CupKayke

34 minutes ago, Biker19 said:

Biker, who usually does not derail review threads.

I don't mind.  I just don't know the answer 🤷‍♀️

We wandered around the ship trying to figure out our way here or there as it was crowded this first day. I took pictures of this and that. It was warm in New Jersey today – mid-60s and sunny.  I loved the elevator animals.  I believe this is a Meerkat with a Martini

This giraffe is in the aft of the boat just off Deck 15 by the Seaplex (where the Bumper Cars are located) and next to the iFly and the climbing wall and the surf simulator.

My husband had an appointment for the iFly at around 5pm and we got there, he watched what he called “Show-off Superman” doing some moves (it was an instructor), and he said NO WAY.  So, we passed but it was interesting to see for a bit.

He looked like the Night Monkey (ha)

View from the very back (aft) of the shift…

We found my husband’s favorite place for the next few days.. covered, very large smoking area by the outside pool Deck 14 Aft.  This place would range from 2 to 3 people to packed.  This was the first night and apparently no one had found it yet.  We would meet a lot of great people here and have some wonderful conversations.  I would watch movies across the way and he could walk back and forth and hang-out with me.  There are two bars just steps away which would get a lot of business from the smokers.   Again, I don’t smoke and frankly, I can’t stand the smell of smoke and he does not smoke in our home however, I had no problem sitting out here with him many times.   On the coldest and worst day we had at sea (coming home) it was still a somewhat protected/sheltered area from the pelting of rain that the other end of the deck was getting due to the wind.  Kudos to RC for offering this area because without it, my husband would not cruise.  

We had My Time Dining so we dined around 7:30pm just about every other night in the American Icon Grill and we did Windjammer the other nights.  I made reservations with the RC app.  We never had more than a 10 minute wait to get inside to our table.  We were sat at the same table every night with the same servers which I did not understand necessarily. 

Tonight's Menu

I am not an apple pie fan or anything but decided to order their apple pie tonight.. it was delicious. I think they put a caramel sauce in there with the apple pie which has the flakiest crust!  Hmmm Hmmmm Good

So, for clarification.. our room was the nicest we’ve ever encountered on a cruise. The cabin drawers are soft close, our cabin had the option of soft nighttime lighting, the bathroom had an automatic night light.  We loved the room overall.

We were muster station B4 which is the Schooner Bar Deck 5.  We eventually headed that way and the Muster Drill was quick and painless and I was impressed with how it was handled. 

At the end of the Muster Drill, the Captain announced it was a clear day so we he was going to take the ship up to see The Statue of Liberty and turn around before leaving the harbor. You could hear the cheers throughout the ship as we hurried to our cabin balcony. She may look small in the pictures but to get an idea of how tall she is, look at the tiny people walking around at the bottom of her. Her light (flame) glows 24/7. It was neat to see.  Note: the Statue of Liberty and the NYC views are on the port side of this ship for this sailing… at least they were for us.

And...

View of NYC and Statue of Liberty before leaving port, no zoom…

You see lots of things leaving the harbor…

Thursday Oct 24 – Embarkation Day – Bayonne, New Jersey cruise port

Today is the day we boarded this beautiful ship! We are only one hour ahead of Missouri and seeing that I normally am awake by 4:45am, I didn't think setting an alarm was necessary. We woke-up at 9:43am Eastern time. Check-out and our shuttle to the cruise ship were both at 11:00am. It was shocking, funny, and marvelous. I had laid-out and organized everything the evening prior so we took showers and grabbed our bags. The ride to the cruise ship was the two of us and this very large extended family of a widowed mom with her grown children (in their 50s/60s) and their spouses. The men started talking about all the seafood they planned to eat on this cruise... fried shrimp, boiled lobster, baked salmon... they all sounded like Forest Gumps. It was funny.

Someone on Cruise Critic had sent me a message (I don’t know who it was) saying they would see me on the cruise shuttle the next morning from the hotel but I never met or saw anyone.  I asked our small shuttle group and they had no idea about Cruise Critic.  The shuttle situation at the hotel was a bit of a mess this morning.  We waited for our shuttle – along with many others – and in the end, they almost didn’t have room for us.  The hotel was friendly selling the transfer but they were disorganized in getting everyone on the shuttles because they also had full buses of folks going to Newark Airport this morning.

