NCL Jewel 13 night Caribbean April 11, 2010

[bsb4273]

Anyone on the NCL Jewel for the 13 night repo in April??

[bcco]

We are considering it. I won an NCL cruise in an incentive competition and get my choice. We are a rather unique family (I am a heterosexual female, my spouse is an in-process, transgendered female and we have a 2.5 year old beautiful daughter adopted from China: It's a long story, but we all love each other and are committed to being together.) So I'm trying to get a sense of how comfortable we will feel on board and if 13 nights is too long. We have only taken a short cruise out of San Juan in the past on RC, we enjoyed it, but didn't have our daughter then. Actually, the cruise I won was on RC, but they let me switch it to NCL because of our daughter's age (NCL kids club starts at 2 and RC doesn't start until age 3.) Any thoughts?

[ausdingo]

Hey there, Myself and my partner will be on the Jewel. We actually took the Jewel repo the other way last year from NYC to MIA and had a big group. It was a blast and we really love the Jewel. Looking forward to the trip in April.

 

Patrick and Glenn

[miamiboater]

My partner and I will be on the Jewel for the April 11th cruise. We've always had great experiences on NCL and are very excited about this cruise. We are also excited about the ports we will be visiting. Where are you guys from? Just a guess........Australia? We're from Miami. Cheers!

[bsb4273]

Good Morning. I am excited to hear that there will be other family members onboard this 13 day cruise. We are from Allentown, PA. Where is everyone else from? We are looking forward to this cruise. This is our first time on NCL. We have done Princess on two other occasions, and was wondering how NCL compared to Princess. What were some of the highlights of your last cruise on the Jewel? Any advice on things to do at the ports? We are doing 3 excursions thus far. We are doing excursions in Belize, Curaco, and Tortola.

 

Brian & Chris

[ausdingo]

Great to have you aboard. We are from Orlando here, but as my name might suggest I am originally from Australia. My partner is from New York. As for the ports, we love Curacao for shopping. If you have any specific questions about the ports I can try to answer them for you as we have been to all but Tortola. Cozumel, Aruba and Curacao are all easy to explore by foot. Belize is pretty dirty but can be explored on foot. No beaches or attractions close to the port though. Same goes for Roatan, although I love West Bay and the beaches. Here are our plans so far.

 

Cozumel. Hit a beach in the am and explore town in the pm(we have rented scooters and explored the island and been to Chanakaab-we recommend both)

Belize. Explore the town(we have gone to Altun Ha ruins before-great half day trip)

Roatan-West Bay-Kayak, snorkel and get drunk(we have done the zip line before-great fun!)

Aruba-shop in the morning-beach in the afternoon(we rented a jeep last time and explored the island)

Curacao-Shop! shop! shop!. Our fave island

Tortola-no plans yet. Either walk around and Botanical gardens or if we can swing it with the half day in port, head to the Baths.

 

Either way, hope weather and company is good. Cannot wait.

 

Patrick and Glenn

[indyboilerboy]

Hey there....my partner and I will also be on the cruise. We are from Indiana. Glad to see other GLBT on the cruise too.

[bsb4273]

Just want to welcome the other GLBT members who will be cruising with us in April. I look forward to meeting each of you in a few weeks.

 

Brian

[indyboilerboy]

We are really excited about the cruise and NYC. We already booked one Broadway show for New York City. We booked a new musical (revival) called "Promises, Promises" starring Sean Hayes ('Will & Grace' TV show) and Kristin Chenoweth (from the famed 'Wicked' musical). http://www.promisespromisesbroadway.com/

[ausdingo]

Looking forward to meeting you all hopefully at the FOD gatherings. See you in 2 weeks.

[CruisinMaterial]

Having sailed on the Norwegian Jewel 2 times this calendar year I can tell you that you are going to have a GREAT time. The entertainment onboard this ship is very good and the crew is phenomenal. Hopefully the crew is still the same for your sailing as a I know a lot of their crew is transfering out to the Norwegian Epic (because they're THAT good).

 

Be sure to get active with your CC Meet & Greet folks and meet the senior staff onboard. They are very welcoming to everyone onboard. I sailed solo on her on 3/14 and the staff couldn't have been more welcoming. I have a review that is submitted about my solo trip on the Jewel and it should be posted by the end of the week.

 

The DJ onboard the Jewel is the BEST DJ in the NCL fleet (DJ Jean) so if you folks like to disco you're in GREAT hands! The Hotel Director onboard is John O'Hara and he's a great great guy. Can't say enough about how much I love the Jewel so you guys will have a blast. I wish I could go with ya'll!

 

~Jake

[indyboilerboy]

Can't wait for the vacation to be here.

