Well we are back from the Caribbean and since I have neglected my blog for waaaay to long I thought it appropriate to start with a post that relates to the last one! :)
So here is my official review of the Norwegian Dawn 10 Day Eastern Caribbean cruise Dec 1, 2005: (It's a long post so you may want to take a nap before you start reading... :)
First I have to preface this review by giving you our background and cruising experience so you all know where we are coming from.
I am 27 my wife is 26 and we had cruised once before on the Celebrity Galaxy back in April of 2004. We absolutely loved this ship, staff, and especially the food!
We had done our research in choosing the Dawn as many of the reviews were extremely positive for the ship.
So here we go...
EmbarkationOur Flight arrived in LaGuardia around 9:40am and we were hoping to grab the 10:00am shuttle. Upon arrival we met the NCL representative who has quite frantic and mumbling something about the bus not being here and she was going to have to order another one. Around 10:00am she announced that traffic was very bad in New York, and the bus would be delayed. This made us both chuckle a little bit since I was pretty sure that traffic was bad everyday in New York and you would think they might have expected that! :)
Nevertheless we made the best out of our delay and ended up meeting another young couple who were also going on the cruise. They are a fantastic couple and as it turns out we ended up getting together every night for dinner and/or drinks every night and developed quite a friendship. Just goes to show you that there truly is a silver lining in every cloud!
Once we arrived at the pier (around 12:30pm, traffic really was bad!) we lined up for about an hour and then we were finally boarding onto the ship! Although the lineup was considerably longer than we had hoped, the staff was great as they had little mini sandwiches and beverages available for all.
We got to our stateroom around 1:30pm, checked out our Freestyle Daily, made reservations at Le Bistro (half off the cover charge) and then went to check out the ship. When we opened our door I couldn't believe my eyes, there was our luggage and it was only 1:45pm!!! Amazing!
CabinWe booked a guarantee inside cabin this cruise and ended up on the 5th deck midship just around the corner from the stairs. We are not really stateroom people (pretty much only there from 2am-9am) so the inside suited us just fine. Being that close to the stairs was great for getting to places in the morning and especially great for the end of a long evening! The room was definitely spacious enough for the two of us, and I'm not sure I would want to try fitting more than two people in it. The stewards were fantastic, by the 3rd day we started seeing some amazing towel animals appear (dog, rabbit, mouse, monkey, alligator, elephant) We barely saw the stewards at all but somehow our room was always cleaned while we were out!
DiningBreakfastWe ordered room service for a light breakfast most mornings (coffee, fruit, Danish) We found that the best way to get up and moving in the morning. It always arrived on time and was terrific. We chose to eat our main breakfast in the Garden Cafe at the buffet most mornings and the food there was good. It was pretty standard, scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, fruit, and these amazing waffles (which you could put chocolate sauce as well as strawberries and whipped cream - yum!) A few mornings we chose to eat in the Venetian dining room and these meals were good as well. Nothing fantastic, but definitely good.
LunchWe split our lunch eating between the Garden Cafe buffet and the Venetian/Aqua. Both were good. We preferred the lunch in the Venetian but sometimes the service was a little too slow for our liking hence the reason that some days we at the buffet. We also ate at the barbeque that they had on the pool deck one day - that was great.
DinnerSince we were on a 10 day cruise and there are 10 main restaurants we planned to try each one at least once - and succeeded! So here is our quick review of all the restaurants:
Le Bistro ($15 cover charge but we paid half price because of the first night special)
Amazing food, amazing service, and absolutely amazing atmosphere. I'm not sure if I will ever have the pleasure of dining in between a Monet and a Van Gogh again! For dinner I had the filet mignon and honestly I probably could have cut it with my fork. For dessert we both had the chocolate fondue which was probably the best dish we had the entire cruise!
Venetian/Aqua/ImpressionsGreat food, varied service, great atmosphere. We had lobster tail one night and steak another night. Both were great, not the best I've ever had but certainly a nice change from the ordinary. The service varied because with Freestyle you may never get the same serving staff twice (more on that later when I add my comments around the Freestyle concept) The Venetian dining room itself is very large and quite nice - lots of tables and people but you never really felt crowded. The Aqua dining room is very trendy and nice. Impressions was also a nice design.
