Just Back From Jewel......

[lilant]

ok, so we have been on several different lines, and several different itineraries. we are both 40, and love to travel. we got a very good deal out of los angeles and we were upgraded from a BB to an AF.

 

ok here we go.

 

the cruise line got us into Folrida a day early and put us up in the wyndam, miami airport. nice hotel. the transfer to the hotel was fine. it did take some doing, but there were alot of flights that had come in at the same time and there were alot of people. i would say by the time we got off the plane and to the hotel, a hour and a half. there were some older people moaning that they had to roll their luggage out of the airport, and the people who thought the wait was to long but we just walked away from the people. it takes alot to organize all of this.

 

the next morning. after breakfast and check out we waited about 30 minutes for the bus to come and get us. the moaners were down in the lobby at the crack of dawn. you people should stay home if your so unhappy with the service. the ride from the hotel to the ship was about 30 min. AND THEN "IT" WAS, TENT CITY. oh my god... i was shaking. i had heard about this place on cruise critic. the wait, the people, the heat.....

 

YOU PEOPLE ARE SPOILED BABIES.!!!!

 

by the time we got to the peir checked in, passed security, sanitized our hands for the first of hundreds of times and got the room, maybe a hour.

again, what do you expect? there are 1800 people doing the same thing you are going, it's not simple. we thought it went very well. someone later on in the cruise said to me, "...and i cant believe they didn't even have snacks or water set out". they did. you were some busy complaining you did not see the 8 foot table in the back of the room.

 

the room. we had a "mini suite" very nice. clean. lots of storage space. two plugs at the desk. i removed the table vanity mirror and stored it for the cruise to make more space. we had ordered the "honeymoon" package and the strawbrries and champange were in the room along with a letter welcoming aboard and noting when our in room Hor'Dourves would be served. the next day a bottle of red wine was delivered "compliments of NCL" not sure why, but it was nice.

 

the food.

we ate at teppanyaki. very good $15.00 each

 

chin chin, very good. one night we just ordered all the appitizers. it was great. ask for "JIN" she was very nice both times.

5:30-6 it's $5.00 pp after that it's $10.00

 

cagneys, we ate there 3 times. ask for "mihala"(sp?) and edward they are very nice. 5:30-6pm $10.00 pp after that it's $20 pp

make sure you order the fries. i had a rib eye topped with blue cheese, not on the menu but mihala got it for me and it was the best. also the sinful chocolate cake. ask the server to take it out early. it's better room temp.

 

 

le bistro, was prepaid (honeymoon package) very good. the goat chees tart is fantastic. ravi the M'd is very nice and will do what ever you want.

 

mama's, very good. we ate here 3 times. free

eat everything. the "land and sea" is very good and the pizza's are made to order and fresh. very good. we had one made and took it with us back to the room. the "califonia" and the "serria nevada" pizzas are fantastic.

make friends with the M'd "rosalina" she is very nice and will take care of you. she always made sure we were good to go. even when she saw us in other rest's she came over to make sure we were alright.

 

sushi, we had lunch here. very good. we ate like piggies for $15.00 each

our sushi guy was, che marie, a bit shy but warms up and is very nice to talk to.

 

tango's. you can have tapa's at the bar or the whole menu at the table. free. very good. order "il popo" very yummie.

 

the garden cafe was the same every morning but lunch and dinner were always different. 15 days and only ONCE did we not like the selection. the food was hot and fresh. very good.

 

we had such a good time with these restaurants we NEVER ATE IN EITHER MAIN RESTAURANTS for dinner. never felt the need. we did have lunch twice in tsaras. both times were very nice.

 

the pool grill is nice for burgers and dogs. hint, the buns are not warm either ask the cook to grill your buns for you OR get a bagel bun from the sandwhich area from garden cafe and have a bagel dog. the only thing i missed was having a water, tea, lemonade fountain outside like some other ships. we had to go back into the cafe to get some drinks.

 

 

 

to be continued.....(i'm hungry)

[LateCruiser]

Great review. Reminds me of our experiences on the Jewel!:) Keep it comin...

