April 3 - 10 Encore , thoughts.

[Ray4Fun]

Spent last week on Encore with the family. 9 in total. Ages 11 - 🙂. First off none of us are first time cruisers. All however are new to NCL. We have NOT cruised since an RCL trip with the kids February of 2020. Pre-C. So things on other lines may have changed. I'm placing my thoughts for NCL as after-C. 

 

1. Embarking process easy. Staff on land pleasant. 

2. Ship itself clean, in this day and age that counts. 

3. Encore has spaces and places I'd never imagined could be on a ship. Liked them all. 

4. For the week, The Crew to a person made us feel welcomed into their home. Nice. 

5. MDR food quality upscale. Ok, the Gnocchi's a bit over-done. We think they are hard to hold for time in an MDR environment. Steaks, Seafood, Chicken products all good. MDR was a go to place. Did 3 speciality and they were good as well. 

6. Entertainment, first off the Stinky Boots show was a no-show. Choir of Man excellent. The Beatles were excellent, put the kids asleep lol. The generic bands aroundd the ship excellent. 

7. Given it is Spring Break, Pool deck full. Deck chairs scarfed up by 7:30 AM. I was sitting there at 6:30 watching the towel toss and run.

8. Our Grandchildren to a person have criticism's. Legit ones for them. Mostly they feel the ship had things for people over the age of 18. The kids club for 12 and under was closed. SO a bust. They say there is plenty of things for them to spend money on. Limited things that are free. The Galaxy thing was not used any time I walked by. Ok, it may have been after mid day. Did not walk by then. The arcades are OK, but are expensive after a few minutes! Not a fun item for a parent to see. That is something a parent need to know BEFORE leaving. Or the Childs card must be locked prior to not after a parent see's. It is a holiday, buyer beware is not what you want. That being said yes we did have there cards locked before not after. 

9. Race Cars are fun. All should do it once. However a huge area that is utilized by a few. 

10. Missed the NCL Island, wind was the reason given as we sailed slowly by the RCL island. RCL had 2 ships already at port. People having a beach day while we scrambled for a pool deck chair. 🙂😞

 

Overall, Yes we would look at NCL again if the itinerary works for us. NCL has a great feel for an adult wanting to escape and have a fun week. There are other players we will review when we have the grandkids with us. Consensus, RCL would still be go to for now. My personal thoughts, food on NCL is above RCL.  All have a blessed week. 
 

 

[cuterlmt]

We were on the same cruise, no kids though. It was a wonderful trip. It was quite crowded though, so we would sneak away to the observation lounge or our balcony for some peace. I'm sure the crowds were there because of the Escape cancellation. We met many of those folks who complained incessantly about not getting the cabins they had booked on the Escape or their specialty dining or shows, etc., etc.

A few takeaways:

1) The Ihealth test given to us by the government was valid for the cruse. We had it proctored (paid $20 and had to make an appointment for each of us), and it was pretty easy to do. I read on facebook before the cruise that some passenger had to re-test after having done the test at 10am two days before the cruise, because he couldn't get on the ship until long after 10, so we scheduled our tests for after 5pm two days before. A lot of people balked at what he said, but I didn't want to take a chance.

2) We stayed at Miami Hilton Downtown through Hotwire for $260, one night. My husband wanted to be close to the port. It was ok. The bathroom was small, and had a tub. We did have floor to ceiling windows that faced the city, which was very nice. The restaurant was fine - we only had breakfast as we got in very late from our flight. I would probably choose next time to stay closer to the airport. We had hoped to have a nice dinner close by but as you'll see in my next point, we got in very late. they did have a shuttle to the cruise port every hour starting at 10am for $7 per person. Quite convenient. Very quick and easy drive, and nice driver.

3) The Miami airport was a nightmare! Anyone going in to Miami might think about flying into Ft. Lauderdale instead. A lot of people were in line to collect their luggage because of cancelled flights. It took over two hours for our luggage to come out on the carousel. There was very little seating anywhere and it was hot in the airport. This was quite late in the evening on 4/2, 

4) We flew out of Fort Lauderdale airport and it was great, small terminal, easy to navigate, etc., etc.

