My review of the Carnival Glory 10/13-10/20 sailing

[mikedx]

Gang,

 

I thought I'd share my experience with my wife and I sailing doing the Eastern Carribean cruise on the Glory on 10/13 - 10/20.

 

Background:

I am 35 and my wife is 36. She is a travel agent, and earned enough bonuses to pay for the cruise, transfers from the Orlando airport, flights, and $400 to spend on the Glory. We would never be able to afford it otherwise. I am an environmental engineer.

 

Packing:

We brought 3 suitcases, and should have brought another empty one for all the rum we bought. We brought 2 12-packs of soda and 1 bottle of rum (yeah, I know you aren't supposed to). So we saved $42 each on soda cards, and whatever a bottle of run would save you on $7-$8 dollar mixed drinks.

 

Travel:

We flew from Charleston WV to Atlanta to Orlando without problems. We stayed at the Orlando Hyatt (she had a travel agent discount) at the airport. When my wife said that it was in the airport, I had no idea that she meant "inside". We walked out of baggage claim and we were right there.

 

Embarkation:

We went down to the Carnival desk at the airport at 10:15am. They had buses running every 15 or 30 minutes. We got on the 10:30 coach bus. It's a very nice ride. At 11:30am our bus got in line with the others At 12:30pm we got off the bus. They put our luggage in huge bins that they used fork lifts to carry it onto the ship. Then we went through a metal detector, and got through some different lines to get our sign & sail card, etc. This was done very quickly. We got on the boat (it was HUGE) at 1pm. The rooms wouldn't be available until 1:30pm, so we went up to the lido deck and had cheeseburgers and walked around.

At 1:30pm we got into our rooms. We had a balcony and the room (7365) was MUCH bigger that it looks in the pictures. At 6pm, we still hadn't got our luggage, so I walked over to the elevators on deck 7 and there were stacks of them. I found 2 of them and brought them back to the room. At 7pm I went back out and found the third.

 

Getting around the ship:

They give you nice diagrams of the ship which helps out a lot, but they don't tell you that you can't get from one end of the ship to the other on most decks. Deck 5 with the Casinos and Deck 9 Lido are the ones we used the most. It was great being on Deck 7 because we had staterooms above us and below us that cut out noise, and we usually had to only walk up or down 2 decks to get where ever we wanted.

 

Food:

We only went to the formal dining room twice. I didn't bring a suit or tux, so we weren't going to the formal nights anyway. We went the first night. I didn't realize until we were wandering around that our S&S card had our table number on it. We were upstairs. I didn't like my waiter at all. I couldn't understand him and he never smiled. The first night we had steak with peppercorn, but there was so little of the sauce that it tasted plain. The other night we had filet mignon, which tasted plain as well. We had most of our meals at the Red Sail. For dinner, it have most of the food they are serving in the main dining room anyway. We also had

pizza:

They had 8-10 different ones, but usually they only had a few pieces of a few pizzas. If you wanted a certain one, ask them to make it and wait for it to come out.

 

fish & chips:

The fried battered fish was very good. Unfortunately it was only open for lunch.

 

sushi:

They only give you 2 pieces at a time, and it's not any better than what they have at the buffet.

 

deli:

Good stuff. But if you get something hot, like a Ruben, then the break tends to fall apart as you eat it. The turkey on roll was very good.

 

oriental:

It was only open for lunch, and it wasn't very good. You can get better at any local chinese restaurant.

 

grill:

Open during lunch, and sometimes from 11:30pm-1:30am. Great cheeseburgers.

 

 

It was difficult trying to figure out which restaurants were open at which times. They didn't always follow the schedule.

 

So how was the food? It was ok, and plenty of it. But you can't mention a meal that they served that I couldn't get better at any restaurant back home. The only exception was the warm melting chocolate cake. It was the best! But only in the main dining room when you got it hot. If you got it off the buffet at the red sail, then it was only warm, and it tasted more like sludge on the bottom.

 

Room steward:

We didn't even see our room steward until the third day. Her name was Olga. She was nice, kept apologizing for either being in our room when we came in or trying to come in if we were already there. She was friendly, I rarely saw her, she cleaned up the room quick and did a good job. I dunno what more to ask for.

 

Entertainment:

We saw two shows with the ship dancers and singers. We didn't like either show. The guy could sing ok, the woman not so much. I do admit that I liked seeing the dancers in thongs. The wife couldn't complain, since four of the guys stripped down to g-strings, put a big hat over the front, and ripped the g-string off right before the lights went down.

 

They had a motown singer that was excellent. An R-rated comedian that was great.

 

The trivia shows and newlywed shows were funny, though we just watched them on tv.

 

The cruise director "Wee Jimmy" was very, very funny. He does a fantastic job. I always enjoyed watching the morning show.

