Liberty's Memorial Day Review (photo heavy) - Including Extra Days in San Juan!!

Greetings and salutations!! Trippingpara here, but you can just call me Trip. As they say, all good things must come to an end. So was the case with our incredible cruise to the beautiful Southern Caribbean aboard the Carnival Liberty. This is my second review so hopefully I’ve learned a few things along the way to make this one as enjoyable and useful for as many peeps as possible. Please note that I write like I talk so there will be typos, poor grammar, run on sentences, improper use of punctuation and a couple misuses of words such as “affect” and “effect”. Oh yeah, and a few made up words too! Out of all of my degrees, an English degree is nowhere to be found! For those of you that don’t like to read but love to look at pictures, there will be a ton of photos as I am a complete camera geek. Please note that does not mean that I’m any good with the cameras; just that I am a geek with a bunch of cameras. With that said, here comes the legal mumbo jumbo…

DISCLAIMER: This review is a compilation of opinions from my family and me. Mostly me, but I occasionally listen to my DW and DD too. The statements made in this review are simply our opinions and views of what took place during our vacation and should carry absolutely no weight or value on how you may or may not feel about these things. If you do not like my opinions or take offense to them, feel free to bugger off and go pound sand. If you feel that strongly about it, please write your own review and tell us all about your opinions. There! Sound good? Cool!

Before I get too far into the specifics and day to day life of the cruise, for those that don’t like to read long reviews, here’s the down and dirty Cliff Notes version (don’t worry, there will be globs of photos later on):

SHIP: What can I say about the Carnival Liberty that hasn’t already been said before? She is beautiful! The artist theme throughout the ship is subtle yet very pleasing and easy on the eyes. We found the decor to be very serene and we loved the changing LED lights throughout the ship. Overall, the Liberty is in excellent condition for being just shy of her 10th birthday (launched on July 19, 2005). The continual weekly schedule does not appear to have worn her down at all. We did learn that they completely strip and reseal the pools every 3 years. Guess how we found that out. Yep, they were doing it on our cruise! Contractors were onboard that closed one pool at a time as they grinded away on it. It was amazing to watch them work so fast as it only took them about 1 ½ days per pool. Surprisingly, this didn’t seem to really overload the other open pools. Of course, with such a port intensive cruise, people were less inclined to spend their days (or nights) in the ship’s pools. The Liberty has the 2.0 upgrades so she has most of the bells and whistles that are out there for Carnival. There was Guys’ Burger Joint, Blue Iguana Cantina, Red Frog Rum Bar, Blue Iguana Tequila Bar, the Diamond Steakhouse (which we highly recommend!), the Serenity Deck, Sports Deck, Punchliner Club, EA Sports Bar, the Taste Bar and the Alchemy Bar to name a few.

One thing to take note of…several people have made comments previously about the shaking and vibrations that can be felt around the ship. Those comments are true. In several places throughout the ship I could feel vibrations that ranged from “that feels neat, giggle, giggle” to “who turned on the washer and why am I sitting on the bloody washing machine?!” Again, this never really distracted from the cruise and appeared to be random and in certain areas at certain times. i.e., we can be sitting at one table on Lido shaking like Little Richard while the family next to us is watching, trying to figure out what in the world is wrong with us. Nonetheless, my clearly scientific overall grade for the Liberty…”A+”.

ROOMS: This was our first time with a balcony. It was Cabin 1067. We were located right at the very end of the hallway on the Panorama Deck (Deck 10), starboard side near the elevators and the door to the Lido Deck. It was an awesome location (talk about ease of movement!) and surprisingly quiet. I was concerned with it being so close to the elevators and the Lido doorway but we never heard anything from our neighbors or people in the hallway or Lido Deck. Some people have stated that there is a loud hum emitting from the extremely large grate that is located next to our room…

You can see the large grate in the red section to the upper left of this photo. Our room is located directly to the right of that red square and grate.

…personally, we never heard any noise that we would consider to be bothersome. There was a hum emitting from it but it was barely noticeable unless we listened closely for it. Consider this to be a non-issue.

Another benefit to this room was its location directly above the gangway (okay, more like 10 levels above, but close enough!) which made for the perfect location to watch pier runners! It was also on the starboard side which is a great place to watch sail away from San Juan at night.

We had 3 adults in our room, but the cabin never felt over crowded or too small. There was some finagling in terms of getting dressed but it was never a problem. There was also plenty of storage space throughout the cabin even with 3 full size suitcases and 3 large carry on pieces. Overall grade…”A+”

FOOD: Of course with all of the foodies on Cruise Critic, I had to address this one. This is where my wife and I slightly differ in our opinions. That being said, since she is the smarter one (and generally always right), you may want to take my review here with a grain of salt (and a margarita for good measure – no sense breaking the salt out without a margarita handy!). Anyways, I’ll break the food down into four areas, the MDR, the Buffet, Guy’s Burgers/Blue Iguana and Diamonds Steakhouse.

