Jump to content
Cruise Critic Community

Glory Eastern 2-14-09 Review

nybumpkin

By nybumpkin,
in Carnival Cruise Lines

Recommended Posts

nybumpkin

nybumpkin

Posted
Posted

We sailed on Carnival Glory Feb. 14, 2009, our ninth Carnival cruise and our third February vacation cruise from a Florida port. We started taking February cruise vacations in 2007 and have found them to be a great way to break out of the winter doldrums. This year, with colder temperatures and above-average snowfall, it was really nice to get away from the frozen Northeast!

We’re a family of five – DH and me in our late 40s and our three sons. Oldest is a high school senior for whom this was likely his last family cruise for some time. However, he has lots of cruising time ahead of him, as he plans to attend the US Merchant Marine Academy for college and wants to go into Marine Engineering. I guess the cruising bug bit him hard! He hung out with kids at Club O2 and we hardly saw him except for meals and shore excursions.

Middle son is almost 13 and in middle school. We gave him more freedom on this cruise than on previous cruises and as far as I can tell he didn’t abuse the privilege. Mostly he liked meeting other teen guys to play basketball. We bought him a soda card, but he did not have charging privileges on his Sail and Sign card.

Youngest son turned 9 during the cruise. He’s a Camp Carnival veteran at this point. We kept him with the 6-8 group and he had a great time. There was a male counselor in Camp Carnival for this group on this cruise, which is unusual in our experience, and son thought he was just great.

Pre-cruise: DH was already in Orlando for a conference the week before the cruise. That meant I was responsible for most of the packing, getting the dog to the kennel, and getting the boys and me to the airport the day before the cruise. It all worked well: DH met us at the airport, where we had hired a car to take us to Port Canaveral, and we stayed at the Radisson at the Port. It’s a very nice hotel; we had a two-room suite for the five of us, complete with hot tub. The pool area is fun, with waterfalls, a kids’ pool, a pool with oversized goldfish (they like crackers), a tiki bar, and nice seating areas. They have parking available for cruise passengers and a shuttle to the port. If you plan to use the shuttle, make reservations early – they fill up quickly. We called the week before the cruise and were on the 12:30 shuttle. It was very well organized, and although we didn’t leave the Radisson on time we were at the port before 1:00.

Embarkation and day 1: Since we booked a suite for DH, youngest son and me, our documents gave us VIP boarding, so when we arrived at the port and saw the line we asked the first attendant we saw where we should go for VIP boarding. She looked down her nose at us and said “if you’re not Platinum you get in this line,” referring to regular boarding. Okay, strike one. The line actually moved very well and when we reached the next attendant we showed her our documents and she sent us to the VIP line. Mostly it moved us up in the security check and gave us a separate check-in desk. It was all very well done, but in the end we boarded the ship the same time that other folks that arrived on the Radisson shuttle with us boarded. In any event, for having arrived at the port shortly before 1, we were aboard the ship shortly before 1:30. We dropped off our carry-on bags and went up to Lido for lunch, and all our checked bags arrived before the muster drill. Disney Magic was also in port, and as we sailed she blew her “When you wish upon a star” whistle. As much as youngest son likes Carnival, he seemed a little wistful looking over at Disney Magic.

In a change from our past experiences, the Camp Carnival registration was at 5:15, before dinner. While not a perfect time, it was better than rushing from dinner to Camp Carnival registration after dinner.

We had 6:00 dinner in the Golden (midships) dining room; for the first time we had a table on the upper level. We were seated with a mom and three daughters from Saskatchewan – really lovely folks. If you think it’s hard to get to a port, try getting to Florida when you live an hour and a half north of Saskatoon. Our servers were Jacobus (Jake) from South Africa and Jarinya from Indonesia – a really great team. I was surprised, though, that this night we were given only two dessert options – the warm chocolate melting cake or the diet orange cake. The regular dessert menu was available every other night.

We went to the Welcome Aboard Show at 10:15. Our cruise director was James Charlton, who was subbing for Butch, the regular CD. James was pretty good, although one passenger left him a bit speechless. Being Valentine’s Day, he called up on stage some folks who had been married varying lengths of time. The man who had been married 40+ years, upon being asked whether he hoped for romance on the cruise, replied “Well, I brought my little purple (sic) pills with me!” I wasn’t sure James was going to recover from that one.

