Yesterday I had a chance to tour and dine on the NCL (Norweigian Cruise Line) new ship the Pearl. (Gem will be her sister ship being built now)
This ship wowed me, and that’s pretty hard to do after you’ve seen almost 40 ships. Innovative decorating and furniture design, and the word fun don’t begin to tell the story. Things to do include; bowling (4 lanes, $5 a game), rock wall climbing, water slide, a basketball, volleyball, tennis court, nice spa with tons of treadmills and other equipment and all the regular things a cruise can have. NCL has a wide variety of dining rooms and just touring around to see how they were all decorated was a blast. The surprise room was the La Cusina Italian Restaurant. It was so original in it’s design for a cruise ship. Reminded me of a lovely little restaurant we ate at in France. Warm, cozy feeling with lots of wood and so much character.
The main theater on the Pearl is wonderful, not a bad seat in the place. Love that. In the main lobby there is a huge screen that you can play Nintendo Weii on during the cruise. They had the video of shore excursions playing when we walked by. Fun furniture in the lobby too. Snail looking foot stools, encouraging to put your feet up. When was the last time you saw that outside a private home.
The lounge where the bowling alleys are is just something you got to see. It has two small private rooms you can host a party in. Sign said something to the effect of buying a bottle of some sort of spirits gets you the privilege of using that area. The main part of the room has large beds to lounge on. You could get very comfortable here. I was also thinking – if your roommate snores there are plenty of great places to sleep around this ship. Bed looking things all over the place. Keeping kids from jumping on them, could be an issue. The bowling lounge is for over 21 after 9PM. That’s good.
The private garden court for the super nice suites $$$ was “over the top” wonderful. It’s on floor 14, tricky to find, but you should try to take a peek. Making friends with someone in a suite would be a good thing on this ship.
First time cruisers that sail on this first are going to think the rest the ships in the industry are a little boring in their designs after experiencing this eyeful. It’s a bright and vibrant ship and looks like a ton of fun.
