What’s in a name? Not that much, apparently. Tony and I have traveled on three cruises now, once on Disney – which cannot be matched I’m afraid, once on Royal Caribbean, and now on Norwegian. We had decided to try different cruise lines to find the one we liked best. Next time we might try Princess, or Celebrity.
But next time will be a long time away. Norwegian has the habit of charging you for every tiny little thing. And charging a LOT. I clearly like to learn things the hard way, and this one was definitely hard.
I chose the ship based on the name and the fact that it was going to Bermuda. We wanted to try Norwegian. It sounds exotic. This particular cruise was originally also going to Bar Harbor, Maine, which is somewhere I’ve always wanted to go. After I booked, Bar Harbor decreed “no more cruise ships” so this cruise’s itinerary changed to Bermuda only. And we would spend three days there. I decided this was ok, and proceeded with the travel arrangements.
I did not realize that cruise ships come in different sizes! Knowing that the Viking cruises are smaller and more intimate because some friends told me so, I figured that all the other ocean cruise lines were basically the same. I should have done more research! The Norwegian Jewel is small. To the point where you cannot possibly get lost finding your stateroom (it helped we were near an elevator), and everything is very condensed, and crowded. There was only one shop. It was a large shop, but the Royal Caribbean cruise basically had a mall, which was fun. Disney also had plenty of shopping opportunities. On the Norwegian ship, the middle of the ship was open only on two decks, unlike the three or four of Disney and Royal Caribbean, so not nearly as impressive. It did have plenty of dining and bars, but you had to search in back corners for them. We finally found an outside bar we liked on deck 12 at the back of the ship on the second to last day. We even saw a whale from this deck, randomly.
You literally had to walk through the crowded and smoky casino to get to the theatre. And that was after already walking through a crowded and very noisy martini bar with a piano man. They definitely used every square inch of space! I was more used to everything being more open and easy to find. One of the “specialty” restaurants was tucked onto deck 13 and we had trouble finding it. So while small, the ship’s layout was not very convenient. We were told the ship had been upgraded recently, but honestly it felt a bit old and worn to us.
The ship had plenty of places to eat. A huge buffet called the Garden Cafe or something like that where the girls liked to go on their own for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I am not a fan of the buffets on any ship as they are always extremely crowded. Plus, the food at this buffet was not that good to be honest. I couldn’t get excited about it. The girls loved the never ending pasta and bread and ice cream. I made a point to check out the desserts every day and they tried (and failed) to get to fancy with it. Nothing normal like cookies or plain chocolate cake. No, there were desserts from all over the “world”, which just didn’t taste that good. Lots of things with pralines and coconut, coffee and marzipan and cream cakes and Jello molds of every color. I honestly just wanted a cookie.
There were three restaurants that were “included” with your cruise fare, in which you could eat off a menu. There were no set dining times, unlike Disney or Royal Caribbean. You could go to any of these restaurants at any time you liked. But. The menu was the SAME no matter where you went. AND it was the SAME every day with the exception of a little box with four or five “daily specials.” The desserts changed every day, as well, but again nothing I was interested in eating. Also, if you wanted to try something new like lobster or lamb, you had to pay extra. That is not the case on the other two ships we traveled on. EVERYTHING was included on those. You got to try some really different things. And if you didn’t like it, they would bring you something else. On Disney, we could order a hot dog, or macaroni and cheese for Skylar, regardless of what was on the menu. They would bring her anything she wanted. The service on Disney and Royal Caribbean was impeccable. The service on Norwegian wasn’t. I honestly liked the sit down times with the same server and people around you every day on the other ships. They got to know you. You could banter and joke with them. They asked about your day. The servers on Norwegian were just doing a job. Like at any restaurant.
We had two free “specialty dining” experiences that came with our cruise package. We chose a Brazilian Steakhouse which was the highlight of our dining experience, and an Italian restaurant, where everything was a bit too rich for our blood. The service in these two restaurants was much better and we had a lot of fun in the Brazilian Steakhouse where they bring meat and candied pineapple on skewers and cut it right onto your plate.
Our stateroom was so small. On the Disney cruise we had a room with a view at the very front of the ship so the ceiling curved down at an angle, but actually gave us more floor space. On Royal Caribbean it was just me and Tony, so there was also a small couch and a desk and plenty of room, plus the lovely balcony. On Norwegian the entire room was taken up by the three beds. The normal bed, then pushed up against that and to the opposite wall was the couch bed, which was never put away the entire time – just left out. And the bed that came down from the ceiling could only be opened with a key and was also down 75% of the time, blocking your way to the balcony. We all hit our heads on the underside of that ceiling bed multiple times. There was no room for anything! We had to stuff our large suitcases under the bed and the girls’ suitcases were in the walkway from the door to the balcony. There was literally nowhere else to put them. And the bathroom was so tiny you could barely get dressed in it. Absolutely no counter space. So we were not impressed with the room. The beds were comfortable enough though. And housekeeping was ok, but again, not as good as on the other ships.
