Mr2Scents

We are in San Juan from 1-9 and are going to hop onto the water taxi to Catano and do the Bacardi Tour. Does anyone have an idea how much the taxi is for the 2 mile ride to the distillery? I see the water taxi is $.50 to take over from OSJ to Catano. Just seeing what the taxi will cost.

I like the feel of the ship. I missed the 2.0 upgrades, but not enough to not sail on her. We were in cabin 7215 and it sounded as if there was a jet taking off constantly from the air blasting through the vents on the door. The seal on the balcony door wasn't entirely intact and the air would blast through the room from the cabin door to the balcony door. It was crazy loud. I'm not a light sleeper, nor overly noise sensitive, but this was always loud. Before we went we heard a lot of people complain about the vibrations. It's a ship and we didn't find that to be an issue for us. I love that it only sails with a little over 2,000 passengers. You never feel crowded. I like the quirky Farcus decor. I'd rather have that than sanitized decor. We had a great time on her and would sail on a Spirit Class ship again in a heartbeat.

We took an upgrade to the spa deck on the Liberty. The balcony was ok. It had a sliding door which was nice. There is no cover to the balcony so if it's raining, it's raining on you. If you're at the glass on your balcony there could be people on the open decks looking down on you. If that's a deal killer, then just know that. The room was in a great location. Easy access to Lido and everything forward. We loved the quiet nature of the spa deck. Only 18 or so cabins. I guess it depends how particular you are about your current location. I was happy to take the upgrade as I wasn't in love with our location and the upsell was only about $70.

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I received one today as well for my upcoming Conquest trip. $830 to move to a junior suite from my bowling alley balcony. Yeah, no. That's not happening.

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My son and I did the Sensation in September and it was my absolute favorite cruise. I felt terrible that DW wasn't with me. The vibe was great fun. There were no fall down drunks or anything negative. The islands were great as well. Go find a great beach in Nassau that's not Paradise Island. HMC was amazing, our second favorite beach ever. Grand Turk snorkeling and swimming with the Ray's was great fun. Go and enjoy!


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Without knowing where home is (edit, I see it's Tennessee), here's an option you might want to consider.  I'll use Southwest as an example as that's how we did it.  Perhaps you can fly to SJU in 2 separate legs.  Shortly after Maria essentially wiped out much of the San Juan hospitality industry for a time, we flew Chicago Midway to Orlando on a Friday night and then caught a 6a flight the next morning to San Juan arriving something like 8a.  Our Windstar ship wasn't departing until late evening so we had the cushion of 2-3 additional SWA flights that day that would get us there in time.
 
Bite off some miles the day before if you can and the price isn't prohibitive.
 
PS:  San Juan is a wonderful port to sail from.  I've done it at least 3 times.  Perhaps my favorite.  

We have flown to San Juan for embarkation twice. One time was great, the other not so much. The bad was bad. We were set to fly out the day before to avoid any issues. There was fog at our stopover and we were delayed by an hour plus in leaving Cleveland. We only had an hour layover. Made up some time in the air. Get to one of the worst airports in the country for congestion, ask the flight attendant to call the gate to let them know we're coming. She won't do it, just says don't stop heading there. We run through the airport, get to the gate 10 minutes prior to the departure. We aren't the only ones in this predicament as there are probably 25 of us running down the concourse. We are yelling at them to not close the doors. The agent sees us and proceeds to close the ramp. She tells us it's closed and she can't open it. There are 20+ people staring at her breathless. The plane proceeds to sit at the gate for no less than 30 minutes and they never let us on. We all have to rebook on another airline in order to get out San Juan. We get to our hotel at 12:30AM instead of 2:00PM. We would have missed the ship if this was same day. To add insult to injury(so to speak), the new airline loses my wife's luggage. We do get it back before we sail.

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I used 20 with my PVP to pay off ours. I’ve used a bunch to pay deposits etc with no issue. 

Respectfully, I don’t understand why people get offended when someone makes that kind of comment. The crowd that these cruises attract is by design rowdier (cheap prices + short duration + Carnival’s reputation for fun). Nothing wrong with that as long as you go with realistic expectations. 
 
Carnival’s beauty is that it aims at making cruising accesible to everyone. That means that fellow passengers on these short cruises will be less homogenous than on longer itineraries or other cruise lines that target a thinner sliver of the population. Some will be great fellow cruisers. Some not so much. That doesn’t mean that I should feel personally offended or stereotyped because there are a bunch of rowdy cruisers onboard.
 
I will not turn away a short, cheapie cruise on these older ships, but I will go with very realistic expectations. Not doing so will set me up for failure, like the OP unfortunately did. 
 
