Carnival Valor Eastern Review with photos

I got off the Carnival Valor just yesterday. It was an eventful 7 day cruise that started off figuratively rocky and ended literally rocky. This cruise was my seventh with my husband and we took my parents. They were cruise newbies! I was so excited to be able to cruise with them and answered the many questions they had.

As with my other reviews, I will add many photos, videos and answer any questions anyone might have about the Valor or any of the islands we went to. DH and I were excited to go to Amber Cove, DR since that was a new port for us. Here's a shot of the Valor at Amber Cove, just to preview the things to come! It might take me a little while to do this review. I moved to Vermont in October and my commute is longer to and from work, but I'll try to at least do a little each night.

DH and I spent New Year's Eve at mom and dad's house, going to bed early (and barely sleeping) as the ride service mom and dad reserved to take us to the airport was due to arrive at 5 a.m. She arrived at 4:45 a.m. and it took us a little over an hour to get to MHT. The flight to MCO went well.

Once off the plane, we went to the baggage claim area and found all four of our suitcases in record time! Vacation was starting off well! Or so we thought...

DH got in line for the Budget rental car we had reserved online. The line was extremely long. DH got into said line at 11:45 a.m. After two hours and 10 minutes in line at 1:55 p.m., he finally came over to me, dad and mom. I was raring to go and we were all really hungry. However, he said they just got our car and were servicing it and it would be another 20 minutes. Ridiculous! Once we finally got into the car, it was 2:45 p.m. A full three freaking hours from the time DH got in line. :eek:

We were starving, so we went to the Cracker Barrel for lunch/supper. For dessert mom and I shared chocolate cake that was amazing! After that, it was too late to do the airboat tour as planned, so we decided to go right to the hotel to check in.

We stayed at the Comfort Inn and Suites in Cocoa Beach. I only have just a couple pictures from the hotel. It met our needs and the price was right at just $107 per room for the night, which included a continental breakfast the next morning.

We were on same cruise, had a blast, I only remember the last day and night rocking and rolling on the ship (heading back up to PC) and otherwise the weather for all the ports were warm and sunny for us.

We found the ship in good shape and food was good in MDR and other places we ate, we loved our OS on Empress deck and enjoyed coffee every from room service every morning watching the sun rise. Your pictures are bringing back sweet memories from last week and cant wait to see the rest....thanks for doing the review...:)

More Budget woes on embarkation day as DH had to stand in line (albeit a much smaller one) to return the rental car. After that, we all waited in line for the complimentary shuttle to the port. It was windy and a little sprinkly. We overheard someone say that they were waiting for everyone to come back from port before bringing people to port. Screw that! We called a taxi at my insistence and we were at the port around 10:30 a.m.

Check-in was easy, however, Frank, the rep at the counter, forgot to stamp our Zone number on our boarding passes. I asked a lady and she graciously stamped ours so it would say Zone 2 like mom and dad's did. She said she cheated, but she wouldn't tell anybody. :D

We got called onboard and were on the ship at 10:59 a.m.! Wow! A record for us!

Mom was excited...can you tell?

Here's the selfie I took of us as we were showing mom and dad around. DH and I have previously sailed on all four of the other Conquest Class ships (Conquest, Liberty, Glory and Freedom) so we were very familiar with the layout.

We were on same cruise, had a blast, I only remember the last day and night rocking and rolling on the ship (heading back up to PC) and otherwise the weather for all the ports were warm and sunny for us.

 

We found the ship in good shape and food was good in MDR and other places we ate, we loved our OS on Empress deck and enjoyed coffee every from room service every morning watching the sun rise. Your pictures are bringing back sweet memories from last week and cant wait to see the rest....thanks for doing the review...:)

Yes, Grand Turk Day and the last Sea Day were quite rocky! The ocean itself didn't look that rough, so I'm wondering why it was so rocky. When my dad and DH were on the Behind the Fun Tour someone asked if they were using the stabilizers and the captain said no. :confused: Why not?

