Victory Review 2/21....w/PICS

[newt98]

i think that's it for tonight. tomorrow we go to st. thomas. :)

[newt98]

San Jaun pix are great. I have been there more than a few times on cruises. I look at other peoples pix and say..."I've been there, and there and there." It is a great city with wonderful people. One of my favorite stops in SJ was the government building. It has a rotunda in the entry that is beautifully painted and probably as old as the US. I even had the governor shake my hand there on his way out....He asked me if I were there on vacation or on a cruise. I told him on a cruise. He said to come back down on vacation for a week the next time so I could spend a little more money there and laughed, patted me on the back and wished me a great cruise....

 

 

thanks jesse.

[cruisinthree]

we get on the ship and head up to lido. we can't get into our room until 2:30, so we just go and hang out. i go straight to the deli, i always do, and get a reuben, the wife gets a caeser salad from the pizza station. she loves the caesar salad for some reason, don't ask me why. i don't even think i checked out the buffet. we ate there for breakfast each morning, but we never really ate there any other time. we could come back from port around 4 or 5, and it was always closed down, no desserts or nothing, so i couldn't even pick at it, kind of sucked. the only thing you could really get when you came back from port was pizza, sandwich, or burger grille.

 

this gets me to some of my other issues on the ship. any cruise is a great cruise, but there were a few things that irked me a bit. first, at tritons pool, the main pool, there is a bar on each side of it. the bar on the non-smoking side was only open one time that i saw. every time i got a drink, i had to go to the smoking bar, which, to me, i would rather not do. every cruise i have been on i use the triton pool bar on the non smoking side. so that bugged me. then when i got my wife a drink that was supposed to have whipped topping on it, the bar keep forgot it, which is fine, but when i asked him to put it on, he was d*** about it, i was like, what the hell? jus put the damn topping on it, and i had to show him the menu that called for whipped topping. apparently he was a prick all week according to some other couples.

 

then one night the back of the ship was closed from 6:00 until after i wen to bed for a private party. what the hell? evrybody paid their fare for use of all public areas. i thought that was crap.

 

i liked the idea of the bigscreen when i first heard about it. but when we're on the deck sailing out of st. thomas, do we really need to listen to chris collinsworth over the lido? no band, just t.v.

 

i'm getting my complaints out of the way so i can get back to rest of the cruise. didn't have beach towels two of the first four days of the trip, had to hunt down my room steward for towels. not a huge deal, but that's not something i've seen on my other carny cruises.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A question regarding the TV on deck and no band....are you saying that they don't have the usual steel drum bands on the pool decks anymore because they have the TV??? If so, that sucks! I love the steel drum bands on deck and will sorely miss them. :(

[newt98]

we get on the ship and head up to lido. we can't get into our room until 2:30, so we just go and hang out. i go straight to the deli, i always do, and get a reuben, the wife gets a caeser salad from the pizza station. she loves the caesar salad for some reason, don't ask me why. i don't even think i checked out the buffet. we ate there for breakfast each morning, but we never really ate there any other time. we could come back from port around 4 or 5, and it was always closed down, no desserts or nothing, so i couldn't even pick at it, kind of sucked. the only thing you could really get when you came back from port was pizza, sandwich, or burger grille.

 

this gets me to some of my other issues on the ship. any cruise is a great cruise, but there were a few things that irked me a bit. first, at tritons pool, the main pool, there is a bar on each side of it. the bar on the non-smoking side was only open one time that i saw. every time i got a drink, i had to go to the smoking bar, which, to me, i would rather not do. every cruise i have been on i use the triton pool bar on the non smoking side. so that bugged me. then when i got my wife a drink that was supposed to have whipped topping on it, the bar keep forgot it, which is fine, but when i asked him to put it on, he was d*** about it, i was like, what the hell? jus put the damn topping on it, and i had to show him the menu that called for whipped topping. apparently he was a prick all week according to some other couples.

