flatman

Did Carnival stop going to Tortola? Why would they do that? Our best cruise ship stop in 10 cruises was Brewers Bay Beach.

We have been to Luquillo Beach. One of the best I've ever seen, however I didn't see any waterfall like was previously posted. Long ride there and back.

I would love to know what ship you were on, since I have cruise about 25 times and used the Dr. A few times and always found them up to speed. Yes I know what meds I am on and my health issues but they always listen and took what I said into consideration on diagnosis and if a script was needed.

I would love to give you all of the info I can. I just can't do it here on this site. contact me at jeflaten@outlook.com.

There will be plenty of taxis (minivans) near the pier so no need for reservations. The taxi rates are from last year, so they may have gone up a $1 or $2 pp.

 

1-2 passengers $18

3-5 passengers $ 7 pp

6-14 passengers $6 pp

Thanks for the info.

Is it possible to take a taxi to Orient Beach from the pier without calling ahead for any reservations, and how much would they charge? TIA

I was in St Maarten last week, and did go see for myself the demolition going on. Pedro's is open, but all other Restaurant/beach bars from there to Kontiki have been/are being bulldozed. There is a chain link fence up around the site. They were still clearing off the properties. Since there are less places, the prices have increased to $10 per lounger and umbrella, with no included drink. Last year, most charged $7 for chair, umbrella and drink. While sitting in a lounger on the beach, something stung my arm. It stung, swelled, got red, and had fever for several days. It is still itching, but is better. I went by medical on the ship, and they offered me to buy a $3 tube of hydrocortisone or pay a fee starting at $120 for seeing the doctor. They also suggested me putting ice on it. I had some hydrocortisone and did use and ice bag several times. I also had asked a local lady on the beach for a small section of aloe plant, and rubbed aloe on it, which helped relieve the stinging.

Since you have brought up the subject of getting stung by something on the beach and going to the medical facility on the ship, I had my own experience going to that facility. I fell at Nachi Cocum in Cozumel and knew I had broken a rib or two. When the pain wouldn't let up I finally went and the ships doctor says to the nurse "do you know how to operate this x-ray machine?" She just said "no" and with out so much as asking me to remove my shirt and taking a look or listening to my lungs with a stethoscope he just told me "you have pleurisy." When I got back to the US I went to an ER and they told me I had 4 broken ribs. I would have to be unconscious to ever go there again.

It is $90-$100us one way by taxi from Castries to Sugar Beach For up to three persons. Lunch, drinks, etc would all be extr. Leave plenty of time for your return as there is only one road back, and it's busy with returning passengers, a minimum of 1.5 hours on return...

WOW! I think this will be a stay on the ship day. They're higher than Grand Caymen.

Reduit Beach in Rodney Bay is your best bet. Numerous for options, long stretch of beach with swimming areas along with all sorts of watersports for hire, etc. About 30 minutes north from port, taxi formally of you will run around $40-$50 one way.

Lots of threads here about Reduit, some with pictures, if you do a search.

Are you kidding? $40 to $50 one way for a 30 minute taxi ride? I think Reduit needs to reduit. That's really high.

My wife has bad knees and a hip replacement. Would getting on and off the water taxi be a problem for her?

Jim can you tell me if my link works or not ??

If not I will remove it

Thanks

 

Lyn

Yes Lyn, your link worked

I just read a very good review written by Jim Zimmerlin who's screen name is Spaniel lover who also goes by Jimzim. I definitely recommend the review for people like you who wants to know the differences between cruise lines and cruise ships. He makes comparisons between the different Lines. On the one I just read he was comparing CCL with Disney and threw in a lot of RCCL as well. It really makes a difference according to your preference's, for example if you cruise with kids you might like Disney (if you can afford them) or if your into Stage Production type shows or musicals you might pick CCL over RCCL. If you are into food preference's CCL takes the lead. If you like quiet relaxation CCL has adult pools on the aft of some of there ships. CCL has several pools to choose from. My preference is Carnival over all of the others because it's fun and relaxing and has the best food and great ports to see.

Another show that I enjoyed a lot was "Getaway Island". Any show that features Kenny Chesney's song "No Shoes, No Shirt, No Problem" is all right with me. Why wasn't this song -- which is all about taking a vacation to a beach in Mexico -- played at least 20 times a day on a 12-day cruise that finishes up with a stop in Cozumel?!?! Don't get me started. I'm saving my rant about the background music played throughout the ship... for later.

 

A musical number from the "Getaway Island" show... featuring the 1958 hit

 

This brings up something that I find interesting about the "Playlist Production" shows on Carnival. Back in my high school days, I was fascinated with sound and lighting for the theater. I volunteered on the stage technical crew of just about every theatrical production during my high school years. Sound, lighting, and set design for the theater have always been of interest to me. It's come a long way since I worked behind the scenes on stage shows during the 1970s!

