Norwegian Breakaway Review
If you're looking for an adult vacation, Norwegian isn't for you.
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“Hey, let’s take our next vacation in a high school hallway.” “Sounds good, but can there also be small children running around and wandering about with no supervision whatsoever? I’d hate to have one moment of peace or be able to relax in a hot tub that I’ve paid for.” “Absolutely!” said no person EVER.
All kidding aside, prior to our trip, I had read every review I could and I have to admit that I thought the negative ones were a bit over the top and posted by the type of complainers who just are never satisfied. To these reviewers, I sincerely apologize. To give you a little background about us, my friend and I are both in our 30s. This was my eighth cruise and fourth with Norwegian. The two that I took prior to this were with Royal Carribean. We were very excited about leaving from New York as it is a 20 minute drive for us to the pier and we couldn’t wait to see all of the things that the Breakaway had to offer.
We were dropped off at the pier at 9:30. It was extremely busy because passengers were arriving and departing at the same time. We knew that we would have to wait around for a while at the terminal, but wanted to be able to get a low boarding number so we could be one of the first groups to be called. Having read the message boards for our sailing, we knew that the ship was just about full and that there would be a large number of children due to the Massachusetts and Rhode Island school breaks. Most of NJ and NY had already had their spring break which was why we booked this week. We hadn’t anticipated other states school breaks.
Cabin Review
Family Oceanview Stateroom with Large Picture Window
The family oceanview cabins offer a little more space than the regular oceanview. There is a large window, not a porthole. The window ledge is quite large and is good for extra storage. The cabin itself is very narrow. From the edge of the bed to the wall, there is only about a foot of space. This must make things very difficult for the poor stewards to get around. The bathrooms in the family oceanviews are very large for a cruise ship. They actually have bathtubs. Kind of strange that a bathroom this size has no outlets though. We did have trouble with getting our toilet to flush. We called maintenance and we were told that we weren't pushing the button is the right place. The button is not that big and we were able to successfully operate every other flush button that we came in contact with throughout the ship. The one in our cabin had to be pushed 10-20 times for it to flush. We just learned to deal with it. There are only 2 outlets in the whole cabin and they are both on the desk. On the second day, I plugged my hairdryer in and shorted out both outlets and the tv. There is no sign or any indication that you can't plug in a hairdryer. Maintenance came and told me not to use my hairdryer and that there was a travel dryer under the desk. Never had this problem before on any other ship. Weird. The family oceanviews have 2 closets, which was very nice. We had plenty of room to hang things up. I brought a few extra hangers because I knew we had 2 closets. Other than the closets though, there really isn't any other storage. The closets have a few shelves in them, but there are no drawers in the entire room. There is a couch by the window and a tiny storage cube as a seat by the desk. The tv is a pretty good size flat screen, but aside from the 10 channels that are just Norwegian trying to sell you things, there are only about 4 other channels and 2 of those are news. There is a slot to put your key card in when you walk into the cabin and the lights do not work unless a card is in the slot. This gets annoying really fast. Thanks to prior reviews though, we knew that you could just put any card in there (thanks CVS) and have access to your light switch without having to fumble for your key card in the dark. Beds were very comfortable. Cabin steward provided excellent service and we had towel animals 6 of the 7 nights.
Port Reviews
Great Stirrup Cay
We finally got to see Great Stirrup Cay! On my last 2 Norwegian cruises, we had to skip it because of high waves. It was nice to see that it actually exists. Water was still very chilly in April, which was surprising, but its been a weird weather year. The beaches were really pretty though and if you don't mind walking a bit, there are some quiet beaches a little further away from where the tenders let you off.