We jumped ship to NCL!! How did they do??

[Pens Fan]

After five DCL cruises, we recently jumped ship to the NCL Sun for our latest Alaskan adventure. I have really enjoyed the various threads on here that compare other cruise lines to DCL, so I thought I’d offer my thoughts on our NCL experience. I find it helpful to get the perspective of someone who has sailed a lot on Disney and then goes elsewhere and can offer the plusses and minuses. So I’m paying it forward, and hope this will be helpful to someone else. The Sun is one of NCL’s oldest and smallest ships - even smaller than the Magic/Wonder. I’m sure our impressions are quite different from those sailing on NCL’s mega ships, but I can only speak to our first hand experience. For those of you who have sailed on any of the other NCL ships (or even the Sun) please feel free to chime in with your own impressions and how they compare to DCL.

First, a little background: We are a family of three, DH and I are in our 50’s and our son is 19. We love Disney (our son’s dream is to be an imagineer). However, while we have enjoyed many WDW and DCL vacations we certainly aren’t joined at the hip with the Mouse when it comes to travel. We have taken a lot more non Disney vacations than Disney ones over the years and enjoyed them all. When it comes to cruising, though, with the exception of our honeymoon cruise on Carnival (which we loved!!) back in 1985, our cruising experience has only been on DCL.

We have been to Alaska twice before. Many years ago, before our son was born, DH and I took a mostly land based 2 week vacation. One misadventure due to temperamental Alaskan weather and small planes not being able to fly necessitated an afternoon on the Alaskan State Ferry, but other than that we were driving through Alaska and the Yukon. Years later, when our son was 14 we sailed on the Wonder for a roundtrip cruise out of Seattle. Each of these vacations were amazing and we have been plotting a return to Alaska for some time now. This time our priorities were two-fold. We wanted a land/sea vacation, so the cruise portion needed to be a one way between Vancouver and either Seward or Whittier. We also desperately wanted to see Glacier Bay. We had planned on flying to Glacier Bay on our first land based trip, but the previously mentioned weather / plane issues prevented that from happening. Both of these priorities eliminated DCL from our options.

We had been kicking around the idea of an NCL cruise, being intrigued by their laid-back, “Freestyle” cruising model. This seemed a great time to check them out as the NCL Sun had the perfect itinerary for our needs. It sailed one way from Vancouver to Seward, and included both Glacier Bay and Hubbard Glacier, as well as the typical stops in Ketchikan, Juneau and Skagway. We were sold! The only decision we needed to make was to decide what category of stateroom to book. On Disney we have always sailed in a balcony cabin - mostly 5A or 5B, and once in a 4A. Looking at NCL, their balcony cabins seemed small, so initially I was thinking of booking a mini suite, as that seemed more comparable to what we were used to on Disney. However my husband really wanted to try out an actual suite as we had never done that on DCL, so we decided to go for it.

 

[Pens Fan]

First, the elephant in the room - Price. It came as no shock that NCL costs significantly less than DCL. But I was really surprised at just how much that difference was. For basically the same money that we would have paid for our typical balcony on DCL, we got an Aft Penthouse Suite with a separate bedroom and living room and a HUGE balcony - as my son noted, “that’s not a balcony, it’s a freaking sun deck!” Also included in our booking were the following freestyle promotions:

- Ultimate beverage package (tips were included for suite guests when we booked so no added fees) for DH and I
- 3 nights of specialty dining (tips were included for suite guests when we booked so no added fees) for DH and I
- 250 minutes of internet
- $50 per port shore excursion credit (didn’t use this as we booked independently of NCL)
- $300 OBC

We purchased the soda plan for our son and an additional 3 night dining package for him. Adding that in, we ended up paying almost the exact amount that we would have paid on Disney for a 5A/5B balcony cabin (slightly more than a 5B, slightly less than a 5A) if we booked opening day.

Had we elected to stick with the mini suite, we would have saved a ton. I don’t recall the exact amount, but I think it was in the $3K-$4K range. I’m the frugal one in the family and that would have been my choice, but DH really wanted to try out the suite. Mini suites on NCL do not qualify for suite perks. They are basically just slightly larger balcony rooms. We both finally decided that having the separate bedroom would be great from a privacy stand point with our adult son along on the trip. Never having sailed concierge with Disney we also looked forward to having that service as well as a butler on NCL and their long list of suite perks.

