AOS Review 3/4-3/11 LONG Part One

Ahh I don't even know where to start.We flew down a day early to San Juan out of JFK. Flight was uneventful, we even landed a 1/2 hour early. We went to the hotel to check in - Condado Plaza. Since check in was at 3 we didn't expect a room to be ready for us. Not only was it ready, but we got upgraded from a city view to an ocean view room. The room was so pretty. The rest of the hotel seems to be under a major renovation. It seems needed. Otherwise perfectly suitable for a night.

The next morning we checked out around 11:20 and were at the pier around 11:30. We waited on line at the pier for maybe 10-15 min, and went through check-in. Priority boarding was allowed for Junior Suites, although it didn't matter. We were early enough that there was really no wait once they opened the doors. We were on board by noon. Our cabins were ready precisely at 2pm.

Once we boarded, we just wandered around the ship for a bit. Checked our table in the dining room. It was a 4 top on the second floor. We were a little worried but decided to keep the table. She looks very good, some minor wear and tear but nothing very noticeable. Just little things. We went to the Windjammer for lunch. It really was not that bad. We enjoyed what we ate. At 2 we went to our cabin Junior Suite Deck 9, 9608. I thought the JS was well worth the extra money. The size was great, never once felt crowded and having the full bathtub was a treat. Had no problem shaving my legs :D. Our cabin attendant was quite competent, although her name slips my mind. She knocked on our door early on day one and introduced herself and said whatever we needed to give her a call.

At 5 pm our roll call group had an informal meeting at the pool bar. We had a nice turnout and met some people there that we ended up seeing the whole week. As luck would have it, through conversation we found out out table mates we none other than CC members we had been chatting with for months before the cruise! Hi Atty & Stacey :) Needless to say Our dinner mates were great and we ended up spending a lot of time with them for the duration of the cruise.

Before dinner we went for a drink in the Duck and Dog. I believe we ran in to WillSam & Diane there but I may have my nights confused lol. We had dinner in the dining room that night.It was ok. Definatly edible. For the most part the food didn't quite wow me. Some things better than others, but food is very subjective. I know I am going to get a lot of grief for this but my husband and I did find the dining room food better on our last Carnival trip on the Pride. I can't quite remember what we did after dinner but I am sure it will come back to me. That is it for now and I will finish the review a bit later.

Shannon

Here is the next part of my review

Sea Day 1/Aruba/ Sea Day 2

I woke up fairly early on the first sea day. Hubby slept in. I took my stuff and went to grab a quick bite at the Windjammer. Went out by the pool, It was around 8:30ish. There were plenty of seats available at this time, even right next to the pool if you wanted it. I stayed by the pool for a couple of hours. the weather was great. My DH got up and we went back down to the pool. Got a couple of new chairs on the deck of the sky bar. Perfect view of the pool. More crowded at this time. We didn't do too much this day but relax.

This was the first formal night. Everyone was dressed up and looked great. The food in the dining room was decent. We had still yet to see the bar waiter. The head waiter had been to our table both nights. Actually he came to our table every night. He was the most personable head waiter I have ever seen. Some people say they never see their head waiter but we saw ours the entire time. He stopped by every night to chat with all his tables.

Aruba was our first port of call.I got up early and did some shopping as our tour was not until one. We did the Aruba See & Sea. It was a bit boring but we got to see most of the island. Aruba was our least favorite island on this trip. It just did not do too much for us.

The second port was Curacao. We did the Sea Lion swim which was absolutely awesome. CC members and also our table mates were on this excursion with us. If you are at all interested I would def. look into this tour. It was more than worth the money.

This is also the night that our service in the dining room started to decline. Our waiter was SLOW. 3/4 of the dining room was emptying out before we even got our salads. Drink waiter still never came to our table, even though he went to the table next to us every night. I tried to flag him down more than once but to no avail. We also ordered a bottle of wine that sat at the waiters station for over 20 min. before it was brought to us. This also happened another night. We had to get the head waiter to bring them to us and he opened and poured for us. This is my only major complaint for the whole cruise.

The second sea day was as relaxing as the first. It was rocky and I had to stop by the pursers desk for some motion sickness pills. We had lunch in the dining room and it was probably the best meal I had on the ship. At this point I left my camera in the dining room. When I realized it I ran back and it wasnt there. I checked the pursers desk and they did not have it. I ran back down to the dining room to check again and our head waiter and another employee informed me that it was just taken up to lost and found. Phew! The guys were very sympathetic as I was almost in tears.