 

Back in those days, they would paint a physical backdrop. The best stages had a flying loft over the stage, so that various new backgrounds could be dropped down on to the stage in between acts. If the stage didn't have a flying loft, you'd push in a physical backdrop from the wings. It was that way on Carnival stage productions for a long time, too. Then along came "Playlist Productions" and the advent of digital screens. Take a look at this shot from "Getaway Island"... where it's hard to tell where the physical set ends and the digital screen begins.

 

 

A still shot of the digital backdrop doesn't do it justice, though... as they are video screens, so the production designers are free to unleash their creativity and introduce motion in to the backdrops. Take a look at this video from "Getaway Island", which really shows how adding motion to the video backdrops can take the fun to a whole new level that we couldn't do in the old days:

 

[YOUTUBE]0QZc8EWYKAg[/YOUTUBE]

 

Please note that the flickering lines that appear on the video screens in my little video clip are NOT seen by the audience. That's a function of my video camera not being synched with their video screen. To the people in the audience, the video screens appear crystal clear.

 

Another one of the new Playlist Production shows is "Heart Of Soul". As you might guess from the title, this one features romantic R&B and soul songs. The songs in the show are from artists such as Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, Otis Redding, Ray Charles, and Al Green. Here are a couple of photos:

 

 

 

It's cool how they coordinated the green lasers with the green lighting and the green "Aurora Borealis" display on the video screen.

 

The fourth of the four new stage shows was "88 Keys", featuring the music of famous piano players such as Elton John, Billy Joel, and Jerry Lee Lewis. I didn't shoot any photos or videos of this particular show, as I didn't get there early enough to get a seat with a straight-on view. I like that you don't need reservations to see a show on Carnival (reservations were required for the shows on the Royal Caribbean and Norwegian ships I was on last year), but it's a good idea to arrive quite a bit early to get the best seats. "88 Keys" and "Heart Of Soul" also have a pre-show... which starts 15 minutes before the posted show time... and the pre-show really just segues right in to the main show, so you need to arrive well in advance of the pre-show to get a proper seat.

 

Since "88 Keys" is all about piano-centric artists, the pre-show features the entertainer from the ship's piano bar. He plays a roll in the main portion of "88 Keys", too. Unfortunately, the piano bar entertainer on the Carnival Freedom, Russell Blues, was the worst piano bar performer I've seen in 20+ cruises... so this was, by far, the weakest of the four shows. But I enjoyed all four of the shows... and it was especially cool that all four were new to me. My guess is that these are the shows I'll be seeing on all my Carnival cruises for the next several years!

 

It's fun to see big production shows during a cruise, as I would just never go out to see live theater at home. The one downside to seeing four Playlist Production shows during a 12-day cruise is that all four shows have the exact same cast. The songs are different, the sets are different, the costumes are different, the choreography is different... but it's all the same people each time. Imagine watching music videos on MTV, but with every music video featuring the exact same performers every time. (Of course, I am speaking of the days when MTV actually played music videos... I'm just that old!)

Loving your review and your knowledge of shows and sets etc. We are going on the Valor in April with one of the Carnival cruise ship dancers in our group. I'm sure that will be very entertaining to pick her brain. One of my sisters was a professional dancer traveling with the Dizzy Gillespie Jazz Band back in the 60's and 70's. We can't wait and sharing your knowledge is going to make it that much more interesting.

What ship was he on in the past?

 

We are going on the Dream in April (and June) and a friend of ours is coming who is always hugely popular at Karaoke. He will spend tons of time doing karaoke and everyone on the ship will know him by name by the 2nd night, I promise. He, too, is a proud gay man. :D

He was on the Splendor. He was so funny even the Cruise Director went to see him every night we were there.

Carnival does something they call "the legend Show," and they take the top 5 or 6 singers thru the week and have them in the main show in the auditorium dressed up like some famous singers like "Elvis" etc. and have them perform for everybody. We had our roll call group one time where the husband asked everyone to go and cheer for his wife so she could make it to the "Legend" show. She showed up at the very end of the first night and sang a Whitney Houston song and she was so good she got a standing ovation. Then we were sure she was going to be in the final show, but this woman was so good she WAS the show and again a standing ovation.

What ship are you all going on? If you really luck out you'll get an Asian DJ named Kim who is extremely funny and he packs the room every night. He is a very proud gay man who will make you laugh all night with the way he plays with it. We went every single night. He was amazing.

On our upcoming vacation adventure my friends (group of 10 all in our early 30's) and I have decided to put together a Karaoke Grab Bag, basically songs get put into the bag and we will each reach in and grab one out to do for our song that night. We figured it was a good way to keep it interesting. I wanted to try and get some additional suggestions for songs we should add to the list.

