Victory 2/8/09 review (written especially for those with younger kids/port reviews)

[Jayhawk]

Ok, this is written from the point of view of someone who has a 5 and 6 year old, so if you don’t have kids, you can just fly over the “family oriented” comments. :) Just got home about 6 hours ago.

 

ARRIVAL IN SAN JUAN: We flew from KC to San Juan the day before (Saturday), not so much because we were worried about missing the boat, but just to enjoy an extra day of vacation (since the ship didn’t leave until Sunday night). We left our home at 5 a.m. for a 7 a.m. flight and arrived in San Juan on time about 4 pm. We took a taxi to our hotel; I think they charged $16 plus $1/piece of luggage. We stayed at the Courtyard by Marriot in Miramar, which we got on priceline for just under $100. It was pretty nice and relatively clean. We went to 5:30 spanish mass at a little church up the street; we were in our travel clothes (shorts) and unprepared, but it just worked out. We were planning to go to the 10:30 English mass the next day and were checking out the church on the way to dinner and just stayed. We had dinner at a little local eatery about 2 blocks away.

 

DAY IN SAN JUAN/EMBARKATION: We had a nice day in San Juan. Thank goodness we went to mass in the morning because we spent about 2 hours looking for a piece of luggage (we broke the zipper on our large piece of luggage and it wouldn’t close). We walked well over a mile to Marshall’s but finally got something. Arriving back at the hotel about noon, we took a bus ($.50 each, adults only) to old San Juan. We walked a TON and the girls were such troopers. We finally stumbled upon the fort (now about 2 p.m.) and the kids had a blast running around it and exploring, as well as watching the kites. Unfortunately, on the way back we could NOT figure out where to catch the bus. Lesson learned – ask the bus driver when the drop you off where to catch the bus back. We tried to walk back, but after a mile, the GPS said we were still 2 miles away, so we caught a taxi for $7. We picked up our luggage and went back to the ship (which was about 2 blocks from where the bus stopped in Old San Juan! Embarkation was FAST, less than ½ hour from drop off to being in our rooms. On board, we checked out the kids club, had dinner, participated in a life boat drill (at nearly 10 p.m. – crazy for people with young kids) and then sailed away to sea :) .

 

OUR CABIN: We had a fabulous room, #1001 – it was evidently an ADA room – for an “inside” rate, it had an obstructed outside view with 220 SF (HUGE!), a sofa and bunk bed. That worked great for us as I was worried about putting Sabrina (who just turned 5 the day before) on an upper bunk. Even the bathroom was huge – large enough for us to have both girls in the shower simultaneous without them bumping into each other which was a big time saver. I highly recommend this cabin for anyone on an upcoming cruise. Our cabin Steward was great and the girls enjoyed the “towel animals”. I was slightly worried as this room was right underneath the SPA/exercise room, but we never heard a peep. Possibly our peers on the left side (port??) had a different experience as they were beneath the kids club.

 

THE SHIP: The ship was nice...pretty much average. To be honest, on this itinerary, we spent VERY little time on it. Some of the decks don’t go all the way through but you’ll get used to it quickly. Honestly, I hate to say this, but if I could change one thing about this cruise, it would have been to have 1 day at sea. I feel like we didn’t get to really enjoy much about the ship at all! We never got to see a big screen movie or swim in the pools or play mini golf. But that’s probably ok, because the ports were fabulous!

 