We left good, old SW Pennsylvania on July 14 on an early, early flight to Vancouver, connecting in Minneapolis. Our adventure had begun!!

After spending 3 delightful days in Vancouver (what a terrific city! and a great way to start a cruise), we headed to the pier to board the Sun. We knew in advance that the Wonder would also be in port that day, so we were prepared for the Mickey envy that would ensue. I’ll admit that it was a bit tough to see her there, along with all of the DCL employees throughout the port. We even heard the Mickey horn as we sailed off and then she followed us for quite awhile, but ultimately passed the Sun and was out of sight (phew!). There was definitely a bit of “well Disney does it this way” on that first day, but honestly by the second day we had settled in and really began to enjoy our “Freestyle” NCL cruise.

I’ll try my best to compare our NCL Sun cruise to those we have taken on Disney. Again, I can only speak to our experiences based on 3 adults sailing together on an older, smaller ship. I am sure others will have completely different opinions / experiences on NCL and that’s great. I’d love to hear about them!

As we sailed in a suite on NCL, some of my comparisons might not seem fair at first blush, particularly comparing the cabin and dining choices. But as the cost was basically the same as a balcony on DCL (not including all the free goodies you get on NCL, that you don’t on DCL), for us it’s a fair comparison (more than fair actually). If you ignore the items we purchased in the gift shops on board, as well as the cruise next deposits we purchased (oops! I’m giving away the conclusion), our end of the cruise bill was basically zero. That has never happened on DCL, not even close. So honestly, if you buy alcohol, specialty dining, shore excursions, or internet (or just want some good, old OBC), then the NCL price for a suite could even be comparable an ocean view room on DCL. The forward suites were also quite a bit less expensive, but I thought they would be too windy for an Alaskan cruise. They all sold out, though, and I didn’t see anyone wandering around the ship with noticeable frost bite, so what the heck do I know???

 

[Pens Fan]

Overall impression of the ship / decor / maintenance / cleanliness:


I honestly was surprised at how much I liked the look and feel of the Sun. It didn’t have quite the elegance of a Disney ship, but it was quite beautiful, super easy to navigate and best of all there were huge windows everywhere. And I mean everywhere. When I’m on a ship, I want to know I’m on a ship, not a shopping mall. I always thought Disney did a good job of that, but NCL was even better, probably because it was so small. Almost all of the public rooms had huge windows looking out to the sea - just lovely!

At first I did miss the Disney touches, but pretty much forgot about it by the second day. Overall I’d call it even on look and feel.

As for maintenance, Disney wins on this one. The Sun was supposed to go in for an extensive dry dock last year, but it was shortened to about a week and a half. It will be going in for a further refresh next spring and I’d say it probably needs it. Nothing was overtly wrong with it, but having sailed with Disney I did notice the dings on the Sun that just aren't there on DCL ships. It didn’t take anything away from our enjoyment and I don’t mean to imply the ship is run down (it’s NOT, not even close), just that it’s not quite as well maintained as Disney. If I gave DCL a 10, I’d say the Sun was about a solid 7.5. I imagine that a lot of those little imperfections will be addressed in the upcoming refresh.

For cleanliness, Disney wins again. Their ships, IMHO, are just spotless. The Sun was also very, very clean. Tables in the public areas were cleaned quickly (similar to Disney) and our cabin was spotless. The one thing I did notice which gives the win to Mickey by a nose is that occasionally there would be a few things lying on the floor in the public areas. On Disney it seems that there is an entire fleet of carpet minders picking things up and cleaning up spills almost instantly. We once got into an elevator on the Sun and someone had spilled a drink. Now, for all I know it was the person right before us, but I’ve never seen anything like that on Disney.

Score: Disney 10, NCL Sun 8

 

[Pens Fan]

Cabin:

I have always thought Disney’s cabins were very well thought out, with plenty of room for the three of us, comfortable beds, plenty of storage. The split bathrooms leave me with a “split” opinion. While I appreciate the separate areas, they are sooooooo tiny. I hate the shower room. I’m a quick shower girl, but that thing turns into a sauna in no time at all.

