Carnival Liberty Southern Caribbean review with pics (Aug. 2-9, 2015)

[QTPieRye]

Still loving this review, your writing style and pics! We are planning on heading to The Boatyard in Barbados. I heard it is within walking distance of the cruise port..... what are your thoughts on this? Did you end up getting the $20.00 price for the turtles from Bliss? I am debating on pre-booking that excursion or just doing it from the beach. My thought was from the beach would be cheaper as we can barter....:D

[Stinger-pr]

I'm glad you're enjoying the review and thanks for reading. I hear that The Boatyard is about 20 Minutes away walking and that it's very easy to get there and back. I did end up getting the tour for $20. Don't pay a cent more. There are lots of "agents" for the same tour. Just keep walking until you find one that will accept $20 per person (usually their rock bottom price) or until you're called back by the one that said no. Don't worry, they will say yes. It's not bartering, it's not letting them con you. They spike up the price to get better commissions. Just do the revision from the beach but get there early. no need to prebook.

Edited September 27, 2015 by Stinger-pr

[pghsteelerfan]

I just logged onto CC this morning for a few minutes this morning and am so happy to see your are doing another review!!! I LOVE your pictures!!! I haven't had a chance to read it yet, but will be setting aside time to do so in between loads of laundry, aka "Mt. Washmore". Believe it or not, we had to have been in the airport at the same time yesterday. Our flight was at 2:50PM but we were at the airport shortly after 8AM. I hope you are enjoying Vegas. Thank you for doing another review and I'm looking forward to taking some time to read it and relive our cruise.

[QTPieRye]

I'm glad you're enjoying the review and thanks for reading. I hear that The Boatyard is about 20 Minutes away walking and that it's very easy to get there and back. I did end up getting the tour for $20. Don't pay a cent more. There are lots of "agents" for the same tour. Just keep walking until you find one that will accept $20 per person (usually their rock bottom price) or until you're called back by the one that said no. Don't worry, they will say yes. It's not bartering, it's not letting them con you. They spike up the price to get better commissions. Just do the revision from the beach but get there early. no need to prebook.

 

Thanks!

[bcsurvivor05]

Awesome review so far. I will be sailing her in November with my 10 yr old as well so I like hearing about things to do with her.

[mss22859]

Loving your review so far! We are sailing on her next week, and the days can't go by quick enough!

[Elaine2]

I'm enjoying ur review so much ! We will be cruising this itinerary on May 8, 2016. First staying in Old San Juan for 3 days prior. I have a ton of questions about San Juan, such as AIRBNB or hotel, and so on. Could I maybe email u with a few questions?

Your daughter is a doll ! Looking forward to the rest of ur review [emoji3]

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Stinger-pr]

Well it took me long enough!! Sorry for the delay guys. Like I said at the beginning I had an upcoming trip to Las Vegas for almost a whole week for a convention and since coming back I have been swamped at work and my home PC had been acting up but if all goes well, I wrap this review up soon enough!.

 

After dinner the night of Barbados we didn't really do much. My daughter found her school friend and hung around the ship a while, I went to Serenity deck to relax and read (and almost fall asleep as well). So I went back to the cabin where my daughter was waiting for me and went to bed.

 

Day 5: St. Lucia!!

 

Welcome to St. Lucia and another beautiful sunrise. You know, now that I think about it, it wasn’t that bad that we missed almost all the sunsets of this cruise due to our dinning assignment but I got to witness some amazing sunrises all week long so really, I can’t complain at all.

 

 

 

The Pitons in the distance:

 

Other than maybe St. Maarten and the plane landings at Maho, St. Lucia was the most anticipated port for us. Last year’s tour with Spencer Ambrose was phenomenal and when my daughter saw the pictures and heard what I told her about the island she was hooked, especially on the snorkeling part. We got up a bit later that usual because I had not set the alarm right after coming back from seeing the sunrise earlier but after another great breakfast we debarked the ship around 8:25 worrying we were going to be late for our scheduled 8:30 rendezvous with Spencer’s crew. We got to the meeting point where we were led to one of Spencer’s speedboats that was waiting on a pier close to the ship. We were briefed on what the day would be and on what we were about to enjoy by Spencer himself and his great daughter Shiqwana (sp? Omg I always forget her name!!). We leisurely set on our way along with Shaggy and another of Spencer’s crew that I wish I’d not forgotten his name because he was a blast! I think everyone in this operation is a part of Spencer’s family somehow. Anyway, one past the bay marker he punched the engines and we were hauling @%%!!