 

Casino:

Dunno, we never gambled (aside from bingo). Some person won a BMW and took the $25,000 cash option, and somebody else won like $8,000.

 

Shops:

We couldn't afford the high end stuff, but they did have gold and silver by the inch. I bought a $1/inch necklace and got a free bracelet for my daughter. Even the $4 and $5 inch jewelry looked like a good deal. We got shirts (2 for $30) at the Carnival store. Something to remember. In the capers it will say that they are having a 1 day only or 1 hour only sale. From everything I saw, it's the same price all week and they just promote it. We bought the photos they took of us getting off the boat ($8 each), frames $8-$10, and a little book of pictures of the ship $5.

 

Ports:

I was more interested in the excursions that the ship itself. So here's what we did.

 

Nassau:

I had wanted to do the Blackbeard's beach break, but after watching a past excursion on tv, it didn't look that great. I didn't want to go to the Atlantas so we would get depressed that we weren't staying there. So we walked around the shops around the ship. The straw market was open on Sunday. My wife and I don't like to barter, so we stayed away. The place seems like a big flea market. We took a horse & buggy tour. A nice guy with them offered to take our picture, then pointed out that they work for tips. The buggy ride was $10/person, and the driver also wanted a tip. But it was worth it. Our least favorite of the three.

 

St. Thomas:

We were the third Carnival ship in dock. Imagine three Carnival ships in line at the dock.

 

Since we went to Nassau, and then to the US Virgin Islands, we had to go through immigration. This is a big joke. Customs agents come on board. They call by excursion time or deck number. You walk quickly through a line where they barely glance at your passport. It's the fastest I've ever gone through customs. Later I was in line at the pursers desk when the guy in front of me was complaining about a letter he got. He said "But we didn't even get off the ship!" Doesn't matter, still have to go through customs.

 

We did the Ultimate Island Experience. We got onto an covered taxi that seated about 20. We went up winding roads with reckless abandon. They stopped for a nice view of the ships. We went onto Megan's Bay for 2 hours at the beach. It was WONDERFUL! Powder sand, crystal clear water, and not at all crowded, even with 3 cruise ships. I was in heaven here and could have stayed all day. We then went a different route where we stopped up on a hill and took pictures of Megan's Bay. He dropped us off at Blackbeard's castle. We saw old cannons, and walked up to the top of an old turret where we got a magnificent view of the island. We ate hot dogs at the restaurant, and looked around a couple of the houses. We walked down to the shops downtown. I had bought a 1.5 L bottle of water from the ship for $3.50. I bought a 1L bottle of rum. I went to a public bathroom, emptied out what was left of the water, and poured the rum in the empty water bottle to smuggle back on board. We caught a taxi for $5/person for the ride back. The traffic was horrible! They drive on the other side of the road, and these people won't let ANYBODY merge in. They will stop in the middle of an intersection that blocked cars going across so they don't lose their place in line. We our taxi driver got pulled over by a walking cop for doing just that. We had to wait about 15-20 minutes for the cop to write out tickets for the three taxi's they pulled over. We got back to the ship, the bag with rum went through the metal detector, and we went back to the room to change and come back out. We then took the tram up to paradise point. It's $19/person. It's probably 50-50 on whether you think it was worth it or not. You get another great view of the island from up there. We went to the bar where my wife got a "bushwacker". She loved it. We stayed up there for awhile, then took it back down and went shopping. Something else to mention is that we saw K-Mart, Home Depot, and Wendy's there.

They have a little "strip mall" by the ship. I think the shopping here is better than downtown. We bought 6 Liters of Cruzan rum for less than $40. They boxed it up in boxes that say you can take it on an airplane. (This is FALSE! You can't bring it as carry-on, as it is over 3 oz. Delta also wouldn't let us check the box as luggage because they said it was too fragile) If I ever go back, I'll just go to Megan's Bay all day.

 

St. Martin

Best of the three. Only our ship was in port. We did the America's Cup Yacht Racing. Only 11 people on the whole ship signed up for it. We met about 15 people staying on the island to do it. We ended up racine two boats. They handed out different assignments depending on how physical you wanted/could do. Mendy was timer, I was main grinder. We rode on True North IV, which was a $20 million dollar yacht that raced in the 1987 America's Cup. It was absolutely the best part of the week. We raced around, worked as a team, and lost to Stars & Stripes even though our boat was supposed to be the fastest. They took us from the boat over to their shop to buy photos ($30!) and T-Shirts ($20). But if you ever go back and wear your t-shirt, they'll give you another for free.

 

We went back to the ship and changed. I had wanted to go to Orient Beach, but it was 2pm when we got to the boat. We took a water taxi ($5 each for all day) over to the main strip (could have walked 15 minutes for free). We walked past many people trying to get us the rent chairs. We laid out the towels and went swimming. The water wasn't clear at all. There were many rocks, but nothing worth bringing home. After a couple hours, we walked along the street behind the beach. I didn't see anything worth stopping for. We got back on the water taxi, and back to the few shops by the pier. We bought 6 packs of soda for $4 each as we were running low. It went into the bag through the metal detector and they didn't even look to see if it was beer. There was a stand that was selling any 2 beers for $5 (including imports).

