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Carnival Vista review - my review (Jan 21st 2018 sailing)

leite

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leite

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INTRODUCTIONS

 

Hello folks,

My name’s Camilo and I don’t come here to cruisecritics too often. We live in Canada (became Canadians many years ago) but both my wife and I are originally from Brazil and have immigrated to Canada over 15 years ago.

 

 

Living in Canada and having a lot of friends that like to drink on vacation we usually go the all-inclusive route (Cuba or Dominican Republic) which, for us, it’s usually cheaper than cruising when you factor the flight to Florida (to go on the cruise, too far for my wife to drive, although I keep saying we’ll do it next time), airport parking and hotel pre-cruise (one thing I learned is never to fly on the day of your cruise and this came true this time for our family this time).

 

 

I personally like cruising much more (level of service, quality of food, entertainment, etc) but as we like to travel with extended friends, cruising is not our first choice.

 

 

This is our third cruise. In 2011, we did our first trip on the Carnival Dream (you can read the review here: https://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1530906. This was for a 7 night western Caribbean on a cove balcony.

 

 

Less than 18 months later, I got an amazing Disney Cruise offer (kids sail free) and we sailed on the Disney Wonder to the Western Caribbean for 5 nights. It was such a great offer than we paid less on the Disney cruise than Carnival one (granted, 7 nights versus 5 and balcony versus inside). For whatever reason, I never did a review on the Disney Wonder but provided a summary on the last page of my Carnival Dream review.

 

 

Fast forward almost 5 years, with one extra boy in the family (3 kids now, 12, 9 and 3), we decided to book a cruise on the latest Carnival ship: Carnival Vista). Vista was chosen for the following reasons:

 

 

-Biggest ship on Carnival fleet, more food options.

-Great entertainment for kids.

-New Family Harbor area with some exclusive perks.

 

Between the option of Eastern and Western Caribbean, once more Eastern was my preference, but we decided to go for the third time on the Western route due to the fact it was a 6 night (versus 8 nights for the Eastern one) and price difference. Finally, we wanted to spend a few days in Florida to do Disney and Universal, so we ended up again on the Western side.

 

Who’s on the review:

 

 

-Our family:

Camilo, writing this review and organizer of the whole trip.

Elane, the beautiful wife and only woman in the family.

Gabriel, 12

David, 9

Lucas, 3

 

 

-Cavalcante’s family:

 

 

Aroldo, my brother-in-law.

Chris, my sister.

And the four cousins:

Yago, 13

Lara, 10

Tales, 8

Theo, 2

 

- Father’s family:

 

 

Maninho, my dad.

Eliane, my stepmother.

 

 

The 2 pictures below show my family and the whole group, taken on different nights.

enhance

 

 

enhance

 

 

As Carnival only allows 5 people in a cabin, we used my dad’s room as a way to book the 3 families. On paper, we had 3 cabins with 5, 5 and 4. In reality, the 3 cabins had the 3 separate families sleeping separately.

 

 

This cruise was booked 14 months in advance (November of 2016) for our sailing on January, 21st, 2018.

 

PRE-CRUISE

 

 

It’s been at least 10 years that we cross the border to Buffalo whenever we want to fly to Florida (for cruising or Disney trips). It’s just a HUGE difference for the price, especially now with 5 people in the family. For us, it’s 1.5 hours door to door from our home to the Buffalo airport.

 

 

In December of 2017, Frontier started flying from Buffalo. When quoting the prices, they were almost half of the price compared to Southwest (our primary option). I chickened out and decided to go with Southwest.

 

 

When I booked the tickets, they hadn’t started flying yet and I noticed they only had one daily flight to Orlando versus around ten with Southwest. I was really afraid of a canceled flight and how to get rearranged for next day, so on a Southwest we went.

 

 

We left from Mississauga to Buffalo on Saturday morning. It was an extremely cold day (-22 C or -7.6 F) and we had a last minute issue with the 2 back doors for my minivan not opening (frozen). At the last minute, we had to switch gears and used our older SUV to travel there. The flight to Buffalo was event free and we landed in Orlando close to 5 PM on January 13th.

 

 

 

As my sister’s family wasn’t arriving until the 15th, we decided to stay in a hotel for 2 nights. We got a deal from Mousesavers and stayed on the Holiday Inn Resort Lake Buena Vista. Huge bedroom (not a suite), overseeing the pool and with buffet breakfast for the 5 of us for less than U$ 150.00 a night (all taxes and resort fees in). I strongly recommend this hotel and we felt very safe there. Everyone was nice and I could have stayed for the whole pre-cruise week there if my sister’s family wasn’t joining us for 5 days. I’ll leave a proper review on TripAdvisor.