 

Just before we punched the engines!!

 

My kid had never been on a boat of this size (only the ship and a few ferries) and that could go that fast but she was having the time of her life and that was enough for me. She immediately hit it off with Spencer’s daughter after I told her I was a returning customer and explaining a few tweaks they made to the tour since I last visited. Frankly I thought some of the changes were fantastic but they left some things out that, while not diminishing in any way the value or enjoyment of the tour, they were fun, cool things none the less.

[Stinger-pr]

St. Lucia Cont...

 

My kid had never been on a boat of this size (only the ship and a few ferries) and that could go that fast but she was having the time of her life and that was enough for me. She immediately hit it off with Spencer’s daughter after I told her I was a returning customer and explaining a few tweaks they made to the tour since I last visited. Frankly I thought some of the changes were fantastic but they left some things out that, while not diminishing in any way the value or enjoyment of the tour, they were fun, cool things none the less.

 

We arrived at out first destination, the town of Soufriere where the group was split between those going on the land part of the tour and those going straight to the beach. We disembarked the boat and got into an air conditioned and clean van on our way to the “dormant” volcano. The route was a bit different from last year but I later found out that we had bypassed some traffic and some ongoing road construction on the way up that would’ve delayed us some. We were all taken to the mud bath area but none of us in the van wanted to go down so we headed on to the volcano

 

 

 

 

We were escorted on a mini (really mini) informative tour of the volcano surroundings and after that was done we were picked up to continue to Toraille falls. The falls are not that high but the water was refreshing, especially since the sun was starting to really make his presence felt. For some reason no one really got into the water, just got their feet wet. So after a few minutes we continued on. We made a stop at the side of the road by a banana plantation were we were given a detailed explanation on the process of growing and exporting bananas (mostly for European markets). We were also given a ripe banana to sample and these things were delicious!! I live in a tropical island myself. I’ve had bananas from the farmer’s market, the supermarket and from some of my family’s land and these were tastier and sweeter than any I’ve tasted before. BTW, for some reason this part of the tour, although advertised, was omitted on the tour I took last year, so this was new for me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Also new was the food part. Last year we had lunch at the beach once we arrived. This time we were taken to a house-turned-restaurant/bar to have lunch. Menu was the same great tasting bits: Jerk (roasted) chicken, creole rice (tasty), potato salad, noodles in a meaty sauce (not spaghetti) and other things that slipped my mind. Food was hot and tasty for our Caribbean taste buds and we thoroughly enjoyed it. After lunch we were taken on a leisurely, 5 minute boat ride into Anse de Pitons (Bay of Pitons) right behind the Sugar Beach Resort and to our beach part of the day. The reason we went to lunch first and then to the beach was that since it was summer vacation time still and there were no other cruise ships in town, there were a lot of other tourists at the beach and going to lunch on land allowed the groups to stagger better. So when we arrived, two other groups left within 10 minutes and Spencer’s group had the beach to ourselves for about an hour before other groups came in. Even so, the shaded part of the beach where you go out to snorkel, never really got too crowded.

 

[Stinger-pr]

St. Lucia Cont...

 

This is where we had lunch:

 

Snorkeling on the base on the Pitons was AMAZING!! Tons of fish and sea life to see everywhere, lots of coral formations and beautiful colors all over. The area is off limits to boats so you don’t have to worry about any type of watercraft near you. There are two sides to the beach. One side behind the resort is sunny and people go to bask in the sun on that side. You're free to lay in the sand but you'll have to rent the chairs on the resort side which go for I *think* is $50. The other side has the famous beaten, old beach chairs but to tell you the truth, they mostly serve to keep your belonging off the sand. They are all on a very shaded part and unless you hate the sun, aren't doing any swimming or snorkeling or simply need to have a shade where to read or write, you won't be using the chairs much. There are some guys that rent snorkel gear right on the beach as well as a guy selling local fruit. As usual, a big cooler full of refreshments from Spencer.

