The 4,028-passenger vessel, which was christened in New York, is no doubt one of the most spectacular mega-resorts at sea, full of restaurants, lively nightspots and deck-top fun.
Five highlights of the ship:
1. The Aqua Park. This sprawling water play area is one of the largest at sea. High above the ship's main pool deck, Aqua Park offers five major water slides that rival any found at a land-based resort, including double "free fall" slides that drop passengers nearly straight down several floors before spinning them in a loop. There also are two pools, four hot tubs and a SpongeBob-themed water play area with squirting water designed for little ones.
2. The deck-top sports complex. Norwegian has put another huge chunk of the ship's exterior space to a three-story sports complex with plenty of fun things. Some of the attractions is a suspended in the air ropes course that has 40 different elements including The Plank, a platform that extends 8 feet over the vessel's edge. The sports complex also offers a miniature golf course, basketball court, rock climbing wall, bungee trampoline and a 24-foot enclosed climbing cage called the Spider Web.
3. The Waterfront. Norwegian is concentraiting on more open sea ideas with its boardwalk-like area where cruisers can dine overlooking the water. Located on both sides of Deck 8, The Waterfront features outdoor extensions of half a dozen Breakaway restaurants including the line's signature Cagney's Steakhouse, Italian eatery La Cucina and Moderno Churrascaria. It also has an outdoor extension of the ship's Shaker's Cocktail Bar, and Malting's Beer & Whiskey Bar, and it also has Norwegian's first gelato outlet. A more casual outdoor Zakarian outlet is also located on The Waterfront.
4. Ocean Blue. Created by celebrity chef Geoffrey Zakarian, this seafood restaurant is delicious as it is also stylish, serving up many of the same dishes found at the Food Network star's Lamb's Club in New York. Zakarian also is overseeing an adjacent raw bar that serves up oysters on the half shell, clams and other shellfish.
5. The Broadway shows. Breakaway's 800-seat Breakaway Theater features a shorter version of the hit musical Rock of Ages, which is one of the longest running shows on Broadway, and the ship's circus-like Spiegel Tent has a really exciting and fun dinner show that is an adaptation of Broadway's Cirque Dreams Jungle Fantasy. The third big show, Burn the Floor, is a high energy display of ballroom dancing.
