Norwegian Sky vs Carnival Victory

[Wolfwolf]

Hello everyone,

 

I am deciding between 2 cruises: Norwegian Sky and Carnival Victory on May

 

I have been to carnival cruises twice and this time I am bring my parents (60 years old) and my sister (25) to Caribbean/Bahams.

 

A couple questions:

 

1) Food quality: Which ship offers better food quality?

 

2) Sky is going to Freeport, Nassau and Great Stirrup Cay. Victory is going to Grand Turk, Half moon Cay, and Nassau. I have never been there and I wonder which destinations would be most fun for us all?

 

Thanks in advance! Cheers!

[CARNIVALCRUISE3]

I have sailed on both ships, and Victory offers more food choices. When you sail on it, it will have been refurbished with the 2.0 upgrades. You will love the ports on the Victory better, especially Grand Turk and Half Moon Cay.

[Jay Sam]

Hello everyone,

 

I am deciding between 2 cruises: Norwegian Sky and Carnival Victory on May

 

I have been to carnival cruises twice and this time I am bring my parents (60 years old) and my sister (25) to Caribbean/Bahams.

 

A couple questions:

 

1) Food quality: Which ship offers better food quality?

 

2) Sky is going to Freeport, Nassau and Great Stirrup Cay. Victory is going to Grand Turk, Half moon Cay, and Nassau. I have never been there and I wonder which destinations would be most fun for us all?

 

Thanks in advance! Cheers!

 

Of the 5 cruises I have taken on Carnival and the 2 on NCL, the food is consistently better on Carnival. The customer service on Carnival is better too.

 

Victory is a larger ship too.

 

Grand Turk is one of my 3 favorite ports. A great one to just lounge on the beach. You can walk from the ship to the beach in 10 minutes. There are tons of loungers right there with an awesome view of the ship. Also there is a nice pavillion right there too, with shops etc.

 

I have not been to Half Moon Cay, but a friend who cruised there raved about it and sent me a couple of photos. Looks very pristeen. It is on my short list of new ports to go.

 

A great site to visit is shipparade.com. It lists tons of ships, with inside and outside photos and facts about each. Great site. On the photo gallery just click on the lower right corner of the existing picture to advance to the next one.

 

Happy travels.

[Namelocg]

Cabins are bigger and food is better on the Victory. I love Half Moon and Grand Turk. The only good thing about Nassau is the Casino at Atlantis.

[FTLCruiseGal]

I am with the majority of everyone else -- definitely the Victory. NCL lacks in so many areas, and I will never cruise them again. Food is better, service is better, staff is friendlier. Hands down -- Victory.

[Jay Sam]

I have sailed on both ships, and Victory offers more food choices. When you sail on it, it will have been refurbished with the 2.0 upgrades. You will love the ports on the Victory better, especially Grand Turk and Half Moon Cay.

 

I see by your list of cruises, you tried NCL and never went back. I am laughing, as I have tried 2 of them and found nothing special. Even the Epic didn't live up to her name. Maybe 3rd time is the charm? I will try NCL again just to make sure I haven't missed something, but have always enjoyed my Carnival experiences much much more. Thanks for your list of your cruise history. Amazing.

[Jay Sam]

I am with the majority of everyone else -- definitely the Victory. NCL lacks in so many areas, and I will never cruise them again. Food is better, service is better, staff is friendlier. Hands down -- Victory.

 

Yep, you are of the same opinion as me. NCL doesn't have as great of a product like the other lines I have taken, Carnival, Holland, Celebrity or Royal. Like you said, food, service and staff overall, are lacking.

[canalwen]

Just cruised the Norwegian in the beginning of March. Wanted to give NCL a try to see if a switch up was in order. While the ship itself was beautiful, lots of rich wood and lots of windows and open deck space, I would not do it again. We thought the evening food choices in the MDR were strange. We did the buffet one night and were not really impressed with that either. Breakfast and lunch in the MDR were great. We did not do any of the pay restaurants. Pool area on the Sky was midship and that was it. Two pools side by side, hot tubs in between the pools. Customer service also was lacking. We never saw our room steward. We found him one night in the hall and asked for extra towels. He made our bed one day with a pillow onder the covers at the bottom of the bed. Wish we had thought to take a photo.