CAMP CARNIVAL: First, I was surprised at the LACK of kids on this trip! Granted, it was February, and a cruise leaving from San Juan, but I was shocked to learn there were more than 100 kids under 18 on the whole ship. They said there were 300, but I never saw them! Anyway, Camp Carnival was a nice option. Our kids liked it pretty well – they didn’t usually beg to stay, nor beg for us to come and get them. It was nice to be able to leave them for a few hours to go on an excursion. We left them twice for 5-6 hour blocks of time, and 2 other times for about 2 hours each, so I think we used it about 16 hours the whole trip…some days several hours and other days not at all. I wondered if they really did all the activities that were listed on the brochure. I’d ask the kids about them (actually going out of my way to take them there for certain activities I thought they’d like) and then they would either say they hadn’t done that or only for a couple of minutes. I wasn’t too crazy about the 2-5 year olds all being together….there were a lot of 2-3 year olds (relatively speaking) so my 5 year old didn’t have many kids to play with. The other thing I wasn’t crazy about was the 6-8 year olds were on deck 12 one day (where the 12-14s go) for “wii” time. As we walked in, we saw a bunch of the kids playing what seemed like pretty violent Wii games (beat ‘em up sort of stuff) and there was a music video playing in the background TV that would flash to a couple making out by a train. Now granted, the video probably wasn’t worse than what you’d see on MTV and the games are probably normal games, but our 6 year old has been exposed to neither. So we just watched the schedule more closely and didn’t bring her to times that were in that room. She didn’t even mention it…probably didn’t even notice it! They did do some fun activities on the last night like face painting, T-shirt and bag decorating, and Samantha won some sort of “prize” for some contest she was in.

 

THE FOOD: We were assigned to a table of 8, but the four of us were the only ones there, so it was like having our own private table with extra room. The food was pretty average – not over the top as far as cruises go, but not bad either. I probably would have preferred a little more variety in the desserts – LOL. Our waiter, Eric, did a great job of being cognizant of requests. He and his teammate, Aleksandra, were great with the girls as well. The girls do a good job with raw carrots, so he would have them there waiting for us each night for the kids as an appetizer, and also did a good job of bringing out their main course pretty early on (usually just after our soup, at salad time.) The wait staff (and our room stewards, nicknamed “T” and “TT”) actually did a FABULOUS job with the kids. I don’ remember people being so kind and accommodating to our children the last two cruises…maybe I’ve just forgotten. Most nights the wait staff sang and danced on the staircase in the dining room, which was actually quite fun to see! The first night (open seating) I had an Indian dish that was very tasty. The lobster and steak were good as well. The Lido deck buffet was ok – probably average. Sometimes the fruit was fabulous and fresh, sometimes, not so much.

 

ENTERTAINMENT ON SHIP: We went to the two big shows in the Caribbean Lounge and while they was glitzy, it held our kids attention. The dancing and costumes were great. The first night was “Living in America” which had different music from America – like sports, country, different cities, etc. and then “Vroom” which was music through the decades. The only thing that bothered me was that the dancer’s outfits were the most revealing I’d ever seen, mostly in the first show. They warn you that it’s a PG show, and I’d suggest a strong PG13, just based on costumes alone. DH played in the blackjack tournament and lost his $20 but said he had fun. On night 3 we skipped the show because we had an early morning, but we did watch “the Newlywed Game”, which is always fun. On day 1, I talked my husband into cha-cha lessons on stage in the Caribbean lounge and we actually both had a great time! We also saw the magician who was pretty good as well. Several PG+ rated jokes that went WAY over my kids heads.

 

DAY 1, ST. THOMAS: We took a cab to Coral World/Coki beach. Everyone wanted to charge us $9/pp which we thought was kind of crazy given the kids. Couple of offers for half price for the kids. Finally, we found a van that was almost full and they took $20 for the 4 of us. The kids liked Coral world, especially the aquariums and observatory and when the divers fed the fish under water. It was smaller than it seemed to be on the web site, so we easily made it through in 1 hour. With the cab card discount, we got in for $54 for the 4 of us. Then we spent about an hour and a half at Coki Beach. The girls could have stayed there all day. We played in the water and built a sand castles. I was wanting to get the girl’s hair braided, but not a single offer! That was surprising. Then we hitched on to another “open air” bus back that was full. She asked what we paid on the way here and we told her $20 and she said “for FOUR of you”? We said yes, she rolled her eyes, and said “get in”. We brought our own snacks from the ship so the day was under $100. Back on board, the kids went to Camp Carnival for a little over an hour while we hot tubbed, and then relaxed and off to dinner.

