Carnival Glory May 31 Eastern Caribbean with American Table Pics!

[pbmsmile]

I am enjoying your review!

[Cruising_K]

My family will be on the Glory in December for my parents 55th wedding anniversary. Your review is getting me very excited.

[poundcake09]

Hey Julie, looking forward to your pictures and the review. Sandy and I had a good time on the cruise and really enjoyed meeting everyone. I didn't post a review, but just posted some random thoughts about the cruise on our roll call.

Hey O'Friend it's Great to see that you and Sandy are still Cruising together!!:D

[CruiserJul]

We were scheduled in Grand Turk 11:00 - 5:30. Woke up around 9 and got some huevos rancheros at Blue Iguana. Basically they just put the Mexican scrambled eggs directly on the plate instead of a tortilla. Went back to the balcony to see us pull into Grand Turk.

 

 

Our plan for the day was to first go to the Boaby Pt and then get back on the ship and grab all the beach stuff and head to Jack's Shack. Boaby Pt. and White Sand Beach are to the right when you get off the ship. Boaby is also known as the conch graveyard. There are so many conch shells laying around (harvested by the restaurants). I cut my foot on one so be careful! It was cool to see so many shells and very scenic, but it was getting really hot..so we headed back to the ship for lunch.

 

 

 

 

I tried the mushroom pizza which was really good. I like thin crust pizza though. The guys got Guys. I think DD got something from the buffet. Then we went back to the room and grabbed our snorkeling gear and beach bag.

This time we turned left off the ship and walked past Margaritaville and a few small beach bars to get to Jack's. Here is the beach area just to the left of the ship:

 

 

It gets less crowded the farther down you walk. Once at Jack's we paid $10 for two chairs and an umbrella. Right next to one of our chairs was Cooper the dog just sleeping the afternoon away, while Topher was busy digging for crabs and chasing handfuls of sand people would throw.

 

The water was pretty and clear and the sand is very soft here. We had printed out our coupons (available on their website) for free shots of rum so we cashed those in. Then I ordered a blue margarita and it was $8. That was the last mixed drink I ordered since DH had stocked our cooler with little bottles of vodka and rum at the duty free store for $2 - $3 each. We did order jerk chicken since it smelled so good!

 

DH and the kids snorkeled a little and then DH and I used his inflatable chair he brought from home. He got it cheap at a Marcs discount store.

 

 

The Carnival Sunshine was in port with us so we waited until about 3 before heading over to Margaritaville. They were scheduled to leave then and it would be less crowded. Their pool is very nice and large (and at the time not crowded) and there is a swim up bar. DH bought us margaritas and we watched the Sunshine sail away while hanging out in the pool. Such a nice afternoon.

 

[CruiserJul]

We got back on the ship at 5 and cleaned up and got dressed up for dinner. This was the 2nd Elegant Night.

 

 

[/url

 

]

 

This time they served us peach flavored champagne.

 

Shrimp cocktail

 

Lobster bisque

[CruiserJul]

Crab cake:

 

 

Jumbo shrimp (an oxymoron) dinner:

 

 

Filet:

 

 

WCMC:

 

DS took off for Club O2 and the rest of us went to the family friendly comedian, Guess the 90's song with Dr. E then the Motor City Show. Another fun filled day!

[CruiserJul]

DH thought this sign was funny:

 

 

At least wash one hand...he he.

 

Misc. towel animals:

 

 

 

 

 

Just kidding! The last one is our Sheltie, Melody who missed us while we were gone...Isn't she cute?

[SMSACE6]

Sweet doggie:) Thanks for your review, I enjoyed very much, and that new menu is growing on me. Thanks for the photos.

[backnine05]

Sweet doggie:) Thanks for your review, I enjoyed very much, and that new menu is growing on me. Thanks for the photos.

 

It appears that the new menu is growing on everyone. In size that is. There are almost double to choices as compared to when it first came out. Good to see.

[mj]

Great review!

[Ciardasully]

I will note that there was plenty of storage space for the 4 of us. Strangely, there was nothing in our amenities basket in the bathroom. Also, the entire cruise we never met our room steward. The room was always cleaned but we had to go to guest services to have someone unlock the mini fridge. Plus it would have been nice to have some ice.

 

 

That's funny only because we didn't meet our room steward on our Glory Cruise either. We were in your general vicinity as well but it was over a year ago so I doubt it was the same steward. When we were on our Sunshine Cruise, I was so excited when we met our steward.