Some of the people waiting…

Note:  everyone on this ship received notice via email about a day or two prior to cruising that the Coast Guard had decided to do an inspection the morning of our embarkation.  There was some groaning on the forum prior to the cruise about how long this could take and what a mess it would be getting delayed to get on the ship.  We were told not to arrive at the terminal before 11 or 11:30am – EVERYONE – including KEY people, suites, etc.   Well, we had no choice because of the cruise shuttle so we left with the shuttle which was around 11:15am or later.  I don’t know how long it took to arrive at the ship – maybe 15 minutes?  Once we started down the final stretch of road to the cruise ship, there was a long line of traffic waiting to get to the terminal and we sat still in this traffic just barely moving or not moving off and on for at least another 15 to 20 minutes.  The local police have all the side roads block and they do a good job of keeping this as efficient as possible.  There is no turning around once you hit this road and frankly friends, I would not want to be stuck in a taxi in this traffic, just an FYI.   Once we were finally off the shuttle and had our luggage checked (super quick)… we were on the boat so fast our heads were spinning!!  We even stopped for our embarkation photo and we were still on the boat with NO lines and NO waits. Thumbs Up big time to Royal Caribbean!!  Almost 5,000 people coming onboard and this was by far our quickest embarkation on any cruise ship!

The first thing we did was walk across the entryway area to Bolero’s and get our RC wrist bracelets.  They were $4.98 each.  You can use them to open your door which is the main reason we got them and pretty much the only thing we used them for.  It was handy when you have trays, drinks, souvenirs, etc in your hands and you need to open your stateroom door.  You can also use them to buy drinks, purchase photos, get your bottled waters or etc.  I used mine to open the door.  Except today.  Today we both purchased drinks at the Bolero’s bar with them which was handy since we didn’t have our stateroom key cards yet.   Would I get this wristband again in the future?  For me, yeah… it was worth it just to open the stateroom door.  We only saw one other couple wearing these the entire cruise, but we had several people asking us about them. A lady in my cupcake decorating class told me she was on the previous cruise and everyone had them on for that sailing because they advertised them on that cruise.  Interesting.

And now a big Thumbs Down for RC…  lunch on Embarkation Day…. Oh my gosh.  There was a long line to eat while you had your backpack on or your small carry-on with you and even after you waited at least 30 minutes to get into the Windjammer… it was another 10 minutes finding an empty table.  It was packed.  We asked about the Solarium but a lady told us it was closed.  We don’t know if that was true or not because we asked another cruiser not an RC employee.  We did not attempt to eat anywhere else so maybe there were other places with no lines but it was day one, we did not know the ship layout, and this is where we were directed.  The food was fine and plentiful as was the iced tea (my drink of choice).  They had a giant strawberry and vanilla sponge-type cake that said Welcome Aboard and they were cutting everyone pieces.  Several staff members were walking around trying to find seating for those walking around with their plates in hand and nowhere to eat.  RC was doing maybe the best they could with everyone attempting to eat at the same time and this was day one when the rooms were still closed, etc. 

At exactly 1:30pm, they announced the rooms were ready. 

We had booked a balcony guarantee and ended-up with a regular balcony room on the 12^th floor Forward – 12166.  We always choose aft rooms so we were a bit leary.  This location ended-up being perfect for us. 

We liked the layout of the room

The bathroom is too small.  Another lady we met at the airport in Newark was complaining that she thought the rooms were smaller than normal RC ships (she’s a regular) but we thought the room was great but the bathroom teeny tiny.

We then turned the corner from Carlo's Bakery and walked maybe 5-10 minutes about 2 blocks down to the Pier Park.  I believe this is also called Veteran’s Memorial Park.   Beautiful, beautiful views across the Hudson of NYC.  Lots of friendly people, some walking their dogs or babies, and some exercising.  It was not crowded.   In case anyone cares.. I do not smoke, my husband does (which is one reason why I am older than him but I look younger so there you go)  ...regardless, it is incredibly insane trying to find places to smoke these days.   My husband was able to smoke in this park, no problem.  