After showing mom and dad around the ship, I went to the shore excursions desk to sign dad up for the Behind the Fun Tour. I had done it on the Liberty cruise and really enjoyed it and my dad wanted to do it. He was the very first one to sign up! Good thing he had veteran cruisers with him showing him the ropes! ;)

Atrium Lobby:

Sports Bar (the only time DH went in as it is a Yankees themed bar. Boo! Go Red Sox! Lol!)

Ivanhoe Theatre:

Promenade Deck 5:

Coffee Bar:

Club O2:

Entrance to arcade:

One Small Step Dance Club:

Wine Bar:

Eagles Lounge:

Cigar Bar:

After that, we headed up to Lido for lunch.

After lunch we showed my parents the joys of Serenity Deck. Mom ended up spending quite a bit of time up there during the cruise. Dad and DH ordered drinks while mom and I took a spa tour. Mom insisted on booking a mother daughter hot stone massage for 4:30 p.m. that very day.

Ahh...Serenity!

DH enjoying his first drink:

A Disney ship:

Thanks for your review.

I absolutely love everything about this pic. From Mom clutching her blue newbie Sign and Sail card to dad photo bombing us. It is a quintessential cruising pic!

We had muster drill at 3:30 p.m. and it lasted forever because people don't follow direction! After muster, mom and I went to our hot stone massage. It was very relaxing and didn't hurt at all. I have had one massage years ago which was painful because my muscles were so tight. The hot stone massage doesn't really work out knots or anything, but it was relaxing. My masseuse's name was Princess. We missed sailaway because of the massage, but I didn't mind and mom didn't seem to care.

We all ate dinner together in the Lincoln Dining Room. We had a table for four. It was yummy, but lasted forever, as do most first night dinners. It took an hour and 45 minutes from start to finish.

After that we all went back to our rooms for a bit and then watched the Welcome Aboard Show. The cruise director was Mat Seguin. It was an old school Carnival style show with the orchestra in the pit and the inflatable ship with FUN in the middle. It also had a preview of the comics. Straight after the show we headed to Eagles Lounge to watch the comedian Arvin. After that we got a little fresh air and dad and DH got pizza and then back to our rooms. DH lived to regret the pizza decision as he got sick shortly after going to bed. I think he just ate too much.

Here's our towel animal dog from the first night. And speaking of towel animals and turn down service, I must go to bed. Gotta go to work :( tomorrow.

Awesome review so far! Will be boarding valor in 20 days ...so will be anxious to hear more from you!!

Thanks for your review.

You're welcome! Much more to come.

Awesome review so far! Will be boarding valor in 20 days ...so will be anxious to hear more from you!!

Have a fun trip! I will post more tonight.

Don't know if its just me but your pictures aren't showing up.

Don't know if its just me but your pictures aren't showing up.

Same here :(

Thank you for your review :)

Thanks for your review. We are doing the western in April with cruise newbies too. Can't wait!

I can see the pictures of the hotel but none of the ship.

I'm so happy to see another of your reviews in progress!!! I love your reviews and am definitely following along on this one. We were on Valor in 2013 (southern itinerary out of San Juan) but also did an eastern on Glory in 2010, so I can kind of relive cruises while I'm reading (and currently freezing). I'm also looking forward to see what you did at Amber Cove. Thank you for taking the time to do another review. :)

Thanks for taking the time to do this review. Looking forward to your thoughts on Amber Cove.

Yeah--can't see the pictures of the ship.

Was on the same cruise. Fantastic time and second time on the Valor! I anticipate they kept the stabilizers in as we didn't go below 20 knots as the great distance we covered. Amber Cove was nice and I had looked forward to that port the most as I had never visited Dominican Republic. Great review so far!

I always enjoy your reviews, LovestoCruise19, but the pics aren't showing for me, either (except the first ship picture)!

I cant wait to read the rest of your review!! We were on the same cruise We had a great time!! I cant see your pictures either

Don't know if its just me but your pictures aren't showing up.

Same for me