Carnival Liberty Review 8/13

I am reposting this from the Carnival boards since it has info that you may find helpful or interesting.....

I have been adding information hear and there, but decided to write a full review since I found them EXTREMELY helpful..So here goes....

The cruise consisted of me and my husband, 26 and 28 year old professionals.

We arrived a day early to enjoy Rome. We took the Leonardo Express Train from FCO to Roma Termini--it was super easy once you found it. It was a little crowded with the luggage, but we managed. I want to say it was 18 E for the two of us. We arrived in Roma Termini and bought 2 metro day passes (realized later that we could have just bought 1 and shared between the two of us). We took the metro to Spagna and went to our hotel Hotel San Carlo. Fabulous little gem near the Spanish Steps. We paid 125 Euro for the night. You can read my review on tripadvisor.com

It is possible to see Rome in a day because we did! We were non-stop from the moment we arrived. We had made reservations for a guided tour of the vatican and sistine chapel via the Vatican's fax number. It took about 3 weeks to get confirmation. Took the metro to Museo Vaticano and walked to St.Peter's Square. Wow---what an amazing place. There was a large line to the Basilica so we just took pictures there and then walked to the Vatican for our tour at 2 pm. The tour was OK...I think the best part about it was that I didn't have to wait in line. At 2 pm on a Friday, there wasn't much of a line. So, my advice--make the reservation and then decide whether to do the tour based on the line. You don't pay until you get there...

From the Vatican, we went back to St.Peter's via the right exit out of the Sistine Chapel. We walked into St. Peter's and was simply floored. It is HUGE! No words can describe this church. Decided to walk to the top of the dome...it was quite a walk and hot, but worth it. The views from the top of the dome are outstanding, but even better was the ability to see a mass happen under our eyes...we saw the priests walking in and heard the hymns echo--very surreal.

After the Basilica, we walked to Pont San Angelo and then took the metro to the Colisseum and walked to the Roman Forum and the Vittorio Monument. At this point, it was about 9:30 and we were exhausted.

The next day we got up early and decided to walk around the Spanish Steps...to our amazement, we were only 10 minutes walk from Trevi Fountain, Pantheon, Piazza Navona, Campo di Fiore! Then we realized how walkable Rome really is and we decided to try to go to Piazza Republicca. Well, after making it back to Vittorio Monument near the Colisseum --we gave up. Couldn't find it anywhere and we had to head back to make our 1:45 train to Civitavecchia.

I had booked on trenitalia’s website two 1st class tickets to Civitavecchia. A word of advice—make sure you know your train’s last stop. We were standing in front of the information board watching trains after our time being posted and got concerned. I asked an agent and they said that you had to look for the LAST STOP---so our train was listed as Torino….luckily we had plenty of time to figure this out. The train was clean and spacious. We were the only ones in our section so there was plenty of room. The trip took about an hour and was worth the savings. It was about 23 euros total.

Now, on to the PORT. Well, we left the train station and decided to walk to the port. It was about a 10 minute walk. At the port, I asked the traffic guy how to get to Carnival Liberty and he directed me towards the ferries..so we walked (with our two suitcases) to the ferry entrance. Could not figure how we were supposed to get to the ship until I asked the ferry guy and he said there was a free shuttle service “over there”…well, we finally found where “over there” was---by the traffic guy! There were free shuttle buses that take you to the ship. No Carnival Signs so it was very confusing.

Embarkation: could have been better. Definitely different that any US embarkations, but it was OK…

Cabin: We had room 9243 on the lido deck (inside cabin). We like the inside cabin’s because they are dark for when you want to take those much needed naps after the long day. It was a great room with easy access to the pools and buffet.

Dining times: A lot of people were upset about the dinner seatings. Luckily we got the late seating, but many did not. So to compensate the others, Carnival would shift the dinner times 15-20 minutes later. So, we had the 8:30 pm seating and 3 nights out of the 12 it was at 8:45 pm. This gave us barely enough time to get through dessert before heading to the show.

