Haters gonna hate, hate, hate…an Epic review

[newmexicoNita]

Love the title of this review :p

 

I think I may be the only one who actually likes the bathroom set up of the Epic. I can use the toilet and sink while my partner is taking forever to shower? Perfect. Too many times in hotel rooms I'm doing a desperate little dance round the room while he hogs the bathroom...

 

We were very happily surprised at how much we liked the bathroom set up and the cabin period.

[Lido_Deck]

Did the Epic last week as well.

 

The thermal spa is worth the cost of the weekly pass. We used in the morning and then later in afternoon or evening every day. In the morning, we'd shower there instead of our cabin.

Have seen others complain about loud people in the thermal spa but we never encountered. Yes, people were talking. Your not required to take a vow of silence to enter. Sit back, relax, talk and enjoy.

 

I only have 1 gripe. Over serving.

 

Too many times we encountered people who were so drunk, they had trouble standing up, running in to walls or when we were at dinner at Shanghais, passed out on their table as they were about to order dinner.

 

This couple came in very drunk, were seated 2 tables from us and ordered drinks. Drinks were served and then we hear "bang". Girl is passed out on the table. Her BF couldn't wake her. Offered to help in any way but was refused. "She's fine, she's fine".

He finally gets her up and is trying to walk her back to their cabin and both collapse in the aisle. She hit hard. I asked him to take her to the ships doctor, just to be safe but he insisted she just needs to "sleep it off". 15 minutes later, he's back at his table (his food was served while he was away) he eats a little, orders 2 more drinks and then off to the casino.

We walked by the casino after our dinner and here they are cleaning up a huge barf mess. Guess who did.

 

UBP in action.

[bigrichtx02]

Delta Dear,

 

I will try to get at least the part of the review out tonight that covers our embarkation experience. Have fun on your cruise, being back at work is terrible!

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

[bigrichtx02]

Niffernay,

 

As for the Posh passes... we definitely were NOT the first people on the boat! We were getting pretty stressed about missing out on the passes as more and more groups got to board before us. We were in the very first "bronze level" group to board (after B2B, Haven, Platinum, Gold, Casino at Sea, those needing assistance boarding, and Silver groups had boarded). We practically sprinted down to Guest Services, and managed to get the 2nd to last pair of Posh passes.

[Niffernay]

Niffernay,

 

As for the Posh passes... we definitely were NOT the first people on the boat! We were getting pretty stressed about missing out on the passes as more and more groups got to board before us. We were in the very first "bronze level" group to board (after B2B, Haven, Platinum, Gold, Casino at Sea, those needing assistance boarding, and Silver groups had boarded). We practically sprinted down to Guest Services, and managed to get the 2nd to last pair of Posh passes.

 

Thank you. Looks like I better wear my tennis shoes to get ready to sprint when we embark :-)

[bigrichtx02]

Is anyone able to give a little more detail on how to use iMessage without incurring a cost ? If I signup for iconcierge do I simply not use the app and I might have success using imessage ? I will be signing up for iconcierge. Will this interfere with the possibility of being able to imessage people off the ship ?

 

I guess my question is how do I use iconcierge and still be able to attempt to take advantage of imessage without an additional cost ? I know I will be paying for iconcierge.

Mark290,

 

The iMessage process is surprisingly simple. All you do is connect to the wifi when you get on board just like any other hotspot. You don't need to open a browser or iConcierge to activate, just start typing.

 

It does only work with iMessage accounts that are paired to an email/icloud address. If you just have a contact's phone number, it will not work. You can view this in your contacts. There were only temporary instances when this did not work, all less than 20 minutes.

 

This is completely separate from the iConcierge app. I did have the iConcierge app as well and paired it with my room to keep tabs on my bill. I was never prompted or charged and I never used its chat function or anything else that draws a fee.

 

I hope that helps and hopefully the glitch endures!

[bigrichtx02]

Sounds like you enjoyed the cruise overall. Curious however, about your problems with the interactive tv system. Was it not working just for you or was it a problem across the ship? I found it so easy to operate and booked everything that we had already booked on line before boarding. It was easy for us NOT to check our account balance. We never spent an extra $ on board.

 

The interactive system may have been down. Staff members did complain about it not being "reset" yet the entire first day and I heard several complaints days after. We also tried the touch screens located all over and had no luck with those.

 

I'm fairly tech savvy, however, I won't rule out user error.