As for our cabin on the Sun, well all I can say is Wow, just Wow. We had a separate living room with a sofa bed (more on that contraption later), and bedroom. The balcony was enormous - room for two loungers, two chairs, three tables with lots and lots of room to spare. I’d say it was about 4 times the size of the balconies we’ve had on Disney. We pretty much lived out there. As it was an aft cabin, the views were incredible, especially on Glacier Bay and Hubbard Glacier days. The bathroom was fantastic. It had a large vanity with tons of storage (more than we’ve ever had on Disney), separate toilet room, a jacuzzi tub and separate shower stall. There was a little vanity/closet area at one end. If I had one quibble it would be that it would have been so simple to install an accordion door (or something similar) to separate the vanity / dressing area from the rest of the bathroom. It’s not an issue if you are just traveling with your significant other, but it would have been nice in our situation. The storage in the cabin was never ending. I’m not sure if we even used half of it and we aren’t exactly light packers.

The one and only complaint with the cabin was the torture chamber they called a sofa bed. We have always found Disney’s to be very comfortable even when our son got older. This one was unbelievably bad. Even just to sit on the thing felt like sitting on a piece of plywood. We asked for and received a foam topper upon arrival. My son doubled it up to add cushioning on the first night, but it was still pretty awful. The second night we asked for another topper and from that night on our wonderful cabin steward made up his bed each night with two toppers, folded in half for a total of four foam layers. From that point on, DS slept just fine. The couch still stunk to sit on, but we spent all of our time on the balcony anyway so we really didn’t care.

In an interesting side note to the torture couch, prior to leaving for our trip, someone on CC posted a question about our exact cabin. One of the answers posted included pictures of the identical cabin one deck below ours. They noted the brand new leather couch and chair in the room which were different from any pictures I’d seen previously of the aft penthouse suites. While our cabin did have the (very comfortable) new chair, we still had the same awful, old couch. I”m guessing that the abbreviated 2016 dry dock left some planned things undone - thus torture couch remains in cabin 9276. Hopefully it will be replaced next year. If not, there are always foam toppers!!!


Score: NCL Sun 9.5 (slight deduction for that stupid couch), Disney 6 (by comparison - up until now I’ve loved Disney’s cabins)

 

[Pens Fan]

Service:

Up until this cruise, quite frankly, I’ve been a horrid snob when it comes to Disney service. My friends that cruise always ask why we stay with Disney when they are so much more expensive. “Oh, it’s the service, I’d gush. You just don’t get that anywhere else!” Fortunately I have wonderful friends (or maybe it’s that I often ply them with wine) because they refrained from pointing out the obvious, which is that if you never sail with anyone else you have absolutely no clue whether or not Disney’s service is any better or worse than anyone else.

Well, now I can make the comparison between the three DCL ships we’ve been on (all except the Dream) and the NCL Sun. Shocker!!! It’s a tie. Really. And that might be me being generous on Disney’s part. The service on the Sun was sublime. Really. Perfect in almost every way. We had one indifferent server at the sports bar, but that was it for the entire week. Everyone else was delightful, thoughtful and treated us like royalty. Really. And if I compare the Sun to our last cruise (Magic out of NYC last October), the Sun wins by a fairly large margin. I’m not sure what was up with that Magic cruise, but our room steward was, well, very un-Disney like. Honestly, the poor guy was nice enough, but he was totally and completely clueless as to how to do his job. The bar staff was at best indifferent and at worst, rude. The one exception was Jay in the Cove Cafe. He was delightful and we spent most evenings hanging out there. But giving Disney the benefit of the doubt and tossing out that one cruise as an outlier and not an indication of things to come I’d say our experiences were equal for service.

Score: Disney 10, NCL Sun 10

 

[Pens Fan]

Food:

OK. Food is completely subjective, so our experiences are pretty much guaranteed to be different than anyone that’s still bothering to read this long winded tale. But it’s a cruise comparison, so there must be a food comparison. I believe it is a maritime rule.

