MITSUGIRLY decides to CONQUEST new ports-complete pictorial review

[butterfly2001]

Following! We are going on the Conquest in August! We are so excited.

[dogbert's mom]

Thanks for your newest review! I love reading your reviews because of the way you include personal details about your family and your life. It's almost reading a series of novellas. I am a retired RN and was excited for you when you became a nurse and I enjoy following the growth of your family. Your frank and honest opinion are great.

 

Janice

[mitsugirly]

IT WAS GREEN PARROTS!!! Oh my gosh. They were beautiful and so many of them!!!

 

 

I guess I didn't realize they just roamed free like that here. It was amazing to watch them. Sakari was so thrilled!!! She immediately went into "I wanna catch and hold one" mode and started "talking" to them, like they were going to listen and just immediately come to her.

 

 

After awhile, I had to convince Sakari they were wild and not coming down to visit her and it was time to head back to the room and gather our stuff to head to the cruise.

 

We packed and headed out to the front desk to settle our bill and use up our gift certificates. We checked out at 11am and went outside to summon a Lyft driver to pick us up. The hotel offered a shuttle service to the terminal for ....get this...$20 PER PERSON!! Um, no thanks. Our Lyft ride cost us $6.12 for ALL 3 of us!

 

As we waited outside, Sakari found a lizard on the tree...this is her picture:

 

 

 

And before long, she had caught her very first lizard! She was so thrilled and amazed at holding it.

 

 

 

Of course her "saying" is "Awww, he's so cuuuute!!!" and she kept saying it over and over. (She says this about every animal...it could be a spider and she'd say it)

 

 

I told her to be gentle and don't pull on it's tail and of course her reply was "I know, it will fall off". How does my kid learn all of these things without being told??

 

 

 

Her love for animals amazes me. It wasn't too long before she either had this thing trained, hypnotized or it just knew she wasn't out to hurt it. It started just walking on her and letting her hold it with her hand out straight and it didn't even run.

 

 

[mitsugirly]

Our Lyft driver arrived within 10 minutes and we were off to the port. It's a very short drive there and we checked our luggage in and caught our first glimpse of the Conquest.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm going to be honest, I really didn't know much about the Conquest nor did I really do much research to see what they had on it. I really didn't care. As I said before, I booked this cruise for the new ports and not the ship. So, it really didn't matter to me. I just knew it was going where I wanted to go, it was a new ship for us, and it was an 8 day cruise!

 

We immediately checked in as we went in the door and it was rather odd to me. They had the check-in area as soon as you walked in the door and they were lined up along this wall. But, they checked our boarding passes and passports and that was it. Ok, so obviously this isn't the check-IN area. It was only a 10 minute wait. I think they might have been doing some remodeling or something (not sure because this is the first time at this port) but everything just seemed odd the way they had it sat up there.

 

Then we headed to the security check in line. After that, into the real check-in area. We waited in line...and waited, and waited. The line stopped moving. People started sitting down on the floor in line. I noticed that there were about 6 attendants at the desk and they weren't helping anyone. They were just standing there or walking back and forth. Is it break time or what? I really had no clue what was going on and it was quite puzzling. I don't ever recall seeing this happen before. Some of the attendants took a few people from over in the "express-platinum-fun pass" line, but we still sat. Well, I plopped down on the floor too. We had been standing for quite some time. About 12:20pm they started taking people again. When I ask the people a few lines over what was going on, they had said that they stopped checking in people because the waiting room to get on the ship was too crowded and they were waiting for them to get on the ship and clear out some. Oh ok, that made sense I guess but it would have been nice for them to inform us of this.

 

We finally made it up to the counter to check in AND apply my abundance amount of gift cards to my account. This will be the first time that I actually had a person that knew how to do this without asking for help from someone else. HOWEVER, I'm thinking she didn't realize that she could just slide the cards in the card reader for it to appear on her screen. Instead, she was just manually inputting all of them. I mentioned it to her, in a nice helpful way saying that in the past they were able to just slide the cards, and she told me "that doesn't work here". However, about 5-6 cards into manually putting them in, guess what she did....YES, she started sliding them and it worked! BOOM! I win! See how easy that was?

 

Another thing that was different this time is that they didn't take our pictures. Once we were handed our cards, I ask why she didn't take our picture and she said "I scanned your passport picture". Um what? Really? I have never had that done before. Sakari is only 3 or 4 years old in hers. She looks like a baby.

 

We headed to the restroom, grabbed some pop out of the vending machine to get our party started with on the ship (lol) and at 12:52pm we were heading on the ship. (So much for an 11:00-11:30 check in time).

 

 

 

At some point, they took our pictures prior to getting on:

 

 

 

This time around, they told us to make funny faces. I laughed because I have been contemplating doing just this when our huge group sails.