[wrigley80]

Great Review. Thank You for the photo of the Margaritaville pool in Grand Turk. We will be there next month and I was hoping that the pool had stairs to enter and exit the pool.....your photo proves that there is

[tropicaledrink]

Great Review. Thank You for the photo of the Margaritaville pool in Grand Turk. We will be there next month and I was hoping that the pool had stairs to enter and exit the pool.....your photo proves that there is

 

First order of business, thank you for posting these pictures! I'm glad to see the menu evolving and I am looking forward to them...I'm a little bored with the old menus. ;)

 

And now...Wrigley, your mom is going???? YAY!

[wrigley80]

First order of business, thank you for posting these pictures! I'm glad to see the menu evolving and I am looking forward to them...I'm a little bored with the old menus. ;)

 

 

 

And now...Wrigley, your mom is going???? YAY!

 

 

Haha. Yep Mom is going along on this cruise. I bought the cruise as a gift to my parents for their 37th wedding anniversary.

[PathfinderEss]

Great review, love your dog.:)

[TampaJules]

Thanks for the menu pics! Menu looks awesome. Seems like the are going a little toward a healthier (or at least not quite as rich) as it used to be, which is awesome.

[CruiserJul]

Sorry for the delay in posting - been busy with summer activities - baseball and Cedar Point!

 

Unfortunately I don't have many pics for this day. I know we took pictures of dinner but I don't know what happened to them :confused:.

 

We were up (everyone but DS) at 8:30 and went to Lido as usual for breakfast. I like eggs benedict and they had these on the Lido every morning. Unfortunately, every other day they had salmon eggs benedict but this morning was the normal Canadian bacon kind. They just have the weirdest things on the breakfast buffet sometimes. Grilled mushrooms and grilled tomatoes? And lunch meat.. I like those things but that is just kind of strange they are offered at breakfast.

 

DD & I went to the gym then DH and I went to Lido deck and found a couple of chairs together. The Lego Movie was playing but I found it hard to pay attention. It was really hot outside and we kept moving back and forth from the chair to the pool.

 

Around lunchtime we headed to the Chocolate Extravaganza. Again, I know DD took pictures of this. If I find them I will post them later. They had truffles, and a chocolate fondue plus cakes and cookies and my favorite, chocolate mousse! Next we had lunch (notice the priorities? he he). I had Blue Iguana

tacos:

 

 

These are just so good! Next I participated in the line dancing for St. Jude.

That was fun, but I like I said it was hot!

 

We went back to the room and DS was just coming back from the gym and chocolate buffet. He wanted to hang out with his Club O2 friends so the rest of us went to the casino and trivia. By the way, trivia usually was held by the casino. Once it was in the atrium.

 

We went to the Hasbro game show again before getting ready for dinner. DS asked if he could eat with his friends so we let him. (We didn't see much of him this day).

[CruiserJul]

The Last Supper (on the cruise ship - boo!)

 

I had been dying to try the flatbread appetizer since I love that sort of thing so DD agreed to split it with me. It was really good! I could make a meal just eating that! For dinner I had the jerk pork loin which was pretty good and DD had shrimp creole which she really enjoyed. DH got the Caesar salad, shrimp cocktail, and strip steak. He was pleased with that as well. For dessert I had the cheese plate, DH got the cherry pie and DD ordered the diet apple pie. Our waiter asked her if she had a second choice..ha ha. He brought her the diet apple pie and a WCMC! She tried the apple pie and said it was good but she really like the WCMC!

 

I want to mention that we never had to wait to be seated with the Anytime Dining. Sometimes dinner would be less that 1 1/2 hours with dessert and other times it would be that long before dessert.

 

After dinner DH and I went to the comedian and DD went to Hunger Games trivia. Then we met up and went to the other comedian. After we went to the casino and cashed out. I was actually up $38!

 

We headed back to the room to do the sad job of packing. We choose self-debarkation usually.

 

We made a final trip to the frozen yogurt/ice cream machines. We saw DS up on deck walking around with his friends. They were showing a movie up on deck and were serving popcorn.

[CruiserJul]

Great Review. Thank You for the photo of the Margaritaville pool in Grand Turk. We will be there next month and I was hoping that the pool had stairs to enter and exit the pool.....your photo proves that there is

 

Brianna - glad you are enjoying my review! I always enjoy reading yours! I'm glad your mom is going with you the next time. You guys will love Grand Turk. Margaritaville is a fun place

[CruiserJul]

First order of business, thank you for posting these pictures! I'm glad to see the menu evolving and I am looking forward to them...I'm a little bored with the old menus. ;)

 

And now...Wrigley, your mom is going???? YAY!