 

 

 

 

 

[Stinger-pr]

St. Lucia Cont...

 

 

 

This is the area where you snorkel. As you can see, beach is calm and there basically no current underwater.

 

 

 

We were at the beach for about two-two and a half hours and again got in the boat to head back to the ship. This was a water-view sightseeing part since all along the way we were informed of various points of interests that varied from small fishing villages to the amazing Marigot Bay with it’s stunning, calm waters, beautiful houses and structures and what I call “millionaire’s row”: a row of houses belonging to rich and famous people. We kept going past the “lady slipper” rock formation and on to the ship. I noticed that we skipped the “fish in the rock” and the “pirate ship” rock formations and asked why and was told that at least the pirate ship formation was a bit difficult to see for some people who couldn’t make out the silhouette so they had decided to stop mentioning it. Oh, well…

[Stinger-pr]

St. Lucia Cont...

 

 

 

 

Marigot Bay:

 

 

 

[Stinger-pr]

St. Lucia Cont...

 

Anyway, about 3:15pm we had come to the end of an amazing day (Best Day Ever, if you ask my daughter!). We had a ton of fun with Spencer and his crew and enjoyed the places we visited the food and complimentary drinks (sorry, forgot to mention them: water, sodas, Piton beer, rum punch) and the professionalism these guys exhibited all day long. I might see the same things, go to the same places, meet the same people, but if I had another opportunity I’d go with Spencer Tours for sure.

We browsed the shops for a while, bought some t-shirts, got online using available WIFI for a while and headed back on board the Liberty with an ear to ear grin. Sail away at this time of year is an awesome sight, especially if you like to take pictures. The light of the setting sun and the amount of colors you’ll find on the houses and the general landscape of the island makes for some great pics. Today we decided to “what the heck” and be late for dinner since we wanted to catch a full sunset. And boy we couldn’t have picked a better day. There were few clouds in the sky and the sunset was simply stunning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Stinger-pr]

St. Lucia Cont...

 

After freshening up we went to dinner and we had no problem with service even after arriving about 45 minutes late. Food today was simply delicious from start to finish. I went with the Jerked Chicken Wings and they had great taste. My daughter went with her salad. For our mains we had the BBQ Spare Ribs. OMG… They were amazing!! I was almost tempted to order a second portion. They served two pieces of ribs (ones hidden in the picture since I had already taken a chunk out of it) and the meat on this things fell off so easily you could almost look at them the wrong way and the meat would fall right off. The glazing and sauce was tangy and flavorful. If you’re into it, the corn bread was also good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our customary two CMC were accompanied, this time, by a S’mores Parfait (the clear cup in the pic) which was also great. This might’ve been the best dinner, overall, of the whole cruise for us.

 

 

. After dinner we walked around a bit, visited the shops, looked at some pictures in the gallery and went to the cabin to rest “just a bit” and had planned to go to the Dive in Movie to see the Spongebob movie (her idea, not mine…ughh). “Just a bit” turned out into calling it a night since we were both spent from our day in St. Lucia and fell asleep and woke up hours later simply to change into our ‘jammies and go right back to bed.

[Dirkgun]

Glad you are back..... Love your pictures of St Lucia, and yes Spencer Ambrose is the best tour in the Caribbean IMHO as well. They do a great job of keeping everyone happy and well taken care of. We have used him 3 times and will definitely use him again. Glad your daughter is having fun. Great pictures of you two together. Thanks again for sharing and for taking the time to write the review.