[bigrichtx02]

Here's the start to my review. So ignore my previous post where I claimed to be tech savvy. I couldn't figure out how to post pictures, so enjoy this wordy, no picture review. I'll have to do a little CC reading before my next post to figure that part out.

 

Background

My wife and I booked this cruise to celebrate our 10th anniversary. This was our third cruise together, and our second with NCL. We booked 9 months prior to embarkation, and took advantage of the “Free at Sea” promotion. We chose the UBP and the 3 Specialty Dining option.

 

Transportation

We flew SWA into Orlando, and had absolutely no complaints. Every one of our flights boarded, departed, and arrived on schedule. Even better, our three giant bags arrived without issue, and flew for free.

 

We were seated toward the front of our plane into Orlando, so we took the time to grab some lunch and a cup of coffee before heading down to baggage claim. The minute our bags were in hand, we requested an Uber to take us to our Universal resort. Unfortunately, Orlando is one of those airports that hates Uber and love taxis, so we had to go with Uber Select. Though slightly more expensive than our usual UberX, the ride still ended up being cheaper and far nicer than any taxi would have been.

 

Just a few seconds after hitting the “request Uber” button, I got a call from our driver who explained where to meet him. We had also read on Uber’s site where to meet drivers, but from baggage claim we still got confused and ended up in the wrong spot. Bottom line: find the rental car counters on Level 1, but don’t cross the street or take the tunnel to the actual rental car pick-up area. There is an underground area behind the rental counters where other fancy car services pick up customers… that is where you need to be. Unfortunately, there is virtually no signage. Despite getting lost for a bit, we still beat the driver and were waiting when he arrived. He found us easily, loaded our bags, and quickly whisked us away to Loew’s Royal Pacific Resort at Universal. The total cost was just over $50.

 

Loew’s Royal Pacific Resort

Check-in at the resort was a breeze, and after we dropped our bags upstairs, we found a nice sunny spot by the pool and relaxed after a long day of travel. When the sun started to set, we headed back in to get our tickets and Express Passes for Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure for the following day. We had pre-purchased park hopper tickets in order to get in to both parks in one day. Additionally, by staying in Royal Pacific, we got to enter the Islands of Adventure (IOA) park an hour early, got Express Passes that allow you to skip most lines in the park, and were an easy walking distance to both parks and the City Walk area. In addition to beautiful grounds and a friendly and helpful staff, the rooms at the Royal Pacific were large, fresh, clean, and well appointed. To stay at a similar hotel, find transportation to the park, and try to do everything during normal park hours without Express Passes would have been cheaper, but the ease and simplicity of the resort setup was definitely worth paying a bit extra.

 

Islands of Adventure and Universal Studios Orlando

We woke up early the next morning and got to the IOA before it opened at 0800. We packed our bags and left them with the luggage porters for safekeeping while at the park, then checked out of our room. We brought some protein bars for breakfast to avoid paying resort food prices, and because we had our eyes set on an early lunch at The Leaky Cauldron. Unlike many theme parks, Universal allows guests to bring snacks and water bottles into the park. By the time we got to the gates at 0750, there was already a decent line to get in. Once the park did open, the line moved slowly as everyone had to both scan a ticket and provide a fingerprint scan before entering. Being the most popular area of IOA, Hogsmeade Village filled up quickly, but we still managed to explore, take some pictures, and ride The Forbidden Journey (which doesn’t accept Express Passes) two times. When Universal Studios opened at 0900, we took the Hogwart’s Express to explore Diagon Alley before it got too crowded as well. After riding Escape from Gringotts, trying the frozen butterbeer, and enjoying some shepherd’s pie for lunch, we used our Express Passes to ride every ride we wanted before heading back to IOA and doing the same there. Since we had virtually exhausted everything of interest by 1500, we strolled back to the resort, picked up our bags, and requested our next Uber.

 

Port Canaveral

Our UberX driver picked us up in fewer than 5 minutes, and we were soon on our way to Port Canaveral. For this ride at 1600, the total cost was $52. We stayed in the Homewood Suites just outside the port, and at check-in, the staff informed us there was a rocket launch that night. We ordered a pizza from Zarella’s Italian & Wood Fired Pizza, and enjoyed every last piece of it outside while we waited for the launch. The pizza was particularly wonderful compared to the park meal we skipped, and reasonable at $17. After viewing the rocket launch from the hotel parking lot, we requested a taxi for 0830 from AAA. While the hotel had a shuttle to the port for $5pp, it didn’t depart until 0945. Given our desire to check in early and (hopefully) ensure Posh Passes, we opted for paying $15 to leave earlier.

