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Carnival Vaor Review - The Good, Ok, The Bad And The Ugly

luv2cruiseny

By luv2cruiseny,
in Carnival Cruise Lines

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luv2cruiseny

luv2cruiseny

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Part 1 -

 

The Good -

We flew into Ft. Lauderdale the day before the cruise and rented a car from Thrifty. The rental was $30.00 and being there were 4 of us it was a great deal. We stayed at the Intercontinental in Miami – a quick 30 minute drive from FLL Airport. The hotel was beautiful. Booked it on Priceline for $105 (including tax). Traveled to Little Havanna for lunch at Versaille (great restaurant, wonderful food) and went to Lincoln Road for dinner (great place to visit and walk around).

 

Embarking and disembarking were a breeze – We arrived at the terminal at 1:30 – the line was long – but it moved along at a pretty good pace - we were on board by 2:30 with no problems. Our cabin was ready and we dropped our carry-on’s off and attempted to get our bearing of the ship. Disembarking took just about as long. The numbered luggage tags definitely worked much better than the color coded ones. We were off the ship and waiting for the Thrifty shuttle by 10:15.

 

Our cabin – we had an aft balcony for the first time – cabin 8450 – it’s next to the wrap around. Our balcony was huge and from what I could tell it was bigger than the rest of the aft balcony’s. We met a lot of the aft balcony passengers while hanging out on the balcony. I’ve stayed in an inside cabin, a regular balcony and a suite previous to this – I didn’t feel any more rocking in the aft cabin than I did in any of the others. We also did not have any problem with any debris on the balcony or soot as posted in other reviews. It may be the way this ship is set up directly above our cabin was the Promethius Pool and it has a glass wall instead of a railing.

 

We spent most of our time at the AFT end of the ship so our cabin was in a really good location for us.

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luv2cruiseny

luv2cruiseny

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...more... more ! I leave in about 2 weeks! We are also from LI. Were did you drop off the rental car? Thanks!:D

 

 

Return the rental car to Thrifty - miami airport and they have a free shuttle to the port. We also rented a car on the return for $26.00 - picked up at the port by Thrifty and drove up to ft. lauderdale. - it was cheaper than the shuttle for 4 people.

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luv2cruiseny

luv2cruiseny

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Is that it?

 

 

no, that's not it - stay tuned - more to come

 

Our room steward – Freddy was fantastic as well as our wait staff Abigail and Eddy from the Philipines in the Lincoln dining room.

St. Martin – beautiful port – we took a 2 ½ hour tour with SXM Tours. It cost us $20.00 per person and we were able to see both the Dutch and French side of the Island. We made a short stop (about ½ hour) at Orient Beach. Clothing Optional on one side of the beach. On the advice of our tour guide (Brooks) we ate lunch in Escargot on the Dutch side of the Island close by the Boardwalk along the shore. I had the best Quiche Lorraine I have ever eaten in my life. BEWARE: If you do eat here, they attempted to tell us that they do not accept credit cards for lunch – we needed to speak to the manager to get them to accept our credit card payment. While we were in St. Martin, there was this crazy wind storm (no rain, just intense wind) one of the umbrellas on Orient Beach was lifted out of the sand and propelled by the wind. A gentlemen on the beach was hit in the arm by the pointy end of the umbrella.

The OK

The Food - it was okay - I was disappointed with any of the beef dish’s I had. The food was always hot in the dining room, no problem with that. We did not eat at Scarlet’s, but our tablemates did and said it was fabulous. The buffet always had some nice varied choices. I didn’t have the pizza – but my cruise mates did and enjoy it – the burgers were very good as was the Rueben from the deli.

The layout of the ship - my forth cruise and the first time I was confused on the ship – I just couldn’t seem to get my bearings. We were on the 8th deck (which goes all the way through) but we spent a lot of time going up and down and around to get from one end of the ship to the other. The décor was also okay – the Hero’s theme works well for this ship - it was not gaudy or over done.

St. Thomas - been there before – it’s very commercial – lots of shopping – you really need to know what you are looking for to get a good deal. We did take a taxi over to Megan’s Bay beach ($8 per person and $4 entrance fee to the beach). It was beautiful – really cool to be in the water and have the fishs swim around you.

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luv2cruiseny

luv2cruiseny

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More Okay -

 

Piano Bar - Mark was very good - (I am a smoker) - but this room did become very smokey.

 

Galley Tour - was pretty cool - first time I ever did one.

 

The Bad:

 

A couple of things I thought (my own opinions) were Bad -

 

The Casino (not the ships fault) didn't win a penny and I was in the casino at least once a day - very disappointing.

 

Nassau - yuck - Atlantis was very nice - the Straw Market - horrid - I walked up one aisle and between the heat and the smell that was enough for me. Just as we returned the ship there was a torrential downfall (not CArnival's fault either)

 

Dancing - alloted time to dance 10 pm to 11 pm - not really enough time - at promptly 11 pm the disco turned into Hip Hop and Rap and anyone over the age of 25 (maybe 30 tops) left. Very very disappointing.

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corinnv

corinnv

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Dancing - alloted time to dance 10 pm to 11 pm - not really enough time - at promptly 11 pm the disco turned into Hip Hop and Rap and anyone over the age of 25 (maybe 30 tops) left. Very very disappointing.

:( I thought I saw on a posted set of capers that there was a night of 80's music.

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