[Stinger-pr]

Next up: St. Kitts

I woke up to my second alarm since I never even heard the first one go off and we started to get ready for our day in St. Kitts. This and St. Maarten were the two ports I slept in and didn’t catch the ship sailing into port or the sunrise but by this time the body was starting to feel the effects of a port intensive, get to the ship, get to dinner, go do this, go watch that itinerary. Don’t get me wrong, in no way, shape or form am I complaining. It’s just a fact….at least for us. Anyway, after our customary omelet breakfast we debarked and headed to the port entrance where we met Mr. Thenford Grey. As soon as I introduced myself he instantly remembered that this was a special father/daughter trip since I had made a note upon reserving and welcomed and congratulated my daughter on her adventure with Dad. After making sure everybody was present we were escorted to his very nice, comfortable and clean van (great A/C, BTW) and started our journey around St. Kitts. Mr. Grey’s voice is almost like listening to James Earl Jones narrating the history and giving you some great information about the sites and sights in and around St. Kitts’ capital Basseterre. And he does this with a passion and love for his island that is very contagious.

 

The towel animals were out in full force tanning this morning.

 

 

 

 

 

[BcIcemen]

great photos doing this cruise 11/1. Cannot wait!!!

[Stinger-pr]

St. Kitts Cont...

 

After a driving tour of the capital we went straight to Romney Manor and Caribelle Batik. We stopped first at the ruins of an old sugar cane mill. The ruins and the grounds are kept in great condition even though they are completely open to roam about unlike some other ruins or forts in the Caribbean. After a few minutes we headed up the hill in the van into Romney Manor itself. This place has beautiful botanical gardens all around and Mr. Grey was knowledgeable enough to point out a lot of the plants and the history of how they arrived on the island or their significance on the gardens. This guy is amazing! After getting to the insanely huge, 400 year old SAMAN tree, we were left to roam about freely and enter the Carabelle Batik were they make and sell their great work. It is amazing the amount of work that goes into creating the artwork on just a few yards of cloth.

 

 

 

The huge size of this tree is lost in pictures sometimes but if you look closely at the bottom center of the picture you'll see a guy standing almost at the base of the tree. Yes, it is that big!!!

 

 

About half an hour later we were on the van again and headed to Brimstone Hill fortress. This stop was a bit of a disappointment for me personally but only because 1) I am spoiled by El Morro and San Cristobal here in PR, 2) For all the reviews I’ve read I had not seen pictures of the inside part of the fort (I took none either, BTW) and 3) because the fort looks so much more conserved and beautiful from the outside. While the fortress on the outside and the grounds around it look great, the inside is a work in progress with a whole lot of work to go. If you stop here, take in the views outside, take some amazing pictures and then leave the inside for last. You won’t miss out much. Exhibitions were pretty bare bones and simple and I think less than half the rooms on the ground floor were actually opened to view. The rest had building material all over (some looked to be there a long time without being used) and were all in plain sight, taking a bit away from the overall experience of walking inside the fort.

 

 

Nice view of St. Eustatius to the north:

 

[Stinger-pr]

St. Kitts Cont...

 

Nice perception picture using a fire going on in the distnace:

 

 

 

We were at the fortress for about an hour and left headed to Carambola Beach Club at South Friar’s beach. We sped past the Timothy Hill lookout point but we were to stop on the way back. We were dropped off at the entrance of the gorgeous beach club were we were free to use all of the facilities, except the beach chairs and umbrellas (which I think was $20 for the chair, something extra for the umbrella). As with St. Thomas, we just lay (or more like tried to) our beach blanket on the sand with our stuff. But it was so windy that the blanket was turning into a flag so we decided to leave it tucked until we came out of the water and actually used it. We had no luck with snorkeling today, though. The wind was making the water very wavy and somewhat murky and we basically saw close to no fish. I later found out that the best snorkeling spot is on the other side of the beach, although with the condition of the water I doubt it would’ve made a considerable difference. The sun wasn’t really shining either since the sky was overcast most of the afternoon. All in all our time at Carambola was still great. We used the outside showers to rinse out the salt water and started to get ready to be picked up for our trip back to the ship.

 

 

 

[Stinger-pr]

St. Kitts Cont...