It was beautiful…

Views across the Hudson were amazing…

Me…

It was a beautiful autumn day outside… almost too nice for jackets but there was a slight wind.  Here is a view of NYC from the 7^th floor of our hotel room.   FYI - Our hotel was non-smoking but had benches and butt holders out front for smokers.  

Tomorrow…  Embarkation Day!

We took the free hotel shuttle from the P4 train at the Newark airport to the hotel.  We checked-in to our hotel around 11am and within an hour we had booked our cruise shuttle for the next morning and taken an Uber from the hotel to Carlo’s Bakery – it’s famous for the show Cake Boss in case you don’t know.  It was a ~ $14 Uber ride plus I've tipped every Uber I've been in but one (more on that later in Boston).  We purchased goodies from Carlo’s Bakery and there was no line plus the staff were all very friendly and helpful.   I also purchased a t-shirt for a friend’s daughter and it was $20. 

The goodies…

More goodies…

Our stash…

We walked next door (literally, like a <1 minute next door walk) to Basile’s Pizza where they were semi-busy, the workers spoke Italian, and two slices of pie with a bottled water was under $10.  The slices were large and they were good.  I would recommend the sausage and mushroom or the red sauce not the white sauce I had (I don’t know what I was thinking).  My husband’s slice was excellent.

Day 1 – Traveling – Wed Oct 23

We flew out of Saint Louis Airport at 5am and landed in Newark, New Jersey before 10:30am.   We stayed at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel Newark Airport.  Beautiful hotel, good restaurant, too busy bar, no Sprite or 7-up or Dr Pepper anywhere in the hotel.  Lots of lounging areas, quick and efficient early check-in with no fee, great pool, clean and renovated hotel.  We would stay here again in a heartbeat.

This hotel is supposed to have a “full-service” Starbucks according to the Trip Advisor reviews but this is not true.  They should just call it a small coffee shop which is fine but you cannot use your Starbucks cards or app and they do not offer any of the Starbucks specialty drinks – just basic coffees and teas – and none of the Starbucks pastries.   The rooms are huge, incredibly quiet and dark, and check-in was super quick as was check-out.   The bar is busy and service is slow.  The bar and restaurant area are nice.

Next door is a very large Ramada hotel also with restaurants and the Ramada hotel has a gift shop that offers all sorts of interesting medical and touristy items including some good luggage at decent prices (no kidding).  We had a suitcase handle break today so we walked next door to Ramada fairly late tonight and bought a new suitcase.   Just as a note, there is NOTHING ELSE in the surrounding area for food service so you are either calling for delivery or taking an Uber to dinner somewhere but again, the hotel’s offerings were good, the service was good, and we enjoyed our dinner.   He had carnitas tacos with chipotle sauce with fries and I had a chicken wrap with fries.

And now that I’ve thoroughly reviewed the hotel (ha)… let’s back-up….

Hello!  My husband and I just returned from an Anthem of the Seas 9-night New England Cruise out of Bayonne, New Jersey and I thought I might write a review with pics.

Our Itinerary:

Day 1 - Thursday Oct 24 - Cape Liberty, New Jersey (Bayonne)

Day 2 - Friday Oct 25 - At Sea

Day 3 - Saturday Oct 26 - Boston, Massachusetts

Day 4 - Sunday Oct 27 - Portland, Maine

Day 5 - Monday Oct 28 - Bar Harbor, Maine

Day 6 - Tuesday Oct 29 - Saint John, New Brunswick Canada (Bay of Fundy)