5) The ship was beautiful - we had been on her before. We were impressed with the staff, as always, and the food was always pretty good. The casino and crew in the casino were wonderful.

6) About the casino - we spent a good amount of time there. A couple of times, the casino host approached me and asked if there was anything he could do for us. I didn't need anything so I said no. On the last night, he approached me at after 1040pm and said that I had a lot of on board credit to use based on my play - several hundred dollars, and encouraged me to go to the shops and spend the money. He said the shops closed in about 15 minutes. I was concerned about buying a bunch of stuff and having to declare it, and didn't really need anything. I do regret not taking him on it but just felt weird about it. It's difficult to explain. We did get all of our extras comped - our extra speciality dining charges. We prepaid all of our excursions and gratuity, otherwise that might have been covered. 

7) we had some nice excursions, all through the ship. To get to Fort Lauderdale airport, we did a bus ride and airboat ride at Gator park (I think that's what it is called) and that was fun.

😎 we originally had an oceanview cabin through CAS, but bid on an upgrade to a balcony for the minimum, $25 per person for $50, and won. We were notified about two days before the cruise. I was surprised we got the upgrade because of all the folks coming over from the Escape, but quite pleased. I will say the bathroom seemed smaller than our last balcony on the encore. The toilet is quite a tight fit next to the shower. I really prefer the Epic set up.

9) We saw Choir of Man which was fantastic - I would highly recommend it. We did not see any other shows but heard mixed reviews of the comedy and magic shows.

10) Out specialty dining was Le Bistro and Ocean Blue and American Diner. All excellent and too much food.

11) We primarily ate in the MDR, only one meal in the buffet because we had to rush to an excursion. All excellent, especially the staff. We ate once in Manhatten so we could go to the show. To me, it is too big and loud. 

 

I would be happy to answer any questions.

[cuterlmt]

A couple of other thoughts about embarkation and disembarkation - both were pretty good.

When the van dropped us off at embarkation, we got through the line within about 10 minutes, maybe less, to show our vaccination card and test, and then check in for the cruise. We just had to wait to get on, which seemed like forever. But we were on before noon. 

Disembarkation, we had a shore excursion to leave the ship. I wish they had given us a little bit of instruction on that - there was some confusion about where to go, what bus to go on, and getting our luggage, but it all worked out fine. 

Also, one other thought - the $50 off shore excursions is really great. We paid for a ride up to the top in St. Thomas (I think that's where it was), and it normally costs $25 per person; we paid $35 for both of us with the $50 off the shore excursion. The food at the top was not great though, so I would not spend too much there - the bushwacker was good, and the staff was great, but very overwhelmed by all the people. 

[hallux]

56 minutes ago, Ray4Fun said:

7. Given it is Spring Break, Pool deck full. Deck chairs scarfed up by 7:30 AM. I was sitting there at 6:30 watching the towel toss and run.

And considering that ship doesn't have Spice H2O, it's made even worse.  Find one that does - Joy, Bliss, Escape are all similar ships to Encore in size and venues but they have Spice H2O (Escape doesn't have the observation lounge though).

 

58 minutes ago, Ray4Fun said:

10. Missed the NCL Island, wind was the reason given

This seems to happen a lot.  I don't know how often RCI missed theirs before the pier was built (I was there during the construction and we made the stop).

 

31 minutes ago, cuterlmt said:

To get to Fort Lauderdale airport, we did a bus ride and airboat ride at Gator park (I think that's what it is called) and that was fun.

I did that same excursion getting off the Joy in March, but flying from Miami.  yes, it was Gator Park.  It was nice, I'd never been on an airboat before, I feel like our boat driver was a bit of a 'hot dog' compared to some of the others we saw out at the same time.

[cuterlmt]

One other thing I meant to mention is for those of you who can't get dinner reservations at the specialty restaurants or show reservations, we did those when we boarded without any trouble. I have never been able to do them online successfully. But have always had good luck doing them on the ship, even later on in the week. And given how crowded it was, I was surprised how easy it was. 

[DyeKat]

Thank you for your insight!!  I'm usually loyal to RCCL, but given the price difference, we chose NCL for our cruise next month.  I do appreciate hearing about Norwegian from someone who prefers Royal.

