Getaway Aug 1 - First Timers With NCL Review

[JimHam4]

Take your time, your job comes first because that's how you can pay for another cruise! Enjoying your review so far.

 

You're exactly right! Alaska is coming up for us in May and that is going to be a little pricey.

[JimHam4]

Following. Thanks for sharing your experiences.

 

My wife and I will be on the Getaway in three weeks and your review is only making me more excited. I only booked the cruise a couple weeks ago, but there's been a lot of anticipation--just crammed into a shorter amount of time:)

 

Cheers.

 

Enjoy your cruise. If I don't finish before you leave and you have a question about something please ask and I'll answer best I can.

[JimHam4]

Any moe info on the MDR menu? Do they offer shrimp appetizer? see any shellfish items?

how slow/fast was the service?

Thanks

 

Sorry I didn't take any pictures of the menu but if you google looking for getaway menus I know I was able to find them floating around on the internet. There were shellfish items in the specialty restaurants and they would have special nights in the free restaurants. One of those was shellfish but I don't remember if it was just at the buffet. Service everywhere was good, sometimes more leisurely than others but I only felt it was slow once and that was at O'Sheehans.

[darienill]

Sorry I didn't take any pictures of the menu but if you google looking for getaway menus I know I was able to find them floating around on the internet. There were shellfish items in the specialty restaurants and they would have special nights in the free restaurants. One of those was shellfish but I don't remember if it was just at the buffet. Service everywhere was good, sometimes more leisurely than others but I only felt it was slow once and that was at O'Sheehans.

 

excellent suggestion. did find menus on google from 2014. just about what I expected. MDR looks pretty boring and O sheehans was slow always. I think the staff is over worked IMHO. causes slower service with fewer people serving you. Trying to figure out a bill at specialty restaurants with everybody having different packages must be a zoo.

[JimHam4]

excellent suggestion. did find menus on google from 2014. just about what I expected. MDR looks pretty boring and O sheehans was slow always. I think the staff is over worked IMHO. causes slower service with fewer people serving you. Trying to figure out a bill at specialty restaurants with everybody having different packages must be a zoo.

 

I think you're right about O'Sheehans for the most part, but there were times we were sitting there waiting and a couple of staff members were just standing around prepping service items and salt shakers. A manager finally went and told them to take care of us. Don't know if that's a breakdown in the hostess telling the staff their responsibilities or the staff lacking initiative to see there are customers not being served. All in all though not really a big deal, I was on vacation.

 

I think it would probably be VERY difficult to figure out a bill with all the different packages. Here is what they had to go through for us at Le Bistro. I prepaid a party of 8. I informed them two days before the child would not be with us so it is now a party of 7 (charge my prepay for 7, give me credit for 1). At the meal 3 had the UDP (now charge me for 4, give me credit for 4). I'd like to have my BIL and SIL pay their own check (charge me for 2, my BIL for 2, credit me for 5). Two in my group on the UDP ordered the premium (charge me for 2, my BIL for 2, credit me for 5 and maybe charge the UDP people $20 unless premium is included).

 

The simple way would have been to just have guest services when I went there to remove my niece (they wouldn't do it, said to do it at the table) credit back my whole prepayment walk in clean to the restaurant and take each person's keycard to charge their meal. I have a feeling the prepay people don't talk to the individual restaurants though.

[darienill]

JIMHAM

Is your signature picture a photo of a dog of some type?

[JimHam4]

JIMHAM

Is your signature picture a photo of a dog of some type?

 

It's my Miniature Schnauzer back when he was a pup. He's an old man now but our Bulldog keeps him on his toes. I'd use a picture of her but she's so ugly it hurts.:p

[JimHam4]

Day 4 - St. Thomas

 

Today is our first port day of the trip and it’s our stop in St. Thomas. We’d been here about 10 years ago on our Carnival cruise and my oldest and I had gone SCUBA diving while my wife took the younger two to the beach so this time we decided to try ziplining. I booked the Tree Limin Ziplining trip through ship after checking them out online and finding the price difference was only about $10 a person. For the peace of mind of not missing the ship and letting someone else worry about transportation I figured it was worth it to go through NCL. The tour is only supposed to last 3-4 hours so we take one a little later in the morning to let us enjoy breakfast on the ship.

 

After eating we make our way down to the gangplank to leave the ship. This morning they are using the forward gangplank located on deck four to get off the ship (I always thought this would be the only gangplank to use but in Nassau they opened up the rear gangplank also). The rear elevators only get us to deck five so we walk forward from there and then use the stairs down to four. The forward elevators go down to four but are more crowded. Leaving a little later in the morning there is no crowd to leave the ship, we just scan our keycards and away we go. Once off the ship we find a guide holding up a sign for our tour and we find seats under a canopy while we wait to board our transportation. While we wait we are handed Ipads to review and sign our liability releases. Once everyone is there we are load onto an open air taxi (a pickup truck/van hybrid) and driven to the ziplining site. The trip up and over the mountain gives us a beautiful view of the Getaway and the harbor, and the ziplining site gives another beautiful view out the other side of the island; luckily we get a cooling breeze up there too.

