Dawn has put me off NCL

[Lexi03]

Our first experience with NCL was on the Dawn and we weren't thrilled about the food overall either. The worst was the steak house which we had super high expectations. I did like Le Bistro however the duck was delicious. We are going to Europe on the Spirit in August and we picked her for the itinerary with low food expectations but here's to hoping that the Dawn is just an anomaly! :)

[valleyvillage]

We bought one of those things on the Sun about half-way through the cruise and won $1000! I just stared at it! Like, I must be reading this wrong.

Took it to bingo the next day and they made a big fuss to the crowd, didn't seem to be keeping it a secret. Almost paid the bar bill! :)

[djacobson]

Just back from a week on the Dawn and, for the first time, did not purchase a cruise reward certificate. But before I go on, I want to let you know NCL has been my favorite cruiseline for a while now and I'm Platinum +.

 

We (me, 2 daughters and 1 granddaughter) had connecting balcony cabins on deck 10. Cabins were okay and kept up well although I don't remember other NCL balconies being as small as these.

 

Entertainment was great...as always. My main gripe is with the MDR food and especially the service...very indifferent and, on a couple of occasions, downright rude.

 

And those darn pull-tab strips they sell. On every cruise I've been on, it always gets down to the final day and 'no one has won the $2000 yet'!! I spent too much time explaining to my 11 year old granddaughter that this is what is known as a colossal ripoff!!!

 

I promised another daughter (who could not go this time) that she and I would go on a cruise together later this year. I wish RCL was sailing from NO but since they are not, I am seriously looking at the Dream. I'm not a big Carnival fan but I think the time has come to give them another chance.

 

As always, JMHO.

 

One more thing. Loved the Spirit and Jewel (sailed both from NO.. the Spirit 4 or 5 times while she was here) and really liked both. Unfortunately, it looks like the Dawn is going to be parked here for a while. DARN.

 

I am interested in knowing more about the Dawn. I am booked for November 29, which will be my second NCL cruise. Went on the Jewel last year and was greatly impressed and am considering the Jade for next year.

Edited April 10, 2015 by djacobson

[spanishguy1970]

No disrespect intended but i don't see why the Dawn put you off from cruising on NCL again. My first cruise was on the NCL GEM and i had a memorable time my second one was on the Gem again and that time even though i loved the ports i did see the changes and the service was not as memorable. Each ship offers their own charm and service and i for one take it as it comes and find something to enjoy. Those 2000 dollar tag things are sold on every ship and since i don't gamble i could care less but i can see why someone enjoys taking the risk. IF you don't risk you don't win :-)...

[StolidCruiser]

I appreciate all you have shared about your experience on the Dawn.

 

If inconsistent service and pull tabs are dealbreakers that cause you to be turned off a cruiseline, be prepared to be turned off every mass market one you try. Service can rarely be 100% perfect 100% of the time (but of course we hope that it is). Anyone who expects it as a guarantee has never worked a day in the service industry.

[margie1221]

We loved the Dawn!! Sailed the Boston to Bermuda itinerary in May 2014 with 22 other couples celebrating a dear friend's 50th Wedding Anniversary which we dubbed their "50th Jubilee at Sea". It was definitely one of our best cruises ever... we've been on several NCL ships as well as Carnival and RCI. Maybe it was our fun-loving group or the Bermuda sailing - so easy out of Boston. I agree with some of the OP's comments - VERY slow service in the MDR (Venetian) just one night - it was OK the other nights, servers not engaged in sincere service in Aqua (two nights), wouldn't rave about service in Bamboo (Asian) either - but the food was good and we just loved being together as friends and family so we had a good vibe going all week long!! Oh and always seem to have a good experience in Moderno - no matter what ship...

 

LOVED Pearly Kings Pub - with Bartender Chips Ahoy - layout a little strange with a lot of through traffic but we hung out there quite a bit. Karaoke was hysterical. Elements and other shows were also great!

 

Enjoyed suite privileges immensely - breakfast and lunch in Cagney's, priority disembarkation, extra treats delivered to the cabin in the afternoon... and, I can't forget to mention, a wonderful NCL Meet and Greet!!

 

Have a great time on the Dawn - we sure did!!

[cod]

OMG...some of you folks slay me. Yes, I mentioned the pull tab sales pitch as being annoying and some of you are intent on coming back to it as if it were my major or my only gripe. It wasn't. I think I mentioned enough other things to justify my not being a Dawn fan so I won't rehash them.

 

Loved the Jewel, sailed on the Spirit 4 times which says it all, liked the Sun (one cruise on her was a Hawaii repo which was great) and even the Sky (Alaska years ago) was a very good cruise. Not crazy about the Star so would not choose her again either.

 

Once again, different strokes for different folks. Happy cruising on whatever your choice of ships is.

