OceanBlue123

Thanks for sharing your tips! I sail soon room 9804 praying for a room that has solitude!

Cabin 9804 looks to be right above the wall separating Fat Cats Jazz & Blues Club and the Maltings Bar. Remember to turn the white balcony door handle up to make the tight seal that will, hopefully, keep out the sounds of the waterfront. As sounds go though, some background jazz does not seem too bad.

i looked at the deckplan. deck 9 fwd has cabins above and also cabins below (deck 8). the theater music is down on deck 6. explain the noise to me please?

You need to look at the deck plans more closely. The cabins mentioned (9441 & 9445) are directly above the large, open white space on the deck 8 plan, and also directly above the middle of the theater on deck 7. There are no cabins in between. Probably just open space for theater lights, etc.

I somewhat agree with you however if one stays in a haven cabin I would imagine there is nothing to complain about. Perhaps if you were hunting for lounge chairs, waiting in lines for the dining rooms or some of the other common compaints about the Breakaway you wouldn't comment that others are "knit picking".

I think a big part of the crowding problem on Breakaway is due to the large amount of space reserved for the Haven. I know the Haven folks pay extra for it, but it does not seem fair to take away so much from so many to satisfy only a few.

The Adult only Vibe and Spice/H2O make the matter even worse for families. There is so little deck space remaining.

They have removed the free movie channels from the TV's and now charge $10 per pay-per-view movie.

Ordering Pizza any time from room services is an extra $5.

Ordering any room service from Midnight to 5am is an extra $4.

All the gym work-out classes cost extra money.

Carlos Bakery, Specialty Coffees, and Gelato are all extra dollars.

Let’s talk about the new Breakaway. It is the newest NCL ship and therefore must represent the direction NCL is headed in. As you walk around the ship you will notice that so many of the public areas are taken up by fee-based activities. Be it all the specialty restaurants. The Cirque tent. Bars. Casino. The Haven. The Spa. Vibe. The stores. Carlos Bakery. Coffee shop. The classes in the gym. And why are the showrooms and entertainment venues so small that people have to stand? Why is the lobby overflowing whenever they use it for a show? And for that matter, why are they even using the lobby for a show in the first place? Why are the hallways so thin. Why is my balcony so small? Because too much space is reserved for fees, and not enough is left for free. To most cruisers (though probably not many of the more experienced cruisers you find here at CC), cruisers that have already spent a lot of hard earned money for what they thought was an all inclusive vacation, this appears to be a giant grab for even more of their wallet. Nickel and diming. To my knowledge, no other cruise line has such a high percentage of public space devoted to extra-fee activities. The nickel and dime theme runs rampant throughout the Breakaway reviews. You can pretend it does not, or say it is incorrect, but the feeling is definitely there. And it is worse on the NCL Breakaway than anywhere else I have seen.

It makes me sad to think that this represents the future of our cruise industry.

Sorry to interrupt your little circle of love Kyle, but pretending a problem does not exist does not make it go away.

I must admit that I, too, have never had a gun held to my head on an NCL cruise. I guess by your definition my cruises must have been perfect, also.

If the specialty restaurants were just an upscale option, rather than overwhelmingly intrusive in terms of lost MDR dining space and constant advertising, I might actually agree with you. Sadly that is not the case. Almost every negative NCL review complains about all the extra charges they are trying to get out of us. We cannot all be wrong.

The first step is admitting there is a problem.

I think that as long as NCL has dinner time waits of up to an hour just to get a seat in a non-fee dining room, while pushing and pushing you to pay up for their specialty restaurants, then you will hear complaints about nickle and diming.

And you should. Those complaints are quite valid.

It all depends on the game and stakes. 1-2 no limit is normally $1 on every $20 capped at $3-5. Limit games up to 20-40 are usually capped at $4. Higher than that you pay every 1/2 hour, like $8 for a 40-80 game.

So would it be fair to say normal is about 5% and NCL wants twice that?

I have been playing poker for years with friends, but never in a casino. What is a normal rake in Vegas or AC?

Gambee, just one more note of thanks for the wonderfully detailed review. So helpful for my August cruise!