Mountainbreeze's HUGE Victory vacation review!

I've been back for a week now and finally got my pictures sorted and several days of my review written out. It's been fun sorting through my pictures and reliving the vacation all over again.

My Cruise on the Carnival Victory was a back-to-back on the September 2 EASTERN CARIBBEAN to Grand Turk, Half Moon Cay, and Nassau.

I also stayed on for the September 7 WESTERN CARIBBEAN to Ocho Rios Jamaica and Grand Cayman.

I had the aft-wrap 8428 for the entire B2B.

I really really loved the Victory, I thought it was a great ship! The staff was amazing!

I was gone for a total of 16 days and this trip took A LOT of planning. I started planning this vacation over 18 months ago, and there was a lot to do to get everything coordinated perfectly. By the time we were ready to leave, I was exhausted from thinking too much.

The good part was that everything was paid off during the planning stages, and I really didn't need to take a lot of money on the actual vacation. I brought money for souvenirs and for meals I wasn't planning to eat on the ship.

This trip involved:

5 people in my group that traveled with me, and 4 friends that also took the same cruise as we did

2 days in Miami, pre-cruise

10 days on the ship with stops at 5 islands

3 days in Ft Lauderdale, post-cruise

About a year ago, I started collecting things I would need for my trip. Shampoo, shaving cream, Aloe Vera, etc..... as I bought each thing, I put it into a box in my back room. By the time we left, we had several boxes full of vacation "stuff" and I wondered if it would all fit into our suitcases. Most of it did, but a few things that were less important didn't make the final cut.

Here are a few pics of the stuff I took with me:

On the far right, you can see 2 of the thermal mugs I got on Ebay. I bought 4 of them so each of us could have a different color (mine was red). We kept these full of cold water or whatever we happened to be drinking during the trip. These mugs really came in handy and I was glad we had them.

I also brought a lot of over-the-counter meds. I wasn't sure what would be available if/when we would need it.

Lots of baggies for wet swimsuits and for collecting seashells and sand.

Going with me on the first part of this vacation to Miami and also on the first cruise was my sister Lisa, and my two youngest kids. My son Chris is 24, and my daughter Cody Leigh is 22.

For the second cruise and the Ft Lauderdale resort, my sis and kids went home and my best friend Christina joined me.

The weather on the whole trip was pretty good, considering we were in the Caribbean during peak hurricane season. The trade off for the low low prices EVERYWHERE we went on this trip was totally worth it to me. There was a little rain here and there, mostly on the 2nd cruise, but it didn't bother us too much.

OK, now that all of the before stuff is out of the way.....

on to the review!!:):)

DAY 1 - TRAVEL DAY - Saturday, Aug 31, 2013

This awesome day started when I woke up around 7:30AM. Everything was packed and ready to go. My documents had been double and triple checked to make sure I had everything we needed. The house was spotless; laundry done, every dish and cup was clean and put away, the dogs were clean and brushed.......

I was totally ready. It was finally time to go!! After all the planning, it felt unreal that it was finally here.

My son Chris had spent the night on our couch, and we were meeting Cody at the airport at 11:00AM.

I sent Chris to get McDonalds breakfast, and he brought it back for us to eat while we were getting ready. We ate, showered, and zipped our suitcases so Timmy could load the car.

At 10:30, we were OFF!!!

We made it to the airport at 11:05 and Cody was already there waiting for us. We said goodbye to Timmy and I was sad about that part, it was going to be a long 16 days without my sweetie :(

The kids and I shuffled our 6 bags over to a bench so we could regroup. I handed them their passports and their plane tickets. I had a smoke.......the last one I would have for 8 hours.

A kind man offered to take our pic for us.

Our first picture of the vacation!! I was really excited that it was FINALLY time to go.

Chris, Me, and Cody sitting outside of Kansas City International airport:

We went in and found our gate. We made it through the airport security and took a seat to watch for our plane. After a few minutes we walked over to the Starbucks counter and got bottles of water to take on the plane with us.

