ishap

Now, all this walking was making me thirsty, so first beer stop was down at the pig and anchor bar on deck 5. This bar was my favorite the entire cruise for 2 reasons...first, the smoked porter and toasted amber are fantastic beers. Second, it was very convenient to me being on deck 5 right near the Havana rooms. We seemed to walk by the pig and anchor all the time. 
 

After I got my first beer, we figured we would grab some BBQ while we were there. No one was in line for food. 
 

Pro tip:  A LOT of people thought the BBQ cost extra. In reality it only costs extra at dinner. During lunch it was free, including while in port. Therefore the line for BBQ was always short or had no one waiting. The pulled pork, smoked Andouille sausage, and Mac and cheese were awesome!  I smoke my own bbq at home so if I say it’s good, it’s good. 
 

I was excited to take a tour of the brewery until I found out they charged $25 per person for the tour. I can tour breweries for free at home so we skipped that. 
 

Here is a pic of the Lido pool along with some pics of Miami from the upper decks. 

 

7 minutes ago, Daliaha said:

Will be on the Horizon in December.   Loving your review so far.   Hubby and me are like you, We want to get to the port city the night before.  On our 3rd cruise we did a Fly in day of.  Had to be up and at the airport at 8am, so we left at 5am.  I would rather be sleeping ( or trying to sleep ) in a hotel.  

 

So excited to keep reading your review. Keep up the good work...

 

 

Thank you for reading and following along!

Here are the lobby, lobby tornado, and casino tornado. 
 

The casino is on deck 4 but when walking on deck 5 you go past the upper tornado and can look down into the casino bar. There is glass that encloses the top of the casino tornado which keeps all the smoke from seeping out. And yes, the casino bar is always packed with smokers.  

We continued our walk around the ship. Most of my cruises ended up being on Conquest class ships and this one is setup very differently.  I forgot to take pictures of the sports deck so unfortunately I don’t have any of the sky ride and ropes course.
 

The sky ride was open the entire cruise so anyone who is sailing shouldn’t have to worry about it being closed for maintenance.  I never did get up to ride it though and I am a little regretful of that. 
 

Here is the library and self serve wine bar in the library. 

Havana area is our first stop.  A couple of shots of the pool and hot tubs, along with the Conquest that is docked behind us and the Port of Miami.

While the pool level looks low, it is typically filled above the level of the pool with about two inches of water through-out the entire area.  That way people can sit under the cabana and still have their feet in the water.  

I don't think I got any shots of the Havana area while we were underway, but it was only "crowded" once and that was the last sea day.  And when I say crowded, I mean about 15-20 people in and around the pool itself, with about 30 or so people hanging out in the entire Havana area.

I will also say that we became a big family back there.  You get to know the Havana people as they are the ones that are hanging in the pool every day.  We would see them all after a port day and everyone would talk about their excursions or their time in port.  We got to know a lot of people back there and everyone talked about how much they enjoyed the exclusivity of the Havana area.  

Into the room we go to drop off our carry on bags.  The room wasn't quite ready when we got there.  Our room steward said it would be ready in about 15 minutes, but we removed valuables from our bags, tossed the bags in the closet, and went out to explore some more.

If you notice, the towels they give you in the Havana area are brown, unlike the typical blue Carnival towels everywhere else.  Just another thing to separate the Havana from the rest of the ship.

While our room wasn't quite ready, our sign and sail cards were at the room, along with our Havana wristbands, so we grabbed them as well before we hit the rest of the ship.

8 hours ago, lasvegascruising said:

Let's talk about carry on luggage.  I have read here on cruise critic stories of lost luggage.  You all know the flyer that shows up in your cabin, hey we are looking for a black rolling piece of luggage.  The story that will never leave my memory is of a lady that never received her bag and had no clothes for the entire week.  She was over heard at guest services and other ladies who over heard this gave her some of their clothes.  This will never happen to me, ever.  I leave the house, a day before the cruise, to the airport with my carry on.  That bag never leaves my sight until I am in my cabin.  Hubby and I each have one carry on and then we have a large bag with stuff that I want to have but if is lost, not the end of the world.  Even typing this makes me nervous about my up coming trip.  I think I will plan to leave to the airport even earlier than ever and my carry on will have even more clothes, shoes and swimming suits.

