, I know. *hangs head in shame*)

 

Funny, I love it...

[johnmpcny]

If someone wants to come on here and tell people how bad a cruise was, I would be more than happy to take their review into consideration along with all other reviews when booking a cruise, if they give details. If they don't want to give details, then their comments will be ignored, because there is no basis for their derogatory comments. For all I know, they could have hated their cruise, because they got dirt on their shoes.

 

LOL yep you sure ignored it! 4 pages in and counting, most often after 2 pg it is just the same old 1000+ posters arguing the same old augments over and over again.

[kylenyc]

Unless you've seen a real flap jack rabbit or had one in a stew, and done so many times, and with a variety of toppings, syrups, and furry creatures, you can't possibly have a valid opinion on one. With that, I retract my opinion on the aforementioned cute furry creature... DOH that was a blanket positive opinion too so I must be a flap jack rabbit cheerleader. :p

[bear3412]

Only on CC. Entertaining, informative, funny, and cruel all in the same thread. :D

 

No wonder it's bookmarked. lol.

 

Happy Sailing to all, whichever line you find yourself aboard. :)

[Partyatsea]

Actually I'd like to thank the OP for such a descriptive and informative post. At least now I have time to cancel my next cruise :)

[NLH Arizona]

[quote name='johnmpcny']LOL yep you sure ignored it! 4 pages in and counting, most often after 2 pg it is just the same old 1000+ posters arguing the same old augments over and over again.[/quote]
I ignore their comments. At least I was civil and didn't bash or belittle the OP, like you are trying to belittle me.

[Senior Sea Dog]

I would like to share my humble opinion of this cruise as I too was on this
BTB cruise. I participated in the Roll Call where I read several post by original OP. I suggest you might check the OP posts and mine too if you wish. I attended both weeks Meet and Greets. They were attended by the Capt, HD and his staff and cruise director. Phone number were given out and all questions answered. I had a couple of small problems which were handled quickly to my satisfaction.
On the positive side I had many positive interaction with crew, for example when my wife asked the MaitreD in buffet about cold soup he introduced me to Executive Chef. He asked when and where I wanted it. We had it three different times in different venues and could have had it more as we asked each time they saw us. The excursion director, the room steward and waiter in LeBistro all went above and beyond their jobs. JMO
SSD

[kcwingwalker]

[quote name='Senior Sea Dog']I would like to share my humble opinion of this cruise as I too was on this
BTB cruise. I participated in the Roll Call where I read several post by original OP. I suggest you might check the OP posts and mine too if you wish. I attended both weeks Meet and Greets. They were attended by the Capt, HD and his staff and cruise director. Phone number were given out and all questions answered. I had a couple of small problems which were handled quickly to my satisfaction.
On the positive side I had many positive interaction with crew, for example when my wife asked the MaitreD in buffet about cold soup he introduced me to Executive Chef. He asked when and where I wanted it. We had it three different times in different venues and could have had it more as we asked each time they saw us. The excursion director, the room steward and waiter in LeBistro all went above and beyond their jobs. JMO
SSD[/quote]

Thank you for sharing your experience! Always nice to hear that someone has had a great cruise:)

[DaisyGoldberg]

I was on this cruise also and will write a review next week. I had a great time, but there were several times during the week where organization/communication among staff appeared to fall apart, causing long lines and aggravation for passengers. Perhaps the OP was caught up in one of those.

Docking at Saint John was probably the most egregious example -- everyone on a tour gathered as requested in the showroom and at one point the gentleman in charge indicated that he had gotten the all clear that we were docked and started announcing tour groups that should proceed to the hall and onward to disembark.

We were the third tour announced (and it was just HOHO, so we weren't terribly rushed). We got out into the hallway and proceded to wait a good 40 minutes. Obviously the line was not moving at all. Eventually word got back through the line that we were NOT ready to disembark at all, as the shore crew was having problems attaching the gangways. Saint John is a difficult port with the changing tides (in fact we were already an hour late going in because of tides) and for whatever reason they couldn't fit the gangway to the correct doorway -- up and down, up and down.

After about 40 minutes, I took my 76 year old mom down the hall and we grabbed a window seat to sit out the wait. From the window seat we could see that not only were there several hundred passengers in the tour line, but that the walk off gangway line was also well underway and hundreds of people were in that line. There was one key scanner on each side, so even once they got the lines going progress was super slow. There was also a medical evacuation, which only momentarily halted the line -- I hope that gentleman is okay.

