(FINALLY) Yet another Valor Southern Caribbean review Sept. 14-21, 2014 with pics

[Stinger-pr]

Loving the review! We are headed to San Juan on Nov 14th. DId you by chance go to the piano bar at all. We love the piano bar, but have not had any reviews about Greg Alcock.

Not really, sorry. Stay tuned to the finish because I'm posting some pictures from San Juan at the end of the review. Hope you enjoy it!

[jenng1976]

Small world! My husband and I were on that Spencer Ambrose tour too! We were in the back row of the van behind the family of 4. We really enjoyed that day too.

 

Great review so far!

 

Jenn :)

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

[Stinger-pr]

Small world! My husband and I were on that Spencer Ambrose tour too! We were in the back row of the van behind the family of 4. We really enjoyed that day too.

 

Great review so far!

 

Jenn :)

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

 

Hey, small world indeed. I'm glad you are enjoying the review. Nice of you to stop by and relieve at least that part of the trip with us!!

[Buffettfan 225]

Day 2: St. Thomas

 

 

BTW, if you’re interested, the ship docked in reverse with port side towards the pier. (leasson learned #2: no matter what floor you are, only the bow (forward) elevators go down to deck O where you disembark).

BTW although we didn't take it, the sky tram was operational at all times while we were docked.

 

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Being a veteran cruiser, I found some of your BTW hints very helpful.

I really hope next June the ship "backs in" we always had starboard cabin, but mixed it up this cruise for Portside cabin view, always love watching action of gangway side if possible.

 

Go to know about elevators and getting off. I also do reverse getting back on -take the deck zero stairs up one deck or more, and then cross to another elevator bank.

 

Have never been on Paradise tram in St.Thomas so may be a new option for us. Thanks for update.

[Buffettfan 225]

Along the way we stopped at a crack in the wall of a cliff. This is the “Bat Cave” where thousands of bats live. You will see them move, screech and you will smell the guano. The only way to reach this is by boat and they take you right up to the cave.

 

Then they take you to the town of Soufriere where the group is split in to those that decide for the volcano tour and those that want the mud baths. We decided for the volcano. Our driver (forgot his name) ended up being Spencer’s brother and he was very informative and easy going. We ended up with an older couple from south Texas and a family of four that basically said nothing the whole trip! Anyway, we were given a quick tour of the volcano crater, and about 20 minutes later boarded the bus on our way to Toraille water fall.

 

 

It is a beautiful place. Being accustomed to going regularly to El Yunque, I found it relatively small but the beauty was unquestionable. The water was not as cold as I expected but still very refreshing.

 

 

 

 

 

Lovely photos BTW. Sorry slight off topic: We love el Yunque and always hike the trail to the "castle lookout." Since you are from PR, can you tell me what trail takes you to the falls in elYunque please. (the trail not the one you park car by)

[Buffettfan 225]

On Wednesday we arrived at Barbados. It was a beautiful morning when we got into port. This is an industrial port and as you can see we parallel parked behind a small freighter.

 

While we were at breakfast I finally got my "cool whale tail shot"

 

When we got to Barbados almost all the shops at port were closed. All the same, I think this was the most expensive port of all. Taxis were lined up just outside the terminal separated into tour buses and regular taxis. There's a big sign to the right of the taxis lines with posted rates but make sure you set the rate before getting on the taxi. Also these buses range in size from big accommodating vans to small, European type vans. If you happen to get one of the non air conditioned vans you will bake inside until the van is full of people that are going in the same general direction. We went to Carlisle beach ($5 per person one way), specifically we went to Lobster Alive since we wanted some peace and quiet while on the beach.

 

This is the view from Lobster Alive. We passed on renting chairs since we took our beach towels to simply lay on the sand. I mean, come on...why would I go to a beach to lay under an umbrella. I wanted sun!!! A few minutes after arriving we were approached by one of the "vendors" to go swimming with the turtles right at the beach. This is one of the things we had on our list so we accepted and paid the $20 per person and were escorted to a double deck boat that was in tip-top shape. They had some rum punch (good and strong) and had all the snorkel equipment as well as life vest available for those who need them and all the equipment was in very well-kept condition.