Truthfully, I must have missed those stories.  I don't think I've read one of those on here.  We usually split our clothes between two bags so if something did happen to one, we would just have to re-wear some stuff.

2 hours ago, beshears said:

It is 2:48AM and instead of sleeping like most people do, I am up on the computer, and found your posting on the Horizon.  I see you did (I believe) the 8 day cruise, but 8 of us (my 3 sons, 3 d-i-ls, and friend) are to do the 6 day in March, and I like reading the pros/cons of everyone that writes reviews, like myself after a cruise. 🙂 In my 19 cruises I have done, I have never gone in the day before, as I leave my airport EARLY in the morning, to make sure I have plenty of time to arrive, but my sons/wives want to go in the day before, so that is what we will be doing.  As you post, I will continue to follow along, and thank you for your posting.

For me it's never the "getting to the airport" that worries me, it's the "your flight is delayed by 6 hours", or "your flight is canceled".  

3 minutes ago, nybumpkin said:

My assistant at work sailed on Norwegian Sky the same day you sailed on Horizon. Not only her first cruise, but also her first time on a plane. Fortunately she traveled with an experienced cruiser; however, their flights came as part of their NCL travel package and NCL booked them on a same-day flight. At midnight before flying she got a call from her cruise partner saying he had just received an e-mail that their flight was delayed and they would miss their connecting flight. They ended up leaving at 2 a.m. to go to another airport for a re-booked flight (actually better than the original flight) and made it to Miami in plenty of time. However, she was exhausted and stressed - I was thankful to see her post an onboard photo with drink in hand.

 

The week before she traveled I thought about sending her a video I had seen of tips for first-time cruisers; however, the first tip was DO NOT FLY IN THE DAY OF THE CRUISE. Knowing she was doing exactly that, I didn't share the video.😮

 

Thanks for sharing your vacation!

Oh boy would I have been stressed!  Yeah that’s exactly why you don’t do that lol. At least she made it in time and now she knows for next time!  Hopefully she enjoyed her first cruise!

Some of what we saw walking to our Havana Cabana. Pics are of the hallway, piano bar, and the Havana lounge and bar. 
 

So now we are on the ship. Time to drop our bags off at our room and take a look around. Lobby is on deck 3 and our Havana room is on deck 5. We spent a lot of time on deck 5. 
 

A few things we took note of:

- The liquid lounge, the main theatre, is only 2 levels night and accessible from decks 4 and 5. We are so used the Conquest class that we kept trying to go enter from the lobby on deck 3. 
- The casino is on deck 4. Smoking is allowed in there. The smoke ventilation system is TERRIBLE and the casino is very smoky. However, the smoke does not seems to drift out of the casino which is great if you don’t gamble. If you do gamble and don’t smoke, well good luck. 
- This ship has the new smart elevators. The biggest downfall for the smart elevators is that it relies on stupid people. And boy are people stupid when it comes to these elevators. You are supposed to choose the floor you want for EACH member of your party. Not once for the entire party.

- We saw so many people press the floor once for their party, no matter the number of people. This is the reason why the elevator shows up and is already full. 
- Because people never figured out the proper way to use the elevator, the elevators were slow. Because they were slow, people tended to call the elevator, get tired of waiting, then use the stairs. Therefore we would stop at floors with no one there. 

Sorry for all the split posts...I am trying to keep everything separated. I also apologize for the video quality lol I was trying to record and take it all in at the same time!

Here are some still shots of when we got on the ship. 
 

And now, the moment we first enter the ship!  First time I ever recorded us getting on the ship cause I wanted to remember the moment we first saw the Horizon interior. 

Little video of us heading up the gangway. This should get you all excited for your next cruise! 

I’m not always a social person, but it always seems that on cruises I tend to talk to strangers more. This is back tracking a bit, but when we were waiting to get in to security, we ended up taking to a big family that was traveling together. We had a good time chatting and it turned out that one of their cabins was right next to ours so we ended up seeing them all cruise long.  Kinda funny how that happens. 

The time has finally arrived!  It’s about 10:50 am and they have called wedding parties, suite guests, Diamond, plats, and now FTTF!  Here we go!  Up the gangway and on the ship!
 