 

DAY 2, DOMINICA: We were debating this, but we’d been to Dominica before and didn’t want to do another island tour. We REALLY wanted to go river tubing but they wouldn’t take our younger daughter. So after stressing and thinking about it a while, we decided to take a plunge, and have some pretty heavy trust, and left the kids at Camp Carnival for 6 hours (they are 5 and 6). It actually turned out just fine. They spent the first two hours in supervised free play (coloring, making “jewelry art”, playing games, etc.), then lunch for an hour, a movie (Horton Hears a Who) and then another hour of activities (having books read/decorating a piñata) before we picked them up. We thought they’d be anxious to see us but actually were fine even staying there! Back to the excursion….we did the River Tubing/Emerald Pool with Antours and WOW it was one of the best excursions ever!! For $47/pp, we went to the Emerald Pool, did well over an hour of tubing in a some really fun rapids, and then had an hour at a local beach, all with a mini tour of the island. The tubing was the best, and was a good mix between gentle floating and some fun rapids. It was much more action than the river tubing in Belize. We had 6 guides on the river for 14 of us, and it was not too many, as we all got stuck a couple of times. I am VERY glad we didn’t try to talk them into taking our 5 year old or even our 6 year old, as my husband even flipped out at one point! The driver was a hoot and there was some crazy driving with hairpin turns and close calls…but all of that is pretty typical on these islands! This night was “elegant night” back on the ship and the girls enjoyed dressing up and going to the formal dinner and then show. There was the typical “captain’s” party, and lobster for dinner.

 

DAY 3, BARBADOS: Against my better judgment, we spent $10 in taxi fare and a $50 total entrance fee to the Boatyard. It was probably overpriced for what we got, but we had a long day in Dominca and another long one in St. Lucia, and I didn’t feel like messing with cab rides all the way over to the west side or Rockley or Harrison cave. We just needed a “light” day – and it was a good day for the beach. Actually, the beach was pretty good (would have been better for $20 for all of us!) I actually also chose Boatyard for the “water toys”, but the kids weren’t interested in them. The water trampoline was out but my daughters didn’t really want to do it, the iceburg was on land, and no one was using the rope swing. But they ran in and out of the waves and made sand castles and were happy as clams. It was supposed to be safe and well guarded, but I was very nervous about leaving out stuff…there were a lot of locals walking by it every minute or two. TONS of people trying to sell snorkeling, jet ski rides, etc. It poured down rain at one point, but only for about 5 minutes – everyone ran to the bar to take cover. We then negotiated to get their hair braided. The lady wanted $3/braid and I told her that was completely out of my price range and I was looking for $1. She laughed and said “ok, let’s talk fixed price”. She offered $80 for both my girls and I told her that was still too much. She said $60 was her final offer. I countered with $50 and she wouldn’t budge, so I decided $60 would be ok. Holy cow, I had no idea what a bargain I think I got. Actually, I think after she started she realized she REALLY underpriced me given how much hair my girls had! Samantha got 35 braids and Sabrina got 32, fully, all the way down, so I guess she wound up UNDER $1/braid. I tipped her $20 Barbados ($10 US). It took over 2 hours, so we actually barely made it back to the ship before the 4:30 “on board time”. I guess it wasn’t such a short day after all!

 

