sunshower9

11 minutes ago, pirate4me2 said:

Hey, I (well, me and my girls) are in the Havana too! I'll be the one drinking Cuban iced teas made with Diet Pepsi (so I feel less guilty). 

Oh awesome!  I'm sure we'll see each other, even though we may not know who the other is. 😂  I might try that Cuban iced tea.  Or maybe I should just stay in my lane with the Daiquiri Clasico lol.

1 hour ago, pirate4me2 said:

Yay, maybe we will run into each other! I'll post a pic of myself so maybe you will recognize me 🙂

 

I also have the Cheers package (whoop whoop!) so if I'm not in the Havana area, you'll likely catch me at a bar too. 😂  I can't wait for this trip!

A live review for a cruise I'll actually be on!  It's going to be a great trip!  Maybe I'll see you around the ship (although I have no idea what you look like lol).

Thanks for sharing!  I'll be embarking on my 3rd Vista cruise next Saturday.  Glad to hear disembarkation has improved because it was awful when we did self assist in December.

15 hours ago, pirate4me2 said:

I will be sailing on her in 29 days and doing a Live review, if nobody else posts feedback before then. 🙂

I'll be there too! 🙂 

The new deck plan is out.  They moved Club O2, the arcade, Cherry on Top, and Dreams Studio, renamed Skybox Sports Bar to Heroes Tribute Bar, and added the nonsmoking casino.  That's all that I noticed.

https://www.carnival.com/~/media/Images/Ships/VS/DeckPlans/carnival-vista-deck-plan-pdf

18 minutes ago, mz-s said:

Somebody dreamed up the IMAX was going, and then other people parroted it as fact. Just as I knew. Looking at the deck plans it is easy to see that a smoke-free casino annex would not fit in where the IMAX theater is right now.

I think whoever started that rumor that confused the Thrill Theater with IMAX.  I had heard a while back that the Thrill Theater was being removed.  It's also no longer listed as being available on Vista on the Carnival website.

I've stayed at Residence Inn, Homewood Suites, and Springhill Suites with their park and cruise packages.  I'd recommend all of them.  They also have shuttles to the port but I've never used them, just the parking.

Just as a note, there hasn't been any official confirmation of what's going to take place during dry dock.  People are only stating what they've heard, and who knows how credible the sources of this information are.  I've heard a couple of different things myself, but John Heald has said that he will post on his page once he has official word of what's actually going to be done.

1 hour ago, tw67 said:

I don’t think I could go on any Vista Class ship and not stay in the Havana area. Like you I love the round beds for shade. I am really looking forward to Vista, but it isn’t until this fall.

If you love Horizon, you'll enjoy Vista.  If I had to choose, it would be Horizon only because of the deck 9 balconies.  But I have more cruises scheduled on Vista simply because I prefer sailing from Port Canaveral instead of Miami.

12 minutes ago, tw67 said:

Please tell me more about the differences. I loved Horizon so much, so I hope Vista lives up to my love for Horizon!

They're not that different, really.  Main differences are the addition of the hibachi restaurant and the extra Havana cabins on Horizon.  Otherwise the layout is almost exactly the same.  I was first on Vista in 2017 and absolutely loved it.  My second time was a few weeks ago.  It wasn't the same because Vista is having a lot of maintenance issues right now, but it will be going into dry dock after the current sailing ends so I expect that my next time on it in April will be much better.

You can't go wrong in the Havana area on either ship.  Even though it seemed like there were more people in Havana on Horizon, it still wasn't crowded.  It was just harder to find an open round bed in the shade (I prefer shade to sun).  And on that note, I was in a deck 9 Havana balcony on Horizon and having entire balcony covered was great.  

23 hours ago, cruisewiththekids said:

I noticed on Horizon the Havana aft extended balconies are on decks 6, 7, 8 and 9, but on the Vista they are only on decks 6 and 7.     Has that always been the case?    I've  been on the Horizon in one of those cabins on deck 8 and went to book the Vista and found they were not Havana cabins.

Yes, that has always been the case.  I've been on Horizon once and Vista twice, and I did feel like the Havana area on Vista had less people than on Horizon.  

15 hours ago, audcc77 said:

Wow!   Thanks for the posts.  I’m on Vista twice next year.   I’ve never been so I was really looking forward to it.   
 

Looks like I’m going to need to lower my expectations.   😳

Vista goes into dry dock in about 2 weeks so all of the maintenance problems will be fixed by then.  I still had a good time despite any issues.  I'm also going on Vista again twice next year and looking forward to it.

I was on this cruise as well.  I'm not platinum yet so I purchased FTTF.  I agree that embarkation was super easy, but debarkation was awful (we carried off our luggage).  There were a LOT of platinum guests on our sailing so apparently that made the priority line go slower than usual. 

Drinks were good and strong.  Found some great bartenders who kept me happy lol.  I thought the food in the MDR was okay for the most part, though some items were downright terrible (worst calamari I've ever had).  People are talking about the lido cakes in another thread.  Sadly, I found them to be awful on this sailing, including the famed Funfetti cheesecake that I finally got the chance to try.  After a couple of days I stopped going by to see what they were offering because I knew they wouldn't be good.  The steakhouse and Jiji were delicious.  I never made it to Cucina because I got sick on the last day and spent the whole day in bed so I had to cancel our reservations.  

