Gem Renovations

[mrrobby]

Hello Gem people, I also just got off this cruise today. I must have said it 10 or 20 times to my wife, thank god we were eating in the specialty restaurants every night. We did stay in a suite this time and ate most of our breakfasts and lunches on sea days in Cagney's due in part to this large group of people.

 

It's a shame to generalize like this, but most of them had no regard for other people. I am a Jew and I feel I can make this statement without any prejudice whatsoever. They as a group, are very hard to be around.

 

 

I will surely avoid Yeshiva week in the future. I am not religious and never really heard of it before.

 

We had a great cruise and meet some very nice people from our Roll Call.

 

All the Best

Rob

[luvtheships]

I am more concerned about next week as thats when i sail :)

 

 

I just googled and it says that yeshiva Week can go up to Presidents' Day

 

While the 3rd/4 th week of January is the prime week ....this timeframe is popular all the way up to Presidents' Day due to the fact that it's a time when the families can vacation together and not have any religious obligations.

Edited February 1, 2016 by luvtheships

[dshefter]

Hello Gem people, I also just got off this cruise today. I must have said it 10 or 20 times to my wife, thank god we were eating in the specialty restaurants every night. We did stay in a suite this time and ate most of our breakfasts and lunches on sea days in Cagney's due in part to this large group of people.

 

It's a shame to generalize like this, but most of them had no regard for other people. I am a Jew and I feel I can make this statement without any prejudice whatsoever. They as a group, are very hard to be around.

 

 

I will surely avoid Yeshiva week in the future. I am not religious and never really heard of it before.

 

We had a great cruise and meet some very nice people from our Roll Call.

 

All the Best

Rob

 

Totally agree with Rob on this one. We didn't encounter the madness at dinner, whether it was in the MDR or specialty restaurants. But it was in the pool area and hallways/stairwells, where we witnessed the craziness, as well as the buffet at breakfast.

[borisivan]

Wow. Sounds like it was a significant pain in the butt for all involved. Glad my Feb 21 sailing coming up should be a bit more tame.

[ABClery]

To me, It doesn't really matter who the group is or why they're off of school, no group of people should be able to act that way on the ship and cause that much disruption. We love having kids around and brought our three year old. It's not about who was on the ship, NCL and other cruise lines need to be able to manage all of their guests. There was security presence on the pool deck but no one doing anything other than passive observation. I'm not looking to avoid specific groups of people or times of year when cruising, this is on the cruise line. If one half of the ship is able to seriously disrupt the vacations of the other half than there is something wrong with the way the ship is run.

 

It was clear who was in charge on the ship, and it wasn't the crew, officers, or latitudes members.

Edited February 1, 2016 by ABClery

[baseballalways]

Marion, I met far more nice people on board. But I have many cruises completed and never have I seen a pack of people like this group. My opinion is that this type of group would not ever be on a cruise out of Miami, Tampa, New Orleans or other ports. I may be wrong here. But I have to travel to cruise (no ports in Illinois) so why would I travel to NYC and risk a repeat?

 

BTW, I loved our mini-vacation in Manhattan and look forward to returning. Just not to cruise and risk being confined with this group again.

 

 

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Wow! I am not sure what group was on that cruise, but I have sailed out of New York at least 20 times. I can honestly say that I did not run into anything like this. That's not to say I haven't seen nasty passengers on some cruises, but don't make it about cruising out of New York and never cruise from here again. It is so wonderful to leave from here in my opinion. I always say why take pictures of the Statue of Liberty and going under the Verazzano Bridge, but we always do! Give it another chance! At least you know that group will not be on any Norwegian ship.

[2boyzmom]

when does this holiday end?

 

The holiday week and school break ended 1/31.

[Mr ncl]

To me, It doesn't really matter who the group is or why they're off of school, no group of people should be able to act that way on the ship and cause that much disruption. We love having kids around and brought our three year old. It's not about who was on the ship, NCL and other cruise lines need to be able to manage all of their guests. There was security presence on the pool deck but no one doing anything other than passive observation. I'm not looking to avoid specific groups of people or times of year when cruising, this is on the cruise line. If one half of the ship is able to seriously disrupt the vacations of the other half than there is something wrong with the way the ship is run.

 

It was clear who was in charge on the ship, and it wasn't the crew, officers, or latitudes members.

 

I think you nailed it too. Crew was fantastic. The officers should have stepped up on this. I even questioned the captain which is how I heard they will be banned. Hope that holds up. Long letter on its way to ncl

[Sizzlechest]

post the pics! (or a link)

 

and how large was this thug group?

 

 

Seriously! I gotta see what they look like.

[Mr ncl]

It was a total of almost 1000 of them. But the true rude ones was about 2/3 of that. And the real trouble young adults were about 15 of them. All in all terrible group of people. But it was the first time ever so it's no reason not to sail out of ny again. I've sailed every cruise I've done out of ny and that's 20. Never had an issue like this. Oh well. Time to move on

[luvtheships]

Ncl priced this particular late January cruise very well so it's no wonder there were so many onboard. If Ncl would just treat yeshiva week like they do spring break and Christmas/new year week and 4th of July week and price gouge...oops I mean raise the prices due to demand ....things may be different...and yes I know holiday cruises are full and sometimes rowdy but I've never seen such negative commentary about other such cruises as I have about these late January cruises

 

The problem is that it's a very cheap vacation for large families in January. Of course those families have other choices but choose Ncl. Why not rccl? Why not a land based vacay?