 

 

On Monday, we rented a home which was very nice for our 2 families. The website (if anyone is interested) is here: www.casalajolla.com. I have stayed in many vacation homes and condos in Orlando area but never in one so nice as this one. Totally recommended, it makes sense even for a single family. In my case, sharing with my sister's family, it was much better than a hotel.

 

 

The first big stress of the cruise happened on the 19th of January. My dad’s flight from Brazil was supposed to leave Sao Paulo on Friday evening, arriving in Miami on Saturday night (one day before the cruise, as recommended SO many times – never travel the day of your cruise).

 

 

Due to bad weather, the flight from their home city to Sao Paulo had to land somewhere else and they lost their international flight from Sao Paulo to Miami. The company did give them a hotel voucher and put them on a flight the next morning, so they arrived in Miami around 6:00 PM on Saturday.

 

 

This messed up our plans and ended up costing a lot of extra money. I had booked them on a bus trip from Miami Airport to Orlando for Saturday morning, so we could do a big family dinner at Disney Springs on Saturday night before the cruise (they would go back to Miami in our rental van the next day).

 

 

We lost the bus fare (nonrefundable tickets) and had to get a hotel close to Miami airport with a shuttle since they don’t speak any English. We picked the Sheraton Airport Hotel, literally 3 minutes from the airport and, according to them, it was a great stay (but expensive).

 

Next will be the biggest stress of the trip, on embarkation day.

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leite

leite

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Thanks everyone for the nice words.

zorky12, would love to hear your feedback on the cruise and rocking on the ship. It really bothered us towards the end of the week.

Continuing now...

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ash-n-brensmom

ash-n-brensmom

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Hi neighbor! I'm in Niagara Falls, On and we always fly out of Buffalo as well. And I agree...Southwest was the way to go for those flights. When it comes to travel, cheaper is usually NOT better.

Looking forward to the rest of your trip report! I will be on the the Vista in December and I'm reading as many of these reviews as I can find.

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SUNDAY JAN 21ST - EMBARKATION

 

Second HUGE stress happened on Sunday, day of the cruise. Here was the plan for that day:

 

 

- Leave Kissimmee in our 2 rental cars at 6:45 AM.

 

 

- Take paid (quicker) Turnpike highway all the way to Miami.

- Pick up my dad and Eliane at the hotel.

- Drop the 11 of them at the port, drive back to the airport, return the cars and check in at 12:30 PM on Vista.

 

The reason for leaving the rental home so early was in case of any issues (accident on the highway, car problem, etc).

 

 

 

At around 8:00 AM, I noticed on my rear-view mirror Aroldo’s car stopping on the shoulder of the highway. At first, I thought one of the kids wasn’t feeling well or had to pee badly, but as a few minutes went by and I saw him going outside and checking the car, I left my van and carefully went to his car to check.

 

 

 

He had a flat tire (passenger side, back one). Right away, I called CAA (which has a partnership with AAA in the States). It took a while to find out where we were (I had to walk ¼ of a mile to find the marker 213.5) and give it to the AAA lady.

 

 

We also tried to change the tire ourselves but had no idea where the gear to change the tire was and how to release the spare (in fact, it even took the AAA guy a while to find it). The Suburban (their car) had no manual on it and Youtube couldn’t help much (and I was trying to save battery on my cell).

 

 

Initial ETA we were given was 9:30 AM (1 hour). No one arrived. Then 9:57 AM, no one there. Finally, they promised to be there at 10:12 AM. At 10:00 AM, I started panicking. AAA arrived close to 10:15 AM and changed the tire. The condition of the spare tire scared me. Even though the car was new (maybe a year old?), the spare was in bad shape. Luckily for us, it was a full size and we were advised by the AAA guy we could keep running at highway speed all the way to Miami.

 

 

We were leaving from this unscheduled pit stop at 11:10 AM and the GPS gave us an ETA to arrive at the hotel in Miami of 1:12 PM. Any and all buffer we had was gone at that time. I advised Aroldo we had to speed up and no more washroom breaks and went over the highway speed (doing 80 to 83 mph) all the way.

 

 

We arrived at the hotel, picked them up (no time even for hugs or cheers) and took the family to the port. My GPS was sending me in a loop at the port area and traffic was going really slow, so I made a decision to leave them all (3 women, 7 kids and my father) with 13 bags and a stroller, taking the 3 heaviest bags with Aroldo and myself in the 2 cars back to the airport.