We’ve always thought the food on Disney was fine. Just that. Some things were really good, some things were really bad (do they actually TRY to make desserts that tasteless???) and most fell somewhere in between - thus the overall “Fine” rating. I always thought they did an admirable job of feeding the masses. I don’t go on cruises and expect fine dining and I’ve never gotten it. Now, to be clear, we have never eaten in Remy (doesn’t interest us in the slightest) or Palo. We were waiting for our son to be old enough to eat in Palo with us, plus we live in a part of the country with fabulous mom and pop type Italian restaurants on every corner. We avoid Italian food on vacation, because it normally disappoints and then we are just annoyed that we paid crazy sums of money for mediocre Italian food. I know most folks rave about Palo, and we have some dear friends that have dined there and loved it, so I’m going to give it the benefit of the doubt and assume it’s really good.

Our first hand Disney experiences are, however, based on the complementary options. On NCL, we ate in specialty restaurants 5 out of 7 nights and ate most of our breakfasts and lunches in the suite - only dining room. Yeah, it’s not exactly a fair comparison (except for the above noted price issue), but it’s all I’ve got. So, I’m going to compare.

This one is easy. It’s not even close. If you threw out the food quality (don’t worry, I’ll get that in a minute) and just based the comparison on choices alone, NCL wins by a mile. We loved, loved, loved the whole Freestyle concept. The Sun is small, so there are no where near the number of restaurants that are on their larger ships, but they still had so many options. It was fantastic! They included 2 buffets - one indoors, one outdoors (a 3rd for lunch when they converted a specialty restaurant to a pizza / pasta buffet), 2 MDR’s, French, Italian, Brazilian steakhouse, Hibachi, Steakhouse, sushi, tapas bar, and a sports bar/pub. I’m probably forgetting something, but I think that’s it. For suite guests, they converted the Italian restaurant to a dedicated suite breakfast and lunch dining room. Honestly, this was probably our favorite suite perk. It was just a quiet, beautiful space with amazing food that got you away from the hustle and bustle.

We just loved not having a set time and place to eat. It was up to us! What a concept! Now, I will point out that we did make reservations for most of the specialty dining prior to setting sail (sushi was the exception and we still got a table right away). For the MDR’s we just walked up and were always seated with no wait. My point is that it’s not EXACTLY Freestyle in that you can’t just randomly walk up to Cagney’s Steakhouse at 7 PM without a reservation and expect to be seated right away. It’s basically just like vacationing on land. If you want to go somewhere special at a busy time, you need to make a reservation (just like Palo and Remy on Disney). But it’s still up to you. No one is dictating where and when you eat. I like that. A lot.

Freestyle dining does mean that you lose the concept of having the same servers every night. That will bother some folks. It didn’t bother us. We have had some amazing servers on Disney that truly added to our cruise experience. We’ve also had some that were just OK and even some that were so fake it was almost painful. On NCL, the closest we got to having the same servers was in the suite restaurant. You didn’t have the same exact server, but there was a small team that served the entire area and by day two all of them knew your names, likes and dislikes, etc. They were all terrific. The other servers we had were fantastic as well. We had one guy in the sports bar that was kind of indifferent, but we didn’t end up staying (not because of him, we just changed our mind - you can do that on NCL - and decided to get sushi instead). All of our other servers ranged from really good to absolutely terrific. Zero complaints about dining room service from this family.

As for food quality, well again NCL wins by a mile. I have no clue how the food on the Sun compares to the other NCL ships, but it our humble opinion it beat Disney, hands down. We were, frankly, shocked at how good the food was. Even in the MDR’s, the number of menu items to choose from and the quality of the food was better than Disney. The specialty restaurants blew Disney’s MDR’s out of the water. I know - not fair - but it’s all I’ve got to compare it to and again I will reference my comments under the price section. We had three specialty meals included with our cruise fare and paid for the other two with a (small) portion of our OBC. So for us, they were still included in the cruise fare.

Honestly, we never had a bad meal on the Sun and probably only one mediocre one. Most were just fabulous. The one mediocre one was when we ate breakfast in the main buffet one morning and it was fine, comparable to Cabanas on Disney. To be fair, we are not buffet people. We rarely enjoy them and Disney is no exception. We eat at Cabanas for some breakfasts, but avoid it like the plague at lunch. We simply do not care for it. YMMV.