[Landl cruiser]

I am interested in knowing more about the Dawn. I am booked for November 29, which will be my second NCL cruise. Went on the Jewel last year and was greatly impressed and am considering the Jade for next year.

 

 

 

 

We are also booked on the Dawn for Nov 29 out of NOLA. The Dawn is one of our favorite ships.

[Jay Sam]

OMG...some of you folks slay me. Yes, I mentioned the pull tab sales pitch as being annoying and some of you are intent on coming back to it as if it were my major or my only gripe. It wasn't. I think I mentioned enough other things to justify my not being a Dawn fan so I won't rehash them.

 

Loved the Jewel, sailed on the Spirit 4 times which says it all, liked the Sun (one cruise on her was a Hawaii repo which was great) and even the Sky (Alaska years ago) was a very good cruise. Not crazy about the Star so would not choose her again either.

 

Once again, different strokes for different folks. Happy cruising on whatever your choice of ships is.

 

I don't know what all that tab stuff is all about. Only came out ahead twice on 11 cruises at the casinos. But that is ahead of Vegas in my history there.

 

Just paid for a Sky cruise on 27th of April for my 28th of April birthday. Four nights to Freeport - Nassau - Great Stirrup Cay. Looking forward to it. Two new ports for us. Got an inside guaranty so hopefully get something better. If not, I plan to enjoy the heck out of the cruise.

 

I agree with you about Star. Just something off about that ship. Can't put my finger on it, as the food was good and the service too, just something about it that didn't feel right.

Edited April 11, 2015 by Jay Sam

[Freespir8]

I love reading everyone's opinion. We have the Dawn booked for 3 cruises coming up within the next year and a half. We have been on the Star three times and two out of the three were great. The last time was just so so. We have a tendency to go with the flow as well when it comes to vacation but I will admit I noticed the changes on the Star this last time.

One of our trips include Costa Maya and it's funny that one poster didn't like it. It was actually one of my most favorite ports and when I have a vision of my happy place that's where I go. We had an amazing view of the ship with white sand beaches, incredible food, service and had $20 massages on the beach. It was truly magical and relaxing. It could have also been because it was our first cruise ever and that was our first port stop. Whatever it was it still remains a favorite for me. We agree though about the port area as you get off the ship. Very commercial so it's important to take a taxi and head off to the little beach and restaurant area about 5 minutes cab ride away.

Thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts on your last cruise. I always appreciate the different perspectives.

[Sand and Seas]

We were on the Dawn twice in the last year and enjoyed both cruises. We have also cruised on the larger 'away' ships and enjoyed those, but they are a different experience than a Dawn size ship. We ate in a specialty restaurant 3 times each trip (Platinum perk and Casino Comp) but otherwise enjoyed the MDRs. We have found that if we tell our waiter we are trying to get to a show, they can bring our meal faster. Otherwise, we are OK with the time spent. I do think they are adjusting staff across the restaurants with so many on the UDP and we are all going thru that process with them. All things considered, we are happy with FreeStyle cruising and wouldn't go back to the other kind.

[Sand and Seas]

Also wanted to add, our favorite excursion to take is to Maya Key on Roatan. It's a private island with an animal sanctuary. You can snorkel, see all types of animals, lay on the beach, and enjoy a really good island fish fry. We have done this excursion 4 times now and enjoyed it each time.

[sparkinator]

Living in Louisiana, we cruise out of New Orleans because it is so convenient. We sailed Spirit, Jewel, & Dawn. They were all great fun. Great itenerary out of New Orleans as well. We've booked two more cruises on the Dawn (2016 & 2017) so we must have found something we liked.

 

We thought the food and the service on the Dawn was good or better than any of our other NCL cruises. We don't visit the bars often, so we didn't miss the Spinnaker smaller venue, but our kids did miss the slide and the Nick activities that were on the Jewel.

[ellis101]

We won $1000 on those pull tab strips on our honeymoon cruise last year. Add that to the $280 profit from the casino and our cruise was paid for! We are not big gamblers and only played DoND once and bingo once getting the pull tabs. And we only played $25 a time in the casino on roulette or craps (both games we learned to play whilst onboard). We were obviously pretty lucky, but you do/can win!

[canadian cruise queen]

We sailed on the Dawn in Nov and it's the worse service we have experienced in all of our years cruising with NCL (in the MDR's). The service was very, very slow on a regular basis. 5 times we had no pepper in the pepper shakers. We noticed that there was a noticeable lack of service and servers. We had a group with us and were embarrassed as we were raving about NCL before we cruised and then had this unbelievably bad experience. I remember when each table had a server and an assistant. Now you only have a server and they are spread too thin and it showed in the lack of service. One night 3 couples at the table had wine tickets and they brought the wine to the table and didn't know who's wine was who's. One night they didn't bring us any bread !!! When they brought our entrees they didn't know who had ordered what, we had to tell them. Just totally unacceptable. One couple had to get up and refill their own white wine from the wine bucket !!!

