spenecer

2 hours ago, mking8288 said:

As usual, there's a line outside the Manhattan MDR tonight around 7:45 pm, prime dinner time and they were out of pagers for the expected 45 minutes wait, unless one has a confirmed reservation - so much for the spirit of Freestyle Dining, which we know is gone with the wind upon the arrival of mega ships sailing near, at and above double occupancy. 

 

Epic, according to one of the asst. dining room manager, hasn't seen crowds this large until this TA, not even when it was sailing out of Old San Juan during spring break.  

 

 

There were 4400 on my Spring Break sailing out of San Juan compared to your 3825.  I wonder if the MDR is more crowded because families with kids prefer the buffet to the MDR.  There was always two short lines in front of the Manhattan room during my sailing: one to get a pager and one to turn in the pager and be seated. 

Are you sure you have the name correct?  NCL has a Lavender Patch cocktail.

28 minutes ago, mking8288 said:

 

 

Ships 5-6-7 public deck space has its unique layout and is different, getting used to it  ... more comments & thoughts about it later. Plus how we are managing 3 to a angled large family balcony. 

 

 

Should you ever choose to walk from mid-ship to the front (fore?) on Deck 7, I would recommend not doing it.  There is only a walkway on one side going past the Ice Bar and photographers hang out there to shoot photos (the paid ones) so it is very crowded and constantly blocked with people standing/posing, waiting to get into the ice bar, or getting coats for the ice bar.  It is very difficult to walk that path with a martini in your hand and not pour it down someone's front (or back).  I managed it on my cruise at the end of March, but I'm sure I looked super dangerous with my martini glass.

2 minutes ago, mking8288 said:

Posting over "free" a WiFi onboard, not using minutes on this account.

 

 

 

Reasonable speeds?

15 minutes ago, mking8288 said:

Express self walk-off / disembarkation just underway within the last 30 minutes, going to take a while to reach zero count before we can early/board accordingly, Haven ... special needs, VIP, Platinums & higher, etc.  Let's see whether there will be any "priority check-in" - not boarding 😉 🤔

 

Car services will be coming to pickup for our short trip to Pier 88.  

 

 

What site are you using for so many Epic camera views?  I was only able to find the Forward/Bridge Camera.

2 hours ago, TPS123 said:

Hi Spenecer , thank you so much for you review and posting the dailies. I have really enjoyed reading it and them.

 

I will be on the Epic for its first cruise post TA from Barcelona on 7 May and can’t wait. It will be my 7th cruise 6 of which have been on the Epic Med and Caribbean. The other one was NCL Dawn from Trieste last year.

 

From reading your dailies it seems Spice H2O is not being used to show films in the evening. Would you know if this is due to the soot issues?

 

TIA

  

I don't know why Spice H20 wasn't being used.  It wasn't a question brought up during the meet and greet but January through May is the windy season in the Caribbean and the wind tended to blow from the port to the starboard side of the boat (or vice versa depending on whether we were sailing north or south), so there would definitely be one side of Spice H20 that would get rusty brown water 'misting' down.  Also, they showed mostly kid and teen movies and Spice is the adults area, so I think this is why they chose the Atrium.  It also rained twice overnight so probably easier not to deal with having to 'reschedule' movies as well due to weather.  Spice H20 also had one of the few bars that I wasn't able to try because it was very difficult to reach being at the top of the stadium seating and the space in front of it was narrow so it wasn't possible to belly-up to the bar and was more of a line.  So, I don't think Spice H20 is a good space for kids to be watching movies and they showed kids movies on this cruise.

13 hours ago, Clay Clayton said:

We have 300 wifi minutes so will likely only post when we are in port-hence the “ish”😂. That’s what I did last fall when we did b2b aboard HAL to Alaska and Hawaii and it seemed to be much easier than trying to upload over the ship’s network. 
 

I was on the Epic at the end of March and I found the network to be fast for live CC posting in the early morning (6AM) and in the evening (11pm+).  You can get almost 2 Mb Up with no packet loss.  Mid-day is terrible.

If you are all Android users, you should be able to communicate using Google Messages for SMS text messages only (no pictures or video).

I was just on the NCL Epic and there are no fountain soda machines on the ship.  You can only get canned soda, but they won't give you the can.  They open the can and pour it into a cup.

21 hours ago, jsn55 said:

We're on the Epic in October.  It was booked without reading reviews, so I really laughed at the descriptions here.  My take is that there's no 'bad cruise or ship' so I know we'll have a good time because we keep our expectations low.  The bathroom layout seems perfect for two people sharing a cabin.  If you know each other well enough to be in the same cabin, why would seeing your roomie's 'silhouette' in the shower be a problem?  People are indeed weird.  I am looking forward to reading this thread ... so much information can be gained by reading others' experiences.

 

I'm amazed that people are still reading this 'live' review now that the cruise is over.  I'm glad you are enjoying it.  I did learn (unsurprisingly) that while I didn't have any issues with my teenage daughter seeing me naked, she had issues with me seeing her naked.  All that teenage self-consciousness needs a few more years of maturity before she can reach either 'I don't care' or 'I look F* awesome.'  I was required to draw the red curtain between the shower/toilet area and the rest of the room so that she could change in privacy.

