Vista short review for 1/21-1/27. Wi-Fi calling and my experiences this week

First off my wife and I took our first cruise this week. It was fantastic. Matt (cruise director) was amazing to watch and listen to. Also the staff works extremely hard 24/7. Earnesto our room steward was fantastic as well. I think he may have been living under our bed because anytime we seemed to leave the room for a short while we come back and its fully been cleaned and serviced.

We stayed in room #9298 which is a balcony. We did hear quite a bit of noise usually very early hours coming from above. Sounded like stuff being slide across the floor. This wasn't a huge deal though and we enjoyed the room location as it was close to Lido deck food. I just saw a thread there was a long delay getting on the ship today, and we had a pretty long delay getting off due to a gangway being out of service. We got off the ship around 10:30am. Was on board at 11:30am when we left.

One thing I wanted people to know because we were pretty nervous about this because this was our first time leaving our 17 year old and 12 year old daughter at home with us pretty far away. The Wi-Fi was actually pretty good. We bought the middle package (social) and my wife was able to imessage, use social media, and the important one is my wife was able to make unlimited calls with really no issues while in the middle of the ocean between ports. She has a iphone 7 and you must set it up on your phone prior to leaving for your trip. Make sure you set it up which basically your saying you acknowledge that if you call 911 it will not work on Wi-Fi calling. Put your phone in airplane mode, connect to the Carnival Hub app. Then access your wifi plan from inside the hub app. Once you do this you can now make calls across Wi-Fi. Once in a while there was a delay in our daughter hearing us and a couple of times the call dropped but my wife made probably 20-25 calls with on Wi-Fi only. Her phone showed in airplane mode and said VZW-WIFI at the top where the wifi status shows.

Nice review, thanks for posting it. Matt is the best, glad you had a wonderful cruise.

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Nice review, thanks for posting it. Matt is the best, glad you had a wonderful cruise.

 

 

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We loved the Vista and agree Matt was the best CD we've had. Glad to hear the service levels continue to be amazing. That is 1 thing that still stands out from our November cruise....The level of service and friendliness of crew was off the charts!!

Thanks for your review. I am so glad you enjoyed your first cruise. There's nothing else like it.

Let us know when you book the next one.

Appreciate the feedback.

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Wanted to add a little more since we had just made it home from the airport when I posted the first one.

We ate the Lido Buffet the most for breakfast. We did eat breakfast once in the Horizon. Lunch we ate at Lido buffet mostly but did have formal dinner one night also in Horizon. Service was top notch. You literally sit down and they great you. At the buffet when you leave they are instantly cleaning your table up. There were probably 100 servers in the Horizon restaurant alone. We had the pizza , Guys burgers a couple of times, Cucina del Capitano for lunch which is also no cost. Also had the BlueIguana Cantina for breakfast and lunch and it was delicious. You won't go hungry for sure.

Casino was fun. I did come out about ahead playing only slots. Downside is there is smoking in the casino which was suppose to be split in half with smoking and non-smoking but people smoked every where.

There is so much to list I really can't for the activities we watched. Really like Flick show, the I-max theater, Lip Sync contest. Hasbro the game show. And thought it was very cool they do a military appreciation the last sea day. Was very moving. We pretty much caught all the shows on the ship. We bought a nice purchase in the jewelry store with No tax and Duty free, This cruise was for my wife and myself's 20th anniversary so we bought her a nice diamond ring. I want to mention the cast for the shows are amazing. I can not believe they remember all the choreography for the different shows. The main character for FLICK was on stage performing for over 1 hour straight for that show.

Weather was pretty good for the most part. Was a few sprinkles at Ocho Rio. Honestly that place is a little scary for us. We went on a sky lift type ride which was great. Food was terrific and scenery was beautiful. Port area seems sketchy and your constantly asked to look at the locals items they are selling. Grand Cayman had perfect weather. We went to Stingray city and Coral Garden snorkeling. That was awesome. Port was fun. Cozumel had a little rain when we first arrived but the day ended up being great. We went on the Atlantis submarine. I recommend this one for sure. The trip from Cozumel back to Miami the seas were pretty rough and the boat rocked a bunch. Also one more thing I wanted to mention was in the atrium nightly was a group of 3 playing some violins. Their group name was called New Age. This is a must watch if they are normally on this ship. They were fantastic ! I really enjoyed them.

Overall we really liked this cruise. Honestly the staff, crew members, performers and of course Matt made this a dream come true for us. I don't have any other cruises to compare it too, but I think we are going to book a trip on the Horizon as our next adventure.

Thanks for the review.

we'll be on that itinary in a month. In ocho Rios, you did the chair lift at mystic mountain? how did you get there, your own taxi or as part of an excursion? Thanks for taking time to review your trip!

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we'll be on that itinary in a month. In ocho Rios, you did the chair lift at mystic mountain? how did you get there, your own taxi or as part of an excursion? Thanks for taking time to review your trip!