[Jay Sam]

We sailed on the Dawn in Nov and it's the worse service we have experienced in all of our years cruising with NCL (in the MDR's). The service was very, very slow on a regular basis. 5 times we had no pepper in the pepper shakers. We noticed that there was a noticeable lack of service and servers. We had a group with us and were embarrassed as we were raving about NCL before we cruised and then had this unbelievably bad experience. I remember when each table had a server and an assistant. Now you only have a server and they are spread too thin and it showed in the lack of service. One night 3 couples at the table had wine tickets and they brought the wine to the table and didn't know who's wine was who's. One night they didn't bring us any bread !!! When they brought our entrees they didn't know who had ordered what, we had to tell them. Just totally unacceptable. One couple had to get up and refill their own white wine from the wine bucket !!!

 

Some of what you described is also what I have experienced on NCL too. The MDR service has not been nearly as good as the other 4 lines I have cruised with. The promptness is just not there for the most part. They are ok I guess, sort of friendly, some are great, but lacking overall in the service area. This is true a lot of the time in the bar areas too.

 

Have sailed on Epic and Star. Am going to cruise on Sky on the 27th of April, so maybe 3rd time is the charm? I am not particular at all, but I notice the differences in the lines. It doesn't take much to please me at all, just friendly and at least half way decent customer service.

[heyletsgo]

It really upsets me that so many people get on here seemingly just to be rude to people. When you read someones review, take it or leave it, ask specifics if you have some, but why are some of you focusing on just being rude about the dang pull tabs? Or being rude at all? I love to research for my cruises, and I find a post I am interested in reading, then I have to wade through bs insults to the poster, including mine. I recently posted about Costa Maya. I wanted to give people some info. I had 3 people insult me. One said clearly you have never been to Mexico. Wrong jerk. Then another criticized my posting style. Use paragraphs she said! Shut up lady. I won't even waste my time on the other. What is going on? I wish CC could block people that do that.

I know what she means. I was on the Dawn and it was just a hokey pushing of the instant win things. I did not get that that was her reason for not liking that ship and questioning future sailings on the Dawn or NCL. The service in the restaurants was so poor. It's as if they are severely short handed. If you are content to wait forever for your food, maybe get a water refill or maybe not. Order fries and want ketchup? Yeah good luck with that. If you don't mind that, or you love to eat at the buffets, or if you want to spend $20+ pp to eat at the specialties where service was better, then you will like the Dawn.

I also went to the champagne art auctions. I love to go and occasionally buy, and I love the free champagne. We got one glass and that was that. I think they were ridiculously short on wait staff or something. I hate that kind of 'forget about you' service. The entertainment was good. The cruise director and staff were fun, but again after hearing "Who wants to win $2,000! Every cruise someone wins and no one has won yet!" in an excited voice. It was such a joke. It was almost insulting. It's like the port shopping talk that you only go to once and realize what it's all about and never go back to again, has leaked out and it's in your face all the time.

The end of the day, where you can sit at the dinner table with your family and talk about the great stuff you did or how relaxing it was, and having a great dinner is so important to our family, and this dining experience was terrible overall.

In closing, and I am sure someone will just act stupid about this statement, it's been bothering me that they did not muster. I mean they took that time, and brought everyone to a restaurant. I recently watched an in depth story about the Concordia, and they did not muster. They told people the instructions are on the back of your door. Mustering is a big pain in the rear, but safety first I say. I think it's a mistake. Someone told me Carnival does that too; pretend muster or whatever. I think people need to go to the actual deck and to their stations. I didn't like that. The fact that Carnival does it does not surprise me at all. How quickly everyone forgets the Triumph. I'm telling you I was on the Triumph about two months before that incident, and there were serious issues. The toilet would not flush every day. And they forced us to wait in the room for the very busy janitor to come try to get it going. Then two months later people are wading in crap and Carnival gives them $500. Haha. Let Carnival pretend muster, does not surprise me a bit, but Norwegian does not have to go there.

[maywell]

After reading your post, Heyletsgo, I can understand the critique directed at you for not using paragraghs.....No, not going requote your post, that thing crits for 9000k hit!:eek:

 

Yes, one can take or leave a review but when they post it in the forums - it open for 'review' from other posters who have questions about somethings that occurred like pull tabs being a form of gambling. If one doesn't want to be criticized or questioned, post in the appropriate location on CC - I believe that is very obvious.

 

Sent from my SGH-T399 using Tapatalk

[mking8288]

OP, first - thank you sharing & writing about your most recent Dawn sailing experience, it's yours & don't ever let anyone take it away. They can write their own & post, if they're on the same sailing.