Our plane arrived!

When we boarded the plane we were able to find 3 seats together, and at 12:55PM our plane took off for Chicago's Midway airport. It was a short flight, only about an hour and 15 minutes.

At the same time our plane was leaving Kansas City, my sister Lisa's plane was also taking off and heading for Chicago.

Our planes were scheduled to land in Chicago at roughly the same time. Lisa's plane ended up taking about 20 minutes longer than ours did so the kids and I stopped to get a snack; french fries and drinks at McDonalds while we waited for her plane to land. Hopefully we wouldn't be eating McDonalds for every single meal on this trip, but for now it was convenient.

Lisa's plane finally landed and we met in the Southwest terminal. After hugs and greetings, we all went to check the screen for our departure info.

We had about an hour before our plane would leave, so we went to a food court and ate lunch. I don't remember what everyone else ate, but I had a hot dog.

After we ate we took some seats near our gate to wait for boarding.

Lisa and Cody were catching up........they hadn't seen each other in a while

Our departure gate was changed at the last minute, but our flight was on time leaving Chicago.

We boarded our plane and the kids and I found 3 seats together again, with a seat across the aisle for Lisa. It was a long flight to Ft Lauderdale, 2 and a half hours.

When the plane finally landed at 8:20PM (eastern time), we headed down to the baggage area to look for our bags.

I called John from John's Car Service and let him know we were at the baggage claim area. I had set up several of our rides with John before the trip. He must have been waiting nearby because he showed up within 5 minutes of my call to him.

Our ride is here!!

I chose a car service because for only a few extra dollars, John kept track of the dates/times and addresses we were going to throughout our entire trip. We didn't have to give an address to a cab driver and hope he was taking us on the shortest route to our destination. We didn't have to wait for a shuttle van to load up, and make many stops. John was there for us for every ride, and we were also able to pre-pay for his services, making it easier on us during the trip.

 

Loading bags into the limo:

John took this photo of the four if us just before we left the airport. I don't know where my sons head is, it seems to be gone entirely and replaced with the taillights of the car behind us.

We got a good laugh over this one when we saw it on my camera

It was a 40 minute ride from Ft Lauderdale airport to our hotel at the port of Miami. John got us there in record time.

Our hotel was fabulous!! We stayed at the Intercontinental.

I discovered this hotel in 2011 when I was researching places for Tim and I to stay before our last cruise. It's a great hotel, 5 star all the way, and I happened to get a great price both times I have stayed there.

One of the first things we noticed was the lady dancing on the side of the building. It was some sort of light show, and she moved and danced across the entire side of the building. The colors changed as she danced.

The next few pics are the entry way of the hotel. I actually took these pics the next day, but I'm adding them in here so you can see (kind of) what we saw as we pulled in.

We arrived around 9:45PM and several men (bellmen?) were there to help John get our bags out of the limo and loaded onto a cart. Cody got this great shot of the limo just after we arrived at the hotel.

Inside the lobby area, we found the check-in desk on the left

Rodrigo checked us in, and gave Lisa an upgrade to a "bayview" room like the kids and I had. We asked for a high floor, and he gave us floor 20. With the bayview rooms, we would face the cruise port and the ocean.

We got our keys to our rooms and headed for the elevators:

The Intercontinental had made some big changes since I was there in 2011.

They added a lot of high tech lights and screens inside and outside of the building. One thing they added was this giant video screen near the elevators in the lobby.

The screen showed different videos from around Miami. Our favorite was this beach video with life sized waves rolling in. It looked like we were standing right on the beach while we were waiting for the elevator

Upstairs on the 20th floor:

And here is our room!

We loved our room! It was comfy looking and very nice.

AND THE VIEW!!!! WOW, the view from our window was amazing.

Within a few minutes our bags arrived and sometime after that I remembered to take pictures of the room:

The kids and I settled in quickly.