DAY 4, ST. LUCIA: After reading the rave reviews on cruise critic, we signed up with COSOL tours. It was a GREAT tour, and definitely worth the money. I think we were gone from 8:30 to 3:00 and had PLENTY to eat and drink. Sam was our driver and he was very knowledgeable of the island. As others have mentioned, the roads were very windy, and my husband started not feeling well near the end, but the kids and I had no issues. We made many stops along the way. The first stop was the banana plantation. They pulled them down and my daughter loved it so much, she asked if she could bring 18 more back for her classmates :) . They stopped at random times to see snakes, grass that responded to touch, just miscellaneous stuff. The first food stop was awesome – two full tables of food including: fried fish (fish cakes?) and chicken, avocadoes, pineapple, coconut fudge, coconut candy, sugar cane, some potato/dip thing, guava cheese (I’m still not sure what that was!), coconut and banana mini cakes, Johnny cakes, Local Banana Ketchup, Savory Fish Cakes & more. Every stop had rum punch, beer, water and sodas and Cosol put pressure on everyone to eat and drink up. We took a water taxi (very casual boat – wear shoes that can get wet!) over to Hilton Jalousie beach, it is at the foot of the Piton Mountains. You can only get there by boat or a 1 hour hike. We snorkeled for about an hour. It was the first time either girl had snorkeled and they both did great! After that, we went to Soufriere, the second largest town. Then we saw Sulpher Springs and the drive in volcano – that was VERY cool! Finally, we also stopped by the Botanical Gardens and I think it was called the Diamond Waterfall. On the way back we stopped at a local bakery for COSOL fresh hot homemade bread & cheese, and of course, more beer, water, coke, etc. I’d highly recommend this tour to anyone visiting St. Lucia.

 

DAY 5, ANTIGUA: We decided to leave the kiddos at Camp Carnival again, since it went well last time, and go to the Spring Hill stables for some horseback riding. (Our backup plan if we still wanted to ride was to take the kids with us and they’d get a short private lesson while we rode, but we weren’t really comfortable “riding off” without them.) Spring Hill is a small outfit near English Harbor, and Kylea, the yard manager was very pleasant and patient with us, and our lack of experience. We went down to the bus stop at the market (about a 10 minute walk from the ship) and took bus 17 to Falmouth (right before English harbor – Ferrell St.), which was only $3 total US for both of us. Things weren’t clearly marked, but we’ve gotten MUCH better about asking directions every block or so (to the bus stop, while on the bus, after we left the bus) to make sure we were going in the right direction. The bus driver ensured we were at the right stop. There is no sign for the stable, but a sign pointing to TBS Reality. You walk about 1-2 blocks, then through a banana grove, then to the stables, maybe another 10 minutes. Chris rode “Gandolf” and I rode “Bilbo” (cute names, huh?). It was fun and completely private, and we rode for an hour for $100 total. I was hoping to maybe do a little trotting, but our inexperience was shining through as indicated by how many times the horses stopped to eat grass and we weren’t able to stop them! The best part was getting to take the horses into the water slightly from the edge of the beach. Kylea then drove us to English Harbor where we shopped a bit, and then took the bus back. We figured we saved $60+ on cab fare. Back at St. John’s, we did a little exploring of downtown, including the old St. John’s cathedral, and then back on the ship by 1. The kids were fine and barely missed us. We lounged around and took a LONG nap and then went to dinner and the magic show. Good thing for the nap or the kids would not have made it through the show. I’m not sure why Carnival has a 6 pm seating for dinner but an 8:45 show. We had over an hour every night of idle time in between and the show was often too late for the kids. It was a very nice day.

 

DAY 6, ST. KITTS: Since it was our last day, we wanted to do something the kids would really like. So we spent the morning shopping in St. Kitts (the girls bought some little sundresses, a drum and a scarf with their saved allowance) and then we took at taxi to Cockleshell beach. We annoyed the driver by bargaining, I guess it’s $26 each way regardless of the number of people. (Hint: Find other people to ride with!) I don’t know that I’d recommend the beach for swimming or really even snorkeling – there were a lot of rocks and seaweed, but if you love to hunt for seashells, this is the place to be. The kids LOVED it and we came home with two bags of seashells. There was one bar/restaurant, a monkey, and a local resident 600 pound pig “Wilbur” at the beach.. At about 2PM, we took a taxi back to the cruise ship dock, did a bit more shopping, and then got back on the ship. On board, we participated in Walk for the Cure, which was a 1 mile fun walk supporting Susan G Komen for the Cure. This cruise was actually a 5 year celebration that my husband and I were doing for my 5 year cancer-free anniversary on February 11th, so as we walked with the kids, I got pretty choked up. (I lost two good friends to breast cancer in December, both in their 30s and both Moms with young kids.) It was also Valentine’s Day today, so we let the kids choose between eating with us in the dining room and going to Camp Carnival for their dinner/Valentine’s Day party, and they chose the latter. It was the first night they ate dinner with Camp Carnival. So Chris and I had a Valentine’s “dinner/date”. We went to a trivia and “liar” show, did some packing, picked up the kids, finished packing, and went to bed.

