Splendor Review Halloween with Pictures

[guntheros]

We had a wonderful time on the Carnival Splendor! A little about me and my family that cruised on October 31st. Me, my dh Mark and my dss Nick shared a room and my SIL and her boyfriend shared a room that was an adjoining room with us. This was my dss’s first cruise, my 3rd and my dh’s 2nd. This was also a first cruise for my SIL and her boyfriend.

Miscellaneous comments:

Weather: It was cool in Long Beach on Friday and Saturday. Stayed cool until Monday. Very nice weather Monday to Friday. It was cool again travelling back from Cabo and into Long Beach. Definitely pack a few pairs of pants/sweatshirts.

Ship movement: You could feel the ship moving the first 2 days and the last day. We had a forward room… WAY forward! I don’t think the movement was any more noticeable in any one place. When tendering in Cabo, it was pretty rough water. Our tender even hit the ship a few times trying to get lined up correctly.

Room: Our room was very far forward. We could easily see the bridge and the captain on a daily basis. It didn’t seem to impede the view a bit though. We were in 8203 and 8207. I was worried about the movement of the ship beings we were so far forward, but it didn’t seem to be any worse there than anywhere else on the ship. We had a balcony that adjoined with my SIL/boyfriend. It adjoined inside like hotel rooms do and we also had the room steward open the balcony divider. On our last cruise, the divider opened toward the ship and covered a small portion of our window. For this balcony, the divider opened toward the balcony. I was a little disappointed because it would block our view, but it ended up being great because it provided a little shade for a portion of our balcony. It looked like the balcony dividers opened ½ and ½. ½ opened to the balcony side and ½ opened to the ship side. The room was like any other room we’ve had. We were starboard (Right side facing forward) and we were lucky enough to be facing the port in every stop we had! In Cabo when tendering, we were on the opposite side though. Here is a picture of our balcony door opened and how it swings toward the balcony side.

Picture of our view of the bridge

Big Screen movies: They had good movies on the big screen. We never watched any, but I did notice that not everyone in the area was kind enough to be quiet when others were trying to watch a movie.

Food: The food is always great to us. We ate breakfast at the buffet every day. The omelet station was a big hit! For lunch, we always ate at the Lido buffet or restaurants. Deli was good. Burgers and hotdogs were a hit! My personal favorite was the burrito bar. I tried Tandoori, but I have to say, I haven’t tried much Indian food before, so this wasn’t that great to me, but only because I am not used to it. The rotisserie chicken was also really good! Favorites in the MDR for supper…. WCMC of course with 2 scoops ice cream! Grand Marnier Souffle. Prime Rib, Lobster, shrimp dishes, etc. food was always good! I don’t think we were ever hungry!

Smuggling: I didn’t want to risk smuggling, but my SIL had bought 4 rum runners. So, we bought 2 bottles of Morgan and filled all 4. We put one in each suitcase and they all made it onboard! I couldn’t believe it. We sipped on that the whole week and came home with some left. Next time, I will definitely pack pop as well though. I had bought a pop card, but it would’ve been nice to have some pop in the room before going to bed and in the morning and afternoons when we spent time on our balcony. My SIL/boyfriend just took the pop out of the fridge and used that. I am somewhat frugal, and didn’t want to spend $2 a pop though. We bought plenty of drinks on the ship as well and enjoyed all of them. At $10 a piece, a few drinks in the room was enjoyable though!!!

Security at port: Security checked all drinks brought on! There were a few ladies with wine, but they were WAY larger bottles than allowed and they were taken. Every water in the case was shaken. One man put beers in his coke case, and they were confiscated! We saw a LOT of confiscated bottles! So… definitely wouldn’t try bringing it on.

Casino: As you will read, we spent a lot of time in the casino. We are smokers, and this was the best place for us to hang out. The casino was split in half for smoking and non-smoking. We eventually earned enough points for free drinks which was great! We saw a lot of people that had earned free drinks too. My only complaint (and I'm sure I'll get rail-roaded for saying this) if you are going to play in the smoking section, then don't cover your mouth and nose when I am smoking! It was incredibly rude!!! I don't go into the non-smoking section and sit and complain because I can't smoke. Okay, my rant is over!