Day 7 - Wednesday Oct 30 - At Sea

Day 8 - Thursday Oct 31 - Halifax, Novia Scotia Canada

Day 9 - Friday Nov 1 - At Sea

Day 10 - Saturday Nov 2 - Cape Liberty, New Jersey 

Just a couple of things... I clearly need a new camera so that will be happening this month.. my apologies.  We are in our late 40s, I'm Kay and he's "J" for the purposes of this blog, we live in landlocked Missouri, we've taken at least one long trip per year for the last 12 years (we've now visited 26 countries) but we do not cruise every year.  We are not cruise line loyal but instead tend to cruise for the ports or if we get a bargain around the time we want to travel.   This cruise was a combination of timing, the ports, and a great deal found on a travel website.   We have cruised with Royal Caribbean previously and we will probably cruise with them again someday.   Royal Caribbean is doing a lot of things right and a few things that could be tweaked.  I'm opinionated and I don't gloss over anything.  Overall, we had a great time, most RC staff are top notch, and we met some wonderful people onboard.  I have been working 60-65 hours per week for the last 9 months so this was a "relaxation" cruise for us so we didn't do a lot of things most people do on ships but I'll share as much as I can of our daily information that may be helpful.  I will post a lot of pics.  If there is interest in this review, I will finish it.... so we'll see... 

The route we took...  

Trying to see if my Photobucket photos are working or not.... 

This is some information I found online (husband is very excited)…

Michael's is a true pub, complete with dark wood, great beer and some serious snacks....  the pub has TVs for sports viewing and a diverse selection of craft beers like Brooklyn Lager, Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA, Bear Republic 5 India Pale Ale and of course, Michael's Genuine Home Brew.  Beer aficionados can order any beer with a branded souvenir glass for an additional $7. 

I don't know if that really answers your question but if it's a true pub... then there should be draft beers...

If we buy the bands, will it make our Sea Pass cards inactive?  I have a hard time wearing any type of wristband but I really want to try this...

Oh Thank you so much!  This answers my question.  The Voom is currently on sale for $9/day if I purchase it pre-cruise so I will go ahead and do that and save some money since I update my blog daily.  :)

We are sailing Royal again for the first time in 10 years.  We will be on the Anthem of the Seas in October.  We both have iPhones but we will have these completely turned-off for our entire trip - that's how we vacation.  However, I will have my laptop and wel have a daily blog I post our trip notes and pictures too for my parents and family/friends to read.  In the past, I was able to buy Internet "minutes" which worked-out great because I could write my blog offline, log-on, upload the blog and the pics, and get back off in a matter of 10 minutes or less per day.  Now....I see this VOOM deal.  Do I have to purchase unlimited Internet per day for one device in order to do my blog thing?  I am not interested in accessing my blog off the ship or with my phone.  Curious as to how they know what my one laptop device is??  I suppose I'm behind the times a bit?? Thanks for any answers. 

nice review....even though we've sailed on her twice, and this last spring most recent, it's still fun to read.

 

we had our 3 kids with us. my wife and my boy and baby would stay in the room after bedtime. me and my daughter (6) would go up for the movie. she'd play in the hot tubs with her friends and i'd get some drinks from red frog. I remember standing out there thinking "pretty awesome!!! in the middle of the ocean, i get to spend fun time with the family, daughter's playing with other kids, i get some tasty drinks, what's not to like?" sometimes things just work out well.....

 

btw Op, did you get to check out the band by the casino in the evenings? I hung out with those dudes quite a bit....super nice guys and quite talented...

Thanks for your comments and sorry but I just now saw your question!

Yes, we did get to check-out the casino band on the last night. They were fantastic. My husband & I went to the casino bar to get a drink and I normally don't pay attention but they were good enough they caught my attention and then I noticed this guy dancing around to them. He may have had too much to drink but that's how we all felt inside listening to them. After my husband ordered, I left to go pack... then I realized it was the last night and I wanted to spend some time with my husband... when I got back to the Casino bar it was a cloud of smoke! LOL Luckily, hubby was up on Deck 10 smoking and having his drink. But yes... to answer your question... we did appreciate them at least one night for a bit.

Thank you for your review! May I ask a question of you?

 

My wife likes to smoke cigarettes and have drinks. Is the smoking area on deck 10 considerably far away from everything? Our previous cruises have been on Fantasy class ships where we were sequestered to one area on the Lido deck. I get the impression that smoking on Lido is completely gone now?

Good Question and the answer is... surprisingly... No, it is not out of the way on this ship. You have to walk down the stairs to a bar but there is a bar at both ends of the smoking area... one aft/one forward. The smoking section is Deck 10 Starboard side - it starts very close to the top of the stairs over the Red Frog Rum Bar and ends very close to the top of the stairs over the bar located next to the Pizzeria. This ship has a great Lido deck layout and the smoking area is long and narrow and above the eating/drinking/bar areas.