[Stillfloatin']

Now I'm hungry too! :D

[Cosmopolitan]

Enjoyable review...keep it coming...

and....now I miss the Jewel and the food:)

[mandiecandie5]

Thanks for posting your review (so far) on the Jewel. Sounds great about the food. Would love to hear the rest of the details!!! :)

[lilant]

ok, well let me be the first to say, WORK SUCKS. I HATE BEING BACK.

 

so i did the food. the ship. how great is this ship. the night b4 we were going to get off, oh by the way we took the transatlantic out of miami, 15 days, i still was finding new places. the ships layout is great. the colors we easy on the eye, and the interior decoration was done very well. the casino is hugh!! and goes on all night. since we were at sea for a long period of time the had the slots open 24/7. there is 3 card poker, let it ride, 21, craps, roulette(sp?), and a high rollers area. hint, when we got on the min. bet for 3 card poker was $10.00. well after you, "pair plus", "ante" and "bet" thats $30.00 a hand. JEEZZZ thats alot. so i waited a day and no one was playing so i went to the casino dek and desk the hostess to ask the pit boss to change it to $5.00 min. ..bada bing bada bang.!! $5.00 and the table was full.

oh, also they had a texas hold'em table. THE TABLE WAS FULL WITH A WAITNING LIST EVERY NIGHT. you can sign up for that nights game that morning. the "casino at sea" card is really not very good unless you play lots and lots of slots. enough on the casino. if i left anything out and you have a question ask me.

 

the martini tasting ... we have done this on other ships and think this one was expensive for what you get. the guy, o'niel, talks about the history and different kinds of martinis and different kinds of vodka, but then when he makes them he uses the cheapest vodka on hand. you get 3 small tastes for $15.00. well thats $5.00 a taste. not a very good deal we thought.

 

we did not play the mystery dinner, but some friends did and said they had a real good time. the ship limits the game to 150 people and then you get put into groups, and dinner is in the main rest. that night.

 

bingo ofcoursse was big. we did not play, but it was announced everyday.

 

the pools are very nice, and ofcourse pack. the water slide is great. the poor guy who is up at the top said to me, " i'm so happy guys are riding my slide i didn't think anyone was going to do it this trip". once we started going down that broke the ice and it was a big hit. it's not really a kid slide. most of the people were adults.

 

we bought the spa package for the whole cruise $98.00 pp for 15 days. we got into the locker room that had a steam room, sauna, ice bath, showers, lots of towels, jacuzzi, and then a co-ed area with heated tile chiars. very nice. no children and not very busy at all. most of the time there was no one else but 1 or 2 people. i think though for the price they could add some little extras. q-tips, razors, cream....... we had all those extras on other ships. but all in all a good by to get away from the crowds.

 

the gym was very nice neat and clean. a busy space in the mornings but then it clears out later. ralph did all his own morning excersises by himself after the "morning classes". he even got some people to join him while he was doing his routine. he does alot of classes at home so he knows all the moves, and he is usually better than the trainers on the ships. so that was fun and thats how we started meeting people.

 

we both had treatments at the spa. dont 4get that they add a tip automacticlly. ralph added a $25.00 tip on top of a $27.00 auto tip. i wanted to kill him. i also had a shave at the spa. it was nice. i had the middle one, i forgot the name but it was $65.00. it came with a mini facial, a hot towel wrap, a double shave, so cream, and a scalp massage. nice, but guess what it grows back ...so worth it hmmmm, not really. nice though.

 

we also did the rasul. a couple thing were you srube down sit in the sanua, rinse, mud up, sanua, cream up sanua. nice and it's only $75.00.

 

well back to work but i'll be back. well it was a 15 day cruise you know theres lots more to come

[eacruise]

We are on the jewel in july I can't wait. Food sounds amazing!

[lilant]

so now i'll talk about the stops just a bit.