 

How successful was the turtle sighting? I am not that into snorkeling, but to see turtles I may, or can you spot them from the boat?

[Stinger-pr]

St. Kitts was our second rest stop. Like I said, we were on a budget and didn't book anything for this day. We got up early to watch the ship come into port only to find we wer not going to be the only ones in town. The Disney Magic was on a repositioning cruise headed for San Juan, PR and was already docked when we got in. I honestly thought the Dream would be much bigger but the Valor was the size winner on this pier.

 

 

We took our time getting breakfast and went into the town shops for a while. We really wanted to take a tour of the island, maybe jump over to Nevis but we finally decided this would become our souvenir stop to buy stuff for our family. Besides, we plan on being back soon on the Liberty.......right honey? ;-)

 

 

What we found out is that ALL of the shopping in a market square right off the ship and that most of the shops sell the same things (also pointed out in another review) and prices don't really vary too much from place to place. Prices for watches and jewelry is mostly on par with the rest of the stops and liquor prices are hot and miss. There are somethings cheaper, other things more expensive than other ports (except Barbados). I don't know if everybody from the two ships went on tours but the shops and streets were not that very crowded. It was also the port we had the most trouble (tie with St. Maarten) finding free open WIFI. And the place was just off the main area near an ethnic clothing store. Also, there's not much of a choice to eat around unless you go to one of the bars.

 

 

Empty street to one of the sides of the main shopping square. Lots of closed down stores litter the side streets here.

[Stinger-pr]

Some more pictures from the shopping area of St. Kitts. As you can see, not that many people around.

 

 

I also want to clarify something about the WIFI here in St. Kitts and in all the other islands. Lesson learned: FOLLOW THE CREW. These guys hang around hotspots as soon as they leave the ship. I'm quite sure that's all they get off for. In St. Kitts (as in other places) there are some stores that will give you their password if you buy something from the store (which basically negates the "free" concept) but we only found one USABLE hotspot all day that required no purchase. It was, as mentioned, from a clothing store and guess what happened to be outside? A bunch of crew members!!

 

Another hint: if your looking to buy "St. Kitts" t-shirts and souvenirs, don't waste much time browsing. While there are some stores that have some specials, prices don't differ much from store to store and neither does the variety of items.

 

Making our way back on board we ran into this guy. That's the Valor's Cruise Director Felipe Coutto (sp). A very available, extremely energetic and fun CD. We will sure miss his "Woohoo" when the Valor gets repositioned and we sail the Liberty.

 

We made a beeline towards the buffet area for lunch, not really being moved by anything we saw. My wife noticed that the Fish and Chips was opened (we were always back on board too late for it) and she went straight for it. I went back to Mongolian Wok. There's always a freakin' line here but don't let it fool you, it may seem long but these guys prepare up to 3 dishes each at any given time. The line moves and the food is worth it. This was also the first time my wife really complained about the seafood all trip. She had three different things (can't remember what they were) but she said they had mostly no flavor without any dipping sauce and that they were mostly batter and drenched in grease. She ended up not eating and decided to get something from the burrito bar downstairs.

 

Buffet at the bottom (desserts dead center!!), Fish n' Chips to the side.

[Stinger-pr]

Saling away from St. Kitts was awesome. Although to tell you the truth, being in St. Kitts longer than any other island does not make any sense to me. Don't get me wrong, from what I've seen St. Kitts is very beautiful beyond the shops. But I doubt that a longer stay is needed. I'd trade that extra hour in St. Kitts for one extra in St. Lucia or St. Maarten. But we were treated to the best sunset yet for the cruise.

 

 

 

That's the Disney Dream to the left in case you're wondering.

 

We went to dinner and tonight was a up and down experience with the food. Service was excellent but the consistency of the food was horrible. I had the wild mushroom cream soup (OMG delicious!! This was the best food item for me of the whole trip) and my wife had a Cesar salad. For mains I had southern fried chicken (flavorful, tender, juicy) and she had the lasagne Bolognese which was a huge chunk filled with way too much spinach and on the mild side of flavor. Desserts included Grand Marnier souffle (if you'd never tasted grand marnier it'll be dificult to identify the flavor) and the most consistent food item, chocolate melting cake.

