I just returned from the Boston to Nova Scotia cruise on the NCL Breakaway. While the journey is still fresh in my mind, I am going to list some observations, make some suggestions, and perhaps impart some information that might help future cruisers. THESE ARE MY OPINIONS. I know people will disagree with some of my ideas but…THESE ARE MY OPINIONS!
GETTING THERE BY CAR:
Although this may be the easiest way to arrive if you live close by, it is a chaotic mess at the Flynn Cruiseport. [My husband is eligible for handicap assistance, so entry at the Black Falcon Terminal was a little easier for us.] For the general population, to get to the terminal, you must drive up Drydock Avenue, follow it to the right and make a right turn onto Black Falcon Avenue. The road is sort of 3 lanes BUT the entire lane closest to the terminal is lined with bumper-to-bumper taxis. DO NOT get into that line by mistake. The porters who will take your luggage are behind those taxis. If you are carrying on your own bags, you do not need to find a porter. If you do need help with your bags, however, to get them to the porter, you have to find a place to pull over on the right side of the road. There is no “official” place to do this, you just have to find an area where you can pull over and beckon to a porter to come to that side of the street. This is crazy! Once you have gotten your luggage in the hands of a porter, you CANNOT continue on the same street to get to the parking lot on in Lot C on Terminal Street. because it is blocked off. You have to go right at the tent, left on Drydock Avenue and around the curve to Black Falcon Avenue/Terminal Avenue. The entrance to the lot is clearly marked. Parking the car is easy as long as you have your phone with you. After logging in to their site and paying the $187.00, you can pick any spot in the lot. Luckily, there is an attendant to help you if your computer skills are not up to par with their app. There are always plenty of spaces so don’t worry that there are no advance reservations. The lot empties after the previous cruise docks leaving lots of room for the next cruisers. Now that your car is secure, you can walk back to the tent and stand in a snaking line to go through security and get your cabin key. Another option would be the Massport Fargo Lot (93 Fargo Street), the official designated cruise parking that requires booking your space online ahead of time via Parking.com and costs $259.70. Free shuttles take you directly to and from the terminal.
Note: If you have requested a wheelchair for access to the ship, the wheelchair and attendant will meet you AFTER you have entered the tent and checked in. Since cars cannot stop right outside the tent, this means that handicapped people have to walk abut 100 feet from the drop off point, another 100 feet to the check in and then a short distance to the wheelchair corral where they will be met by an attendant. Thus, a handicapped person must be able to walk over 200 feet to get to their reserved wheelchair that they need because they can’t walk. This makes absolutely no sense at all. Luckily, my husband’s neuropathy does not hinder him from walking that distance if he has his rollator with him, but it was a slow, painful process. The ADA needs to take a look at this situation and allow the wheelchair attendants to come out of the tent and meet the cars. BTW, if you do need assistance, be sure to apply for it before you leave so that it will be noted on all your paperwork. Mobility scooters should be reserved ahead of time too.
THE WAIT:
Once you arrive onboard you have to wait until your cabin is ready. Once a deck is completely cleaned and the cabins are ready for you, an announcement is made that cruisers can go to that deck. All decks appear to be complete by about 2:00PM. During the time you are waiting for the cabins, there are plenty of places that you can sit. The Atrium in the center of the ship (Mid) on Deck 6 has many comfortable chairs. Also, on almost all decks there are seats available outside bars (not open), the library, and other spots. IMHO, the best plan is to head to one of the complimentary restaurants. The Garden Café is on the 15th deck and holds an enormous amount of people. You can definitely find a seat there and enjoy the buffet. O’Sheehan’s and The Manhattan Room (Deck 7) are open and I think the Shanghai Noodle bar is too, but I’m not sure. On Deck 6, Savor and Taste are both available for you to order from the menu.
CABINS:
We had a handicap cabin so I cannot compare it to other cabins. To enter a cabin, you place your room key against a panel outside the door and the door opens automatically, at least it did for our room. I highly recommend bringing a lanyard with a card holder to carry your room key since it is your lifeline on the cruise. We bought two of them on Amazon for under $10. You can purchase them onboard at some unreasonable price! Cards can no longer be punched to attach to a lanyard so make sure you have a card holder attached. We found that our cabin was spotless and our Steward was there to welcome us and learn our names. Each room has a small refrigerator stocked with bottles of water, Caution… they will charge you if you drink that water! There is also a safe, a closet, and varying amounts of drawers depending on the cabin. The bathroom has hand soap at the sink and body wash and shampoo/conditioner in the shower. A hairdryer can be found somewhere in the room. Our bed was incredibly comfortable and there was plenty of room under it to store our suitcases. We were surprised that the bed did not have a top sheet. The ship uses a thick cotton blanket as the top sheet and we grew to like that setup. The temperature is regulated by a wall mounted gauge. We like our room cool so we just controlled the coolness by opening the slider on the balcony. Since it does not take long to get from port to port on this cruise, the ships moves very slowly. The result is that you can hardly tell that it is even moving. I can’t imagine anyone getting seasick on this cruise.
INFORMATION:
Bulletins and brochures are left outside the cabins at least once a day. They tell when the restaurants are open, the activities for the next day, and other general information. It is important to note that there is a time change when entering Canada. If you don’t pay attention to the bulletin they leave, you may find yourself an hour ahead or behind the rest of the people on the ship. BTW, if you get confused about which way is Fore and which is Aft on the ship, look down at your feet! The carpets have a fish pattern and all the fish are swimming toward Forward. There are also lists of what is on each deck and a map showing where you are at each elevator.
