Carnival Victory 4/25/2010 Review

[Benilana]

DH & I flew the Redeye out of LAX Thursday night 4/22/10, arriving in San Juan around 9am Friday. We gathered our bags at baggage claim and headed toward the taxi stand but were stopped by airport personnel before we got outside, as they politely requested to see our baggage claim tickets. It's great they have such security but not so great when you can't remember where you put your claim tickets. After I searched in vain for about 10 minutes, the nice folks finally let us pass after we showed our IDs and matched them to the luggage tags. Lesson learned: keep claim tags next to ID, not buried away for "safe keeping."

There was no line for taxis and we easily hopped a cab to Old San Juan after checking in at the taxi booth and getting our fare card.

We had pre-paid for a room at the Hotel Milano in OSJ and were thrilled when they let us check in early at 11am. We had Room 307: one queen bed facing the front street Calle Fortaleza.

The Hotel Milano staff were very nice and the room was great, although we agree with other reviews that it can be noisy at times with honking cars during rush hour, and a nearby dance club that plays music until the wee hours on Fri and Sat night. We managed to embrace the experience and still enjoy this hotel. DH slept perfect and I only used earplugs for a couple of hours to sleep through the party noises on Saturday. The location made it all worthwhile.

[Benilana]

Sorry, I'm still learning how to post pics correctly :(

 

 

We spent Friday and Saturday relaxing & exploring Old San Juan.

 

View from San Cristobal Fort looking toward El Morro Fort.

 

 

We spotted some iguanas down in a culvert at the fort.

 

La Fortaleza (Governor's Mansion)

[kenrod]

We were on this sailing!

 

I am really looking forward to your review through your eyes. I like what I see so far!

[Benilana]

If you explore Old San Juan, pick up a tourist map from one of the local shops or restaurants. It was much more useful than the guidebook map we had.

We had wonderful meals at The Parrot Club (Nuevo Latino), Tantra (Indian w/ Caribbean flare: we bought a bottle of their fabulous hot sauce!), and Cafe Berlin (Peurto Rican). All 3 were suitable for both carnivores (DH) & vegetarians (me).

We stocked up on cruise provisions at CVS near the cruise ship terminal and also at a local grocery store near our hotel called Supermax, which was much cheaper than CVS. My favorite find was right across from Hotel Milano on Calle Fortaleza: a natural grocery store called Ayurvedics. I bought organic sodas, snacks & toiletries here.

Overall, it was nice to have a couple of days in San Juan before the cruise to get acclimated to the time change (we're from California) and the weather (we're used to heat but not humidity. San Juan has plenty of both).

We didn't venture outside of Old San Juan since we didn't have a rental car.

I would not recommend trying to drive or park in OSJ. The streets are narrow, parking is scarce and other drivers seemed quite impatient (or just love their horns). We only took a cab from the airport, walked while exploring the town (although there are free trolleys), then walked w/ our baggage down to the cruise ship on Sunday.

Before check-out, we wandered up to Hotel Milano's roof-top deck where they have a continental breakfast. It also appears that there's a bar here in the evenings. Look closely and you can see Victory's whale tale in the distance.

 

Sunday around 11am, we walked from our hotel to the cruise ship terminal w/ luggage in tow. We had planned to use a porter upon arriving at the terminal as someone on Cruise Critic had suggested. We asked one gentleman if he was a porter and he said no, he was a taxi man. I found this odd since he was wearing the identical shirt of all the men who were carrying people's bags and putting them through the Xray machines. Oh well, we had managed to carry the luggage over several blocks of cobblestone streets so going 100 more yards was no big deal. We turned our suitcases over to the baggage screener and headed upstairs. We had VIP check-in since we were booked in a mini-suite and it was all quite simple. It didn't appear crowded for the regular check-in, either.

One thing to note is that upon check-in at the terminal to get our Sail & Sign cards, they did say they needed to see the same credit card that we'd used to pay for the cruise. I suppose at the end of the cruise you could use another card (or cash of course) to settle the S&S bill, but I thought I'd mention it here just in case.

Since we were told we couldn't board the ship until 12:30pm, we grabbed lunch in town then headed back to the terminal. We picked up a bottle of champagne and a bottle of wine at the duty free shops and proceeded to the security check-point. We observed a man in front of us ask if he could bring a bottle of water on board and the security officer then checked the bottle's seal and told him it was fine. I had an unsealed bottle of water in my backpack along w/ the wine and I just sent it through security w/ no problem. I later saw on the flyer they gave us when we first entered the terminal that all unsealed bottles of water, etc, were not allowed & would be thrown away.

[missymac]

Sounds like the trip started off well. Cannot wait to hear the rest (we'll be on the Victory in January).

 

Thanks for sharing! :)

[ladyj3641]

I can't wait to read more...I cruise next month!!

[Joanns6569]

Jamie,

Doesn't sound good to finally say we cruise next month!!!!!:p

[SoonerOne]

Thanks for sharing, we leave in October:D

[PreciousCruiser]

I was on the same cruise with you and kenrod. Can't wait to read more (as kenrod said "through your eyes"). We had a wonderful cruise!

[ToesntheSand]

Thanks for your review I will be on her in 1 week from today!!

[Jeans*Fanatic]

Thanks so much for starting this review! We leave in 3 weeks... looking forward to reading the rest of this review as well! :D

[83Heritage]

Sounds like the trip started off well. Cannot wait to hear the rest (we'll be on the Victory in January).

 

Thanks for sharing! :)

 

I'll be on Victory in January also. What day are you sailing?

