Glory Mini Review - January 16, 2016 Western Caribbean (Pictures)

Included in this review will be:

Planning the trip

Pre-cruise stay in FLL

Transportation transfer with SAS to Miami

FTTF

The cabin

The ports (Cozumel, Belize, Roatan and Grand Cayman) and the excursions we did (Caveman Snorkeling and Daniel Johnson's Sloth and Monkey Hangout)

The comedy club

The service

The food

The entertainment

and whatever else I can think of to throw in.

This is my 5th cruise overall and my 4th with Carnival. It's also my second time onboard the Carnival Glory. As you can see by my signature it has been quite a few years since we sailed and we did notice quite a few changes. My husband and I travelled together on this cruise. Not only did we sail over his birthday but this cruise was a gift to us from my parents for Christmas.

We found out we were getting this cruise in late September as a gift. My parents let us know early so we could do some planning for our excursions. I used both Cruise Critic and Trip Advisor almost exclusively to do all of this. There were many people here on CC who were extremely knowledgable and helpful during this time. Reading through many reviews certainly helped us make decisions for our own trip. I hope this mini review does the same for someone.

The first thing I did was decide which ports we would like to do some sort of excursion at. I ended up deciding that Belize needed some sort of excursion to fully appreciate it's beauty and all it has to offer (and Belize City isn't the safest place to be wandering). I also decided that we would do an excursion in Roatan because of an amazing review I read about Daniel Johnson and his sloths. More on that later.

We were able to find the best deal on a flight with Southwest and we flew from Buffalo, NY to Fort Lauderdale the day before our cruise. My husband was able to catch this picture of the sunset from above the clouds.

Pre-cruise stay in FLL

Transportation transfer with SAS to Miami

FTTF

Following!

I'm going on this cruise in May!

Following, I will be on the Gory in March but will be the Eastern Itinerary.

Following. We are going to be on the Glory in March.

Subscribing! Looking forward to reading about your western Caribbean itinerary.

sailing on Glory April 9

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Great start, looking forward to the rest of your review.

Prior to our cruise we spent one night at the Quality Inn and Suites Airport/Cruise Port on Stirling Rd.

Now this is not a luxury hotel by any means but it certainly did the trick just fine. Now I admit it has been a LONG time since we visited Florida and we were in a bit of sticker shock at the price of hotels down there. What happened to the prices, am I right? Anyway, back to the hotel. You walk outside to get to your room which worked just fine for us because the weather was lovely. But in rain or something it would be annoying. The continental breakfast was just right. They had the usual cold fare of fruit, cereal etc as well as toast, waffles, eggs, and sausages. Pretty much what you would expect. The only complaint I had about the hotel is the shuttle from the airport to the hotel. We followed the instructions exactly and we waited over 40 minutes to be picked up. I would have been fine with the wait (it is free after all), but don't tell me 10 minutes and then take 40 to arrive. Other than that, the hotel itself was clean and comfortable. It's also close enough to walk to food as well as a little shopping. We headed over to Kmart to purchase some pop (soda) to bring onto the ship and some other toiletries. All in all I would recommend this place if you are looking for a clean hotel at a reasonable price.

So I'll break this section into two parts. One for the transfer to the cruise and one for the transfer back to the airport.

Setting up the transfer with SAS on their website was a breeze. So easy to use and you get a confirmation email very quickly.

On the morning of the cruise, we woke up with enough time to enjoy our breakfast, checkout and be down in the lobby right on time for our transfer. Unfortunately our transfer was not on time. We waited for about 30 minutes and then called SAS and they said they were on the way. We didn't get a reason for the lateness during the phone call. While we were waiting the hotel shuttles were bringing guests to the cruise ports through them and offered for us to hop on one of their shuttles. We declined but were thankful that they offered us a last minute spot. Because we already had a booking we felt bad about backing out which is why we didn't. After another 20 minutes we called again and did not get an answer. About 10 minutes after that I saw the van pull up to the hotel and hurried out the door. I will say at this point I was annoyed that they were an hour late. The driver was apologetic and explained the situation. Apparently the ship was late docking because of fog in Miami and the airport was a mess because so many flights were delayed. This caused the transfer to be behind schedule because of waiting at both the port and the airport before coming to get us. He also said he tried to call us but the phone call didn't go through. I find that a bit hard to believe because we had our phones with us and we paying very close attention but I'll take his word for it. Once loaded up and on our way the driver was extremely informative of the city and gave us a bit of history of the area which I appreciated. The quality of the driver made up for the lateness and honestly it ended up not being a big deal at all because we ended up only waiting about 15 minutes before hopping on the ship so it actually worked out for the best. I could have slept in for an extra hour though. ;) As the driver was dropping us off he made sure we knew exactly where to wait to be picked up the next week when we arrived back and told us to call the number listed to let him know we were ready.

