Carnival Vista Review/thoughts - Southern 8 day - July 1st

Thanks for the hot tub shot!

We have been to La Romana twice and both times we have gotten a cab driver to take us around town. The cab drivers have always been perfect gentlemen and their cars are pristine clean. We shop for Larimar and always go to the big grocery store to stock up on spices, coffee, and anitbiotics. We usually stop in at a cigar store to watch them roll the cigars and there is a fantastic ice cream shop/bakery in town. We have never felt unsafe or threatened in anyway. The last time our cab driver went into the grocery with us and helped us with our shopping and did some of his own at the same time. I know it sounds strange, but I love going into groceries in foreign countries.

We also have purchased 2 of the wooden parrots and they are in our flower garden right now. I love them when we put them back out in the Spring! They look good as new and they are in their 2nd year outside.

By the way, we found the local people really very nice and wouldn't hesitate going into town again.

We are going to chance a private excursion in a few weeks. The "Saona Carnival Special" with Seavis is highly rated and if folks were getting left behind, we would see posts about it. It's a $15 round trip taxi fare to Bayahibe. This will be the only new-to-us port in the cruise, so we have to do something.

 

 

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We're planning to do this on our cruise as well. I've heard some things about the taxi situation being confusing/frustrating, like not knowing where to go to find the taxi or being made to wait so long that they almost missed the tour. It seems like a tight timeline with the time the ship docks and the time the tour is supposed to leave, so I'm a little nervous about finding the taxi quickly. But the tour itself gets great reviews, so I'm looking forward to it.

Thanks for the review. Nice work.

How was the nightly entertainment/show options. Also are the alternative food options like Guys free?

thx in advance.

The options for free food was amazing and one of the highlights of the ship I never ate at the lido for lunch. I only had it twice for breakfast once when i was rushed for time and wanted a omelet and the other on the last day. I could easily go back on another 8 day cruise and not get to try everything that I wanted to for lunch.

Breakfast

Blue Iguana Cantina (Mexican)

Lido Buffet

Main Dining Room

Breakfast Grill (made to order in lido)

Seaday Brunch

Room Service

Lunch

Blue Iguana Cantina (Mexican)

Guys Burger Joint (poolside)

Guy's Pig & Anchor BBQ (sea days only)

Lido Buffet

Fresh Creations (salad)

The Carnival Deli

The Captains Pasta Bar

Jiji Asian Kitchen (Mongolian wok) lunch only

Cucina del Capitano (Italian) lunch only

Chef's Choice

Salad Bar

Pizzeria Del Capitano (24/7)

Main Dinning Room

Dessert / Snacks

Taste Bar (sample of paid resturants)

Red Frog Pub (fried peas only

Swirls (lido deck 24/7)

Sweet Spot

*Fresh Churned ice cream for a few hours during lunch with 2 cool/different flavors each day

Means its a Must try

Snacks are not free in Red Frog Pub. Jiji's and Cucina are free at lunch as you do say, but there is a cost for dinner. Just clarifying a bit!

Yea they wood carvings was a cool I bought a smaller one of parrots and my cousin got the flamingo with a price of 10-20$. The good things is they break down so they will easily fit into your luggage if your flying

 

 

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That is a great idea!

Snacks are not free in Red Frog Pub. Jiji's and Cucina are free at lunch as you do say, but there is a cost for dinner. Just clarifying a bit!

I prob should have just erased the red frog pub as the only free thing they have is the fried peas or whatever they are called.

I tried to go back and edit to clarify before my 10 minutes to do so ran out. Yea those 2 are free for lunch only.

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Thx allot for the response and the detailed info. Just booked for Sep 3rd on the Vista. What were the show options nightly?

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Thx allot for the response and the detailed info. Just booked for Sep 3rd on the Vista. What were the show options nightly?

 

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I cheated I already had the info typed up and saved on my computer so i just copied and pasted it.

I can go back and get a full list of shows I know they had 4 production shows with flick and 80's rock being the 2 best ones. I skipped the one that was a Latin show. You also had a welcome aboard show the first night and a lip synch battle the 2nd night. Also you had love & marriage game show, white out party and Motown (ocean longue) and I am missing some more

Here is a few videos from the whiteout party while I have over 2 hours of video most of it is not generic enough to share. Let me know if the videos don't work

This is a great Vista review. We are on November 4th...almost under 100 days, but who's counting:) Wondered if you know who the Alchemy bartenders were. It's always our favorite watering hole and we have had some fun times with the alchemists! Best martini's ever! I have learned how to make the Basil Drop every bit as good as them but I can't get the Cucumber Sunrise! That one is soooo good!

This is a great Vista review. We are on November 4th...almost under 100 days, but who's counting:) Wondered if you know who the Alchemy bartenders were. It's always our favorite watering hole and we have had some fun times with the alchemists! Best martini's ever! I have learned how to make the Basil Drop every bit as good as them but I can't get the Cucumber Sunrise! That one is soooo good!

Thanks for the nice words sadly for you Matt will be on vacation during that time so you will miss out on him. I am not a drinker so I never spent any time at the Alchemy Bar. They always seem to be a crowd at it though.

Thank you for your review! We're sailing the Vista on Sept 9, so unfortunately we will miss out on Matt. I just assumed that all playlist shows were the same fleet wide but your comment about the Latin show makes me believe that's not true. On the Magic in May we had Flick, 88 Keys, America Rocks, and County Road.