Sunday (Nassau): We arrived in Nassau right on schedule and docked with Imagination and Majesty of the Seas. Since our port time was so limited (8:30-2:00), we decided to do our own walking tour near the pier. We went to Pirates of Nassau first, and the boys enjoyed it. They have some decent re-creations of what life on a pirate ship would have been like. The five of us were admitted for a total of $42 – much less than the ship’s excursion would have cost ($39 pp, which would have included a bus tour of downtown Nassau). After Pirates, we walked up the hill to St. Francis Cathedral for Sunday Mass at 11:00. The boys were horrified that we were making them go to church on their vacation. And this wasn’t your American 50-minute Sunday Mass – it was a full 1 ½ hours, with lots of singing. The parishioners were very welcoming; at the end of Mass, the priest went around to ask each visitor to tell where they were from, and they were very appreciative of the fact that the visitors took time from their vacations to spend with them.

After sailaway, we had our Cruise Critic get-together at the aft pool bar. It was nice being able to put faces and names together!

That night was the first “elegant” night. I can’t say much about the Captain’s reception – DH took too long getting dressed and by the time we reached the aft lounge it was too crowded to get in. They were supposed to have the other aft lounges open, but everyone jammed into the one lounge. We opted to go get some pictures taken and get some drinks at the casino bar before dinner. I can say that by and large, people dressed up for dinner – jackets and ties for the men, nice dresses for the women. This was lobster night at dinner, and our youngest son ate two lobster dinners as well as the shrimp that went with the lobster. We just told him not to get used to it.

After dinner, youngest son changed and we took him to Camp Carnival. They had a late-night party until midnight, so we took advantage and went to the show (Livin’ in America) and then to the Ivory Bar, where “Souldrive” was playing classic rock. This ended up being our hangout for most evenings – they are really good and a lot of fun.

Monday (sea day): We followed our usual sea day routine of Lido deck breakfast followed by coffee from the coffee bar and gin rummy on the Promenade deck. The Purser’s (excuse me – Guest Information) desk still has decks of cards for the asking. After lunch, Super Trivia was scheduled in the Ivory Bar. This is a team trivia event: participants form teams (we had four teams on this cruise) and you are asked questions from 5-6 categories; if you get the question right, you roll a large cube to determine how many points you get. There were three rounds scheduled, all at 1:30 on sea days. We had a fun team: The Glory (Splash) Turtles. Youngest son was our designated cube-roller.

After trivia, there was swimming, followed by Tea time, also in the Ivory Bar. (Can you guess where we spent most of our on-ship time?) We brought youngest son along – he was worried that he wouldn’t enjoy it, but when they serve chocolate cake and strawberries, how could a 9 YO not be happy? Ian, the piano player from the Lobby bar, provided the music for tea time. (Of all things, he played Billy Joel’s “New York State of Mind.” If you’ve seen any of my other reviews, you know that this is my least favorite cruise song, usually encountered in the piano bar. Although I actually like the song, when I’m on a cruise I’m looking to get away from New York and am definitely NOT in a New York state of mind!)

The show this evening was Marcus Anthony’s “Evening of Motown and More.” Marcus is a fly-on entertainer; he does a show on one ship, then disembarks and goes to another ship to do a show. If he’s scheduled to perform on your cruise, do not miss his show – he’s great. Aside from being a good singer, he has fun with members of the audience. I did a bit of wandering after the show while DH got youngest son ready for bed. Gayla in the piano bar was very good – she had quite a following.

