DCL compared to Celebrity and Princess

[Jules1]

We love the personal choice dining on Princess. We never had to wait - you just have to look at the entertainment that you'll be participating in during the day, decide when you want to go to dinner and make a reservation for that time. We usually ate 6:45 -7:00 pm and never had to wait for a table. That gave us time to get ready for dinner after the afternoon activities and still make the show. In fact, we made standing reservations for the same time, same table each evening, and therefore had the same waitstaff. Best of both worlds.

 

[awatt]

I did not think I would like Freestyle dining,thought the service would not measure up.

I was wrong,very wrong. We opted to dine in the same restaurant nightly because we were so taken with it and our servers on the first night. We never had to wait on line. The maitre'd always had the table ready for us at 6:30. And our servers took such good care of us- it really made the cruise so memorable, For instance,we were eating a few things from the chocolate buffet. We did not see our waiter,but he spotted us and came over with a plate of cheries for my little girls,as he remembered they liked extra cherries. All week,they went above and beyond.

The girls still talk about Prince and Nadia.Last month we were at our place in Miami. We saw the Dawn sailing out to see. DD saw it and said "There's Prince and Nadia's boat!"

Freestlye debartkation was the best I've seen so far. No more cattle calls.

So keep an open mind about Freestyle. Don't knock it till you tried it. You might be very pleasantly surprised like me!

 

[awatt]

Also, guests still fill out comment cards on cabin attendants and waitstaff on the NCL DAwn. This somehow is incentivized for the staff,with those recieving good evals rewarded with more time off,promotions etc. We found because of this the staff was not indifferent at all.

Finally,you don't have to do the auto-tipping if you don't want to.