[hallux]

19 minutes ago, cuterlmt said:

One other thing I meant to mention is for those of you who can't get dinner reservations at the specialty restaurants

It's posted in every thread on dinner reservations - NCL only releases a fraction of the dinner reservations for booking in advance, the rest are released on embarkation day.  Some can connect to the ship's WiFi from the terminal and use the app to book while waiting to board.  On ships like the Encore, they can be done using the touchscreens by the elevators (2 screens in the stair lobby at each set of elevators on each deck).

[cuterlmt]

i agree with you that it's always mentioned. In my many cruises, I have always done it when I board, and haven't had any problems. But I heard such complaining about it from folks from the Escape, I thought i would post how easy it is. I even told the folks complaining to schedule on board. I know they did get in because they talked about their specialty dinners later. 

[seeyakids]

From a Diamond+ RCL cruiser, I have only cruised 3 times with NCL. This last one was an Escape replacement. I really wanted to say NCL is at or near RCL/Celebrity quality, but NCL is not quite there.

There are a few areas which I did like: The many, many dining venues.....the Observation lounge.....the entertainment (loved Choir of Man).....friendly staff.

The not so good: Extremely understaffed on this ship, especially bartenders........ very small pool for this sized ship,....... food quality not as high as RCL/Celebrity,.......NCL has a tendency to nickle/dime you to death (drink package does not include specialty coffee, water, sodas....free means free: don't say free drinks and then charge you 20% service).....and please NCL build a dock at GSC (of the past 2 NCL cruises we missed GSC both times).......I know it is a problem on all ships, but pool chair hogs on this cruise were over the top.

We will use our FCC on the Prima and hopefully I can give NCL a better review. 

Sorry to all the NCL homies.

 

[lgdesign]

No need to apologize... reporting on your negative experiences is just as valuable as any positive info. 

 

A lot of the complaints lately... especially those due to lack of staffing... make me wonder if the overflow of the damaged Escape... and that it's Spring Break time... contributed to that issue.  Sounds like NCL was perhaps not quite ready for surges in passengers after sailing shorter-staffed for so long.

Edited April 13, 2022 by lgdesign

[seeyakids]

Bingo.....perfect storm for NCL. You would think they would pull more Escape staff to Encore to try to quick fix the anticipated problem. I felt so sorry for the staff, especially bartenders. Fortunately they tried to overstaff the bars on the missed GSC day (lots of irate passengers looking to drown their sorrows)🍺

[ggTexasGal]

4 hours ago, Ray4Fun said:

6. Entertainment, first off the Stinky Boots show was a no-show.

🤣No "Kinky Boots" performance = "Stinky Boots?!?!🤣

[cuterlmt]

They did pull some staff from the Escape to the Encore, but I agree, they were overwhelmed by all the extra passengers.

 

[BirdTravels]

6 hours ago, seeyakids said:

From a Diamond+ RCL cruiser, I have only cruised 3 times with NCL. This last one was an Escape replacement. I really wanted to say NCL is at or near RCL/Celebrity quality, but NCL is not quite there.

There are a few areas which I did like: The many, many dining venues.....the Observation lounge.....the entertainment (loved Choir of Man).....friendly staff.

The not so good: Extremely understaffed on this ship, especially bartenders........ very small pool for this sized ship,....... food quality not as high as RCL/Celebrity,.......NCL has a tendency to nickle/dime you to death (drink package does not include specialty coffee, water, sodas....free means free: don't say free drinks and then charge you 20% service).....and please NCL build a dock at GSC (of the past 2 NCL cruises we missed GSC both times).......I know it is a problem on all ships, but pool chair hogs on this cruise were over the top.

We will use our FCC on the Prima and hopefully I can give NCL a better review. 

Sorry to all the NCL homies.

 

We were an Escape transplant last week on the Encore. We were on the Wonder of the Seas a few weeks earlier. 

 

We're a D+ on RCCL and equivalent on NCL. We greatly prefer NCL over RCCL. 

 

wrt nickel and diming, I think that NCL is equivalent to RCCL for finding opportunities to charge you extra for things. 

 

Totally agree about GSC needing a dock. We're around 65% on getting to the island. We have successfully docked at CocoCay 4 times since the restart in June. 0 times to GSC. 

