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tbmrt

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About Me

  • Location
    Near Tampa, Florida
  • Interests
    Golf, travel, snorkeling
  • Favorite Cruise Line(s)
    RCCL, Celebrity, NCL, Princess, MSC. Virgin Voyages
  • Favorite Cruise Destination Or Port of Call
    Southern Caribbean

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3,000+ Club (3/15)

  1. So different than Virgin Voyages...The night club was packed.
  2. There is a standing joke in my family...They know how much I dislike Sweet Caroline song. I think just too many events and happenings with this playing. Oh well, one more won't hurt!
  3. Do you receive an earlier check in time if you sign in early on the 45th day? I just got off a Virgin Voyages cruise and this is how they do it.
  4. Interested in this as well. Tx
  5. Hi Cantgetin! Recognized your name from the VV CC board from all the help you gave me. Check there for my VV reviews if you haven't already. We enjoyed our 2 cruises in the past year on Scarlet Lady and Valiant Lady, but definitely will wait a few years before doing VV again due to the same restaurants, many of the same shows, etc. (Plus the cost have risen considerably and the perks lessened...We had $1,050 in loot and a $600 bar tab. In the meantime, we chose a totally different, easy, relaxing cruise in 12/24 from our home port of Tampa. We've cruised on Celebrity many times in the past and know the vibe is totally different.
  6. Never cruised to New Orleans before...Arriving at 9:30 AM...Best side of ship for viewing New Orleans from ship as we approach the city? Any info appreciated.
  7. Getting caught up after getting home from our cruise on March 2nd. My trip report follows. Thanks to everyone who helped me plan along the way. Thanks to all of you for the help and answers you gave me to my many questions. We've decided to book a Celebrity cruise from Tampa close to home to New Orleans to Costa Maya and Cozumel in December just to do something quick and easy. Have to tell you that I posted one thing in the CC boards there and already got a snippy response. I found this happened with many other forums except for this VV one! I hope to sail VV again down the road, but want to wait awhile since we just did two in a year. Trip Report – Virgin Voyages Valiant Lady 2/24 – 3/2/24 Very long….but I like to keep these reports for future reference. This trip was originally planned on the Brilliant Lady, but was changed to Valiant Lady. We had cruised on Scarlet Lady from Miami in June and loved it so we decided to book the VL from San Juan to the Southern Caribbean in February. We had 3 balcony cabins, 1 for my husband and me, 1 for our friends and 1 for my sister/daughter. We had gotten a “coupon” onboard so we received $1,050 in loot and a $600 bar tab. Some of the loot was from our travel agent. We had about $33 left on our bar tab when we disembarked and used the loot for small diamond earrings, t-shirts, etc. Since this was a port intensive cruise, we weren’t onboard all day so we never completed the $600 bar tab. (We were surprised at this because we do enjoy our drinks!) Didn’t bring the 2 bottles of wine onboard and had a total of 3 bottles of Moet since our 3 cabins booked Splash of Romance. The weather for the whole cruise was sunny and comfortable onboard and at all the ports. Highest about 82 degrees; coldest about 64. We have cruised on many cruiselines and thought the Valiant Lady rocked more than the others. Our friends agreed. Not a big deal, but you could feel it. On 2/23 we flew from Tampa to San Juan on Jet Blue. The only direct flight we could get left at 6AM so we were up very early. Jet Blue’s seats and wifi were excellent. The hotels near the Port in SJ were extremely expensive ($500 and up!) so we decided to go with an airbnb in the Rosalina/Carolina section of Puerto Rico, about a 10 min Uber to the ship. Ubers were numerous and not too expensive. The airbnb was plain, but had everything we needed and a small pool/courtyard to share with others. Check in time was 4pm, but we could leave our luggage in the office before that. We ate at a pizza place near the