Naples: We booked Drive Amalfi for our tour of Amalfi, Positano, and Pompeii. Our guide was Roberto. He was incredible. His English is impeccable. What a great guy and a great guide. He is very passionate about his work and really made our day special. We were there on the day before a holiday so traffic was an issue. He decided to take us through the mountains to get to Positano. It worked out well, but we were short on time and were unable to go to Ravello. That was OK though. Amalfi and Positano were amazing. We had a lovely lunch in a small town and headed to Pompeii. We had a guided tour of Pompeii (Gianni) and he had to give us the express tour throughj Pompeii(we only had 1.5 hours). It was fabulous—I could have spent a whole day there…) This was our best tour of the trip—mostly because of Roberto.

Dubrovnik: decided to do this one on our own. If you are a family of 4, take the taxi to town—it is cheaper than the bus the town/ship provides..we got of the ship bright and early and went to town. Highly recommend this as the town was PACKED by 12 noon. We walked the wall 1st thing. It was listed as Kuna per person, but the guy took euros. Someone in our group bought the tape recorder they rent—not worth it. Ours was all static and you couldn’t hear anything.

After the wall, we walked around the town and found that “cold drinks, beautiful view” bar and had some drinks. It is a great spot. We just fell upon it, couldn’t tell you how we found the place. After that, we looked at some shops, listened to the music the string quartet played, and chilled out. By 12 pm, we were heading back to the ship. Beautiful town though.

Venice: Another do it yourselfer. You can reserve St. Marks’s Basilica online. It is free. It was sooooooooooooooooooooooo crowded here. We arrived at 2 pm. Took the vaporetto to St. Mark’s and walked around. We took a gondola ride for 80 euros for just the two of us. We tried to haggle with him but he would not budge in price. The minimum price is 65 Euro during the day and he promised us a great ride for ~ 30 minutes. He took us through the canals and then took our picture in front of Rialto bridge. Very nice. It is something that everyone should do. We walked to Accademia bridge and took pictures of the Grand Canal. Also, tried to go into Harry’s ,but DH had shorts on so we couldn’t go. Apparently, it is SUPER expensive—like 40 euros for a 2 drinks…wow. I was bummed, but we did walk along that street where Harry’s is on…the shops there are great…this is def. the place to shop in Venice.

We walked to the Campanille bell tower and took the lift to the top. It was a very nice view. Not sure if I would wait in line for this though—go late around 5 pm. Same for the Basilica—go right before closing…hardly any line.

more to come...

Great review - can't wait to read the rest! Thanks for posting.

Great info! Can you please tell me which website you booked your St. Mark's Basilica reservations through?

thanks,

Great info! Can you please tell me which website you booked your St. Mark's Basilica reservations through?

 

thanks,

It took a bit of 'hunting' but I found the website for booking St. Mark's: http://www.alata.it/eng/musei/musei.asp

Thanks again for the tip on making a reservation!

Messina

We opted to take the ship’s Taormina and Mt. Etna full day tour. Taormina was a lovely little town. We walked up to the Greek theatre and took pictures and heard some history from our guide (who was very good). Since we didn’t have a lot of time in town, we decided to head to the shops. Bought some ceramic name plates and a Cannolli…I guess Sicily is the place to get your cannolli. It was good.

Then hopped back on the bus and went to Mount Etna. This was disappointing. We only had about 30 minutes here. If you have been to Hawaii’s Volcano National Park, you will laugh at this crater….but for those who have never seen a crater before—you might be amazed….So, we were bummed….I think if I were to do it all over I would have taken the train to Taormina and stayed there all day.

Barcelona:

Yeah, a place where I can speak the language! We got out at the port and tried to take the blue city bus to town (it was cheaper), but then we were told it was only for staff???? So, we talked to the taxi drivers and asked him to take us to Sagrada Familia….It cost 12 euros. I think the coach buses wanted 3 euro per person/way…with 4 of us it was worth taking the taxi and getting there faster. Sagrada doesn’t open til 9 am so we waited around and then went in. The inside is a waste of money. Nothing is finished. I guess the cool part was that you can see the pillars (which are made to look like trees)…we also took the lift to the top…not sure if that was worth it either.

