Live from Conquest 2/6/16-2/14/16

[xxoo-j]

Hi everyone!

 

We are heading out on the Conquest out of Port Everglades (Fort Lauderdale) later today. If anyone has any questions while we are on the ship I would be happy to try and get the answers for you. We are doing the St Martin, St Kitts, San Juan, Grand Turk itinerary.

 

Thanx for the offer! We leave on the 28th of this month on Conquest. Wondering if the doors are magnetic for white boards. Any suggestions to make our trip special?! Any must-see shows? Etc?

 

We are doing the Western Caribbean, so different ports of call for us. Hope your trip was fabulous!

 

Janet

[NoDayButToday]

So why does customs get so backed up?

 

 

They only had 3 customs agents working when we got off the ship. About 30 minutes into the line another few showed up and the line started to actually move. The porter said that's pretty standard, so the port has decided that they just don't care about the volume of people coming through.

[NoDayButToday]

Thanx for the offer! We leave on the 28th of this month on Conquest. Wondering if the doors are magnetic for white boards. Any suggestions to make our trip special?! Any must-see shows? Etc?

 

 

 

We are doing the Western Caribbean, so different ports of call for us. Hope your trip was fabulous!

 

 

 

Janet

 

 

I didn't try to use magnets on our door, but command strips worked really well for our banner. There were quite a few people that had dry erase boards next to their doors using command strips. We did use magnetic hooks on the wall of our room to hang stuff up in the room. That was actually a huge space saver in our interior room, kept stuff from piling up on the desk or little table.

 

 

We had seen the production shows on other cruises so didn't go to any of them (Latin Nights, Divas, Epic Rock). We spent a good amount of time at Alchemy at night-bartenders were great and it's a nice area. The adult pool in the back was typically pretty empty at night so a great place to spend time together. We are also somewhat nerdy and were always able to find a group to play a board game with at night up in the lido buffet area or in the library. Even on our ship, which was an active party cruise due to the Super Bowl, there was always somewhere special we could find to spend time together where we were alone. It's a great ship for that.

[chrisegler]

Thank you for your posts! I will be on the Conquest with the same Itinerary in early April!

[bigfig63]

I was on cruise and a couple of comments. Had 6452, port aft wrap balcony. Had a great cruise. My only complaint was breakfast didn't open till 0730 most days as I am usually up at 5am. Not bad for complaints but since I am on vaca, not much will bother me. Couple of bullet points

 

Embark-arrived at 1230, did not get on till 140. Carnival blamed it on border patrol. I could handle the wait but my 85 yo father that was supposed to go but couldn't at last minute would of been a real concern. Muster lasted about 30 minutes and once again could of been tough for dad. Cramped quarters on deck and hot. Headcount was taken to verify participation.

 

Disembark-a breeze for me. Had lido bfast at 0600, did carry off. Called early flights at 645, was at my gate by 0730. Could of taken the 0800 flight to Dtw if I paid the change fee. Had to wait about 10 minutes for taxi as port did not let thru yet.

 

Casino-video poker odds were the pits. Somehow they do not allow for perfect play as some of the hands had multiple combos which turn into a 50/50. Never saw that b4. One word of caution. You must use your sail and sign and you can load the machine from your acct. Easy to over spend.

Also, I hate smoke more then most. The casino did smell but it was tolerable. Detroit casinos are much worse.

 

Dining and food -lots of options so no one should complain. My time dining good. Table for 8, NP. Nothing outstanding but good variety. Try the popcorn soufflé, you will be surprised.

 

Ship- showing some age but so were the Rccl ships. I think the cruise lines are putting there cash into the big ships as that is the future.

 

Staff-all very friendly and approachable. The morning young guy at blue iguana was always asking how cruise was.

 

Finally I am normally on Rccl but after this cruise give Carnival the edge on being a better product. There was always something going on and a lot overlapped and I had to choose one or the other. Rccl average age 40 to 70, Carnival prolly 30 to 60.

 

As a side note on the formal nights almost all in Renoir deck 3 were dressed nicely. Very nice to see. Also the string trio, the brass trio and Fannypax were awesome performers.

Edited February 16, 2016 by bigfig63

[NoDayButToday]

I don't think that I will do a full breakdown review of this trip simply because I didn't take nearly as many pictures as I did on the last cruise. I did want to include a few picture of our room though so that if someone googles this room like we did when booking it, they can see the pictures (there were very few available when we were booking).

 

We booked room 8431, it's an interior room, but one of the few odd sideways oriented inside rooms on the Conquest class ships. It is directly behind the aft elevator, and while the Lido deck is right above it, there is no real traffic or deck chairs above the room itself. No noise from the deck or the elevator. We had ear plugs just in case and never needed them. The location is amazing. It was a short run up or down the stairs to nearly all the places we spent time on the cruise-the only real walk was to get on or off the ship because they used the 0 forward doors.