 
 

This is good news. This will keep me checking back so I can log in using the app once again.

On 11/29/2018 at 2:45 PM, John&LaLa said:

 

Just curious, do you use Tapatalk for any other boards?  I didn't.  Had both TT and the CC app on my phone.  Mainly used the TT one.

Sorry, I haven’t checked this in a while. Without the ability to use the app I don’t get on CC much any longer. I don’t sit on a computer to read CC. I use Tapatalk for about 7 other boards. Mostly fishing reports here on Lake Erie. It would be nice to get CC back available on the app. 

I also have stopped visiting the boards due to Tapatalk no longer working. I check back just to see if there is any progress. Hopefully they figure this out and reconfigure with Tapatalk. I really don’t need yet another app on my phone. 

I will access this board much less without being able to use my iPhone and TapaTalk. It would be much appreciated to once again be able to access CC through the app.

Was the Steakhouse the old or new menu? Did the deli have the pre-made sandwiches?

Glad to hear as we’re getting on the Miracle Saturday. Can’t wait to enjoy the ship, Serenity and our balcony.

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I’m glad someone else noticed this. I thought I was crazy. I haven’t made any changes to our booking that leaves next Saturday. I’ve been joking that we’re getting Ricky and Lucy beds in the cabin. That would not be to my benefit if that in fact were the case.

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My thoughts are that you're on vacation and should do whatever you need to in order to not stress out on day 1! If you need to rent a room for a night...so be it!

Exactly this. If being close and stress free means a room, then do it. It’s your vacation. Start it early!

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Book the itinerary that suits you the best first, ship and amenities second. As for the Liberty, it was our favorite cruise although it’s been a few years now. It has everything that we wanted without having to book a mega ship. This is of course subjective as we love this size ship and amenities. We were on a 7 day on the Liberty and loved every minute of it.

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I agree with those that say the best beaches are a taxi ride away. The beach at the port in St. Maarten isn’t the best.

You can walk to the beach via the boardwalk in Barbados, but much easier to grab a cab and head to a beach.

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Nope. Flying is one of those things I want to be in charge of. I decide if there is enough time to navigate a large airport, I decide if I want to fly early or late, I simply don't trust anyone else to coordinate my schedule.

 

 

 

And we love flying in the day before. Time to get sodas and snacks (diabetic DH) and time to be sure I have my "things I must have" packed (shampoo/toothbrush/medicines, etc). But the biggest reason is in case of delays. Even though I only live one mile from the South Carolina state line, I've seen snow in every month except June, July, August and September! And who knows when some fool tries to bypass security or your plane breaks down (I'd a whole lot rather find that out on the ground as opposed to in the air :D) and that just places everything in slow motion or a complete standstill.

 

 

 

Nope, not gonna let Carnival book my air and not about to chance flying in the day of the cruise!

I picked my flights with my PVP when booking. This wasn’t luck of the draw or taking what we were given. I already knew what prices and times I could get. Since Carnival has blocks on flights we were able to get on a flight that was unavailable to me booking in my own. Fly2Fun worked in this case for us.

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We used Fly2Fun and are still flying in the day prior for our April Miracle cruise. We just liked the ability to roll airfare (which was the same price we could find on our own) into the cruise contract and pay with gift cards that we had purchased though Verizon and AARP. Saved us $250.00 which isn't a bad thing.

Yep, you can.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Huh, the Miracle does seem a little "slim" when it comes to eateries...especially for Carnival. I see the Miracle DOES have Chopsticks, so if you like Asian cuisine you could try there on embark. It's open for lunch, and free.

I think Chopsticks is a great option.

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Call a PVP and they can help you.

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When we went boarding started around 12:00.

 

 

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Same for us the two times we sailed from San Juan. We were on board by 12:30 both times.

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It has to be younger than the HAL cruise we took last February. The average age of that cruise was in the middle 70’s. The sidewalks rolled up at 9:30. If the average age is 45 when we go on the Miracle in a month that will seem like spring break.

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Hubby wears cargo shorts occasionally, but usually jeans & shirt. Elegant nights he usually wears slacks & a collared shirt. Every once in a while we will go all out & wear tux & gown. Don't mind dressing up so much as just packing the extra stuff.

I’m with you about packing more. It’s another pair of shoes, a coat, another pair of pants. We dressed up for both nights of our HAL cruise because we found it appropriate. Less is more for my vacation now. I’ll always look presentable though. I will also say that what other people wear has absolutely no impact on my vacation whatsoever. Let’s all have a drink and enjoy the cruise.

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