airbnb and the pizza was the most amazing I’ve ever eaten (I’m originally from NJ so know good pizza!) Pretty expensive though. Had breakfast at Kasalta’s near the airbnb. What a great place for breakfast. Everything from pastry to hot breakfasts, puddings, cake, etc. They had wine, sandwiches, etc as well. The coffee was terrific! On Saturday, 2/24 we ubered to the ship to drop off our luggage at 10AM, get checked in and obtain our ship’s bracelet. Had a few drinks across from the ship and went back at around 12:30…Walked into the terminal and was let on the ship around 1. My daughter was able to book shows there before getting on the ship. The rest of us could not do so. She was able to book everything we wanted. Had previously booked our dinners at midnight on the 45th day before our cruise. Our cabin steward and his assistant were very friendly and cleaned our cabin once a day. We could request towels etc on the tablet that was in the room or by calling Sailor Services on phone or chatting on the app. I found that Sailor Services was definitely the place to chat for anything you need. The shower was big enough…Not too much space in the bathroom for cosmetics, etc. though. The bed and pillows were very comfortable. Booked the thermal spa that was part of our Splash of Romance package. While it was very pretty, the one hot tub only fit 2 people, didn’t have jets and water was just warm..not hot at all. There were 2 cold pools and 1 a bit larger pool with room temperature water. The heated seats were lukewarm and not comfortable. They had 2 steam rooms and a sauna which were nice. I think paying the $200 for the Splash of Romance helps if you don’t have a very early embarkation time, but we would never do the thermal spa again. The candies they left a few times during the cruise weren’t that good. We ate at all the restaurants except Test Kitchen. My husband loved it on Scarlet Lady, but I really disliked it. So we headed to the Galley for dinner that night…The butter chicken and Beef Wellington were excellent. The Wake was a big disappointment. Steaks were very tough, lamp chops dry. Service was very slow. Did brunch and same situation. Love Extra Virgin..food and service was wonderful.Pink Agave was good and Razzle Dazzle was just okay. Most of our group didn’t care for the food at Gunbae and the server didn’t speak good English so we had no idea what we were eating. Fun playing the drinking game though. We ordered Ship Eats twice in the early morning. Came in about ½ and hour and although food/coffee were excellent, they were cold. The PJ Party was changed to The Manor. We were disappointed that it wasn’t on deck and headed to The Manor…Just overly packed so we didn’t stay long. Tortola - Went to Jost Van Dyke White Bay on a VV excursion. Great time with excellent painkiller drinks. We stayed on the ship in Guadeloupe. 2 in our group went on a private kayak tour and enjoyed it. Barbados – Did a catamaran tour with private company…Just 9 people on it. Food was amazing and service great…We had a wonderful time. St. Lucia – Did private speedboat excursion to Jalousie Beach. Absolutely beautiful.On our Sea Day we did Loteria bingo which we love. Lots of margaritas and fun. Also did slot pull with our FB group. Got our $ back plus just a bit. Antigua - Walked around town and came back to enjoy the ship. Scarlet Night was absolutely amazing...music, dancing, watching acrobats, etc. Loved Misbehave and Carlos the Diva - best ever. Left our luggage outside the doors by 10 pm. Went to brunch the next morning and then easily picked up our luggage in the terminal. Headed to a Resort Pass hotel, Sheraton Casino Convention Ctr to spend the day. Fabulous service, good food and drinks. Left the resort by Uber about 3:30 pm and headed to airport for our approximate 7:30 flight. USDA and TSA both pretty empty! Our United flights were fine (4 of us). We received a notice that our Jet Blue flight was delayed an hour. My sister told me to keep watching our email because often Jet Blue moves the flight back to its original time. Sure enough we took off just a little after the originally planned time. Got home to Tampa around 11 PM. Slept the whole flight.
