flower31

Isn't it sad how quickly 8 days melts away while on a cruise? We had a great cruise recently on the Liberty's inaugural sailing from Galveston. I'm going to take a shot at a review and hopefully include some photos along the way. I hope you all are enlightened in some way and enjoy in another...

 

The Why

I am an impulse cruiser. I frequently scour over Carnival’s cruises for the best deals available for times when we can cruise (wife is a teacher). During late 2015 I came across this particular cruise, an exceptional deal for an 8-day Spring Break cruise! To top it off, it would be the inaugural cruise from Galveston for the Liberty, who just repositioned from her 7-day Southern Caribbean itineraries from San Juan, Puerto Rico. I have long wanted to sail on the Liberty, the first ship to ever have my favorite Guy’s Burger Joint onboard. Additionally, the itinerary for this cruise was the only remaining 7+ day cruise from the Gulf Coast (New Orleans or Galveston) that we had not done, and I have forever wanted to visit Jamaica and Grand Cayman. So in January, feeling the post Holidays blues, we pulled the trigger and booked this sailing.

 

 

 

 

 

Traveling to Galveston

This cruise was somewhat of a bonus for us this year, so we were doing things as cheaply as possible. Airfare between Memphis and Houston was nowhere comparable to the low, low costs of driving, even if it is a 600+ mile, 10 hour drive. So on March 17th we took off down Interstate 40 toward Little Rock, where we took Interstate 30 to Texarkana. The second half of that was a pleasant drive, but Memphis to Little Rock on 40 has to be one of the roughest stretches of road in the country. Horrible. And the big trucks love the fast lane, even if they’re only going 60 MPH. Once we hit I-30, though, the traffic thinned and remained so clear to Texarkana.

 

Once in Texarkana we got on US Highway 59, which runs all the way to Houston. Everything is certainly bigger in Texas, including the speed limit, with much of US 59 holding a 75 MPH speed limit, faster than most interstates I’ve been on! This makes the seemingly long drive between Texarkana and Houston not that bad. There are small towns to go through, so the speed limit does vary, and occasionally you’ll have to slow/stop for a red light after going 80 MPH.

 

We stopped to spend the night at the Hampton Inn in Livingston, Texas, and were extremely pleased with our experience there. We ended up with one check in bag for the ship more than we had anticipated, so I had to go to the front desk to get them to copy my luggage tag for the ship. The front desk attendant was extremely accommodating, and became our first “vacation chat” of the trip. One of the best experiences of travel is meeting and talking to people, at least in my opinion, so I always revel in my travel conversations, becoming far more extroverted than normal. After check out we headed toward Houston, hitting the big city around 9 AM. I had been warned that traffic would be bad, as we were going from US 59, which becomes I-69 near Houston, to I-45 to Galveston. However, we hit no traffic. Hooray!

 

 

 

 

 

Embarkation Day

The drive from Houston to Galveston takes nearly an hour down I-45. The excitement of cruise day for me is simply unprecedented, which may have been the cause of the seemingly quick drive between these two, which seemed much longer on the way home. Before we knew it we were crossing the long bridge into Galveston. We quickly drove by the cruise terminal to have a look at “Lady Liberty” before doing a tour via Nissan of the rest of Galveston Island. We were following a blue book group for our sailing, and several members were already at the terminal and reporting a delay in boarding of at least an hour, confirming an email Carnival had sent us a couple of days prior detailing the same thing. Apparently, since this was the Liberty’s first cruise from her new home port after several months stationed in Puerto Rico, lengthy US Coast Guard inspections were required, which delayed both check in and boarding. After we had seen all we wanted of Galveston, we headed to our parking location, Discount Cruise Parking, also known as the Exxon station. This is a great place to park at Galveston, and so easy! We pulled up to the entrance and the workers took the bags out of our vehicle for us before directing us to our (gated) parking spot out back of the station. After parking, and with almost no bags to carry ourselves, we made our way to the lounge area where we waited for the shuttle to the ship, nearly 4 miles away.

 

Arriving at the terminal we noticed so many people were in line outside of the terminal. Uh oh. We quickly dropped our bags with a porter (as a Johnny Cash tune repeated in my head) and proceeded near to the line to see what was up. We were quickly met by a Carnival representative who asked to see our boarding passes. Galveston is one of the trial ports for Carnival’s new staggered embarkation system which requires you to select a check in/boarding time before cruise day. These are in 30-minute increments from 10:30 to 2:30. We had a check in time of 11:30 – 12:00, and it was just at 11:30 when we approached the line/Carnival representative. He quickly told us that embarkation was delayed an hour and strongly suggested we come back “well after” 12:30. This was being strongly enforced as well. No one was entering the cruise terminal building without at least 4-6 people first looking at their boarding pass. We walked across the street to Starbucks and proceeded to walk the shops around historic Galveston. However, it was hot and we had several carry on bags that got heavy quickly, so we headed back to the terminal before 12:30. After waiting a few extra minutes after 12:30, they finally called for the folks with an 11:30 check in time to enter the terminal.

 

After multiple folks checked our boarding passes and verified our check in time, we were finally in the air-conditioned terminal building! At this point check in went very quickly. We first went through security, similar to airport security, then up the escalators to the second floor where a Carnival representative verified our boarding passes and passports. After assigning us a zone number (zone 8, ugh) and giving us our Sail & Sign cards, it was nearly 1 PM and we went to find a seat in the packed terminal. Maybe three minutes after we sat down boarding (FINALLY) began. Now this was my 5th cruise with Carnival, and this was the first time I was not on the ship before 12 PM. I have never witnessed boarding begin so late. While we had a zone 8 boarding and I assumed that was a bad thing, I was actually pleasantly surprised how quickly they move through the zones! Before I knew it, and before 1:30 PM, they had called our zone. This was my first experience with Galveston, but I really like how they ‘ding’ you on the ship via your Sail & Sign card with multiple booths before you take the embarkation photo (which was totally optional- no thanks!) and before you ever enter the long, long gangway. This meant once we stepped foot on the ship we weren’t in a huge traffic jam while everyone was processed on via two booths. Is there any sound sweeter (other than the ship’s horn) than the first ‘ding’ of the cruise?

 

We were finally onboard the Liberty! Next stop, Guy's Burger Joint!

 

 

Coming up...

 

American Table tales

Did we hate Montego too?

Not going there

Hello!!!

I really enjoyed the cruise, I was there with my family, we were 14 on board!!!

In fact I'm looking for a guy I met the last day! His name is Erik but I didn't ask for his last name, he said that he is from chicago!

Any thought about how to contact him?

Thanks!

Hi!

I just comeback from a Liberty cruise in Caribbean. It was on March 18, 2016.

I'm looking for someone I met there. I just have his first name and the city he is from. Do you have an idea of how I can find him?

Thanks!