We then took to the closest stop to Parc Guell. And walked to the parc. I would recommend taking the bus 24 from catalunya. The parc is great. Very relaxing place. Took the bus to la pedrera (where Casa Botilla and Casa Mila is) and took pictures of the houses. Then took the metro to the gothic area to discover that the cathedral is covered in scaffold and for some reason was closing at 12 noon. So, that was a waste. Headed to La Ramblas towards the Colombus statue. The ship said there would be buses there to bring you back to the ship….Since we took a cab into the city we had no idea where the buses dropped people off. Well, after walking around, we found some people who knew…once you are at the Columbus plaza take a right and go to the left of the rotary. The bus was free in the way back—well, they didn’t ask for tickets J

Cannes:

We chose Revolution tours. Isoline was our guide. She was very good and flexible. This is a summary of what we did.

Drive to Monaco by the highway and then by La Turbie

Stop in Monaco (Monte-Carlo)

Drive through the city

Stop in Monaco (the rock)

View the changing of the guard at 11:55 AM.

Drive by the medium corniche

Stop in Eze to see the perfume factory and then the village

Drive through Villefranche and the Mont Boron (Nice)

Drive on the promenade des anglais

Stop in St Paul de Vence

Drive on the seaside

Stop in the old Antibes

Drive to Cannes by the seaside

We bought perfume in Eze. Eze was a beautiful medieval town. And Nice, was much nicer than I imagine. The water was an incredible blue. Old Antibes was cool—we just buzzed through and stopped at the market. I don’t think we could have seen the same amount on a ship tour or on our own. Highly recommend.

Livorno

Did a tour with drive amalfi. Well, he contracted another company to do the tour. Michele was our driver. He spoke little English and played a dvd on our trip towards Florence. He was driving super slow and I asked him why and he said because if the speed limit, but I had my suspicions. We were behind another van and I thought he was trying to stay with the van. We arrive in Florence and hour later, but it felt like FOREVER. We were at this sightseeing spot above the city and then he said this is your guide. She was driving the van in front of us! Now, it all made sense. Her name was Paola. She was great, but I wished we had her as our driver. She spoke English well and was very knowledgeable. She explained the history of Florence and the Medici family influence. Our driver took us to Accademia where we had reservations. We walked right in…the guide met us there and she gave us a tour through Accademia ending with the fabulous statue of David. WOW! That is amazing. Do not miss seeing the statue..it will be etched in your mind. After Accademia, Michel drove us to the square where the david replica is and we did Florence on our own. Then we headed to Pisa and Paula met us there…it was super. So, I was happy with our tour overall. The schedule that drive amalfi states was a little ambitious. We skipped going to lunch in Chianti—there wasn’t enough time.

One issue I had with the ship here was that they said that we would arrive at 8 am and leave at 8 pm…..they changed it to 7 am---I had planned on meeting our guide at 9 am due to the ship’s arrival at 8 am….well, luckily he was there at 8:30 so it worked out, but I am not sure why Carnival didn’t send people notification of the arrival time especially for those who arranged private tours….

My SHIP REVIEW

Overall I was pleased with Carnival Liberty. You can’t beat the itinerary or the price for a 12 day cruise. The beds and pillows were awesome. I plan on buying the pillows they were that nice!

We had table 548 in the Silver Olympian…service could have been better to say the least. Our servers were nice, but food was slow and we had to ask for things like ice tea, water, bread, cracked pepper, and grated cheese. Sorry, but on a cruise ship—this stuff should be second nature. The food was OK, I wasn’t blown away. On previous cruises I couldn’t decide which entrée because they all looked incredible…same thing for the desserts…I wasn’t impressed with the food at dining.

The food that I liked:

The burgers by the pool, sushi, fish and chips, pizza and the ceasar salad, and the buffet breakfast.

LOVED the steam room!! Highly recommend checking it out.

The hot tubs were never hot….the pool was ice cold…but refreshing.

