Review- Carnival Victory, NYC to Canada June 21-25

[vjmatty]

First let me start by saying this was my first Carnival cruise and all I had to compare it to was Enchantment of the Seas we were on earlier this year, so bear with me ;)

 

Embarkation: LOVED embarking in the port of NY... easy find, easy unload and easy parking with the terminal right below the lot. Plenty of spaces but the price was steep at $24 per day. Terminal entrance to boarding the ship took just under an hour, but in all fairness to Carnival we did have 8 people in our group.

 

The ship: Getting around was a bit tricky, but my 12 year old stepdaughter figured it out within one hour of being on board. I didn't like that only a few decks let you walk the length of the ship with some dead ends and lots of down-one, up-one to get places. The decor, some rooms were very nice such as the Irish Piano Bar and the Ionian Lounge. The Casino was a bit over the top for me, but for the most part I didn't find anything too hideous. If you don't like seahorses and the color green this is probably not a good fit for you.

 

The cabins: We had three aft balconies on veranda deck. BALCONY TIP: The aft balconies next to the aft wraparounds are about three to four feet longer than all of the other regular aft balconies, at least on veranda deck. For us this was cabin 8430. Don't know about the other levels, but my stepdaughters lucked out on this deal. Also, because this was a Canada cruise, we adults spent a lot of time on the balconies which were about 20 degrees warmer than the outside pool deck and had no wind. The only drawback was we were right under the Lido deck and had a little bit of noise, but at the same time the best part of this location was being right under the Lido deck because our kids spent most of their time in Sirens pools.

 

All of our cabins had good sized bathrooms and showers with plenty of room, bigger than we had on Enchantment. Another Carnival plus.. bathrobes! Excellent for those room-service breakfasts on the balcony. TIP: If you are like me and keep singles in your bathrobe pocket to tip the room service staff, REMOVE the money from the robe pocket before the last dinner in the dining room when they clean your room for the final night, because they take away the bathrobes :o

 

Food was excellent all over the ship... dining room, buffets, pizza. My only complaint was the set up of the buffets, too many things all in the same line instead of buffet stations. As a result there was always a long line at the buffet, even on a port day at 2pm. TIP: Pizza and bar together near the Sirens pools excellent for parents whose kids like to spend evenings in the pool. Dining rooms were a little bit loud but they did hold off on the team playing as well as the singing and dancing by the waiters until after the meals were finished.

 

Activities my kids will tell you the best part of the ship would be a draw between miniature golf, water slide and Sirens pool. Yes the water slide was open even though the sea days were pretty cold and my kids were crazy enough to spend a half hour on that thing... apparently they have no cold cells in their bodies. On the decks, chair hogging was no problem anywhere as there were plenty of chairs on both the inside and outside decks.

 

On the other hand, Camp Carnival was a bit of a disappointment. For one thing, they had people doing late registrations in the same lines as people signing their kids in and out of activities, making it so the kids would get in 15 or 20 minutes late to activities. Another problem I had was that each time you signed a child in you had to give permission for any other person to sign the child out rather than have a permanent list of two names authorized for sign out. It was all kind of disorganized but the kids didn't use CC that much anyway.

 

Saint John We didn't do an excursion because there were 4 kids plus my dad in his 70's but we had a nice time. Spent about a couple of hours shopping but it was a bit chilly so we headed back early, after listening to a local bagpipe band and buying some crafts at a local fair.

 

As the ship sailed away from Saint John we were standing on our balcony, and a single member of the bagpipe band stood at the end of the pier and played bagpipes as a farewell to the ship until we exited the harbor. It was a very nice touch. :)

 

Service: For the most part was great, except the pursers desk. First they screwed up our key-only cards making them all for the same room instead of one of each. Then they deactivated my dad's card saying it was reported as missing. On the first night we still were missing one of our bags, so at 8pm I went to the pursers and it was sitting in the lobby... not only was the Carnival tag ripped off of it, but the business card I keep in the tag holder was also gone. Apparently they took it out to find me but never located my room to call me about it. I took my bag to the room and didn't bother them with a complaint.

 

One other minor thing that is probably picayune and petty is the photo gallery... it was set up so that if anyone was cashing out for pictures it would create a major cluster-up and you couldn't get by. Again, a minor complaint.

 

Debarking We did self assist which was a little bit of a disaster in that everyone just kind of mobbed deck three and it took us about an hour to get off the ship. After we got off the gangway we were waived in pretty quickly.

 

All in all we had a good time, mostly I think because of our location which was very convenient for the kids and for us. If anyone has questions or topics I left out please let me know.;)

[trvlexprt]

Ginny, Thanks for the review and glad you had a nice time.

Do you have any pictures that you will be posting?

I am sailing on the Victory in August and I gave up cabin 8430 for an aft corner wrap. What did you think of the difference?

Glad to hear that the service and food was good.

Did you have to ask for the robes or were they in the cabin already?