 

After dinner we finally caught a show at the theater and boy was it worth it. Is was a couples games kindda like the Newlywed Game with a twist. They picked a newlywed couple, one that had between 20-30 years of marriage and one over 50 years married and since this is basically a non scripted "anything-can-happen" thing, it was a blast (I even played along with my wife and I got all answers right, she missed three......really???)

 

After the show we spent some time at Serenity before going to bed.

[Stinger-pr]

Being a veteran cruiser, I found some of your BTW hints very helpful.

I really hope next June the ship "backs in" we always had starboard cabin, but mixed it up this cruise for Portside cabin view, always love watching action of gangway side if possible.

 

Go to know about elevators and getting off. I also do reverse getting back on -take the deck zero stairs up one deck or more, and then cross to another elevator bank.

 

Have never been on Paradise tram in St.Thomas so may be a new option for us. Thanks for update.

 

I had read all kinds of stories about how the Valor docks on each island but apparently we got lucky. We had a port balcony and one way or the other we were on the dock side all the time.

[Stinger-pr]

How successful was the turtle sighting? I am not that into snorkeling, but to see turtles I may, or can you spot them from the boat?

Our experience was mixed. There weren't that many turtles to tell you the truth. But there were some and they are not afraid to come up close and personal with you. A few are better than none. But with the stop at the shipwreck, it made up for a few missing turtles. Go early since as the as the hour pass, more and more people show up and the water gets crowded.

[Stinger-pr]

Lovely photos BTW. Sorry slight off topic: We love el Yunque and always hike the trail to the "castle lookout." Since you are from PR, can you tell me what trail takes you to the falls in elYunque please. (the trail not the one you park car by)

There are two trails that meet at the big La Mina fall. One if the "Big Tree trail" the other is the one that starts at the visitor's center that's located further up the road from Yukiyú (observation) tower. There's a picnic area with gazebos and BBQs where you an have a heck of a day. Start there all the way down to the falls. But this one is moderately hard on the way up since it rarely lets up. Best bet is the Big Tree trail. You'll find it when you see a small, parking lot with basically no signs. Good luck!!

[Stinger-pr]

 

 

This port was bitter-sweet for us since there were so many things we wanted to do but never got a chance to. After breakfast we browsed the terminal shops and were worried that if prices there were going to trend over in Philipsburg but in part it was my fault for focusing on shopping and some other stuff rather than planing a real excursion. But I'll make up for it next time honey, I swear!! So we ended up taking a land taxi to Phillipsburg for $6 each round trip. Other than maybe San Juan, this has to be the most organized cab operations in the Caribbean. No hassles, No hidden charges, all up front and with uniformed drivers with most vans in tiptop shape. We started walking up and down town looking for specific liquor and did find the best prices of the trip in St. Maarten. Don't expect huge differences from, say St. Thomas, but you will likely find some savings here. One thing I found funny (actually it was my wife who pointed it out to me) was that Bacardi rum was a few buck CHEAPER than in Puerto Rico.

 

The color of the water here was simply stunning!!!

 

 

We ended up in the (in)famous That Yoda Guy place and as a Star Wars fan I saw some nice things and some "mehh" ones. For some reason I actually felt sorry for this guy. I get his pitch but really $10 each for a 5 minute tour of his place is nuts. I mean $20 gets up to 7 in (I think) but you can't adjust the price for two?? He says that all sales go to paying for his US$10K a month rent. Are you kidding me?? Here's a guy that helps build the original Yoda puppet and his only Yoda figure is from the newer films (the II and III episode, CG character, not the ugly Ep. I thing). I browsed his "for free, for sale" part of the place and left. What a disappointment!! And people actually like this....