Score: NCL Sun 10 (for a cruise ship), Disney 7

 

[Pens Fan]

Embarkation / Debarkation:

Being in a suite on the Sun, we had priority check in, embarkation and debarkation (including debarkation at ports of call). The results were kind of a mixed bag. The poor lady that checked us in was honestly clueless. She had no idea what she was doing and had to go back and forth asking for help. We saw numerous non-suite customers walk right up, check in and head off while we waited. Finally a supervisor came over and took over and got things moving. We thought we were home free, but no! As a suite guest you get a personal escort through border control (have to go through US customs to get on the ship in Vancouver) and into the suite waiting area. This was really a little embarrassing for us. I mean, we can follow the crowd. We don't need someone to hold our hand. But it was part of the "suite experience", so we went with it as we didn't want to rock the boat. Of course, our escort was the clueless one. We got almost to border control when she realized that she had the wrong room keys. So we stepped to the side, while guest after guest went on ahead while she - finally - retrieved the correct room keys. That "suite check in priority" probably doubled (or tripled) our check in time. Still, it was only about 30 minutes or so, as the lines were short and moving fast.

Once we ditched our “priority escort” it was smooth sailing - everything you’d expect a suite experience to be. We met our lovely concierge Rashida at the suite waiting area. Honestly, this woman never stopped moving and always had a smile on her face. She was one of those people that made you feel that taking care of whatever goofy thing you needed was the most important thing in her life at that moment. We’ve never sailed concierge on Disney and really never thought we’d even want to, but Rashida did have a way of making our lives so much easier. Need a hard to get dining reservation? No problem. Need to hop off the ship first thing to meet an early private tour? Yep, got it covered by passing through the crew hallways, and off of the ship ahead of the crowd. No waiting in line for you!!! It was the same for final disembarkation - no lines, just whisked off the ship by Rashida. I’ll admit, at times it was almost embarrassing how much they catered to suite guests and we tried our best not to take advantage of them. We really didn’t use Rashida or Sumedh (our wonderful butler) all that much. But they were always around, always very kind and ready, willing and able to help. I’ll admit that a couple of port days, we were too busy to eat either at all or very much and it was really, really nice to come back to our cabin and find the yummy treats that Sumedh had left for us. Not just junk food, treats included sandwiches, sushi, fruit, cheese and more. On Glacier Bay day, he surprised us with hot chocolate and cookies on our balcony.

But I digress, this is about embarkation and debarkation, not butlers and concierges.

I’m going to call this a tie. If you take out the fact that we received preferential suite treatment and that our embarkation escort was probably working her first hours as an NCL employee (or just incredibly bad at her job), I’d say there really isn’t much difference. We have experienced wildly different embarkation / debarkation on Disney anyway. Personally I thing that whole experience is more a factor of the port, rather than the cruise line. Port Canaveral is a very different experience vs. NYC vs. Copenhagen vs. Seattle vs. Vancouver - the ports we’ve sailed out of.

There is one thing that we noticed, though, during embarkation. There were very few visible NCL employees at the port, other than at their own check in area. Vancouver cruise terminal is a winding, twisty series of luggage drop off, hallways, security, and border control. Other than at the cruise line’s individual check in areas, you are sharing these spaces with passengers from any and all ships in port that day. At every juncture point, there was a smiling DCL employee standing there pointing the way forward. We saw hardly any from NCL. Who knows, maybe the cruise lines have some type of agreement as to who is directing the herd each day and it was DCL’s day when we were there. No clue, but it did make us wonder a bit.

 

[cruiser21]

Our service on NCL and Carnival was just as good as our service on DCL. It just wasn't as personable, but I'm ok with that. I don't need to know my servers life story. I know when I go to cruise critic and read reviews I get really confused. One thing I've noticed is that parents with kids seem to write better reviews. It think their just happy to have a kid/teen club and some time to themselves. Working people are happy to be on vacation. The retirees seem to be the most fussy, and write the reviews that leave me shaking my head. I'm glad you enjoyed your NCL cruise. I think the Sun is one of their oldest ships so that's saying something.

