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Review - Norwegian Sun Oct 2-13 Mexican Riviera

bccanadamom

By bccanadamom,
in Norwegian Cruise Line

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bccanadamom

bccanadamom

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Thanks to everyone for all the great advice I found on here before our cruise... here is some post-holiday commentary from our holiday. For perspective, we like to travel and generally chose upscale hotels and resorts (not ultra-luxury but generally 4-5 star - think Fairmont or Westin Resorts). We eat out a ton and again, prefer higher end dining but don't typically go for "gourmet" or anything too fussy. We've been on Royal Caribbean before (Mexico), as well as Celebrity (Alaska) and Disney (Mexico again). I'll split this up into sections to make it easier to scan for relevant info:

 

Embarking:

Boy, San Diego is a great port to cruise out of - it was literally a 7 minute taxi ride from the airport to our hotel the night before the cruise and another 7 minute ride to the port the morning of. We did shuttles both times ($40 each way for 5 of us, a taxi would have been less). Hotels were super expensive though - we ended up booking using starwood points at the four points downtown (not a great hotel but not terrible - middle of the road and fine for one quick night). We had 11am arrival at the pier booked and it was too early... dropoff of luggage was super quick with the porters but we ended up in a long line outside the terminal (maybe 20 plus minutes or so) - once inside things went quick and we were on the ship around 1230 I would say, with our rooms ready - if we had a do-over (I wish!) we would probably arrive at the pier around 130pm or so instead - there didn't seem to be a line outside by then.

 

Rooms:

We had 2 connecting balcony B3 family staterooms booked. They were great - plenty of room for my husband, 6 year old son and I in one with my parents in the next one. The balcony was awesome, too bad the connecting rooms don't have connecting balconies. I watched and waited patiently to see about a suite upgrade but the pricing never really came down much - and in the end we were just fine in our rooms and glad we didn't pay the extra. I read lots of comments about the dreaded shower - honestly, it was just fine for us (I am 5'8 and pretty average size) - no issues with the shower curtain, and the water temp and pressure were awesome (we did leave the b'room door open when showering which probably helped). There were plenty of shelves to hold toiletries - and I also bought a hanging cosmetic case which worked awesome to keep things tidy (there are 4 hooks on the bathroom door). Both my parents and I found that there was tons of storage space in the cabin - the shelves & baskets in the closet were awesome, tons of hangers, then two 3-drawer dressers and two cabinets to store stuff, plus more shelves throughout... we had 3 large suitcases plus toys etc and easily stored everything neatly away. Lots of pictures showed an old-school tv but it was a newer flatscreen with decent size and we got most of the NFL games on tv, plus 2 movie channels (with pretty limited choices). We only had the tv on once or twice though and spent little time in the room aside from bedtime. Our son slept on the pullout couch - it was a great setup - it is perpendicular to the bed - very hard and I wouldn't want to sleep on it but perfect for kids. Our AC was super inadequate at the start of the cruise - we called maintenance and they came down within an hour and made some adjustments and it was better (never really cold, but I think we had a hot streak even for Mexico and it was always comfortable so we were happy). We used the coffee maker every morning, it was great to have, as was the fridge which we just filled with water as we had the beverage package.

 

Dining:

After all the reading about the food I was a bit apprehensive but agree with one of the recent posters on cruise critic - the dining is what you make of it for the most part. Yes, after 11 days the dining room menu was definitely getting tired - but there were always 4-5 "daily" options plus the 4-5 standard options. I think people got tired of seeing the "standards" every day and it makes you feel like it's the same very day but really they do change it up with the specials. However, we were glad we had 4 specialty restaurant nights (we pre-purchased) - and we ended up buying a 5th one, plus we had one fun night just having snacks in the sports bar (great wings as many have said and also decent fish&chips) and ended up in the buffet one night for dinner when we were all bagged (generally, I hate buffets for dinner and this was really was not a winner). One of our few complaints: there HAD to be something wrong with the AC in the buffet - seriously, it was often stifling during the day and night, I don't know how people ate in there, but it was always pretty full (we stayed away like the plague, I didn't even like walking through it, it was that stuffy). The last couple of days were better so I think they had some repairs done or something (but the weather was also cooler those days). We had sub-par service in the DR the first night but the other 3 dinners were great - I think they were having some growing pains the first night perhaps with new staff. We had 2 dinners in Cagneys, 2 dinners in Le Bistro and 1 dinner at the Teppanyaki table. Both Cagneys and Le Bistro were awesome the first night - the second night was good but I think the first was better just because it was first. Honestly, there is a HUGE difference between the service in the dining room and the specialty restaurants. You get way more personalized service, it's faster, friendlier and they just seem to care way more about making you happy. The wine & drinks come faster, the food is super hot and the staff were very personable in all 3 restaurants. I would definitely pre-book at least 1/2 of my dinners in specialty restaurants were I to do NCL again. We didn't do room service, aside from the occasional coffee order the night before with a pastry & hot chocolate for my son. One of our favorites was to get lunch in the "deli" restaurant adjacent to the sports bar (it becomes the meat restaurant at night) - they had a great mini buffet with tuna salad & chicken salad we all loved, along with cold cuts to make your own buns, plus salad, soup and a pizza/pasta bar - we had lunch there pretty much every day. And breakfast rotated - again we often had the breakfast buffet in the same place as lunch (can't remember the name of the place) - sometimes at the great outdoors if it wasn't too hot (many people say that buffet is less crowded and they are RIGHT) - and only once b'fast in the dining room - it was really slow but nice to be served.

