Stealthdog

We are in a Club Balcony (MC), 9th deck, the same cabin both cruises. We typically like longer cruises in December (12 days+) because they tend to be cheaper and have fewer children on board. The last 2 years its been more challenging to find a longer cruise that was affordable, and one we were interested in. We still had 4 Cruise Next Certificates to use before they expired, so used 2 per cruise. We also got the 10% military/vet discount from the fare, so this B2B ended up being a very affordable 14 days of cruising. Port Canaveral is a cheap port for us because we don't have to pay for lodging the night before and can get a ride to the port to avoid the parking fees. Its about a 1 hr ride for us - a family member (who is our also our TA) is taking us this time, so this review won't have any information about the parking garages, prices, or experience. We are Platinum status and will be looking to book some of the status events on board, particularly the wine tasting event and the ship tour.

I'll take pictures of all the B2B instructions for you. We booked the same room on both cruises, and didn't participate in any upgrades because we didn't want to run the risk of having different rooms. We are still finalizing excursions this week. So far we booked 1 each cruise through NCL (mostly to spend enough $ on AMEX to get the cash back). We have been to some of these ports several times (Cozumel and Puerto Plata), so we may stay on or close to the ship for some of the stops.

We made reservations on both cruises for Choir of Man. If we like it enough, we will probably keep the reservations on the 2nd cruise and go again. The Pour House is kind of 3rd priority right now to us - we chose the Choir of Man dates we wanted, and then penciled in the nights for the Supper Club we are interested in. I need to go back to the dailys and see what is happening on the other nights we have no plans and will probably do a couple of the Pour House shows.

We are excited to be in our sailing week for a B2B on the NCL Escape, December 9-16 & December 16-23 out of Port Canaveral. Special thanks to @CAKEisgood for their live review from the Escape last week and posting of the dailys, which has been incredibly helpful in planning this B2B. This week before boarding I'll post some background information, packages we have purchased, pre-cruise planning, and hopefully start collecting questions from people looking for information on board. This will be our first B2B, so really looking forward to learning and experiencing that. We did a side by side last year (Royal then Celebrity), which caused us to disembark, go to another pier, and embark a different ship. Planning a B2B has been interesting so far because we can spread activities across two sailings and not try to cram everything into one. This is our first NCL sailing since COVID, and first Breakaway category ship, but have been on the Pearl, Epic, Sun, and Star. Our last cruise was an Alaskan Princess Majestic Cruise Tour (7 day cruise followed by 5 day land tour in Denali) June 2023. Itinerary NCL Escape Cruise 1 (Dec 9-16): Day 1 - Port Canaveral Day 2 - At Sea Day 3 - Puerto Plata Day 4 - St Thomas Day 5 - Tortola Day 6 - At Sea Day 7 - Great Stirrup Cay Day 8 - Port Canaveral Itinerary NCL Escape Cruise 2 (Dec 16-23): Day 1 - Port Canaveral Day 2 - At Sea Day 3 - Cozumel Day 4 - George Town Day 5 - Ocho Rios Day 6 - At Sea Day 7 - Great Stirrup Cay Day 8 - Port Canaveral

Looks like you are having a great time! 2 important questions: 1) What has been your favorite cake onboard? 🙂 2) Have you heard anything about or gone to any of the supper club shows. It looks like they had dinner/show Day 2, Day 5, and Day 6. Keep enjoying your time!

Are the freestyle dailys being delivered to your cabin the night before, or do you have to request them or get them at guest services?

I’ll take the extra adults over no children. 😂

Sometimes we prefer the older cruise ships without the activities because it means there won't be many children on it.

Following! We will be on the Escape for Dec 9th and 16th sailings. Only request is don't break the ship!

Got it on my platinum. Thanks for the heads up!

Who runs that tour group….the Sanderson Sisters?!?

My favorites in no order: 1) Mature clientele 2) Blu Restaurant 3) Longer cruises (though they are harder to find now) 4) Simple, classy ships

All the mainstream cruise lines have been going through cuts. Since cruising reopened we have sailed Disney, Royal, Celebrity, and Princess. Food is the most important experience on a cruise ship to us and the only times we have been satisfied was the Beyond (we ate in Blu) and the Symphony of Seas (we had the ultimate dining package and ate all dinners and most lunches in specialty dining restaurants). We were surprised at how mediocre Disney and Princess were in their main dining rooms (and some specialty restaurants) and the poor quality of meats. Food is always subjective, but I get the disappointment and the questioning of whether the more luxury lines are better fits.