In the picture below.... I am standing in front of the smoking area taking this picture...

In this picture...you can see the smoking area above the stairs on the far left. This area has yellow umbrella tables and other covered areas too. To the left (downstairs) you can see the Red Frog Rum Bar which is open late.

Here is a daylight picture. On the far left at the top of the stairs is where the smoking area starts. It runs all the way to the back of the ship. There are two staircases at the back of the ship too. One leads to the ice cream/yogurt area and one leads to a bar but they are directly across from one another. The back is a quieter area and it's where the adults only pool is located.

PS - I like your screen name.

We arrived in Miami before daylight...

By the time 6:30am rolled-around... it was daylight...

We were out of the shower and out of our room by 6:45am. Someone had vomited all down our hallway and it needed to be cleaned-up!! Eh. We took our suitcases to the main lounge and we were there maybe 5 minutes when they said we could start disembarking. We were off the ship by 7:10am.

We took an Uber to MIA - $18.69 plus tip

We had an early flight on Delta to Atlanta and then on to Memphis. I was thankful it was no problem as I really should not have booked an early flight so we got lucky.

There were cards in our rooms the night before telling everyone they had to be out of their rooms by 8:30am. Everyone was supposed to be off the boat by 9:45am.

A few things I remembered...

- Half Moon Cay only sells beer, pina coladas, and strawberry daiquiris (or the mx of the two). No other alcohol is available on the island per our waiter.

- Our room steward was nice. He asked us the first day if we wanted room service in the morning or evening. I chose evening and he was disappointed. I explained to him my husband sleeps in. Of course, for the entire vacation, my husband did not sleep in. :o He was always asking me where was my husband... which I found strange. He was on Deck 10 smoking is where he was a lot of the time.

Overall, I liked this cruise. It was a good mix of cruisers. A very large family from India in full dress every day... a lot of family and friends cruising together all wearing matching t-shirts at embarkation... a wedding party down the hall from us (they got married in Nassau at 11am).... some honeymooners... old, young, black, white, Asian, Indian, you name it... this boat had it. Everyone was nice and friendly. No pushing or shoving or ugliness was witnessed by anyone. If anything let me down this cruise it was simply the weather was too hot for us. I expected that when we booked the cruise. We are not warm weather cruisers but this little getaway for us of 7 days felt like 7 weeks so we are very glad we got a good deal from Carnival and very glad we took this cruise. I'm really glad we got to visit Miami even if it was just a little bit. Overall, Carnival offers a good value for the money and I do recommend them to my co-workers or friends who are considering cruising. Hope you enjoyed my review.

When we got back on the ship, the boat had added a little Halloween "Spirit"

And these were in the gift shop...

And this was the main lobby... where they had 80s and 90s music for about an hour this evening and it was AWESOME!! The lobby was packed, the banisters were packed, people were laughing and enjoying the "old" music! HA

The Cruise Director was Phillipe (?) and I could not understand him very well. I did understand that after every announcement he said "Whoo Hoo" like Homer Simpson. We thought that was funny. He had reported it would be 80s & 90s music in the lobby tonight plus lots of people were buying last-minute pictures and liquor so the area was packed. Just a note about the Victory.... I've read various stories on here but they were NOT allowing liquor to be carried back to your room tonight. We tried around 8pm (before dinner) and again around 11pm and both times we were told no. Actually, the second time the guy said "Sure, you can carry it back to your room at 6am tomorrow morning." Rude, frankly. We were leaving for the airport early so I wanted to pack it so there was no need for his attitude. What the other guy had said before dinner was they would have the main lounge open from 6am to 9am for liquor pickup.

Tonight we had dinner in the MDR and again, there was only four of us. Sooooo many tables were completely EMPTY!!! There were only two or three people sitting at the tables around us. I will never understand that but I know my husband would have skipped the MDR if he didn't like the company of our fellow cruisers so much so to each his own. Hubby said the ox tongue appetizer was fabulous and so did the other guy at our table. They also had Baked Alaska and loved it. I had Butter Pecan ice cream. The fried chicken was sorta sweet (strange and not good). I don't remember what else we ate. Bar service and service in general in the dining room was fantastic this cruise.