 

Thanks for the menu pics! Menu looks awesome. Seems like the are going a little toward a healthier (or at least not quite as rich) as it used to be, which is awesome.

 

I was a little bored with the old menus as well. At least they added back some of the favorites like soups and shrimp cocktail, but I think variety is a good thing. I also like that you can choose your sides.

[CruiserJul]

As I mentioned before we chose self debark since we weren't flying home until the next day. We docked a little late - 7:15 and it was a while before they started letting people off the ship. We were Zone 18 so we had a while. We headed up to Lido for a leisurely breakfast. Surprisingly it was not packed like usual on the last morning! We did not get off of the ship until 10:40!

 

EZ Express picked us up around 11 and took us to FLL to get our rental car. Then we drove back to Miami and visited Shark Valley in the Everglades. A few years ago DH and I went there in March and we rented bikes and did the 15 mile loop and saw hundreds of gators! They would just be lying on the path or in the grass and never bothered anyone and no one bothered them. So we thought it would be a cool experience for the kids. There is a $10 entrance fee and bikes are $8.50/hr to rent or there is a tram if you are not up to biking on their one speed bikes. We rented bikes and headed out but we were keeping an eye on the clouds since it looked like rain coming at us. We saw a few gators but mostly they were in the creek next to the path. There were also turtles and herons, etc. We rode out 3 miles then turned around when we saw lightning. I was bummed because I would like to have gone out longer. We made it back within the hour and walked around a little before it rained.

 

We stopped at a little store along the road and bought DS some alligator on a stick (He's an adventurous eater :p) This store had a couple of peacocks in the back and chickens roaming around.

 

We headed to the Aventura Mall which is a lot bigger than our local mall at home and we ate at the food court there. They had a Michael Kors store so I got to pick out a purse for my birthday present :D.

 

Later we checked in to the Holiday Inn and Suites again in Dania Beach and then drove the 2 miles to the beach. It's a very nice beach with 3 restaurants and wooden chairs and tables on the beach that anyone can use. I wouldn't mind coming back and spending a little more time here.

[CruiserJul]

We really enjoyed this cruise. The Glory is the biggest ship we have been on thus far but it never really seemed that crowded. I thought maybe we would have to get to shows super early to get seats but that wasn't the case. However, I don't think the ship was sailing full and I never heard how many people were on this sailing.

 

I enjoyed the food as much as always in the MDR and Lido buffet (some things I really like and others not so much). As you know I loved the Blue Iguana and the guys loved Guys Burgers. It was nice to have those options. I also liked the Brunch.

 

I feel we were kept busy and I would have like to have played mini golf or ping pong and gone to the hot tubs more often, but this was a port intensive cruise and that is what I prefer.

 

I loved having the balcony! That is probably why we were not on deck as much as usual because it was very enjoyable to sit on our balcony. It was a little strange not meeting our room steward but at least our room was kept clean!

 

I liked our CD Dr. E. I thought he made everything more enjoyable...he was pretty funny and was good at engaging people.

 

I was happy DS made friends at Club O2 because on our past cruises he was too shy to attend much of the activities.

 

Well I guess that's it unless I think of something important that I left out Thanks for being patient while I finished the review and please let me know if you have any questions!

[Lovefuninthesun]

Great review! Thanks so much for taking the time to post.:)

[Jana]

Thank you SO MUCH for this! I'm on her on the 26th; I see several people in this thread on the same cruise.

 

I wanted to take DD away for a week; she's transitioning into a new position (big promotion!) and this would have been the perfect trip, but it turns out she can't go after all. So I'll be solo :( It's ok, I'll take the time to just sit on the balcony and read, but I'm sad that she won't be along. Still, the rate was so good that even paying for both of us, it's a bargain. I love when that happens!

 

I was on a four-nighter on Inspiration in March. The menu was almost identical but there were tablecloths every night; I was startled to see them missing in your photos. Somehow it diminishes the experience of "dining" in the MDR to me to not have them. That's not necessarily a bad thing, I just won't feel as guilty choosing a more casual venue on a couple of nights!

 

Thanks again, it was a really complete review and your photos are wonderful.

Edited July 2, 2014 by Jana

[jordanaire]

FANTASTIC review! Especially the food pics!

 

:cool:Bill