Will be back later to finish up! any questions feel free to ask.

Shannon:

I chuckle every time I think of that sea lion kissing Chris and the look on his face :)

Glad you made it home well. Don't forget the night that the dining room bar guy was coming around with the after dinner shots before we had gotten out main course :)

Shannon:

 

I chuckle every time I think of that sea lion kissing Chris and the look on his face :)

 

Glad you made it home well. Don't forget the night that the dining room bar guy was coming around with the after dinner shots before we had gotten out main course :)

YES, that did slip my mind. Most everyone finished with desert before we had dinner :rolleyes:

St. Martin/St. Thomas/Disembarkation

Day 6 brings us to St. Martin. We got up and left the ship. There is a cute little shopping area right off the ship. We didnt buy anything here, only browsed. We hopped a cab and went to Orient Beach. The cab was cheap enough $6 pp. We got to the beach and walked up and down finally renting a chair and umbrella at Kontiki. There were places with better deals, but they were packed. We got chairs right near the waters edge. The beach was beautiful. I dont usually swim in the ocean, but the water was warm and calm. We stayed there for quite a while. Around 2:30 we grabbed a cab into town and did some shopping. I bought a bottle of that guavaberry liquor. We priced some electronics but did not purchase. I found matching earrings to a necklace I bought earlier in the week. St. Martin had the cheapest cigarette prices of all the islands. While I was making a purchase later on at one of the shops near the pier we somehow lost our credit card (I know, I seemed to have butterfingers last week;)) It was only a matter of minutes from when we lost the card to when we went to board the ship. As we were boarding DH dipped his card and an alarm went off. I got so scared, thought we were in trouble for something. The girl at the entrance said did you lose your credit card. The card had already been returned to the ship! Our luck was holding! Same problems at dinner that night, now including the most obnoxious people at the table next to us. They were putting their beer cans on the floor and stomping on them to crush them, fighting with all the servers. They were horrid. Thank god not my at my table.

I forgot to mention earlier if they are on your sailing DO NOT MISS JOHN JOSEPH w/ JOHNNY B. They were hysterical. The most enjoyable act I have seen on a ship.

Also forgot to mention, we caught the ice show on the second sea day and enjoyed it a lot.

Day 7 brought us to St. Thomas. We had booked the underwater scooter excursion. We had originally booked for 8:30 but they called us and said that one was canceled, come at 1. No problem. We went through mandatory immigration check. Totally quick and painless. We went shopping in the morning. I found decent liquor prices in St. Thomas. Bought a couple of bottles of Johnny Walker Blue. You can't beat the price. Also bought some crystal. The excursion in the afternoon was fun although I could not take the scooter down as far as some people. I could not get my ears to pop due to the pressure and it was very uncomfortable. They were very helpful though and gave me a few options. I chose to stay closer to the surface so I scooted around only a few feet down. I was still able to see everything, and I missed nothing. After our group went we had a ton of time to snorkle. There were a ton of fish to see. Totally worth it. After we got back on the ship I wandered around to take some photos of places I had missed and played a quick game of mini golf just to say I did. This night we had our last dinner in the dining room. We were finally served promptly but bar waiter still yet to be seen. I was totally depressed as it was the last night of our cruise and we had to leave in the morning.

Disembarkation. We were out of our stateroom by 8. Went to the dining room for breakfast. It was pretty good. As we were finishing up our number was called. The line was quite long and took us a while to get off the boat. By the time we hit customs, all we needed was our declaration. They did not check passports, ID nothing. I thought this was odd. It was then off to the airport for our flight home.

RANDOM: The weather was great for the entire cruise. Sea days a little rocky though. We didnt make it to to many of the shows. I dont like sitting for the show before dinner, (we had late seating) so those are the shows we missed. Mike Hunnerup was the cruise director and I thought he was fine. He was visable all throughout the ship if that is your thing. The price of drinks was reasonable. I had a couple of different types of martinis and they were pretty strong. Def. more alcohol than mixer. The frozen drinks seemed a little light on liquor though. I was never pushed to buy a souviner (sp?) glass, they always had them in the plastic glass.

If you can think of anything else you want to know just ask!

Thanks for the review. I am on AoS in June and I eagerly read all these reviews :)