Tonight was Family Night at the Dive-in Movies...

Peter Rabbit 7pm

The Incredibles 2 9pm

Showtime in the Lounge was Vrooom at 8:15pm and 10:15pm

Our next stop was not a good one... we were already running over time but we were given an hour to go to "the famous Fish Fry" but we were NOT at the famous Fish Fry... we were at Fish Central Fish Fry - the dirty restaurant next door to the famous restaurant. Our driver would not allow anyone to check out any of the other restaurants and told us we all had to go inside this restaurant and we had one hour. It was hot inside. People ordered food. Some people ordered full meals. We each got a small Bahama Mama to sample.

This guy (the owner?) got mad at some of the people on our excursion for talking while he was talking. One girl finally just told him she was interpreting for her mother. He cracked open a conch shell, took out the moving conch, skinned it alive, scored it alive, squeezed lime and pepper sauce on it, and then cut it up and offered pieces for people to eat. No thank you.

There were two vans of 20 on this excursion. We did not stay together generally. The other van driver let his people go anywhere they wanted to go in this area and even pointed out the beach if they wanted to go there, he would meet them there in a bit. Not our driver. No way. Several people on our excursion asked him (over and over) if he was related to the guy who did the conch display because the guy said he was one of fifteen kids. The driver said he was not.

After we finally left this stop, we thought... great.. it's well past 1pm... this is over...but no... the driver took us down to Blessings Beach to put our feet in the water. I did get out and do this but only four people got out at this point. The whole van was done at this point. The part of the beach where we stopped was dirty and littered with liquor bottles but it was still beautiful.

If you walk about 100 feet down the beach, it is clean, there are tourists, souvenir stands, hair braiding, etc.

I saw this on our way back to the dropoff spot by the gates to enter the cruise ship area..

If we could redo Nassau, we would just take a taxi to Atlantis and explore on our own or we would simply walk off the boat and explore the small area in front of the ship with all the little shops and Senor Frogs right there in front of you. Nassau is beautiful but you need to be smart here. Lots of beggars, sadly.

We chose the following Carnival Excursion today..

Top 10 of Nassau

Would not recommend. It was boring, hot, and lasted 5 hours. We only enjoyed two of the stops. It was supposed to start at 9am but one couple just casually strolled off the boat at 9:15am. We also stayed way too long at some dirty restaurant which was odd and not really on the schedule. Regardless, we didn't get dropped off again until 2pm. I think excursions should say.. If you are late, you are left.... No Refund. This may be the last ship excursion we ever book.

The best part of our excursion was visiting Atlantis. We drove around all three towers and saw the dolphins being fed and then we had some time inside and outside of Atlantis. I purchased my dad a very nice hat in their gift shop.

These condos are party of the Atlantis complex...

We stopped at Fort Finncastle. Meh. Nice views from here however..

We loved the stop at John Watling's Distillery. The grounds are beautiful and the cold Pina Coladas were wonderful.

Sooooo good...

How do we reserve clam shells ahead? Is this through Carnival or private company? Thank you in advance.

BTW—loving your review!

Either at Guest Services desk or at the Excursions desk - it is through Carnival

Half Moon Cay is a private island owned by the Carnival Corporation

Glad you are loving the review. Thank you :)

One more note about HMC. Those blue clamshells are $30 to rent for the day. Good deal. You should rent them before your HMC day. They give you a big receipt to put at the top of your clamshell. Lots of people just sat them up and didn't have a receipt (like us). So I walked around asking the others where they paid and they said they didn't pay but about an hour later a nice lady came by asking for everyone's receipts. I asked if I could pay her and she said we had to walk down to the end of the beach (by the water shuttles) and pay there. We just removed our items and didn't use the clam shell anymore. If you want one for the full day, pay your $30 ahead and have your receipt to display at the top of your clam shell - this will save you a lot of walking and time in the heat.