Fabulous review! I really enjoyed revisiting my girl Vista through your eyes, especially the stuff that I totally forgot about!! :D Please don't let this be your last review! ;)

Thank you for your review! We're sailing the Vista on Sept 9, so unfortunately we will miss out on Matt. I just assumed that all playlist shows were the same fleet wide but your comment about the Latin show makes me believe that's not true. On the Magic in May we had Flick, 88 Keys, America Rocks, and County Road.

Are you on the 6 day or 8 day? On the 6 day they replaced the Latin show with a disco show called Studio Live. We also had Flick and America Rocks.

Thank you for your review! We're sailing the Vista on Sept 9, so unfortunately we will miss out on Matt. I just assumed that all playlist shows were the same fleet wide but your comment about the Latin show makes me believe that's not true. On the Magic in May we had Flick, 88 Keys, America Rocks, and County Road.

The America Rocks and Flick are the two signature shows so they are on several ships. I don't know for sure the process just know not all the shows will be the same. I will go back and make a list of all the main shows and post them over the weekend.

Fabulous review! I really enjoyed revisiting my girl Vista through your eyes, especially the stuff that I totally forgot about!! :D Please don't let this be your last review! ;)

Thanks for the nice words I really enjoyed your review as well as it was right before I sailed out. Hopefully I'll be able to go on another cruise this fall and I'll be able to post another one. I just don't like how aggravating it is to post pics.

Question about the Serenity area. Are there changing rooms with showers and saunas in the Serenity area?

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Are you on the 6 day or 8 day? On the 6 day they replaced the Latin show with a disco show called Studio Live. We also had Flick and America Rocks.

I'm on the 8 day.

Can I find out who will be on Vista in November if Matt is on a break as CD?

While the different options on the ship for live music was the best I had seen. The quality of singers in the main production shows both male and female was maybe the worst I had seen a cruise. I went to all the shows in the theater except the Latin one. I don't expect to see anyone with a amazing voice, but the ones here in my opinion just wasn't any good or at best average cruise ship singers. During the 80's rock show they tried to sing a Stephen Tyler song and it was painful to listen to. The shows are still worth going to and I give them credit for doing everything live. The 80's party on pool deck was another show where the band sounded good and the singers just wasn't up to par.

Question about the Serenity area. Are there changing rooms with showers and saunas in the Serenity area

 

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I didn't really use the Serenity area so someone else can prob answer this better then I can. I didn't see any changing rooms I am sure there is a bathroom close by. I didn't see any showers or saunas

Can I find out who will be on Vista in November if Matt is on a break as CD?

You can check out the link below

https://johnhealdsblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/ED.CD-Schedule-5.3.pdf

We did anytime dinning and we ended up meeting at 7 on most nights. We have 6 adults in our party and we all enjoy getting dressed up in nice clothes talking about the day we had. This is one of the highlights for me as well as the others in my group. I have a few photos that aren't right now so I'll go ahead and post this and post them later.

Check in / Wait

The only time that we had a wait was on the first formal night and it wasn't all that long so no issues here.

Service

I prefer the traditional way where you have the same waiter/ waitress and get to know them during the week. That way they have things waiting on the table for you when you sit down. Overall the service was very quick whenever we would ask for something special. Since I always get the coke card a lot of times on ships it is hard to get a refill. This time it was pretty easy as they had cans on the work station close by. Sometimes they would have a jug of water on the table where you could refill your own. I am not sure why this wasn't every night as I would prefer this way since the servers are over worked.

Another traditional thing that we prefer is just bringing the soup / appetizer one at time. Then after everyone gets done bringing the next round out. A lot of times they would just bring 2 or 3 out at the same time and then you wouldn't even have room on the table for all of them. So a few times what we would do is just request to bring them out one at a time and they would do this without a problem.

Friendly

Despite having a new waiter every night everyone was friendly so a 10 out of 10 here. Even though they knew they wouldn't get any extra tips so worlds better then the bartender on the ship.

Ordering Seconds

If we ever requested seconds of something or ordered 2 entries this was done without a problem. Since we live in Georgia we don't ever get Lobster so its a treat for us. The waiter had thought ahead had several extra lobster ready and even pushed us to eat the last one when we was all full.

Dress Code

I know this is a touchy subject and I wasn't a fan of the more relaxed dress code. Matt said the only reason they still do the 2nd formal night is $ made off pictures. All the men in our table had on khakis and collared shirts and the ladies dresses. So looking over and seeing pretty much anything goes at the tables beside us I didn't like even on formal night. I know this is how the world and cruising is going so I guess I will have to adjust. I wonder if the traditional dinning would have lead to more people dressing up ?

Food Quality

Most people are have been on Carnival should be familiar with the quality of food. This was my first Carnival cruise since 2010 so the quality of food was better then I expected. I never had a problem coming up with something to order and I am a very picky eater. I posted more about the desserts in a earlier post. I think I gave the quality of food a 9 of 10 for MDR in my carnival review.

Really enjoying your review Georgiafan. I think I"m almost ready for my cruise in 3 weeks.

Doug

Can I find out who will be on Vista in November if Matt is on a break as CD?

Schwartz is covering for Matt

Question about the Serenity area. Are there changing rooms with showers and saunas in the Serenity area?

 

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There aren't any saunas in the Serenity area on any carnival ships.