LouisianaCruiser4200

Which is why I'm anxiously waiting! Quick drive from Arizona. And I believe "Cruiser 2019" wants to compare itineraries between Panorama (Mexican Riviera) and Horizon (caribbean).

Panorama itinerary will be 7 day cruises that go to Cabo, Mazatlan, and Puerto Vallarta

Don't like lines? Willing to pay a little more? BUY FTTF. Beat the lines at the food venues on embarkation day. The staff that would normally be working in the MDR and some of the other closed venues are pushing wheelchairs, delivering luggage, answering questions, and all of the various other tasks that are limited to embarkation day. I think that it may be unreasonable to expect them to "staff up" to the level required to have everything open on embarkation day, when the additional staffing is only necessary for one day.

fair point! We usually get FTTF. We eat by 12 and are in our rooms drinking a cold drink before most board :)

Well, I do agree the closed venues could be open. BUT, when trying to service thousands of people at one time, there are bound to be lines. You’re boarding 3,000+ people in a 3 hour time period.

Thank you for your review. We have our cruise on the valor in December. Our room is close to where yours was, how is the noise?

No noise at all really!

Thank you so much for this review! My daughter and I will be sailing the Valor in a couple weeks on the same itinerary. First time on Carnival and I'm a bit anxious after reading mixed reviews. Wonderful to see the Valor getting so much love!

You’ll love the Valor. I’m sure of it :D

Thanks for the review! Any favorite bars on the ship?

As a tequila guy, I've always been partial to the Blue Iguana :)

My family and I went on Valor in January of this year. We had a great trip; we enjoyed it so much that I'm booked again for this month! Here's a short review of our January 8th trip from Galveston to Cozumel and Progreso:

Embarkation:

We are about 5.5 hours from Galveston/NOLA and 6.5 hours from Mobile, but our first cruise was from Galveston, and we really enjoyed how easy it was to get in/out of. I have nothing negative to say about embark at Galveston; they really have everything together. We parked across the street at Galveston Park N Cruise. The prices are good, and we can easily wheel our luggage across the street with no shuttle. We arrived at the terminal about 10am. We had FTTF, and were among the first in line. I am an advocate of FTTF, especially if you're traveling with children. We were through security and checked in by 10:30. We were allowed to board about 11:30.

Stateroom:

Since we had FTTF, our cabin was available when we boarded. Our room keys were also waiting on us in our mailbox. We had an oceanview room on deck 2 (2335). No complaints about the room. Our room steward was very nice (I have forgotten his name now).

Pools/public areas:

We never had a problem finding an open chair to lounge in. Lots of open areas.

Comedy shows:

Hilarious. I'm thankful Carnival hires some hilarious comedians. I've never been disappointed with the PG shows. Now, the R rated shows get a bit disgusting sometimes, so be wary of those if traveling with parents, children, in laws, etc.

Serenity area:

Personally, I'm not a fan of the serenity area on any of the Conquest ships. It is too close to the loud pool area, and there is a fan that is quite noisy.

Camp Carnival:

My niece loved Camp Carnival. She begged to go every second of the day. She was a bit hesitant at first, but if you can convince the kiddos to give it a shot, they'll love it.

WiFi:

I bought the social plan for this cruise ($20 for 5 days if you prepay). It worked well enough for $20. Snapchat, Facebook, Messenger, Twitter, all worked. Snapchats sometimes would not send out but snaps sent in loaded quickly. It worked very well the first few days, but by the last sea day, it did not work much. Based on other internet reviews, I theorize more people use the internet in the last days of the cruise, and it slows. Also, the weather was bad that day which may have impacted it. Speaking of which....:

Ship stability:

We had no issues our first 4 days. You could not even tell we were moving except when we were at dinner. Our stateroom was low and mid-ship so that helped with motion. Now, the last sea day was easily the worst ship movement I have experienced. A cold front had passed through the Gulf and the ocean was extremely stirred up. We were at brunch and hit the largest wave of the day, and the entire table's contents lifted off the table about 1/2 inch. This is not really a complaint about the ship, just a warning about cruising in the winter months.

Dining:

The food on this ship was comparable to all the other ships I have been on. Service was comparable as well. I do find the dining experience in the evenings is a bit long. We had 6PM assigned dining and arrived by 5:50-5:55 each night, yet we did not leave earlier than 7:30 each night. I do feel for the serving staff as they are working 3-4 tables. They tried to time the courses of each table before putting in orders. This made our waits considerably longer since another table in their section showed up about 6:15 each night. We were on a cruise so it did not bother me all that much (just a general observation).

Cozumel:

Gosh, I love this place! There is always something new to do. For this trip, we weren't into a big excursion so we just went to Discover Mexico park. Only $20 and it was pretty neat. I'd recommend it if you want to do something, but don't want to spend a lot of money. If you have never been to Cozumel, I'd recommend it! It's very safe and easy to get around on your own.

