1st time on NCL. Any tips please.
 

Hello. We have cruised 11 times before on X, Princess, Carnival and Royal and decided to try NCL so we booked the Getaway for early May. We are very excited about it as this ship and NCL are getting great reviews. In fact in the latest issue of CN Traveler NCL 2nd in the large line class to Disney which is way more money. However free style is new so how about some advice.

So what about the shows. We are used to a fixed dinner and a show is scheduled afterwards so how are the shows scheduled on NCL?

I understand there are several restaurants we can use outside of the extra charge ones for dinner. Do we just go when we feel like to whatever one we want and are there times when you have long waits?

Normally when we embark we usually show up earlier than the suggested time and breeze on. Can we do this for NCL?

My wife is Indian and we have always requested Indian food for her for dinner and it's always been accomodated which is easy for us for a fixed dining time and place. However for free style I am concerned how this will work. My TA said not to worry as this will not be a problem. Has anyone ever had experience with this?

Any other bits of advice appreciated. Thank you.

Larry. :)

I enjoyed freestyle dining. The only problem we had was on Thanksgiving Day when you had to reserve a restaurant, but we waited to late. We ate at the buffet and the turkey was good. I was on the Dawn and there were a variety of free restaurants, each having different menus. I can't remember the name of the one we went to but it had seafood and steak. I think one had Italian food. I remember if you like to eat early, there is no wait. But come to think of it we never had to wait. We were seated rather than walking to the table in the restaurant. In my opinion the food was better than Royal Caribbean.

When we were on Jade we usually just turned up for dinner in the main (free) restaurant. We tend to eat early in comparison to some others; often when we were leaving the restaurant there was a short queue of people waiting for a table.

Further into the cruise we discovered that if you wanted to eat at a particular time, you could make a reservation.

Can you email NCL regarding the availability of Indian food on that particular cruise? I needed meals with no artificial preservatives, and had no problem organising this with the Chef once we were on board.

We loved everything about the free-style dining option, Di

I have not sailed the Getaway but am taking my 4th cruise on
the Gem in 2 wks.

On this ship there are usually 2 shows a nite so you can schedule your dinner accordingly. For the specialty restos, there are boards outside showing the availability.

Actual boarding does not begin to about 11:30 & one is given a group number for boarding so no breezing in.

Cannot answer the Indian cuisine question; you might call Miami & inquire.

On the first day instead of the buffet you might want to have lunch in a dining room to avoid the crowds.

Enjoy your cruise & let us know how it went.

Thanks for the replies. I did call NCL and they assured me getting the Indian food would be no problem as did my TA. The NCL rep said just tell the Maitre'd at which ever restaurant we want to eat in and he will take care of it. It should be fine.

It's good to hear the waits were minimal. I think we will reserve the more popular shows like the Grammy Expwrience, the Illusionarium and Legally Blonde and eat accordingly.

One difference I noticed is that even though I booked this with a TA the rep made a note into our record about the food request whereas Princess reps don't touch the record of the booking is done with a TA. Any changes or requests have to be made by the TA.

You might want to re-think legally blonde. There is an extension discussion on this show on CC

an excerpt:
Imagine a group of vapid young women screeching "OH MY GAWD YOU GUYS!" at each other ad nauseum, and you'd have a fairly accurate image of the train wreck that is Legally Blonde the Musical. Perhaps some consider that enjoyable, but I walked out after 30 minutes. A few days later, I decided to give it another chance and stayed till the end. Someone mentioned that the show got better towards the middle and end. IMHO, it did not.

That's worth looking into. Is there a charge for this show?

We were on NCL dawn to Bermuda from Boston 2014
Great Indian foods with the buffet everyday, but you have to go all the way at the end, not too many people knew about it.
Entertainment on NCL Dawn better than Princess and a Celebrity. Magican husband and wife team
very nice. I forgot their name,wife is very skinny and they have a daughter around one old(2014)

Thank you. We r looking f/w. It's about 1 mo. Away now.