LIVE aboard the Gem 12/22-1/2 Holiday Cruise

[Turtles06]

4 hours ago, ellewoods said:

Overall a great cruise, as always. 

 

First, a big welcome home, and a big thank you again for sharing your trip with us!  You certainly made the best you could of a shortened cruise, as well as a ship with a lot of kids over the holidays.

 

I'm sorry to read about the brush off you received from the concierge re assisting with a couple of dinner reservations, especially when it turned out there was in fact room to move you to an earlier time slot as you wanted. 

 

4 hours ago, ellewoods said:

Please let me know if you have any specific questions and I can try to answer them for you.

 

Were there any "show tunes" shows in the theatre?  (Happy to learn about Blazing Boots, thanks for posting about it.)

 

Again, welcome home, and have a very Happy New Year!
 

 

[ellewoods]

23 minutes ago, Turtles06 said:

 

 

 

 

Were there any "show tunes" shows in the theatre?  (Happy to learn about Blazing Boots, thanks for posting about it.)

 

Again, welcome home, and have a very Happy New Year!
 

 

We didn’t see any show tunes shows. There was a Christmas show which I assumed replaced one of their regular performance shows for he Holiday. It’s possible we missed a show as we didn’t go to the theater every night, but I don’t recall seeing anything about one. 
 

happy new year! Thanks for coming along on the adventure. I hope your next cruise is amazing 

[FLcruisergrl]

1 hour ago, ellewoods said:

No it is not. The Haven key cards were white with a starfish, not violet. The only control out keycards had in the elevator was the ability to access the 14th floor, we had to stop on every floor just like everyone else 😂 Would be a cool feature. 

On some ships (not Haven) suites get violet cards. That’s what we had on the Sun.

[njkate]

Welcome home!! I’m sure there will soon be a thread  with people grumbling as Dawn is very very late getting into port.

The coast guard halted traffic coming into Tampa because of fog anyone familiar with Tampa knows how brutal that fog can be. Already grumbles on other social media

Edited January 2, 2023 by njkate

[ellewoods]

1 hour ago, njkate said:

Welcome home!! I’m sure there will soon be a thread  with people grumbling as Dawn is very very late getting into port.

The coast guard halted traffic coming into Tampa because of fog anyone familiar with Tampa knows how brutal that fog can be. Already grumbles on other social media

 Delays are never fun in any kind of travel but better safe in my mind. I have already seen complaints on Facebook about the Dawn situation. People act like the cruise lines enjoy delays any more than they do! 

[Birdnutty]

Thanks so much for taking us along on your vacation.  It helps tide us over until we get to experience it ourselves.

[njkate]

12 hours ago, ellewoods said:

 Delays are never fun in any kind of travel but better safe in my mind. I have already seen complaints on Facebook about the Dawn situation. People act like the cruise lines enjoy delays any more than they do! 

Agree it’s frustrating but no one can control Mother Nature. I very much enjoyed your review 

[juju2454]

On 12/26/2022 at 8:16 PM, scaaty said:

I think this thread shows how folks on the same cruise can have very differing opinions. That's why I take most reviews with a grain of salt. To me a cruise is what you make of it. Sure 'ship' happens, but you're on vacation, not cooking or cleaning. I like to just go with the flow.

there was no flow to go with,

[jetsfan]

Hi I have a question. As there is no true restaurant in the Haven where can you eat if you do not want to go to buffet ? Is there a place to get a drink in the Haven sundeck area?  Thanks so much!

[RCCLifer]

On 12/26/2022 at 11:07 AM, AwesomO said:

Has anyone used the splash academy with their children? I'm curious what kind of activities they have available. I'm not keen on it, but I'm thinking we may need to bring our Nintendo with us (I know, I know. the controversy). But my kids are 5 and 9, and with the Gem having less entertainment amenities, and the potential for extra sea days (we have 4 already) since we're sailing out of NYC in February, just feel like I may need to come prepared. 

My 3 and 6 year olds LOVED Splash Academy on Gem.  Problem was it only held 42 kids so we got on line anywhere from 20 to 45 min early every drop off to assure they got in.   Def have back up plans for school vacation weeks.   A fully loaded IPAD saved our waits in line most of the time, and I say loaded because the internet never really worked on the voyage until the last day.  

[ellewoods]

31 minutes ago, jetsfan said:

Hi I have a question. As there is no true restaurant in the Haven where can you eat if you do not want to go to buffet ? Is there a place to get a drink in the Haven sundeck area?  Thanks so much!

For breakfast you can eat in Moderno, lunch in Cagneys. As well for breakfast and lunch the Haven menus are in the courtyard and you can order directly from the courtyard butler and he will bring the meals down to you. There are tables and chairs in the courtyard. At breakfast time they also have assorted pastries, and fruits in the courtyard. Dinner is just in the regular restaurants. 
 

as for drinks… the courtyard butler will come around and ask if you want drinks and go get them for you. 

