Cruise Help / Advice

lea2012

Hello all,

I've just received an email from NCL with 2016 cruise offers so decided to have a nosey. I've never been on a cruise before but it something we've fancied for a while. Were a family of 3 and our daughter will be 9 next year.

The deal I've seen is a western med cruise from Barcelona, heading to Italy then Cannes and Palma before back to Barcelona. 7 nights in Oct would be £1300 ish for the 3 of us for an inside cabin. This seems a great price, but just wondering if anyone can shed any light on what 'extras' should we expect on top of that?

NCL offer a freestyle dining so food is totally covered but it looks like drinks packages (alcoholic) start at $45 per night for beer and wine and $54 per night for spirits and cocktails. But then it mentions 18% gratuities and VAT if traveling from Spain so this could all add up.

There looks to be quite a lot of entertainment for our little one, but is this usually included?
Excursions- I presume you can book this cheaper with a third party rather than directly with NCL?

Alternatively Thomson have a cruise available, mainly around Spain, for a similar price. The itinerary isn't as great as the NCL one as we have done most of the places that it visits but it is described as All-Inc so no extra drinks package needed.

Is NCL worth the extra money for a cruise newbie?

Any hints or tips appreciated.

Caz3121

cruisecritic is a great forum for this sort of thing, there will be boards for NCL and for Thomson
Cruising on the right cruise ship with the right cabin is a fantastic holiday. Wrong ship/cabin...not so much

vivatifosi

Hi Lea, I've been on a couple of NCL cruises, including one on a similar itinerary to the one you are going on. First thing I would say is that NCL has bigger and more modern ships than Thomson. I also really like the freestyle concept. However it will be a much more international ship, so if you want to holiday with other Brits, then Thomson is better, if you like meeting people from different countries then NCL is better.

£1300 for three is not a bad price, but the interior staterooms can be quite small. It's not bad as a place to sleep, but that may be something to think about if you are planning to stay in your cabin.

I'm not a drinker, but tend to go for the fixed price soft drinks when cruising. The people who I know who go on NCL say you have to drink a heck of a lot to make it worth buying the drinks package.

The main dining rooms on NCL are good, and you always have other options if you don't fancy the menu. The buffet is free, and many ships also have an always open cafe (Blue Lagoon). You also have the option of paying a bit extra (c $20-30 for the top restaurants) to eat in one of their premium locations. Tbh, this is something we do as a treat, not daily.

A lot of the children's activities are included.

Cannes and Palma it's quite easy to do your own thing without a ships tour. The train service in France is good, or Cannes is very walkable; in Palma there's plenty to do and a HoHo bus you can take if you fancy it. Italy... depends on where you are going. Livorno is a long way from Florence, similarly Civitavecchia to Rome. There's a train you can take from Civi to Rome (90 mins each way). I've done it on a cruise but probably wouldn't DIY if it was my first time there.

Check out Cruise Critic at https://www.cruisecritic.com. There's a ton of info on NCL, and there are forums where you can ask NCL related questions as well as port related ones. Have fun!

daveyjp

Looks a good price for 18 months out. Does it include flights to Barcelona?

Yinster

Definitely go onto cruisecritic forum as it helped me when I went on my first cruise in 2014. Just booked another one - this time with NCL on I think the same ship as the one you are thinking of going on - the Norwegian Epic so back onto the forum to ask questions like bath tubs.

Just now till the 29th of May NCL are doing an offer of those who book on an Oceanview (Norwegian Epic has none of these rooms), Balcony or Mini Suite (which is really just a larger deluxe balcony room) where you can pick one of four offers

1. free speciality dining experience - eating in one of the paid restaurants every night
2. $200 spending money
3. free premium drinks package (of which both of you will get and your daughter will get the soda package)
4. $75 shore excursion credit per stateroom

We went for the drink package as it works out better for us. As there are lots of free restaurants anyway we may treat ourselves to one or two of the paid ones. So it might be worth paying for a bigger room and getting the extra thing free.

As for the excursions it is up to you whether to do your own in each or some of the ports. We probably go with the cruise excursions as you are guarantee the boat will wait for you if you are late. If you DIY then it won't and you need to catch the ship on your own expenses.

Also look at booking through a travel agent. Usually we DIY but our TA managed to get the cruise and flight cheaper than what NCL are advertising it plus we have transfers and hotel stay for one night

stoneman

We have been on 5 NCL cruises and have another booked for this June from Venice. There will be 1 or 2 main dining rooms which are set menu, and a buffet, those will be free. In fact now the oriental dining is free as well.
Drink prices are about $6-8 for beer and $10-12 for cocktails. A gratuity will be automaticly added to all drinks.
Also you have to add in that everyone in your party will pay $12.50 a day service charge.
Here is the cruise critic NCL forum
http://boards.cruisecritic.co.uk/forumdisplay.php?f=107

lea2012

Thanks everyone for your replies, I will get onto the cruise critic boards and have a good look around.
We don't mind it having more of an international crowd, or if it's a bit British either I suppose. We're not really an egg and chips kind of family, but we do have an 8 year old (9 when we go) so some British entertainment might go down well with her.
The NCL ships look great as there's plenty of activities and things to do, but if it's only a week and we had a great itinerary then we wouldn't have that much time to make the most of it either too.
I'm sure we'll make up our mind once we do some more research.

Thanks again.

Finishrich

A good resource for planning your own trips in port is:
http://tomsportguides.com/

stoneman

lea2012 wrote: »

Thanks everyone for your replies, I will get onto the cruise critic boards and have a good look around.
We don't mind it having more of an international crowd, or if it's a bit British either I suppose. We're not really an egg and chips kind of family, but we do have an 8 year old (9 when we go) so some British entertainment might go down well with her.
The NCL ships look great as there's plenty of activities and things to do, but if it's only a week and we had a great itinerary then we wouldn't have that much time to make the most of it either too.
I'm sure we'll make up our mind once we do some more research.

Thanks again.

Hahah. We don't get off the ship when in port. It's the best time to have things to your self and really enjoy what the ship has to offer. The ports are only full of chat anyway

Archergirl

The Thompson ships don't have much on them to do, especially for children but we always get off each day and there is only one sea day usually.
October is cooling down a bit, the weather may be a little unreliable but I guess that's reflected in the price.