Cruise Review: NCL Majesty Ship

The Norwegian Cruise Line's claim to freestyle cruising has obvious appeal to the average traveler. Who wouldn't enjoy fine dining in your casual attire while at the same time visiting exotic ports of call. You can "live your day...you're free to do whatever" where you can be off the clock with no schedules, no fixed times for meals and you never have to eat in the same restaurant twice. Isn't that what they tell you?

The only goal of NCL's freestyle cruising idea is a marketing strategy to entice you to try their cruise. As you board the beautiful Majesty ship with expectations of relaxation and being officially "off the clock" as NCL promised you of course realize that certain things will have to be done on the clock such as the life boat drill (you definitely want in on that schedule) and shows and events.

As you board your ship at your leisure be informed that if you board before 1:00 p.m. you must at that time start watching your clock as your cabin will not be available to you until then. Lugging around your carry-on then is only a minor inconvenience and you are still ready for your freestyle cruise.

Once inside your cabin you then receive your onboard schedule along with rules and information. This information is crucial as here you will learn what freestyling really means. You learn that casual attire means one thing for breakfast and lunch and another for dinner. While shorts and flip-flops are acceptable for breakfast and lunch they are not acceptable for dinner. At dinner feel free to wear your miniskirts, jeans and Capri's but no shorts or flip-flops.

Next you will learn that while there are not fixed times for the actual meals the restaurants do have opening and closing hours. If you decide to eat in the main dining room the Sevens Seas is available for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The Four Seasons Dinning Room is only open for dinner.

On a side note, the good news is if you are used to a hearty portion size of everything you will be pleasantly surprised to learn that you may lose some weight on this trip. The servings provided you in the dining room are miniscule as they promote their cooking light, healthy lifestyle menu NCL have designed especially to save them money. The servers are all very friendly and accommodating so feel free to order two of everything. You will order both soup and salad as well as ice cream with dessert to get some semblance of a meal in your stomach. If still hungry you can always venture to one of the small outside buffets where you will be served the same food every single day.

Never eating in the same restaurant more than twice works out great if you eat only nine meals total on a seven day cruise. There are nine various places to eat which include one specialty restaurant that has a cover charge. At this specialty restaurant, Le Bistro you will get a divine meal with the hearty portions that you expected to receive in the dining rooms.

The next part of being off the clock involves participating in your shore excursions that may or may not deliver what they promise. Your shore excursion begins with meeting at a scheduled place and time and waiting and waiting and waiting. Take caution you to be on time to meet your guide or you will be left behind so your instructions say. You may actually freestyle here and take your time to get there as NCL doesn't want to lose any money on their shore excursions. It is not uncommon to wait up to an hour for latecomers to get there to start your excursions. With this wonderful freestyling option you may expect to tie up four hours of your port of call time to parasail six minutes.

Lastly, on the day of your disembarkation when you are to disembark at your leisure you will follow the color coded luggage tag system and will disembark with your group at set time unless you go make other arrangements. You spend the last portion of your freestyle cruise waiting in line to get off the boat. Welcome to NCL freestyle!