Norwegian Encore is an amazing ship. It is the largest ship we have cruised on and probably not the best ship for starting Mom and Dad off on their first cruise. We did a lot of walking during our time on this beautiful ship.
We attended two different ship presentations to learn more about these large floating vessels. One was all about the housekeeping/hotel side of running a cruise ship and the other was all about the engineering/captain side. Both were fascinating as you never really know what goes into the day-in/day-out details of providing the best customer experience for fellow vacationers.
Encore was built with the Alaska destination in mind as the highlight of the ship is the Observation Lounge located on dec 15. We starting out day of cursing Glacier Bay in this area and gravitated one level up to deck 16 in the Garden Cafe buffet as we found the views were just as amazing and less obstructed than where I had selected on the deck below. We were pretty sure people slept on deck 15 the night before so they could “camp out” and ensure they had the best views the following morning. While we each had a balcony we could have sat on, we enjoyed the views from the warmth inside the ship.
In the evening, the Observation Lounge had live music by this really great pianist name Alexia, which we enjoyed a few times during our cruise. There is also a really great bar and during the daytime, you can get light snacks, water, coffee, and tea.
Alcohol was really expensive and this cruise was the test on if I needed a drink package. It really depends on how much you think you will drink but I now know the biggest benefit of having a drink package is that you don’t have to worry about how much a drink costs. The cruise would have been more enjoyable if we weren’t so worried about the cost. Of course, if we had the drink package, we would have drank a lot more! When you book your cruise, one of the “free at sea” offers is an included drink package where you pay just the taxes on the alcohol package, an average of $138 per person for a seven day cruise, and each person in the room has to have the drink package. This is also good for soda, which is what Kenyon drinks. I really missed having soda during our cruise and would have also enjoyed more had we gone for the drink package. So, in the future, I think that will be my decision. We enjoyed visiting the Sugarcane Mojito Bar and the District Brew House.
Had we gone for the drink package, I would have liked to have visited the other bars around the ship, although most drinks were the same menu throughout. One thing we really loved was the smoked margarita, which is only available at Q’s Smokehouse Restaurant. It was delicious.
Let's not forget to talk about the Starbucks on board. I visited everyday and there was never a line for my coffee.
As for the food, the main dining room was really good and we ate there most nights. The buffet food often was lukewarm at best. That was a bummer. The pizza was amazing and the hand scooped coconut ice cream was delicious. We enjoyed many desserts during our week-long cruise. We had two nights speciality dining as part of our “free at sea” promotions. We picked Cagney’s Steakhouse and OMG the filet mignon was the best I have ever tasted. I am 100% going back on future cruises as it is the signature steakhouse on the NCL ships. We also went to Q’s Smokehouse and enjoyed every bite.
I didn’t take in much entertainment as everything just felt so late. Once I started vacation, we rotated back to dayshift hours and staying up past 9:30pm was tough. I remember this same feeling in our prior Alaska cruise. Plus, I wasn’t sleeping well. We had some really tough seas at the start and end of our cruise. I found out as soon as I boarded Encore that seeing the Broadway show Kinky Boots would not be in my near future. They had “technical difficulties” which I think was code for COVID. I had pre-booked Mom and I for two back-to-back nights to see Choir of Man near the end of our cruise. Thankfully we were able to at least see them on the last night as they also had some “technical difficulties.” Since it was my only opportunity to see them, I went to both shows in the same night! It was amazing! We also took in a show called Company of Men: From Motown to Boyband and the Beatles Through The Years. Both were good.
For this reason, I really want to sail Encore again as there is just no other way to see Kinky Boots right now since it stopped touring. If our Australia/New Zealand cruise gets cancelled, there is a perfect opportunity to get on Encore in Miami for one of the Caribbean sailings. So I think we will consider that but need to see how things shake out. Somewhere in my future I will get on Encore again! We also missed our opportunity to ride the race cars since the weather was nicer at the start of the cruise and I never made it up to deck 18 to check it out. Again, maybe on a future cruise.
That is the recap for NCL Encore.
I’ll be back to talk more about our cruise, including COVID testing at embarkation day and the ports of call.
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