  8. Here is my trip report from our first VV cruise in June 2023...Last trip in 2/24 will follow. Trip report Virgin Voyages Scarlet Lady Loved Virgin Voyages Scarlet Lady cruise….Already thinking about next one! Bought placeholder w/perks onboard. Although we had 2 GPS going, we must have missed something and ended up not going through 395 Miami Tunnel. No traffic from Land O Lakes to that point, but really took forever to get to terminal. Next time will consider flying from Tampa to Miami. Did fine exiting the ship around 8:30 AM on a Wednesday thru tunnel. Embarkation Day – had a 1:45 time assigned. Got to ship around 1 pm and got on ship exactly at 1:45…No leeway in boarding times at that time of day. Sat down immediately on entering ship and booked every event we wanted. Had previously booked all dining at around 11:30 PM, the night before 45 day booking window opened. Got to cabin in aft of ship and found it to be efficient with App use and places to store things. Had problem with safe twice. Turned out it needed to have a new battery installed. Our steward was OK..Just a Hi in the hallway which as fine with us. We really didn’t need much. Cleaning, water, etc taken care of in the morning promptly. Pushed button on app for any extras we needed in afternoon/evening like towels, ice, water. Had a great time and did not miss the usual all inclusive drink package which was surprising. Got $300 bar tab and $300 loot w/booking promo. We used about $400 in drinks and ended up using the remaining $200 in loot for souvenirs, in casino (can use loot, but only can cash out winnings…do not get loot back. Had difficulty getting same light beers at various bars. Liked Amstel Light, but not available everywhere. No mojitos since there was no mint available. Martinis not too good. Husband sent a few back. Got one at Extra Virgin that was about 1/3 glass full and way too much vermouth. Waiter and manager very apologetic. Manager gave us a new martini filled almost to the top. Husband gave quality of that one about a 7 out of 10. Good enough! Loved the frozen and regular margaritas at most restaurants and bars. Didn’t get to see Ships in the Night or Ship Show….Just too tired. Scarlet Night was moved to Red Room which was very disappointing, but we decided to not go and wait til our next VV to do that event by pool. Loved Duel Reality, Untitled Dance Party Thing, Loteria Bingo, Bingo with the Diva.(Carlos is amazing..Prizes from about $500 to $2,200 (4 games). He did a Liza Minelli skit which we loved), Great margaritas and shots included in Loteria cost ($40). Main con with the cruise was the layout of the ship. Felt like we were always walking in circles due to the left/right of ship configuration and going to 7 to get to 6 sometimes, etc. After 5 nights on ship, we still felt like we were getting lost. Room service ordered in wee hours of morning and delivered about 45 minutes later. Food hot and good. Favorite Bar…On the Rocks. Loved the hammock, shower, and bedside table in cabin that can be turned over to use on balcony to give one more room to eat, etc. My eating preferences were Extra Virgin and The Wake. Foodie husband loved Test Kitchen, Pink Agave. Great pizza, hot dogs in Social Club just OK. Spent less time at pool than we usually do on other cruiseships. Not much seating around pool and pool is ridiculously small. Did a lot more onboard on sea days than we usually do and more time on balcony. Puerto Plata – Took free trolley from ship to walk through shops (not much there) to pool/lazy river…Wonderful with lots of seating areas. Drinks were a bit weak…..$14 for a pina colada - $4 for a bottle of water. Nice day. Bimini…Great time poolside with wonderful DJ & Happenings Cast. Really nice beach. Bar service very slow. Didn’t care for curry and other food. Loved the rum cake!
  9. Sorry....I did ask that already. Had a brain fart and forgot.
  10. I decided to book a guarantee Concierge cabin on the Constellation. Have not put deposit down yet. Any awful guaranteed Concierge cabins? Tx
  11. I'm trying to decide between a standard balcony and a concierge guaranteed. Thanks!
  12. Getting caught up after getting home from our cruise on March 2nd. My trip report follows. Thanks to everyone who helped me plan along the way. Trip Report – Virgin Voyages Valiant Lady 2/24 – 3/2/24 Very long….but I like to keep these reports for future reference. This trip was originally planned on the Brilliant Lady, but was changed to Valiant Lady. We had cruised on Scarlet Lady from Miami in June and loved it so we decided to book the VL from San Juan to the Southern Caribbean in February. We had 3 balcony cabins, 1 for my husband and me, 1 for our friends and 1 for my sister/daughter. We had gotten a “coupon” onboard so we received $1,050 in loot and a $600 bar tab. Some of the loot was from our travel agent. We had about $33 left on our bar tab when we disembarked and used the loot for small diamond earrings, t-shirts, etc. Since this was a port intensive cruise, we weren’t onboard all day so we never completed the $600 bar tab. (We were surprised at this because we do enjoy our drinks!) Didn’t bring the 2 bottles of wine onboard and had a total of 3 bottles of Moet since our 3 cabins booked Splash of Romance. The weather for the whole cruise was sunny and comfortable onboard and at all the ports. Highest about 82 degrees; coldest about 64. We have cruised on many cruiselines and thought the Valiant Lady rocked more than the others. Our friends agreed. Not a big deal, but you could feel it. On 2/23 we