carnivaladdix120

We sailed NYE last year and are sailing again this year and can't wait! Definitely lots of energy and fun! Like everyone else posted, they give out lots of fun NYE goodies and the balloon drop was awesome! 

I have SO enjoyed both of your live reviews! So exciting! We sail on 12/30 for the NYE cruise and can't wait! This is our first ever RC cruise (have done 22 with Carnival) and seeing all the beautiful pics really made me even more excited to try a new line. Thanks so much for keeping us updated and entertained! Sorry you ended up with the stomach flu and glad it didn't last too long. 

He is Literally the first cruise director we ever had that made us realize that we had a cruise director! we've been on 10 cruises and we just had him last year!! He was FANTASTIC!!! You will LOVE him!!!

Same here! He was SOOOO awesome! Ever since we sailed with him last March, I make it a point to see who our CD is and compare them to him ;p

On another forum folks recommended this fan. Purchased 2 for our cruise next month.

 

 

 

efluky Mini USB 3 Speeds Rechargeable Portable Table Fan, 4.5-Inch, Black

I bought 2 of these last year and bring them on every cruise. They work great! I even bring one off the ship when we have a beach day planned since my husband hates being too hot ;p;p

My first cruise was on the Carnival Sunshine, and my second was on the Grand Celebration.

 

Carnival will have more amenities obviously, but for a ship of the Celebration’s size it is not exactly feature poor - the ship has two pools, several hot tubs (one of which is on the adults-only top deck, in the Oasis - their version of Serenity), a casino, a couple of lounges, a gorgeous library, duty-free shop (great deals on logo merch!) and a spa. The outdoor dance club on Deck 11 has cornhole boards out during the day, and ping pong tables just up a deck from the main pool. There’s even a kids club with arcade games as well.

 

Food is a bit of a weak spot - the Forward Dining room essentially operates as a steak house, and charges extra. The aft dining room does fixed time dining, and the menu is not very big. The buffet is a bit small for lunch and dinner, but the ship does offer burgers poolside on embarkation day, and barbecue as a “late lunch” on days in Freeport, both of which are good. I also was pleased with The Bull (priced a la carte) which operates poolside in the evenings and offers gourmet burgers (think more like Red Robin than Guy’s Burger Joint).

 

The production show the first night was kind of odd, but I really liked the production show the second night (“Let’s Dance”). You can even learn from the onboard illusionist how to perform some of his tricks (and he’ll gladly sell you his book). I didn’t try it, but there’s also a champagne breakfast.

 

Being a smaller ship, you will feel some vibration on the lower decks. I stayed on Deck 5 (Deck 2 using Carnival’s current nomenclature) and felt lots of vibration pulling into port in Palm Beach. The cabin really isn’t much different from any of the oceanview cabins in Carnival ships built in the 1990s.

 

I booked directly through the cruise line. Never was I approached by anyone regarding a time share.

 

You do book excursions and dining at the terminal, but you have to remember how small the lobby is on a Holiday-class ship. If you do stay on Deck 5 (Mercury), just carry your luggage to your room rather than checking it.

 

Breakeven on the drink coupons is around 6 drinks - drinks like mudslides or pina coladas will set you back around $11 each. I actually had the soda package, and it was no problem getting drinks at any of the bars, and you even get a mug (although you don’t have to use it).

 

The ship never felt crowded outside of muster drill (which was indoors) and I sailed on Labor Day Weekend.

 

One thing that was odd was that my TV kept coming on in the middle of the night. Be sure to mute it before you turn in for the night.

 

 

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This is a perfect comparison!! Thanks so much for sharing! We live in Palm Beach and have never sailed this line but always talk about it as a quick weekend getaway between our Carnival sailings. This definitely helped!