 

 

 

To this date, my lovely wife says what I did there was 10 times more stressful than the flat tire and delay on the freeway. It turns out I dropped them off a good 3 to 5 minute (drive) to the actual port and, after getting wrong information from several people and walking back and forth dragging all bags and thinking they were going to miss the ship, they had to take 3 cabs (which charged them different amounts: 14.00, 17.00 and 20.00) to take them to the port check in area.

 

 

Aroldo and I arrived at the airport, returned the cars, had to fill out a report for the flat tire (we were told no extra charge will come on his credit card) and picked up the Alamo shuttle back to the port.

 

 

It was 2:20 PM when we arrived at the port and there was pretty much no one else (cruisers) at the big lobby area. I was surprised to see the porters still took our 3 huge bags (as it mentions on the papers I received the cut-off time is for them to load the bags is 2:00 PM) and we went to check in close to 2:20 PM.

 

 

Check in was slow (maybe due to the fact we had Brazilians and Canadians checking in together and kids registered in staterooms different than their parents). We finally boarded the Vista at 2:45 PM and were told that Lido was still open for lunch.

 

 

We were starving at that point, bypassed the picture opportunity and quickly entered the ship.

 

 

We ended up splitting up when I told Elane and my sister I wanted to get a burger from Guy’s Burger. I went with 5 oldest kids and the remaining ones went to the buffet on the same floor. OMG, what an amazing burger that was. It lived up to my expectations. We were still eating when we were called for the Muster Drill.

 

 

 

This is when we realized we still didn’t have our Sail and Sign Cards. We boarded so late that we went straight to get food and didn’t know where to go for the Muster Drill. I told the family to stay put and went down with Yago and Gabriel to get our cards in the cabin. We had to use the stairs as we all know how hard it is to get an elevator on the first day of the cruise.

 

 

As we arrived back on the Lido, no one from the family was there and we went to our station (B3 at the Horizons restaurant). Yes, we were one of those families called on the sound system for being late and I apologize for that. It wasn’t intentional at all.

 

 

 

We found our family there (my wife was smarter than me, gave the cabin number to one of the staff and they gave her the location of the muster drill for us).

 

 

Drill took 10 minutes and it was easy. What was tough was leaving the restaurant at the end. This was probably only one of the two times time I felt ship packed/crowded, even though we waited for 3 to 5 minutes before started leaving the restaurant. I decided to take the stairs and the family used the elevators.

 

 

I went with the kids to the cabin and Elane and Chris went to the sail away party.

 

 

This is went I met our stateroom steward Mertha, from Indonesia. He was very efficient but not the “chatting/friendly type”. I explained to him he didn’t have to lower the upper bunkbed from my dad’s cabins and that we would be sleeping in 5, 6 and 2 (instead of 4, 5 and 4). I gave him U$ 20.00, he thanked and went his way.

 

 

 

Talking about Indonesia, I’m going to take a guess that more than 50% of the cruise workers on the ship were from Indonesia. I was told there were 5 Brazilians on board working but didn’t meet any.

 

 

The cabins (2437, 2439 and 2443) were decent size. A lot of people here complained on the lack of closet space. I didn’t mind that and thought it is was sufficient for a week, to be honest. The cabin had 3 large bottles of water for being repeated cruisers (it was Lucas first times and David was not registered in our stateroom) and we had pre-ordered 12 small bottles, which were enough for the whole trip.

 

 

 

One of the biggest advantages of this section and cabins was the 2 showers (one shower and one tub) and 2 sinks. Very useful for our family of 5. There was always a lof of pressure on the water and the temperature was great, being adjusted from freezing to very hot. Toilet worked very well, no issues there either.

 

 

Carnival no longer offers a little “goodie bag with freebies”. I remember getting that in 2011. Shampoo and soap are available on dispensers and refilled nightly by the steward.

 

 

I loved the ocean-view and being so close to the water but I’m afraid I’m not staying in one in the future. Both Elane and Gabriel felt dizzy whenever the curtains were open, so it was left closed pretty much every time, except while in the ports. With this, going forward, we’ll save money and likely stay in an inside cabin.

 

 

By the way, with this cruise, I have done all 3 types of cabin: balcony (cove) on Carnival Dream, inside on Disney Wonder and ocean-view on the Vista. We are now missing the suites only and will probably miss this category for a while :D.

 

 

A little bit on the family harbor section. We loved it.

 

 

It comes with a few perks:

- free night of Night Owls babysitting service (after 10 pm) at Camp Ocean (kids club)

- kids eat free at most of the specialty dining restaurants onboard the ship.

- Dedicated lounge for guests staying here.