 

DAY 7, DEBARKATION: We were assigned Zone 1 (we had a 10 a.m. flight – they had originally given us zone 9 and no idea why, so we traded them in for zone 1). People were sitting around all over as you had to be out of your room, so they could prepare for the next cruisers. Even though the ship docked at 7 a.m., we didn’t clear customs as a ship until 8:15. I was starting to get nervous! We were standing by the stairway on deck 3 and the minute they called group 1, we were on our way down the stairs. We were probably in the first 10-20 people off the ship. We had set our luggage out the night before and I’m glad we did – it was much faster than carrying ourselves. We claimed our luggage, flew through customs. and were outside in a cab by 8:30 and to the airport by 8:45. We zipped inside and there was no line at the Delta counter. As I predicted to Chris (but he didn’t believe me), our luggage was too heavy and we spent 10 minutes in line trying to redistribute. I am so glad we got out early because when we left, there was a huge line behind us, probably no thanks to us! We got to our gate about 9:15, and had a relatively smooth trip home. The weather in Kansas City was 35 degrees.

 

CONCLUSION: Overall, it was a good cruise with a great itinerary, and the staff was fabulous and overall it was very kid friendly.

[GENEVA4]

Great review our kids loved camp carnival as well. So well, that they are going on cruise # 6 :).

[lizardhowson]

Thanks for the review.

 

Although no kids, have the Victory scheduled in Sept.

[SunnyinDC]

Thanks for the great review, especially all the child-related info! I'll have a 7 year old and a 5 year old when we cruise in a few weeks, and it's really helpful to hear how other kids (near) their ages react to things on their cruises! Thanks for sharing!

[SweetpeaOne]

Very nice review. Thanks for sharing. Any sea days on your trip?

[operaclg]

Thanks for the review. We are also from Kansas. We will be leaving this Saturday for the same cruise. Can't wait!

[TortieGal]

Thanks for the review! Will hopefully be booking this as part of the CC group going next April...

[TheVegasMan]

Very nice review. Thanks for sharing. Any sea days on your trip?

No, the Victory is in a different port each day. Something that is accomplished by leaving from San Juan.

[Jayhawk]

I'm glad this is helpful! It's a "pay it forward" for all the questions I had before I left.

 

I can't believe I'm saying this, but if I could change one thing, it would be to add 1 sea day, maybe on day 4 (but not at the expense of St. Lucia - LOL.) It would have FORCED me to just relax a day. The kids never played mini golf, never played the large "chess" game, never saw a movie on the big screen (family movies at 10 a.m.) and Samantha never went down the water slide, because we were always so concerned with getting out to the islands.

 

Operaclg, please take the 25 degrees weather with you and bring back some warm stuff! :)

[swartz]

Great review im going on the same tour in a month!!

[Pami1968]

Thanks for the review. It was really informative and helpful. :)

[lives2travel]

Thanks for posting such a detailed review! It sounds like you had an excellent time. It's certainly a vacation the kids will remember!

 

We're taking this same cruise in June and are considering the Antours river tubing tour on Dominica, as well. I'm trying to decide if it would be safe enough for my 11 year old daughter. Were there any kids on your tour? At what age do you think you'd feel comfortable bringing your daughters on this excursion? Any advice would be greatly appreciated! I've read so many reviews...with differing opinions on that. My daughter's a good swimmer and is not afraid of water. She says she could do it, but I'm looking for another parent's point-of-view. Thanks!

 

Debbie :)