 

 

Embarkation Day

I’ll go into a lot of detail here, and taper it off as the stressful portions subside. We were downstairs ready for our taxi just before 0830. A AAA taxi pulled up right on time, but it was for someone going out to the space center. That group wasn’t ready yet, so another couple that hadn’t ordered a taxi talked the driver into taking them to the port instead. The driver asked if we wanted to cram in, but the front desk worker at the hotel called him on it and he backed off. I’m not sure if he was breaking some sort of rule or not. The front desk then called AAA to confirm our pickup, and affirmed that someone was en route. I was already agitated and anxious about Posh filling up, but managed to wait until 0840 before calling AAA and asking where the taxi was. At this point, they claimed they “couldn’t guarantee a pick-up time because they were busy with other pick-ups/drop-offs.” She offered about 15 minutes. Feeling no loyalty to a company that doesn’t honor their pick-up time, I called 2 other taxi companies (pulled from CC), which both estimated 15 minutes. I declined both elected to go with Uber again. I was in the process of hitting the “request Uber” button when the AAA taxi finally pulled up. I canceled the Uber, and we hopped in the taxi. The driver took us through the “back way,” which ended up costing us an extra 15 minutes, as we had to cut back across the entire port. The lesson: forget the taxi, and use Uber. We confirmed with our driver after the cruise that they pick up people from hotels and drop them off at the port every day.

 

We finally arrived at Terminal 10 at 0910. We found some porters to take our bags…they weren’t quite ready for us, but I made sure to tip well and explain we were about to get on the boat, not off. A crowd started to congregate at the bottom of some stairs that were roped off by a security guard. At 0920 he opened the barricade, checked passports and cruise documents, and one by one let people up the stairs. We must have accidentally chosen the correct spot, because we were the third group up the stairs and into the security line, which opened a bit after 0930. We made it through security first because several lines were open, and the people in front of us were carrying on their bags since they had missed the porters upon arrival. I was slightly jealous of them until the race for Posh began, and those people had to lug their bags around while my wife and I could sprint and elbow our way to Guest Services unhindered. We were the first to the check in desk, and the first to finish with boarding cards in hand. We ended up with “boarding group 1” cards, which meant very little given our measly bronze status. We grabbed a seat by the ship entrance, and began the long wait. The entire time we waited to board, the check-in line never grew more than a few people deep. Despite NCL’s prohibitive “new” beverage carry on policy, I saw one lady confidently strolling through the terminal with a 12 pack of Pepsi. The terminal filled up fast, and unfortunately the boarding was delayed.

 

Initial boarding didn’t begin until almost to 1145, and by then the terminal was absolutely packed. Literally every single seat was taken, and people were standing everywhere. They boarded in the following order: B2B, Haven, Platinum, Gold, Casino at Sea, those needing assistance boarding, Silver, Bronze (by boarding group) and everyone else (by boarding group). Luckily, once they finally started the boarding process, it went pretty quickly. From Haven to A1 (me) took approximately 15 minutes. We hustled up the gangway as quickly as possible, and hopefully didn’t knock over too many slow movers. We made it to the final gangway where it bottlenecked at the entrance to the boat. Only 1 person could pass at a time, but there were 2 gangways that both emptied onto Deck 7. At that point, everyone was funneled forward (left for us), however, you could have turned aft (right). There didn’t seem to be much hoopla on Deck 7 to greet boarders, which-- being the most open and saddest part of the ship-- could have used a bit of fanfare to make it a little less depressing. The Deck 6 entrance into the casino and atrium would have been much better suited. Additionally, the big doors that lead out of the stairwells were shut, which made the passage look closed. I was familiar with the deck plans before the trip, but was very disoriented by the changes. I will admit, though, that we were in such a Posh-focused frenzy, there may have been a lot that we missed in the rush to get below deck.

 

We ended up exiting the stairwell on Deck 5 by the art gallery when I started to get my bearings, and we soon hurried to the Guest Services line. The line was 10 people deep, and moved agonizingly slow. The attendants would take a new customer, disappear for several minutes at time, come back, pound on their computer, and promptly disappear again. Issue finally resolved, they’d then take a new customer. This process repeated until we got to the front of the line. They did, however, have a line screener helping ensure people were in the right spot, and taking note of Posh availability. When we were next up, someone announced that there were only 4 passes left, so we stepped up claimed 2 of them. The transaction took about 5 minutes, and the attendant said we were good. She hadn’t done anything with our cards, so I asked if we used our cards to get on the elevator to deck 18 (already knowing the answer), she then thought of something and did the attendant disappearing act for no less than 5 minutes with no explanation. She finally returned with our cards and we trotted off to get food…Posh passes on our wrists.