Thanks for sharing! Can't wait to hear more :)

We sailed in San Juan in March and used Carnival's shuttle service. They were quick and never had to wait longer than 10 minutes both ways. I checked the taxi rates prior to flying out and they weren't really any cheaper that I found anyway, so I just chose booked Carnival's thru the cruise manager portal.

Great start! Looking forward to more :)

I can say this is the first ship that I felt completely loston! LOL Seriously I felt like a first time cruiser all over again! I think itmay have been day 2 that I finally realized that Vista basically split thePromenade deck into 2 decks, 4 and 5. Our cabin was on deck 3 near the shore excursiondeck which I was worried about with noise and stuff, but it ended up being theperfect location for us! We took the stairs often since the casino was on deck4 and all the great areas were either on 4 or 5. Plus the Liquid Lounge wasvery close by so I was able to get in line early for a few shows. I did getlost quite a bit the first few days, walking all over the place trying to find ourdining room which was all the way in the back of the ship and we had to enter ondeck 3, BUT we had to take deck 4 all the way back first and then go down onedeck. This is not really unusual but deck 4 appeared to end at the casino whenin fact it did go all the way back. I think there weren’t enough signs aroundlike on older ships to really find where things were so we used the deck layout near the elevators quite often lol Maybe it was just me though or thecocktails that turned me around, who knows lol

Speaking of cocktails, none of us purchased the Cheers or Sodapackage. We’ve never purchased it mainly because I think the price isridiculous and hubby always gets the DOU card from the casino so I just getdrinks on his card while we play. My husband is really the life of the party inthe casino. He gets to know all of the dealers, most of which he already knewfrom other ships and the hosts and pit bosses LOVE him! It’s crazy! He has this crazy sayingthat gets everyone going and by the 2nd or 3rd day,everyone in the casino, players and staff, yell it out whenever they see him. Outof all of our sailings, this one had the most people who yelled it out, even inthe comedy club! It was hilarious!! So if there are any casino players on herewho have heard a man yell out “Who you wit!!”, it’s my crazy husband LOL

Back to day 1 lol After exploring a bit, it was time formuster which we were stationed in the Liquid Lounge. It went by pretty quick. Theyhad a LONG list of people to call who hadn’t checked it and then Matt came onthe intercom calling out even more names. I really don’t get why people can’tjust go to their station, check in and get it over with. We didn’t have tostand outside in the sweltering south FL heat, we had comfy seats, what morecould you ask for? Oh well, that’s neither here nor there. So, after muster, wewent to our cabin to give my friends their luggage to take to their cabins. Ourluggage hadn’t arrived yet, so we went up for the sail away and relaxed. Thisship has LOTS of awesome seating all around the ship. Seriously, they did agreat job in making sure there were plenty of places to relax and enjoy the sunor shade. Deck 5 goes all the way around the entire ship and had so many differenttypes of relaxing places to sit and chat or lounge, it was awesome! Rightoutside the Ocean Plaza, there were these clamshell type beds (without tops) thatI found so relaxing and breezy that they quickly became my favorite spot, evenmore so than Serenity.

We went to Alchemy for the martini tasting which is somethingI do on every cruise and always enjoy! I love the bar staff all over the ship, especiallyAlchemy. I love the concoctions they come up with. We all enjoyed the minimartinis and each received the little martini glass charm for playing andreally had a great time. Afterwards, we went to the casino and played blackjack and my friends played slots for a while. Around 8pm, we went to dinner inthe MDR. We always opt for YTD and it usually works for hubby and I, but Ithink next time we have a group, we’ll opt for 8:15 set time because it washard keeping track of everyone and deciding what time to meet up for dinnerevery night. But we did have great service and everyone enjoyed their food aswell. I’m sorry, I did not take pics of the menus or food, although I do havepics of our food from the steakhouse that I’ll share later.