I have cruised on the Victory 3 times, all before her upgrade. I would choose Victory.

[mitsugirly]

I have not been on the Victory, so I can't comment on the ship. I was just on the Sky 4 months ago and did a complete review of it (listed in my signature line) and it has TONS of pictures if you are interested in viewing it.

 

I mainly sail with NCL most of the time and have only done Carnival (Dream) once. I will be on the Carnival Pride in 1 week and can't wait (and hope to do a lot more Carnival in the future). We find the good in every cruise we take and I don't find many negatives no matter what ship I'm on.

 

I do have to say that the Sky probably has one of the smallest buffet areas I have ever seen on an NCL ship (and also the Sun which is her sister ship). The variety wasn't as good as most of the other fleet.

 

The Sky does small 3-4 day cruises, which is normally something we would NEVER consider doing (airflight cost more than the cruise and not worth it) but we just added it on right after our Sun cruise since we were already down there. It worked for us, but under any other circumstance, I would have not even considered it for that reason.

 

I think the smaller cruises (days) give off a totally different vibe than your longer cruises.

 

Another thing to consider is you are posting on the Carnival board so a majority of people on here are going to tell you to do the Carnival. If you post on the NCL board, they will tell you to do NCL. So most will be biased with their choice. Just do a lot of research and come to your own conclusion and whatever you decide on have a WONDERFUL cruise!!! :)

[CARNIVALCRUISE3]

I see by your list of cruises, you tried NCL and never went back. I am laughing, as I have tried 2 of them and found nothing special. Even the Epic didn't live up to her name. Maybe 3rd time is the charm? I will try NCL again just to make sure I haven't missed something, but have always enjoyed my Carnival experiences much much more. Thanks for your list of your cruise history. Amazing.

 

I would love to try the Epic, but I always end up finding better deals on Carnival. I had a great experience on the NCL Sky. It's just that Carnival always has such great deals. I booked the Sky at the last minute. They had the balcony 3 day for $199 and the inside for $99. I booked it 2 days before. Carnival's 3 day that weekend was $299. I live 30 minutes away from the Port of Miami.

[Jay Sam]

I would love to try the Epic, but I always end up finding better deals on Carnival. I had a great experience on the NCL Sky. It's just that Carnival always has such great deals. I booked the Sky at the last minute. They had the balcony 3 day for $199 and the inside for $99. I booked it 2 days before. Carnival's 3 day that weekend was $299. I live 30 minutes away from the Port of Miami.

 

Epic is not for me. I took that ship once and that was enough. It is often said that Epic is a ship that people either love or hate. I didn't hate it but it wasn't my cup of tea. Would like to try out NCL's Sky to try out some new ports in the Bahamas at some point. At this point my priority is the ports that I can experience more than the ship.

 

Great prices you mentioned for Sky. I have been looking at those itin's lately, hopefully a 4 night sailing, Nassau - Freeport - Great Stirrup Cay. You are fortunate being so close to the port of Miami. I am a similar distance from the port of Tampa. Not even close the number of deals that can be gotten from Miami and Ft. Lauderdale. You guys have lots of options.

[knb0628]

I've been on both, and unlike most here, I would vote for NCL Sky. Having said that, I tend to prefer NCL over Carnival. I know much is being said about the Victory getting 2.0 upgrades, but it's looking like it isn't getting the full 2.0 (though I'll be on her next week, which is when it'll be known exactly what she got). Have you been on either cruise line? You may want to look into which cruise line would suit your needs/preferences more. I can't speak to the ports, as I've only been to Nassau.

[cdamion]

Cabins are bigger and food is better on the Victory. I love Half Moon and Grand Turk. The only good thing about Nassau is the Casino at Atlantis.

 

Different strokes for different folks I guess. While the Atlantis is an impressive place, I do not cruise to go to highly commercialized places like Atlantis or to go sit inside of a casino.

 

In Nassau you can wander around or head over to Fish Fry on Arawak Cay, which is a nice way to relax.

 

Every port is what you make of it. I would not specifically choose Nassau to go to, but if a ship stops there I will make the best of it.