piper45maru

I was in 11584 on the Pearl last month, and I was underneath the kids' activity center. Here's what I wrote in my review of the room in the Cabin Compilation thread:

"Quiet Stateroom? (With comments on problems) – For the most part. It’s right under Entourage, and the kids had some daytime activities that had a lot of pounding feet. It didn’t bother me as I was not in my stateroom during the day for long periods of time, but if you’re a daytime napper, it might be an issue. I didn’t hear anything at night, and I was back in my room by 10 p.m. 2 nights during my 4-night cruise."

We did a cabin crawl with CCers on my cruise, so I saw the balcony room, and was amazed at how much larger the mini-suites actually were. I thought my room was in a great location and the daytime noise won't deter me from booking in that area again if I ever get the chance! Good luck!

So,,, the $40 plan includes 100 mb of data (which you could blow through really quickly). You either need to turn off your data for a week (no email, surfing, steaming or even the most basic apps that reach out over the Internet for data) or reconfigure all of your apps to only reach out when you ask them to.

That's exactly what I did--turned off basically everything on my iPhone. I posted once a day on Facebook in each country I visited (and on the sea day) during my 7-day cruise and used data for nothing else, and I was just under 100MB at the end of the week. Made it home with no overages, but like you said, you have to be very restrictive and disciplined to stay under.

Napping on the quiet sun deck (deck 18 forward) if it's warm enough! That and the water slides are what I did on my only sea day on the Epic.

So We also bought the $40 per phone Verizon plan. Is it true that we will NOT have to purchase the NCL wifi package and still be able to call home and text just using our 100 text messages and 100 calling minutes??? We are on the 10 night Gem cruise tomorrow. Thank you for any clarification

If you bought the $40 international plan that includes countries as well as cruise ships, your texts and minutes will work in port using whatever carrier is local to the countries you visit. Just make sure you confirm on Verizon's website that the countries you're visiting are on the list. It's pretty extensive. Have a great cruise!

This must be a new plan from Verizon. We always paid $25 and got 100mb of data (which is useless) but no calling or texts included.

The $25 plan is still available (or at least it at the beginning of November when I took my last cruise) with no calling/texts included but a reduced per-minute charge for calls. Not sure if there was a discount for texts.

Did your email work, because mine did not work the whole trip?

I turned email off for the duration of both my cruises, so I can't say. I agree with mein18 that 100 MB of data is completely worthless (although it did allow me to send one pic to friends/family from GSC), so I disabled all email on my phone--I didn't want to blow through the 100 MB of data because my phone auto-downloaded emails I didn't need to see. Everyone knew I was on vacation and that if they needed to get a hold of me, email was not the way to do it.

Once I was back in the U.S. and enabled email on my phone again, as far as I can tell, I received all of them.

When I bought the package, I had to tell them the islands I would be on. They said everything would work on all the islands.

That's how it was for me on both of my recent cruises (Europe and Bahamas). At the Verizon website, I selected which ship and which countries I would be in, and my phone worked for me on the ship between ports and in each country I visited. It's a shame it didn't work for you in Tortola. I wonder if they'd be willing to give you a credit since it didn't work like it was supposed to. But, being Verizon, probably not. :(

Thanks for the advice. Hopefully we'll have a good host. :)

My host at the end of August was AWESOME! Can't remember when he said he was leaving the ship, but there's a small chance he could be there in March. His name is Vish.

Awesome. Thanks piper45maru for taking the time to answer. Much appreciated!

You're very welcome! I've only got two NCL cruises under my belt but I'm always happy to help others!

You've already gotten good advice but I'll add my agreement to book ahead of time and play it by ear on the ship. I actually booked ahead of time and the solo coordinator arranged for the solos to see the same show I had booked at the same time. I would've changed to go with the group but it worked out that I didn't need to change and it was one less person the solo coordinator had to arrange for. Win win! Enjoy the Epic! I had the BEST time with other solos on my Epic cruise!

Part of the delay in getting quick service is the need to chop down a tree to produce two receipts for each order, unlike Celebrity's 21st century approach of just swiping your key card. A couple of ways around this are as follows:

 

 

 

1. Get to know your bartenders.

 

2. Tip them from time to time.

 

3. Order the same drink so that when you take care of numbers 1 & 2, they start preparing your drink when they see you coming/make eye contact/just give them a nod.

 

4. Order doubles. (And before anybody says you can't do this, see points 1 & 2)

 

 

 

All of the aforementioned greatly enhance the experience of the PDGBP (Pretty Darn Good Beverage Package, but not "Ultimate").

I was also on the Pearl earlier this month like the OP. Some bars were very difficult to get drinks, but I made the martini/champagne bars "my" areas the evening of the first day of the cruise, employed above points 1&2 and a modified 3 (telling them what my next drink would be when one was delivered so I could go down the martini list), and I rarely waited for drinks the rest of the cruise. And I'm still in touch with one of the bartenders I made friends with. :)

That is exactly how they explained it to me over the phone. Sounded straight forward, but as sometimes things translate differently when actually on the ship, so I am glad to hear it actually worked out exactly how they said it would.

