Carnival Liberty Again! Feb 2015

[nickiford]

So, I'm planning my cruise for next February when I realize I haven't done my trip report from the last one!

 

Can't let that happen! I love re-reading my reviews and re-living the fun so here we go. Might have to omit a few details but I think I've got the gist of it. It was a great trip, a rocky start, a missed port, but we roll with the punches (and the ship as you will see ;-)

 

There is the usual cast of characters, myself and my sister, I have to now say that I'm in my 40's and she's in her late 30's, but just for another year and then she will be 40 too. We are both married but travel solo and this was our 5th Carnival Cruise and only our first time to go on the same ship twice. We really like the Liberty, it's the only one we've been on with the 2.0 upgrades. Considering the Breeze for next year, can't wait to see what it is like.

 

So here we go, first test pic. The obligatory, we are on vacation selfie!

Edited June 16, 2015 by nickiford
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[nickiford]

Oh my, I'm having some pic posting issues. I usually upload from photobucket, but my pics are on facebook only right now...does anyone know how to post them from facebook? I can't seem to get it work.

[BcIcemen]

Do you have any photos of the American Menu's

[nickiford]

Do you have any photos of the American Menu's

 

Hi, no sorry, no menu pics, but I can say that we enjoyed it!

[nickiford]

 

Ok I think we are back in business now!

[nickiford]

Here are a couple more pre-cruise shots. Here is my home attempt at a mocha chocolate getaway and our luggage, Heys spinners and Lug carry ons.

 

 

 

[nickiford]

So we live in Southern Ontario and it is ridiculously expensive to fly out of Toronto so we always fly out of Buffalo. We were flying from Buffalo to Baltimore, then Baltimore to Fort Myers, where we were renting a car and driving to North Fort Myers to stay at our parents Winter House for the weekend then driving to Port Canaveral.

 

We had a great drive to Buffalo, went to the Walden Galleria and had supper at the Cheescake Factory and then went to bed because our flight was at 6:30 the next morning. Just for additional information, we always stay at the Best West Buffalo Airport Inn and park the truck there for the duration of our trip.

 

Woke up to great weather, took the shuttle to the airport, got on the airplane, long story short, flash freak snowstorm and by the time we take off we have missed our Baltimore connection. No big worry for us, we are in no hurry, this is Friday, ship doesn't leave until Sunday this is all that we care about.

 

Get to Baltimore and the next Fort Myers flight we can get on instead until 4:00 and it's now about 9 am, still we go with the flow, we are on vacation! Spend the day in the Baltimore Airport. Love the Southwest comfy chairs and really appreciated all of the plug ins. Finally got on the plane and made it out to the Sunshine! We were originally supposed to land by 11 am in Florida but didn't end up getting there until around 8. Believe it or not but it looks like we are going to tempt fate again with the same flights this year, can't happen two years in a row can it?!?

 

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[nickiford]

We had a great weekend with our parents. We went to The Shell Factory and they have the weirdest collection of Taxidermy of all things. Then we went to this neat little town called Matlacha.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We got up early on Sunday morning at 6:45 to leave for the port. We decided to take Hwy 17 to 4 and then to 528. It was a nice easy drive. It cost almost $5 in tolls but we had a roll of quarters so we were fine.

 

It was easy to return the rental to Budget, it was chaos though waiting for the complimentary shuttle to the port so we decided for the sake of sanity to spend the $15 on the taxi, best decision. Nice peaceful ride to the port we arrived just before 11 am. We had FTTF but the terminal didn't seem that busy at all, they were already boarding Zone 1 when we arrived! We walked right in went down to our cabin, dropped our bags and within minutes, it was this!

 

[nickiford]

We had some lunch on the lido, Guy's Burgers of course! The restaurant was the using boarding day chaos so we sat upstairs and had a nice peaceful lunch. After lunch we went back to our room and quickly got changed and went to claim "our spot" on Serenity. Just at the top of the stairs by the hammock under the partial shade.

 

 

My sister doesn't mind the sun so she usually was across from me. But she should mind the sun as you will see how red she gets in later pics!

 

 

First on the ship selfie

 

 

 

 

After a few hours we went back to our room, our luggage was there, we unpacked, went for muster, had a nap and then got ready for our first night steakhouse dinner, so good!!!

 

 

We had beef carpaccio, Caesar salad, filet mignon with Béarnaise sauce, broccoli and the chocolate sampler. Everything was perfect!

 

We missed the Welcome Aboard show as they just had one early showing, we wandered around a bit and then went to bed fairly early.