 

 

After getting all our booze and some Gouda cheese and some hot sauce we left for the ship. We changed into our swimsuits and headed to the almost empty aft pool for some sun and some delicious pizza. Once the time to sail away from St. Maarten came we headed back to the cabin to say goodbye to our last island of the trip. We started the sad chore of packing our stuff and preparing to leave the next morning. We finished pre-packing got dressed to go to dinner.

 

Tonight's dinner was again hit and miss. I had the protabello mushroom starter and my wife had some crab cakes that she said were good, not outstanding. For main dishes I had the prime rib which was delicious. My wife struck out with our third try with the flat iron steaks. It was well cooked but no flavor to it. We both had the final Melting cake with extra ice cream!!

 

We headed out to the theater to catch the Legends show and had a trip down memory lane with the 80's themed musical. Good show for what was said to be the final show for that crew on the Valor. They introduced all the dancers at the end. There were two guys that did a break dance number and when they introduced them as being from Puerto Rico the roof blew off the theater. After the show ended we sat the stampede out and waited for the room to clear before heading to pick out the pictures we had taken during the cruise and hitting the shops.

 

If you get your picture taken be prepared to fork some good cash for them. Some pics come only in 4x6 size (US$11.99 each), some only 5x7 (US$14.95) and some like the ones taken on backgrounds during the evening (elegant nights, for example) only come in 8x10 prints which cost $21.95 each!!! No discounts for multiple prints and no packages. Also, avoid handling your pictures too much since those that are up on the wall are the prints you will be taking with you if you buy them. Those that you don't want go in a disposal/recycle bin. My opinion: in this day and age, wouldn't it be more cost efficient on the long run to have a few interactive terminals where you can view and order your prints or even purchase and download to a USB drive or portable device and save so much money, time and materials printing photos that could potentially be unwanted and end up in bins? I don't know, just my two cents... The "sales" at the stores were not much of a sale. You have a table with some (ugly) Invicta watches that even on sale are overpiced, compared to land based stores. It's all bait and switch. For example, Citizen watches were 35% off all cruise. Not a cent less on the last night's sale. And who even buys US$1,800 Tonino Lamborghini watches on a cruise ship???

 

Anyway we spent a while on Serenity deck as we were passing between St. Thomas and the island of Culebra, PR and that meant PHONES AND DATA WORKS!! At least from AT&T signal was good for about two hours more or less between 11pm-1am if I recall. And people were starting to realize this since the outer decks were filling up with people, phone in hand...lol.

[wrigley80]

Very nice review. The Carnival Valor was our first Carnival ship....so that ship will always hold a special place in my heart :) I am thinking about booking a cruise on the Valor again when it repositions to Port Canaveral.

 

Btw I agree with your wife....I love the décor on the Valor

[Buffettfan 225]

There are two trails that meet at the big La Mina fall. One if the "Big Tree trail" the other is the one that starts at the visitor's center that's located further up the road from Yukiyú (observation) tower. There's a picnic area with gazebos and BBQs where you an have a heck of a day. Start there all the way down to the falls. But this one is moderately hard on the way up since it rarely lets up. Best bet is the Big Tree trail. You'll find it when you see a small, parking lot with basically no signs. Good luck!!

Thank you. BTW have you ever SEEN the elusive Coqui(sp) frog? WE've only heard their song.

[cntryman77]

Thanks for the great review! We're really looking forward to this cruise in May 2015. It's our honeymoon & first cruise for us both.

[Buffettfan 225]

I am sad your cruise is nearing an end , thus report near end. I have found review delight of honesty and comments ( hints) that are very original & helpful- like the cell service last night. :rolleyes:

We have enjoyed your island of PR five times visiting, and a really remote chance our son ( in early twenties) would get a transfer there for work for the big W discount store as he works shipping logistics and speaks fluent spanish.

Does one get " island crazy" after a while, or safety issues?

Some day hope to visit Vieques.

[Andoria]

Wonderful review!

[deladane]

Thanks for writing this review! It's making me even more excited for my Valor cruise in March :)

[Dallas Bengal]

GREAT review..Even more excited for my Valor cruise on Nov.9th...Quick question, Did you get a vaccine for the Yellow Fever? I received a letter from carnival about it. Any info from anyone would be appreciated.