The transportation on the pick up end of our trip could not have went smoother. We called as instructed and went to stand where we were told to. We waited less than 10 minutes and a nice driver hopped out, checked my name off the list and off we went to the airport. He was not as chatty but that was okay. He dropped us off at the airport quickly and efficiently. All in all, I would use SAS again. Even with the little slip up. No one can be perfect all the time.

We were really uncertain prior to our cruise about whether or not we should purchase FTTF. We were trying to really watch our budget on this cruise but there was one big reason why we considered FTTF. Belize is a tender port and we had a private excursion booked that was time sensitive. We really needed to be off the ship as early as possible that day and FTTF meant this would be possible.

In my opinion FTTF is worth every penny. My husband was sold on it when we got to embark the ship right after the platinum and diamond cruisers. Being able to bypass the hundreds of people waiting is quite a perk. Especially when you arrived only 15 minutes prior. Once on the ship, we were able to go directly to our room which was already made up and we met our room Stewart Edwin. More on Edwin later but he was a great addition to our cruise. With FTTF you also get a private line to guest services (which we used) as well as the ability to bypass the guest service line and use the platinum/diamond line (which we also used). But the best perk of FTTF is the priority tendering. This made tendering in Belize so easy peasy. We met in the golden restaurant and at 8pm we walked down as a group and right onto the first waiting tender boat. We zipped over to Belize City and got there with plenty of time. I'm sure it would have taken forever to wait for the tendering otherwise.

The cabin

Our first day at sea (rough seas)

Our first port (Cozumel)

Subscribing! We might do the glory to western carribean this summer so I'm looking forward to your review.

What is SAS transport? We are looking for transport to our hotel and I think we have ruled out uber.

Following along.

Enjoying your review.

Keith

Thanks for the report.

What is SAS transport? We are looking for transport to our hotel and I think we have ruled out uber.

Hi Crazyrbbt

SAS is a transportation company that we used to take us from the hotel in Fort Lauderdale to the cruise port in Miami. It was $15 per person. We then used them again on the way back where they picked us up in Miami at the cruise port and took us to the airport in Fort Lauderdale.

Here is the link if you are interested:

http://www.ridesas.com

Great review so far. We will be on the Glory 4/23/16. Many thanks!!! :)

Following. We are looking at going on Glory!

Looking forward to reading more....we will be on the Glory very soon.

Thanks. We will check it out.

So as you may remember from the beginning of my mini review. This cruise was a gift. Which means we did not pick the cabin ourselves. If we had we would have picked low and midship. I love low decks anyway, but as you'll see later in this post, I would have killed for this the next day.

We were in cabin 6245 (an inside) which is right above the Amber Palace.

Now before hand I wondered if this was going to be a problem. I got a few different responses that it would likely be okay as long as we weren't going to go to bed early. And it probably would be if that were the case. In my pre-cruise haze of thinking I'd be able to stay up late and do things until all hours of the morning and it would be great, I neglected to realize that the two of us are more like an elderly couple and usually fall asleep early due to being so active during the day.

Alas, the Amber Palace was super loud an annoying through the cruise. Often times I dreaded having to stay out of the room until 11pm so I wouldn't have to hear the noise. Maybe we were directly above a speaker or something but the entire room vibrated with noise. Not exactly relaxing.

The only other small complaint I had was that the toilet was definitely showing its age. No amount of cleaning would be able to take care of it so it was definitely not a cleanliness problem.

Other than that, the cabin itself was fine. Lots of room for the two of us (we always book inside cabins). Lots of storage space. Bed was comfortable and cozy. I did not hear any noise from cabins on either side of us or above. We had to walk a bit to get to the back of the boat for food but that was also obvious before hand based on the deck plans.