 

It felt way more roomy because of the sideways orientation it created some big open floor space and it didn't have that narrow hallway of closets and bathroom door when you first enter the room. The only negative to the room is that the space between the wall and bed is a bit narrow so that may be an issue for some-but I'm not a thin woman and could navigate around the bed without much issue. However, because the room is sideways, the bed is oriented in a way where it rocks side to side with the ship (like balcony rooms) instead of head to toe-like most inside rooms. We would absolutely book this room again. You will see some rainbow hooks on the wall- we bought some very strong magnetic hooks from Amazon since we knew there would be limited surface space in an inside room, but the big empty magnetic wall. We were able to hang a LOT in these hooks without them sliding and it helped keep our room more neat.

 

Standing by the wall facing the bed

 

Standing by the door facing the bed, this is the narrowest path in the room-that shelf next to the bed. I could still navigate around it.

 

 

I was sitting on the bed for this one. The door to the room is to the left, and that hallway my (confused, lol) husband is standing in is the closets and then the bathroom to the left. You can see some of the open floor space here.

Edited February 16, 2016 by NoDayButToday

[NoDayButToday]

Definitely agree on much of the above. The staff was incredible, and we loved many of the live music groups. The talent of the musical groups around the ship were astounding, especially when you look at their performance schedules. It isn't easy on wind player chops or vocal performers. Truly professionals and lots of big crowds to listen to the music.

 

We had late seating for dining and was pleasantly surprised with how many dressed up both for cruise elegant and for cruise casual. It wasn't that way on our last cruise. I know there is much contention on the American Table menus-our group of 6 enjoyed them very much. And the special needs team was great handling my sister's gluten intolerance. There were frequently dessert surprises for her instead of what they called the "fallback" (gluten free chocolate melting cake), and they surprised her with a huge plate of gluten free cookies one night at the start of dinner. She said the gluten free bread and desserts were some of the better ones she has had anywhere.

[rubysmom]

It WAS THE roughest cruise I have ever been on....and all the above I agree with....the Blulypso band of two on the Lido DECK was great.... We had no complaints with the food...the burritos at Blue Iguana were so good....In St Kitts we took the Grey tour excursion...Thenford Grey was a very nice man and I really learned a lot on that tour.....Our steward Leo was great....our waiter was OK...but my husband put his empty COKE can on his empty plate and he said to him...PLEASE DON'T DO THAT.. MY BOSS WILL FIRE ME...... HUH?

 

Our little grandson loved Karaoke with FannyPax....Camp Ocean was outstanding for a 9 yr old.... Cannot understand people when they say their kids were bored there.... He loved it.....

 

We had a fun cruise...I do agree with the port... There were two ways to get down to customs...the escalator or the elevator.... When it worked... The man herding people was a rude ahole........the ship did dock earlier than expected and I did feel rushed to get out of there.. Our lines weren't too long at customs but I don't like the port set up there and FLL airport is a mess..their security line is obnoxious... Glad we has TSA precheck...walked right up.... I really don't want to sail out of there again....kind of confusing...

[bluefins]

our waiter was OK...but my husband put his empty COKE can on his empty plate and he said to him...PLEASE DON'T DO THAT.. MY BOSS WILL FIRE ME...... HUH?

 

 

This is my first time copying quotes from previous posts, so I am thinking I did it wrong, but wanted to chime in. A few years ago (I can't remember which ship) in the MDR, we had a booth with 6 people open only at one end, so it was a long reach to the person by the wall. The first and second night we all stacked our dishes up and placed them close to the end so our waitress could reach them. She scowled the first night and the second night she asked us not to do that. I think it is considered "full service" dining and the staff is expected to do everything!

[Monsterluvs2cruise]

I was on Conquest on the same 8 day itinerary last November. It was a great cruise. Guy's Burgers, the Blue Iguana Cantina, the steakhouse and the Alchemy Bar are all great. The American Table menu in the MDR is very good too.

 

Have a great time on the cruise!:cool:

 

Hi JohnSpo,

I have been trying to find out what the American Table menu is and I am wondering if you could enlighten me? I cruised on the Liberty in 2013 and Freedom in 2015 and am wondering if this is a recent change?

Thanks!

[l2f]

Do you have the FunTimes and if so could you post?

[Clarea]

Very nice photos, enjoying the review.

[NoDayButToday]

Do you have the FunTimes and if so could you post?

 

 

I'm sorry, I don't have the fun times. I tried to save them, but I think they got lost in the packing shuffle and ended up in the trash by mistake.

[l2f]

I'm sorry, I don't have the fun times. I tried to save them, but I think they got lost in the packing shuffle and ended up in the trash by mistake.

 

Thanks anyway. Great review