Eventually (half hour later) things appeared to have moved along enough that we went back to the "tour" line. At that point it appeared to have been converted to general passengers, so they took one look at our tour ticket and let us through, then closed the line behind us (or at least marked it with an employee for some reason).

Once we were on the pier we then had to wait another hour for a shuttle bus to the main terminal where the pink buses were waiting, as the HOHO bus could only carry 70 at a time, it was about a 20 minute round trip trip to the terminal, and there were several hundred in line.

Again, we had HOHO (our first selection had been canceled the night before for "mechanical issues" so we chose HOHO), and we opted out of the first long wait after a while, so we weren't terribly put out, especially since it was a beautiful day. But there were MANY disgrunted people in both lines, and on an itinerary with so many elderly people, standing for 90 minutes at a time in close quarters was stressful.

I really enjoyed my vacation, but there were several times when I wondered why they weren't taking perfectly practical steps to alleviate bad situations. For example, in the Saint John situation, people should have been directed back to the showroom to wait in comfortable seating. Yes, they would have grumbled, but they would not have been grumbling while standing in dangerously close quarters for an hour. Likewise, the chaos int he showroom even on regular days could have been alleviated by marking specific areas with tour signs so that as each tour was announced people left together, instead of everybody crowding together and then climbing over each other as their tours were called. That's how it was done on POA, I believe, and it worked great.


Crew members should also have been on the ground in port (or over the PA on the ship while people were in line) giving direction. More than one person in our hour-plus line for the shuttle into town learned after an hour that it was ONLY for HOHO passengers, and all HOHO had been sold for that day (multiple ships in town). So people got off the ship, learned they were not in downtown Saint John at all, sought the shuttle line, waited an hour, then learned they had to walk for 20 mins or get a cab -- except there were no cabs.

None of this ruined my vacation, but it may have been a situation that the OP was caught up in which soured his impression of NCL. I have some sour memories of my Princess cruise, too, so I guess we're all entitled.

Won't hesitate to sail NCL again. Things happen. Vacations are what you make of them.

[NLH Arizona]

Thanks for letting us know what happend to you and your family at this port, I'm sure it was very frustrating and could have been handled differently; hopefully NCL learned from this experience. Hopefully, the other ports went smoother.

[petesweet]

[quote name='QuiGonJohn'] As long as the food isn't horrible, I'll manage.[/quote]
[SIZE=4]Then you'll manage just fine. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=4]You don't HAVE to pay for extra stuff. I usually cruise without paying anything extra but gratuities.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=4]I prefer traditional dining, and you won't have that option on NCL. Otherwise, you should have a great cruise.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=4]Happy sails.:)[/SIZE]

[SIZE=4]Kathy[/SIZE]

[petesweet]

[quote name='hamgela']I'm glad to see a few of you coming to NCL's defense. We are cruising with them in November. it will be our first time cruising with them and I'm nervous as it is. Not because I've heard anything bad about them, just because I've never cruised with them. We have cruised on RCCL and CCL and I have nothing bad to say about either. I've had a few people tell me they weren't a fan of carnival but personally, we love carnival. feels like home to me! I try not to read too much into negative reviews because I think we're pretty easy to please people and my guess is our experience will be good regardless of the cruise line because we're going to be on a CRUISE! And we love cruising![/quote]
[SIZE=4]Attitude is 99 percent.:) Have a great cruise.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=4]Kathy[/SIZE]

[LMaxwell]

[quote name='DaisyGoldberg'] Vacations are what you make of them.[/quote]

Thank you for your very informative response to those looking at this thread. It is great information. But your last line seems to be sort of directly against the first 9 out of 10 paragraphs you had. It certainly seems to me that poorly run guest flow at crunch times is more of what NCL made of it (as you well illustrated) versus whatever you can choose to make of it.

You can choose a good attitude or bad attitude, but the cruise line most certainly plays a large part in making a vacation what it is or isn't.

Anyways, I look forward to your upcoming review. I haven't gone on NCL yet but I like a lot of their itineraries so I lurk here a lot. The first poster gave no useful information or comparison / baseline.

[MommaBear55]

To the posters who say CCL feels like home, all I can say is your home is way cooler than mine. I still have to cook, clean, do dishes, make my own bed.

That is why any day on a cruise is better than a day at home.

And I love pancake bunny.

[NH Cruisers]

[quote name='LMaxwell']Thank you for your very informative response to those looking at this thread. It is great information. But your last line seems to be sort of directly against the first 9 out of 10 paragraphs you had. It certainly seems to me that poorly run guest flow at crunch times is more of what NCL made of it (as you well illustrated) versus whatever you can choose to make of it.