 

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Hello, the excursion if booked with Carnival comes with transportation to and from Mystic Mountain. You board a large van and you are packed in like sardines inside the secure fenced area of the port. You are let off at Mystic Mountain where there is several other things you can do once you get to the top like the bod sled and water slide. Also zip lining is up there. Very beautiful area. Would recommend taking some mosquito spray or repellent band. They will tell you mosquitoes are bad and will offer to sell you a band for $5 at the entrance to the lift. There were performers at the top doing a tribal type dance and playing music and a very good restaurant above the shops. Also there is a nature walk and humming bird area with some exotic humming birds flying all over the place. You can stay up there as long as you like and then come back down. Buses ran at 15 and 45 of the hours. Drivers were friendly. Also they will drop you off anywhere you want along the way, Some people got off at the main street market area. I thought for the price offered on the website it was worth the money. Drinks at the restaurant on top of the mountain are very cheap costing and delicious. Also they were cooking jerk chicken on some bbq grills which smelled amazing.

Appreciate the feedback.

"Also one more thing I wanted to mention was in the atrium nightly was a group of 3 playing some violins. Their group name was called New Age. This is a must watch if they are normally on this ship. "

Question...Was the group made up of 2 females and 1 guy?? If so, they were called "String classics with Dolce" on our Thanksgiving cruise. They were amazing and we listened to them nightly! I'm wondering if it was the same group!! I guess its possible they could still be on the ship....sometimes groups sign 3-4 month contracts

Hello, the excursion if booked with Carnival comes with transportation to and from Mystic Mountain. You board a large van and you are packed in like sardines inside the secure fenced area of the port. You are let off at Mystic Mountain where there is several other things you can do once you get to the top like the bod sled and water slide. Also zip lining is up there. Very beautiful area. Would recommend taking some mosquito spray or repellent band. They will tell you mosquitoes are bad and will offer to sell you a band for $5 at the entrance to the lift. There were performers at the top doing a tribal type dance and playing music and a very good restaurant above the shops. Also there is a nature walk and humming bird area with some exotic humming birds flying all over the place. You can stay up there as long as you like and then come back down. Buses ran at 15 and 45 of the hours. Drivers were friendly. Also they will drop you off anywhere you want along the way, Some people got off at the main street market area. I thought for the price offered on the website it was worth the money. Drinks at the restaurant on top of the mountain are very cheap costing and delicious. Also they were cooking jerk chicken on some bbq grills which smelled amazing.

Thanks for the info!

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"Also one more thing I wanted to mention was in the atrium nightly was a group of 3 playing some violins. Their group name was called New Age. This is a must watch if they are normally on this ship. "

 

 

Question...Was the group made up of 2 females and 1 guy?? If so, they were called "String classics with Dolce" on our Thanksgiving cruise. They were amazing and we listened to them nightly! I'm wondering if it was the same group!! I guess its possible they could still be on the ship....sometimes groups sign 3-4 month contracts

Yes they were 2 females and one guy. They were from Brazil I think. I googled the group you mentioned and they are different from them. This was a taller white gentleman with a beard and the young ladies were a blonde girl and a dark complected black hair girl. They were also playing electric violins which it looks like they group you mentioned were playing regular violins.

Yes they were 2 females and one guy. They were from Brazil I think. I googled the group you mentioned and they are different from them. This was a taller white gentleman with a beard and the young ladies were a blonde girl and a dark complected black hair girl. They were also playing electric violins which it looks like they group you mentioned were playing regular violins.

Yes...Based on the description...definitely different. Dolce trio played regular violins to a backdrop of current and past soft rock... They were great too!! Good to know Carnival tries to keep similar type of musicians for the Atrium venue

Actually I found the guys name. He has a youtube channel. They were amaizing. His name is Dani Gonzalez.

Actually I found the guys name. He has a youtube channel. They were amaizing. His name is Dani Gonzalez.

I'll look him up...Thanks!!

Enjoying your review

Keith

I am, too. Thx for writing a review.

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Yes if the internet gods are good then you can make Wi Fi calls.

Thank you for all the great info. Do you remember which nights were elegant nights? We are going on this cruise in March but in the opposite direction. All the information you could give would be great.

Thank you for all the great info. Do you remember which nights were elegant nights? We are going on this cruise in March but in the opposite direction. All the information you could give would be great.

They were on Monday and Wednesday nights.

My husband and I will be on the Vista in March. We were looking at the Mystic Mountain triple ride package "The Big Three" on Carnival (SKY EXPLORER, CANOPY & BOBSLED). Carnival wants $125 per person, but on the Mystic Mountain website, the price for all three plus round-trip transportation to and from Ocho Rios for 2 adults is: 149.69. I am going to see if Carnival will do their price match.

SKY EXPLORER, CANOPY & BOBSLED

So, how did the party at home go?

Hopefully nobody got hurt and the cops didn’t get called.

Carnival claims that if you find a lower price on excursions they will refund 110% of the difference as on board credit. Important thing to remember is that if you book with Carnival the ship can not leave without you if there were to be a breakdown or something causing you to get back late. This did happen on our trip to some people in Cozumel. Their boat was 30 minutes past the leave port time when it arrived back in Cozumel and the ship waited and the people were not rushed or in need of running.

So, how did the party at home go?

 

Hopefully nobody got hurt and the cops didn’t get called.

No parties here lol :). Both grandma's took turns staying the night to make sure it was smooth sailing off to school in the mornings.