 

[Pens Fan]

Entertainment:

This one is little harder to score. As we were on the Sun, rather than one of NCL’s larger ships, the entertainment options were limited. Yes, they had the typical bingo, trivia, game shows that most cruise lines have but those really don’t interest us much, so I won’t even attempt to compare. One thing that NCL did that we really enjoyed was they had two different Q & A sessions with ship officers, even the Captain at the technical one, where guests could ask them questions. It was really, really interesting. I’ve never seen that on Disney, but could have missed it.

There wasn’t a lot on the pool deck except the pool and some hot tubs. There was no funnel vision type screen for watching movies. While we have never actually sat and watched an entire movie at the pool on Disney, I did miss it on the Sun. We never swim in the Disney pools, not even our son - kid soup is not our cup of tea - and we didn’t take an Alaskan cruise to swim on NCL, so I can’t really compare them. The NCL one did seem larger, but there was only one of them, but then it’s smaller ship. I’m not much help if you are looking for insider pool info, sorry.

As for the evening shows, I think that most of us will agree that Disney does this extremely well. Their musical shows are so well produced, and we have always really enjoyed the variety acts as well. But if I’m being honest, I’m kind of tired of them. After just five cruises, they all seem to run together. I couldn't even begin to tell you the plot differences of Believe / Dreams / Wishes anymore as they all run together after awhile. Well done, for sure, but we usually skip them now. One exception was Tangled on the Magic. We loved that! The lantern scene (I don’t want to give it away) made me teary-eyed and I’m not ashamed to admit it. You aren't going to find anything like that on the NCL Sun. I know that NCL’s larger ships do have Broadway-type shows, but as I haven’t seen them I can’t compare them to Disney except to say they exist. The Sun’s musical / dance acts weren’t in a class with Disney from a production standpoint, but we were pleasantly surprised at the talent level of the performers. We also really enjoyed that they were not all similarly themed and were, well, different than the ones we’ve experienced on Disney. Now, if we sailed on NCL a ton, we’d probably get bored with their shows as well. So it’s hard to judge. But we enjoyed all of the shows that we chose to attend on the Sun. Were they as well done as Disney - nope. But they were still fun.

The Sun had variety acts which were basically like Disney’s. One difference was the comedian. We have always laughed at Disney’s “adult” version of their shows. There really is nothing remotely offensive to them and I would have gladly taken my teenager to see any one of them had it been allowed. It wasn’t, so we didn’t, but there was nothing in those shows that he hadn't heard on the school bus (and then some!!). Now, on NCL, when they say adult they mean it. We went to one adult comedian show and while it certainly wasn’t raunchy or terribly offensive, it was adult themed. We loved it (our son - he’s 19, remember) especially did!

There were two things that I really missed on the Sun that we have made great use of on Disney. One was a dedicated movie theater. They did show a movie most afternoons in the theater, but that was it. We love watching movies on Disney and usually catch at least a couple on each cruise. We missed this. A lot.

The other thing we missed was the enrichment lectures that we’ve seen on Disney. We loved the naturalist talks in Alaska on the Wonder and found the political/historical talks on the Norway/Iceland cruise to be terrific. Even our son (17 at the time) loved them. He missed a couple of them, but planned out a time when he could watch the replay on the stateroom TV. They are that good. NCL doesn’t really have anything to compare to that. They did have a National Park ranger on board for Glacier Bay and she gave commentary throughout our time there. There was also one lecture listed in the Daily (NCL”s version of the Navigator) about glaciers, though we didn’t go. I think we were still in our “mesmerized by the aft balcony” state. Seriously. We hardly left that thing! One day our son fell asleep out there and got sunburned.

NCL had liquor tastings, just like Disney. We went to one of the wine tastings, and while their approach was different than Disney’s we enjoyed it just as much. But then we pretty much enjoy anything that includes wine.

It’s hard for me to score this, as we don’t take part in a lot of the entertainment on board either cruise line. I’d say Disney wins for family friendly activities, but we really, really enjoyed everything we did do on NCL.

Score: DCL 10 NCL Sun 6.5

The score aside, I'll just say that for most folks still awake and reading this thing, you’ll probably prefer Disney’s entertainment to that on one of NCL’s smaller ships - especially if you have small children or crave a bit of the Mouse in your shows. But you won’t get bored on NCL either. If you do and we are on board, give us a call and we will let you hang out on our aft balcony. You'll love it. I promise.