I think our standards are a bit high because of Disney being our first cruise, and also because I paid a ton of money for four of us to go on this cruise and I just wanted to be a bit more comfortable than I was. And because the ship was smaller, you could really feel it moving a lot. There were a lot of times I just felt “off” because of motion sickness. Not enough to make me nauseous but moving enough to notice it constantly. Amy said she kind of liked it – it helped her sleep!
The pool deck and hot tubs were nice. I’ve never been in a hot tub on a cruise ship that was truly hot. Warm, yes, but not hot. There must be a temperature level they’re not allowed to go above. The girls, especially Skylar, had fun swimming and laying out. I learned that you do not need to bring beach towels with you on a cruise. Plenty of towels on the boat and also they provided towels when we were going to the beach. So we could have saved some space there and spared ourselves the sand in the room and in the suitcases. The magnetic hooks I had bought before the last cruise were a lifesaver as we could use them to get things out of the way. The water proof phone cases we bought were useless because I was too afraid to trust them not to get our phones wet! The ship felt cold to me so I had to buy a sweatshirt from the one shop, I won’t even tell you what that cost and Skylar wanted a box of 100 colored pencils for $36 which I said no way Jose to. I did wear the sweatshirt every day and will now be able to advertise “Norwegian Cruise Line” loudly for everyone to see.
The ship had some things for the girls to do, besides the buffet and the pool. They were too old for the kids’ club and too young for the teens’ club. And not interested in the basketball or ping pong tables. But there was a small arcade. When we boarded the ship I saw a sign to “sign up for an arcade pass!” so we went to investigate. For $175 (Holy Moly!!!) we could buy a pass and the girls could come play the games with the GREEN square around the card slot. I nearly stopped breathing but I paid it. I thought this would keep them somewhat entertained for the days we were on the ship. There were other games in there, too, where you could win prizes. Those games weren’t included in the green square games.
I should have paid better attention.
I, mistakenly, thought that the girls’ key cards would ONLY work on the green square games. I did not realize that once activated, the cards could ALSO be used on what turned out to be the “pay each time” games. The girls were gone for hours.
That night I received both a written letter and a voice mail asking me to come to guest services to handle the fees accumulated by the arcade. I went. What do you mean, I ask? Well you have over $300 worth of arcade games that will automatically be added to your bill. What?! Including the $175 I already paid? No. No Sir. No Ma’am. I saw the charges… they went on forever. Pages and pages of arcade games played within about a two hour time period at about $2 a pop.
I’m pretty sure I fainted.
I DID get mad. I told them all sorts of angry, frustrated things. They would not budge. I told them we misunderstood, that we thought the cards would work on the green square games only. We thought that only AMY’s card was activated, for both girls to use. It was no use. They did not care. I finally went to the casino and directly negotiated with them to reduce the fees to $356, total. Instead of about $475. But no more arcade games at all for the girls. I felt, and still feel, that it was a total rip-off and that they purposefully did not explain as well as they should have. I also should have paid better attention when the girls came back with armfuls of plastic turtles and stuffed power rangers (or something). Skylar even got a sparkly pink plastic duck. But I was there to relax on the deck with Tony and drink things and I did not, as it happens, think anything of it. Until it was too late. Lesson learned. (PS this was all on the first night).
So the girls did not get to do the arcade anymore.
Another lesson learned was the Diet Coke lesson. The first night on the ship I wanted to get some Diet Cokes delivered to our room so that I could put them in the tiny fridge because I like to have a Diet Coke in the mornings when I wake up. And I didn’t want to have to get dressed and go find one. I was told that they could certainly do this but that there would be a room service charge. I agreed that this was fine. They did not tell me how much the charge would be and I, thinking it would probably be about $20, did not ask. Remember, we are talking about a 12 pack of cans here. $5-$6 at your local Walmart.
SIXTY-ONE dollars later I had my Diet Cokes. In my fridge. Now, I had also brought my pink 32 oz Yeti cup with me and by the third day I had figured out I could take that cup to the bar on the 8th deck and the bartender would fill it up for me. For free, because we had the ultimate drink package. I also learned that I could ask for, and receive, more than one can of Diet Coke at a time, at any of the bars or the buffet.
So what I SHOULD HAVE done was simply to ask for two or more cans of Diet Coke every time I was near a bar and then stockpiled those in my fridge.
Now I know.
At any rate, I would like to say that we did have a good time but were pretty perplexed/frustrated by all the mistakes we made and the cost of things. The evening entertainment in the StarDust Theater (notwithstanding having to walk thru the smoky casino to get there) was all pretty good. We went every night at 7:15 and the girls loved the dancing, singing, and magic shows but were not impressed by the soul singer. He was pretty boring in my opinion. Just not our style of music. After the show we would all hang out on the beds in our room watching a movie or reading or playing games on our phones. We played a lot of UNO.
We sailed. We relaxed. We drank (some). And we learned a lot.
Once we get this one paid off I’ll book another one. I’m committed to cruising. It’s such a safe and easy way of seeing new places. Next time, Honduras! Or New England! Who knows where we’ll go, but we’ll go. Just not on Norwegian.