[guntheros]

We left South Dakota on Friday afternoon and arrived at LAX in the afternoon. We took a shuttle to Budget to get our rental car. We got a great deal from hotwire for less than $200 for a Ford Escape for 10 days! We brought our own GPS, plugged in the hotel we were staying at and away we went! We got a room in Marina Del Rey at the Courtyard Marriot Suites. I got the room for $85 on priceline. It didn’t seem like a 3 star hotel, but rather 2 ½, but because of the location, I still think it was a good buy. It was a great location and only 4-5 miles from LAX. It was right next to a shopping mall, gas station, and lots of great restaurants. We decided to go for a drive to look around and ended up at the Santa Monica Pier (short term parking was a few dollars) which was only about 10 minutes away. We had supper overlooking the ocean at Bubba Gump Shrimp which was very good! We then went back to the hotel for the evening.

In the morning, my dss wanted to fish.

The Santa Monica Pier

We went back to the Santa Monica Pier and he rented a fishing pole for $4 an hour and $4 for a pound of squid as bait. He fished for about 4 hours and didn’t catch a thing! No one was really catching anything…. Some were catching small bait fish, but that was about it. Mark and I ate breakfast on the pier at the Mexican restaurant, but it wasn’t very good. Their regular lunch and supper meals would probably be good, but I’d stay away from their breakfast. After fishing till mid afternoon, we headed to Long Beach. We went down to the shopping/restaurant area by the aquarium. It was nice and there were plenty of food choices. Gladstones, Hooters, Bubba Gump’s, etc. We chose to go to the aquarium which was really nice.

Aquarium pics

Nick petting stingrays

Mark and Nick by the 3 story aquarium

It took about 2 hours. We then went and picked up my SIL and her boyfriend at the Long Beach Airport around 5:30PM. The area in between the aquarium to the airport changed quite a bit. The closer we got to the airport, the more we saw of the less desireable neighborhoods in Long Beach. I was glad we hadn’t gotten a hotel room in these areas. I was glad we booked the Hilton instead of another hotel. We then went to King’s Fish for supper. We did valet parking for $8. It was good food, but kind of spendy for what you got, IMHO. The whole area was pretty busy and there were several nice restaurants in the area. We then went to our hotel, the Long Beach Hilton. I used the Carnival rate code which was $134 for the room with 3 of us and $98 for the room for 2 of us. It included parking for the week and shuttles to/from the cruise terminal. I believe anyone could take the shuttle whether or not you used the Carnival rate code. It was very organized and the bellmen were very kind and professional organizing the shuttles. The shuttles weren’t supposed to start until 12, but they started running around 11:30AM. They will not give you a voucher for a taxi as I have seen in other threads. Anyway, the hotel was very nice and we got a good night’s sleep…. before we went on the shuttle to the ship, we went to breakfast at Denny’s. This was a close walk to CVS and Albertson’s where we purchased 2 bottles of captain Morgan.

Off to the ship! We left the hotel around 11:45AM and weren’t on the ship until a little before 2PM. The lines to get your S&S cards was very long… then you went to a line for security to get onto the ship. First thing once we were on the ship was to change our room numbers. I booked my SIL/boyfriend with my dss to get them military discount. So, I needed to switch our rooms to put us in the room with dss instead of SIL/boyfriend. We ate lunch right away in the Lido and went up towards the Rotisserie to sit as it as nearly vacant and there were many tables open. The rest of the afternoon we spent looking out over the ship from deck 10 and our cabin. We had a balcony cabin that adjoined with our other family, just like in a hotel with adjoining rooms. We also asked our room steward, I Putu to open our balcony divider so we could share the balconies. He brought us an ashtray for the balcony, ice, moved our beds together and asked our names and never forgot them! He was really a great room steward. We explored the ship a little, went to supper and enjoyed our balcony and the casino that night. Our first night at supper we had a table just for the 5 of us, but the Matre D asked if we would move for the next night. We agreed. More on that later. We also went to the spa raffle, they gave out 5 prizes, but unfortunately we didn’t win. Everyone was tired that night, but me and my dss went to the Welcome Aboard show. We loved John Heald as a cruise director. He was always funny, did improv well and kept everyone informed about what was going on throughout the cruise. The first show was cut short because the coast guard needed to come in and evacuate a crew member via helicopter and the CD needed to leave to help assist in the process. We… along with many others went out to watch the helicopter arrive. It was VERY cold and windy so we stayed outside long enough to watch the copter come in and lower the coast guard, but went in before they lifted the injured person back off. They later said he was doing OK in a San Diego hospital. That was about it for the first night. Make sure you bring jackets and pants, it was very cool on the first sea day!