FOOD:
We found the food to be mediocre in the complimentary restaurants. Some of it was very good and some was very average. On the first few days we decided we were going to be vegetarians for this cruise because the meat was so tough that we couldn’t cut it with a knife. This condition seemed to improve as the days went on, however. There is plenty of food! In the garden café there are salads, entrees, soups, pizza, specialties, deserts, breads, and served ice cream every day along with Indian cuisine. One day the specialty was a whole pig that was cut into pieces by a carver. It freaked me out a bit looking at the little pig’s eyes and tail! Hot dogs and hamburgers are also always available. The menu varies from day to day. There is also a self-serve soft ice cream machine that is always available in the buffet. We found the pastries to be excellent, especially the biscuits, cookies, and I loved the chocolate scones. The problem is that the food is really not hot. Some of it isn’t even lukewarm. The exception is the soup selections. At breakfast the hot cereals and congee are also hot. The buffet has 4 banks of self-serve drinks. Water, iced tea, lemonade, apple juice and orange juice are grouped together with a changing variety of infused water like strawberry kiwi. Then there is the bank with the soft drinks. In order to access those drinks, you have to hold your key card up to a pad and wait for it to authorize you. Then you have19 seconds to fill your glass. Or course, sodas are unlimited on the drink plan so you can get as many as you want by continually placing your keycard on the panel. The third selection is coffee, teas, and milks. The salad bar is a bit minimal, but all the ingredients are cold and fresh. Dressing is in bottles. The fruit is also nice and ripe. There is no restriction for walking around the ship with alcohol or food. You can bring food back to your cabin and tour the ship with a drink in hand. I believe the specialty restaurants deliver your “doggie bag” to your room, but you take you own food from the buffet. I’m not sure about the other complimentary restaurants.
Cagney’s Steakhouse – a specialty restaurant: My colleagues who had beef were unimpressed with the quality. It was good, but it should have been excellent. It was also not cooked medium well as requested. I don’t like steak, so I ordered a wedge salad, shrimp skewers with asparagus and a baked potato and a caramel cheesecake for dessert. It was an excellent meal! Suggestion: Don’t order the apple pie with ice cream dessert. It is a small tart with lots of crust and little filling.
Le Bistro – a specialty restaurant: I had a delicious meal and so did my friends. They had beef, which they thought was better than at Cagney’s. I had escargot, and lobster Thermador, and a dessert resembling a baked Alaska with meringue, vanilla sauce, and raspberry jelly. I had to pay extra for the lobster, but it was well worth it. The best meal of the cruise!
ELEVATORS:
There was never more than a few minutes wait for an elevator. Since my husband has a mobility scooter, we often had to wait for an empty elevator. That was no problem. BTW, out of approximately 4000 passengers, only 1% were under the age of 18. No kids pushing all the buttons in the elevators! I worked with middle school children for my whole career so I enjoy kids. I just don’t like parents who let their young children run all around the dining room or drunk teenagers staggering around.
CREW:
Everyone was smiling, courteous, and friendly. They were extremely attentive in the restaurants and everywhere else. They were always busy cleaning, shining or straightening something. BTW, the passengers were also outstandingly helpful to me and my husband. The moved chairs, changed seats, moved out of elevators, etc. to accommodate my husband’s scooter. We met many new people that we enjoyed talking to.
DEPARTURE:
Your suitcases have to be outside your door by 10PM the night before if you are not going to be handling them yourself. You will have put a colored tag on them that indicates the time you want to depart. I guess they put the luggage out by the colored tags and call people to the luggage room accordingly. When you have a person in a wheelchair, everything is different. We had to drop off the scooter at the Martini Bar (Deck 8) and wait for a wheelchair attendant to arrive. I went to get the car while my husband waited with the attendant in the tent. (It isn’t really a tent, it is a white, peaked building). This time he didn’t have to use his rollator to walk as far as he did when we went onboard. BTW, I paid a porter to take our suitcases to the car.
TIPS:
As mentioned, bring a lanyard
Get to the theaters when they open because they fill up quickly
Allow plenty of time in the specialty restaurants because they don’t rush you out
Bring $5 and $10 bills to tip people who have helped you along the way
No one checks what time you are scheduled to arrive at the terminal so don’t be concerned about it
Make your dining reservations before you get onboard. The ship does hold out a bunch of tables for booking once on ship, but the times may not suit you.
Get your luggage tickets for departure times as soon as they announce that they are available in the Arrium. There are tickets on both sides of the room so check both sides to see what is available. Otherwise, you will get the last departure times, which really isn’t so bad
The buffet is open until 8:30AM on the return date. Have breakfast and don’t rush off the ship. You do have to be off by 10:00AM, however.
We would have liked to have tried the Skyy Vodka Bar, but never got around to it. It is a freezing cold room! You pay $15 and they provide you with a long, thermal poncho with a hood. You get two drinks from a list of just three, and you have to drink them within a 20 minute period.
We did get to the Vodka tasting and it was informative and fun. It had a $25 fee. My feeling is that I am on vacation and I’m not going to save $25 by not going to events that are unique.
If you want to play games, bring your own. The library/game room is tiny and not well stocked. Find another spot on the ship to play. Do go to the library each day and pick up that day’s Sudoku, crossword puzzle, and trivia puzzle, and a pencil
Download the NCL app on your phone so you have the scheduled events and other information with you.
The casino has a smoking and a non-smoking side. Pick the one that suits you.