 

We unload and meet our guide at Tree Limin. All the staff here is very friendly and fun but seem to be very aware of your safety and act professionally. We start out in an open air building where we are fitted with helmets and harnesses. There are bandanas for sale to wear under your helmet, not really necessary, but we buy a couple as souvenirs since they have the company logo on them and come in lots of different colors. There are also lockers for rent if you need to stash some bags but they do allow you to take a lot of your stuff with you if you want to risk it. I rent a gopro camera to attach to my helmet for about $25 including a memory card (you keep the card when you leave). Your attachment to the zipline here is a little different than I’ve seen in other places. They use a metal trolley that you carry from line to line instead of hanging from a bungee cord type of harness. It’s not heavy, nobody in our group (including seniors and younger teens) had a problem with it but it is something that occupies one of your hands when you're walking from place to place (you cradle it like a baby).

 

We are loaded into a Pinzgauer ( a funny looking six wheeled vehicle) and taken to the top of the course after listening to a short operations and safety lecture. The course is a lot of fun with various ziplines and two swinging bridges to cross and on the last zipline you slide forward and backward a few times until they bring a ladder out to the center of the line and unhook you. After the final zip you walk down a short distance to a little gift shop to return your gear and buy any souvenirs you might want; we never felt any pressure to buy anything. We have a little bit of a wait while the rest of our group finishes up and then we are loaded back into a van to take us back to the port. We are given coupons for a free drink for a bar called “da Lime in da Coconut” and of course this is where the taxi lets us out. Tree Limin was a lot of fun and everyone seemed to have a good time I would highly recommend it as something different to do away from the beach and we still got back to port with time to shop and have lunch. They have a very good website that answers a lot of questions.

 

Arriving back at the port we decided we were hungry but didn’t want to go back onto the ship just yet. Should have known better but I decide I’d like to try the Senor Frogs here in St. Thomas (I’ve been to Puerto Vallarta, Vegas, and Orlando). The first problem is getting there; it’s at the complete opposite side of the port from where we are let off and becomes quite a walk in the heat. Senor Frogs in St. Thomas is an open air restaurant with a small swimming pool in front for people to use (nobody was when we were there). There is some kind of cooling going on but it just made the heat tolerable not like you would feel in an enclosed restaurant. Service is friendly and the DJ is playing music we like and having a good time interacting with the crowd. There aren’t a lot of people here, I think it’s not the direction people tend to walk when they leave their ships. We enjoy nachos and burgers with a few drinks. Food is decent and hits the spot after a long morning, but it’s a little expensive, a little over $200 for the five of us with only three of us having a couple of drinks. Remember I said we loved trivia? Well the DJ decides to have a TV theme song contest with the prize being a shot poured down your throat when you get a question right. We have fun keeping our mouths shut but knowing most of the songs until my oldest decides she has to get credit for at least one right answer. Problem is she doesn’t drink and the DJ allows her to designate a drinker - ME! Okay, I can drink with the best of them but this was some nasty blackberry liqueur thing that was way to sweet and thick for a hot Caribbean afternoon. Of course if it had been Rum I probably wouldn’t have made it back to the boat! Bottoms up, I stand in the middle of the bar with my head tilted up while the DJ pours and pours directly into my mouth while I gulp it down for a few seconds. My wife and kids get a good laugh out of it so I guess it was worth it. We finish up our meal and head back into the shopping area.

 

I think shopping in St. Thomas is a little tricky, you have to know your prices back home. Browsing the camera stores I saw a few things with slightly lower prices and if you’re not paying sales tax you’re saving even more. But I saw just as many items that were equal to or more than I would have paid at home. Example, just before leaving home I bought an underwater housing for my smaller Nikon camera. Hunting around the internet I found it on clearance at B&H for just over $100, regularly almost $800 and still selling for at least half that everywhere else. In St. Thomas it was running between $300-$500. So you could get a deal, but you may be able to find a better deal at home, just do your homework; I found similar prices/deals on some of the surf wear and sandals. We pick up some souvenirs for friends back home and some clothing for ourselves and head back to the ship.

 

Getting back on board is simple and quick, we are offered iced towels to cool down with was we board. The kids have reservations at Cagney’s this evening (taking advantage of the UDP) and my wife and I have no plans so make do with the buffet. After dinner we meet up and I am told Cagney’s was the most wonderful meal they have had and they are ready to burst. Even though they’re girls my kids can put away food like linebackers so the portions must have been huge. They said the steaks alone were plenty but of course they had to try several of the sides. With no room left they still ordered the Oreo cheesecake claiming it was the best dessert the entire cruise.

 

We head to Bliss, the lounge that is doing Karaoke this evening. It also is serving as a venue for the kid’s club for some events so we have to wait a bit while they change the room over. Once we settle in the crew member in charge sets out a list for everyone to sign up with the song they want to sing. Everyone seems to be having a good time and there is a wide variety of songs being performed, both in groups and solos; my oldest performs Black Horse and a Cherry Tree. My only complaint here would be something I feel all over the Getaway. It feels like a lot of venues are being repurposed to handle events they weren’t built for, either that or they were poorly designed. Bliss for example is perfect as a small dance club with the dance floor at one side, high tops and couches to sit at and a bar against one wall; but for a stage type performance the seating was inadequate and most of it couldn’t see the performance area. It’s not a big deal really, but if I’m designing a bright new shiny ship I’d like my designers to take more of the usage concerns into account.

 

That’s all for tonight, tomorrow Tortola where we hope to find some beautiful beaches.