Edited January 3, 2023 by ellewoods

[jetsfan]

Thank you so much for your quick and kind reply. We need to get out of town and saw a great price for the January 16th sailing. We are easy going, know things can go wrong sometimes, but will have fun no matter what. Anything else we should know? Have been on 20 something cruises but not since Covid.. We are vaccinated, boosted and understand the risks. We can engage as much as we want or have space. I do have one more question. We stayed in the Haven before and had dinner in our cabin even though they had a restaurant. Can we have dinner delivered to our cabin on the Gem? Thanks again!

Edited January 3, 2023 by jetsfan

[ellewoods]

3 hours ago, jetsfan said:

Thank you so much for your quick and kind reply. We need to get out of town and saw a great price for the January 16th sailing. We are easy going, know things can go wrong sometimes, but will have fun no matter what. Anything else we should know? Have been on 20 something cruises but not since Covid.. We are vaccinated, boosted and understand the risks. We can engage as much as we want or have space. I do have one more question. We stayed in the Haven before and had dinner in our cabin even though they had a restaurant. Can we have dinner delivered to our cabin on the Gem? Thanks again!

You will definitely have a great time! If you go to Moderno for breakfast or Cagneys for lunch ask for Raquel, she will take great care of you. Tell her Elissa says hi 👋. Provide your butler guidance on what kind of snacks you want in the room, I wish we had done this, the stuff we got was comically bad, we were dating each other to eat it by the end. I believe you can get dinner delivered although we never did. As far as Covid goes I don’t know if there is much you can do on a cruise ship or any location with tight quarters. We cruised RCCL in June, and most in my party came home with Covid, those of us that didn’t had just recovered before the cruise. I think it is always a risk we are going to have to take these days. I got sick on a number of cruises pre Covid as well, so really nothing new just a new virus to catch. 

[pamrose228]

So I also made it back with Covid. NYE I didn’t feel right and it got worse. I’m recovering at home now and glad I got sick on sea days,  As for the cruise I disliked the entertainment, food and most of it but I never vowed to go on NCL and in May to June I have a b2b TA and the gave me 30% off 2 cruise which made the iceland port more expensive. I also got 500 fcc for the first part.

 

I figured how many kids was to go to Iceland. Norway while finals and graduations are going on.

 

who has been on the Prima? What do you think!

[DaisyGoldberg]

My strategy is just to mask everywhere outside the room unless we're distant from others on the sundeck, or actively eating/drinking.  Yes, there's exposure while dining... but if I walked by 120 people on my way to the dining room and did not breathe in their germs, that's 120 fewer exposures. No problem masking at a show - there's a few hundred more exposures decreased. There's risk involved in cruising, but a lot of it you can mitigate if you try. (And the mask helps with the cigarette smoke in the casino!)

 

Given the #s of people mingling unmasked I am not surprised that the post-cruise rates are high.  We've been lucky so far and I don't feel like we're missing a thing.

[RCCLifer]

23 hours ago, jetsfan said:

Thank you so much for your quick and kind reply. We need to get out of town and saw a great price for the January 16th sailing. We are easy going, know things can go wrong sometimes, but will have fun no matter what. Anything else we should know? Have been on 20 something cruises but not since Covid.. We are vaccinated, boosted and understand the risks. We can engage as much as we want or have space. I do have one more question. We stayed in the Haven before and had dinner in our cabin even though they had a restaurant. Can we have dinner delivered to our cabin on the Gem? Thanks again!

 

As a Haven guest you are entitled to Dinner in your cabin from any restaurant on the ship complimentary or paid.  Our butler explained to us that the feature simply doesn't work.  The timing is always wrong and it is certain you will get cold food.  

[pamrose228]

Remember to ask NCL for refund in port charges. The will ask you to fill out a refund order 

[P_Mcruisers]

Must the port charge refund be requested while  on onboard? or can it be requested after disembarkation?

 

Edited January 4, 2023 by P_Mcruisers
Better word usage

[luckyinpa]

On 1/4/2023 at 1:41 PM, RCCLifer said:

 

As a Haven guest you are entitled to Dinner in your cabin from any restaurant on the ship complimentary or paid.  Our butler explained to us that the feature simply doesn't work.  The timing is always wrong and it is certain you will get cold food.  

 so you can go in person to any specialty then and it's free because you are haven? 

[luckyinpa]

gem lovers . a deal

 

[cruiseny4life]

2 hours ago, luckyinpa said:

 so you can go in person to any specialty then and it's free because you are haven? 

No. You still have to pay the Ala Carte prices. There is no charge for having anything served in your room, as in the $9.95 room service charge. 

[rrraydon]

Thanks for your review, I enjoyed it. First time I read 2 reviews in one.

[HabitualLineStepper]

On 12/31/2022 at 8:06 AM, Turtles06 said:

 

Happy to hear that.  While we've always enjoyed the appetizers there, we've never enjoyed the entrees.  Sounds like they've improved. 🙂 

I doubt that is the case and agree that the appetizers are superior over the entrees. The entrees are difficult to correctly make and requires preparation time with the right methods and sauces. They are certainly edible, but throughout my many times eating there, I never expected nor have they ever been as good as neighborhood take-outs, let alone an authentic Asian restaurant.