First Cruise: Detailed review and photos of our Carnival Vista March 17-24, 2019 trip

[grandmarnnurse]

3 hours ago, Ideb said:

Well, I just realized that my previous menus and food pics may be out of sequence by a day. I have used my google photos as a guide to help my memory of what we had each day. When we were on the ship I noticed that my pictures weren't uploading in sequence. I was the only one of the three of us who had the cell phone plan and left my cellular data on and I was the only one who had trouble with the time staying correct on my phone and photos uploading in sequence so I think that's reason they are off. 

 

Anyway, since Friday was formal night and there was white tablecloths on the table and the menu looked different, I think these are the correct pictures from that night:

 

 

I remember our waiter brought us a HUGE basket of bread which I thought was a waste since there was no way we would eat it. 

 

Austin said he wanted 5 shrimp cocktail and he got them and ate them. He had those and his filet steak but no sides or dessert.

 

My app was stuffed mushrooms

 

My shrimp dish

 

Austin's filet 

 

I didn't get a picture of Alex's food but it was either a hamburger or chicken nuggets.

 

Grand Marnier souffle

 

 

 

 

 

Your boy sure loves his shrimp cocktail! My hubby ordered one every night for us to share, and then we ordered other appetizers of our choice. I had those stuffed mushrooms and they were awesome! As for the bread, I have to admit that we would have made a fine dent in eating all that bread, as bread is a weakness of ours, and probably the reason our weight doesn’t go down much. Lol! 

[Shaded Lady]

3 minutes ago, grandmarnnurse said:

As for the bread, I have to admit that we would have made a fine dent in eating all that bread, as bread is a weakness of ours, and probably the reason our weight doesn’t go down much. Lol! 

 

Grandmanurse you and I may be sisters from another mister! Both lightweight drinkers and lovers of bread!!!

[grandmarnnurse]

36 minutes ago, Shaded Lady said:

 

Grandmanurse you and I may be sisters from another mister! Both lightweight drinkers and lovers of bread!!!

👍😎

[lennythenose]

I’m with the previous posters about the bread. My husband and I would eat most if not all of the bread😀

[JQTravels]

We did a cruise on the Vista in January, it was awesome!!.  We did a tour of our Cloud 9 Spa Balcony Cabin  if anyone would like to see what the Spa Cabins look like.

 

[Ideb]

7 hours ago, grandmarnnurse said:

Your boy sure loves his shrimp cocktail! My hubby ordered one every night for us to share, and then we ordered other appetizers of our choice. I had those stuffed mushrooms and they were awesome! As for the bread, I have to admit that we would have made a fine dent in eating all that bread, as bread is a weakness of ours, and probably the reason our weight doesn’t go down much. Lol! 

Yes he sure does 🙂 I've bought him a couple of those shrimp rings with the cocktail sauce in the center from the grocery store after this trip so he can get his shrimp fix at home. I'm usually right there with you when it comes to eating bread, but that was a whole lot. The basket seemed fuller that night than when we had the other two people with us for dinner.

[CoasterGuy]

Enjoying your review so far. Look forward to the rest of it.

[somewheretropical]

I love your review and pictures! Your favorite dinnertime bread is also my husband's favorite.

 

Was the craft session with the bracelet making free?

[Ideb]

On 5/26/2019 at 10:02 PM, somewheretropical said:

I love your review and pictures! Your favorite dinnertime bread is also my husband's favorite.

 

Was the craft session with the bracelet making free?

I'm glad you are enjoying my review and pictures. I feel like we weren't the most exciting family to follow since we didn't really do any excursions but I if you just want to get a feel of the Vista then hopefully this review accomplishes this.

Yes, the craft sessions didn't cost anything and everything to make the bracelets were included.

[Ideb]

Our last day at sea was Saturday March 23. We were getting close to home.

[Ideb]

We started the day by going to the sea day brunch. I didn't take a picture of the menu but the Vista had the "new" menu. There are plenty of pictures of the new menu floating around on this forum or you can easily google and find it.

 

 

Here's what we ate that morning.

I had the steak and eggs with a side of bacon and hashbrowns  (in case I didn't like the steak which I really didn't). The bacon and hashbrowns were the best part of this meal.

 

Austin had steak and fries with a side of bacon.