 

then one night the back of the ship was closed from 6:00 until after i wen to bed for a private party. what the hell? evrybody paid their fare for use of all public areas. i thought that was crap.

 

i liked the idea of the bigscreen when i first heard about it. but when we're on the deck sailing out of st. thomas, do we really need to listen to chris collinsworth over the lido? no band, just t.v.

 

i'm getting my complaints out of the way so i can get back to rest of the cruise. didn't have beach towels two of the first four days of the trip, had to hunt down my room steward for towels. not a huge deal, but that's not something i've seen on my other carny cruises.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A question regarding the TV on deck and no band....are you saying that they don't have the usual steel drum bands on the pool decks anymore because they have the TV??? If so, that sucks! I love the steel drum bands on deck and will sorely miss them. :(

 

i remember seeing one guy playing steel drums once. i'm sure he had to have been there more, but i only saw him once, but i saw the tv on every other time.

[Joanns6569]

Newt98,

Please pass on the taxi driver information, it is good to know a driver that you can trust.

Great review, thank you, I leave in June on the Victory

[purrlinda]

I would like Lenin's phone number.

 

Can you please email me at snowedunder at gmail dot com ?

 

A few of us are arriving at different times and I want to make sure everyone has a good taxi service.

 

Thank you! So enjoying the review.

[newt98]

Newt98,

Please pass on the taxi driver information, it is good to know a driver that you can trust.

Great review, thank you, I leave in June on the Victory

 

email me at noot98athotmail.com for his info.

[newt98]

Thanks for the review and the pics. I like details! I like the pics too! :)

 

thanks.:)

[sailorwife]

doing good Mike , great pics can't wait until I get my disk, I will get yours in the mail soon, beautiful day here bbq steak for dinner and of course some wine, wish you Guys could come over,

Joan

[newt98]

doing good Mike , great pics can't wait until I get my disk, I will get yours in the mail soon, beautiful day here bbq steak for dinner and of course some wine, wish you Guys could come over,

Joan

 

we're doing steak too!

[scraphappylady]

I'm loving your review so far, especially ALL your pictures from San Juan - I just love those multi-colored buildings in the old city!! It's fun to compare what you guys did with what my DH and I did on our Victory cruise. And I know how much it takes to write a review like this, so it's especially nice when someone adds so much detail like you're doing! Can't wait to read more . . . . :D

[newt98]

I'm loving your review so far, especially ALL your pictures from San Juan - I just love those multi-colored buildings in the old city!! It's fun to compare what you guys did with what my DH and I did on our Victory cruise. And I know how much it takes to write a review like this, so it's especially nice when someone adds so much detail like you're doing! Can't wait to read more . . . . :D

 

 

thanks, it's hard to spend the time that takes to get this done, i actually have a life outside of this computer!:cool:

[newt98]

1ST STOP, ST. THOMAS

 

well we didnt need an alarm clock thanks to the deck chairs above us, so we got in enough time to go to the buffet and get breakfast. i either had pancakes or french toast every morning. if there was french toast, you can bet that's where i would be, it's really good. i also like the ham, i would usually have at least three pieces. i have never liked the bacon on carnival, and i love, did i say love bacon? but i just cannot force it down my throat on these ships. but not a problem, because they have the ham.

 

so we have booked a tour with sunny liston for today. we had a meeting time of 10:00 at the pier. he would drop us of at the shopping center for two hours, then pick us up for an island tour, then we would end up at sapphire beach. i had wanted to go to megans bay, but the group voted for sapphire, so keep that in mind if you book this type of tour. i don't know if they're all the same, but that's how this one went, but it was still a great beach though.

 

pulling into st thomas, caribbean princess in port.

 

the view from the balcony as we pull in.

 

sun coming up, yes, the deck chairs got us up early, lol.