Half Moon Cay was a nice day. It was also a semi-short day. Everyone back by 3:30pm was the rule. it was extremely hot so many people were back long before that time.

Tonight they only had one Dive-In Movie. Book Club at 7pm. I really wanted to see it but it hadn't cooled off enough to be out there yet so we skipped it.

There were only four at our table for eight at dinner tonight. We don't normally go to the dining room but we liked the conversation with our tablemates. We noticed a lot of half-empty tables around us. The waiters were again on their game- quick and friendly.

It poured rain, thundered, and lightening flashed all through dinner and most of the night. The boat was rocking but nothing too over the top. We fell asleep to the sound of the thunder.

Day 4 - Nassau, Bahamas

We arrived into Nassau to a downpour of rain...

We sailed by Atlantis in the rain...

Carnival Ecstasy was already in port...

To answer your question about the sodas onboard: I don’t believe they have fountain drinks onboard. They open a can of soda and pour it into a glass before giving it to you. You can have the can instead if you ask, but they almost always open the can before handing it to you.

 

And for the hand soap: they are supposed to give you a bar of soap. That’s what you use to wash your hands. It’s not for the shower because there’s body wash for that.

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

They definitely DO have fountain drinks onboard... which is why I asked if the Bubbles program gets you a can of soda or not... because we saw them using the fountain sodas to refill the glasses for the Bubbles program and not use the cans. It's not that big of a deal but I was just curious.

There was no bar of soap given for anything in our bathroom. We brought our own body washes for the shower because I've never liked Carnival's offerings.

I am loving your review! Thank you so much for taking the time to write it all out.

We are going on the Victory on Dec 3rd

Thank You. I'm glad people are still reading. I will finish this today (I better, at least).

Half Moon Cay looks crowded but it never felt that way to us. There were lots of empty lounge chairs and the water was NOT crowded despite the pictures. We were in the middle of the beach. I floated around with my eyes closed and never came close to hitting anyone.

Below are pics of the beach... right to left... showing how the beach thins out as you get further away from the water shuttles.... it's practically empty by the time you get to the pirate ship.

Closer to the water shuttle dropoff point...

Middle...

Pirate Ship BBQ area early afternoon was practically empty (it was HOT today folks)...

We were back on the ship quick... strange because the Lido deck had a bunch of people in the pool and laying out?!! So. Odd. It was a scorcher outside today but in the water, you didn't feel it. We saw a few burns today for sure - even people's feet got burned.

We saw this from our balcony....

Good Morning Half Moon Cay

They had three water shuttles (at least) running to HMC and back starting early. They pack them but it's a short, safe ride and you can stand-up if you want.

The Beach is amazing...

The sand is like flour...

The water is aqua...

The drinks are $16! LOL

We left the show early hoping to get seats to the second Dive-In Movie of the night... and we did! The Dive-In Movies tonight were...

Avengers: Infinity Wars 6:30pm

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom 9:15pm

People were very polite and quiet during the movies even though the bartenders were serving drinks. They let the kids swim in the pool between the movies. Fresh popcorn was made before each movie and they had different sprinkles. It was good.

There was a nice breeze blowing and even thought the movie lasted until late, this is such a great thing Carnival does! We loved it!

I apologize but I got ahead of myself trying to get this review finished before tomorrow when they shutdown these forums for a bit. I wanted to say that in the morning on Sea Day they have Trivia in the Lobby Lounge (Seven Seas Lobby, Deck 3). This place...

Trivia is free. They offer little trivia notecards and pencils for you to write down your answers and maybe win a prize. It's completed on the honor system and it's a lot of fun. They have General Trivia at 9:30am, Rock Tunes Trivia at 10am, "Friends" Trivia at 10:45am (Can't believe I missed that one!!), Harry Potter Trivia at 11:15am and Sports Trivia at 11:45am. We were walking the decks and seeing the shops when we overheard the General Trivia which was a lot of fun - everything from "What English dinner consists of sausages and potatoes?" to "What fruit is named after a color?" I sat and played the entire Rock Tunes Trivia. I did okay. There were a lot of people on the balconies that would join-in and it was kinda funny. I think I will attend more trivia in the future now that I know how much fun it can be.