Thanks alot and sorry its over :)

Carol

[vjmatty]

Ginny, Thanks for the review and glad you had a nice time.

Do you have any pictures that you will be posting?

I am sailing on the Victory in August and I gave up cabin 8430 for an aft corner wrap. What did you think of the difference?

Glad to hear that the service and food was good.

Did you have to ask for the robes or were they in the cabin already?

Thanks alot and sorry its over :)

Carol

 

I will try to post some pictures but not sure how many came out. :o If you gave up 8430 for a corner you did fine size-wise. 8430 and its counterpart are bigger than the other flat aft balconies, but are not bigger than the wraparounds.

 

All three rooms had bathrobes already in them, we did not have to ask for them, in fact I had no idea they would be there. :)

[yogimax]

Thanks for a great review...

 

Did you enjoy the shows?

[vjmatty]

We didn't make it to many of the shows but I did enjoy the piano bar... also I forgot to mention I caught a cold halfway through the cruise, so make sure you pack a sweater for temperature changes! ;)

[Hannibal Smith]

Well I cruised on the Explorer of the Seas from Bayonne last September to Bermuda and it was night and day compared to the Victory. I felt like the Victory was built in the 1960s era compared to the new Explorer. The deck plan was horrible, with having to go up and down to get to 1 or 2 decks that would allow you to go from end to end w/o issue. The elevators would routinely skip floors even if they were empty. The food in the buffet lines was sub-par at best. I will say the dining room food was better and Malcom was a kick-ass cruise director. The shows were good and the comedians were outstanding.

[richstan]

Ginny, thanks for the review and tips!

[caren]

Hi Ginny..

 

I'll start by saying that we had a great time too.

 

Our experience with embarkationa and debarkation was the same as yours. No problem.

 

I thought the shop was beautiful and pretty well maintained. Once we figured out that decks 1 and 5 were the straight passage through the ship we didn't get lost very often.

 

We had an inside cabin 1435. Horrible. It was our first inside and we won't do that again, but particularly this cabin is extremely small and directly above the engine. So that whenever the ship started up and pulled in or out of port, the cabin didn't just vibrate...it had a massive seizure that was quite loud and scary. We found the beds and pillows to be uncomfortable and we didn't sleep really well due to this and the engine and DH and I had stiff necks most of the time.

 

The shows were excellent. We saw them all including the late night comics. The casino was very busy and pretty smoky. We went there twice and didnt stay long.

 

We also thought the food was good. Tried everything that had been recomended on the cc boards. Hamburgers, ruebens, pizza, and warm chocolate melting cake all lived up the their reputations. Dining room service was fair, not great not terrible and our table had alot of fun because of this. The dining room food was mostly very good as well. We stayed away from the buffet because the lines were just rediculous.

 

And as for activities for the adults during the day....there were very few!!!! On a colder route like this were sun bathing and swimming isn't easy, there should be alot more planned activities by the cruise director's staff. But we weren't sleeping well, so we took the down time during the day to nap.

 

The kid's program definitely had issues. I liked the director and one counselor very much, and my son spent alot of time there....but.....they are very disorganized. The staff doesn't really seem to have the same training as the previous kid's programs that we used on NCL. There were alot of issues with the kid's camp that I will take up with Carnival directly and do not want to go into here, but I only would leave my son there after a while if the director or the one other specific counselor was present. But in fairness, I will add that my son liked Camp Carnival and wanted to spend alot of time there.

 

Additionally about Camp Carnival....they are not as strict about the age groupings as I've heard here. My son is 9 and they allowed him in the 6 - 8 group after we started having problems with the lack of supervision in the 9 - 11 group. ANd I saw another 9 year old signed into that group and they told me that it's because his sister was in the younger group and they allowed them to stay together.

 

We loved the ship, we got alot of rest (not sleep), we enjoyed the music around the ship, the night time entertainment, the food and definitley the company. Lot's of nice people on this ship. I only saw friendly happy people. The crew was also nice and hard working. We enjoyed walking around Saint John.

 

A cruise is what you make of it. I had a really good time on this cruise, but the problems with the kid's program will probably stop me from sailing on Carnival again.

[buddyjo143]

Thank you thank you thank you.

 

We are going in 9 days and I cannot wait. DH so needs this vacation and it sounds like it will be relaxing for us.

[vjmatty]

Thanks for adding, caren! I am sorry about your room,I wasn't sure where you guys were staying.

 

I forgot one other tip... WHALES! On the second sea day between 845 and 9am we passed through an area where there were about a dozen whales swimming around and spouting not far from the ship. I don't know if this was a fluke or a common occurance, and have absolutely no idea where we were geographically but it is worth packing some binolculars if you happen to be out on deck the morning after Saint John day.

[caren]

Yes Ginny. Pat saw a whale one morning. The whales that you saw, a table mate at breakfast that day, saw them too. He kept trying to point them out to us, but we didn't see them.

