Valor Review, Spring Break with PICS

[Indestructible]

lol!:o

 

 

 

chris answered that before me, and thank you.

 

 

 

man i did a ton of research, too bad you couldn't come to eden rock, it's a nice place to snorkel.

 

I did make it there and to the dive shop. There was a T shirt for devil's grotto that I saw on line and I got it. I was kinda bummed when I saw that a beginner dive was $99. That's what I paid for snuba. Originally, I had decided to skip Snuba, but it was my b'day the day we were in Cayman and my BIL and nephew wanted to try it too. And, to my surprise, mis sis and here grand daughter went to HELL and back to get me a t-shirt. Angel and Tori ( the girls I was with at cave tubing ) also made me a sweet souvenir gift of things they found for me throughout the ship over 2 days. They surprised me with both AND a Happy Birthday desert with Efrhain ( our waiter ) leading the Happy Birthday song.

 

I couldn't have spent my b'day this year any better.

Chris:cool:

[singbluesilver1]

at least he didnt have on a banana hammock

[newt98]

after coz we were on to our last sea day. our plan for the day, wait, no more plans, just as they say now, chillaxin'.

 

we woke up to calm seas for the very first time. the seas were rough for pretty much the entire trip, even worse than last year on the eastern route, which is generally rougher than the western.

 

we didnt do too much today. walked around a bit turned in a guy to security, and ate food. today i finally had the burgers from the grille, i had two of them, man they are the best.

 

the girls layed out in the sun and went cruising the ship. i found elaine from our roll call and talked with her a bit. then i found mark sitting on his laptop downloading pictures. i had seen that he had a piece of the carrott cake from the coffee and dessert bar, and i had wanted to try it, so i got one. i thought it was pretty good, he didn't like it as much as i did.

 

it was hard to sit and talk because we wer in the area of the teen club, and there were kids on these couches all week that were almost always loud, yes my kids were there at times also. but cmon man, chill the heck out. one of these little....., well one of these kids had some damn bongos that his parents must have thought would be a great addition to his noise making abilities. because as i'm trying to sit and have a conversation with mark, this little.....well this kid couldn't keep his hands off of his new toy. i hope that kid is banging the living heck out of that thing in his parents house right now.

 

me and my sweetie after her recovery from the night before

 

 

i never thought i'd be on a boat, got sunglasses and my flippy floppies! (it's a song sorry)

 

 

ice carving

 

 

ice carving finished

 

 

from our balcony

 

 

patrick and his new "friend". yes, i embarrassed him and snuck up and took a pic, ha ha!

[newt98]

we had one last night at the dinig room, and patrick asked if he could were his new sombrero into the dining room. at first i said no but then i was like, "what the heck, if people are going to show up in costumes, and sexually explicit t-shirts, then why in the world can't he wear a sombrero?"

 

i think they had prime rib for the last meal, i had two.

 

 

last drinks of the cruise

 

 

dig in goofy

 

 

guys from the next table took our pic for us. we didnt meet them until the very last night, they were from boston, and we wished we had met them sooner, we would run in them later that evening

 

 

sleeping gringo, gringo isn't a bad word is it? if it is, i'm sorry. i think gringo means whitey or something like that

 

 

washington dining room lower

 

 

and all in the world is perfect

[BJHOOSER]

I caught a pic of the tender when you were in Belize and it is the same type i had in Catalina, or at least it looks like it. When you get on, there are a few steps (5?)down, and not much room after that is there? Scooter is 24" by 45" so would there be room to put it? I hope so, the rolator is one i still have to walk a lot but can stop and sit for a minute. Tire easily using it and a pain to take along. Thanks for your info.

Your speedo man suit covered a lot more then the speedo man we had on the Triumph, his was half that size and he wore a different one several times a day. He sure had a nice collection of them....lol

[newt98]

we did go to the carnival legends show, it was the first full show we watched all week, we didnt want it to end. it was funny, they usually are. i've seen alot of people complain about the legends show but it's more entertaining than the deck party.

 

after that we walked around a bit before heading off to bed.