[missymac]

It'll be January 23, 2011. Cannot wait!! :)

[McDebbie]

Can't wait for the rest of the review either, we will be on in September.

[crusing48/51]

We'll be going in September. Thank you for your review. I love to read other people's take on their cruise. Yours is starting out great! Keep it coming!:)

[Benilana]

Sorry I haven't been able to add more until now. Work, life, etc....

So we boarded around 1pm or so and the doors were still closed to the room hallways. We didn't try to sneak a peak but instead we set out to explore the ship. Yes, it's huge! We thought it was nice overall and didn't notice anything really worn out except that the hall carpets on the lower cabin decks 1 & 2 were quite stained w/ what appeared to be water stains.

By the end of the week, there were still parts of the ship that we never saw and I was still getting lost on occasion. It was all good fun though.

 

I believe this was the Sushi Bar, Deck 5 next to the Casino

 

This map on Deck 5 showed the ship's location throughout the cruise

[seguincruiser]

More, more, more.:D Love your pics of San Juan. Want to visit some day.

[Benilana]

While exploring the ship we ran into our friends and shared a drink on the Lido Deck, then headed down to check out our home for the week.

DH and I had a guaranteed booking in Cabin 7325, a Mini-Suite. We were on the Starboard side of the ship and we docked on this side at 4 of the ports (St. Thomas, St. Lucia, St. Kitts, St. Martin). I don't think it really made a difference since sometimes the better views were port and sometimes starboard. I'll touch on this a bit more when I talk about each port.

We chose Deck 7 on the advice of Cruise Critic members so there would be only cabins above & below us, instead of noise from night clubs & cleaning crews. Our friends had a standard cabin on Lido Deck (9) and they said noise was not a problem at all. Of course, on both decks there were times when inconsiderate people would be running in the halls, slamming doors, and shouting or talking loudly right outside your door. Overall this was a minor inconvenience and usually occurred during the late morning or early evening, rather than while we were sleeping.

 

Here is Cabin# 7325

 

 

Our balcony. I'm standing in front of a 3rd chair that reclined a bit.

[janabm81]

Great review so far...can't wait to read more. We leave in June!!! :)

[Benilana]

Thanks everyone for the feedback! I know how much I appreciated others' reviews in gathering helpful info for our cruise so I hope to do the same for you, or just simply share our thoughts, tips, and the good times we had. I'm trying to add a link on my signature that will take you to my Picasa web album for more pics of the cruise. I didn't want to overwhelm anyone w/ too many photos in this review :D

 

So anyway, we REALLY enjoyed Cabin 7325! DH and I have only cruised once before: 12 years ago on a 7-day Carnival Mexican Riviera cruise w/ an ocean view cabin. On that cruise I remember how much I hated not having fresh air in the cabin, so I swore I'd never cruise again without a balcony. We decided to go for the mini-suite because we had a gift certificate to offset some of the cost. Our friends had a standard balcony cabin which was of course smaller but still nice, and DH & I would probably fit in there just fine (we didn't use all of our storage space in the suite). But I think once you've had the mini-suite it might be hard to go back :o

Near our cabin we saw several larger suites which I believe they call Penthouse Suites. They appear to be basically the size of two standard cabins: wider than ours with a long skinny desk along the entrance wall, an extra armchair, and of course a bigger balcony. We didn't go inside so I'm not sure what the bathroom was like in the Penthouse Suite.

Our mini-suite bathroom included two medicine cabinets, a shower/jacuzzi tub combo with a 3-piece sliding glass shower door, and a retractable clothesline plus a towel rack in the shower which was nice for hanging wet swimsuits.

Our cabin included a vanity area with 4 small drawers, two closets (each had 14 hangers but FYI none of the hangers had clips, so keep that in mind if you bring skirts or pants that you don't want to drape over a hanger), two robes, a 4-drawer dresser, 2 nightstands w/ storage space, a flat-screen tv (our friends had a regular tv in their standard cabin), and a bar area with glasses, mini-bar, safe, and a couple of shelves.

 

This is the mini-bar, and as others have reported it does not keep things cold or even very cool, just what I would describe as "fairly cool." Regardless, we removed most of the items from the mini-bar and stored them in the cabinet to the left (where the safe is located), then kept a few of our own beverages and snacks in there during the week. At the end of the week we simply replaced the original items and there were no charges on our Sail-n-Sign account. We had also brought a soft-sided cooler and our Room Steward was awesome about keeping the cooler plus the small in-room ice bucket filled with ice every day.

 

Here's the free in-room safe. I wish I had put my hand or something else in the photo to give you an idea of the size. My 10.1" netbook in its neoprene case just fit inside, along w/ a little room to spare for passports, etc. I'm not sure if a much larger laptop would fit though.

[Benilana]

Our bathroom

 

Dressing room

[seguincruiser]

Loving your review, thanks for taking the time.

[gjsmth]

Thanks for the suite photos, we are in a suite port side July and it's great to see ahead of time what a Victory suite looks like. Keep'em coming

[Benilana]

gjsmith, I have a few more photos of the suite that are on my Picasa Web Album (mixed in with a ton of other photos from this cruise). Hopefully this link will work http://picasaweb.google.com/lanapowers/Cruise2010WebAlbum?feat=directlink

[islandwannabee]

Thank you so much for taking the time to do a review, as you can see we are doing a btb on the Victory in a few months, can't wait and love reading reviews. Patiently awaiting your next instalment.

 

Cindy