All in all, Matt and I had a pretty incredible trip to the Bahamas aboard the Norwegian Sky last week. We booked the trip because of a great promotion Norwegian was running that allowed us to get the unlimited drink package for free. Normally, it’s $500 a person for a 5-day cruise. We had both cruised twice before, but had never taken one with Norwegian. Below, I break down the entire trip from start to finish with things I loved and things I wished were a little better.
Getting to the ship:
When we originally booked our cruise, Norwegian was also running another promotion that let us add round trip airfare for $99 each. We aren’t super picky about flight times or airlines so we thought this was a pretty good deal. About 45 days before our cruise, Norwegian sent us our flight info. We flew on Delta from STL to Miami and had a connecting flight in Atlanta. Our flight left STL at 6am (a little early, but not unbearable). The nice thing about leaving early is that you usually get to your destination early too. It worked out really well because we landed in Miami before noon. We had arranged beforehand to use the cruise line’s airport shuttle. I think it was around $20 a person. When booking our cruise, we also opted for Norwegian’s new program called “Priority Access”. It was $70 for both of us and gave us a few perks throughout our trip. One of these perks was being able to skip the line when we got to the port and get on the boat faster. The trouble with new programs, is that often they’re hard to implement. We ran into this problem several times on our cruise where crew members didn’t even know how we were supposed to use some of our perks from the program. When checking in, we had to ask several Norwegian employees where the Priority Access express check in line was before anyone even knew what we were talking about.
Features of the ship:
Although the Norwegian Sky just got a complete remodel earlier this year, it’s still one of the smallest and oldest ships in operation. Many of the newer ships are built much larger and feature impressive water slides, go kart tracks, or even roller coasters on board. This ship however, is relatively simple. Up top, it has a decent size pool area with 4 hot tubs and plenty of beach chairs surrounding it. Down below, the ship has a jogging track, casino, theater, library, spa, and an open area with a stage and plush seating that they referred to as Bliss night club. These features were a little lacking (but that’s to be expected with a ship of this size).
The pool was always crowded given that it’s the only area on board to cool off. We did like how many beach chairs were spread around the ship and we never had a problem finding a spot in the sun to lay out. The casino was much smaller than ones on other ships I’ve stayed on and we didn’t spend any time in there this trip. The theater had a good size stage and great sound and lighting. The seats were comfy and held much more people than you’d expect. During the cruise, there were two productions from the performers, two performances by the comedian, and a show put on by a magician. This room is also where Deal or No Deal games were played and some Bingo games too. There wasn’t a bar in the theater, but there was a wait staff walking around taking people’s drink orders.
We didn’t spend any time in the library, but there seemed to be a decent amount of books to check out in here. We were actually really excited to check out the Spa because when we signed up for the Priority Access Program, we were told that we would each get a $50 spa credit and that there were no restrictions. We knew most of the facials and massages in the spa start at $100+, but I was hoping I’d be able to use the credit on a simple pedicure which usually ranges from $50-$60. Once on board, we were told that the credit could only be used on a few items in the spa (the cheapest being $100+). This was pretty disappointing that no one from Norwegian mentioned that there were such severe restrictions on this “credit”.
Bliss nightclub had live music most nights and game show activities during the day. The design was a little flawed given that the night club was in the middle of the ship and everyone else had to pass through here if they wanted to get to other areas of the ship. The only thing we really did in here was play Bingo. (The first night of Bingo, they drew names for a Bingo King and Bingo Queen. Matt won Bingo King, so we got to play Bingo for free the rest of the cruise.) In light of these ship features, we did feel a little bored at times throughout the cruise and wished that there had been more activities to choose from.
Food:
Sadly, the food on the ship was the most disappointing part for me. When I’ve cruised in the past, I’ve been overwhelmed with so many delicious food options that I would go to bed stuffed every night. This ship had one small buffet that had the same exact food every day. We only ate here twice because the options were so bland. Pizza was available in the Italian restaurant for three hours in the middle of the day, but was never out at the buffet or available during dinner time. We had lunch in the dining room when we first got on the ship, but weren’t intrigued by their lunch menu any other day. Dinner in the dining rooms were pretty hit or miss. I was also disappointed in their lack of dessert options available. You’d think having a staple chocolate cake or cookies would be a no-brainer, but most of the desserts available in the dining room and buffet didn’t seem very appetizing. There was one complimentary dining option called the Local Bar that was a sports bar open later in the evening. We went here a few times after being disappointed in that night’s dining room menu. The Local Bar had options like wings, grilled cheeses, and spinach and artichoke dip and was pretty good.
Below are some of the menu options for lunch and dinner from the dining room:
Here are some of the meals we had from the dining room:
The Local Bar Menu:
Drinks:
What the cruise lacked in food, it made up for in drinks! Because Norwegian was running their “Free at Sea” promotion that allowed guests to add the unlimited drink package for free at the time of booking, the majority of the guests on this vacation had done so. Originally, this made me a little nervous that there would be a ton of long lines at the bars and it’d be difficult to get a drink. Thankfully, this was not the case at all. We were very impressed with how many bars there were on board. The busiest bar was Topsiders, the one right by the pool. But even here, we hardly had to wait more than 5 minutes for a drink. Another benefit of the unlimited drink package is that you can each order two drinks at a time. So, Matthew was able to grab two beers and go hang out on a lounge chair for a while before he had to go back and get another one. We also liked that there were a lot of servers walking around the pool deck taking drink orders and delivering them to us in our chairs. I prefer fruity rum cocktails and was really impressed with the options. The Bahama Mama was definitely my favorite of the week.
Another bar we liked to hang out in was the Spinnaker Observation Lounge at the front of the ship. The room was surrounded by windows and had a ton of couches and comfy seating. The bar was only open in the evening though. So if you wanted to hang out in there during the day, you had to grab a drink somewhere else. The other bars on the ship that we didn’t spend a ton of time at were the Atrium Bar (located along the walkway above the Atrium), Champs Bar (located above the pool, also a designated smoking section on the ship), and the Mojito Bar (which was never very busy at all). There’s also a bar on the side of Bliss Night Club that we grabbed drinks at a few times while playing Bingo. The Norwegian Sky also had a full Starbucks on board, but we hardly saw anyone there.
Staff:
One aspect of cruising that I absolutely love is the staff. Most cruises have employees that go above and beyond for the guests. On past cruises, my room steward would make a point to personally introduce themselves to us and learn our names so they can greet us around when they saw us around the ship. On this cruise, we never even saw our room steward. When I’ve sailed on other cruise lines, we would have the same table and server every night at dinner and would be able to also get to know them as well. Because of Norwegian’s “freestyle dining” philosophy, this isn’t really possible. Throughout this cruise, I felt really disconnected from the staff which took away from my overall cruising experience.
Stateroom:
We absolutely loved our stateroom on this cruise. Originally, we booked an ocean view room. But because prices dropped close to our sail date, we were able to upgrade to a balcony room for free. Norwegian did a really amazing job upgrading their staterooms in the recent remodel. We thought all the furniture and decor were really nice and the room was plenty big. The balcony ended up being a lot bigger than we expected as well and had room for two chairs and a table. Like with most cruise staterooms, ours only had one outlet so make sure you bring a surge protector with you if you think you’ll need more. We each also had night lights attached to the wall above the bed that had USB plugs so we could charge our phones easily at night.