We sat in the window and soaked in the view. Miami is such a beautiful city! I loved the giant window sill that was big enough for us all to sit on.

Unfortunately, pictures of the view at night don't work out so well from the window.

Our view was so much better than this pic looks.

Looking straight down from our window, there was a giant yacht parked outside of the hotel. It wasn't as big as a cruise ship but it was the biggest boat I had ever seen.

We were finally able to tear ourselves away from the window to check out the bathroom, which was very nice too.

On the right was a shelf with extra towels and a closet with extra blankets and an ironing board

Straight ahead from the door was the sink area (pics were taken after we had settled into our room)

Great start to your review! My DH and I will be on Victory this Sept so I'm looking forward to further installments!

Continuing with pics of the bathroom:

I loved this shower head!! It was one of my favorite things!

After we looked over our rooms and rummaged through our luggage, we all went down to the lobby to look around a bit and figure out what to do for dinner.

This giant marble sculpture is in the center of the lobby. It's really huge. I read up about it and found out it's built from huge marble slabs and was imported from Italy. The whole thing weighs 70 tons, and there is a waterfall made of glass around the bottom.

Interesting fact: The sculpture was put in place first and the lobby and hotel building were built around it.

The glass water fountain at the base of the sculpture:

We knew as late as it was, we had limited choices for dinner. None of us wanted to change into nice clothes and go out somewhere. We talked to the hotel concierge, who unbelievably was still working at 11:00 on a Saturday night. We discussed our choices and decided on pizza, which we could have delivered to the hotel.

We sat down in the lobby and looked over the menu the concierge gave us.

(we caught Cody in mid-blink, or she was REALLY bored)

We called in our pizza and we looked around the hotel while we waited.

Another pic of the beautiful giant sculpture, this one taken in daylight.

One of the bars in the hotel:

Back out in the lobby, there were seating areas separated by these cool lit up screens. The screen backgrounds changed colors from soft red to soft greens, blues, yellows, pinks......it was very cool.

Built into the tables at the different seating areas in the lobby were these touch screen computers. You could press on a circle to get info about the weather, things to do in Miami, hotel info, etc........

In this pic, we were looking at the menu from one of the restaurants in the hotel.

And the lady was still dancing.

Stay tuned for DAY 2!!

Great start to your review! My DH and I will be on Victory this Sept so I'm looking forward to further installments!

I have plenty of installments coming to keep you busy! Glad you are enjoying my review :)

Sorry about the different sized pictures and the text looking a little funny. I'm using pics that came from a few different camera's and apparently some of them need to be re-sized. I'll keep trying to work out the kinks as I go :)

I'll be back with Day 2 of my awesome vacation tomorrow!!

Loving it! Can't wait for tomorrow's episode!

Loving it! Can't wait for tomorrow's episode!

Thanks Aggiejade! I'm glad you are enjoying it! I'm having a lot of fun re-living it while I write it all out :)

Andrea, it's great to read about the cruise. I loved meeting you and Cody. I can't wait to hear how you viewed the cruise (since I didn't see you after HMC).

Great start! I've always wanted to try the Victory but haven't gotten around to it yet. I will have to live vicariously through you! :)

Going on the Victory next month, can't wait to read and see more.

[/sizeHubby and I will be on the Victory in December. Can't wait for the rest of your review!

We'll be on the Victory in December also. Subscribing.

Me too Dec 9 sailing. Cant wait!

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I cruised on The Victory this summer. I love that ship! I also love all the pics you have included- brings back wonderful memories. Enjoyed the Intercontinental for my pre cruise stay as well. Beautiful hotel! Can't wait to read the rest :)

Caro

Wonderful start to your review. I am enjoying your pictures.

Got off the Victory's sailing of the Eastern Caribbean on Saturday and already miss it :( Fun to see others' reviews :)

Excited for this review! Going on her dec 14! She was my first ship back in 06!