You can choose a good attitude or bad attitude, but the cruise line most certainly plays a large part in making a vacation what it is or isn't.

Anyways, I look forward to your upcoming review. I haven't gone on NCL yet but I like a lot of their itineraries so I lurk here a lot. The first poster gave no useful information or comparison / baseline.[/quote]
Any of the lines and confusion folks talk about being caught in with not much communication from the staff, I have experiences on every cruise line I have sailed at some point. Mass market lines, it happens. Don't want that? Cruise on a small ship for a lot more money.

[Mr Robberts]

Well I for one will not miss the op let them sail Cunard it will give me mor room for my popcorn slash snow cone slash king size Seta perfect sleeper life boat mattress slash jet ski

[gene48]

I was also on the Dawn Boston Quebec B2B. First time on NCL but not the last. We thought the entertainment was great especially the magician and acrobats. Food was good except the soups. Highly recommend this cruise, lots of interesting ports.

Gene

[SissasMomE]

[quote name='Demonyte']By looking at their previous posts before the cruise about NCL, unfortunately I think that they had made up (at least unconsciously) their mind about NCL and hence they found all kinds of problems onboard that others didn't even notice or didn't care - here on the board we saw this happen recently with an another person and their bloated expectations vs actual experience onboard.

[/QUOTE]

She who shall be nameless :D

[SissasMomE]

[quote name='triptolemus']Well...

[IMG]http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_0B0VEm_uRcA/TPLhoaUdLEI/AAAAAAAAAAM/FZGrZtvy_eU/s1600/bunny.jpg[/IMG]

:confused:[/QUOTE]

Awww, I want a rabbit with a pancake on his head. Best post yet!

[SissasMomE]

What is a HOHO tour?

I never really understood the "my cruise was horrible" posts. Unless, God forbid, there was a tragedy or the ship sank or something ... then I can understand that. I never really had a "bad" cruise. I've had cruises where the service crew were not friendly (only Princess), but it definitely didn't ruin my vacation. I'm not that old, but I definitely have learned over the years that how you react to something dictates the outcome. Maybe just ... go with it next time instead of getting so upset? The cruise line didn't lose out. You are the only one who did :(

[faymuiheng]

ok...now this made me laugh... :p


[quote name='bear3412']Only on CC. Entertaining, informative, funny, and cruel all in the same thread. :D :)[/quote]

[SteveH2508]

[quote name='SissasMomE']What is a HOHO tour?

[/quote]

Hop-On Hop-Off bus tours.

[SissasMomE]

[quote name='SteveH2508']Hop-On Hop-Off bus tours.[/QUOTE]

Thank you :o

[B6ConMe]

[quote name='SissasMomE']What is a HOHO tour?

I never really understood the "my cruise was horrible" posts. Unless, God forbid, there was a tragedy or the ship sank or something ... then I can understand that. I never really had a "bad" cruise. I've had cruises where the service crew were not friendly (only Princess), but it definitely didn't ruin my vacation. I'm not that old, but I definitely have learned over the years that how you react to something dictates the outcome. Maybe just ... go with it next time instead of getting so upset? The cruise line didn't lose out. You are the only one who did :([/QUOTE]

Thanks for asking that ? about HOHO, I wondered if it was the Hop on hop off. We've done a lot of road trips and love using the HOHO in new cities/areas we visit.

I totally agree with what you're saying about "how you react to something dictates the outcome". Having travelled throughout the US & Canada, coast to coast we've come across many situations which had the potential to have a negative impact on our travels but... in the end you have to move on. A smile goes a long way in making you feel better and possibly changing how the situation turns out too. We're finding it's the same on cruises. We've enjoyed our cruises despite there having been situations we could have done without.

[DaisyGoldberg]

[quote name='LMaxwell']Thank you for your very informative response to those looking at this thread. It is great information. But your last line seems to be sort of directly against the first 9 out of 10 paragraphs you had. It certainly seems to me that poorly run guest flow at crunch times is more of what NCL made of it (as you well illustrated) versus whatever you can choose to make of it. [/quote]

We did a back to back, so if you subtract the two sea days and the two ports we elected to skip, I had 8 flawless or completely unremarkable disembarkations at the other ports. I was just offering a specific example of something that could have messed up somebody's day in a particular port and sour their trip (since the OP didn't really provide specifics).

Once we stepped out of the line and took a seat in one of the big round windows it was interesting to watch the officers take over and put things right. We saw officers here and there throughout the week, but in this case they were scrambling and running the show in a way I didn't see at any other port -- perhaps a crowd control drill? :)