Embarkation Day

My friends and theirspouses flew in from ATL the morning of the cruise and actually got on the shipbefore us and they didn’t even have FTTF! The rest of us live in Palm Beach (50mins north of Miami) so we had a party bus pick us up from my house and rodetogether to the port. A slight mishap with misplaced keys caused us to leavefor the port later than planned which almost sent me over the edge, but theywere found and we were on our way. We arrived at the port at about 12pm, gaveour luggage to the porter, got into the priority line (thank God because the regularline was LONG!). I turned platinum this cruise, hubby was already platinum and ourparents and BIL bought FTTF so we all got on the ship in about 15 minutes. Notbad for Miami!

Side note: I have read SO many reviews on Vista that Ialready knew what to expect of the atrium, but when we walked on, I was notreally disappointed, but definitely miss the high atrium and glass elevators. Whenreading how others were underwhelmed, I thought they were crazy until I experiencedit myself. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still beautiful! The funnel is awesome andI do like the brightness of the atrium. But something was missing and I didn’t realizewhat it was until day 3. You can’t see the ocean from many parts of the shipinside! Everything is enclosed. Like others said, it did feel more like a hotelthan a ship.

Anyway, we went right to our cabin to drop off our bags and metour room steward, Gloria, who was very nice! We always opt for evening only cabinservice as we tend to sleep in and really only need fresh towels. We then foundmy friends and let them put their luggage in our cabin since theirs wasn’t readyyet. They had already eaten, so we left them and went to get our first meal! Hubbyalways gets a burger from Guys and I always get the burrito bowl from BlueIguana. We then met up in the Market Place to find seats and eat. I don’t knowif this is normal, but it was unusually HOT in there! I was already sweaty fromthe FL heat but goodness, I was burning up in there! It was hard to enjoy my foodbecause I was trying so hard to cool off LOL But the food was great either way.After eating, we went to explore a bit since this was all of our first time onVista.

Hello fellow cruise addicts!

We just returned from a funfilled 8 day southern Caribbean cruise on the beautiful Vista and I wanted to shareour experience on the ship and ports. I’ve found of wealth of knowledge and informationfrom other awesome reviews here and although mine won’t be as spectaculr asothers, I’m hoping to provide a little insight from our perspective.

A few things before the cruise - We decided to prepay for thesocial media packages as well as excursions. I get the social media package tokeep in touch with my kids as well as our employees while on the ship. The onlyexcursion we purchased was the Ultimate Adventure with Lunch in La Romana. Afew other excursions we were interested in ended up either being sold out ornot enough spaces left for all of us to book. This was purely our fault as “some”in our group couldn’t make up their mind soon enough 😉We also made reservations for the steakhouse. We tried to reserve for Father’sDay, but it was booked and after several emails back and forth selectingalternate days and times, we finally were able to snag the 3rd nightof the cruise at 5:30. This day we were in Grand Turk until 1:30 so it workedout really well for us.

A little background info on our group of cruisers. We had agroup of 10 altogether which made for some fun times and occasionally nerve rackingtimes as well (lol hard keeping up with everyone) My name is Michelle (42) andmy husband is Thomas (34) and this sailing we chose to leave our 4 children(ages 20, 14, 12 and 10) behind and enjoy a kid-free (our kids at least)cruise. We actually take quite a few kid-free cruises a year and save 1 eachyear for them LOL Hubby is a big casino addict (in a good way) and he alwaysgets a BB (bounce back) offer at the end of each cruise, so we take advantageof them ALL! We have only sailed Carnival and this was my 17thcruise and hubby’s 19th. Our first cruise together was in 2009 andwe’ve been hooked ever since. The others in our group were my dad (2ndcruise), mother-in-law (probably her 30th cruise, she’s sailed withvarious lines), brother-in-law and his spouse (1st cruise), my bestfriend of 26 years and her spouse (3rd cruise) as well as anotherfriend and her spouse (1st cruise).

Really enjoying your review!!