Salsa (reservation required, no cover charge)
Great Food, Varied Service, Great Atmosphere. This restaurant was a pleasant surprise for us. We dined there once at the beginning of the cruise and once at the end. Our first dinner was great and the service was amazing! Our waitress was really nice and extremely attentive to anything that we needed. On our second trip to the restaurant the food was great and the service was unfortunately some of the worst I have ever seen. We got a waiter who we also had one time at breakfast who I'm sure won't be working for NCL very much longer. Thankfully he was an exception and not the rule and was really our only bad experience all week! Both times I had the fajitas and they really were great.
Bamboo All you can eat sushi ($10 cover)
Great Food,Atmosphereice, Good Atmposphere. This was a great setup - just walkup to the sushi bar which has the sushi and rolls coming around on a conveyor belt and grab what you want. I am a very big sushi fan and I thought the food was great. The service was great as well and we chatted with one of the waitresses for the better part of our dinner (the restaurant was almost empty)
Teppanyaki (Cover Charge a la carte pricing $12)
Great Food, Fantastic Service, Fun Atmosphere! This was the most unique and fun dining experience that we had! The table sat probably around 20 people and they had two chefs cooking up our food. I went with the filet mignon and shrimp and it was cooked to perfection. The show that the chefs but on was nothing short of amazing and we both really enjoyed the experience!
La Trattoria (Reservation required, no cover charge)
Ok Food, Ok Service, Ok Atmosphere. This restaurant could use some help. I had the lasagna and it was ok, but tasted like something I would grab out of the freezer at home and cook in my oven. The service was ok, nothing special and the atmosphere was ok (they take part of the Garden Cafe and change it into the specialty restaurant) We did enjoy a wonderful bottle of wine that night though, so the dining experience was not a total loss! :)
Cagneys (Cover charge $20)
Amazing Food, Amazing Service, Great atmosphere. We definitely enjoyed this restaurant. I had the T-bone steak and again, I probably could have cut it with my fork! The service was very attentive and the actual restaurant was laid out very nice. Again, they fit a lot of people in, but you never felt crowded. I'm not sure if it was worth the $20 cover charge, but I'm definitely glad we chose to eat there!
Late night snacking
Blue LagoonGreat Food, Good service, Good atmosphere. Actually we didn't really care about the atmosphere; it was just great to be able to have a place that was open at 2am to satisfy my chicken wing craving!
Overall we found the food to be great and always plentiful. Was it as good as Celebrity's? On an overall scale Celebrity's food far out performed the Dawn's, but we still really enjoyed the food.
EntertainmentThis is the area that surprised me the most on this ship. When we were on Celebrity the entertainment was very old-fashioned. It was nice, but not really what we are in to.
The Dawn however absolutely blew us away with the quality and variety that they offered. Here is a list of the shows we attended with my thoughts:
Opening Show - This show left a little bit to be desired (too much talking by the Cruise Director Linda - that turned into a common theme throughout the cruise.)
South Beach Rave - Fantastic show of upbeat Latin dancing and singing. My wife really enjoyed this show.
Comedian - Very funny gentleman, good clean humour that had the entire audience laughing
The Gleason Magic show - Absolutely fantastic! This show was top notch. This couple had performed at the MGM Grand for 13 years and after seeing their performance I can see how they lasted that long. It was interactive, upbeat, funny, and the magic was outstanding!
The Second City Comedy Troupe - Again, absolutely fantastic! Being from Toronto, we enjoy going down to see the Second City group here, and the cast onboard the ship was no different. Extremely funny improv, and terrific rehearsed skits that had everyone in the audience in stitches.
Fernandez the Hypnotist - Truly hilarious. We enjoy watching Mike Mandel down at the CNE in Toronto every year, and Fernandez was very much the same. Extremely interactive hypnosis comedy that had us all laughing in the aisles.
Bollywood - Definitely my wife's favorite show and I also really enjoyed it. A cross between Moulin Rouge, Cirque de Soleil, with a whole bunch of other stuff mixed in. The performers were right on queue with everything they did. Extreme energy and terrific singers, dancers, acrobats, etc etc etc.