 

I have to say that's what we missed most about a balcony. We really didn't see too much ocean because it was so cool on deck we weren't out there too much.

[JohnGaltny]

VJ & Caren,

 

Thanks for posting. We leave in about 10 days on the same trip so this was great timing.

[rellersi]

Yes Ginny. Pat saw a whale one morning. The whales that you saw, a table mate at breakfast that day, saw them too. He kept trying to point them out to us, but we didn't see them.

 

I have to say that's what we missed most about a balcony. We really didn't see too much ocean because it was so cool on deck we weren't out there too much.

 

Charlie saw the whales, I didn't, but she thought it was great, it was one of the reasons she wanted to do the Canada cruise.

As for the cruise, for the most part I thought it was fantastic also, we got to the port about 11:10 and were on the lido deck getting lunch at 11:45, was the only time that I did not see lines for the buffet or the hamburger/hot dog place at lunch time.

Except for the first night my meals were great, but I am easy to please. The first night the first couple of bites I took of my NY Strip were kind of tough, but once I got more toward the middle it was very good. Charlie thought the entire steak was tough, but enjoyed all other nights. We did the buffet out by the pool for breakfast every morning there were short lines, not too bad.

Tried lunch on the lido every day, I am a picky eater so was not thrilled with the selection and the lines were long, but the line to the burgers was outrageuos. This was our third time on Victory and there had never been lines like that before. Might have been timing, might have been too few staff there, I only saw two, on our previous cruises there were always at least 3.

The only other problem I had was at debarkation. The actual debarkation was no problem for us we were off the ship by 9:30, Self assist is chaotic though, they called deck 11 then 15 minutes before calling another deck and 5 minutes before they called the rest. I think everybody doing self assist decided to leave when the first deck was called. But our problem with debarkation was outside the terminal, we wanted a taxi and it took almost an hour to get one. Tip if you are going to take a taxi, try to go down stairs to the street and flag one down on your own, don't know if it will work, but can't be much worse. by the time we thought of that we had already been in line 1/2hr and did not want to leave the line. Next time I think I will drive to the port in spite of the price

[dtenery]

Just got off this cruise and was quite pleased. We've cruised Carnival before, as well as Celebrity and RCL. As perspective, I'll say my favorite cruising experience was Celebrity to Bermuda.

 

Getting on the ship was a breeze but of course leaving was a little bit of a nightmare because of so many self-assists (who wouldn't carry their own bags out on a 4 day cruise?!).

 

We actually thought they did a nice job of spacing out the adult activities and we got to do all we wanted to. (It can be frustrating some times to see nothing you want to do for 3 hours and then 2 things you'd love scheduled at the same time, but none of that this time.) We went to all the trivias and a few (not all) of the shows. We also both gamble so we'd just duck into the casino when not in the jacuzzi or at a game.

 

Food was good as well. Although I did find there was nothing that looked at all decent to me from the entrees on the final night. The starters were usually a much more interesting combo of choices. Desserts in the dining room were always yummy... from the buffet, not so much.

 

The staff was universally pleasant, but not in that "in your face" kinda way. I think I have tough standards when it comes to customer service and I was never disappointed by anyone who helped us on the ship.

 

I was a little worried about getting overrun by kids as its summer, but it seems Carnival (and their parents) did a pretty good job of keeping the kids busy.

 

I'd definitely recommend this cruise to friends.

[richstan]

Thanks to all the reviewers. This will be my first Canadian cruise and I was a little anxious on what to expect.

[Cassinster]

We are going the same cruise (7 days) in September, so we hope we will have as good of a time as all of you!

 

David

[maps]

What are the Camp Carnival hours? Are they open during port days and do you have to pay for that?

thanks

[nybumpkin]

What are the Camp Carnival hours? Are they open during port days and do you have to pay for that?

thanks

On sea days, Camp Carnival is usually open 9-12, 2-4, and then after dinner until 10. The hours may vary somewhat depending on the ship. Some nights they have dinner with Camp Carnival beginning at 5:45. The extra charges for babysitting start at 10:00 each night. Camp Carnival is open while you're in port; I think they ask only that if you're on board at lunchtime that you collect your child for lunch. (I haven't used Camp Carnival during the day when in port, though.) I don't think there's an extra charge during the day.

[Loralie]

Thanks for the review and I am glad to hear you had a good time. We will be there July 5th and am getting so excited as the days get closer.

 

Thanks for the tip about the pizza/bar area near the pool. We are going with my family, a group of 15 people total, and I am sure the kids will like to be in the pool while the adults will like to have a drink or 2. LOL.

 

Loralie

[sleeples23]

Ginny,

 

Thanks for your review. I loved the piano bar when I last sailed on the victory and I'm hopeful I will have a similar experience this time. Do you remember who the entertainer was? Since you spent a lot of time there, I'm guessing he must have done a good job with it.

 

Thanks,

Donna:o