 

If you like specialty dining (which we do), NCL greatly out shines RCCL in that department. 

Edited April 13, 2022 by BirdTravels

[Ray4Fun]

The Bar's. Ahhh the Pool deck Bar's having 2 maybe 3 serving. Some wondered that since the entire ship had the "package" NCL was just throttling the output down a bit. Agree the time of year and the quick doubling up (noted 1400 from Escape) of the passenger count almost overnight was a stress. 

 

Yup, to get the water and Starbucks and more you needed the extra package. We did buy it. Pleased we did. 

 

I will say I am pleased with the crew. Busy yes, maybe too much at times for sure. 

 

The ship has many more places to relax V. the RCL mega ships. 

 

 

[lexxfield]

We were on the April 3 sailing of the Encore.  I agree with others that the Encore was not prepared for the large number of passengers.  One bartender told me that there were nearly 4000 on board.  It did seem like the pre-COVID days were back.  

 

We usually didn't have to wait for a drink at the bars, although the pool bar was the exception the one time I used it.  Where I felt something amiss was in the three main dining rooms.  On the six nights we ate there, dinner took much too long on each occasion. I don't know whether the problem lay with the wait staff or with the kitchen, or both.  I thought we were allowing plenty of time between dinner and shows, but this proved not to be the case.  Only once were we able to enjoy dessert.  The other five occasions, there wasn't enough time to do so.  The wait staff appeared to be doing the best that they could, but clearly they were overwhelmed at times.  We did not experience any Delay in being seated any of the nights and we did not have reservations.  

 

I am in agreement with BirdTravels.  I used to sail exclusively with Royal Caribbean and I have Diamond status with that line.  About five years ago, however, we booked a last minute cruise with NCL on the Escape, and since then we have not sailed again with Royal.  The freestyle experience coupled with the wonderful thermal suite area in the spa sold us completely on NCL.  Casual dress during dinner coupled with not having to make reservations or have a set dining time is hard to beat.  I also agree that the food on NCL is better than on Royal Caribbean, especially the buffet at lunch.  Others, of course, will have a different opinion as to food.  

 

I also think that the entertainment on NCL tops Royal.  Entertainment, however, on this sailing was somewhat disappointing.  Kinky Boots was canceled. We happened to eat lunch on embarkation day with a cast member of that show.  He said that the previous week was the last show of the old cast.  The new cast was boarding that day.  He stated that the week of the 3rd was ship orientation for the cast, then the following week was rehearsals.  We sailed on the Escape in December and on that ship there were two different solo singers and one vocal group performing at sit-down venues in addition to the two main productions.  We missed having that option on this sailing.  The Beatles tribute band "Beatles Invasion" made up for that, however.  The band appeared five of the seven nights and we saw every show.  They were excellent.

 

If I were a fan of the main pool area, I would definitely choose Royal Caribbean over NCL.  That area on NCL is much too small for the number of passengers and the area immediately surrounding the pool have only chairs and not loungers. 

 

 

 

 

[sberg23]

I'm glad you enjoyed the overall experience, as we did as well.  We were transfers from the 4/2 Escape to the 4/3 Encore, and I can say that despite the early inconvenience/scramble of rebooking at the last minute, we had a FANTASTIC time overall. 

 

What was originally a 2 hour drive down to Port Canaveral the morning of instead became a 6 hour drive down the day prior + hotel.  Last-minute Miami hotel prices were nuts on 4/2 so we chose to stay at the Hilton Miami Dadeland to save a bit.  Very nice hotel and a quiet location.  Plus it allowed us to finally visit the nearby Mr. and Mrs. Bun (amazing Peruvian sandwiches) that we previously saw on DDD.  Score!

 

Yes, the bartender staffing felt reduced at the pool and in the Observation Lounge (didn't attempt to visit the Atrium or Casino bar), but we kind of expected this when understanding the infusion of Escape passengers and we made the best of it being patient toward the staff who were there and working VERY hard to take care of everyone.  We did not have the same drink order delay issues while in Maltings, Sugarcane or the Le Bistro bar, which was a nice alternative.  And ordering drinks while in the MDR was also easy.

