Carnival Liberty, 09/19/09: A pictorial review.

[jabberjaw070596]

I am so loving this review!!! Makes the days go faster until we board her:)

[TJaway]

I'm referring my family to your review since your pictures are so much more descriptive and precise than mine. You have a real knack for this. Really nice job. Terrie

PS. I wanted to mention too that we got to the port at about 11:30 am and were escorted right up to the counter. We aren't platinum or any have any VIP status. Waited in the B lounge area for about 10 min. before our boarding # was called and we were on. Couldn't have been easier. We weren't able to go to our room until 1:30 ( which they made us aware of at the counter) but at 1:30 on the dot it was ready.

[mizLORInj]

HMC is absolutely the one of the most gorgeous beaches; everything about it is perfect. The tendering is a bit of a hassle, but they are large tenders and hold a lot of ppl.

Yeah, I'm surprised there's an adults only deck on this ship.

Thx for your review.

[early_iron]

Great review so far. Looking forward to the rest of it. We are on the same itinerary in less than 3 weeks so really appreciate this particular review. Nice pics too!:D

 

What time did you arrive for embarkation? Were the regular lines really long?

 

My wife and grand daughter and I were on the cruise with DarthGrady and we are not platinum members so went through the regular line. We arrived at embarkation around 11;15 or 11:30 and were sipping a drink on the lido deck before noon. The lines were not excessively long and moved very fast. I don't think it was more than twenty minutes from the time we got in line until we stepped into the atrium area aboard Liberty. You will have a great time.

[mississauga]

My wife and grand daughter and I were on the cruise with DarthGrady and we are not platinum members so went through the regular line. We arrived at embarkation around 11;15 or 11:30 and were sipping a drink on the lido deck before noon. The lines were not excessively long and moved very fast. I don't think it was more than twenty minutes from the time we got in line until we stepped into the atrium area aboard Liberty. You will have a great time.

 

 

Thanks for your reply with the good news about the wait. Once cruise day comes, we're anxious to get on the ship as early as possible. LOL

[Koval]

Thank You so much for those Pics.

I posted your link on my Possible 1/15/2011 thread.

Different ports, but what a great job you have done in getting all those photos posted,

I don't have to post any now.

I have not been on the Liberty, only the Spirit (and soon the Dream)

But your photos and write up just made the Liberty come alive.

Anyone want to go back in Jan 2011, Liberty, Western this time?

[MzOhioLady]

Grady, you are doing a great job on your review! Loved meeting you and your wife. This was truly a great cruise!

[DarthGrady]

Grady,

do you have the capers? Is there an "adult" deck? I thought they got rid of them. Besides waves hitting the bow did you also here the anchor chain?

No, I dont have the Capers, sorry.

We did not hear the anchor chain, but we did hear the bow thrusters quite clearly.

 

It also looked like there was access to the bow? How do you get up there?

 

You can't actually get to the bow, its a crew area. There are obervation decks at the front of decks 6,7,9 and 10. Just walk all the way forward on those decks and you will see doors at the end of the hallways. Those areas are closed sunset-sunrise though. That picture was taken from the deck 6 observation area.

 

thanks!

 

We are going on the Liberty on 10/31!

 

Have fun on your cruise!

[DarthGrady]

Grady, you are doing a great job on your review! Loved meeting you and your wife. This was truly a great cruise!

 

Hey Mickey, thanks! We had an equally good time. Hopefully we will have a Liberty Lovers 2 in the near future!

[DarthGrady]

Which dining room was used for the anytime dining? I take it the other was for the 6:15 & 8:15 sittings?

Thanks

Brent:)

 

Ours was the forward dining room, the Golden Olympian. Only the upper floor was anytime. I assume the Silver dining room was this way too.

[DarthGrady]

Wow, great pix! I'm going on the ship in less than two weeks! I booked an interior but wouldn't mind bunk beds with a window as it would $80 off the fare. I looked at the deck plan on carnival.com. It appears to have 12 1As with windows and 7 1As without. Just curious if you got to pick your room or did the fun saver?

 

We did fun saver.

