Comments from Susan… NCL Hawaii Cruise March/April 2009
We had a ball!!! The flights were great, everything ran very smooth. We would recommend this trip to everyone. The weather was good. Hilo was rainy, but that was to be expected since we where on the "rainy side" of the island and it is the rainy season. The tours were perfect and the beaches were gorgeous. The cruise ship had good stewards and awesome restaurant. (We where really impressed with the Catallic Diner Burger Joint. It had a 50's styles theme. Plus they always had a table waiting for us.) We loved the "freestyle" cruising so you could dress as you wanted.
Maui is still our the favorite island. We had "land only" option here and we almost like the cruising option better. When your doing land tour and renting a car, you are reading maps and wondering if you your going in the right direction. With the ship, they have somebody pick you up or you can grab a cab and do some site seeing. Then every night you go back to your ship and your room.
We think using just the "land only" option is more adventurest, but going by ship is more of a "no hassle vacation". You don’t have to move your bags from one room to the next and then try to find things. Everything is right there. Being on the cruise seemed, to us, to be more relaxing.
The water was rockier compared to cruising in the Caribbean’s, but it's still a lot of fun. I would recommend the patch, it really helps with motion sickness.
