My wife and I booked a large balcony on this cruise on and invitation from some friends. We were on deck 9, forward, starboard, cabin 9732, and it was a good location, with the exception of being a bit far from the forward elevator/stair lobby. Overall the ship was in great shape, and cabin was well laid out and in immaculate shape. In keeping with some comments we'd read before hand the balcony was small, though larger than the regular ones, and made worse with too much furniture. Two chairs, a table and two loungers took up all of the space. Since it rained every night and we only really wanted it to have coffee in the morning, we really didn't get much use out of it.

Embarkation was the usual nightmare, as POM is just not setup to handle these larger ships. Check in was prompt and easy, but there was quite a wait to board. Once on the ship there were plenty of lunch options, and we bypassed the buffet in favor of one of the main dining rooms. Lunch was served fairly quick and the food was average.

This was our 14th cruise, an our second on NCL, and we were both impressed by the layout and amount of storage in the cabin, There were spaces we just didn't need, and plenty of room under the bed for suitcases, even after our steward emptied the mini bar and stored the contents under there. Read more