MDR: We ate here every night except for the final night. The food here was generally excellent (although we did have one not so great meal – surprisingly the filet mignon was not very good nor was the key lime brulee). Corina from Romania was our head waitress. She was one of the best that we’ve seen. She had this knack of knowing what we wanted before we even knew what we wanted. She had a great sense of humor and seemed to enjoy playing around and laughing with us. She unfortunately got ill about mid-cruise and was not able to work so there was a sharp decline in the level of service that we got from her team afterwards. I was surprised to see such a drop off with the loss of just one person but that was the case. With Corina, grade is “A”, without Corina, grade is “C”.

Buffet: We ate a couple breakfasts and one dinner here. I found the food to be mediocre at best. My wife and daughter hold a better opinion of it than I do but they are also a lot nicer than me and all-around great gals. The omelets were very good but I found the other options to be about 45% being pretty good (not great) and 55% being subpar yet still slightly better than the gourmet dog food that my wife insists on feeding our dogs. However, I did find the pizza to be very good (in my eyes, even a bad pizza is still good) and of course, Trippette and me put a large dent into the ship’s onboard supply of the free soft serve ice cream. Grade: “C+”

Guy’s Burgers/Blue Iguana: We ate a couple lunches at Guy’s and a couple breakfasts at Blue Iguana. Hot diggity-dang that food was good!! Okay, so I’ve had better burgers before, but those burgers certainly weren’t free! I was a big fan of the Ringer burger and the fries were excellent. Now the Blue Iguana breakfast burritos were absolutely friggin’ outstanding!! I solely place all of the blame of my six-pack abs warping into a keg on them! We rarely had to wait for either place and the service was excellent as well (remember that there are two lines for Guys Burgers. Everyone kept lining up in one line and while the other line on the opposite side of the service counter was empty. We just walked right up and got our burgers!) Grade: “A++”

Diamond Steakhouse: We ate here on our first night in order to take advantage of the free bottle of wine. (I will never look a gift horse in the mouth, especially when that gift horse has free booze!). We selected the red wine and found it to be pretty good and slightly sweet but certainly not overbearing. We heard a lot of complaints about the quality of the red wine, but since we are not wine affectionatos (and probably wouldn’t know a good wine if it smacked us in the head), we found it to be pretty good. As for the actual food and service…top notch! It was clearly worth the additional $35 charge here. Although Trippette did not like her Filet Mignon (this seemed to be a theme with filet mignons on this cruise) but Lady Trip loved her Chilean Sea Bass and my Cowboy steak was to die for. Trippette is very young looking and our waiter was having fun with her by telling everyone that she has a fake ID. Very funny! Okay, I guess you had to be there! We highly recommend spending at least one night here. Grade: “A+”

ENTERTAINMENT: We actually did not partake in too much of the entertainment options on this cruise. We did see the Newlywed Game which was hysterical as usual and we saw the production show Rockers which was entertaining since it was free. I also watched the Hairy Chest contest (always entertaining) while my two ladies were enjoying the spa. It is hard for me to grade the entertainment as a whole since we barely partook in it but what we did see was enjoyable, so I’ll grade it as an “A”.

STAFF: As always, the staff onboard the Liberty was excellent. As I mentioned before, our head waitress Corina was outstanding but the service did suffer when she was away ill. Jayvon, our drink waiter was really good and funny too even though he would like to hang out at our table and talk to us for about 15 minutes while our food got cold. We must have been the fun table as our wait team seemed to like just hanging out chatting with us! Jerold, our room attendant was excellent as well and went above and beyond searching for Trippette’s lost iPhone (and found it). No matter what crazy things I could dream up, the staff was always able to provide and do so with a smile. Grade: “A-”

SPA: Lady Trip and Trippette took part in some of the spa services with a makeup show as well as a Swedish massage. They both really enjoyed the massage although Trippette wasn’t very fond of the attitude of the young masseuse that worked on her. Pleasant but rather condescending at the same time. Lady Trip really liked her masseuse but felt a large portion of the show and massage was them trying to aggressively sell spa products. Both felt that the staff pushed them to purchase expensive spa products and was rather degrading to them when they didn’t. Grade: “C“

CASINO: We did not partake in the casino facilities since I have about as much chance in winning anything as a broken down pony does in the Kentucky Derby! I did hear a lot of people complaining in other threads about the amount of cigarette smoke in the casino due to the more stringent smoking policy now in effect. I quit smoking almost 10 years ago and I have developed a strong aversion to the smell of cigarette smoke (much to my dismay and ire). However, I never found the smell to be overpowering or offensive. Now I never sat down to play nor did I ever stay for long periods of time in the casino so it may have become more bothersome over time. However, I did have some drinks at the casino bar and walked through the casino on several occasions and found the smell of smoke to be much lower than I found at the casinos in Las Vegas. The smell was also barely noticeable when walking by the outside of the casino. I found the complaints about the heavy smell of smoke in the casino to be a non-event on this cruise. Grade: “A”.