Tuesday (St. Thomas): We arrived in port at 10 a.m, but our excursion did not depart until 12:30 so we enjoyed a leisurely morning and lunch on board. Our excursion was the “Castaway Barefoot Sail and Snorkel” through Carnival. St. Thomas is a port where I would ordinarily do an independent excursion (as we did last time we visited), but we found this excursion was cheaper than an independent when you factored in taxi costs. Castaway Girl is a 65 foot catamaran, docked within walking distance of the ship. You take a short sail to Buck Island, where you moor off the island and snorkel. I ended up not snorkeling, but DH and our two older sons enjoyed following the crew to a shipwreck. I was very happy to stay on the boat and drink rum punch – which turns out to be stronger than you think it is. Oldest son watched them make it – two small cans of orange and pineapple juice followed by two large bottles of rum. There were a fair number of folks that were feeling no pain on the way back. The boat was nice and the crew was fun and very capable. After the excursion we just returned to the ship, so no shopping for us – we sat out on the balcony, went to dinner, sailed away at 8:00 (the first nighttime sailaway we’d done since San Juan in 2006), and went to listen to Souldrive in the Ivory Bar once again. We had an early morning in St. Maarten, so we turned in early.

Wednesday (St. Maarten): We booked the “Shipwreck Beach Snorkeling Excursion” through Island Marketing, which we’ve used for excursions on previous cruises. We had to walk about 10 minutes to a marina to meet the boat – a nice little launch (bio-diesel fueled, no less). First we went to a cove for snorkeling; I thought the water was a bit rough, so I opted out of snorkeling (again) and stayed with youngest son. DH and older sons had a good time – there was a sunken submarine for viewing – but the waters were too stirred up for good fish viewing. After snorkeling, we headed over to Great Bay for some beach time. If you’ve ever gone to the Kroooz-Cams website and clicked on the St. Martin webcam, that’s exactly where we were. Nice beach, great view of the ships and Phillipsburg, and good beverages and snacks. The only downside was that since we went over the side of the boat to get to the beach, our sunscreen washed off. DH and youngest son were okay because they kept tee shirts on, but the rest of us turned a bit red.

After the excursion, we went back to Glory, showered and changed, had lunch, and went back out. This time we took the water taxi over to Phillipsburg, did some shopping, and stopped for beverages at one of the waterfront bars. DH loved St. Maarten and wants to go back; I won’t object. I think I’d like to go to Maho Beach and watch planes land next time.

We booked the supper club for this evening. It’s a wonderful evening, even if this time we were serenaded by George Michael and Air Supply instead of live music. (They did have live music on two nights – Ian, the piano player who usually played in the lobby bar and also provided music for tea.) Unfortunately, between too much sun and too much movement (Glory was sailing through a front with 12-foot seas), my appetite was not what is should have been. I managed the lobster bisque and salad okay, but by the time my steak arrived I just couldn’t eat any more. I felt bad about it – the chef even came out to make sure the food was okay. Lesson learned: I won’t book the supper club on a port day, even if we have plenty of time between re-boarding and dinner. I need a more leisurely day before a big meal like that.

Thursday (sea day): Again, we had a morning of breakfast, coffee and cards, lunch, Super Trivia (our team grew since the last round), the Marriage Show (what a riot) and tea time. This was the second “elegant” night, and the Past Guest party took place right before dinner. The aft lounge was completely full. Now that we’re about to be Platinum, I’m starting to think that there should be a special party for Platinum guests! Our table mates from Saskatchewan did not make it to dinner; as events proved, a couple of them were suffering a bad case of mal de mer. The main show was “Just Rock,” a new show we hadn’t seen previously (pretty good, although not my favorite production show), and after that we headed back to the Ivory Bar for more Souldrive.

Friday (last sea day): Last days always have a different feel to them. You feel as if the crew has already moved on, even though the ship is completely yours for another 24 hours. You try to get in things that you missed earlier in the cruise, go through the photo area one last time (didn’t we get a photo taken with Bahama Mama on Sunday? And doesn’t she look a lot like Tropicana Anna in Belize last year?), and start packing. Starting earlier in the day makes it somewhat less painful after dinner. One last round of gin rummy and coffee in the morning – one last Lido deck lunch – the finals of Super Trivia (our team won!) – the kids’ talent show – and last dinner. This was youngest son’s birthday, and we had cake for him in the dining room. (Camp Carnival took good care of him for his birthday as well.) Bade farewell to the family from Saskatchewan; they’ve decided that although they liked the cruise, they like land-based vacations better. Sons said farewell to their new friends and we spent one last night with Souldrive. Oh, yes – I came out ahead at the casino. DH and I don’t normally spend time in the casino, but I had a handful of quarters left from laundry and I decided I wanted to try my hand at the slots. One quarter went in, five quarters came out. Two quarters went in, four quarters came out. That was it – we were $1.75 ahead. Now I can say I won in the casino.