 

we stopped in funchal. we really liked this stop. we did not take a ship tour. we got off the ship took a taxi (7euro)to the cable car and took the cable car r/t(14 euro pp). at the top of the hill you can relax with a coffee and some cake at the little cafe next to the cable cars. have the coconut cake OMG!!!

and the coffee is so la te da.... there is also a little church, a small village, a public gardens, and a private gardens. this is also were the tobageens(sp?) start. so really if you wanted to die in funchal you could just take the cable car up and the tobageen down. some people said it was fun but very scary. not for me. i would rather sit and have a cafe and coconut cake.

 

rome (civitavecchia). we took the port bus to the gate then walked to the train station and bought tickets to rome right there. with a credit card. self service. 8 euro each one way. about a hour and 15 min ride. safe and nice.

take the train to termini roma. from there you can take the "hop on hop off bus" or the metro. much much cheaper then a ship tour. everthing is very expensive. two people for the coloseum with a self guided audio tour was 31.50 euro. lunch for two was 40. euro. nice but a very busy conjested city. and we were on the off time.

 

naples was very nice. here we did take a tour with the ship. naples, pompeii,sorrento, capri//hydrofoil $219.00us each. nice tour but a lot of walking and it's a very LONG tour. 10 hours. lunch was fantastic. fantastic.

our guide was "ciro" very nice guy had all the answers and was polite.

 

crete. on our own here also. take the port bus to the gate walk to the city about 15 minutes to the right. nice little cafes and shops. also you can take a taxi to konosos palace (8-10 euro) or take the city bus from the bus station (1.5 euro) we did not know and took a taxi up for 8, but then we we wanted to return it was 15 euro. we said no and took the city bus. it goes right to the bus station were its about 6 minutes from the port. there was not much to see here. the palace was interesting, but hot dry and dusty. sunday is free, and other days it's 6 euro.

 

athens. was our gate home . we did not stay this time because we had been here b4. we were dark blue tags and got off the ship at 7:30 am our flight did not leave until 1:25pm so there was a little wait at the airport, but you can get a cart and walk around. really no choice. but better safe then sorry and misss your flight.

 

SO.

1.eat at all the rest's on the ship, yes even if you have to pay. go during the early bird time. the food is really good , and it's nice to see the whole ship.

 

2. ride the water slide

 

3. have a good bottle of wine in cagney's. try merryvale, cab. fantastic. or a chianti classico also very good.

 

4. have the sinful chocolate cake

 

5. enter into the slots tourenment.

 

6. buy your euro at home. it cost $7.00us to exchange dollrs on the ship.

 

7. dont bitch. have a good time. on the last day there was this old man down at the front desk screaming. " how could you charge me $10.00 a day per person for tips?" " i never heard of such a thing"!! oh please, BS!!

nothing worse than someone screaming and yelling making a fool of themself. remember people are watching. the same time that man was yelling , i swear there was a lady at the front desk she must of been there for 30 minutes. trying to get a $15.00 tip removed from the bill. she had gone to a rest. had dinner and tip the servers $15.00. well when she found out that the $10.00 a day covered the ALL the waiters, " she wanted her money back" because, "why should she tip them twice"? please !! we tip when we got good service. and asked for certain wait staff when we went back, and they were happy to see us. thats why you tip. for god sake.

 

i'm sure there are lots of things i left off so if you have a question ask and i'll try to help. you cant go wrong on this ship with this crew. and we LOVED FREE STYLE. OH, THERE IS "FREE STYLE TANNING" ON DECK 15, AND YES IT IS NUDE....anyways we loved it and really think free style is the way to come. and soon as the people who, "can remember the old days" stop complaining we'll all be better off. this is the way. some days i wanted dinner at 6pm some days were so busy or tried we ate at 10pm. there really is no better way then my way. thats what it should really be called "my way" crusie.

[Cosmopolitan]

ok, well let me be the first to say, WORK SUCKS. I HATE BEING BACK.

 

the "casino at sea" card is really not very good unless you play lots and lots of slots. enough on the casino. if i left anything out and you have a question ask me.