[DarthGrady]

I'm referring my family to your review since your pictures are so much more descriptive and precise than mine. You have a real knack for this. Really nice job. Terrie

PS. I wanted to mention too that we got to the port at about 11:30 am and were escorted right up to the counter. We aren't platinum or any have any VIP status. Waited in the B lounge area for about 10 min. before our boarding # was called and we were on. Couldn't have been easier. We weren't able to go to our room until 1:30 ( which they made us aware of at the counter) but at 1:30 on the dot it was ready.

 

Thanks Terrie!

[Kurbanfan]

As always your reviews are awesome......it feels like we are there with you......

[DarthGrady]

As always your reviews are awesome......it feels like we are there with you......

 

Many thanks! I work late today, but I will try to get St. Thomas up before I hit the hay tonight.

[retroPK]

Fantastic review so far!! I keep checking in to see if more pics/review posted...really enjoying it - GOOD JOB AND THANK YOU! Definately giving me a little insight to our first cruise! Leaving on the Liberty in 33 days :)

[cruisincountrygirl]

Thanks for such a great review. We're trying to decide on a cruise on this ship early next year, and it was great to see such vivid details. Great photos, and wonderful comments. I'm glad you had fun.

[DarthGrady]

Day 4: St. Thomas, USVI

I slept in until almost 11 AM on Tuesday with no interference from Butch. I stopped by the Purser’s desk on the previous evening and made a polite complaint about the volume of the announcements in the cabin areas. The crewman did say that Butch used to do them at around 8 AM, but pushed it back to 10 due to complaints. I’d like to think that this quiet morning is due to mine, but it’s more likely that he just did not have as much to announce since this was a port day.

We had lunch in the Lido buffet, and the Deli sandwiches were good as usual. I also tried the Mongolian Grill for the first time; it tasted alright but not wonderful. We spent a little while in St. Thomas, but the weather was rainy so we just went back to the ship. This was not really a big deal since we will be going back there in October on the Freedom of the Seas.

We decided to lay out by the pool with friends during the evening after leaving St. Thomas. While there, I went to the aft pool bar to get a bucket of beers. For some reason, it was totally unmanned and I stood there for several minutes waiting on the bar tender to show up. This was the second such occurrence of an abnormally long wait at a bar this cruise. The first was at the casino bar on the previous day, where I waited for over five minutes for service. The bar tender saw me, but she apparently felt it too far to walk since I was on the other side of the bar. To her credit, she did provide dazzling service to the several people that walked up after and were closer to her.

We chose to eat dinner at the buffet this night since the menu for the main dining room wasn’t fantastic. As fate would have it, the buffet dinner would prove to be equally lackluster. We ended up just getting room service, as their steak and brie sandwich is very good.

We received our invitations to the Past Guest Party, with no accompanying pin. I had read on Cruise Critic that the Platinum guests would still get one, but the folks at the Purser’s desk said that this was not the case. She said that the program was totally gone, that there were none to be had, and to possibly check EBay. I checked the gift shop for them, but they had none either. This was a common occurrence at the Liberty’s gift shop. They have no ship pins, and no Liberty specific shot glasses. This really got me peeved since I usually collect both from all the ships I cruise on. Day 4 was a little dodgy; I went to bed hoping for a better day 5.

 

The shopping area near the port

 

Liberty at the pier

 

 

 

 

 

[DarthGrady]

Day 5: San Juan, PR.

After a dicey day 4, we had a much improved stop in San Juan. We slept in until about 8 and had breakfast in the main dining room for the first time on this cruise. I had the eggs benedict which were good, but not the best I have had on a Carnival ship.

After breakfast we left the ship and headed into San Juan. We were immediately bombarded by persons selling taxi rides, island tours, fishing trips and city tours. I immediately wished I was back at Half Moon Cay. As a matter of complete fact, I wished that our cruise was just six days at Half Moon Cay. After escaping the hordes of sales people, we started toward the fort El Morro.

We took a wrong turn, and accidentally walked down the City Wall path that runs next to the ocean. We were thinking that this would eventually lead us to the fort. However, we got a fairly big surprise when it dead ended into rocks near the foot of the cliffs that the fort sits upon. We turned around and retraced the 1.5 miles of steps that we had just traveled. Apparently we missed the small sign stating that this particular trail was a dead end, had no restrooms, no water, no shade, and should not be taken by anyone. We counted this as our daily exercise, got on the right path, and continued to the fort.