Next up:

Day 1 at sea

Cozumel

I'm actually going to combine this section to include the day of embarking as well as the first sea day, then onto our first port stop!

As I said previously, we had FTTF, which made boarding a snap. We were on within 15 minutes of arrival and we immediately went to drop off our luggage to our room. We met our room Steward Edwin and he introduced himself and asked if we needed anything. We didn't and figured we'd take a look around the ship to see what had changed in 10 years (A LOT). So off we went for our little tour of the ship and to grab some lunch. I honestly don't even remember what we ate that day but I do know that whatever it was, it was good. It wasn't Guy's Burger's though because we walked past that lined and noped right out of there. We did eat there 2 times during the cruise and it was good. My husband loved it and tried some of the speciality type burgers. I thought it was a typical burger which aren't my favourite thing to begin with. The fries were delicious though. Seriously if you need fries get them from Guy's!

We did go to the MDR for diner that evening. We had early seating which we like (remember I mentioned that we act like we're 90). Our waiter Luhur was great and really funny. We were seated at a table for 4 but on the nights we went (3 I think), we were the only 2 there. We were looking forward to the company but it did make dinner service very quick with just the two of us.

Not much else to say about that first day. We had beautiful weather, bright and sunny and we played some mini putt and relaxed in the sun.

Onto the first day at sea.

We woke up and I noticed that my stomach did not feel right. I really wanted to do the Seaday brunch because on all our prior cruises we hadn't made it to one so this was important to me. We headed down around 9 and were seated at a table of 10. I really wanted to order the huevos rancheros but my stomach had other ideas. I ended up just getting eggs and fruit. Thank goodness I made this choice.

Next stop was the Lido deck because sadly they had to evacuate a passenger by helicopter. The wind and rain made this seem terribly dangerous. They obviously knew what they were doing though. While neat to see, very sad for the family. I hope this woman is doing well now.

The ship was really rocking due to the weather by this point. I wanted to go to the shops to see if they had any seasickness meds. They were sold out of course. They still had some oil that was $15.99. I was hesitant about how effective it would be and asked the worker. She assured me that it worked great. By this time I knew I did not have long so I just bought them and quickly put it on. Don't buy this stuff (motioneaze). It did not do anything at all. In fact the smell of it made my stomach feel worse. I remembered that I read here on CC that if you ask at guest services they will give you meds if they have them. I hurried over and the woman behind the desk handed me a packet. I didn't realize that you needed to take the stuff BEFORE feeling ill for it to work. Needless to say, about 15 minutes later, all over the floor, myself and the poor man in front of me who was unfortunately in the wrong place at the wrong time I was not having a great day. To the man I puked on. If you are reading this, I am SO, SO sorry. I hope you still had a good day and I hope your wife was feeling better.

Note: I did try to run to the bathroom but unfortunately did not make it in time.

So embarrassed and feeling awful, I scurried back to my cabin and had a shower. I spent the next 10 hours sitting on the floor of the bathroom with my head over the toilet. It was not a great time. I learned my lesson and will always travel with meds from now on. I never have experienced seasickness before and hopefully never will again. Better safe than sorry though.

So now while this might be such a small thing to some and I'm embarrassed to say it's true. It was Lobster night in the MDR that night and I may have shed a tear or two that I had to miss it. Ridiculous, I know. But I had thought about that lobster for months. And now I was missing it.

The CD made a few announcements throughout the evening about the weather. Seems most people were in their cabins feeling much of the same way I did. Everyone we talked to throughout the cruise had a similar experience. Because of the evacuation and the bad weather we were now behind schedule. We had an itinerary change and our ports were now in the reverse order. I had scheduled private excursions so I knew that I was going to need to find wifi in the next port to email them and hope they could accommodate us with our new itinerary.

So that's all I have for day 1. I didn't do much at all. Onwards and upwards though. The rest of the cruise went much better!

Up next:

Cozumel

We were on the same Cruise, also had a tough 1st day at sea !!

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Thank you so much. My uncle was asking us about the type of helicopter and a bunch of technical questions about it. I had no clue and we didn't have our camera with us at the time. I'll send him yours so he can see.