Chandler,
See below for the answers that I have:
Dave
Thanks for your response, Dave. It has been years since I devoted much action to video poker until recently, but I remember playing NO Harrah's. These days I consider it something of a sin to waste time in NO gambling. Rather be filling my face with char broiled oysters and crusty bread or seeing a good band.
A few questions about the Jewel... Were you able to draw cash from your ship account which would later be reflected as a regular charge on your credit card?
Yes, each person can draw $1,000 per day (so a couple can draw $2,000 per day) I have an ongoing credit line with NCL and Princess so I usually use both methods to avoid carrying a lot of cash. They waived the normal service charge (I think it is 3.5%, the cost they pay your credit card company) for us. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't so you may want to check ahead of time. When they do it's a great way to pile up points on your credit card.
There's usually not much for me to do on a ship's casino, so I tend to pass time with their tournaments and poker game. I assume they had these? Dealer or electronic table? Rake? It's usually huge.
They have a slot, blackjack and Texas holdem tourney's on Monday and then wind them up on Saturday or have a second set of tournaments then. There are only two sea days for them to run them. They are all dealer tables on the Jewel, although I think there may have been one mechanical roulette table. Not sure of the rake, I'd didn't play any holdem this trip.
Good on board entertainment? Good or bad experiences in ports?
Entertainment is a hit and miss. The first night is a small set from each who will perform on the ship. We liked the ship singers/dancers the best, a magician/comedian wasn't too bad.
In Roatan we went to a private Island rather than going to the popular beach which is a long bus ride back and forth. This island has a beach, a nice pool, and is owned and run by the same company that does the dolphin encounter on the other side of the island. On this private island they made it a park for rescued animals, so you can watch (free) the Sea Lion encounter (or participate for a fee) - they are huge, do a shark and stingray encounter (my wife did it with two others where you scuba out in the pen and they feed them next to you and she loved it), and then they have a lot of rescued animal exhibits where you can see on your own monkeys, parrots, various cats, etc. etc.
In Belize we had a good time riding Segways for our first time. Now my wife wants one for home 
We knew the ship casino manager (Horatiu) and the Exec host Angelo from previous cruises in Europe. They are both very good and friendly as well as Crisina who did a nice job arranging free specialty dinners and other stuff for us. Say hi to them for us!
We ate at almost all of the specialty restaurants and always really like Cagney's (steak), the French and the Japanese Teppinaki restaurants. If you go to the buffet for breakfast a secret is to get you food and then go to the back of the ship, turn right where the elevators are and sit in what is the Italian restaurant at night. It's never crowded and unlike the regular buffet seating they actually have someone coming around with coffee and sweet rolls and you don't have to fight for a seat like in the regular buffet seating area.
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--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, <chandler_re@...> wrote:
Chandler
---In vpfree@yahoogroups.com, <slutoo@> wrote:
One bitter sweet thing was they can now open the casino on the Jewel immediately upon leaving NOL and keep it open all night of the return even though you are not in international waters for 8 hours. They now have a special exemption. The bad side of that is the payouts on the ship are the same as all ships, which is terrible, so you will loose big on the ship if you gamble a lot.
I sure do hope they don't downgrade the remaining good VP and slots in NOL.
Dave