Saturday (disembarkation): Since we were in a suite, we had early disembarkation, even though we didn’t need it. When we booked our flights, we couldn’t get a flight home on Saturday so we opted for another day at the Port Canaveral Radisson. We were off the ship before 8 a.m. and back at the Radisson before 9. We did have to wait until a room became available, but we had a great time hanging out by the pool. I did a lot of reading, something I haven’t done in ages. The next morning, the guy who had driven us to Port Canaveral the week before picked us up at the Radisson early and had us to the airport in good time for our flight. We were home by midday on Sunday.

Random thoughts:

Food: No complaints from me as to either quality or variety. We ate all breakfasts and lunches on the Lido deck – burgers many times, also enjoyed the chicken fingers they served at the grill. I’m a fan of the “Taste of Nations” line, and Glory did not disappoint. The “French” day was particularly good; I’ve also liked “Indian” and “Caribbean” in the past.

While the dinner menu is now divided into “starters” and “entrees,” you’re welcome to order more than one in either category. Our oldest son regularly ordered an appetizer and a salad. I ordered two appetizers the night they offered the tomato/mozzarella and the wild mushroom soup. The lobster was paired with tiger shrimp and the filet mignon with braised short ribs on the two “elegant” nights; I hadn’t thought about their pairing a smaller expensive cut with another less expensive one (Dr. Jack Daniels, sailing on Legend the same week, made that observation), but he’s probably right – the filet got smaller, as did the lobster tail. However, I really liked the short ribs – they had great flavor. The side dishes are more uniform now – if they’re serving creamed peas with the chicken dish, the peas are probably also being served with the fish. I wasn’t fond of the mac and cheese side dish, but then I don’t order an entrée based on the side dishes anyway. As noted at the beginning, I was a little surprised on the first night when we were offered only our choice of diet orange cake or warm chocolate melting cake for dessert, and I was a bit apprehensive that this would become a regular practice for dessert – but not to worry, they had the full dessert menus the other nights.

Service: Again, no complaints. Jake and Jarinya provided great service in the dining room, as did Carolina the bar server. Both Jake and Jarinya worked on the Lido deck cleaning tables near the pool. Jake told us his schedule – long hours, starting early morning on Lido, then a break in the afternoon, then on to the dining room. His hope was to be out of the dining room at night before the crew’s buffet closed. The food available after that wasn’t nearly as good. Our room steward (I wish I could remember her name – she was very visible and a really nice person) took very good care of us. She saw me coming down the hall with an armload of just-washed clothes and went right over to open the cabin door for me.

Entertainment: All of the entertainers we saw were enjoyable. As noted above, Souldrive was our favorite. Their music was 70s-80s classic rock, but our kids liked them as well. (Mostly they were trying to get tips for Guitar Hero.) There was a duo going by the name “Euphoria” that did “romantic dancing” music, and they were very good. Gayla in the piano bar has a great voice and is very entertaining. The nights I saw her, she had a good crowd. I did notice a lot more “doubling up” among the entertainers – one night the Lido calypso players were performing at the casino bar, Souldrive did a Lido deck performance when we sailed from St. Thomas, Ian the cocktail pianist also did turns at tea and in the Supper Club – you get the idea. No jazz group on this cruise, or a classical trio. However, the ship’s orchestra did some big band and jazz concerts to take the place of the jazz group. To be honest, I thought I would miss the jazz trio in the cigar bar (cigarettes permitted – no cigars), and I thought it was wrong to put the cigar smokers in the sports bar – but Souldrive brought more people into the cigar bar space than I ever saw with the jazz groups. Maybe the powers that be actually knew what they were doing, aside from cutting costs.

Kids’ Activities: One thing that keeps us coming back to Carnival is the kids’ programs. The counselors generally are top-notch and have a good variety of activities available for the kids. Our older sons were in Club O2 and Circle C and they enjoyed both programs. If they weren’t doing program-sponsored activities, they were hanging out with other kids from the program.