 

[Pens Fan]

Kid Stuff:

I’m not much help with this subject. Our son is 19, so no kid's clubs for him. There were kids on board, but not nearly as many as on Disney. That is either good or bad, depending on your perspective. We liked it. Don’t get me wrong. I love kids. I have one. But we’ve raised him (well you never stop raising them, but you know what I mean), and don’t necessarily want to spend our vacation with a bunch of little kids. I’m not becoming the cranky “get off my lawn” lady (or at least I hope not!), but I do like a little peace and quiet in my down time.

There was an 18-20 meet up scheduled the first night in the tapas bar. Our son was the only one that showed up and the bar tender had no clue it was even scheduled. Obviously, not a big thing on NCL (or least not on the Sun).

I have no clue what the kid’s clubs are like other than that they had them, because I saw them on the the deck plans. The kids we saw on the ship looked to be having a good time. That’s pretty much all I’ve got on that subject.

Hopefully someone reading this with smaller children can chime in and relate their experiences.

 

[Pens Fan]

Conclusion:

I gave this away early on in this novel I’ve written, but we definitely plan on sailing with NCL again. We loved this cruise and think NCL offers a great product. They have so many interesting itineraries, and for us the destination is more important than the ship anyway. We had already booked our second prior to this sailing - on the Gem roundtrip out of NYC, sailing to Nova Scotia, PEI and Quebec in the Fall of 2018. We also bought four cruise next certificates while on board the Sun. It’s a program NCL has where you can buy $250 deposit certificates at a reduced price. We bought four (you can use two per cruise if you sail in a balcony or above and book at least six months in advance, otherwise one per cruise) and only paid $500 for them, for a savings of $500 spread over two cruises. It’s not as good a deal as Disney’s 10% off plus OBC for booking on board, but you have up to four years to book the cruise (actual sail date can be after that) and they are completely transferrable.

Will we forgo Disney completely for our future cruises? Oh, no!! We love their product as well. But it will have to be the right itinerary and the right price. I’m curious about the new ships and we will have to see if they entice us on board with some new tricks.

The bottom line for us was that this was an eye opening experience. We had an amazing cruise and now we’ve opened up a whole long list of options when it comes to cruising. When we were in Vancouver, our hotel was only a couple of blocks from Canada Place. Every single day we would walk down there and check out which ships were in port. Of course, we amused ourselves by admiring / trashing them all equally based on their exterior appearance. It was fun, but also got us thinking about all of the other cruise lines out there. It’s a huge industry and there are so many options. While we still love Disney, we no longer feel the need to confine ourselves to just those ships. It’s exciting, really.

Anyway, if you haven’t fallen asleep by now, I hope this helped anyone thinking about trying NCL, especially the smaller ships. I’d love to hear about others’ NCL experiences as well. Feel free to chime in!!

 

[cruiser21]

Great review. I have two teens so the teen club experience is very important. It's probably the main reason I'll continue to book DCL cruises. I'll still venture outside of DCL...with the big mega ships geared toward families. I like reading these reviews because in 5 years both my kids will be adults.

 

[Pens Fan]

Great review. I have two teens so the teen club experience is very important. It's probably the main reason I'll continue to book DCL cruises. I'll still venture outside of DCL...with the big mega ships geared toward families. I like reading these reviews because in 5 years both my kids will be adults.

I'm with you. I've been wanting to try NCL for a long time, but as long as my son was able to go to the teen club, we stuck with Disney. It's funny - he did not enjoy the clubs on Disney at all until he was old enough for Vibe. Then he loved them (about the time I started pushing for NCL). Go figure.

Now that the kid's clubs are no longer a factor, I feel kind of free. I know that's pretty cheesy, but it's how I feel. Travel is a huge part of our life. We take more land based trips, but we really love cruising. Knowing we don't "have" to stick with Disney to have a great cruise experience has been very liberating. I've read a lot of great threads on the Disboards about others that have tried different lines, but until you do it yourself you don't really know. NCL is awesome. We sailed on one of their oldest, smallest ships and it was amazing. All three of us can't wait for more NCL time.

 

[#NotMyName]

Thanks for the detailed report. I'm considering booking an impromptu cruise to tide me over until our Alaska cruise next year and don't want to spend big bucks. (Also, wondering if I should have booked the Sun for Alaska rather than the Wonder...)