Also, she complained that the room was too cold and that all the interior spaces on the ship were too cold.  She wore her 'boyfriend sweater' everywhere.  I thought the interior temperature was just fine (and never pointed out the thermostat on my side of the room).  I was never hot or cold.  My daughter claims that the temperature is only perfect for women in menopause (Could that have marketting value?  Sail NCL if you are in menopause.  You finally have money, spend it with us.).

7 minutes ago, redmomof4 said:

Do we have to do this on board? I do not drink coffee or Starbucks, but my husband loves it. So he can do the unlimited Starbucks and I don’t have to? If I understand you correctly?! 

You can do it onboard or beforehand using the app or NCL website.

4 hours ago, hawkeyetlse said:

Unlimited Starbucks is $12.95 a day. I don’t know how strict they are about making everyone in a cabin get it (especially kids). But one person sharing their Starbucks with 1-3 other people probably gets noticed pretty fast (not suggesting you were planning to do that!)

Not everyone in the cabin needs to get the Unlimited Starbucks Package but you have to be over 18 to get it. You are also limited to 1 order at a time on the Starbucks package (and you have to wait 15 min to get your next drink).

FYI, the price to upgrade a minor to the FAS+ is less than upgrading an adult.  I did this recently for the wi-fi and the upgrade for my child was $100 less than mine.  Also, if you get the FAS+, then you can get 2 drinks at Starbucks per visit whereas with the Unlimited drink package you can only get 1 drink.  You can then give the second drink to the minor.

13 hours ago, StarAFire said:

Are you talking about the google chat app or something else?  Because we tried google chat, teams, discord and WhatsApp before giving up and using ncl app. 

None of those are SMS apps.  Clearly they have to leave SMS open to allow the NCL chat app to work which is why it works for iMessage and Google Messages.  Both of those send SMS.

When I was on the Epic two weeks ago, the buffet had Lipton tea bags.  It had the orange pekoe and then 6 different herbal flavors.  One herbal flavor was apple.  

7 minutes ago, hallux said:

Interesting that you mention this.  When I was on the Escape in March I was definitely able to use my Android phone (and the Google Messages app) to receive and send SMS/MMS messages to people not on board the ship, without being signed on to access the external internet.

Any two people with the same SMS texting app should be able to communicate on or off the ship.  I would assume you could text anyone with the Google Messages app installed.

iMessage works while on ship's wi-fi and in airplane mode.  You do not need to be logged in to your minutes.  I tested with a passenger that I randomly met on my first cruise who had an iPhone and I could text him without him being logged in.

On 4/7/2023 at 12:45 PM, periatza34 said:

So we decided to get our 15 and 5 year old passport cards instead of passports and the 16 year old a full passport.  We got the 16 year old's passport in the mail two weeks ago.  We still dont have the passport cards and we sail out in 16 days. I think we will have the cards by the time we sail, but I'm not sure the birth certificates will be mailed back in time.  the 15 year old has a different last name than my wife and I.  Without that birth certificate, will they take my wife's word that he is her son with the passport card?  Do I have to go and buy new birth certificates now?  What really is the point of the passport card if I still need to travel with their birth certificates?  

 

Also, when doing online check in, I checked 4 of us in early in the morning and was able to get 9:30-10 check in time.  I wasnt able to check in the 5th till later in the day and was only able to get 10-10:30 check in time for him.  They can't assume a minor is going to check in 30 minutes later than the rest of the family?  I have only cruised two other times and with no minors before so I can't really remember how the process goes.  Am I just being too worried?  Last thing I want to do is fly all the way down there and get denied boarding.

If you are a US citizen sailing on a closed loop cruise with Norwegian (meaning starting at a US port and ending at a US port), then your children (15y and 5y) do not need a birth certificate or a passport (card) to sail.  I went last week out of PR with a 16y and she never had to show ID (just her cruise card) to get on/off the ship.  For gov't issued ID, we actually used her school ID card. Minors get flagged getting on/off the ship, but the NCL security merely check to see if there is an adult there. When you check-in at the port, you have to show whatever proof of ID you used in the online checkin for the child.  So, if you used a passport card number, then you will need that because the check-in person will match.  If you used a birth certificate, then you need that. 

On 4/7/2023 at 11:34 AM, mking8288 said:

 Cisco servers that are currently in use onboard the Joy, Escape, Getaway & even the "older" NCL ships all have fairly robust hardware and network servers in place - I'm doubtful that NCL needs to upgrade their access points or hotspots already deployed, i.e.  Breakaway "live" beta testing 1.0 was done fairly quickly several months ago.  

 

I would argue that Epic does not have enough network hardware installed onboard to handle 'local' traffic on ship.

In other things that the Epic has totally failed to do, I didn't catch COVID while on my very first cruise.  Sigh.

1 hour ago, laudergayle said:

I also recommend a cabin near the forward elevator/stairs. Deck 12 was perfect for the stairs.  Three decks up to the buffet and pool…and 5 down to the theater. 

I was on Deck 12 and it was perfect for stairs!

The link to an actual Freestyle Daily and not just the general thread. 

The Manhattan Main Dining room has Blues and Jazz band with a singer the night we dined there and space left open for people to dance but we didn’t see anyone get up at dance. 

I posted all my Freestyle Dailies from the March 26-April 2 Epic trip in my recent live.

I just got off the Epic and had a room by the Fore Elevators which was really convenient because they go all the way to deck 4 for getting off at ports. There are no midship elevators or stairs on the Epic. I took the stairs to burn off food calories and found the stairs to be really shallow and easy to do 6 decks without realizing it.