The mini seminars that they offered were also fantastic. A memory seminar by Greg Gleason (the magician) as well as a close up magic show by him that left me astounded! Fernandez also offered a hypnosis seminar (I missed that one - fell asleep on the deck in the sun! :)
Overall the entertainment was truly top notch. In a way I would have been more comfortable paying a cover charge to see some of the shows then pay to eat in the restaurants (I'm not saying they should start charging us money for the shows - it's just a thought!)
Ports of Call
St. Thomas - We went over to St. John for the day. It was a long trip and we were a little rushed because of the time we got into St. Thomas, but it was definitely worth it. Spent the afternoon on the beach at Trunk Bay and soaked up the sun- Awesome!
Tortola - We went over to Virgin Gorda and spent the day at the Baths. What an incredible place - impossible for any words or even pictures to do it justice! I'm glad we ventured out on our own because we ended up having about 3.5 hours at the actual beach and I think the ship tour only had 1.5 hours - Awesome!
St. Maarten - We've been here before so we stayed on the ship and pretty much had the pool deck to ourselves - Awesome!
San Juan - Went to El Morro and toured around there for the morning then spent the afternoon on the pool deck - Awesome!
Great Stirrup Cay - We managed to get on the first tender and grabbed two loungers in a prime spot on the beach. We laid in the hammocks for a while, rented one of those big floating raft things and rode the waves for a while - Awesome!
Disembarkation
Because we are non-US citizens (Canadian) we were required to meet in the Stardust theatre at 9am to be processed by immigration. Immigration had some problems with their computers and we didn't end getting off the ship until close to 12pm. This was a bit of a downer (it's a little cramped with everyone in the Stardust) but NCL really had their hands tied. We ended up get the shuttle to the airport and arrived in plenty of time for our flight. We ate at a restaurant in the airport and quickly realized we were back to reality when the waitress handed back my Seapass card and asked for a "valid credit card" oops! :)
Freestyle Dining Thoughts
I wasn't sure what to make of the Freestyle dining concept before we went and I must admit I'm still of mixed emotions about it now. While it was truly great to have so much variety in restaurants, we found that the varying levels among the wait staff to be a little frustrating. One night we would have a fantastic waiter, the next night we would have a so-so waiter, and another night we would have a waiter who shouldn't even be employed at McDonald's (nothing against anyone who works at McDonalds!) A few times we called for reservations around 10am and were told that the restaurant was already full for that night, but we quickly found out that if you called the restaurant around 5:15-5:30pm we could usually get in due to cancellations.
Quick thoughtsThe one thing I noticed about the Dawn was the over abundant amount of ship wide announcements. I guess they think that most passengers can't read since it was mostly just a recap of what was in our Freestyle Daily (The Second City troupe had a field day with this) I really didn't need to hear everyday about when Bingo was! :)
On a similar theme, Cruise Director Linda did an ok job, but she really just talked way too much. It was not uncommon for her to go on for 5-10-15 minutes about all the activities coming up for the next day (which again are in the Freestyle Daily) Personally I would have rather seen that time given to the entertainers that we were all there to watch!
The Casino staff was extremely friendly and fun to be around. I ended up doing very well at the Blackjack tables, so I might be a little biased.
The Spa staff was great. I had a full body massage, and my wife had the hot stone massage. We both enjoyed our treatments immensely. The only thing that I would have liked to see was a bit more privacy in the spa pool/whirlpool area. Instead of only being available for people with appointments it was open for everyone. Just my preference
The Kids programs must be fantastic because I was told that there were 400 kids on the ship and we barely saw any at all! We only saw kids at dinner most of the time they were extremely well behaved and a pleasure to be around.
On the second night we found the hot tub that is located all by itself on the forward of the ship. Pretty much any night we wanted it was empty and we had it to ourselves!
Overall ImpressionsWe really enjoyed this cruise and will most likely do NCL in the future. The food was great, the entertainment was terrific and the ship was beautiful!
We are now in the process of booking our next cruise (Yes we are officially addicted...)
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