Review Valor May. 11,2014

[maudde]

I don't have pics. to post, but will give my experiences from my cruise

We landed in San Juan Sat. Evening and upon arriving at Sheraton OSJ, we were upgraded to a suite looking out to the pier. The room was great and was great to wake up to a view of Valor.

This was my first Carnival cruise. Previous cruises have been with RCCL. We walked over to the ship around 11 and were seated quickly. They started letting people on at 11:30 I believe. It was a very quick process. We had booked 6452, the corner aft wrap port side. We walked directly to our room and met our room attendant. He was quite the talker. The room was great. Due to the shape of the room, it had a lot of space to walk around in, very nice. We really enjoyed the balcony. The view was great. It had 4 chairs, two tables and 2 loungers. It did get sun most of the time, which we enjoyed.

Only one night did I hear some noise from the Eagle Lounge, but still fell asleep fine. One night I heard laughing from the comedy show, but again nothing that kept me awake through the night.

The first day we got on, the servers seemed very aggressive with trying to sell drinks. After one left another was right there trying to sell drinks. I thought wow, this is going to be a long cruise trying to fend off hard sell servers, but after the first day it was not an issue. They were always around when you needed or wanted something and were so friendly with their service.

We had MTD and enjoyed sharing tables and meeting new people. The food was very good and I did enjoy the warm chocolate melting cake. We ate at Scarletts steakhouse and had the best meal. Everything was cooked perfectly and tasted fantastic. We also ate at the buffet, which I thought was limited in choices, but still the things they had were good. The grill by the pool also had good food. I enjoyed the pizza but always had to wait. They never had it readily available. We did the Sea day Brunch and I though it was just ok. I had blueberry pancakes and would opt for something else if I were to go again. The first day was the only time I had a chance to eat the fish and chips and they were pretty good. They are only open a couple hrs in the afternoon. I had a sandwich from the deli one night and it was ok. The guy working was very nice though.

We enjoyed the casino. I "earned" my drink on us card lol. The last night we were on, I was fortunate enough to play one machine for a few hrs and ended up hitting the jackpot which was fun.

We didn't go to the production shows, but enjoyed all the comedy shows. There was one comedian we didn't care too much for, but the other 3 were funny. We went and saw the newlywed show and wasn't impressed. I found myself comparing it to my previous cruises and it just failed imo. We attended a couple of trivia shows which was a lot of fun.

We had such a great time on the ship and would definitely book her again. We just needed another sea day as we didn't get a lot of time enjoying the ship because we didn't want to miss out on any of the islands.

In St. Thomas, we took the ferry from Red Hook to St. John and had a beautiful day at Trunk Bay.

Monday, we had our sea day, yay! In Barbados, we went with Calabasa. That was one of my favorite sails. We swam with turtles and did some snorkeling. The crew and food were the best. St. Lucia, we did a sail with MysticMan. It was a long day of sailing, but the snorkeling was very good. We also were fortunate to see a huge amount of dolphins that were swimming all around the cat. St. Kitts was a new island for us and had thought about staying on board for a second, but couldn't resist going on another excursion. We went to Carambola Beach Club. It was awesome. We spent the whole day there and thought the island was beautiful. We had been to St. Maarten several times, so decided we went sleep in and head to Maho around 11 to have lunch at Sunset Beach Bar and watch the planes. It was enjoyable as always. It never gets old watching people go tumbling down the beach by the planes.

I forgot to mention that with the aft room, you definitely hear and feel when you are pulling into the port. There is noise and vibration. Personally for me, it wasn't an issue and was like a wake up to see us arriving into port. As far as motion of rocking being at the back, it was no more than anywhere else on the ship. No problem.

I love this itinerary and even thought there were some minor differences on Carnival, I wouldn't hesitate to book another cruise with Carnival. Everyone was so friendly and always spoke as I passed by.

For those interested, we had an 11:30 flight out. We got off the ship at 8 with our bags and were at the airport by 8:30.

For this of you on upcoming cruises, enjoy and if you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer them.

 

Karen

[teetee6263]

Thanks for the review. I'm doing this cruise in 3 weeks & can't wait, sounds like it's gonna be great.

 

Noticed you said you were on board & room was ready by 11:30 am, did you have FTTF?

 

Thanks.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Cruise Critic Forums mobile app

[maudde]

I did purchase FTTF, but I wanted to make sure my bags arrived earlier than later which they did. With no tender ports, not needing to use guest services and the ship leaving so late, it's probably not needed. You are sure to have a great time. The itinerary and crew are great. I will say I was exhausted flying home yesterday only because there is so much to see and do during the week

[PathfinderEss]

Thanks for your review.