 

sunrise

 

on deck in the morning

[newt98]

looking at land from the deck

 

you can see my yacht sitting at the end of the dock

 

st thomas harbor, everybody has this pic

 

you can see havensight mall from our balcony, it has all the red roofs. and there's al cohen liquor store in the distance. but the mall has liquor stores also.

 

you can see the butterfly farm from the balcony also.

[newt98]

your tour guide and his assistant, and i am wearing the shirt that i got here two years ago, geek.

 

the DW thinking about the shopping she is about to do.

 

just getting off of the ship.

 

look at that, it's the grand princess, not the caribbean.

 

this is where we landed to do the first bit of shopping, i am on the lookout for another shirt like the one i got two years back, maybe a different color though.

[newt98]

when we get off of the boat and go through the security gate, sunny liston is standing there with a sign and directs us to his bus. we had about ten people or so on this tour, along with one other couple from the roll call, emily and raymond.

 

sunny took us to the locals market area for shopping, which is right across the street from the store. we walked around there for a bit, and i found the shirt i was looking for, in blue, so i was done shopping. but of course, she wasn't. so anyways we meet our group back at the spot two hours later for the island. we found out right away that we were in fro a ride! we took off around a corner and up a hill and sunny drove it like he stole it, it was alot of fun.

 

sunny is a great tour operator and keeps everybody involved in the tour along the way. we drive to some lookout points, and end up at the top of the hill where there is a bar serving banana daquiri's. they were pretty good, you can add your own rum to it, as much as you like. after our stop at the top of the hill, we all decided which beach to go to. well not all of us, i decided meagans bay, but sapphire here we come.

 

 

market

 

shopping in st thomas, can anybody say "what if there aren't enough jewelery stores to choose from"? almost every store is a diamond store.

 

sittin at the fountain with my new shirt

 

there'e our ship

 

a princess ship at the other pier

[newt98]

so we get to sapphire beach, and it's kinda crowded, but i don't really care about that, i know some people do. but the beach and water were beautiful. there was a bar that served food and drinks and rented snorkel equipment. i didnt bring my gear because i thought we were going to megans bay, which has no snorkeling. i think i paid $10-16 for the gear, i can't really remember. i didnt bring my underwater camera either, which was a real bummer because i saw a turtle out there eating sea grass. i was the only one around the turtle as he ate. we would come up for air every so often, and he was pretty close to me, probably about 6 feet or so. he always kept one eye on me.

 

the snorkeling was pretty decent, i went out there there twice. the dw stayed on the beach for the most part. then these iguanas starting chasing each other around where we were sitting. they were running under peoples chairs and stuff, and everyone was pulling their feet up because they didn't want to lose any toes.

 

me out snorkeling

 

gorgeous water

 

sapphire beach

 

the other end of sapphire

 

another pic of sapphire beach

[newt98]

me taking pictures

 

 

tree

 

critter

 

beetlejuice

[newt98]

here we are headed back to the ship

 

us with sunny liston

 

sunny's bus

 

pilot boat picking up their guy

 

gotta put this in there, everybody like them.

[barbevrn]

Wow, you have a great eye for photography! Absolutely beautiful pictures.

 

Loving your review. Keep it coming.

[newt98]

Wow, you have a great eye for photography! Absolutely beautiful pictures.

 

Loving your review. Keep it coming.

 

thank you, but i think it's because if you take so many, you bound to get a good one.;)

[framerman]

Great review. I've enjoyed reading your reviews in the past and this is great too!

[MzOhioLady]

This is a GREAT REVIEW!! You really do an excellent job. I've also read your other reviews. The Pictures are Wonderful and I can actually see them. Most pics are blocked from my work computer but whatever link you use to load your pictures I can see them! You are giving wonderful information. I'm seriously thinking of doing this cruise and same itinerary for the end of the year.

[imagine8]

Great pics and review! Keep it coming!

[mjhbrown]

This is so great! We're on this cruise on April 11 and I CANNOT wait! Thanks for such a wonderful review so far.