 

We dined for dinner in MDR 5x and Specialty 2x, and breakfast in MDR 3x and Local 1x, and found all meals to have excellent service.  None felt "slow" to us, but we also were never rushing to get anywhere afterwards.  We definitely enjoy the quality of meals in MDR.  Le Bistro has always been, and still remains, the highlight of specialty dining for us.  The balance of meals were either at the buffet or up in the Observation Lounge (more enjoyable).

 

Because we don't travel with children we always lock up Thermal Suite passes on NCL cruises, and thankfully our Escape-priced TS purchase carried over to the Encore (NCL absorbed the price difference).  Allows us to nearly completely avoid the chaos that is the pool deck.  Sure, we have experienced our own issues historically with people "claiming" chairs in the TS with their towels and then walking away, but we found the TS on the Encore to be the biggest one yet, so there were definitely more chairs and loungers available to not really be an issue this time.

 

If you enjoy Scotch whiskey, the $20 Macallan whiskey tasting/pairing in Malting's on a day at sea is a must-do.  I didn't expect to appreciate this 45-min event as much as I did, and I'm glad I stumbled on it.  I'll be doing this again.  And evidently I now need to carry around sample chocolates for pairing when I drink whiskey 🙂

 

And as always, our cabin steward was just amazing.  Always friendly, always great to talk to, and always attentive.  That standard is what we have come to expect with NCL, and we are never disappointed.

 

Of course, we did have some nitpicky things that were noticeable, and hopefully some of these get cleaned up soon so as not to be issues for others:

 

- NCL app utilization over WiFi was a bit sketchy for the first couple days, but then cleared up by Day 3.  

 

- That Day 4 Disembarkation in St. Thomas was a trainwreck.  I get that there was a 1 hour delay getting to port, and everyone was getting off the ship at the same time at noon, but goodness that face recognition method of getting off the ship was just killing the flow of movement.  The method of easily scanning your card with a 'ding' was certainly missed.  Getting to our excursion meet-point in time definitely crossed our minds, as that was NOT a shining example of NCL prioritizing health and safety of its passengers by herding them all together in a single stairwell for multiple floors.  We took the stairs down and then suddenly hit the logjam of people starting at Deck 7.  Perhaps a third exit would have helped?  After all, there are 3 available to go back aboard.

 

- NCL certainly has some kinks to work out, and one of them is the lack of organization for their excursions while on the docks.  In Puerto Plata we saw no one holding signage identifying where to go for NCL excursions.  And we were looking.  We managed to walk right past the meeting point, all the way through the port bazaar end point leading into work, and then fully back to the dock before seeing someone/anyone.  In St. Thomas once off the ship we managed to finally identify the line for our excursion after a bit of wandering the dock, but then when our line walked to the safari bus... part of the line in front of us mistakenly deviated into ANOTHER excursion's line and suddenly a decent-size group of us were standing at the wrong tour bus only to have to turn around and walk all the way back to find our own busses.  Come.  On.  Whatever happened to those tall NCL excursion signs being held by staff so that, you know, one could easily see exactly where they are supposed to be among a crowd of people on a dock?  Holding a 8.5x11" laminated sign at chest height just doesn't cut it 😕

 

- For those planning to dine in Onda, expect it to be LOUD.  Like, unnecessarily loud.  Unlike all other NCL dining restaurants that we can recall, this new restaurant has no carpeting, no curtains, no tablecloths and no upholstered chairs.  Nothing to dampen the sound that radiates off the wooden and marbled floors and walls.  And as an added bonus, all kitchen noises radiate into the restaurant.  Even the noisy icemaker (what repeatedly sounded like ice pouring) and accidental plate and tray drops.  One passenger in particular made his dissatisfaction with the noises to staff quite clear.  That was our evening's entertainment.  Just something to be mindful of to help set expectations when you dine there.

 

- Very surprisingly, The District had no porters or stouts (other than bottled Guinness).  That was surprising since we did not experience the same on prior cruises and even have experienced Left Hand Milk Stout on Nitro tap.  Definitely a disappointment for us as we do not drink IPAs or most light ales (blah).  And did it really need to be that freezing cold in this ship's version of The District?  Multiple days it gave the Thermal Suite's Snow Room a run for its money.