[guntheros]

2nd day: Day at Sea… Elegant night

My dss is 18 and went to the 18-20 year old meet and greet and no one else showed up. No biggie… Spent the day wandering around, bought cigarettes in the shops. 2 cartons for $57. They didn’t have any of our brand for the special 5 cartons for $117 left.

Mark and Nick by the slide. None of us ever went down the slide. Kind of regretting that now. I have never went down the slide, but it will be on my to do list for our next cruise!

Went to the Hairy Chest contest which is always a lot of fun! We took a nap almost everyday. We are early risers and didn’t want to be too tired for the night activities, so we napped almost everyday, usually right before supper. We took a few elegant night portraits, but didn’t end up purchasing any. We never went to look at pictures until the last sea day… BIG MISTAKE!!! There were so many photos, it was impossible to find them all. We found a few… they were good, but not ones we NEEDED to have. Went to the Captain’s celebration and they had $1 off drinks. Grabbed a photo with John and the Captain, grabbed a drink and off to supper we went.

Mark, me, the captain and John (CD)

We found our table. It was a table for 9. We had been told we would be the only ones, so we went ahead and ordered. Then, we had a couple show up about 10 minutes later and said they were waiting for their parents. About 10 minutes after that, they showed up. So… here we were, all eating our meals at different stages. Kind of awkward, but what do you do? I didn’t want mine to get cold waiting for them to order… even their kids(adults) ordered without them, so we went ahead and ate. We went to the show, THE BEAT. Didn’t care for it much at all. There were only about 2 songs I recognized. The performers were good, just not a good show. We went to both R rated comedians that night. Both were good.

3rd day: day at sea

I lost my caper, but I do know we played in the casino, milled around the ship, hung out on our balcony and ate WAY too much! I think SIL went to the show this night and liked it. It was the Latina Fiesta. Again, not sure if my nights are right, but she did go to Latina Fiesta and liked it, just not 100% sure it was this night. I think we missed dinner this night as we had eaten way too much too late in the day. Our assistant waitress from our last cruise is now a host on the Splendor and she made sure to find us at our new table! We really enjoyed seeing her again!

Frosina, Mark and me

[guntheros]

4th day: Puerto Vallarta

Me, dh and dss had pre-booked Los Veranos Canopy Tour. Grabbed a taxi outside the gates and took a 15 minute ride to their office. We had booked 10:45AM and were there about 1 hour early, but I HATE to be late. At 10:30, we hopped on the shuttle bus. There were about 32 of us. We took the back seat. Got a nice look at the coast on our way up the mountains. We had a fabulous time zipping! The guides were fun, energetic and made sure everyone was safe.

Mark and Nick getting all their gear on.

I was worried about my dss, who was weighing in at 250lbs BEFORE 2 days of cruise food. They had a scale by the large, FREE lockers, but didn’t make him weigh in. They had a camera man with the group who would ride the zips… definitely made you want to buy the dvd for $40.

Camera man riding tandem with Nick

My dh isn’t a fan of heights, but did great. The first couple, he put on the brakes, but he didn’t need to… they tell you when to brake, but it feels like you should be braking because you’re going fast! The first few, you zip over trees, so the height doesn’t seem to be too much. The end zips you go over the river and see the bottom… which was awesome and even my dh didn’t mind the height! It was a blast! 14 zips total! Be bought the dvd, had a couple of beers, dss held and fed the monkeys.

