Semi live quick update, Breakaway 5/22/2016 to Bermuda

[mking8288]

Live music & dance floor is busy on a full dining room, long line outside, everyone showed up for the last evening

 

That's my prime rib, medium

 

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[Gershep]

Hope you liked the Pistachio Creme Brulee. It was so delicious when we had it on the Gem.

[mking8288]

Finally done w dinner tonight, took 2+ hours, gallery very busy due to full dining room

 

 

Still about 100 people outside waiting to get in, once a table is available, as the sunset fade away.

 

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[SailBreakaway]

Hope you guys enjoyed your time on board. We got off last Sunday. It flies by so fast. Enjoy your final hours until the 'walk of sorrow, trail of tears' off the ship in the AM and thanks for all the great photos. You captured it well and in superb detail.

[mking8288]

Cream brulee is one of our NCL favorite. Yes, time flies & they will have to "help" get us off the ship early.

 

Pretty quiet on the Waterfront, deck 8 Aft, port side near Cagney's. Enjoying our final hours till NY.

 

A bit of last minute fun, unexpected as we're not planning to play more - place is still busy at 9:45 pm.

 

 

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Edited May 29, 2016 by mking8288

[riclop]

Ncl will nickle and dime you to death.

[mking8288]

Luggage packed & out in the hallway about 30 minutes ago, I can still hear the party music going upstairs.

 

On our 2nd room's free WiFi 250/1GB package, we managed to use about 470 MB & 367 minutes so far ... in 2 days, 530 MB remaining & that can go a long, long way if you are a smart user of data.

 

I have all the Dailies but will only post them on requests, if they are still needed. Other CC on the sailing will supplement what I missed from the M&G with their reviews.

 

Got 2 more ship pins from the Shorex staff, no longer in the welcome kit & also, no Godiva chocolate - not a big deal or they just managed to missed us on the route. And, our friends got a comp'd bottle of sparkling wine early today along with chocolate-covered strawberries today from CAS, lol on the last day.

 

Here's a list of the movies shown this week, some in the atrium lobby & some in H2O:

Ant Man, Pixels, The Walk, Jurassic World, The Man from UNCLE, E.T., Top Gun, Blendel, 3D Star War Force Awaken, 007 Spectre & Everest.

 

The Duo, Arvin & Emily are ever popular.

 

That's about it as we continued toward NY at 16.2 knots, wind is very light & seas at just 2 ft. - in the morning, we will repeat our tradition of full breakfast in the MDR, and watch the kettles race with the bags & wait for our priority disembarkation. Good night from onboard the BA, will answer & write up a summary afterward.

 

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Edited May 29, 2016 by mking8288

[mking8288]

Home again, oh mine ... must we go soon, I guess so. Time to wake up & get the clan to go to breakfast next and then, do the right thing.

 

Happy Memorial Day, especially for those in uniformed services. Those sailing today, time to get ready to come to Pier 88, the GEM should be next to us at Pier 90 - going to be very busy.

 

Thanks for following & a look at our final net use on the BA with help from Fi Network in Bermuda. Will do summary later & continue to take any questions, if we can.

 

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Edited May 29, 2016 by mking8288

[Casino Comp Chick]

Im sailing the Breakaway beginning of August and asked shore side concierge who would be the concierge and they wrote me back Anoop. Only sailed with Adrian. I dont know how anyone else could compare but happy we wont have John after reading some reviews.

 

OP...LOVE your review!! Thank you for taking the time. If you go to the gym, can you please let me know if they are still giving the morning complimentary classes and check if there are rowers. Thanks!

 

Anoop is very nice and very efficient, He has a different personality then Adrian who is very rambunctious, Anoop is low key but very sweet.

[Casino Comp Chick]

 

**** Footnote: multiple adult male guests in Manhattan MDR wearing shorts & sandals to dinner, not enforcing dress code or turned away, etc. - whatever !!