Hopefully it does work out smoothly for you!

Thanks Piper45maru! I think I'll try to pin down a few excursions now then. One more question if you don't mind. The excursion that was less than $75, the $59 one, did more than one person in your cabin go? I ask because my promo (which is $50 per excursion) is per cabin for up to three ports. So if you and someone else took the $59 excursion for a total of $118, shouldn't they have taken $75 off of that total?

 

 

 

I'm not saying buy one get one is a bad deal. :) :) Just wondering if it really is per stateroom or not. Thanks!

Sorry! I should have clarified that I was traveling solo, but you're correct--if it had been $118 for the stateroom (assuming 2 people), all $75 would have come off.

I wonder how frequently GSC is skipped? Was thinking maybe I should have a back-up plan with Nassau. But if the ship doesn't dock until after 5:00, then I doubt a back-up plan excursion can be found. We have no interest in bar hoping for us.

 

 

 

Fingers crossed GSC does not get skipped on our next cruise.

I was on the Pearl and it made it to GSC on November 6, but the day before a ship skipped it (Breakaway maybe? I can't remember) and two days before that a ship skipped it. So, we seemed to be the only ones to make it that week AFAIK. When we pulled up and I saw the waves I couldn't believe we were going to tender, but we did. And it was WAVY. And I love stuff like that but even I was a bit nervous. Everything turned out okay though and the tender back was flat. Hope you can make it on your next cruise!

My first cruise with UBP, I never saw any drink charges. On the second, they all showed up the first day like piper45maru. I asked at GS and they said the system wasn't set up yet. By the end of the next day they were all gone until the club soda charges starting appearing. They were removed but it took a trip to guest services each time and I was told it was due to a change in their accounting system and not having a way to "ring up" fountain club soda's. I hope that gets fixed before my cruise in Jan.

 

 

 

Dana, when is your next cruise? We are off to South America and can't wait.

I wonder if our charges stayed for a full day because our cruise was immediately following a charter cruise that didn't have the UBP. Not that it matters, but I am the curious sort and wonder about these things! [emoji56]

I don't have a cruise booked right now, but I promised to take my niece and nephew in the coming year, so I've been eyeing all the F&F sail free promos so that my nephew can sail for just the cost of port fees. Not looking at a specific itinerary so much as the promo and affordability, because the kids want to go to experience the ship more than anything. Although my niece did just announce she wanted me to look at South America cruises because she wants to hit all the continents (except Antarctica) by the time she's 18. At 13, she's already halfway there! I hope you and your mom enjoy your SA cruise! It sounds amazing!

All's good, except that going to Guest Services is never my first choice for spending time on board. Especially on disembarkation morning. :mad:

Exactly! Which was why I worried that all of my drinks staying on my account for so long might mean taking that dreaded stroll to GS the last morning. I was so relieved when they came off! Sorry you had to go through it. [emoji31]

Thanks for this information! Does this mean your credit card isn't charged until you take the excursion (or whenever the cancellation date passes)? I ask because I have this promo too and I want to use OBC to pay for the balance. I assumed that if I booked in advance my card would be charged even if the promo was applied. But from how you explain it, it sounds like that's not the case. Thanks! :)

When I used the promo in August, I called the Shorex number, booked my excursions, and my card was not charged.

When I got onboard, each time I took an excursion it was charged to my account the day of my excursion with the $75 credit shown as a separate line item. At the end of the cruise, I paid the difference between the amount of my my excursions and the credit when I settled my account.

Just as a side note, the one excursion that was less than $75 showed up as a line item of $59, with the credit line item also showing up as $59, which I expected, but I know some people have asked if that difference carries over to other excursions. It doesn't.

HTH!

...so I couldn't care less if they sat there until the last minute. (Never had ginger ale though!)

Nope! As long as they come off, I certainly don't care either! I was just trying to describe my personal experience to the poster who had a question about whether there's an itemized list and how long it stays on the account. And now, after talking to herdingdogmom on my last cruise and reading the experiences of those posting here, I know to be careful about ordering a club soda or a ginger ale! [emoji3]

I read somewhere else that all of the regular drink charges are on your bill until the last day when they zero them out. is that true or do they come up as zero charge unless you left an additional tip? is it an itemized list of your drinks that you can see when you get the printout?

My experience was that the first day's drinks appeared as an itemized list that was on my account for about 24 hours or so (not what I personally would consider brief). After that, even though I checked my account from the app frequently (I had a couple of erroneous charges on my first NCL cruise, so I was vigilant), I never saw any other charges. Sounds like everyone's mileages seem to vary.