 

Alex got a burger. He said it wasn't very good but by then he was spoiled to Guy's Burgers 🙂 

 

 

[Ideb]

We didn't take the time to have dessert at the sea day brunch because as first time cruises, I wanted to get to the debarkation seminar so I could find out about that process. I found It wasn't really necessary for me to go because it mainly covered declaring the alcohol and tobacco you purchased onboard or at the ports and I didn't purchase either. We saw K and J there and sat with them. This was information she needed because she had purchased some alcohol as a gift and needed to know the process for declaring it.

 

Another reason I didn't think we needed to rush to go see it is because when we went back to our room they were playing it on the stateroom tv so it was recorded.

 

I was glad we went though because Captain Vittorio Marchi spoke and several crew members from different departments came on stage while our cruise director Joey talked about the importance of their work. 

 

Debarkation Information

 

Captain Vittorio Marchi

 

 

 

[Ideb]

We walked around the ship and took more pictures. The reality that this was the last day had hit me and I took a lot of pictures of the boys on the ship and pictures of the ship. They took one of me as well.

 

 

[Ideb]

We ate some lunch and enjoyed some gelato on the Lido deck. 

 

 

 

[Ideb]

We spent some time in our room that afternoon. They were playing the Debarkation info we had watched in the lounge that morning.

I also took a picture of our television greeting screen.

[Ideb]

I took a photo of the debarkation show on the tv screen because I spotted Alex in the audience. (lower left)

Edited June 5, 2019 by Ideb

[Ideb]

We spent some time up on the Lido deck that afternoon.

 

 

The boys played and I took pictures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And enjoyed that beautiful ocean 🙂

 

 

[Ideb]

The skyride was open and we wanted to ride it again but was face with a really long line so we didn't. We just enjoyed the afternoon and the terrific weather walking the outside of the ship.

 

 

 

 

 

[Ideb]

We went back to the room and got ready for dinner in the mdr. We wanted to eat before the stand up comedy show.

 

There was a book on the desk about Carnival Vista that we had never paid attention to before. It was a nice book about the building of the ship.

 

 

 

 

 

[Ideb]

We got a table with the app and headed to an earlier dinner than usual for us. I was hoping to see the waiters parading out the baked Alaska as I've heard that is a tradition but it didn't happen when we were there. K and J ate later and she said they got to see the singing waiters.

 

 

[Ideb]

Dinner menus from the last night. I forgot to take many pictures. I had the baked onion soup also and didn't get a picture. I also didn't take pictures of the boy's meals although they usually ordered the same things each night so I'm guessing they were that night too.

 

Our waiter talked us into trying the alligator fritters. He said there are 3 of them and 3 of you so you each try one. We did and they were pretty good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Ideb]

Our waiter suggested the corn meal crusted chicken so I got it. I will say that was the only thing I really did not like our of all our dining room meals. Some were better than others but this was flavorless and also temperature wise it was cold. I know I could have sent it back but I had plenty with the soup, mac and cheese (I had to have this one last time) and dessert.

 

 

 

 

Wow! I should be a food photographer 🙂 I think my subject was very photogenic.

Edited June 5, 2019 by Ideb

[Ideb]

After dinner we went to the comedy show in the Limelight lounge.

 

 

Outside the Limelight lounge

 

 

Hallway outside Limelight lounge all lit up in lime green

 

Inside the lounge before the show started. They ask you not to take photos of the comedians

during the show so I didn't.

 

 

 

 

 

[Ideb]

Somewhere in between dinner and the comedy show or after the comedy show and before the next show in the Liquid lounge we stopped for some pictures. We took some with our cameras and took some with a ship's photographer.

 

 

 

Another cruiser took this picture 🙂

 

 

 

[Ideb]

We went to the Liquid lounge for the grand finale of the Lip Sync Contest. I hadn't watched any of this previously as I think it's held in a bar or some smaller venue but on the last night they make a big deal of it and hold a show in the main lounge.

 

I would have preferred another Playlist Production show as a grand finale for our last night. I thought the lip sync show was just cheesy and predictable. I've seen some videos online of this and it looks pretty much the same on all ships so I'm not sure how much of a contest element there was too it. It was cute but not very entertaining in my opinion.