Well since my last post, Norwegian Epic has carried her first passengers and the first reviews are starting to come in. Some of them are good, and some have been relatively bad, others, somewhere in the middle.
Above picture "NCL (Norwegian Cruise Lines) Norwegian Epic making her debut in Southampton on 22 June, 2010" By flickr member ' Calshot observer'
For these first few “preview cruises”, it should be noted that NCL has invited a lot of journalists, cruise review writers from websites like Cruise Critic or USA today, and many travel agents, to come on these cruises for free. While this is all well and good, it does have one negative effect…it can occasionally cause biased reporting. So be careful when reading some of these reviews, some will not fairly represent the ship. In my opinion the best kinds of reviews are those written by paying passengers on regular cruises.
On top of that, these cruises have only been sailing half-full (the first only carried about 2500 passengers). This changes how the ship feels to those onboard.
Well, as excited as I am, still, about this ship I do have to say I have lost a little confidence in her design.
Even in these early reviews, and even sailing with half capacity, there have already been lots of reports about bottlenecks and over crowding in some areas. Like I said in my previous blog, I figured this would be a problem for her, but I didn’t think it would be a problem for her with over a thousand less passengers than she can accommodate.
But before anyone writes off a cruise on Epic, let me also point out several other things to consider. As of right now Epic is not complete, (the ship yard was not able to finish everything before the deadline) therefore, some of the public areas that will help absorb the missing 1,000 (+) passengers are not yet open. The Villa complex (the large structure above the bridge), which houses many of Epic’s suites and their amenities, is not complete. When it is done and open to passengers it should help absorb some of the crowds. Also to be noted, Epic has been sailing in pretty cold weather which means that the out door deck spaces are not being utilized like they would normally. When the ship is finally sailing in the warm Caribbean, this shouldn’t be such a problem. (Above picture "Norwegian Epic, Rotterdam" by flickr member 'stefanverhoeve')Also worth noting, the people onboard right now are only onboard for a 1 night cruise. These people are probably trying to get the most out of this time by spending their time walking around, exploring and experiencing all of the ship that they can, and thereby causing some crowding. When the ship is in regular service things will probably be more relaxed.
I wish that was it, but unfortunately for Epic, crowding hasn’t been her only problem...
Her first cruise out of Rotterdam arrived back several hours late which delayed the next cruise. This was apparently caused by some problem with her propeller shaft (for you non ship-geeks this is the long tube that connects the engines to the propellers). On top of delaying the next cruise, this problem means that Epic can only cruise at half speed. To fix this problem NCL is keeping Epic at Southampton while repairs are made. The short cruise that was supposed to sail yesterday will now be pier-side instead. Now the question is…will Epic be able to carry out her transatlantic crossing on time? NCL says yes, but others aren’t so sure. Maybe she will, but for now we just have to wait and see.
Yesterday, I was talking to a friend from England who had just debarked from Epic’s delayed June 21st cruise from Rotterdam to Southampton. According to her, NCL has a lot to work on. Apart from the crowds, which she also mentioned, there seemed to be a lot of misunderstandings among the crew regarding the delay and what time they would arrive in Southampton. There were some technical failures, including 2 dead elevators, and some other organizational problems around the ship.
A lot of these kinds of problems are only to be expected with a new ship. The crew is still learning their way around, and new systems are still being broken in. Almost all new ships experience problems like these upon start up.
One other problem that many people are mentioning, is that of the bathrooms. Epic’s cabins are a completely new design for both NCL and the entire industry. Epic’s cabins have something called, wave design…this is where one wall is curved in an ‘S’ shape. The point of this design is to allow the cabin to be marginally narrower while still allowing for a 6ft plus bed, (by putting it where the ‘S’ curves out) and all other regular cabin amenities. When making a cabin narrower, however, you run into another problem…the bathroom. On the Epic, NCL overcame this problem by getting rid of the bathroom altogether, and instead have 2 stalls, one for the shower and one for the toilet, flanking the door to your cabin (the sink is located out in the open). While you may be reading this and thinking that’s bad, it only gets worse. The 2 stalls are enclosed, not by a solid wall, but by a wall of frosted glass, allowing any onlooker to see a vague shadow of what you are doing. So don’t do anything too private in the bathrooms!
In my opinion, this was NCL’s biggest mistake with Epic (even though I think the wave concept is cool). If they had at least made the walls of the stalls (hey that rhymed!!) solid and more private, then I might be more willing to forgive this flaw. While I can understand the economics of this decision, (making cabin narrower allows you to fit more cabins in the same space and therefore squeeze more money out of that space) I don’t think that justifies this design (not to mention the narrower cabin is a little more cramped then regular cruise ship cabins). Maybe if it was just you and your spouse in the cabin, then it wouldn’t be a problem, but what if you are a family travelling with older kids who need their privacy? In that case, these cabins don’t offer a very good option.
There is one small shred of hope though…there is a curtain that you can draw to separate the bathroom area of the cabin from the rest, giving you a little more privacy.
Apart from those problems there have been reports of several other minor difficulties. I would list them here for you, but at the moment I am feeling too lazy to do so. They were small, and will probably be fixed pretty fast by NCL.
Anyways, now that I have pretty thoroughly trashed Epic, and probably destroyed her in your minds, lets talk about the good things about Epic…there are many.
First of all, don’t let the ship’s…..hmm….lets say “interesting”….exterior fool you, on the inside Epic is really pretty nice. While some rooms are a little odd, most are of a clean looking, modern design…very NCL but slightly toned down I would say, compared to others in NCL’s fleet - on other ships in NCL’s fleet, there are a lot of very bright colors…which I don’t mind, but others do. I’m not sure which room is my favorite, but I guess if I had to pick I would choose maybe the Manhattan Room. Then again there are a lot of little spaces that you wouldn’t even think about, that have great design to them. I even love the interior design of the cabins, dispite the bathroom...or lack there of.
(Picture, at right "Deck 7" by flickr member 'Le Havre Ships')
Secondly, there’s her food. I mentioned in my earlier article on Epic, just how many food options this ship has, and it seems that almost every venue is open for business (I know at least one isn’t). On top of that, the reviews all seem to be rating the food pretty high, which y
ou don’t always see on a new ship. I know that NCL has had problems with food quality in the past so it’s good to see that this problem so far seems to be corrected on Epic.
Also something that seems to be getting good reviews, even though I admit, I personally have not seen too much mention of it, is Epic’s entertainment options. As I mentioned in my last post, Epic has several brand name entertainment options like, The Blue Man Group (which I hear is amazing), The Second City improv group (which I haven’t heard anything about so far), Cirque Dreams & Dinner Show by Cirque Productions, (which again I hear is awesome) and Howl at the Moon (which also, I hear is really good).
Besides the brand name entertainment, Epic’s other entertainment venues like, “Fat Cats Jazz Bar,” for example, have been getting very good reviews.
Overall, I think that Epic is still a very exciting ship and definitely worth sailing on. She has her problems and quirks yes, but I think the good stuff, so far, out weighs the bad. I think this will also be the opinion of the cruising pubic, as well. There is a ton of buzz over the internet about Epic, and if that’s anything to go by then NCL definitely has a winner on their hands.
(Above image "2010-06-19 Norwegian Epic- 130" by flickr member ' Topaas')
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