40 minutes ago, grandmarnnurse said:

OMG! I should have married you! Lol! Just kidding, but you and I are EXACTLY alike. I’d rather be a half hour early for anything, than ever be 5 minutes late. With that said, I want to be at airports AT LEAST 2 hours ahead of flight, where as it’s a real hassle to get my hubby of nearly 50 years moving. He just doesn’t have that same drive to be early as me. If it was up to him, he’d pack morning of flight, and arrive at airport with barely enough time to squeak through security and make flight! 😱 It’s an anxiety attack every time! This next cruise, we have an 5am flight out to NOLA in the winter. I convinced him that traveling that early to the airport a half hour away on snowy roads could be a real nail biter, so we book a hotel by airport that will shuttle us over at 4am (the soonest I can get this man to the airport). So, when I hear a man (or maybe this is a woman writing the review?) I feel so much envy for anyone that doesn’t produce stress for his/her spouse on travel day. 

yes, I’m a man. My wife just goes with my travel flow cause she knows how I am. Anymore she doesn’t worry about travel plans at all. She knows I will take care of everything. I just tell her when to be up, when we are leaving and she makes sure we are packed in time. 

1 hour ago, lazydayz said:

Great start.  Thanks for doing this. 

 

We cruise Horizon in March, an 8 night to the Southern Caribbean.  Hope that was your route!  

Yep!  This was an 8 night with stops in Grand Turk, DR, Curaçao, and Aruba. 

2 hours ago, grandmarnnurse said:

How much does it cost to take Lyft from FLL to Miami? I always heard that the only reasonably priced choice was a shuttle. 

Lyft prices as follows:

$34.29 from FLL to Hampton Inn and Suites Brickel

$7.96 from hotel to Port of Miami

$31.81 from Port of Miami to FLL

I think for Carnival to compete they have to come up with good land offereings.  I am just starting to look at Alaska cruises for 2021 and from everything I've seen so far, HAL and Princess are the ones everyone recommends.  They both offer good land packages to go along.  If I'm going to do Alaska, you gotta hit the interior as well...at least to Denali.

We got our bags dropped off to the porters with a cash tip to make sure they were handled nicely.  The doors to security didn’t open till 10am so we got in line. As we got to the port about 9:30, we were second in line in the priority line. 
 

At 10 they opened the doors and in we go...breeze through checkin and security, then to the FTTF area to wait boarding. 
 

The Lyft arrives and it’s off to the port!

Embarkation Day...

Up and at 'em!  Embarkation day is finally here!!!  Head down to breakfast, then back to the room to collect our luggage.  We head down to the lobby at about 9am to grab a Lyft to the port.  The hotel does have a shuttle to the port, but they want $16/person and the first shuttle doesn't leave till 10am.  That's a little late for me as I like to be at the port early.  Plus, as I already posted the cost of the Lyft, saves me about $23 or so.  That's about 3 beers on the ship!!

You may be wondering why someone would want to get to the port early just to sit and wait there, well let me tell you...

First and foremost, I am an anxious traveler.  Not anxious in the manner of being nervous about traveling, but anxious as I want to be there, get there, be on board.  That being said, I can't relax at the hotel while waiting to go to the port.  I would rather get to the port early before it gets busy, get my luggage turned over to the porters, get through security, and sit at the front of the lounge with the ship in sight.  Yep, that's me.  And I will never understand why people drag their luggage with them instead of using the porters.  Too much hassle.

I also like to be on board as early as possible.  Day 1 of an 8 day cruise is embarkation day.  So why waste day 1 on land?  GET ME ON THE SHIP!  I know I am not first on board, but close to it.  I want to board, drop off my bags, grab some grub, and since this is a new to me ship, explore!!!

Do yourself a favor and buy a nice lanyard before you cruise, then just keep it for cruising.  The ones the casino gives you are trash.

After dinner we hit up the hotel bar for a few more drinks.  The hotel gave us a couple of free drink coupons, so why not?  While at the bar we started chatting it up with another couple, and a pair of ladies who were cruising together.  Come to find out, they were all on the same ship as us!

During the course of the conversation, we found out that one of the ladies went out drinking the night before, got really drunk, then decided to pack when she got home, so she drunk packed.  When she got to Miami she discovered that she didn't pack most of what she wanted haha!  She ended leaving the bar to go to Target to buy clothes for the cruise.  Let this be a lesson to you all!!  Oh and if she is here on CC...please chime in!

We ended up seeing all four people around the ship over the next week so made for some fun conversation.