We usually go on cruises early-mid December before Christmas. We prefer the 10+ day cruises - few kids and the ships usually aren't full. But, we had 4 cruise next certificates from before COVID we still had to use so decided on the 2 7-day cruises this time with NCL. We have been a one dog household and have either put him in boarding and dropped him off to Eric's Mom to watch while we are gone. A little more than 3 months to go 🙂

We wore basic hiking boots that provided ankle protection and waterproof. Brand we had was merrell and they were perfectly fine. Any shoes you have that give ankle support should be good. The paths are fairly well managed, but there are inclines and declines and if it rained, it could be a little slick.

I don’t remember a winemakers dinner, but I wasn’t actively looking for it. I love Caymus so could have been convinced! I’ll check to see what brand of hiking shoes we used.

We were June 10th. I loved Mark the Naturalist - he was awesome. We went to a couple of his lectures and listened to his narrations as we were sailing. They were great. We did the same thing - "this is Alaska, this is why we are here" during our excursions and post cruise land tour. 🙂

We just did a sailing on the Majestic (also Alaska, so really can't judge the entertainment either) and I think I agree with every point you made. Princess is a more affordable line compared to Celebrity and I absolutely would go on another one if the price and itinerary were right (or we go on a Princess Casino cruise from the offers we started to get). And the sailing into the fjords and straits were awesome with Princess that you may not get with the other lines, so Princess would be a go-to for Alaska. But, I just don't see Princess and Celebrity being peers. Princess and Norwegian are more similar to me than Princess and Celebrity.

For our 7 day Dec22 cruise, they had different shows on 3 nights (we only went to 2 of them). On our sailing they had a flutist, acrobats who did aerial acts, a hulahopper, the normal dancers, and 2-3 singers as part of the shows. The youtube video was a different show than what was on our sailing, so it looks like they change the shows periodically? Maybe they have scaled back since December as well.....

Its only 1 min, 30 seconds long. It was posted in June - I assume it was also taken in June? I was on the Beyond in December 2022 and they definitely had those shows in Eden (I think there were a total of 3 of them) - I posted them in my live review.

That must be really new. I just saw a youtube clip from June 2023 with an Eden show that included the acrobats, dancers, singers, and other live performers. That "Alice in Wonderland" show they posted was different than ones we saw last year.

This is good news to me - I love Coco Cay - its my favorite Cruise Line Island. I would go on a cruise that does a 3 day, 2 overnight stay at Coco Cay. Celebrity has huge competition if they are rebranding to a younger market - not sure how well they would compete with Virgin (haven't gone on one yet, just heard and its on my list to try). And, local Floridians have a much, much cheaper option for short party cruises with Margarittaville (also on my list). That said, I'm all for Celebrity adding Coco Cay to its list of ports.

The Edge Class entertainment is completely different than the rest of the Celebrity fleet. Its like comparing RCL Oasis Class to Radiance Class entertainment. Celebrity stepped up its game with entertainment with Edge Class. Outside of Edge Class, I am not a very big fan of Celebrity's entertainment. I loved Eden - its something you don't experience on any other cruise line/ship. The Beyond and Symphony of the Seas are my two favorite ships. To me, the Beyond had a much different feel than any other cruise ship I've been on - it felt more like a land-based resort and every once in a while you go outside to be reminded you are on the cruise ship.

The December cruise for me. Holiday cruises tend to have more children on board. Though, I’m not sure how many would be on board for a 15 day cruise regardless, so it’s probably not an issue with either cruise. The December one also has an extra port stop - there are enough Sea Days that I’d prefer the extra port stop. The difference in weather will probably be marginal - it will be great in November and December. The only other consideration would be travel. I’d rather fly to California for the start and end in Florida, since I live here. But, the first cruise leaves the Sunday before Thanksgiving, so that will probably be a really busy travel weekend.

We just sailed our first Princess sailing on Majestic. It’s hard to compare lines based on one or two experiences. That said, to us Celebrity is a generally a higher end line than Princess. Food and entertainment is always subjective. We were very disappointed with the food (MDR and some specialty restaurants) on Princess. The only exception was The Catch, which was fantastic. Princess has a lot more in common with Royal Caribbean and Norwegian. Not that there anything wrong with that. The entertainment was standard for a cruise outside of Oasis Class or Edge Class ships. We would sail Princess again depending on itinerary and price - but to us Celebrity is clearly the superior brand.