When we did make it to El Morro I was pleasantly surprised. It was very interesting to learn about the history of the place and of surrounding Old San Juan. We spent a couple of hours exploring the fort and taking many pictures. We then walked back through the city and eventually to the ship. I also made it up on deck for sail away and got many good photos of the fort as we left San Juan harbor. Overall I was very happy with our day in San Juan. Had we had more time I would have visited the other fort, San Christobel, but that will give me something to do next time.

In the evening we attended the Past Guest Party. Apparently there were many past guests on this sailing since they had two parties at different times. We met up with some of our Cruise Critic friends, and we all headed to the same party (some of us had different times). They didn’t check what time we were supposed to be there, so I assume they didn’t mind. They were serving free drinks and cocktails as well as beers. I’m fairly certain that they were handing out Heineken, which is on tap on the Liberty. I was surprised that they were serving something other than Bud or Coors. We kept the fun going by moving our little party to the Gloves Sports Bar. This was a very nice little room that seems to be underused due to it’s off-the-promenade location. The bar tender seemed happy we were there, brining out chips to our table.

We had dinner this night at the main dining room. They were serving beef stroganoff, a dish that I had not seen on Carnival before. I gave it a try, and it was pretty good! I will definitely order it again, classic comfort food. I also had the flat iron steak which was cooked well, but kind of tough. I wished I had just gotten two orders of the stroganoff.

Later that evening we went to the deck party and midnight Mexican buffet. The buffet was pretty standard tacos, chips and desserts. A lady in line ahead of me apparently did not know that the carved fruits are decoration. I surmised this after seeing one of the cantaloupes that had been carved into a flower on her tray next to her food. I don’t know if she intended to eat it or take it home, but I found it immensely comical either way. Due to our unplanned hike, we were both pretty tired, and headed back to the room following the buffet.

 

Around Old San Juan

 

 

 

 

 

 

[oncruisecontrol]

Day 3: At Sea

 

The morning of day 3 started out much as day 2 did, with Butch gabbing over the intercom at 10 AM like a teenage girl on a telephone. Now had this been reserved only for the open decks and public areas I would have been fine. But it gets blasted throughout the halls and subsequently resonates into the cabins. So everyone on the ship gets a wake up call, whether they want one or not. I debated with myself briefly about going on a covert raid and stealing his P.A. microphone and throwing it into the ocean. I decided not to only because I determined that he would likely just find another one and that I would probably be locked up or set adrift in on a small wooden raft.

 

Later in the day we had our Cruise Critic group meet and greet. We all decided to pay extra and have an open bar party in one of the lounges. We all had a great time and the Carnival staff did a wonderful job bringing the drinks out to us. We spent the rest of the day hanging around the pool and having a great sea day.

 

After dinner, I went to the Ault Comedy show featuring Phat Kat. After that we spent some time in the Piano Bar, but it was fairly empty so it wasn’t a late night.

 

 

Great review DarthGrady. Nice pictures too. Sorry Butch was a little annoying. Butch is my favorite cruise director. But perhaps, because we love him so much, we never tire of hearing his voice! Lol.

[DarthGrady]

On the dead end path of seawall and sunburn

 

 

 

 

 

The last remaining of the old city gates

[DarthGrady]

Great review DarthGrady. Nice pictures too. Sorry Butch was a little annoying. Butch is my favorite cruise director. But perhaps, because we love him so much, we never tire of hearing his voice! Lol.

 

I agree, he was a fine cruise director and was a bundle of energy. I just didn't like him as an alarm clock.:D

[DarthGrady]

 

 

We finally made it to El Morrow

 

Inside the Fort

 

 

[DarthGrady]

A cannon emplacement

 

 

Looking out onto the point

 

The narrow path out to a lookout post

 

.......and its view

 

Looking out onto the mouth of the bay

[DarthGrady]

A smaller fort across the bay, to create a crossfire

 

Just in case the Brits come back :D (they occupied San Juan briefly)

 

 

El Morro's Lighthouse

 

[DarthGrady]

More views from El Morro

 

 

Found in Old San Juan

 

 

Heading back to the pier