 

we awoke in port in miami to beautiful weather. we gathered our belongings and headed up to lido for breakfast. after eating at the buffett we just hung out on the lido waiting for our munber to be called, number 17. we dont fly out until the next day, so we were in no hurry.

 

they kept making announcements about how great the disembark was going, that should have been the first clue.

 

our number got called and we waited a bit longer, we should have kept waiting even longer though. we headed to the elevators and went down to deck 3. it was so backed up, we couldn't even get out of the elevators. do you think people would move to let us out? yes, one would think that's the right thing to do. but alas, it did not happen. nobody moved, they stood there looking at us like we should just turn on our hover jets and fly over them. finally patrick found small gap and started to move. (yea, post #1000)

 

 

 

 

morning in miami

 

 

 

sittin on the deck of the bay, i mean boat, sorry, singing to myself again.

 

 

one last shot of the boat

[newt98]

I caught a pic of the tender when you were in Belize and it is the same type i had in Catalina, or at least it looks like it. When you get on, there are a few steps (5?)down, and not much room after that is there? Scooter is 24" by 45" so would there be room to put it? I hope so, the rolator is one i still have to walk a lot but can stop and sit for a minute. Tire easily using it and a pain to take along. Thanks for your info.

 

Your speedo man suit covered a lot more then the speedo man we had on the Triumph, his was half that size and he wore a different one several times a day. He sure had a nice collection of them....lol

 

 

i think the scooter will fit, i'm sure they will do everything they can to accomodate you from what i've seen. the pic of his speedo doesn't really do it justice. if you saw it from the from the front you would have though he was smuggling one of those spider monkeys from roatan.

[newt98]

we had to stand there crammed in like sardines for about fifteen minutes before we started to move. we got off the boat, and headed down to get our luggage. that went fairly quick. then we headed to homeland security hoping we would get through with our cubans, just kidding, maybe.

 

made it through fine and waited out front for the hertz van to pick us up to take us to their rental location. the driver wasn't really paying attention, and he just zoomed right by. so we waited another fifteen minutes for him to come back around. by the time he came back, there were two other groups that needed a ride to hertz also. a guy from one of those groups waved him down, and he pulled up in front of us. so we loaded up and hopped in. there wasn't enough room for anybody else because it was just a regular van. the guy that waved him down was all bent out of shape, but sorry man, we had been waiting there a whole lot longer than he had.

 

it was a short ride to hertz where they gave us a full size van, which was fine with me, we needed the room. we headed to FLL which is where our hotel is.

 

i'm running out of stuff to write about. if you can't tell, i don't want this to end either. we got to the hotel, got some food, then went back down to the FLL beach to shop and hang out.

 

 

outside the terminal

 

 

nobody was happy to leave the ship

 

 

nobody

 

 

and i mean nobody

 

 

FLL beach

 

 

FLL beach

[newt98]

headed to the airport the next morning, it was a zoo! i knew right then we had a lond day ahead of us. we had tiny ones sitting in front of us day long crying. it was horrible. then one of the little ones puked all over her mom, yea, that smelled wonderful!

 

but we made it home, no major incindents, no injuries, and everybody had the time of their lives.

 

in miami airport

[luvtocruise11]

awesome review

[TortieGal]

GREAT REVIEW! Heck, I'm sad for you that your cruise ended. ;)

[newt98]

we had a truly wonderful trip. i wish it wasn't over, and i look forward to my next cruise with my wife next year. we are cruising with some friends we made on our cruise last year, and we are trying to convince mark and mandi from this years roll call to come with us next year on the victory.

 

cruising with kids is definately different than cruising without. i think i felt like i had to be more responsible and couldn't let loose as much as i have on past cruises. but that's ok, because we were together, we still had a blast.

 

i probably wont cruise at that time of the year again though. we like to cruise early february, but had to do this one on spring break. there were not many college kids on board, and the ones that were, were well behaved. there were a lot of kids, high school age and lower, ashley actully ran into a guy that she graduated with two years ago, and they still habg out with the same friends, so that was funny.

