“Transatlantic Exceeded Expectations ”
4 stars
Cruise Date: 10/31/2022
Destination: Transatlantic/Repositioning
This was a fabulous cruise. We observed an exceptionally well run crew. They went out of their way to meet our needs. Embarkation/ disembarkation was well organized and went very smoothly. No waiting. Food was great and all our dining experiences were wonderful.
We did our research ahead of time so there were no surprises. We are not heavy drinkers so buying the drink package was not worth it for us. We were offered free at sea but then we would still have to pay almost $700 gratuities so that’s misleading. My niece is Europe went on NCL escape in the fall and their drink package was truly free. They did not pay gratuities on their drink package. I don’t think it is good PR to advertise “Free” drink package and then charge gratuities. We enjoy a glass of wine with dinner. Perhaps offering a wine package would give give us a better option. We did purchase wine at some of the ports knowing we would probably have to pay corkage fee according to NCL policy. With that in mind the wine was still cheaper than purchasing on the ship. We brought 2 bottles and told them we only plan to drink it in our room. Nobody else would be touching it. (Oceania allows this ) we paid the $30 and enjoyed it in our room for a few days. Another passenger told us they had brought wine on board and were not charged. They told the attendant that they will only be drinking it in their room. So we tried it again a few days later and got charged.
We didn’t see the charge come up on our statement until the last day. It showed up as an expense purchased at one of the restaurants. It did not state what it was for, just that we spent $30 at the restaurant. We went to customer service and they told us it’s a corkage fee.
That felt dishonest. We didn’t think they should have assigned the fee to a restaurant as a purchase when it wasn’t. That felt dishonest.
We suggest that NCL be up front and put “corkage” fee on the statement. It was not a purchase we made in the restaurants. I could understand if we had taken it to the dining room to drink. But we didn’t. In fact we did purchase a bottle of wine at dinner that night so we paid gratuities. They added another $30 corkage fee to restaurant bill for 2 bottles of wine that we consumed in our room.
So those small details dropped our rating to 4 stars. Our cruise was great value for the money we paid. However I guess NCL makes up for it with all the extras they charge. Nothing is truly “free”
We prefer smaller ships but being as this cruise was just over half full it didn’t feel crowded unless you wanted to sit in Atrium for activities and speakers there. We could never find a seat and it was very noisy. We had a great vacations, the details are small things. We were thankful to be able to travel and stay healthy. We felt safe and impressed by their strict cleaning policy. There is always a few passengers that ignore the rules
Reviewed almost 4 years ago by Patricia