 

I’d read that O’Sheehans is the un-crowded place to get food on embarkation day, so we headed up to try. The wait was 45 minutes, however, and Deck 6 was packed. We headed back down to Deck 5 for Taste, found it virtually empty, and were seated immediately. By this time, my Posh anxiety had subsided and I was feeling good, but a certain member of my party was starting to get hangry. By the time we had finished our food, however, everyone was feeling better. For lunch we had salads, fish n’ chips, and the fried chicken. The salads were fresh, and the fish was amazing--better than the O’Sheehans version. Lunch complete, it was time to ditch our backpack and head up to Posh to start getting our money’s worth of relaxation. We headed to our room despite the closed stairwell doors (a housekeeping lady said we could, although I don’t think we were supposed to), found our room, dumped our bag on the bed, and quickly met our room steward who was frantically trying to finish up his block. We headed up to Deck 15, and then caught the elevator up to Posh. We scanned our cards at the bottom, hit 18, traveled up, and then stood waiting for almost a full minute as nothing happened. It took us two days and many elevator trips until we figured out you’re supposed to put your card in the slot inside the elevator to get the doors to open. Until I learned that trick, I just muscled the doors open…that worked too. Up at Posh, we met our bartender for the week, and started to relax on Deck 19. By 1400, all the rooms were ready so we headed down. Just as we got settled on our large balcony, our luggage arrived. I was pleasantly surprised at the promptness, and we began to unpack.

[coloradocruiselover88]

Anyone know what this is? First time NCL cruiser here :-)

Thanks

[bigrichtx02]

It's a picture of the beach at Universals Royal Pacific, I'm just a newb to posting and couldn't insert it into m the correct spot.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

[coloradocruiselover88]

It's a picture of the beach at Universals Royal Pacific, I'm just a newb to posting and couldn't insert it into m the correct spot.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

 

 

 

Thanks!

 

 

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[Melissalcsw]

Thanks for the information on the Post Passes, I hope to snag 2 as well....Time will tell :)

[coloradocruiselover88]

Thanks for the information on the Post Passes, I hope to snag 2 as well....Time will tell :)

 

 

 

Are post passes available on all ships or just the epic?

 

 

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[SquishTheWhale]

A man hogging a bathroom? Sounds impossible to me. :D

 

I swear we have 3 bathrooms at home and somehow he manages to hog them all at once...

[pooh/tigger]

Sailed last year and had someone like you sprint up the gangway and knock me over as I walked up with my forearm crutches. And we were early boards.

Took the same trip as you and was right behind you in security line. (on my forearm crutch). Because of last year, I got a wheelchair to take me on board. Boarded with the back to back people.

Been in Posh before and enjoyed but it's not worth sprinting, elbowing and knocking people over to get.

[mojiomac]

We are heading on Epic in June. Can you explain a bit more about the benefits of s posh pass and the cost. Thank you

[BirdTravels]

We are heading on Epic in June. Can you explain a bit more about the benefits of s posh pass and the cost. Thank you

 

Private sun deck for the Havems. Private bar. Very very few passes since it is the Havens space. Not much benefit.

[jancl57]

Yes...A cruise on a bad ship is better than no cruise at all.

 

Although...It's just as easy to book a cruise on a good ship as it is a bad ship to make a cruise even better.

 

But...I will cruise on a bad ship like the Epic if the price is right because...

 

I'm curious as to why you consider the Epic a bad ship? Could you elaborate?

Thanks

[BermudaBound2014]

We are heading on Epic in June. Can you explain a bit more about the benefits of s posh pass and the cost. Thank you

 

 

 

For us, Posh passes made all the difference in the world. I really appreciate a nice padded lounger and some shade. Posh has padded clam shell beds that were perfect for long days lazy reading/napping. The service was great! Little snacks bites brought to you in your chair and the bartender learned our drinks. He even wrote my name in chocolate in the top of a mudslide. We were able to order lunch also and I had swordfish burger twice that was fabulous. I have read that the lunch menu is reserved for haven only, but our bartender never batted an eye. If you want quiet, comfy, and great service I highly recommend Posh.

 

 

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[aubreyc1988]

were they serving Raspberry Mojitos on the ship somewhere ? :)