 

Scott

[pghsteelerfan]

Stinger-pr: I just caught up with and finished your review and want to let you know that I've really enjoyed it and your pictures are beautiful. I really want to do this same cruise again and hope to soon, with a few extra days in San Juan. Thank you for taking the time to share.

 

Dallas Bengal: Yellow Fever vaccine - you don't need it. When we were on Valor out of San Juan in May 2013, we never received a notice but several others on our Roll Call did. We contacted our travel agent and she also said that we didn't need it unless we had been to a country with risk of Yellow Fever, mainly Africa/South America. She said Carnival normally sends the notice to passengers residing outside the USA but the notices get sent to USA residents in error and she believes that started the year before our cruise. She did advise us that using a passport should be proof enough that we had not been to any of the affected countries and also recommended having our flight information handy, just in case, at the Carnival check-in desk just as proof that we haven't traveled through any of the affected countries' airports and have a 12+ hour stay/layover. When we checked in, nothing was ever said about the Yellow Fever vaccine. Attaching a link about it that may help as well. Hope this helps.

 

http://www.iamat.org/country_profile.cfm?id=149#profile_immunization

Edited October 8, 2014 by pghsteelerfan

[cntryman77]

Stinger-pr: I just caught up with and finished your review and want to let you know that I've really enjoyed it and your pictures are beautiful. I really want to do this same cruise again and hope to soon, with a few extra days in San Juan. Thank you for taking the time to share.

http://www.iamat.org/country_profile.cfm?id=149#profile_immunization

 

So you think a few extra days in San Juan is worth it? I'm finding that if I stay 2 nights in San Juan after my cruise , even with the hotel, it's cheaper because the airfare is so much cheaper to fly out on Tuesday instead of Sunday. We will be coming in the Sunday of the cruise because of the wedding Saturday.

[rs12065]

So you think a few extra days in San Juan is worth it? I'm finding that if I stay 2 nights in San Juan after my cruise , even with the hotel, it's cheaper because the airfare is so much cheaper to fly out on Tuesday instead of Sunday. We will be coming in the Sunday of the cruise because of the wedding Saturday.

 

We did this cruise last January. There were 2 families with a total of 14 people (young adults and parents). Although I wasn't too crazy about several aspects of the ship (noise, constant blaring of the large screen on the Lido Deck, the most annoying cruise director ever) it was still an incredible cruise with wonderful ports.

 

We chose to stay 2 days before and 1 day after in Puerto Rico for the very reason mentioned above, the more affordable airfare. There are wonderful restaurants and beaches in the San Juan area, and the extra cost for hotel stay did not even come close to matching what the higher airfare would have been. Since I paid for all of the airfare, believe me it was a wise decision.

[pghsteelerfan]

So you think a few extra days in San Juan is worth it? I'm finding that if I stay 2 nights in San Juan after my cruise , even with the hotel, it's cheaper because the airfare is so much cheaper to fly out on Tuesday instead of Sunday. We will be coming in the Sunday of the cruise because of the wedding Saturday.

 

Personally, I definitely think so. I'd love to spend a week there sometime. There is so much to see and do: the forts (great views), Old San Juan, the rainforest, bio-bay, and from what I've seen in reviews, some very nice beaches to the east as well. They have zip lining, the rum factory, and I read and saw pictures in another review where they did a helicopter tour pre-cruise, and the list goes on. If you fly out Tuesday, it will probably be less crowded and shorter lines at the airport as well. Congratulations on your upcoming wedding!

 

Stinger-pr is from PR, so I'm sure he can give you some wonderful ideas.

[Stinger-pr]

Thank you. BTW have you ever SEEN the elusive Coqui(sp) frog? WE've only heard their song.

 

As a matter of fact yes I have. They are a light tan colored frog just a bit bigger than a quater. Very elusive and sometimes hard to locate even with the noise it makes. Some people fiand it annoying but I love falling asleep to the it's sound outside my window.