 

So Ncl allows this bad behavior to go on all in the name of sailing over capacity? Ncl would be better off raising the price of the late January cruise or otherwise limit the capacity to 2 /3 pax per cabin and not 4/5....which translates to sailing at 105% of capacity approx.

 

All Ncl accomplished by low balling this particular cruise price was to piss off the the 2/3 of their pax who had no idea such a large group would be onboard

 

Alternately just try to market this cruise out as a charter and be done with it

 

But Ncl doesn't make the best decisions anymore and doesn't learn from past experience.

 

This isn't the first time yeshiva week has existed. It's a long standing tradition from what I can tell

Edited February 2, 2016 by luvtheships

[Turtles06]

I'm on the Gem now. While waiting to board yesterday, I was speaking with a B2B cruiser who said the Jan 22 cruise was the worst he's ever been on. He said the groups of kid and parents were totally out of control. He said he was accosted by teenagers who threw coffee mugs at him, that young women were being harassed, that kids were doing cannonballs into the pool from Bali Hai above, no lines respected in the buffet or at guest services, etc. Had I not already seen some reports on here about that sailing, I would have thought he was making it up. It sounded horrific.

[shaun07]

This is crazy, everyone should be requesting a partial refund

[nbbell]

I did take pictures but I am not going to post them yet. I have contacted NCL with a phone call and a letter. I had food spit on me by a man yelling at his children with food in his mouth. The same group or family another one spilled a drink on me. I was by the pool because I got up and sat there didn't move from 7am on principle. If either my husband or I left for a second 4-6 teenage girls would jump into the chair. They would argue and not move!! This was my cruise too and at that point I had enough!! I also had a man bend over and hit me in the face with his butt. My husband was there for that one and he let him have it. There are HUNDREDS of other incidents from the crew and other passengers and more from me. I love the crew LOVE them and non of them deserved this as there was an air of anger and just weariness. I also saw increased security and upper management monitoring the situations but nothing was ever done, except to tell the crew that the customer is always right. My question is what about us the other passengers? Why were some of us that don't do the UDP or in Suites left out in the ocean? Not by the crew again they were so full of apologies for so many things. I finally did speak to Sonja more to defend the crew and report some specific horrible abuse to two specific bar staff. Sonja was was also at her wits end. She said that she had never in all her years seen anything like this. I have been on 8 cruises 6 out of NYC this same time but never have we ever experienced the level of craziness. Had I not been on this boat I would never had believed it either.

[luvtheships]

I'm on the Gem now. While waiting to board yesterday, I was speaking with a B2B cruiser who said the Jan 22 cruise was the worst he's ever been on. He said the groups of kid and parents were totally out of control. He said he was accosted by teenagers who threw coffee mugs at him, that young women were being harassed, that kids were doing cannonballs into the pool from Bali Hai above, no lines respected in the buffet or at guest services, etc. Had I not already seen some reports on here about that sailing, I would have thought he was making it up. It sounded horrific.

 

 

I believe everything you posted

 

The cannon ball thing alone should be enough for Ncl to put a stop to this nonsense

 

Those families off at next port and culprits put in the brig

 

Fwiw.....this cruise appeared to have a dangerous group of people on board and Ncl is totally responsible if they did nothing to stop them once their actions were viewed onboard

 

 

I'm not one to expect money from a cruise...but yes a refund....partial or 3/4 is due to those who want to pursue it

 

But then those problem families will demand a refund too ....and scream discrimination if they don't get one and others did

 

I doubt those disgusted with this cruise actually have any documentation of the bad behavior other than what they experienced

 

Video docs would help

Edited February 2, 2016 by luvtheships

[luvtheships]

To me, It doesn't really matter who the group is or why they're off of school, no group of people should be able to act that way on the ship and cause that much disruption. We love having kids around and brought our three year old. It's not about who was on the ship, NCL and other cruise lines need to be able to manage all of their guests. There was security presence on the pool deck but no one doing anything other than passive observation. I'm not looking to avoid specific groups of people or times of year when cruising, this is on the cruise line. If one half of the ship is able to seriously disrupt the vacations of the other half than there is something wrong with the way the ship is run.

 

It was clear who was in charge on the ship, and it wasn't the crew, officers, or latitudes members.

 

 

To a certain extent it does matter who the group is.....

 

Pax routinely know to avoid spring break cruises if they want to avoid groups of college kids

 

Routinely know to book mid summer cruises if they want lots of kids on the ship for their kids to meet

 

Routinely know that extended families travel the holiday cruises

 

Personally I want to know if my cruise is going to have a partial charter or a nudist group onboard. Lol

 

 

I know you are trying to be "inclusive" "diverse" or whatever the politically correct name is but the fact remains......

