Live From Valiant Lady 2/10-2/17

[Steelers0854]

We are excited to be here on our very first Virgin cruise!  A little about us, we are DINKs hanging on to our 30s by the skin of our teeth, and have cruised most of the major US cruise lines.  Our favorite is still Princess but we have enjoyed Celebrity, Royal and Disney quite bit.  So this is going to be an interesting experience for us!

 

We were originally booked at this same time on the same ship for 8 days out of Miami when we got caught up in all the re-positioning with the delay of the new ship.  No big deal for us, we love PR, we have less days at sea, and go to places we have never been.  Plus a boat load of Sailor Loot, a win win for us.

 

DW has several food allergies (Dairy, Gluten and Egg) so we will be covering a lot of how that process works onboard.  We have had mixed success across cruise lines on how its handled, and we are a little concerned as we generally rely on a consistent wait team to help with the process.  In recent years this has become less common with the shift away from traditional set dining times. So while we are excited about the food offerings on board, we are cautiously optimistic things will go well.  DW is already excited about the ice cream location that has several dairy free options!

 

We had no issues getting status matched to DBE, so it will be nice to get the priority boarding and we are probably most excited about the daily coffee credit lol.  We didnt have too many issues booking our dining and got almost everything we wanted at the times we wanted.  We will be dining at Pink Agave (twice), The Wake, Extra Virgin, Gunbae, the Test Kitchen,and  Razzle Dazzle for dinner and for breakfast Razzle Dazzle one day.

 

We don’t have a lot planned for this cruise, on purpose.  Being new to Virgin, and this new style of cruising they offer, we wanted to be really flexible and take in everything they throw at us.  Plus, we have been all over the Caribbean and just like to wander around town these days.

 

We are coming in a day early, as we typically do, and are staying at our favorite hotel, the Hilton Caribe.  Based on folks experience on the cruise before ours I think we will plan on getting to the port around 1:15 or so.

[herdfans4]

Looking forward to hearing about your travels and interested to see how you spend all the loot. We sail in March and are in the same boat 😉 with the large amount of loot/bar tab. Last count is about $2400 between dbe/regular credit give and make up credit (from canceled valiant lady cruise) and some extra from TA and taking a survey. Wondering if we should be planning daily massage or if we can drink our way through all that loot. Either way at looking forward to see how you spend it all. Have fun!!

Edited February 9 by herdfans4

[tbmrt]

Jumping onboard! We are traveling on the 2/24 cruise and hope to learn lots from your experiences.  Happy cruising!

[Steelers0854]

8 hours ago, herdfans4 said:

Last count is about $2400 between dbe/regular credit give and make up credit (from canceled valiant lady cruise) and some extra from TA and taking a survey

Ok wow. You are on a whole other level. I thought we had a lot and we have $700. 

[Steelers0854]

We arrived later in the afternoon. Got to the hotel and had a walk around. These views will never get old. 
 

 

 

The photos don’t do it justice but the waves today are pretty fierce. 
 

we grabbed a couple of drinks, a comfy chair and our books and are taking in this amazing weather and beautiful view. 
 

Dinner tonight is at Fogo de Chao. Before you come at me in the comments it’s right across the street from the hotel, the food is excellent, it’s really easy for DW to eat at with her allergies, and it’s half the cost of what it is back home. So after a travel day it’s gonna hit the spot 😉

[SteelCityCruiser10]

6 hours ago, Steelers0854 said:

We arrived later in the afternoon. Got to the hotel and had a walk around. These views will never get old. 
 

 

 

The photos don’t do it justice but the waves today are pretty fierce. 
 

we grabbed a couple of drinks, a comfy chair and our books and are taking in this amazing weather and beautiful view. 
 

Dinner tonight is at Fogo de Chao. Before you come at me in the comments it’s right across the street from the hotel, the food is excellent, it’s really easy for DW to eat at with her allergies, and it’s half the cost of what it is back home. So after a travel day it’s gonna hit the spot 😉

Checking in here 👋🏻

 

We stayed near there in Condado a couple weeks ago pre-cruise on RC Jewel.  

 

Hope you have a wonderful cruise!

[Steelers0854]

We had a beautiful view for dinner tonight and Fogo de Chao didn’t disappoint. 


 

 

after dinner we scheduled our Uber for tomorrow to pick us up at 1pm. It’s about a 10 min drive to the port and it seems like the best time to try and head over. 

 

 

 

[scubagal44]

I'm excited for your trip! I just got off so I'll be glad to continue on in some capacity. 😂

[Sherry84]

Following along, have a great cruise! 

[tbmrt]

On 2/9/2024 at 6:22 AM, Steelers0854 said:

Ok wow. You are on a whole other level. I thought we had a lot and we have $700. 

We have $600 bar tab and $1050 in loot which I thought was alot.

[Steelers0854]

Day 1 Embarkation Day

 

I’m certain all the good Virgin jokes have been said and over said before so I’ll skip those. It was a beautiful morning for our first foray into the Virgin experience. We enjoyed the included breakfast at the hotel and read by the pool until it was time for our Uber to pick us up at 1pm. It’s a pretty quick 10 minutes to the port from the hotel.