SMOKING: Since I brought it up above, I thought that I’d address the topic of smoking in a bit more detail as I see plenty of hotly debated threads on this. My biggest concern in regards to this topic was the balconies. Since we were the aft balcony on our deck, any cigarette/cigar smoke would blow downwind into our balcony. I have heard hundreds of people say that the smoke would never be smelled downwind because of the movement of the ship. When I was a smoker I would have wholeheartedly have agreed. Now, not so much. When I have my window down while driving, I can smell which cars in front of me has a person smoking in it. I was shocked to have discovered how far the smell can travel and just how noticeable it is. I was also shocked to discover just how much of an aversion I would get to it (I unfortunately get a really queasy stomach from it – don’t ask me why or how, I just do). I swore to myself that I would never be “that kind” of ex-smoker. Every smoker knows what I mean by that. So I try to be very tolerant and deal with it the best that I can.

Any ways, I never smelled or noticed anybody smoking on their balconies. I did notice quite a few people smoking and vaping on their balconies on the Splendor when we docked next to her in St. Kitts. I was also a little bit concerned about being on the starboard side of the Panorama Deck since that is the outside smoking area. Now I knew I was upwind of it so we would never smell it on our balcony but would I be walking into a cloud of smoke when we exited out onto the Lido area? The answer is a resounding “NO”. I never even noticed it and we constantly walked all the way across the outside area of the Panorama Deck through the entire smoking lounge area. I found the whole smoking issue to be a non-event (at least from the aspect of a non-smoker). Now for the smokers out there, our cabin would have been a perfect cabin as it was within feet of the smoking area and would have been very easy to step outside for the first smoke of the day or the last smoke of the night, etc. Non-smoker grade: “A”.

MUSIC: There was always some sort of live music going on somewhere on the ship at any given moment. The musicians were quite good and played a wide variety of music. Now you won’t hear modern rap music or heavy metal or hard rock since this is a family cruise and must appeal to a large audience. They tended to play a lot of older pop music, some modern dance, and a few country songs as well. All the songs tended to be very popular and commonly heard on the radio. Very easy to identify and to dance/sing to. Really helped to keep the “fun” vibe going. Like many posters have stated before, I would really like to have heard more Caribbean influenced music. There was some, but I would have enjoyed some more of it. Even though I prefer heavier music, I often found myself dancing and singing along to what was being played. As a musician myself, I found the various musicians to be very talented and versatile. Grade: “A”.

SECRET DECKS: The Liberty has a variety of secret decks including the Serenity Deck on Deck 12 and the gym on Spa Deck (Deck 11). As usual, these secret decks were almost always empty. I don’t think I ever saw more than 10 people on any of the secret decks at one time. Great place to watch us pull in or out of port. Also a great spot to star gaze as there are no lights forward of the bridge. The secret deck on Deck 10 is where the ships cameras are. I was always tempted to photobomb them but I always chickened out. Yes, I’m a wuss!

BEHIND THE FUN TOUR: This was our first time partaking in this tour. Since our daughter just graduated from Virginia Tech with a degree in Hospitality, she was extremely interested in seeing what goes on behind the scenes. The tour cost $95 per person and lasted almost 4 hours. It was held on the morning of sea day and was well worth it. We will definitely be doing this on the inaugural run of the Vista next year! We got to see the ship’s bell, laundry services, back stage, dancer’s dressing rooms, the training center, crew lounge, the main galley, crew’s quarters, crew’s mess, captain’s mess, sick bay, warehouses, engine control room and finally the bridge. The captain came out and spoke to us for a while and we got pictures taken with him. The tour ended with some champagne and mimosas and we were given a bag-style backpack with a Carnival hat, lanyard and a carved swan bar of soap. When we returned to our cabin, there were copies of the photos they took as well as a plate of chocolate covered strawberries. Too bad I’m allergic to strawberries but Lady Trip and Trippette loved them. Grade: “A+”

PORTS OF CALL: Puerto Rico; St. Thomas; Barbados; St. Lucia; St. Kitts; and St. Maarten. This is hands down, the best itinerary that Carnival offers! It is exhausting but an incredible journey at the same time. We did the exact same itinerary on the Victory a few years ago and we couldn’t wait to do it again. When Trippette said that she wanted to do this one, we jumped at the chance. Grade: “A+++++”

Coming up next...the full day by day review with a plethora of photos including food shots, Fun Times and whatever else anybody would like me to discuss. Bring it on!