Enjoying a few beers

Me and Mark

Nick feeding the monkeys!

There was a river you could swim in, but we didn’t.

A few from our group did though. Nice little restaurant there too. We opted to wait to get back to our ship to eat for free. The shuttle on the way back would drop you wherever you wanted to go. A few got out at the hotels they were at, some downtown and we opted to go to the ship. We went to our room to drop some stuff off and my SIL/boyfriend were on the balcony, and weren’t very happy. They had went to explore on their own and didn’t have much luck. They talked to a tour guide when getting off the ship and she told them to take a cab and he would get them their and talked on the phone and told them the ATV tour they wanted would wait for them. The cab driver was nice, gave them a little tour and dropped them off in a not so desirable location! They walked a while, then decided it didn’t look very safe, so grabbed a cab. Told them to go to the ship by Wal-Mart. They agreed on $4 per person, and clarified $8 total. The cab started driving in the wrong direction, my SIL pointed this out so he turned around. Once at the ship… tried to charge $8 per person. After a few words exchanged, they gave him $8 and left.

[guntheros]

Puerta Vallarta Continued...

We went out together and grabbed another “yellow” (actually peachy colored) cab from outside the gates. Went to the boardwalk (malecon). Meandered on the boardwalk and the shops. Looked at the sand sculptures which were AWESOME!

Headed back to the ship once it got dark.

Mark and Nick

Cab ride to/from the ship from Malecon was $3 per person. We skipped dinner tonight and ate a little later at the buffet. Watched for pier runners, but not much to see. Played in the casino again where I finally earned FREE DRINKS! I had earned 1500 points on my S&S card and could have free drinks the rest of the cruise while playing in the casino. Since we were just hanging out on the balcony, our room steward cleaned our room while we were outside. When I came in, this is what was waiting for us!

Boy, are we going to get him back tomorrow night!

[guntheros]

5th day: Mazatlan

We had pre-booked Mazatlan Frank! What a great day! This was a favorite for many of us. He took us to the Cathedral and Market.

Notice the PIG HEAD?

More from the market

We saw the Cliff Divers.

 

Did some shopping. We also went to Stone Island and had paid for inclusive drinks and food!

Me with my new favorite drink... Tequila sunrise!

Our tour guide, Mazatlan Frank!

We rode a catamaran to Stone Island, then a tractor to the restaurant. The restaurant was Los Cardones. The food was great! We had chicken and fish platter. The fish was excellent. We also bought a few shrimp platters to share as we were told you can’t go to Mazatlan and not eat the shrimp. The drinks were really good. You could choose from Tequila Sunrise (my new favorite), rum and coke, margaritas, beer (poured in a glass), sex on the beach and a few others. They made them pretty strong! We walked on the beautiful beach. It was quiet without a lot of people. They had ATV’s to rent, massage on the beach (they weren’t there the day we were though L), and activities like horseback riding, banana boat, boogie boards, etc each for about $5 a piece. We then made our way back to the van on the last tractor ride to the catamaran and Frank took us back to the boat. Frank has several tours and I would definitely go with him again! We got back to the ship, took a nap and went to supper in the MDR. Our tablemates were late again, but this time we knew they would be coming, so we waited to order. Played some more in the casino and had a nice night. This is what we left for Putu, our room steward tonight...

[spideyfam]

Great pictures! Looking forward to seeing how you get the steward back!

[guntheros]

6th day: Cabo

We went down to the spectacular about 7:45AM, 15 minutes after the first tender was supposed to get going. We were given #4 for the tender boat. They said it was taking a little longer than usual because of the rough water and trying to line up the ship and tender boats. We had waited maybe 10 or 15 minutes and we were on a tender. When we were in Mazatlan, we asked Frank if he had any suggestions. He e-mailed a friend and set it up for him to meet us and show us the tours he offered. We met him right where described and he said he would take us snorkeling and give us a city tour for $30 a piece! Great!