We really, really liked the freestyle concept and wouldn't do anything else (with kids) - it was really easy to get into the dining room when we didn't have a reservation, but also easy to get a reservation pretty much anywhere including the DR if we wanted one.

 

Beverage package:

Tons of discussion on this topic so here's our feedback: We thought it was great. We probably drank too much (more than we would have if we were paying per drink), but it was nice to just have what you wanted when you wanted it. We never had/wanted a drink that was more than the covered price (except for the Veuve Cliquot at Le Bistro - at $9 for 3oz it was still a great deal and I had several :) The wine list I thought was awesome, we always found something we liked and there were lots to chose from. You do have to sign for every drink, which I can see some would find annoying... having worked operations mgt I can understand why they want the audit trail. We very often tipped even though it shows right on the bill there is a tip - we just like to acknowledge hard workers and most times added on $1 to our drink orders - there is NO obligation to do this and I don't think it made any difference really to service levels. On that note - the bars were busy at peak times (especially the pool bar) and the service was sometimes slow (like, maybe 1-2 minutes at most to get a drink) - we didn't see it as a problem at all - who wouldn't expect the bars to be busy at the pool on a hot day? Staff were somewhat confused about the bvg package in some places - sometimes they wanted all 4 cards when we were out as a group - after a few days, most times they just looked at all of them to check if we had the package and then put it all on one bill - at the speciality restaurants the drink orders were most seamless - sometimes it was a bit slow in the dining rooms with all the cards & signing but not terrible. (ps not surprisingly there were times around the pool where there was probably some over-indulging - we did hear that the staff dealt with a couple of folks responsibly by cutting them off - no big deal to us but they do seem to be watching for potential problems with the bvg package.)

 

Activities:

We hardly did any. Our son wasn't keen on the kids club - went a few times but would rather play basketball, ping pong and golf with his dad any day so we only had 3 quick visits which were fine - some other kids seemed to take more advantage (there weren't a ton of kids on this cruise).

My mom & I did bingo a couple of times - it was expensive! and the bingo caller was a bit annoying for us - lots of people enjoyed him though - to each his own...

We enjoyed the music briefly in a variety of venues - we really liked the guitar guy. The staff talent show was good - they have a great finale that's worth waiting for. The only evening show we went to was the hypnotist - just okay.

The staff seemed to be working hard to entertain those who wanted it - we were happy to sit by the pool and have a good time with our son and weren't really looking for a lot of involvement. The white party was fun for a bit - I was surprised there weren't more people out for it.

 

The ship:

There are some great places to seek out if you want quiet - my son loved the observation lounge, we managed to sustain his belief that he was really steering the ship from there (that imagination won't last much longer I fear!) During the day it was lovely, quiet and cool there. The pool was very busy on sea days but if you are patient you will find a chair in the sun or shade - some people block chairs for the day but lots of people come & go too - you just have to wait for one to come free. Deck 6 has some quiet lounges in the shade if you don't want to sit next to the pool - they looked nice for reading. We also ended up in the Havana lounge a few times in the afternoon for games - (the library was usually full) - comfy seating & a cool, quiet place for board games. The sports bar was packed during NFL but otherwise was also a nice place to relax with a drink. We thought the ship was just the right size. Staying in the aft we walked the length of it often and were thankful it wasn't too big. And as others have said, you definitely make some acquaintances and get familiar with the staff on this ship. I really liked the decor -it's not too cheesy, the carpets are this really pretty sea-blue and turquoise, there's tons of lovely wood and NO neon or anything too plastic looking. I suppose it's showing it's age in some spots but nothing looked neglected or shabby in my opinion.