 

- Lastly, and I know this a challenge for crew that don't ever want to say "no" to customers/passengers, but there has GOT to be a way for staff to stop a group of kids wet with towels running and yelling from the pool deck into and through the Garden Cafe to get ice cream and then run back out.  Clearly the problem lies with the inattentive parents and not the crew themselves, but this is not something that the rest of the entire population of passengers dining should have to deal with.  Perhaps a brig to put them in "time out"?? 😈

 

In all this was our favorite NCL Caribbean cruise yet, even with the concerns listed above and the missed port at GSC (was just going to be a day on the beach for us after prior days of dune buggying, catamaran sailing, beach enjoying and snorkling).  The Encore is a fantastic ship with LOTS of areas to enjoy, whether you want it noisy and busy, or you want it quiet and relaxing.  We love having these options to do whatever we want when the mood hits 🙂

[CaptainBazz]

10 hours ago, sberg23 said:

If you enjoy Scotch whiskey, the $20 Macallan whiskey tasting/pairing in Malting's on a day at sea is a must-do.  I didn't expect to appreciate this 45-min event as much as I did, and I'm glad I stumbled on it.  I'll be doing this again.  And evidently I now need to carry around sample chocolates for pairing when I drink whiskey 🙂

A group of us were on the Encore in February and four of the guys did this tasting twice. The first time we did it the barman asked where we were from...3 from Scotland and one from northern England...he became quite worried that a guy from Indonesia was going to teach scotch to Scots...but we actually learned some things...it was such a great time that we did it again and this time there was no one else at the bar so we had a long private scotch discussion. Definitely worth the money and I highly recommend it. Still no idea why they pair chocolate with the scotch 🤔

[JCDCA]

On 4/13/2022 at 5:54 PM, BirdTravels said:

We were an Escape transplant last week on the Encore. We were on the Wonder of the Seas a few weeks earlier. 

 

We're a D+ on RCCL and equivalent on NCL. We greatly prefer NCL over RCCL. 

 

wrt nickel and diming, I think that NCL is equivalent to RCCL for finding opportunities to charge you extra for things. 

 

Totally agree about GSC needing a dock. We're around 65% on getting to the island. We have successfully docked at CocoCay 4 times since the restart in June. 0 times to GSC. 

 

If you like specialty dining (which we do), NCL greatly out shines RCCL in that department. 

Interesting about specialty dining.  I think dining in the Oasis class is pretty good.  Nothing on NCL that I’ve had is as good as 150.  Also I’ve routinely had better meals at Chops than Cagneys.  What do you like so much better about NCL over RCCL?  Genuinely interested in a comparison as those are my two main lines as well.  

[Always Cruising]

On 4/13/2022 at 8:52 AM, cuterlmt said:

We were on the same cruise, no kids though. It was a wonderful trip. It was quite crowded though, so we would sneak away to the observation lounge or our balcony for some peace. I'm sure the crowds were there because of the Escape cancellation. We met many of those folks who complained incessantly about not getting the cabins they had booked on the Escape or their specialty dining or shows, etc., etc.

A few takeaways:

1) The Ihealth test given to us by the government was valid for the cruse. We had it proctored (paid $20 and had to make an appointment for each of us), and it was pretty easy to do. I read on facebook before the cruise that some passenger had to re-test after having done the test at 10am two days before the cruise, because he couldn't get on the ship until long after 10, so we scheduled our tests for after 5pm two days before. A lot of people balked at what he said, but I didn't want to take a chance.

2) We stayed at Miami Hilton Downtown through Hotwire for $260, one night. My husband wanted to be close to the port. It was ok. The bathroom was small, and had a tub. We did have floor to ceiling windows that faced the city, which was very nice. The restaurant was fine - we only had breakfast as we got in very late from our flight. I would probably choose next time to stay closer to the airport. We had hoped to have a nice dinner close by but as you'll see in my next point, we got in very late. they did have a shuttle to the cruise port every hour starting at 10am for $7 per person. Quite convenient. Very quick and easy drive, and nice driver.