flew from Tampa to San Juan on Jet Blue. The only direct flight we could get left at 6AM so we were up very early. Jet Blue’s seats and wifi were excellent. The hotels near the Port in SJ were extremely expensive ($500 and up!) so we decided to go with an airbnb in the Rosalina/Carolina section of Puerto Rico, about a 10 min Uber to the ship. Ubers were numerous and not too expensive. The airbnb was plain, but had everything we needed and a small pool/courtyard to share with others. Check in time was 4pm, but we could leave our luggage in the office before that. We ate at a pizza place near the airbnb and the pizza was the most amazing I’ve ever eaten (I’m originally from NJ so know good pizza!) Pretty expensive though. Had breakfast at Kasalta’s near the airbnb. What a great place for breakfast. Everything from pastry to hot breakfasts, puddings, cake, etc. They had wine, sandwiches, etc as well. The coffee was terrific! On Saturday, 2/24 we ubered to the ship to drop off our luggage at 10AM, get checked in and obtain our ship’s bracelet. Had a few drinks across from the ship and went back at around 12:30…Walked into the terminal and was let on the ship around 1. My daughter was able to book shows there before getting on the ship. The rest of us could not do so. She was able to book everything we wanted. Had previously booked our dinners at midnight on the 45th day before our cruise. Our cabin steward and his assistant were very friendly and cleaned our cabin once a day. We could request towels etc on the tablet that was in the room or by calling Sailor Services on phone or chatting on the app. I found that Sailor Services was definitely the place to chat for anything you need. The shower was big enough…Not too much space in the bathroom for cosmetics, etc. though. The bed and pillows were very comfortable. Booked the thermal spa that was part of our Splash of Romance package. While it was very pretty, the one hot tub only fit 2 people, didn’t have jets and water was just warm..not hot at all. There were 2 cold pools and 1 a bit larger pool with room temperature water. The heated seats were lukewarm and not comfortable. They had 2 steam rooms and a sauna which were nice. I think paying the $200 for the Splash of Romance helps if you don’t have a very early embarkation time, but we would never do the thermal spa again. The candies they left a few times during the cruise weren’t that good. We ate at all the restaurants except Test Kitchen. My husband loved it on Scarlet Lady, but I really disliked it. So we headed to the Galley for dinner that night…The butter chicken and Beef Wellington were excellent. The Wake was a big disappointment. Steaks were very tough, lamp chops dry. Service was very slow. Did brunch and same situation. Love Extra Virgin..food and service was wonderful.Pink Agave was good and Razzle Dazzle was just okay. Most of our group didn’t care for the food at Gunbae and the server didn’t speak good English so we had no idea what we were eating. Fun playing the drinking game though. We ordered Ship Eats twice in the early morning. Came in about ½ and hour and although food/coffee were excellent, they were cold. The PJ Party was changed to The Manor. We were disappointed that it wasn’t on deck and headed to The Manor…Just overly packed so we didn’t stay long. Scarlet Night was absolutely amazing...music, dancing, watching acrobats, etc. Loved Misbehave and Carlos the Diva - best ever. Tortola - Went to Jost Van Dyke White Bay on a VV excursion. Great time with excellent painkiller drinks. We stayed on the ship in Guadeloupe. 2 in our group went on a private kayak tour and enjoyed it. Barbados – Did a catamaran tour with private company…Just 9 people on it. Food was amazing and service great…We had a wonderful time. St. Lucia – Did private speedboat excursion to Jalousie Beach. Absolutely beautiful.On our Sea Day we did Loteria bingo which we love. Lots of margaritas and fun. Also did slot pull with our FB group. Got our $ back plus just a bit. Antigua - Walked around town and came back to enjoy the ship. Left our luggage outside the doors by 10 pm. Went to brunch the next morning and then easily picked up our luggage in the terminal. Headed to a Resort Pass hotel to spend the day. Fabulous service, good food and drinks. Left the resort by Uber about 3:30 pm and headed to airport for our approximate 7:30 flight. USDA and TSA both pretty empty! Our United flights were fine (2 of us). We received a notice that our Jet Blue flight was delayed an hour. My sister told me to keep watching our email because often Jet Blue moves the flight back to its original time. Sure enough we took off just a little after the originally planned time. Got home to Tampa around 11 PM. Slept the whole flight. Although I thought most things on Valiant Lady were fine, I don’t think we will cruise with VV for awhile due to same restaurants and most shows. We enjoyed our past cruises on Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Princess, NCL and Windsurf but think we’ll stick to land vacations for awhile. We had gone to Ecuador and the Amazon a few years ago and it was wonderful.
  13. Trip report will follow, but in the meantime, thanks to everyone who was so helpful to me on this site. Thanks to you all, things went very smoothly. I would never have known so many pertinent things if it was not for your input. I passed along info from you to other cruisers who had no idea what to do in several circumstances so you helped others besides me.
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