 

but back to the kids on the ship. they weren't overwhelming, i coach football at this age group so they don't really bother me, except for the kids that run down the halls, and through the elevator areas. kids running around actually drives me up a wall. the other thing is the are around the game room and club O2 area. this area is also shared by the coffee and dessert bar and has alot of comfy couches for sitting. these dang kids overran this whole are, and i like to use the area to sit. but oh well, just one of those things i guess.

 

we cashed in travelers checks before we would go on shore at the pursers desk. you should do this at night, or very early in the morning, it gets backed up at times.

 

our safe wouldn't open once and they had a guy there within five minutes to get it opened, and it never happened again.

 

now that the CD has been removed from the ship i can tell you that he.....well, i guess i'm just glad for the current pax that they have a different CD.

 

it really was a great ship and a great cruise, i wish i had more to say, but i think i'm about done, which is sad, because now it's officially over.

 

the family at the mayan princess in roatan

[newt98]

awesome review

 

thank you

 

GREAT REVIEW! Heck, I'm sad for you that your cruise ended. ;)

 

 

thanks, why does it have to end?:(

[singbluesilver1]

spider monkey hee hee

[sophie_lou]

We're sailing on the Valor on the 19th and I thought I was already as excited as I could be...until I started reading your review and seeing your beautiful pictures. You've got me super excited now! Thanks for sharing your experience with all of us!

[newt98]

We're sailing on the Valor on the 19th and I thought I was already as excited as I could be...until I started reading your review and seeing your beautiful pictures. You've got me super excited now! Thanks for sharing your experience with all of us!

 

thanks, i don't know what to do with myself now. i guess i need to start getting ready for the next one, but i don't think i'm ready to close the book on this one.:(

[mano123]

Dude you are the Man.. the Review czar lol.. I hope everyone looks to this review as a template for thiers, I know I will ... 100 some odd days to go can't wait...

 

.. Im doing excursions on all the islands except Grand Cayman.. just wanted to hang out at the beach..one question any one can jump in i guess ---is there a beach in walking distance from the port?

[ebandive]

Fantastic review! You kept me thoroughly entertained! Thanks! :)

[ellenmb]

We went on the Valor last (2008) May and loved her...Thank you for sharing your fun cruise and keeping our memories going....I may just have to book the Vaor again!

[sports-mom]

I really enjoyed reading your review and looking at all your wonderful pictures. I'm bummed its over too. :p

[WAcruisers]

Loved reading your review and seeing your pictures! What hotel did you stay in at FLL? Was it close to the beach?

Again you have a beautiful family and your review :D

[Jeans*Fanatic]

 

last drinks of the cruise

 

 

What drinks were the twins drinking? That looks really really good!!! I might have to add that to my list of drinks to have.

[bitt72]

What type of lens did you use for most of your shots? I have 5 and don't wont to take them all!! Sailing Valor 5/10/09!!!

[newt98]

Dude you are the Man.. the Review czar lol.. I hope everyone looks to this review as a template for thiers, I know I will ... 100 some odd days to go can't wait...

 

.. Im doing excursions on all the islands except Grand Cayman.. just wanted to hang out at the beach..one question any one can jump in i guess ---is there a beach in walking distance from the port?

 

thanks. seven mile beach is a short taxi ride away. i've heard it's about six bucks per person. we walkled to eden rock to snorkel, but no beach.

 

Loved reading your review and seeing your pictures! What hotel did you stay in at FLL? Was it close to the beach?

Again you have a beautiful family and your review :D

 

thank you. we stayed at courtyard marriott fort lauderdale beach. it was directly across the street from the beach, right on the strip. it was really nice, and i hope to stay there again.

 

What drinks were the twins drinking? That looks really really good!!! I might have to add that to my list of drinks to have.

 

girls had blue hawaii.

[newt98]

What type of lens did you use for most of your shots? I have 5 and don't wont to take them all!! Sailing Valor 5/10/09!!!

 

 

i brought two lenses, the 18-55, and a 75-300.

i ended up using the 18-55 most of the time.