 

Our first towel animal...the beloved seal (or towel vagina). Whatever you like best. ;-)

 

[nickiford]

My pictures are a bit out of order, here are some from the shell factory and a picture of "our spot" and also an "after" shot of my sisters day in the sun lol.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[nickiford]

The first day was a sea day. We got up early, got our spot, got all organized and then went down and had buffet breakfast. We are never more than about 20 mins for breakfast so we don't feel bad that we set up our stuff person. We are not chair hogs.

 

I had a breakfast burrito, it was very good. It was pretty windy all day, no complaints other than the hot tub did not seem to be working, it was cold. It was fixed the next day.

 

Laid out all morning, had chicken tacos for lunch, delicious again.

 

We laid out after lunch until around 2 and then when the sun came around to overhead we headed back to the room for a nap. This is pretty much our usually sea day routine.

 

We went for dinner in the dining room that night, it was formal night, we had YTD and had no wait for dinner. No food porn, we love the soups, I like the spring rolls, the tuna tartar, the Caesar salad and we like the steak and we almost always have Warm Chocolate Melting cake Mickey ears style. We also tried to smores parfait this night for the first time, very good.

 

We had a few drinks this night and made the rounds, comedian, piano bar, disco and gambling!

 

Here are pics that I think are from that night but I'm not 100 percent sure.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Apparently I like to take a lot of photos of drinks! You might think that we had the drinks package, but we didn't. We are usually just under the break even amount so we don't bother.

[nickiford]

I'm not sure which night was which, so here are all of the towel animals.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 17, 2015 by nickiford
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[nickiford]

Our first port was Grand Turk. This was our second time here, we just like to hang around the Margaritaville Pool. We got some good chairs under a nice palm tree and hung around until lunch and then we got back on the ship.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[nickiford]

We had lunch, Monogolian Wok today and then it started to rain. It's actually the first time that it has really rained when we have been on a ship! It then got really windy and we couldn't leave! They determined it was too windy it wouldn't be safe, we didn't end up leaving until 10:00 pm that night and we were supposed to leave at 3 pm.

 

Rainy Pics

 

 

 

Even though it was raining, we were still having fun!

 

 

That night after dinner we went to the arcade for the first time and it was really fun. They had a game in there that was almost like a 4D ride, we rode it a few times.

 

The following morning when we got up it was supposed to be our Puerto Rico day, we were pretty confident however that we were going to have to miss it because we left so late the night before and sure enough we were right.

 

We assumed the sea day position and carried on about our day. We had been to Puerto Rico before and didn't have any really big plans.

 

I made my own special Guy's Fries poutine concoction for lunch with the toppings bar. So yummy!

 

 

We watched the ice carving.

 

 

 

Later that evening we went to the lobby bar for a drink before dinner and listened to the singers. They were very good, I don't know how she walks around the ship in these heels though!!

 

 

[nickiford]

Our next port was St Maarten. This was the first time for us so we did a bus tour through Carnival. We prefer for the first time at least in each port to take a ship tour so we have an idea what things are like while being in a safe environment and guaranteed not to miss the ship!

 

Our excursion wasn't until 12:00, so we got off wandered around the port a bit, got back on rested for about an hour and then went out to meet our tour.

 

We toured the Dutch and the French Side and we had one hour in Marigot, it was drizzling a litte again for a bit, we stopped for croissant and beer and Sarafina's to get out of the rain.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[nickiford]

Our last sea day was the same old routine. I never get tired of it. Get chairs, have breakfast, lounge in chairs, eat lunch, lounge in chairs, back to room, have nap, get ready for dinner, wine before dinner and so on.

 

This last sea day had a lot of movement. Very large swells, ship was moving big time! Lot of people sick, we were fine.

 

We had tried to get a reservation for the steakhouse the last night earlier in the week but it was fully booked, we took a chance that someone may have cancelled due to seasickness and sure enough we were able to get in.

 

We enjoyed it the last night as much as the first.

 

Ship docked on time, we took the Carnival shuttle back to the Orlando airport where we had about 3 hours to wait for our flight but it's a great airport to kill time in.

 

Here are some random remaining pics that I didn't post throughout the review.

 

Our Room - Oceanview

 

 

 

Chandelier pic

 

 

Hunger Games Dive In Movie

 

 

Before dinner selfie

 

 

How my sister sleeps on the plane :-)

 

 

It was a great trip, can't wait until next year, Carnival Breeze February 2016.

 

If anyone has any questions at all please feel free to ask!