Input on the Norwegian Gem cruise ship.- NCL?

If you have been on RCCL's larger ships, this will be a step down in terms of the innovation. However, you are in the Medditerranean, not the Caribbean, so the cruise is more about the ports. The ship is very nice, especially if you love various cusines. There is enough to do on sea days, and the pools are heated, so no matter how cold it is you can swim (I swam in Alaska on the Pearl) If you can, you MUST get a penthouse suite, or anything higher. When you check in, you are whisked out of the 'normal passenger' line and into a suite lounge with no wait. For the whole week you get a butler and concierge to help you and the suites are very nice. If you get a courtyard suite, you even get a pool to share with about 10 other rooms that no one else can uuse.

NCL sux. End of story.

i havent been on norwegian gem - but my really good friends went on that ship for spring break and they absolutely loved it (:

I cruised on the Gem a couple years ago when it was first launched. I liked the ship OK but didn't think it was anything special. By that I mean I would not cruise on that ship again just to enjoy features that I liked. We cruised the Western Med on the Gem leaving from Barcelona and with port stops in Spain, Gibraltar, Morocco, Portugal and the Canary Islands. (The cruise line canceled the Casablanca, Morocco stop after we got on ship saying there was some kinda security problem.) We had a balcony cabin and it was good, about the same as on the many RC ships I have been on. The cabin steward did an OK job even though we rarely saw her; we didn't see her the first day of the cruise until we were going to bed. That's rather unusual in our experience where the cabin steward is usually around as soon as you board the ship and get to your cabin. But we had no complains about the cabin or service in it. The ship has some rather unusual features. For example, the lounge where the disco, and bingo during the day, are held had some unusual lounger chairs. But they were rather nice. There was also a snookers board and a table top bowling game there also; both required a fee to play. The ship has gambling tables in unusual places, a video roulette table in the lounge, a gaming table on the pool deck, and slot machines in the bowling alley. The bowling alley is another night spot; it has two alleys. We didn't bowl because it was $5 per game per person; kinda high by my standards. The places for lounging on deck were also kinda unusual. They had contoured lounge chairs on the Promenade deck; nice if you wanted to recline but otherwise not. The food on the ship was OK. I have been on about 7 or 8 NCL cruises but I just do not like their "freestyle" cruising. That's the major difference between NCL and RC or Carnival. With freestyle you don't haev an assigned table and waiter; you just go to dinner whenever you want after about 6:00 PM. That's OK most evening but on some days, usually the "at sea" days, you may end up standing in line waiting for a table in the main dining room. If you don't mind that you'll be OK; but I prefer to have "my table", " my wait staff" and like to get to know them and have them the whole cruise rather than a different table and wait staff each night. The ship also has a lot of alternative restaurants where there is a fee (about $20-25) per person to eat. I don't care for them and think the main dining room food was great and good enough for me. I did have a few issues with service the last time; staff not bringing what I ordered and slow service. The luggage limits are the same as other cruise lines; usually 2 bags per person and that's about what you can fit under the bed. It the airlines rather than the cruises ship which will limit your luggage. After this cruise we pretty much eliminated NCL from any future cruise plans. However, we liked the cruise itinerary even though Casablanca was canceled, especially Gibraltar and the Canary Islands.