 

Excursions:

We had an awesome time at Las Caletas in PV - worth it for us! A great lunch, decent beach for Mexico, but most importantly they were great with our son - he loved the zip lining, the activities and also got to visit the sea lions with his grandma (extra $$$ but worth it). In Acapulco we hired a private driver to pick us up and paid for a day pass at a hotel resort about a 40 minute drive away. With the driver, the pass, lunch & several drinks it was still cheaper than the cruise excursion and AWESOME. We literally had this huge, beautiful resort totally to ourselves, including an enormous pool that no one else was using. In Manzanillo we did the cruise resort excursion which was also worth the $ - I tried to find a resort privately that would do a day pass but didn't get very positive (or any!) responses to my inquiries. We just did a walking tour & paid for the water taxi in Cabo - do the water taxi, it's so cheap & a fun way to spend 45 minutes. Had an awesome lunch at a seafood place on the marina with the BEST margaritas we've had in a long long time.

 

Overall value:

I was really torn between this cruise and going back to a resort in the Mayan Riviera we like - we were glad we chose the cruise. The food & wine were far superior, and we still got some beach days. We missed the beach sometimes but the pool on the ship was nice - not too cold like sometimes they are at the resorts in Mexico. This itinerary was good for us - 3 days at sea was a bit long, but then it is busy with all the days at port after that. I think we booked this October cruise in around August - so pretty much last minute - there were still TONS of rooms left when we booked - we got our son as free 3rd guest and the bvg package. If we could have taken a guarantee balcony we would have gotten something for much less as the date got closer but we really wanted the connecting rooms to spend time with my parents after our son went to bed. So it was worth it for us.

 

Would we do it again? Absolutely - it was very relaxing and we really had no significant frustrations at all... except for my dishwasher breaking the day we got home (sigh)... back to reality! I agree with so many other posters on here - the holiday will be what you make of it - not everything was perfect, but the irritations are minor and easily made up for by the wonderful times we had. 11 days was awesome - at 7 days I was glad we had booked the longer cruise (but honestly, by day 11 we were ready to get home, if we had more than 11 days I would have done a cruise/land holiday rather than a longer cruise for variety).

Edited by bccanadamom
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mugtech

mugtech

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Thanks for the review! I'll be on the Sun going to Alaska and it seems the cruise reviews with this ship are few and far between so I was glad to read yours.

 

We did the 19 day Panama Canal and 10 day Alaska b2b and loved the ship and the crew. We were extremely lucky to have great weather 5/8 to 5/18 in Alaska. Hopefully I could answer any questions you may have about the cruise, keeping in mind we were in an inside cabin but did not feel we missed anything.

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bccanadamom

bccanadamom

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Thanks for the review! I'll be on the Sun going to Alaska and it seems the cruise reviews with this ship are few and far between so I was glad to read yours.

 

I know I searched and searched and didn't find many reviews either (I research stuff WAY too much) - we had a great time and really liked the ship, if you have any questions about it specifically I'm happy to help you if I can! The pictures I did find in reviews are pretty true - the ship was nicer than I expected given the age...

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bccanadamom

bccanadamom

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Glad to hear you had a great cruise. We enjoyed the Sun very much. We were spoiled with our aft minisuite. Now we are trying an aft on the Breakaway- I am sure it will be very different on our first mega-ship!

 

I'd love to hear how you liked it in comparison to the sun... we're tempted to try a bigger one but also tempted to rebook with something familiar!

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  • 3 months later...
Mitch2016

Mitch2016

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Thank you so much for your review of the Sun! Have read some people who have stated that the food was horrible and chose not to cruise on that line again, and others that said the food was okay but nothing to write home about. Some have said it's an "old" ship and really needs a thorough once over. I am currently researching and deciding on a cruise to Alaska and trying to pick the right ship/cruise line as this will be our first cruise ever and this ship is the only one that is going in 2017 when we had planned to go..... so any input you can give will be greatly appreciated.

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  • 7 months later...
Gursk

Gursk

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Thanks so much for this review bccanadamom! It was so nice to hear some positive things about the Sun. Also to hear about a southbound voyage. Very encouraging and really making me look forward to our Panama Canal trip this fall.

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bccanadamom

bccanadamom

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Thanks so much for this review bccanadamom! It was so nice to hear some positive things about the Sun. Also to hear about a southbound voyage. Very encouraging and really making me look forward to our Panama Canal trip this fall.

 

 

You're welcome! Hope your trip is awesome - we are doing another Mexican one in November, this time on the Jewel :)

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