3) The Miami airport was a nightmare! Anyone going in to Miami might think about flying into Ft. Lauderdale instead. A lot of people were in line to collect their luggage because of cancelled flights. It took over two hours for our luggage to come out on the carousel. There was very little seating anywhere and it was hot in the airport. This was quite late in the evening on 4/2, 

4) We flew out of Fort Lauderdale airport and it was great, small terminal, easy to navigate, etc., etc.

5) The ship was beautiful - we had been on her before. We were impressed with the staff, as always, and the food was always pretty good. The casino and crew in the casino were wonderful.

6) About the casino - we spent a good amount of time there. A couple of times, the casino host approached me and asked if there was anything he could do for us. I didn't need anything so I said no. On the last night, he approached me at after 1040pm and said that I had a lot of on board credit to use based on my play - several hundred dollars, and encouraged me to go to the shops and spend the money. He said the shops closed in about 15 minutes. I was concerned about buying a bunch of stuff and having to declare it, and didn't really need anything. I do regret not taking him on it but just felt weird about it. It's difficult to explain. We did get all of our extras comped - our extra speciality dining charges. We prepaid all of our excursions and gratuity, otherwise that might have been covered. 

7) we had some nice excursions, all through the ship. To get to Fort Lauderdale airport, we did a bus ride and airboat ride at Gator park (I think that's what it is called) and that was fun.

😎 we originally had an oceanview cabin through CAS, but bid on an upgrade to a balcony for the minimum, $25 per person for $50, and won. We were notified about two days before the cruise. I was surprised we got the upgrade because of all the folks coming over from the Escape, but quite pleased. I will say the bathroom seemed smaller than our last balcony on the encore. The toilet is quite a tight fit next to the shower. I really prefer the Epic set up.

9) We saw Choir of Man which was fantastic - I would highly recommend it. We did not see any other shows but heard mixed reviews of the comedy and magic shows.

10) Out specialty dining was Le Bistro and Ocean Blue and American Diner. All excellent and too much food.

11) We primarily ate in the MDR, only one meal in the buffet because we had to rush to an excursion. All excellent, especially the staff. We ate once in Manhatten so we could go to the show. To me, it is too big and loud. 

 

I would be happy to answer any questions.

I try to find my casino credit (if I have any) asap the last night of the cruise.  Usually about 9 pm.  Then I go the gift shop and grab a pair or two of Raybans - easy to pack and good as gifts.   I wish the casinos would do it a bit earlier, but they want us gambling as long as possible, I'm guessing

[esimon]

is everything except main dining extra?    I'm a HAL cruiser and looking and Encore - very leary about number of kids and size of ship - I do not need to be entertained by stuff and activities and extras.   I love kids but don't want to travel with them - thinking on a 21 day in April numbers of them might be down

[deliver42]

On a 21 day, I don't think kids would be much of a problem.

[hallux]

17 minutes ago, esimon said:

is everything except main dining extra?

Taste, Savor, Manhattan Room (these first 3 are all considered MDR and share a menu), Garden Cafe and The Local (some of the best burgers on the ship can be had here!) are all included.  Q, Cagney's, Le Bistro, Teppanyaki, Onda, Los Lobos, Food Republic, American Diner and Ocean Blue are specialty dining and most fares come with 3 trips to specialty dining on a 21 day cruise.

[EllieinNJ]

We just came off our 4th cruise since the pandemic (1 NCL, 2 RCL, 1 Carnival).  This was our first Carnival ever and the first one that allowed kids.  There were 2300 adults and 300 kids.  We thought it was too early for spring break but apparently ALL of April is spring break somewhere.

 

The younger ones were busy with the camp but the older teens were a problem.  They were hanging around everywhere, running and screaming and laughing at the top of their lungs.  Very distracting.

[mjkacmom]

31 minutes ago, EllieinNJ said:

We just came off our 4th cruise since the pandemic (1 NCL, 2 RCL, 1 Carnival).  This was our first Carnival ever and the first one that allowed kids.  There were 2300 adults and 300 kids.  We thought it was too early for spring break but apparently ALL of April is spring break somewhere.

 

The younger ones were busy with the camp but the older teens were a problem.  They were hanging around everywhere, running and screaming and laughing at the top of their lungs.  Very distracting.

Spring breaks start in March and end this week.