 

That in late January particularly out of NYC....the yeshiva schools take a break and take cruises...and these are families known to have large numbers of children....11 is not unheard of

 

So yes....I want to know....why? Because it WILL change my cruise experience

 

 

Fwiw....we went to a well known water park in ct on a weekday in July and several buses of campers from an orthodox camp showed up...ok the place is huge and didn't matter to us at all.....until....now get this.....

 

About 200 young teen women in full floor length woolen skirts....socks....long sleeve shirts...and street shoes.....jumped fully clothed into the wave pool!!![emoji79][emoji79][emoji79]

 

 

It's not discrimination nor profiling for me to say this....but....it was disgusting.....unsanitary...and turned the pool into a cloudy mess that had to be shut down....only after they were done swimming

 

Oh and not one staff person tried to stop them or suggest they get suits on....but I bet if I tried to swim fully clothed I would be stopped

Edited February 2, 2016 by luvtheships

[Mr ncl]

The man with the coffee cup was correct. I saw him in a rage after it happened. The whole group was disgusting. I actually feel worse for first time cruisers as now this is the first impressions of ncl and that's not fair. These people were downright nasty, rude, entitled and everything else you can say about them.

It was hard to enjoy this cruise. Usually coming back to a floating feeling of relaxation, far from that this time. Had to get TWO massages to calm down. I felt like I was defending the poor crew all week.

[leeb331]

Marion, I met far more nice people on board. But I have many cruises completed and never have I seen a pack of people like this group. My opinion is that this type of group would not ever be on a cruise out of Miami, Tampa, New Orleans or other ports. I may be wrong here. But I have to travel to cruise (no ports in Illinois) so why would I travel to NYC and risk a repeat?

 

BTW, I loved our mini-vacation in Manhattan and look forward to returning. Just not to cruise and risk being confined with this group again.

 

 

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Pls don't let a group of people who may reside in the area stop you from leaving out of NYC. They could been from anywhere in the world but choose to leave out of NYC and been so terrible. You could leave out of any other port and this could happen as well. Unfortunalty they chose your vacation time to travel and they should've been stopped at day 2 The captain should have gotten hold of the ring leader and told him to stay in check and not abuse the guests or crew or they would have to leave the ship I bet that would have had them second guessing their actions. wouldn't that have been an embrassement going back home and tell your friends and family you were thrown off the ship for not behaving.

[Crusin6]

Pls don't let a group of people who may reside in the area stop you from leaving out of NYC. They could been from anywhere in the world but choose to leave out of NYC and been so terrible. You could leave out of any other port and this could happen as well. Unfortunalty they chose your vacation time to travel and they should've been stopped at day 2 The captain should have gotten hold of the ring leader and told him to stay in check and not abuse the guests or crew or they would have to leave the ship I bet that would have had them second guessing their actions. wouldn't that have been an embrassement going back home and tell your friends and family you were thrown off the ship for not behaving.

 

 

This group is mostly from Brooklyn

 

This group cruises the 3 rd week of January

 

The 3rd week of January is known as Yeshiva Week

 

Jewish religious schools take this week off but it is not a religious holiday

 

You can google the dates of Yeshiva Week.... it's not profiling or an insulting description

 

Just like Jersey Week is not profiling or insulting

 

 

They have very very large families

 

They rarely fly during this week to get to a cruise

 

This is not a week that is even known in other areas of the USA

 

They were not from anywhere in the world they were from Brooklyn

 

 

They chose this week for convenience and price

 

This group would not be cruising out of other ports

 

 

I live in New York

I love cruising from NYC

 

But....I know when to avoid it and when to book it.

 

 

 

 

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[peg013]

In 2014 we actually changed our cruise week once we found out they were going to be onboard. So glad we did.

[Letsgo 2]

In 2014 we actually changed our cruise week once we found out they were going to be onboard. So glad we did.

 

How does one find out what group

is going to be on board?

[Red-Sol]

How does one find out what group

is going to be on board?

 

Very good question...I too would like to know how these things can be found.

[luvtheships]

Just google yeshiva week 2017 and you will see the approx dates. This primarily affects reasonably priced cruises out of NYC. The recent cruise in question had ksf and the dates worked. However the week is usually around mlk day and/or the 3rd week in January. Many are home schooled btw as well as religious schooled so missing school is not really an issue. It sounds like these parents do whatever they want anyway My guess is the January 18 2017 cruise will be prime time yeshiva week but I'm planning on January 8 cruise so I will take a closer look before I book just in case

[Letsgo 2]

Just google yeshiva week 2017 and you will see the approx dates. This primarily affects reasonably priced cruises out of NYC. The recent cruise in question had ksf and the dates worked. However the week is usually around mlk day and/or the 3rd week in January. Many are home schooled btw as well as religious schooled so missing school is not really an issue. It sounds like these parents do whatever they want anyway My guess is the January 18 2017 cruise will be prime time yeshiva week but I'm planning on January 8 cruise so I will take a closer look before I book just in case

 

Works for us, since the earliest we cruise

would be middle of May and the latest

we would go is December.

[luvtheships]

I cruised the gem June 1 one year and it was a wonderful group.