 

This website has a nice review and pictures of this section (http://www.carrieontravel.com/carnival-cruise-vista-family-harbor-tour/). From all perks, we only used the lounge, but we used a lot.

 

It was SO nice being able to stop from the ports and have a quick snack or ice-cream before dinner. Some days, we used it for breakfast and it was also a nice place to send or go with the kids while the other family members get ready. David and Lucas played video games a few times there and it was VERY convenient on the last day of the cruise (I will touch on that when we get to that day).

 

 

Back to that late afternoon, I gave the kids a quick shower, Elane came back, we got ready too and headed to our first dinner. We had a table for the 13 of us on the Reflections, lower level (3rd). We picked early dining because of the 2 little ones (Lucas and Theo).

 

 

Our server was Angel (from Peru) and Sebastian (from Colombia) was his assistant. There was a third one (that helped with desserts) but I forgot his name. Similar to Mertha, Angel was efficient, but didn’t have empathy and didn’t feel comfortable on the “shows” the waiters perform almost nightly. Sebastian was one of the nicest Carnival employees we met during the cruise. We also saw him working on the Asian restaurant at lunch time. Always serving with a smile, playing with the kids, I have yet to write to Carnival and say how great he was…

 

 

A quick note on the people working on Vista. Please note this is OUR perspective (mine and my wife’s), I know people have different experiences. We didn’t feel the people working at Vista to be very friendly, having several rude occasions. From one person asking my son if he was going to ask the time every minute (I had given him a specific time to be back to the room) to a lot of people not providing proper information or not willing to go the extra mile. This is a BIG difference from my experience on the Dream, in 2011 and, of course, on the Disney Wonder.

 

 

Another exception to this rule was Mia, working at Guest Services. Always willing to help and friendly whenever I went there.

 

 

Back to that night. I told Angel I had purchased the Bottomless Bubbles plan (https://www.carnival.com/cruise-food/bottomless-bubbles) and asked for a Coke Zero no ice. On the first 3 nights, I had to remind Angel about my drink but after that, he would bring to our table (my drink and Aroldo's, who also bought the package) as we arrived there.

 

 

On the bar service, I had to wait for a few minutes (which felt like minutes sometimes, but I didn’t keep track) to get my Coke at different bars. I truly wish Carnival would start using self-serving machines for Coke products, like Disney and Royal have. It gave me the impression that waiters were more interested to serve people getting alcoholic drinks. Also, I did feel a reduced number of people working in bars. Sometimes, I would see only one person working in the Atrium bar, at Carnival Vista, when 7 or 8 people were waiting for drinks. Taking into account the complexity of some of those drinks, that really meant a delay in getting yours.

 

 

I will be mentioning what we ordered every night and rating to 1 to 10.

 

 

On Sunday night, for appetizers, I had the shrimp cocktail (6). I didn’t like and it was the only time I ordered that. Elane had the corn chowder Maryland (9.5). We both had the Sweet and Sour Shrimp with shrimp fried rice. It was really good, the shrimp very crispy and the rice well seasoned with lots of little shrimp (10).

 

For dessert, we both had Carnival’s signature one: Carnival Melting Chocolate Cake (10).

 

 

After dinner, we went to Camps Ocean to register the kids there. According to the lady working there, the first day is the only day you (parent) actually can walk inside and see the space. After that, we went to check the IMAX theater. Gabriel got very excited to see his favorite movie series (Maze Runner) would be premiering on sea the day before land (Thursday night) and bought his ticket for the 8:30 PM session that night. Kids (he still paid as a child) pay U$ 9.95 for the IMAX.

 

 

We went to Circle C (club for kids 12 to 14) to register Yago and Gabriel and checked the arcade (next door). Finally, we stopped by Havana area (exclusive until 7 PM for guests booking stateroom there), stayed for 2 songs from the Latin band playing there and went back to our cabin to sleep. I was so tired that must have slept within 5 minutes of getting to bed. I had forgotten how comfortable Carnival beds were….

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leite

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One thing I forgot to mention on the first sea day is that we were given mini Cisco phones at Camp Ocean for having little ones (2 and 3 years old) in two of our staterooms. This was useful since we could call each other on the ship but as we all had the Social package for the Internet, we would use WhatsApp as well. The batteries would run out every 24 hours or so and you would need to go to Camp Ocean and they would install a new battery right away.



 

 

Social package worked well and facebook, instagram and WhasApp worked without issues. On the second day, Aroldo upgraded to the value package as he DID need his emails on the ship. He had no complaints on that one and it worked everywhere in the ship.

 

They have a system that makes it easy to switch from one device to another so we all could get our updates on social media when required.

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