It's been 10 years since we last cruised on the Dawn and we've been on a few other ships since - still have fond memories of the old days, and missed the service & fine food then ... times have changed.

We've noticed the apparent reductions in staffing, from the dining room (to the smaller ratios - with the waiter/ress & the assistant as a team, to now just one - but apparently not true, they are just covering more tables & challenged to keep up at busy dining time) to the Room Steward, who used to have an assistant as a team to work quickly There used to be a wine/beverage person in the MDR taking orders & bring the wine/soda but now it's the waiter doing it all. MDR food quality is up, range of choices & options are down while speciality dining is down in quality for us. Times have changed - the NCL "intel" cruise & surf often quietly here - and hopefully, we can get their attention to let senior management at NCL to pay attention. Things just don't seemed to be clicking & humming along with all cyclinders - perhaps the pampering in Haven are great, but majority sailing on NCL aren't getting a butler or concierge, nor, do we have a need for what they supposingly do.

Our current plan is to go back & sail an older & smaller ship - the GEM is next on a hold/with FCR deposit hold since final payment aren't due for another 5 months. I much rather not ended up sailing on a ship at the next pier ... but their MDR food quality is actually good & better than NCL, and they aren't even an upscale make-believe line.

[gooch47]

Why do cruiseline personnel lie about the availability of a dining room for lunch on embarcation day? We have been "misled" on both NCL and Princess on multiple ships each. Since I know better, I just usually ask just to hear them lie.

 

And although we have cruised on various NCL ships in the last few years, I have never heard the pitch for the $2k tickets. Where do they sell them? We go to the casino almost every night, but don't go to shows or play bingo.

Edited April 15, 2015 by gooch47

[declansdad]

The MDR issue is disappointing. Could be a staffing issue and temporary, who knows. The Dawn was our first NCL ship and I have very fond memories of the cruise that hooked me on NCL. But we do tire easily of dinner in the same room every night and so we always go a few nights to a specialty, O' Sheehans or even the buffet just for a change of pace.

 

I don't think it is temporary. This was our experience with both MDRs last summer and the food on the buffet was terrible.

[declansdad]

 

I've also been on the Carnival Ships. You can't compare that line with NCL or RC. If you were upset with the service and the food on the Dawn you will not be happy with Carnival.

 

 

In my opinion, Carnival compares very well with NCL and the food and service was much, much better.

[declansdad]

 

LOVED Pearly Kings Pub - with Bartender Chips Ahoy - layout a little strange with a lot of through traffic but we hung out there quite a bit. Karaoke was hysterical. Elements and other shows were also great!

 

 

This was a nice little pub but I wish it was bigger. There isn't much space at night available on the Dawn. We did enjoy the karaoke a bit but hearing Sweet Caroline over and over got a bit much. ;)

[Barb Nahoumi]

I don't want this to come off as rude but I don't quite see in your mini review what was so bad that made you swear off NCL. I saw the MDR issue but did you try other food venues. I am curious as to what was so bad as I will be on the Dawn in May. I know that all the changes with fee etc and the way they are being implemented are a huge turn off but what was it specifically about the Dawn that pushed you over the edge. Thank you.

 

We'll be aboard the Dawn for the third time in June. Hopefully, you'll post a review of your May cruise, and give us your thoughts.

 

I always enjoyed my cruises aboard the Dawn, never had a bad experience.

[Barb Nahoumi]

Just back from a week on the Dawn and, for the first time, did not purchase a cruise reward certificate. But before I go on, I want to let you know NCL has been my favorite cruiseline for a while now and I'm Platinum +.

 

We (me, 2 daughters and 1 granddaughter) had connecting balcony cabins on deck 10. Cabins were okay and kept up well although I don't remember other NCL balconies being as small as these.

 

Entertainment was great...as always. My main gripe is with the MDR food and especially the service...very indifferent and, on a couple of occasions, downright rude.

 

And those darn pull-tab strips they sell. On every cruise I've been on, it always gets down to the final day and 'no one has won the $2000 yet'!! I spent too much time explaining to my 11 year old granddaughter that this is what is known as a colossal ripoff!!!

 

I promised another daughter (who could not go this time) that she and I would go on a cruise together later this year. I wish RCL was sailing from NO but since they are not, I am seriously looking at the Dream. I'm not a big Carnival fan but I think the time has come to give them another chance.

 

As always, JMHO.

 

One more thing. Loved the Spirit and Jewel (sailed both from NO.. the Spirit 4 or 5 times while she was here) and really liked both. Unfortunately, it looks like the Dawn is going to be parked here for a while. DARN.

 

 

The Dawn is home ported in Boston for the summer. What's in N O while she's here?