Perfect timing. I was looking for a review with lots of pics, so hopefully this will be what I'm looking for. My Breeze cruise to nowhere is going to be cancelled, but Liberty will be sailing out of Galveston by then and has a four day cruise that sails the day before my Breeze cruise. Thinking about booking that once Breeze is cancelled but want to know more about Liberty first.

GREAT start!! Looking forward to the pics and reading the rest.

We did this itinerary in January on Liberty and agree that is the best one out there. :):)

:) Subscribing

I did this itinerary on 5/31 -6/7 Awesome Trip!!!

Okay, enough with the Cliff Notes, now it’s time for the meat and potatoes of my review. Let me give you a little background about us. I’m in my mid-forties (I celebrated my birthday on Memorial Day in St. Thomas!) and work in upper management for an international manufacturing company. I’m a pretty laid back guy that loves to travel and goes pretty crazy with planning trips. I think I missed my calling as a travel agent. You should see my Excel spreadsheets outlining our itinerary, back up options in case our primary excursion falls though, options to eat, etc. I won’t even get into my packing lists!! Oy vey!!

Joining me on this adventure was my lovely wife who we’ll call Lady Trip. She is in her early forties and works as a paralegal specializing in international biotech patents. Not quite sure what that means, but it sure sounds important! Well, the real reason for this cruise was to celebrate our daughter’s graduation from Virginia Tech (Go Hokies!!). So yeah, she was with us too! We’ll call her Little Trip. Huh? ....She’s shaking her fist at me….Okay, she doesn’t like that. Let’s go with Little Lady Trip. No…too long to type. Mini-Trip? Wait…I’m getting the stink eye. How about Trippette? Got a thumbs up. We’re good! Moving on…

As it became clear that our little babushka was actually growing up and going to graduate from college, Lady Trip and I decided to let her pick what she wanted for a graduation gift. The conversation went something like this:

Me: “So honey, what would you like as a graduation gift?”

Trippette: “A Beemer. Preferably an X5 in Midnight Blue or Graphite Charcoal.”

Me: Silence

Trippette: “Okay, okay. No need for the ‘Look’. How about a cruise??”

Me: “Sounds great!”

Trippette: “Seriously? That was easy. How about a ‘round the world cruise?”

Me: Silence

Trippette: Sigh. “Caribbean it is!!”

As we were planning this cruise, my initial thought was to get Trippette her own cabin. That conversation went something like this:

Me: “Honey, I was thinking of getting you your own cabin. A nice inside cabin across the hall from us. That way you can hang out with us on the balcony but you will still have your own room to get away from us ‘old folks’ at night ”

Trippette: “Dad, stop saying you’re old. And besides, I’m going to be hanging out with you guys the whole time. Might as well just all room together. Heck, I’ll sleep in the shower if I have to! I don’t care; I’m going to the Caribbean!”

Me: Smile

My wallet: Even bigger smile.

Trippette: “Plus that way you can buy me and Mom a spa package with the money you would have spent on the extra room.”

Me: Frown

Lady Trip: “That’s a great idea honey! I'd love some mother-daughter spa time!”

My wallet: Openly weeping

Seriously though, I love my daughter! She’s a female mini-me. I’m just extremely thankful that she doesn’t look like a mini-me. That probably wouldn’t work out too well for her!! Any ways…we had to fly down from our home in Rhode Island to Blacksburg, Virginia for her graduation the weekend before we left for the cruise. We flew down on Thursday and sat through 2 days of graduation ceremonies (Seriously. I mean really…2 days??) Okay, so it really wasn’t that bad (actually it was pretty nice!), but I never did understand the need for a whole gaggle of speakers for graduations. But it was all worth it to see our little babushka march across that stage! Plus I like the VT campus and enjoying hanging out with Trippette and her friends. Lady Trip and I then flew back home on Sunday, while Trippette stayed behind to pack up her stuff. She then flew up to little Rhody on Thursday so we could all head down to San Juan, Puerto Rico together. It was a whirlwind week that led up to our whirlwind cruise!