Loving your review! We sail Vista on Saturday so you’re helping me get more and more excited [emoji12]

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I'm SO looking forward to the rest of your review. We sail Vista this coming Saturday on the same itinerary and definitely excited to see your pics. This will be our first sailing on Vista and this itinerary :)

LOVING your review! You are hilarious! Also love the different drinks you're sharing as well! Gives me great ideas to ask for on our next cruise in June :)

I went down to 1209 to get my bag. When I came back, I didn't want to wake him, so I sat close to him on a lounger. I closed my eyes for about an hour until I got the notification for Tea Time. I looked back and when I didn't see W, I sent him a chat message in the app. He replied that he was on his way to Tea Time, and for me to meet him there. He didn't see me in the lounger in front of him, so he went to eat. As usual.

 

AC and V were already there when we arrived at Tea Time, so we sat with them. We saw our dinner server Mirjana and she hooked us up by bringing the whole dessert cart to our table. We chose quickly cuz we were kinda monopolizing her time. The Tea Time desserts were the Peach Crumble, Chocolate Cake, Scone, Coffee Macarons, Orange Cake, and a Fruit Tart. I wanted to purchase one of the better teas, but no one ever brought the box to our table. We loved everything that we had on our plates. The servers were very nice. They even went to find something special for a lady at our table who couldn't eat gluten.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oh my gosh thank you SO much for posting pics from Tea Time. I've been trying to make it to Tea Time but always miss it and wondered how it was. Definitely going to make it my business to make it next month on Vista :D

Thanks for the review in advance. We are doing your first leg cruise to the southern Caribbean on June 16 on the Vista so very interested.

 

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We are on the same sailing with you! So ready! This daily review will help build up even more excitement ;)

OMG, you have me cracking up!! You're hilarious! And the pictures are absolutely amazing! Just beautiful! Looking forward to more :)

So excited!!! I love your reviews and as usual, you do not disappoint :) Can't wait to read more!!

I think that this thread is excellent,especially for first time cruisers. When DH and I went on our first cruise in 2009,we had absolutely NO idea what to expect in regards to how much we would need or spend. Unfortunately I didn't know about this awesome site back then either LOL We used our bank debit card which wasn't a problem at all, but we did go NUTS with ordering drinks and not keeping track of what we each were ordering and things like that so when we received our printed charges the last night, I almost fainted! $800 alone on DRINKS!!! Needless to say, we learned the hard way and have never had a tab that large again! We had an awesome time tho and became addicted LOL but I have spoken to many new cruisers when we sail and even with the new HUB app and kiosks around to check your balance, there are still many newbies that have no idea how to use them or just don't think to check their balances. Probably a big reason why the GS line is ridiculous on the last night lol

So happy everything worked out! I honestly would have had an absolute melt down LOL

I also was a little shocked at some of the rude comments, but glad you didn't entertain them :)

Enjoy your cruise!!

I can see the Dealer's Choice in my offers online. Looks identical to the casino offers that expired on the 26th of April. Like, EXACTLY the same except for a later expiration date and cruises through December, 2020. Have to wait for email to find out how much the casino cash will be, but guessing it's the same as last month's offer. I did also receive a "last minute" offer just a little bit ago in my email for a free Balcony on the Breeze out of Galveston leaving May 6th. Not really an option since I live in Florida, but nice to know they were thinking of me :). Hopefully a sign of better things to come!

Our new offer is the exact same as well LOL I did get the email as well though and indicated the same amount of funplay chips as well. I do like that the sail dates extend to 2020 so may take advantage of it.

So happy to hear you had a great time! We love that ship and all of the smaller ones. We are sailing Vista in June and I'm a little nervous about it due to the size and amount of people especially since it'll be during the summer but definitely looking forward to it. Thanks so much for sharing!!

Following!! We sail Vista in 54 days and I'm so anxious so your review will help tide me over LOL Excited to read more!

SOOOO happy to hear she was able to make it!! Good for her and I hope she has an awesome time and congrats to her for all her hard work!