 

the martini tasting ... we have done this on other ships and think this one was expensive for what you get. the guy, o'niel, talks about the history and different kinds of martinis and different kinds of vodka, but then when he makes them he uses the cheapest vodka on hand. you get 3 small tastes for $15.00. well thats $5.00 a taste. not a very good deal we thought.

 

we did not play the mystery dinner, but some friends did and said they had a real good time. the ship limits the game to 150 people and then you get put into groups, and dinner is in the main rest. that night.

 

I agree..work SUCKS :-(

 

Casino at sea works for us...without lots and lots of slots;)

 

Martini clinic..what's with that? We've had 5-6 martinis on the Dawn and Jewel for that price. I have pictures. Hope this is not a new thing?

 

Murder Mystery Dinner is fun...you can only do it once...script has not changed.

 

Loving your review...keep it coming:)

[Cruise_More_Often]

Thanks so much for your excellent review. I've run into a few of the types of passengers you mentioned. Don't you just want to punch them? Whenever I'm near one of "them," I make sure to tell the recipient of the tirade what a wonderful time we're having and how we appreciate everything they are doing for us.

 

I can hardly wait to get on the Jewel in in 9 months. :eek: You have painted such a beautiful picture of your cruise.

[MechTeach]

Thanks so much for your fantastic review. We're on the Jewel out of Athens on May 31, so thanks also for delivering our ship to us in good condition ;)

[cruisingbob]

Hi Lilant:

 

My bank charges 7% to exchange Euros. Do you remember what the exchange rate is on the ship.

 

 

Thanks,

Bob

[lilant]

Hi Lilant:

 

My bank charges 7% to exchange Euros. Do you remember what the exchange rate is on the ship.

 

 

Thanks,

Bob

 

hey bob, sure do. it was 1.44 to the dollar plus a $7.00 surcharge.

 

you can do better else where. and the line was always long on the ship.

[sdsun*]

Thanks for the info; very entertaining. Just wanted to share what a car rental agent said to us once in Maui ; That people that come to her counter in a grumpy mood, complaining about everything don't even deserve to be on her beautiful island. Those whiny complaining people should stay at home. Will be on the Jewel May 31 as well.

 

Stef

[kekoa3uk]

sdsun,

 

Have you checked out the roll call for our May 31st cruise? There will be a meeting on the second day for all interested. Hope you are planning to be there.

 

Lilant,

 

Do you know if you can use the showers/sauna if you don't buy a spa package? Some of the cruise lines, specifically Celebrity, allowed use of the locker rooms/sauna/showers without paying for any spa treatments. Thanks for the great review. You sound like you would be fun on a cruise. Consider the Med cruise on May 31!!!

[lilant]

sdsun,

Lilant,

 

Do you know if you can use the showers/sauna if you don't buy a spa package? Some of the cruise lines, specifically Celebrity, allowed use of the locker rooms/sauna/showers without paying for any spa treatments. Thanks for the great review. You sound like you would be fun on a cruise. Consider the Med cruise on May 31!!!

 

 

hi. you dont have to buy a "spa treatment", but you will have to but either a "day pass" or the "whole cruise pass" to get into all of the above. a day pass was $15.00, a week was $65.00 and our two week pass was $98.00. well worht the money for us. there were no crowds.

 

i know what you mean about celebrity. we were on the summit and the locker rooms, showers were kinda outside the spa area. on jewel it's all behind the spa doors. if you have a lot of sea days then its worth it. otherwise buy a day pass. IMHO.

 

have fun guys.

 

pictures to come today.:o

[lilant]

heres a link to our pictures. mostly of the ports.

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLandingSignin.jsp?Uc=xjwhome.c3423d86&Uy=-49cj3p&Upost_signin=Slideshow.jsp%3Fmode%3Dfromshare&Ux=0

[eacruise]

those pictures are amazing!

 

So you didn't have any problems navigating the train to Rome and back?

[Tahoestarr]

Soooooo beautiful! Thank you for sharing!!!!

[lilant]

those pictures are amazing!

 

So you didn't have any problems navigating the train to Rome and back?