And for all of you wondering, yes, ‘babushka’ is Russian for grandmother or elderly woman. And yes, therefore I am calling my little girl a grandmother or an old chick. Don’t ask me why, but ever since I studied in Moscow, I have used the word ‘babushka’ as a term of endearment. Yes, I’m weird. Can we move on now?

Trippette is anxious to start her Caribbean vacation!

Can't wait to read more!

Keep it coming!

I can't wait for the rest of your review! We are doing the same itinerary in October, bringing two newbies with us. My DW thinks I am obsessed with planning, maybe I am! I just like being prepared.

Our vacation officially started on Friday, May 22nd when we checked into the Four Points Sheraton near Logan International Airport in Boston for their Park/Sleep/Fly program. It’s a whole lot cheaper than leaving our vehicle at the airport, it provides a shuttle to and from Logan and allows us to sleep in later since we don’t have to fight the horrible morning traffic into Boston. The hotel is pretty nice, nothing too fancy but it allows us to get into vacation mode early.

Right next door to the Sheraton is an Uno's restaurant which we ran over to after check in and wolfed some delicious pizza down and started to get the vacation mojo going! ...okay, I really have no idea what "vacation mojo" means but it sounded cool, so we're going to run with it!

Apparently I didn't have my camera geek on yet as I didn't even think of getting any pictures of our hotel. So here are some stock photos courtesy of the Four Points Sheraton website (please don't sue me Sheraton!)

Four Points Sheraton, Revere, MA (stock photo)

The check-in counter (stock photo)

Our room. Cozy and quaint (stock photo)

I know there are quite a few peeps on here that are from the New England area and if you fly out of Boston and have never used the Park/Sleep/Fly program, we highly recommend it. There are several hotels near Logan that offer it and their total price is very comparable to the cost of parking alone at Logan (but in lieu of the comfy bed and the free hot coffee on your way to the free shuttle to the airport, you get a bunch of blaring horns, a few middle fingers and a couple comments about one's relations with their mother). Just saying...

Next up....

San Juan here we come!!

Great Start

Looking forward to more review. We are booked for next February for the same itinerary and can't wait for more reviews and pictures

Perfect timing. I was looking for a review with lots of pics, so hopefully this will be what I'm looking for. My Breeze cruise to nowhere is going to be cancelled, but Liberty will be sailing out of Galveston by then and has a four day cruise that sails the day before my Breeze cruise. Thinking about booking that once Breeze is cancelled but want to know more about Liberty first.

I wouldn't hesitate to rebook on the Liberty. We loved her. Has the vast majority of the bells and whistles from the 2.0 upgrades and we loved the decor. It was a very relaxing ship. I'll be posting a bunch of photos of the ship a bit later on but don't be shy, ask any questions that you may have about her!

Still 3 months to go. Thanks for doing the review. I am needing it right now.

Good Start! I have always wanted to do this itinerary. Keep it coming!

Great start. Doing this itinerary in August so looking forward to seeing more.

Yay! We go on August 2nd and I can't wait to read the rest of your review. Thanks for sharing!

We head to San Juan next Saturday to hop on the Liberty. Your review is just what I need to get me through the week. Keep it coming!

We are preparing that same trip in 37 days, great start to your review, have me smiling st the humor keep it up!

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Great start to your review! Thanks!

Just looked at my review so far and realized that my first post looks akin to War and Peace! Sorry! Guess I should have broken that down a little bit into more readable clips. I'll try and keep the rest of my review in more palatable bite sized pieces. Coming up...arrival in San Juan!

SATURDAY, MAY 23rd - San Juan, Puerto Rico

We flew in directly from Boston on JetBlue. It’s about a 4 hour flight and the cost was not too bad since we booked it about 6 months in advance. The flight was pretty much uneventful (which is how we like our flights to be!). However, we did have some inflight entertainment courtesy of a young lass in front of us who clearly had a very high opinion of herself. This was quite evident due to the fact that she took about 250+ selfies during the 4 hour flight. With each selfie that she took she had to primp and squeeze her chest to maximize cleavage and practice her pouty lips to achieve that perfect Kardashian pose. It was quite funny to watch even though a part of you died each time realizing that this was an example of our future.

On the ground at Boston’s Logan Airport

Boston, MA

Trippette excited to be on her way!

Our first sight of Puerto Rico!

Old San Juan

San Juan

More, More!!!!! I am enjoying this!

Just looked at my review so far and realized that my first post looks akin to War and Peace! Sorry! Guess I should have broken that down a little bit into more readable clips. I'll try and keep the rest of my review in more palatable bite sized pieces. Coming up...arrival in San Juan!

Please dont change a bit, the more details and ensighful opinions the more information we will have to prepare for upcoming adventure.

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