[bsb4273]

Hey Everyone~

It's just a little more than a week away. I hope everyone enjoys the holiday weekend. No work tomorrow and no work on Monday. That means, only 4 more work days for me. Looking forward to meeting everyone soon. I need this vacation so bad!

 

Brian

[bcco]

Hello future cruisemates and hopefully friends,

 

As i mentioned above, my travel partner/best friend/co-parent is a transitioning transgendered female. She is wondering how things will go with getting on and off the Jewel on port days as she will be traveling under her old passport, old male name, etc. Do you have to show your passport and go through some type of immigration/customs process when you get off in port? Or do you just show/scan your Jewel card?

 

For that matter, will it be possible to request a different name on the Jewel card or must it be the name under which the cruise was booked and the one on her old passport? She hasn't done her legal name change yet but wants to be able to be herself on board. Should we email someone like John O'hara, the hotel director, about this before hand? Does anyone know how I can find his email address?

 

I hope it is okay to ask this here. Gina is still rather self-conscious and is a shy person by nature, so I said I would try to find out. We have only done one other cruise, a 3 day that was part of a business meeting for me, and Gina wasn't out yet and we weren't yet parents either. Please forgive my newbie ignorance. I appreciate any advice you might be able to offer. Thanks much, Barry

[miamiboater]

Hey everyone, Kurt and I are very excited about the cruise. We're almost there! We're really looking forward to meeting you all. Kurt and I always meet great people at the FOD meetings..........we're still friends with a lot of the people we've met and have travelled with them afterwards. Hopefully the FOD meetings on the Jewel will be better than on the Dawn. On the Dawn they told us to meet at the D.J. booth in one of the clubs while they had regular entertainment going on in that club. It was not very conducive to being able to meet other FOD's! Anyway, we shall see, I'm sure they will probably set it up better. Does anyone know if there is a martini happy hour on the Jewel? Kurt and I love martini's. On the Sky they had a martini happy hour but on the Dawn they didn't. We were very disappointed that they didn't have it on the Dawn, we thought it would be the same fleetwide.

 

Barry-

When you board the ship they will give you an NCL card that has your name, ship, and sailing date, it's also your on-board credit card. This is your boarding pass when you are in the ports, they will take a picture of you as you board which they will store electronically. As you board in the ports, they scan your card and your picture will pop up on their computer screen, this is how they verify it's you. They ask you to carry a second form of identification with you but I've never really seen them look at it or compare them. That being said, you never know! You may want to call the cruise line itself since your situation is unique. As far as the name goes, I'm fairly certain that the name printed on the card will be the one that you booked with, as well as, the official name on your identification. Hope this information helps. The best thing to do is call NCL and get it right from the horses mouth! Make sure you write down names of who you spoke to in case you get a different story at the port. Tell Gina not to worry, I'm sure everything will work itself out. You both will have a great time.

 

Again, we really look forward to meeting you all. It's gonna be a great time!

 

John

[bcco]

Hey everyone, Kurt and I are very excited about the cruise. We're almost there! We're really looking forward to meeting you all. Kurt and I always meet great people at the FOD meetings..........we're still friends with a lot of the people we've met and have travelled with them afterwards. Hopefully the FOD meetings on the Jewel will be better than on the Dawn. On the Dawn they told us to meet at the D.J. booth in one of the clubs while they had regular entertainment going on in that club. It was not very conducive to being able to meet other FOD's! Anyway, we shall see, I'm sure they will probably set it up better. Does anyone know if there is a martini happy hour on the Jewel? Kurt and I love martini's. On the Sky they had a martini happy hour but on the Dawn they didn't. We were very disappointed that they didn't have it on the Dawn, we thought it would be the same fleetwide.

 

Barry-

When you board the ship they will give you an NCL card that has your name, ship, and sailing date, it's also your on-board credit card. This is your boarding pass when you are in the ports, they will take a picture of you as you board which they will store electronically. As you board in the ports, they scan your card and your picture will pop up on their computer screen, this is how they verify it's you. They ask you to carry a second form of identification with you but I've never really seen them look at it or compare them. That being said, you never know! You may want to call the cruise line itself since your situation is unique. As far as the name goes, I'm fairly certain that the name printed on the card will be the one that you booked with, as well as, the official name on your identification. Hope this information helps. The best thing to do is call NCL and get it right from the horses mouth! Make sure you write down names of who you spoke to in case you get a different story at the port. Tell Gina not to worry, I'm sure everything will work itself out. You both will have a great time.

 

Again, we really look forward to meeting you all. It's gonna be a great time!

 

John

 

Thanks, John. I did call NCL and they said pretty much what you did. Have been crazy busy at work trying to get ready to leave-can't believe we will be in Fort Lauderdale in just 48 hours and then on our way on the ship the next day. Hope I make it until then, Barry