 

Funny what you come up with on the spur of the moment. I wish I would have known about this and they did this on all ships and I could have planned something spectacular! hehe

 

[tropicaledrink]

We stayed at the same hotel last May and we only paid $99/night. I'm guessing it's because of when you stayed? Ok yup - I just looked at the place we booked through and for your time frame it was definitely higher. We got a real value on our trip (if you catch my meaning).

 

However, I don't remember scaling a wall at all. I think we cut across the street from the side parking (low traffic since it dead ends in to apartments), and then walked through the fitness center's parking garage. We walked over there a few times as we stayed in that hotel two nights (we did a kind of back to back with a day in between).

 

Great start!

[Riley's Mom]

OMG! I love your reviews sooo much!

i appreciate all the details you put into them and love all the pictures.

We leave in 16 days on the Magic out of Pt Canaveral. Eventhough its going

to be my 25th cruise I am still as excited as the first time.

Sakari is beyond adorable!

[Destaw71835]

Always enjoy your reviews. I've never been to Aruba or Curaçao either so I'm very interested to read about your excursions and time spent there.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

[hlb76]

Just wondering about the SW biz credit card. I want to get my hubby a biz card to as I feel like we are throwing money away not using one with perks. What is the ratio on dollars to points? And how many points for a Canival gift card? This may be a game changer for us too. Though he is some what limited on what he can use a credit card for.

[Spire2000]

We're currently circling the idea of booking on the Conquest in Feb. This review is really going to make or break our decision.

 

Thanks for doing it!

[backnine05]

Just wondering about the SW biz credit card. I want to get my hubby a biz card to as I feel like we are throwing money away not using one with perks. What is the ratio on dollars to points? And how many points for a Canival gift card? This may be a game changer for us too. Though he is some what limited on what he can use a credit card for.

 

Southwest's points value is 1 point = $.01 value in gift cards. You earn 1pt per dollar spent. So, you need to spend $10,000 to earn enough points for (1) $100 gift card. Although when you use your points to reserve flights, the value is a lot better. A $100 flight, will only cost you about 6,000 points. They do have attractive sign on bonuses though, 50,000 bonus points after $1,000 in purchases for example. I believe the bonus offers change frequently though. Although the $99 fee is a little unattractive (this is for the non-business card) you do receive annual points bonuses when the fee is assessed.

[lyndilouwho]

So excited for this review! I love the Conquest and we are doing this exact itinerary in October on the Vista! 😘

 

Sent from my VS995 using Forums mobile app

[Florings]

Enjoying your review and looking forward to more!

[mitsugirly]

Yea! I was hoping your gap in posts meant you were on another cruise, and I am so glad I was right. :cool:

 

(No, I'm not a stalker. I was looking for your Blue Kay review and happened to notice. We are going to try Blue Kay after doing Maya Chan and Almaplena...)

 

hehe. I hope you enjoy Blue Kay. It's definitely beautiful there.

 

 

Yay!!!! I can't wait to read what you thought of Conquest, I am thinking of switching one of our cruises to a sailing on her that I like better. Thanks for doing this review so I can live vicariously thru you until it's my turn to cruise again!

 

Thanks and it'll be your turn before you know it. :)

[mitsugirly]

You Got That Right :'):')

 

 

:')

OMG, free cruises with southwest points, my husband won't be able to curtail my cruising bug anymore. Thanks for sharing that!

 

No problem. Hopefully you can benefit the way we are.

[mitsugirly]

Thank you for your detailed review & photos of the Hyatt Place. Normally we stay at Marriott properties, but may decide to try one of the Hyatt properties in downtown Miami for our November cruise.

 

You're welcome. It was a nice place and a decent stay.

 

 

Thanks for your newest review! I love reading your reviews because of the way you include personal details about your family and your life. It's almost reading a series of novellas. I am a retired RN and was excited for you when you became a nurse and I enjoy following the growth of your family. Your frank and honest opinion are great.

 

Janice

 

Aww, how sweet. Thank you very much. I appreciate your comments. :)

[mitsugirly]

We stayed at the same hotel last May and we only paid $99/night. I'm guessing it's because of when you stayed? Ok yup - I just looked at the place we booked through and for your time frame it was definitely higher. We got a real value on our trip (if you catch my meaning).

 

However, I don't remember scaling a wall at all. I think we cut across the street from the side parking (low traffic since it dead ends in to apartments), and then walked through the fitness center's parking garage. We walked over there a few times as we stayed in that hotel two nights (we did a kind of back to back with a day in between).

 

Great start!

 

Yep, Spring Break time = high $$ for everything. But I'm still noticing a trend in increasing prices for hotels during any time we cruise. :( Yea, I still think I got a "value" with booking with them compared to everything else I was looking at.

 

 

We cut across that side street but to the left of the fitness center. So maybe that's why you didn't experience the wall.