I didn't watch any of the playlist shows, which is a first for me.  I heard they weren't very good because the cast was new and there were injuries/illnesses that kept them from performing like they normally would.  I did see the Marcus Anthony show, which I thought was really great.  Afterwards we did the Motown party and Quest.  The line for Quest was crazy long but we didn't have issues getting in and finding good seats, even though we were really far back in the line.  I'm sorry you had a rough time with that.  There were definitely some rude and entitled people on this ship.

Sad to say that the Vista is not in good shape.  We were on deck 6 in a Havana room.  Our room was fine but the floors on that deck were sagging, there was a sewage smell almost constantly, and there were drips from the ceiling on deck 5 in the Havana bar area.  IIRC, deck 6 flooded not too long ago, so all of those issues make sense.  I'm so glad she's going into dry dock soon because she needs it.  I'll be on Vista again in April so I'm looking forward to her being in much better shape.

I'm on the Vista right now with Lawrence as our CD and we had it. 

I'm so sorry to hear this.  I hope that your family can find peace in this difficult time.

Have fun!  I'll be on Vista December 2.  She's my favorite ship and I'm excited to have her back in Florida.  Enjoy!

I just saw this in my booking manager. I figured this was coming but didn't expect the increase to be quite so much.  I think Jiji is still a good deal for the quality of the food, but I'm also glad I already purchased at the lower price.

Thank you for your review!  I'm strongly considering doing a cruise on Sunshine next year.  We were scheduled to go on Sunshine for the first time in 2021, but that got cancelled and we've been sailing other ships since.  I need 5 more days to get to platinum by the end of next year so I'm thinking of squeezing in a 5 day cruise on the Sunshine.  We're in GA so we usually drive to FL for cruises, but I'd like to sail from Charleston before they shut down the port.  It's only about 5.5 hours away so I figure we can leave really early the day of embarkation and save on hotel costs, which would be GREAT lol.  We're used to bigger, newer ships, and I know Sunshine is old and showing signs of wear, so I'm glad to hear you enjoyed yourself. 

I'm doing a 10 day on Celebrity Beyond in 2025 that visits St. Lucia, Barbados, Grenada, Antigua, and St. Maarten.  It leaves from Ft. Lauderdale.  They have some other great itineraries as well.

I had booked an 8 day cruise on Carnival Vista for next year that originally visited St. Kitts, but they changed it to St. Thomas instead.  They seem to only be visiting St. Kitts on Journeys cruises now.  St. Kitts was one of the reasons why I booked that cruise, so it's disappointing but I'll survive lol.

40 minutes ago, sazcruiser said:

Quick question… we have an Excel Aft Suite booked on Celebration. Any benefit to FTTF? I see we get priority boarding but wasn’t sure about early access to the cabin or luggage delivery. Those two things seem worth it!

 

Side note: We’re SO excited for this cabin! 

I was in an Excel aft suite a few months ago.  You will be able to drop off your bags as soon as you board.  Your room might also be ready, but no guarantees.  We boarded early and our room appeared to be ready since our cards were outside the door, but the door was still propped open so we just dropped our bags off and left.  I can't speak on luggage delivery since we carry on all of our bags.

You will absolutely LOVE the room.  I just booked another one for 2025.

Thanks for the heads up.  It's not showing for my April or September 2024 cruises yet but I'll keep checking.

I'm a regular Carnival cruiser who just did my first Royal Caribbean cruise on Wonder of the Seas last week.  The whole time it felt like something was missing but I couldn't figure out what it was until close to the end of the cruise.  I realized that while the crew on Royal was pleasant, their vibe was different from the crew on Carnival.  Carnival crew always seem genuinely happy to be there, and it shows in the way they interact with guests.  They're more engaging and approachable - I always see the Fun Squad around the ship.  On Royal, I never saw the cruise director or any of the entertainment crew aside from during their performances. 

Another thing I noticed is that on Carnival our room stewards would typically call out to us by name every day, even when they saw us at the other end of the hall.  It dawned on me that our steward on Royal never called us by name once.  He did his job as he was supposed to so I had no complaints there, but that was a personal touch that I realized I missed.  There's just a different energy on Carnival ships and I personally find it more appealing that what I experienced on Royal.

That being said, I did see one guy get totally naked during the Quest show on Wonder, so there's that. 😂

42 minutes ago, Grannygirl21 said:

You are correct.  I booked this upcoming cruise under DH profile as he had the better deal.  I purchased the Glitchy Cheers logged in to Carnival under my profile.  I tried the code logged in to my profile and it wouldn't work.  I logged out and logged in to Carnival under DH profile and boom, it worked.  The price went from $990.38 to $891.36.  Savings of $99.02!  

Thank you, you both fixed my problem.  I forgot that I had booked the cruise under my husband's account to take advantage of one of his offers.  I logged into his account and now the promo code is working.

36 minutes ago, iamsteph said:

Carnival cancelled my glitchy cheers.

I received the email for 10% off. 

The result? "Promo Code not Valid" 😂😂

I just tried it and mine says that too. Dang, Carnival. 😂