The weather was awesome…couldn’t ask for a better 12 days! Especially in August.

The gym was good….always packed. A few of the machines were out of service…already?

The entertainment was FABULOUS! Some of the best I had seen. The first dance show blew me away. !!!!!

The comedians were pretty bad…

The décor was atrocious. The company that designed this ship was smoking something. This ship doesn’t match at all from wall to carpet. Don’t know what these people were thinking…………..

The itinerary was FABULOUS! What a great way to see Europe.

How much we spent overall……..including everything (kennel, flights, parking, tours, etc: $7500 for 2 people. Well worth it.

Thank you for a great review - am planning this cruise for Sept 2006

No problem---glad I can help.

Thanks for a really informative review. My family and I will be cruising on the Liberty on October 12th. I have also booked Isoline from Revelation for Cannes so I really appreciate your comments. You mentioned that you took the vaporetto to St. Marks. I am curious as to what that entailed. Was the vaporetto right near where you got off the ship? How long was the ride to St. Marks? Do you buy the ticket on board the vaporetto or is there a ticket booth? Would it have been possible to walk to St. Marks? Thanks!

Cannes:

We chose Revolution tours. Isoline was our guide. She was very good and flexible.

Glad to hear that you liked Isoline...

We are booked with Revelations for our 9/30 Liberty sailing. I was disappointed that Michele was already booked for that day. He told me Isoline will be our guide and that we would be very pleased. Yours is only the 2nd time I have ever seen her name on the boards. I was trusting Michele's recommendation as his reputation is so good here and I'm sure he would not recommend someone who would reflect badly on his tour company.

Thanks for a really informative review. My family and I will be cruising on the Liberty on October 12th. I have also booked Isoline from Revelation for Cannes so I really appreciate your comments. You mentioned that you took the vaporetto to St. Marks. I am curious as to what that entailed. Was the vaporetto right near where you got off the ship? How long was the ride to St. Marks? Do you buy the ticket on board the vaporetto or is there a ticket booth? Would it have been possible to walk to St. Marks? Thanks!

We will be on the sailing just before yours (9/30).

Vaporetto 24 hour pass = 10,5 euro. This can be obtained from ACTV @ Piazzale Roma. There is a grocery store there (COOP) as well where snacks, soft drinks wine etc can be purchased to bring back onboard.

We will be docking at the Stazione Marittima. http://www.vtp.it/

Piazzale Roma is supposed to be about 15 minute walk from there. I don't know for sure if the 24 hour pass can be purchased on board the vaporetto as well. It is 3,0 euro per ride otherwise.

This site should have all the Venice transportation info you might need

http://www.venicebanana.com/eng/tr_pub.htm

Thanks for a really informative review. My family and I will be cruising on the Liberty on October 12th. I have also booked Isoline from Revelation for Cannes so I really appreciate your comments. You mentioned that you took the vaporetto to St. Marks. I am curious as to what that entailed. Was the vaporetto right near where you got off the ship? How long was the ride to St. Marks? Do you buy the ticket on board the vaporetto or is there a ticket booth? Would it have been possible to walk to St. Marks? Thanks!

from where we docked, the water taxis were about a 5 minute walk. You could see them from the ship. You buy your tix at the ticket booth--we got a round trip ticket...pretty expensive from what I recall. Like 25 dollars round trip for 2 people....

Seeing as we'll be 7 people I guess the Vaporetto is the way to go. From all that I've read it seems that Venice is the most expensive city we'll be visiting. DebNJoe, thanks for the Venice Banana web site. It really helped me get a handle on things. I can't believe we'll be boarding in 5 weeks!

Bumping this up

Hi Jessica,

Thank you for the very nice informative review, I am planning a similar cruise for summer 2006. Could you please post your review in the reviews section of cruise critic where it will be seen and read by many long after this thread is forgotten.

Doug

Jessica,

I was perusing some of the dessert menus and wondering if there was an addiitional charge for the liqueurs. I just love Kahlua over vanilla ice cream, and thought that might be a nice option if I don't like the other offerings.

Bumpitie,bump,bump