Overlooking Cabo

We went to the glass factory where they hand blow glass. It was amazing. They made a dolphin while we watched, it was really neat to watch them make it right in front of us.

They even let us blow the glass.

Took a nice tour of the sites and went to Chilleno Beach to snorkel.

Mark had never snorkeled, but loved it so much we had to practically drag him out of the water!

It felt a little rough at first, but then everyone got the hang of it. Everyone had a blast! My dh doesn’t swim, but ended up enjoying it the most. Our tour guide Rolando had rented us snorkel equipment for $5 at the cruise terminal. Our equipment was included in the price. I had brought my own dry snorkel and recommend everyone buy one. They don’t allow water to get into your snorkel tube and I ended up letting everyone in the group use it. They were all first time snorkelers and this made it so much easier for them to not have to worry about swallowing sea water. After snorkeling, we got in a little shopping and headed back to the ship! Another GREAT day! The tender line was long, but it moved quickly. Went to dinner, it was elegant night and enjoyed another night roaming the ship. My SIL went to VROOM and said it was good. We had to stay in Cabo a few extra hours because someone had to stay in Cabo because of an injury/illness. They had a hard time locating a member of their group (apparently a sibling?/young person). They were hiding because they didn’t want to have to leave their vacation behind. Poor thing. What a beautiful day and nice weather! After supper, this is what was waiting for us in our room.

[guntheros]

7th Day: Day at sea

My dh hit a lucky streak in the casino and we spent much of the morning/afternoon there. He won it, I lost it! He hit his free drinks today! Better late than never!!! Dss and SIL/boyfriend bought future cruise credits, but we lost track of time and missed it L We tried to look through our pictures, but there were far too many. We had met up with our waitress from a past cruise and went to find her again to get another picture. We also made sure to get a picture of our room steward, Putu

Disembarkation:

We were the LAST people off the ship! It was about 12:00. We didn’t have flights until the next day, so I suppose that is why we were one of the last. It’s always interesting seeing all the supplies, food, pop, beer being brought on by the palate load! Once off, we waited in the terminal for the Hilton shuttle to come around dropping off people boarding the Splendor (those poor people) and got a ride back to the Hilton to pick up our car. We went to Redondo Beach and had lunch overlooking the ocean at Joe's Crab Shack which was awesome!

We all had the Big Daddy Feast and enjoyed every bite!

We booked a hotel via priceline near LAX. We got the Hilton Los Angeles Airport for $55 a room. They charge $22 to park for the night, so dh returned the car to budget and they dropped him off at the hotel. Great hotel! We were on the 3rd floor and had a outside door to the “garden” which was convenient because we could smoke there. Stayed up late enjoying our smuggled booze we didn’t drink on the ship and in the morning…. Back to reality!

Here's a few miscellaneous pictures:

The line waiting to get on the ship.

 

THE END! I hope you enjoyed the review! I feel so badly for the people who were so excited to board the beautiful ship right after us, who spent a vacation that turned out to be no vacation at all. Hopefully the Splendor will be up and running again soon. It was truly a wonderful trip for all of us.

[C n C]

Very nice review and pics. I enjoyed reading it and you managed to bring back some good memories of the various ports. (We enjoy PV the most.)

 

Thanks for taking the time to type all that.

[pseudochicken]

Ooooh you were on the cruise before the infamous power outage cruise! Coooool! You must feel very lucky to have such an excellent cruise vacation and to know that the very next day after you debarked the Splendour, the engines caught fire and the ship lay stranded in the ocean without power for days. :cool:

 

*Cue creepy violin music*

[nybumpkin]

Nice review! Loved your photos of the "towel people" - you had a really imaginative steward. And your other photos are really great - thanks for posting!

[boaterette]

Nice review. We were on it last month and had a blast.

[tiger belle]

thanks for the review...glad y'all had a fun time

[iggy's mom]

Thanks for the review! Love the photos.:)