 

 

Luggage drop off was just fine, took all of 5 minutes at 1:10pm. There is both a CVS and a Walgreens very close to the port in case anyone forgot anything and needed to pickup something. They were plenty of gatekeepers checking for Suites, DBE etc at the entrance and we were asked to show prof no less than 4 times before we entered the priority checkin waiting area. Half the room is setup for those that have already checked in, my guess is those are suites. They said at 1:45 those people would begin boarding and then we would get priority checkin behind them. So if you have priority checkin you get this nice air conditioned am waiting area. Those with a 2pm boarding time were queued up, in the shade but outside standing. Everyone else was outside the port.

 

 

At 1:41pm they let the first group whom have already checked in start to board.

 

Pro tip: if you have priority sit closest to the door you enter the room in. They start boarding closest to the door and work their way to the back boarding in sections.

 

By 1:45 we were heading up to checkin. We were on the ship and in our room by 1:50.

 

 

 

[CineGraphic]

On 2/8/2024 at 6:37 PM, Steelers0854 said:

Our favorite is still Princess

 

I thought I recognized your name....we've been on 4 Virgin sailings since leaving Princess.

Enjoy your cruise!

[princess76021]

Permission to come aboard please 😇😇

I promise to behave 😁😁

Hugs from Texas

[Steelers0854]

59 minutes ago, princess76021 said:

Permission to come aboard please 😇😇

I promise to behave 😁😁

Hugs from Texas

granted. But misbehave is tonight, so you may have to go back on your promise. 

[Steelers0854]

 

I wish I knew why half my photos are uploading as all black, sorry but you won’t be able to see a bunch of the photos I took. We headed to the galley for lunch. It’s an interesting concept with the food stalls. Staff instructed us to walk around and order from anywhere we wanted. If they weren’t busy you got it right away. If they were you got a pager that went off when it was ready and you went back to pick it up.

 

 

DW confirmed they use the same allergen free bread most of the other lines use. But the station was apparently going though an inspection and they could only serve premade sandwiches and couldn’t make anything to order. Never fear the taco station was safe and she grabbed Al pastor tacos. She also found an açaí pana cotta she could eat for dessert.

 

 

 

I got what you could only get on a cruise ship. Sushi and tacos. The sushi box was a combination of the daily offerings. Same with the tacos. Both were excellent!

 

We started our ship exploration. After much discussion we thought we would spend our Sailor Loot on the Thermal Spa for the cruise. It’s not cheap, but we are taking a relaxed approach to this cruise and the space looked amazing. $328pp later and we still have a bit of spending to do but the majority of it atleast is dealt with. Can’t wait to relax down here.

 

 

We grabbed some ice cream and sorbet, found our muster station and a great lounging spot out on deck 7. We basically chilled here and booked some show reservations until dinner. We had no issue booking any of the shows and got the whole week booked up. We did call an audible the test kitchen. While it’s right up my alley we thought it would be too hard for DW to eat there so we booked the dinner show for that night, so excited about that!

[Sherry84]

Question @Steelers0854 so you go and order from each individual station in the galley as opposed to sitting at a table and a server taking your order? This is different than what I've experienced so I'm curious. Also same situation for me with the test kitchen as I would also have a hard time dining there due to my food allergies. 

[Steelers0854]

8 minutes ago, Sherry84 said:

Question @Steelers0854 so you go and order from each individual station in the galley as opposed to sitting at a table and a server taking your order? This is different than what I've experienced so I'm curious. Also same situation for me with the test kitchen as I would also have a hard time dining there due to my food allergies. 

correct. Atleast on embarkation day lunch that’s how they were doing it. Servers only came by to clear plates. 
 

to be fair, we didn’t even speak with anyone at Test Kitchen, we love a good dinner show and just made the change. So they may very well have been able to do something. 

[Steelers0854]

Here is the galley menu from today for both lunch and dinner. 

Galley Dinner Day 1.pdf Galley Lunch Day 1.pdf

[Steelers0854]

We have the premium WiFi via DBE, I’m sure there is a difference but don’t quote me on that. Preliminary speed test looks great!

 

 

[CineGraphic]

Glad things are off to a good start for you.

You will find that they do a great job with food allergies.

Miss Behave is a hoot...I hadn't laughed that hard in years.

[Steelers0854]

anyone know if I need to keep this DBE band on for anything? Wasn’t sure if it was needed for anything other than boarding?

[CineGraphic]

1 minute ago, Steelers0854 said:

anyone know if I need to keep this DBE band on for anything? Wasn’t sure if it was needed for anything other than boarding?

 

You can take them off if you wish. Some folks will leave them on for the entire cruise.

We've taken the fobs off of our bracelets and have been wearing them for over a year.

[Steelers0854]

14 minutes ago, CineGraphic said:

 

You can take them off if you wish. Some folks will leave them on for the entire cruise.

We've taken the fobs off of our bracelets and have been wearing them for over a year.

cool. Thanks! Wasn’t sure if we needed them for something else but I didn’t think there was anything we would need it for. 

[Sherry84]

15 minutes ago, CineGraphic said:

 

You can take them off if you wish. Some folks will leave them on for the entire cruise.

We've taken the fobs off of our bracelets and have been wearing them for over a year.

That's a great idea, always wanted to keep wearing mine but never thought to take the fob off.

[CineGraphic]

8 minutes ago, Steelers0854 said:

cool. Thanks! Wasn’t sure if we needed them for something else but I didn’t think there was anything we would need it for. 

 

It just occurred to me that on the transatlantic last fall, we were able to get into the Deep Blue party a lot quicker because we still had the blue band on, while others were lined up to see if their names were on the list. You do what works for you. There tends to be zero-judgement on board for the most part.