 

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https://www.ncl.com/sites/default/files/Freestyle-Cruising-Overview-042915.pdf

 

 

Freestyle Attire

Freestyle Cruising applies to the dress code on Norwegian ships. Guests have much

more relaxing cruise vacations when they are comfortable. Resort casual is the norm throughout

the fleet, so guests can leave their tuxedos and party dresses at home if they wish. For those

who enjoy dressing up for dinner, there is one (two on cruises longer than seven-nights)

completely optional “formal night” in various areas of the ship.

[mking8288]

Immie, I was under the impression that Manhattan MDR still have a resort casual dress code for the evening, like neat jeans but not shorts, so I stand corrected. We've dine in Taste & Savior in shorts & sandals. Most dressed neatly & some dressed up more in Manhattan MDR, never did see anyone in a Tux - don't even recall any difference on the dress-up night.

 

When we're on the GEM, the host/hostess turned away folks in shorts at dinner in the large MDR, but not the small MDR, as expected.

 

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[mking8288]

The tradition continued

 

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[LCfromFL]

Thank you for your semi-live review! I have been following along and really appreciated your pictures and story. We will be sailing on BA two weeks from today - and I cannot wait!

 

Safe travels home.

[mking8288]

Express walkoff has begun, we see folks outside the terminal, heading away now. Still waiting for our Priority yellow tags to be called.

 

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[djmcwilliams106]

Thank you so much for your review. It sure helped pass the waiting time. On NJ TPKE heading to board her now. Safe travels home.

[leekel619]

I'm getting *chills* thinking of the last morning...getting off. It's awful. You wait and plan and the excitement builds. Then all of a sudden it's OVER. [emoji30]

We are forced back to reality against our will.

Truth is I don't care for the way I feel on the last night either. It's hard to focus and stay in the moment with that dang clock ticking towards morning.

 

You had a wonderful week! It was nice to follow along!

 

We leave June 17 on the Dawn. Straight out of dry-dock.

[esm54687]

I'm getting *chills* thinking of the last morning...getting off. It's awful. You wait and plan and the excitement builds. Then all of a sudden it's OVER. [emoji30]

We are forced back to reality against our will.

Truth is I don't care for the way I feel on the last night either. It's hard to focus and stay in the moment with that dang clock ticking towards morning.

 

You had a wonderful week! It was nice to follow along!

 

We leave June 17 on the Dawn. Straight out of dry-dock.

 

I think we all had a little "crap it's over" flashback to our own cruises when mking8288 mentioned disembarking was under way....

 

Especially since we were seeing things from a "first person perspective" with pics and stuff

[mking8288]

In our own sweet home again for 20+ minutes now, PTSD from a wonderful cruise, we got inside the terminal, got our bags, took the porter route, only 3 people at the taxi stand & 30 minutes later ...it's all over. Final pix as we join the herd on the AFT gangway, hint - it's a shorter way.

 

Safe travel to those boarding soon, lots of extra police & heavier security around the port today, and street closures in midtown Manhattan.

 

 

An amazing journey, needless to say.

 

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Edited May 29, 2016 by mking8288

[mking8288]

Shots of the slot machines as requested earlier,

 

 

 

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[mking8288]

Checking on our (Project) Fi Network (by Google) "extra" charges for data usage while in Bermuda (shown as being in Jamaica, on Digicel 3G network) - Woohoo, OMG

 

5 minutes worth of cellular call at 20 cents/minute - for a total of $1 USD only and about 201MB worth of 3G/HSPA data at $2.97 USD (plus, whatever taxes, nominal) - on top of the "free" NCL WiFi 250 minutes (but, really 1GB worth of data - at least on the Breakway ... a best kept secret) It turned out to be a nice deal over Shorex for us, YMMV.

 

While sluggish & unresponsive at times, I chalk it up to network overloaded due to excessive # of users all signed in at once - otherwise, uploads were much faster than downloads on the ship's WiFi - and, because, our Nexus device were connected to the less croweded 5 Ghz band vs. the popular 2.4 Ghz band (only newer smartphones & tablets have the extra hardware for dual band WiFi connectivity).