So far we have :

 

Sweet Home Alabama

Sweet Caroline

Anything Journey (probably don't stop believing)

Wake me up before you Go-Go - Wham

Love Shack - B-52's

You've lost that loving feeling -Righteous Brothers

500 Miles - The Proclaimers

Buddy Holly - Weezer

Living on a prayer - Bon Jovi

Sweet child of mine - Guns and Roses

Wanna Dance With Somebody-- Whitney Houston

My Own Worst Enemy -- Lit

Friends in Low Places -- Garth Brooks

All The Small Things -- Blink 182

Brown eyed girl - Van Morrison

Inside Out - Eve 6

Crazy - Gnarls Barkley

Mr Jones - Counting Crows

Build Me Up Buttercup - The Foundations

Semi-Charmed Life - Third Eye Blind

 

 

What are some other suggestions?

For What It's Worth - Buffalo Springfield. Nobody ever knows this song by it's title. Some of the words should tell you. (You better stop hey what's that sound? Everybody look what's going down....)

Really enjoying your review. We are going out on the Valor out of Port Canaveral in April and we are also staying at the Radisson at the Port so this is a treat to find. Thanks for posting. I'm really glad I booked 2 days before sail away.

Were your friends on our roll call?? We had a very active roll call.

 

You will love the Dream. It's a perfect fit for the city of New Orleans.

Yes they more than likely were on your roll call, I wouldn't know because I didn't read it, but she's in one of your "Fishlips" pictures. I don't want to use there names until I have there permission. But she is "UpState Cruiser" on Cruisecritic. We cruised with them again last year on the Dream and hopefully they'll be on the Liberty next year 2015 for our "Buddy Bear reunion cruise."

Jim

Absolutely go for it. Freedom is one of our favorite ships. Once you have a balcony you won't book an inside again.

Jim

2 friends of ours that we met on the Carnival Splendor about 5 years ago just took this same repo cruise with you and they said that they loved it. Can't wait to hear your take on how it was, but you better hurry because we are boarding the Dream in New Orleans on this Sunday morning.

Jim

Suntana, this is my first review out of all of my cruises. I've never really thought about doing one before. It was a review someone else did on here about the Dream that inspired me to do one. I'll probably always do one from this point on although this is quite time consuming. :-)

This review, being your first one you ever wrote, and the first one of yours that I have ever read, makes me definitely want to be sure and read your other one's. Your photography goes without saying, but your review is not like a lot of them. I really like that you didn't spend your time writing about traveling to the port, or pre cruise hotels, and going on and on about embarkation and your trip to the desk to sign in and all of that boring stuff.

Roatan is really peeking my interest because it's a lot like a very special place in my life. 45 years ago I sold everything I owned in Minnesota and moved to an Island off of the coast of Charleston South Carolina. The pictures of the shacks and the people riding on the back of the trucks, and the lifestyle of the locals were just exactly like that of those people on that Island. They eventually became my good friends and I could never ever forget them. One day I would love to get a place in Roatan for the winter months and live that lifestyle again.

We are going on the Dream on this same itinerary april 27th 2014. And we're going on a tour with Victor Bodden. I can't wait to see and experience some of that Island and pick the brains of the locals.

Thank you for taking the time to write this wonderful review.

Jim

Hi great review! Cozumel is bitter sweet for me. The first time was Mr. Sancho's Beach where we got scammed for $140 by some woman posing as an agent for them on CC. We finally were let in out of the kindness of there heart. Had a great time there. Then the second time we went to Nachi Cocum where I was getting out of the pool and slipped going down the stairs and broke 4 ribs, so I had to sit for the remainder of our cruise (5 days) in pain inside of our cabin. We are going to give it another try in 16 days. I think I'll stay out of the pool this time.

Jim

Maybe it's the photo companies just not allowing anyone to see them without signing up. I have clicked on Photobucket, and Webshots, and a few others and just can't see pictures like I used to be able to.

Jim

Great review

You have been waiting 511 days for this cruise??!! All that waiting and counting down makes it more exciting now that it's finally getting close! I'm so excited for you!

The Dream sounds awesome :) Have fun!!!

Thanks for your kind compliments on my review. I'm glad you enjoyed reading it

Just finished reading your great review and hope there will be more in the future. We have another cruise booked for April of 2015 on the liberty but now we are also considering booking another cruise for 2016 so we can go back to Half Moon Cay and St. Thomas, Grand Turk, and Puerto Rico. I'm curious what the price is of the cabana's in HMC? Oh and one question, didn't they have your Sail $ Sign information right there on your TV in your cabin each day? Thanks for this review.

I am really enjoying your review. I know what goes into making a good review as I tried it myself once and thank you for taking all of the time and effort to do this. We leave on the Dream in just 30 days with 5 other family members on there very first cruise. Been counting down since day 511 and I couldn't tell you how excited everyone is. Thanks. Subscribed!