 

[John VN]

Thanks for your review. Sun set for May next year. DW and I have a port cabin and DSIL and husband have a starboard so we have balcony/cabin going up and coming back to view from if weather is rough. We have Dream concierge in a few months and an Oasis Sky right before the Sun so accommodations can't be compared but food, service and the rest sounds great to me!!!

 

[kaseyC]

I'm with you. I've been wanting to try NCL for a long time, but as long as my son was able to go to the teen club, we stuck with Disney. It's funny - he did not enjoy the clubs on Disney at all until he was old enough for Vibe. Then he loved them (about the time I started pushing for NCL). Go figure.

Now that the kid's clubs are no longer a factor, I feel kind of free. I know that's pretty cheesy, but it's how I feel. Travel is a huge part of our life. We take more land based trips, but we really love cruising. Knowing we don't "have" to stick with Disney to have a great cruise experience has been very liberating. I've read a lot of great threads on the Disboards about others that have tried different lines, but until you do it yourself you don't really know. NCL is awesome. We sailed on one of their oldest, smallest ships and it was amazing. All three of us can't wait for more NCL time.

Enjoyed your review. It is a case of "You don't know what you don't know"! It is liberating especially with the variety of itineraries offered by other cruise lines.

We figured we would stick to Disney only with our kids. But in 2010 when NCL completed the building of the Epic. The inaugural transatlantic crossing bringing the ship from Europe to the US was scheduled for late June. 7 nights, no ports from Southampton to NYC. Summer TA crossings are rare unless you are sailing Cunard. My husband and I had sailed other lines but not my girls. Long story, short. My girls had a blast. They were 7, 9 and 14 at the time. Absolutely loved the kid's and teen club. Because of late June sailing date, there was a ton of kids on board which made it even more fun. We sailed in a 2 bedroom Haven suite and the Epic was the first ship with the expanded Haven with the dedicated Haven bar, lounge and restaurant. The girls are now 21,16 and 14 and have sailed Epic 2 more times, the Getaway, the Breakaway, the Star and Jade. Non NCL cruises have been the Carnival Dream, Vista and RCCL Harmony of the Seas. We have upcoming cruises booked on MSC, Celebrity, Disney and Princess. I think I can say that my daughters have become cruisers. They love the whole experience and look forward all of their cruises.

 

[mevelandry]

For those of you who have sailed on any of the other NCL ships (or even the Sun) please feel free to chime in with your own impressions and how they compare to DCL.

Ouhhhh, can we make this thread the official NCL vs DCL comparison thread? This would be so helpful!

 

[Pens Fan]

Thanks for the detailed report. I'm considering booking an impromptu cruise to tide me over until our Alaska cruise next year and don't want to spend big bucks. (Also, wondering if I should have booked the Sun for Alaska rather than the Wonder...)

Well, we certainly loved our Wonder cruise to Alaska as well, so I don't think you can go wrong with either option. Though, having done the one way cruise now, I'd be more inclined to stick with that if time / funds allow rather than a round trip regardless of the cruise line. As much as we loved the cruise, we loved our week on land afterwards equally as well. Alaska is an amazing place and there is just so much to enjoy. A few days in port while on a cruise gives you a nice taste of it, but it's not the same as just booking a hotel and being there.

Whatever you decide, I'm sure you are going to love it! We miss it already.

 

[Pens Fan]

Thanks for your review. Sun set for May next year. DW and I have a port cabin and DSIL and husband have a starboard so we have balcony/cabin going up and coming back to view from if weather is rough. We have Dream concierge in a few months and an Oasis Sky right before the Sun so accommodations can't be compared but food, service and the rest sounds great to me!!!

Have fun! Hope you love the Sun as much as we did. We had such great luck with the weather. We had a little bit of drizzle on Glacier Bay day, but it didn't affect visibility very much. Then it rained one day in Homer during the land portion of our trip. But that was it. Other than that it ranged from overcast (but dry) to bright and sunny, though mostly on the cool side.

 

[ukintheus]

Thank you for putting all of your thoughts down - it was a really good review. We are still on the fence about Alaska and considering an alternate to DCL so it's all really good information.