 

 

OMG! I love your reviews sooo much!

i appreciate all the details you put into them and love all the pictures.

We leave in 16 days on the Magic out of Pt Canaveral. Eventhough its going

to be my 25th cruise I am still as excited as the first time.

Sakari is beyond adorable!

 

Thanks you so much for the comments. I super-duper appreciate it. Have fun on the Magic. I'll sail her some day and I can't wait!

[Buckett]

Count me in as another one who is excited for this review, as bf and I will be doing the same itinerary in January, except on the Vista. I've been to GT, but the other 3 ports are new for me. We love the beach too, so will be really curious to see what you guys came up with! :cool:

[mitsugirly]

Always enjoy your reviews. I've never been to Aruba or Curaçao either so I'm very interested to read about your excursions and time spent there.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

 

Thank you. I hope you enjoy this one as well.

 

 

Just wondering about the SW biz credit card. I want to get my hubby a biz card to as I feel like we are throwing money away not using one with perks. What is the ratio on dollars to points? And how many points for a Canival gift card? This may be a game changer for us too. Though he is some what limited on what he can use a credit card for.

 

It's like any other card with certain "perks" geared toward their business. I believe 1% for regular purchases and 2x the points when using for SW. After you spend $3,000 in the first 3 months you get (now) 60,000 points (ours was 50,000 at the time we signed up). Also every year they automatically give you 6,000 on your anniversary date of the card. The points are unlimited and they never expire. It takes 110,000 points and you get your Companion Pass and each time you hit that 110,000, the companion pass time starts over for longer. You also somehow earn toward the A-List, which allows you to get on before everyone else (1-15). Then all the gift card benefits for a lot of different places...makes it all worth it if you can accumulate the points to do it. When we signed up for it, they started our business out with a $17k limit but we push it as much as we can and have pushed it to $56k and they have never had a problem with it. We have to have 2 other unlimited Amex cards because at some point, they always manage to cut it off because we use it so much and then we just pay off and start all over that same month. So, we can potentially use up over $100k in 1 month and continue to have so many points to use. I'm just amazed at how this all works and wish I would have found out about it much sooner than this!

 

A $100 Carnival gift card is 10,000 points. :)

[mitsugirly]

We're currently circling the idea of booking on the Conquest in Feb. This review is really going to make or break our decision.

 

Thanks for doing it!

 

Oh no! I don't want that responsibility. Eek! (going in hiding now). :eek:

 

 

So excited for this review! I love the Conquest and we are doing this exact itinerary in October on the Vista! 😘

 

Sent from my VS995 using Forums mobile app

 

Very nice! I would love to sail on the Vista!

[mitsugirly]

Enjoying your review and looking forward to more!

 

 

Thank you so much.

[sstalk]

Wow. You have lots of fans. I think I am becoming one too. Thanks for your review.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

[mitsugirly]

Back to the review...

 

As soon as we made it on the ship (almost 1pm) we decided to see if we could find our room and drop our things off.

 

We decided to book an interior room this time around, based on pricing for spring break and buying a house and everything else going on with our lives, and it was on deck 1. I have found that I really enjoy these rooms a lot (the lower decks, not necessarily the interiors). I really like being able to just walk down a flight of steps and off the ship in ports as well as getting back on the ship and walking up a flight of steps and being at my room! So much nicer than fighting for your spot on a crowded elevator when people are returning from port. Ahhh, the little things.

 

We were in room 1451, which was located toward the back of the ship. Like I said, I didn't put much thought into the ship and I didn't research the location either (big mistake on my part). This would be a first for me not really even knowing WHERE our room was. Now don't get me wrong, the room was fine but I usually try to book my room based on the kids club and walking distance from there. Well, the kids club happened to be on the front of the ship...oh joy! Oh well, there goes all that walking off the calories already. I'll live.

 

Here are the FuN~TiMeS for the first day~

 

 

 

 

 

And here is our home*sweet*home for the next week.

 

 

Would ya get a load of that pink trim!! Yikes!

 

Once again, it was odd that they already had the bed pulled down. Did they talk to the employees at the Hyatt? Usually the beds are up and the room steward asks if we'd like it down only at night or left down. I prefer for the bed to be put up during the day to make more space and to be able to walk on the side of the bed easier. However, they already had this one down...where it would remain down the entire cruise! Eh. Everyone knows I'm not a complainer and I usually don't speak up too much about little quirks that I don't like. I did throw several hints out during the week that I would like it up...for instance pushing it up myself a few times...but I guess he didn't get the hint. Oh well. We don't spend a lot of time in the room to begin with anyhow and Sakari always preferred to sit up there instead of down below when we were in the room.