 

For those of you that go to Carambola with an appetite, this is the menu posted at the door with the prices:

 

On our way back we stopped as planned on the famous Timothy Hill and took the standard pictures of the Atlantic/ Caribbean view. Sounds boring but trust me, it’s a breathtaking view. There were a few vendors here and my daughter bought a stuffed monkey that will come into play in a strange way a bit later. After a few minutes, we headed back to the ship while Mr. Grey talked about the economy on the island and the affect of the drought that was hitting St. Kitts since a few months back. We related closely to this since Puerto Rico is also going through a drought as well (basically the whole Caribbean basin) that has even caused water rationing for most of the Metro area since or reservoir lakes are at very low levels. It’s getting a bit better for some parts as of this writing on October but we got a long way to go still. We were dropped off near the terminal and the shops, paid for the tour (you paid at the end) and included a well deserved tip. Folks, this tour cost just US$48 per person and it is very much worth more. The trip, the information, the professionalism, attention and the places we went make it an amazing value.

 

 

 

Last time I was in St. Kitts I simply went to the shops and did nothing else. I regretted that as soon as I finished my time with Thenford Grey. There really is a lot to do and see in St. Kitts and we didn’t get to go to Nevis (a good excuse to do another cruise!!) We browsed around for some shirts and trinkets before getting to the ship (we arrived at the dock around 3:30pm). Not sure if it was that it was close to sail time but the shops and overall area was really not crowded. Now, I’ve said it before, Most of the shops in the terminal sell almost the same trinkets and clothing with almost the same prices. They don’t really banter on these items either. We browsed around looking for shirts with something more than just “St. Kitts” on it and found two stores almost side by side and made our purchases. My daughter was set on a specific shirt I had pictured (but not bought) from my last trip and we found it! So having made our score, we left for the ship after another amazing day.

 

 

 

[Stinger-pr]

St. Kitts Cont...

 

We got back on the ship and headed straight for Guy’s burgers since we were starving! Luckily the line for Guy’s was pretty short and we were eating in no time at all. We enjoyed sail away for a while and went to our cabin to get ready for dinner since tonight was the second formal dinner.

 

 

 

Again we had tug boats on the ready but were never needed.

 

 

 

This is when we had a moderate hiccup at the dinning room. We arrived earlier than ANY night prior but when we arrived at our table there was another couple sitting there…***? Our waiters looked at us like “Sorry, but there’s nothing we can do” and our head waiter took us to see the Maitre D’ who simple went with the same “sorry” and took us to another table. The other couple hadn’t even had their starters yet so I don’t understand why they couldn’t be moved to whatever table they were supposed to be at. This would turn out to be bad for us since we ended up not having that good of a service at the table they put us on. And trust me, this has nothing to do with attitude. Food was slower than usual to get to us and when it did, it was lukewarm at best. The wait staff wasn’t as attentive as the ones we had either. At one point our usual head waiter waved from the other side of the room and I shrugged and he came over and asked how everything was and apologized for the incident again and went back to his area. Tonight I had the Stuffed Mushrooms which must’ve tasted good if hot. Our mains were the Dual of filet Mignon and spare ribs and a seemingly still shrinking flat iron steak. They had good flavor but the temperature they were served at killed them. Our two CMC were accompanied by an Amaretto Cake that barely tasted like chocolate and tasted like someone forgot the Amaretto. It ended up being the only dessert item we didn’t eat at all on the whole week.

 

 

[Stinger-pr]

St. Kitts Cont...

 

 

 

 

 

After a lengthy and very disappointing dinner service we made our way to the aft lounge to catch a stand-up comedy show. Tonight we had Breaking Bad’s own Steven Michael Quesada and his PG show. His portrayal of growing up Latino was absolutely hilarious, especially for the Latinos in the audience since most who were over 35 could relate as if he was talking about their own childhood. This was the saving grace of the night and we had a ton of fun with his show. We went and found a background we both liked for some portraits. We went to our room to change and found the turndown service had been done. Now remember the stuffed monkey we had bought earlier?? It was integrated into the decoration along with tonight’s towel animal….

....Just not in the best of ways, really...LOL!!!

At least my kid had a huge laugh out of it.