Progreso:

This was my first cruise to Progreso. I had absolutely zero exceptions for this place. But, really, it is not that bad. There's a nice shopping area at the port with some good deals. One of the bars had $1 tequila shots. We ported at 9am, but hey, I'm on vacation, so I ordered 5 :p. Here's the thing about Progreso, if you don't want to spend money on an excursion, you will not enjoy Progreso. Our cruise director said they only port at Progreso for the excursions, which really makes sense if you have ever been there. At many ports, I'd say you can do an excursion on your own and be fine (like at Cozumel or Grand Cayman). But, this is one port I would not feel comfortable going on my own. We did a Merida city tour and Mayan rum tasting. I would absolutely recommend it. The tour was $50, but I price matched it beforehand, and we got the excursion for $32. The tour was just a nice drive around the city, and we stopped at the downtown square and got to walk around, buy souvenirs, take pics, etc. Then we went to a rum factory where we could buy rum if we chose. They sell the same rum at the port for about $2 more. I bought a bottle at the factory and regretted not buying more so I bought another bottle at the port. Anyway, I would absolutely come back to Progreso and do another excursion here. This is one of those ports that has so many different excursions to choose from. In my opinion, it's a shame there are no cruises here from Florida on Carnival.

Debark: With FTTF, it was super smooth. We waited in the midship dining room and were off the ship, cleared, and in our cars by 8:45.

Please ask any questions you have!

You can buy the internet package in 24 hour increments, but do consider the entire cruise package if you are planning on doing this more than 2 or 3 times

Make sure all of your phones are in Airplane Mode. Make sure you have WiFi calling enabled before you go airplane mode. Connect to the ship WiFi with your $100 internet plan and your phone will work as normal. But make sure you are in airplane mode to avoid charges from AT&T (or whoever your carrier is)

I noticed Summit is on the way to NOLA. Is this something that occurs often? I thought this shipped was based out of Puerto Rico.

Half off deposits and $50 OBC

If you apply more than 3 gift cards to your S&S account, shoreside has to be contacted to verify the cards. It’s an anti-fraud type thing. May take overnight to verify and get the amounts on your account

Is the carnival hub the wifi plan or just the Carnival Hub for $5, as I purchased the $82 dollar package for the week

That is just the website you use to log in your WiFi plan. The carnival hub app shows you schedules of what’s going for free. It costs $5 to use the chat feature with other guests on the ship

Carnival excursions booked online? No problems.

 

Spa services booked online? Yea, huge problems.

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What a rant. While I completely agree the spa services are crap, that seemed long winded and a bit dramatic over a $70 error

I just purchased the value Wifi plan on my sailing as I need to keep in contact for info on my mom. What do I have to do once I get on the ship to activate it, as I have never used the wifi from the ship and don't know what to do. Thanks for any help

Simple. Connect to WiFi network (there’s no password). Go to carnivalhub.com. There, it will ask for your folio (on your room key) and date of birth. You’re logged in

On Breeze in December and Valor last week, social plan had to be bought entire cruise

I just got on the valor with both baby chams. To be honest they weren't looking very hard. I think they missed the second bottle.

Now I am about to sample the sushi

When we went through Galveston, I had three bottles of wine in a backpack. Security asked “that wine?” I said yes. They pointed at the wine table. We walked over to the wine table and just let the lady see our cokes. She didn’t even inspect the wine

Wow is that across the board? Did that just happen recently?

 

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It was like that on the Breeze last month

Soooooo is there a promo code going on? I need to book an excursion through Carnival for the Tabyana beach break but I dont see any promo codes to use?

No there’s not. You know there’s a free beach in mahogany bay?

I’ve seen that 10% off pop up but it leads to nothing. Where is your cruise headed? I’m booking a cruise that goes to Mahogany Bay and I want to get the 20% discount, but I don’t think the excursions that are “for a pair” would qualify for the 20%

Something to consider - Belize is a tender port. Going on a smaller ship may be quicker to get to shore. We loved the freedom, just a little more than the Breeze. Breeze felt too big for us

iMessage works for messaging only, no pictures or videos

Sorry to revive an old thread but does anyone know if the bundle discount applies to excursions that are a pair. In Mahogany Bay, an excursion is $49.99 a pair and I wondered if it would count that as an excursion toward two people or only one person therefore the second person wouldnt receive the bundle discount?

No, you do not have to. The carrier name in the top left hand corner of your phone (if you have an iPhone) is who your phone is receiving service from. If it says "Sprint" or "Extended", you will be fine. If it says "Roaming" or anything else, I would flip it to airplane mood. I usually keep mine on until the land begins to fade away in the distance. It should remain on airplane mode until you return to the US, so if you are porting in Key West, you can also use it there. If you want wifi in the international ports, keep your airplane mode on, and then go to Settings, Wifi, and find a network to connect to. You can use wifi while being on airplane mode. Happy cruising!

 

 

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What I do, is turn off roaming in settings and then use my phone until I have no signal. If you see the dreaded “Cellular at Sea” at the top, go airplane mode immediately!

CBP found it was a CWOT (complete waste of time) to have Americans fill out this form because the huge majority had nothing to declare.

 

Just wasting time and paper on nothing productive. Thank you President Trump.

*eyeroll* has nothing to do with him