 

Ship Stuff:

Balcony:

Absolutely worth getting. The thing I miss most is having that balcony to see the blue ocean, the breeze, and looking at the stars. But especially the ports and other island we could see. I kept wanting to sleep in , but kept getting up at 7am and going out the door to see everything.

 

Tips:

They put $140 on our S&S card ($10/person/day) on the next to last day. I went down to the purser and had it removed. I tipped the room steward well, but didn't think the waiter was worth anything.

 

People:

Very few kids since school is in. Most people in 50's and up. Mostly Americans. Friendly.

 

Bartender:

I went to the same bartender on the aft deck every night for a bucket of 4 beers ($20, saves $2). Every night he asked me what I wanted, and how many opened. I said none, and every time he told me that they weren't twist off. I told him I had a bottle opener. So he never remembered anything, so why tip him more than the 15% already added to the alochol charges?

 

Aft Lido:

If you want quiet, this is much better than the front pools. Fewer kids, fewer people, no music. The pool and hot tub are open till midnight. Mendy spent most of her sunning time here.

 

Bars:

Many of the ones I wanted to visit were smoking. I'm not griping that you smoke. But it triggers my asthma, so I didn't get to enjoy the jazz music, piano bar, and some of the others. Not many people out late dancing. Again it's an older crowd.

 

Disembarkation:

You could pay $15/person to have 2 bags each taken by the ship to the airport, so you wouldn't have to touch your luggage after you put it outside your room the night before to when you arrived at your final airport destination. But you had to sign up at 1pm the day before. I was in line at 12:50pm, got to her at 1:08pm and she said it was too late. Then checked and said they were just finishing up and could still do it and where was my passport. I didn't know you needed a passport to do luggage, so they said it was too late.

 

Which wasn't a big problem. They called by decks & air flight times. It was supposed to be for those carrying the luggage first, then those with certain flight times, etc. But they only called two decks for carrying luggage, then switched around. We left when they switched around and made a mass migration. It was pretty tough navigating luggage, but once you got off the ship it was pretty smooth. And you just walked with your luggage to the shuttle and it takes off quickly.

[DqALEX]

Thanks for your review. IM going on the Glory Jan.26 for the first time. I can't wait to see the ship

[McDebbie]

Great review, seems you had less kids than we did. We were on the Triumph which left before you did in St Thomas, did you see me waving? :) The sight of the two ships all lit up passing each other leaving port was priceless.

[GAMOMOF2]

Thanks for the review. I am going on the Glory in April 09 and can't wait to get on another bigger ship and do a longer cruise. I have several shorter ones to get me by until then.

 

St. Martin is my favorite port so far too. I just loved Orient Beach. Sorry you could not make it. It was just beautiful.

[seafun]

Nice review with lots of helpful information. I'll be on the Glory in about 12 days. Thanks for whetting my appetite. :)

[mikedx]

We didn't get back on board until just after the Triumph left. But we did see it sail off with it's lights on. It must have been wonderful to see the two ships so close together all lit up.

 

My wife and I decided that if there's another vacation, we will just fly down to St. Martin and spend a week there. So I'm sure I'll have a chance to see Orient Beach at some point.

[mikedx]

One thing I left out is room service. We didn't order it. I didn't see the point in tipping people a couple bucks when I could just walk up two flights of stairs, get food, and take the tray back down to our room.

 

But then I'm the kind of guy that would rather dig through all the luggage by the elevator on our floor to get my bag an hour early...

[kicia]

Just a note about bringing liquor on the plane. You can take it as a piece of checked luggage. We have done that several times with Delta even before the 3 oz restrictions. We just take newspapers and repack the box tightly and use tape to seal it. We did have to sign a form for Delta saying that we would not hold Delta responsible for any damage. We've never had a problem and everything made it home safely. We've usually done this from St. Thomas as we have stayed there a lot.

[mikedx]

They would NOT allow us to check the liquor box in as luggage. My wife told them that the liquor store told us that it was approved as checked luggage, but they weren't listening.

 

They didn't mention any forms waving them of responsibility.

 

We just ended up putting them in the luggage. But to keep each suitcase under 50 pounds, we had to juggle them around. Fortunately they had a scale right by Delta, so we got 2 suitcases at 49.5 lbs each.

[Tiffany1203]

I sailed the Glory 9/1/07...I liked the ship but the atrium wasnt as "grand" as other carnival ships I have been on and half of the atrium looking up was just a gray/silver PLAIN wall...... That was the only disappointing thing to me about the ship.