We got changed and went to see the Wonderful World show at the Venetian Palace. It was another good show with a lot of stage deco and clothing changes. It’s amazing the work these stage and show people do. After the show we went for some pizza and a bit later went to bed. Tomorrow we head to St. Maarten

[Stinger-pr]

St. Maarten:

 

This was our “taking it easy” day of the trip since we had no tour booked but had some specific things we wanted to do but that were not really time-sensitive. That meant I get to sleep in until later and no sunrise for me today. We had a leisurely breakfast and debarked around 9:30am.

 

 

My daughter had insisted in buying this shirt she has on here in St. Kitts after seeing a picture of it from my last trip. Everywhere we went this morning somebody commented on the shirt, high five her smiled or laugh. She had tons of fun showing off...lol.

 

This would be my shopping stop as well since I was going to get a few pounds of Gouda cheese to take home and I was buying all my booze here as well. If anyone is interested, I found the best price for the cheese at one of the shops right at the terminal (bought it on the way back to the ship) but I got the liquor from a store at the beginning of Front Street in Phillipsburg. There’s one of the smaller shops that I found to have the best overall prices and “take one of these, get one of those” packages. I made my selection, they took my info and later delivered straight to the ship so I didn’t carry all that weight around by myself. One thing I noticed was that the streets were almost deserted and it was past 10am. Last year by this time there was considerably more passenger movement on the streets and we were also the only ship in town so I guess everyone either took a tour or stayed behind sleeping late. By the way, we got to Philipsburg by water taxi which is $7 to ride all day ($5 one way) and after buying the liquor an the requisite island t-shirt we took it to go to the ship to have lunch and change into our beach attire before moving on to our next part of the day.

 

This is the water taxi right on the dock:

 

Arriving at Phillipsburg:

 

A really quiet Front Street:

[Stinger-pr]

St. Maarten Cont...

 

We debarked again about 1:15pm and caught a taxi to Maho beach at the very organized and informative taxi terminal right at the pier. The ride was about 30 minutes from the terminal to Maho. I had made some research here on Cruise Critic and more exhaustive reading outside the forum and found out that the arrivals and departures at Princess Juliana Airport really ramped up after 1:30pm and we arrived just in time to catch some of the big birds landing and taking off (no jumbos, though… none fly in or out on Saturdays). We took or plane pictures, rode the fence a few times and in between planes got back over the rocks at the “beach” and stayed in the water since it was HOT that day. Now, as you can see in the pictures, Maho is not really a beach any more. Erosion had been so bad that they had to throw huge boulders to act as wave breakers and protect the access road. So in essence, if you’re looking to relax in the sand and catch some sun, Maho is not the beach for you.

 

 

That's the Sunset Bar and Grill in the center:

 

 

 

 

[Stinger-pr]

St. Maarten Cont...

 

Once you get to Maho I recommend you check the surf board located on the outside of Sunset Bar and Grill which has the plane arrival and departure times written on it. They checked out with the times I had found elsewhere so I kept my list.

 

We stayed there about two hours and around 3:15-3:30 hailed a cab (which are more than readily available at all times) and headed for the ship. I recommend you leave no less than an hour before “all aboard time.” While we had no heavy traffic either way, it’s a 25-30 minute ride (with no traffic) like I said and any delay could cost you big time. I asked a few taxi drivers and the all told me the same thing: leave at least an hour before you need to be on the ship. Anyway, my daughter had a blast from riding the fence and seeing these huge planes just a few feet overhead. It was a very unique experience for both of us.

On the way back I started talking about how dry the land seemed and they were also experiencing a big drought and after telling him where we were from we started exchanging impressions and experiences of the situation and I realized that sometimes being a better, bigger and more “stable” economy is not always better since these people had to make more with less yet no one complained. Yes, it was a nuance but they adapted better, faster than what I had expected. I was impressed. I congratulated him, wished him and his people the best and left the cab for the ship after a simple but great day in St. Maarten.

 

 

 

Just a few minutes after we arrived the ship started to pull away from the pier and we were escorted by the pilot boat for a few minutes. Now this guy was a freakin’ show off since the guy in the boat was making all kinds of maneuvers right besides the ship, which was fun to watch. We stayed outside for a while, took a few pictures and left for the cabin to get ready for our farewell dinner.