 

hi erica,

 

oh no. very very easy. and to make it even easier use the self service kiosk. touch screen. use the british flag and everything is in english. and you can use your credit card. we took the "local" train in the morning to rome and it was 7 euro pp one way. and in the afternoon on the way back we took the "eurostar" express, one stop i think, and it was 9 euro each one way. much much cheaper than the bus offered by the ship and faster. get on in civitavecchia to roma , and go all the way to roma termini. from there you can take the sub-way very easy. you can buy a ticket by ticket or a day pass. you can also catch the "hop on hop off" bus tour from the train station. right out the front door.

train tips

treno=train

partenza=departing from

posti= seat (on train)

 

there are little yellow date/time mechines near the trains. you MUST validate your ticket b4 you get on board. this prevents some one from using the ticket over and over.:D

[mandiecandie5]

Nice pics, looks beautiful! Some questions if you can remember..

-Did they have specials for the sushi ever? Someone posted there was $5 AYCE on sea days on the Jewel.

-in crete you took a "port bus to the gate" was this provided by NCL free? We are going to try and take the city bus I think since it sounds easy enough ;)

-does the steam/sauna in the spa have windows or enclosed? I love that about RCL spa but on Princess its no windows and a bit clostrophobic feeling. :(

 

Thxs!

[jarnina]

Thanks for great review-we are sailing from Istanbul on May 19-also in mini-suite-will use many of the tips you described-did you use laundry service-I thought I saw mention on some posting of washers and dryers available-any advice on making rest. reservations which apparantly can be a problem-thanks again

[lilant]

hey mandiecandi.

ok lets see.

1. sushi specials, no but way worth the $15.00. we had lunch there and ate and ate and ate. "che marie" is a very freindly guy, and made what ever we wanted.

2."AYCE"?

3. the port bus was free. and the city bus was easy and cheap. as you exit the port gate make a right walk up about 10 minutes and the bus station will be across the street.

4. steam/sauna. now i was in the guys sides but i'm sure it's the same. the steam room had no window, but the sauna had a hugh window. one whole side. and the whole locker room area was very nice.

 

jarnina,

we, well i, did laundry a couple of times. in the day it did get busy but on off hours you could get it done. i bought a "4 load" container of tide at target b4 i left put it in a zip lock and washed with that. the washers are free. there are also two ironing boards and a rinse sink. i had no problem. actually made freinds with a lady who had a AB suite and she let me come in and look around. jim & kathy, they were very nice. washers and dryers are on decks: 5,9,10 & 11. on our cruise, 2weeks, the ship had a laundry special. all the clothes you could fit in the bag for $25.00, but it took 2 days to get it back.

 

i know i read about people having trouble making reservations and having to get up at 7am and call and call to get the time they wanted. BS! two weeks and i never had a problem. now dont forget i NEVER ate in the main REST. for dinner, no reason except i liked what i was getting in all the other rest's. now one night i did call for mama's and wanted a table for 10 @ 7:30 and they could get us all in. so i made it for 6 @7:30. then ran down to tell my freinds. one of them had made a reservation for 6 @7:45. we laughed and called back. after i explained it all to "maria" she got us all in at 7:30pm. i said, "i love you maria, thank you". and she said "i love you too sir". you get more with honey!! nasty gets you nowhere. i work retail, i know.

 

hint. if you call reservations, it's a button on your phone, keep one finger on the button and one on the hang up button. if it's busy, hang up and redial. you get in much faster. i did not use the "call back option" i never was on the phone for more than 3 or 4 minutes. dont forget about the pizza's in mama's. OMG! the california and the serria neveda!! "rosalina" the M'D will take good care of you.

[eacruise]

hi erica,

 

we took the "local" train in the morning to rome and it was 7 euro pp one way. and in the afternoon on the way back we took the "eurostar" express, one stop i think, and it was 9 euro each one way.

 

Some other posters state you should buy a round trip so you don't miss the train. You didn't have any problems getting tickets back did you?

[MechTeach]

Awesome pictures! Thanks for posting those!