On the Pearl 2 weeks ago, I had the UBP, and all of my drinks showed up on my account the first day. By the second day, they had all been removed and none showed up the remainder of the 4-day cruise. Not sure why they showed up that first day, unless maybe the system was slow to recognize I had the UBP, but it did end up working correctly. Just wanted to mention it in case it happened to someone else.

Glad those charged for club soda were able to get them reversed. Too bad you had to deal with it at all though!

That's fantastic! Thanks for arranging a nice social for us veterans. I'm prior US Navy and will think about arranging something myself on my next cruise. Thank you!

I didn't stay in a Studio when I was on the Epic recently, but I was traveling solo and did experience the lounge. There was a wide range of demographics--from a girl in her early 20s traveling with her family (who were booked in a bigger cabin) up to solos in their 70s. There was probably an even mix of men and women if I had to guess.

I only had access to the solo lounge during the evening mixers, so I can't speak to the rest of the day, but there were always 20-40 people at the gatherings in the evening, and it was a good time.

I'm not sure what you mean by outings, but we had a large group for dinner each night (to give perspective on the interest and number of solos, one night there were so many interested solos that the original planned venue for the evening--the Chinese restaurant--was too small to handle us and we ended up in one of the MDRs), and another day we all planned a big group takeover of the water slides. There were about 10-12 of us for that, and while on the pool deck we ran into other solos we had previously met, so by the time we ended up at Spice to relax in the late afternoon, there were a good 20 of us.

It was very congenial, and I loved every second of it.

As far as off-ship outings go, I believe several solos met up and planned excursions together (there's a white board in the lounge to facilitate this). I had all of my excursions planned prior to boarding, but I have no doubt that if I hadn't, I could have found someone through the white board, meeting other solos throughout the cruise, or with the wonderful solo coordinator.

My experience a few weeks ago on the Pearl (which does not have Studio cabins or a solo lounge or a dedicated solo coordinator) was an entirely different story!

I can't express enough how fantastic my solo experience was on the Epic, so if you're thinking of booking, don't hesitate! If you have any specific questions, I'll be happy to answer them.

Really like my french fries. Can anyone recommend which restaurant serves really good french fries?

Just read in another thread a review that the curly fries in the Summer Palace (MDR) were the best fries the reviewer had had at sea. I had potato wedges in Summer Palace one night that were really good, too. Not French fries, but still very yummy!

When I booked a GTY for my Epic cruise more than 30 days out, I was told by a PCC that the e-docs would become available at 30 days before the cruise or when my room was assigned, whichever came first. 30 days out happened to be on a Sunday, but my e-docs were available the next day, and my cabin had not been assigned yet. You may want to check back in a few days since you're close to 30 days out.

Near the lagoon is a bar, hopefully it will be open on your sailing

I was on the Pearl, so I didn't expect the lagoon bar to be open, but it was! It had a limited menu: four frozen drinks (pina coladas and daiquiris), rum and vodka, and cans of soda. There were big jug coolers with ice cold water, too. I was happy to settle myself down at the lagoon with a nice frozen pina colada!

Our sailing was sold out, but most of the time there were only 10-30 people at the lagoon. At peak, I counted 40. I was on the first tender and stayed until 2:30 pm, and there were only a handful of people then. I did end up getting a clamshell, and I LOVED it. I chose one with ventilation and propped it up in the back, and it never got too hot.

I really, really want to go back with my niece and nephew, who would absolutely love it! It was a perfect day in paradise!

I am not up with what has new v old..does this mean a no to new menus?

Depends on which "new" menus you mean. If you mean the ones with a la carte items, those were just introduced on the Escape, and they were not on the Pearl last week.

If you mean the other iteration of "new" people were talking about before the a la carte ones were introduced, all I can say is that the ones on the Pearl were the same as the ones on the Epic two months ago. HTH.

Ship – Pearl

Deck – 11

Stateroom # – 11584

Stateroom Category – Mini-suite (M1)

Starboard or Port Side – Port

Quiet Stateroom? (With comments on problems) – For the most part. It’s right under Entourage, and the kids had some daytime activities that had a lot of pounding feet. It didn’t bother me as I was not in my stateroom during the day for long periods of time, but if you’re a daytime napper, it might be an issue. I didn’t hear anything at night, and I was back in my room by 10 p.m. 2 nights during my 4-night cruise.

Was stateroom a connecting stateroom? – Yes.

Balcony View . Give comments on view, noting if location of any obstructions was an issue. – Completely unobstructed.

Balcony Size? Normal or oversized for class? –Normal.

Was wind a problem? – No.

If an aft cabin, was soot a problem? – N/A

Any specific problems with this cabin? – Nope!

Any other comments? –I would book again in a heartbeat—great location!

I enjoyed the striploin. I didn't dislike anything in the MDRs on either of my recent NCL cruises, but I also didn't think anything was absolutely spectacular and not to be missed. There are a lot of good choices, though.