 

Data usage

Jamaica

0.197 GB at $10.00/GB

May 25 20 MB

May 26 98.4 MB

May 27 83.7 MB

$1.97

 

For anyone sailing the BA (only, as your allowance on other NCL ships might varied & not the same) with the Free 250 WiFi minutes as taken, our 1 GB or 1,000 MB of data yielded 1,016 minutes (in 33 sessions) worth of connections - which we used up entirely. But, if you do NOT upload all the pictures like I do on this semi live thread, your 1GB worth of "free" data could really last a long time - on a tablet, iPad or smartphone configured for smart use of data. Remember to log off and disable most backgroud data updates or downloads, etc.

[dexddd]

Welcome home Mking - sounds like you had a good time. The time really flew. Watched the webcam on Friday and didn't see you doing the pier run.

 

Oh, and don't worry as we didn't talk too much about you here on CC while you were gone.

[SailBreakaway]

I always tell people, the two best moments of the year are walking up the gangway onto the ship at boarding and two worst moments of the year (barring tragedy, etc) is walking down the same gangway in the opposite direction. We cruise twice a year. Again, great job blogging the experience. It will be very valuable for someone doing so for the first time. This month we experienced nothing but perfection, great crew who always smiled and were exceptional, great service, food and drink.

[DeeT]

Welcome Home!!! Awesome real-time review. Enjoyed it immensly:)

[mking8288]

Welcome home Mking - sounds like you had a good time. The time really flew. Watched the webcam on Friday and didn't see you doing the pier run ...

Thanks, 4 of us had a good to great time. Ran into a slight disembarkation jam due to Fleet Week with street closure but still managed to skip the lines with porter's services & almost nobody across 12th Ave at the Taxi Stand, walk into the house before 10 AM.

 

We're on the lookout on the Waterfront for pier runners ourselves, RS reminded us to be back by 2:30 ship time - we're back around 1 PM & made it to Taste for another sit-down lunch, the Cajuns Grouper Sandwich was pretty good, IMO.

 

Here's a few pix of Heritage Wharf as we pulled sideway forward, leaving the Summit at King's Wharf. With calm seas inside the reefs, the Faithful was ready & available for possible transfer to the big ship, lol - if the Captain do stop & allow late boarding at sea. The last 3 pax walked slowly, never ran for the ship even after the loud air horns from the ship blasted twice already - as soon as they're up on the Fwd gangway, dock workers showed up & started released the lines. We're moving about 2 or 3 minutes after 3 PM ship/local time, right on schedule - leaving nobody behind as there're no more PA announcement for the missing 3 names called already.

 

 

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Edited May 31, 2016 by mking8288

[mking8288]

Last week, O'Sheehans were surprisingly not crowded at all - unlike our previous 2 BA sailings in 2014 and 2015 - very nice, we only ate there 3X and never had to wait for more than 1 or 2 minutes for the host/ess and a table. Comfort food is just that, had the Soup of the Day twice - Blackbeans Soup & New England Clam Chowder, both were good & served hot. Overall services are friendly, fast & plenty of staff on hand in case of unexpected crowds showing up ... not sure how things went on the 3 nights with Dinner Specials (Prime Rib - Day 1, BBQ Ribs - Day 2 and Seafood Basket on Day 7)

 

Senior officers/crew on the BA last week:

Capt. Hakan Svedung

Hotel Director - Djamel

F&B Director - Carlos

Guest Services Manager - Dia

Executive Housekeeper - Junior

Cruise Director - Soozy

Asst CD - Luz (ran the Bingo's, etc.)

CruiseNext Manager - Martin Visser

 

Wine Lovers the Musical (Saturday @ 12:30 pm, Spiegel Tent) - lunch & wine tasting with the show @ $25 p/p for those 18 and up

 

DW did finally spotted the Hotdog Cart up on Deck 15 by the main pool toward the end of the week, never once seen it downstairs on Deck 6, or 7.

 

Sports - basketball & tennis were shown on giant HDTV screens in the bars/lounges during the week ... dont' recall seeing soccer or baseball games being played, live or taped ...

Edited May 31, 2016 by mking8288