 

 

The other odd thing I found was that the room steward did not even put the ladder up at night. We had to do it each time. Not that Sakari can't just climb up and jump back down but she requested for it to be attached at night in case she had to get up and go to the restroom in the middle of the night. She knew we probably wouldn't appreciate it if she did a dismount onto our bed from hers.

 

This was a 4 person room with another drop down bed from the ceiling on the other side.

 

I felt that the room was a pretty decent size to be an interior. There was PLENTY of storage space for 3 people. I had all kinds of drawers, shelves and hanging areas. Lots of options!

 

Also, see the little table in the picture below beside the ladder? That was a cool little table that you could pull over to the bed and have a snack/meal or in Sakari's case-draw. It also went up and down to whatever size you needed it to be. Great idea! The end table beside it (in the picture) is where the refrigerator was located! Now some say these are just "coolers" and don't get things very cold. But this one worked really good! But the time our pop was delivered, we put it in there and by that evening it was cold.

 

 

 

There was a desk in front of our bed, which had the convenient 1 plug for all your electronic needs. (giggle). The safe was also located here behind the doors, under the tv, and you use a card to swipe for opening and closing.

 

 

 

[evawebrez]

Thank you so much for this review! I'm excited to follow it because we are going on the Conquest in June. We've only been on 2 other cruises (Carnival Miracle and Victory) so we are looking forward to being on a bigger ship. Our family of 6 is booked in rooms 1408 and 1412 so we'll be very close to where you were! I'm glad to hear being on a lower deck makes it easier/quicker to get on and off the ship... I hadn't even considered that.

 

I like the idea that we're lower in the ship... someone told me you may not feel the movement as much the lower you go which is why I booked us on the lowest passenger deck this time. I don't care what anyone says, I was able to feel the ship movement on both of the cruises I've been on and the only thing that prevented me from being motion sick the entire cruise (both of them) was wearing seabands on both wrists 24/7. Some folks have suggested that it's all in my head... all I can say is they should be glad they're not in my head. ;p

 

Being right next to the elevators seems pretty convenient. Did you feel like being that close to the elevators made it more noisy with the other passengers moving about? And/or did you notice any loud "ship noise" being that low or that far back in the ship? (as opposed to "quiet" ship noise, I guess, lol)

[mitsugirly]

Oh whoops, here's a better picture of the refrigerator and the extra table I was referring to above.

 

 

 

Lots of shelves for all of your clothes:

 

 

 

Two other cabinets with a shelf and hangers for clothes

 

 

 

As you can see, someone had brought extra hangers and left them behind, but you can always ask your room steward for more if you need it.

 

 

 

Your typical Carnival bathroom:

 

 

 

 

[mitsugirly]

Our room steward found us and introduced himself before we left the room. He gave us his card and then presented us with a "time schedule" of his hours. This was a first. He worked from 8-noon and 6-9pm. It made me wonder about all the talk of how the room stewards work so many hours, are over worked, get no time off and so on. After thinking about it, my room steward works approximately 7 hours a day with a 6 hour break in between. Hmmm

 

He did ask if I required anything during my cruise and I told him the only thing I really needed was an ice bucket and to have it filled daily (they don't seem to even give you ice buckets in the room anymore unless you ask for it...and I seen them stacked on top of each other down the hall in the "closet") and I needed 4 towels total for my room because of my long hair that I always wrap up in one towel. He said he would make sure to have these items for me daily.

 

The ice-he managed to get right..at least in the mornings, not so much in the evenings. The extra towel...never once did he get it right or bring that extra towel.

 

He also ask if we preferred morning service or evening service or both. I told him both. It's the little "pampering" things I enjoy on a cruise. My husband makes the bed in the mornings at home (our rule is last out of bed is responsible for making the bed and I usually win that bet), but someone to come in and turn down the bed and the towel animal...then we usually have taken a shower after being in port and have wet towels that need replaced...yea, I need service both times. I'm a needy little sucka aint I? lol

 

As for the evening service...I really felt like it was lacking, well...at least compared to our other cruise (whether it be from Carnival or NCL). He did come in and replace the wet towels, but that was all I ever noticed. The beds would still be made from the morning, but never "turned down" like some have in the past flipped the corners down. The regular lights were left on (not the fancy side lights that give that "nightlight" type of feeling to signal you that it's time for bed. The towel animals were done at the first service=SUPER WEIRD!! The ice was never filled in the evenings and was usually melted into water at that point. I felt like all he really did was replace the towels in the bathroom and leave the Fun Times for the following day on the bed.

 

Also on the last day of the cruise, once again he gave me a card. It stated to be out of the room by 9am (although the paper they gave you said 8:30am).

 

 

So basically I felt that the room steward was average and didn't really go out of his way or above and beyond. It's fine. I'm not complaining, just telling the story of what we experienced. It doesn't make me feel negative toward Carnival or him in any way. Just stating there was no real "special" service this time around.