Youngest son stayed with the 6-8 group; we could have moved him up since he turned 9 during the cruise, but he – and we – really like the 6-8 program on Carnival. Summer is soon enough for the 9-11 program for him. He had a great time. He went to two “late night” parties, participated in the talent show (a group number), had lots of craft projects – he was busy.

I have noticed more efforts to “sell” to the younger crowd – build-a-bear, Freddy packages, and photo shots. Youngest son had a photo done with a ship’s background and it was very good – in fact, we decided to buy it in place of the photo package done at his school the week before. It was a nicer photo and about half the price! There was no pressure to buy anything, but it does seem apparent that this is being viewed as another available revenue source.

The Ship: We liked the “colors” theme. Usually there’s at least one lounge on a Carnival ship where I say to myself, “What in the world was Joe Farcus thinking?” I didn’t find one of those lounges on Glory. The ship is well maintained and aside from normal wear and tear (the camels in the casino are starting to show the effects of people sitting on them for photos) is in great shape. I did notice a few things different on Glory than Valor and Liberty – no rest room in the supper club, for example. And I found I missed the Lido deck movie screen.

The Passengers: There was a wide range of age groups on this cruise – lots of young families, families with school age kids (since it was President’s Week, there are some states – ours included – where the kids are off from school the entire week), couples without kids, and seniors. There was a group of older teens who were rather annoying – sitting on the tables in the Lido restaurant, racing up the stairs (they almost plowed down a man in a wheelchair once), and there was the two thirtysomething couples who got into a fight over deck chairs by the aft pool, but aside from those instances I didn’t see any “over the top” behavior.

Overall: This was the first Eastern itinerary we’d sailed since 2006, and we loved it. We liked having three full sea days. While my first thought for next year was Pride out of Baltimore because we can drive to the port, I’m thinking that this same itinerary on Dream would be a lot of fun. And Glory is coming to New York in summer 2010 for the Canada itinerary, including the 9-day Quebec cruise that ended up getting cancelled this summer. Stay tuned…

Link to comment
Share on other sites
smarks

smarks

Posted
Posted

Thanks nybumpkin for a great review. Looks like you covered all the bases. I haven't been on the Glory and can't wait to sail her. We sail May 9. Glad you had a good trip. Thanks again for the great review.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
cjkumbaya

cjkumbaya

Posted
Posted

Your review was really fantastic - thank you so much for taking the time and for sharing your great cruise with all of us. My husband and I will be on the glory on this same itinerary in May and we are really looking forward to it. Your review has really help us to know that we are in for a really great trip.:)

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Kcarp

Kcarp

Posted
Posted

Great review, thanks for sharing. :)

 

This time we took the water taxi over to Phillipsburg, did some shopping, and stopped for beverages at one of the waterfront bars.

Could you explain how this works?

Link to comment
Share on other sites
pe4all

pe4all

Posted
Posted

Thank you for the great review. I hope the 10 plus inches of snow we got last nite/today doesn't fade your tan too fast!! Do you mind me asking - what car service did you use to get to PC from MCO and back? I know there were 5 of you - was it reasonably priced? I am already looking for our Dec. cruise. And congrats on DS's college acceptance. What a great career choice for him! (Now, if I can only get DD17 to make a college decision...:rolleyes:)

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Catrin

Catrin

Posted
Posted

Thanks for a terrific review!

 

I especially loved the review of the kids activities.... although we h ave been on many cruises with our kids, it is nice to hear what others do!

Catrin

Link to comment
Share on other sites
vlwalker

vlwalker

Posted
Posted
We sailed on Carnival Glory Feb. 14, 2009, our ninth Carnival cruise and our third February vacation cruise from a Florida port. We started taking February cruise vacations in 2007 and have found them to be a great way to break out of the winter doldrums. This year, with colder temperatures and above-average snowfall, it was really nice to get away from the frozen Northeast!

We’re a family of five – DH and me in our late 40s and our three sons. Oldest is a high school senior for whom this was likely his last family cruise for some time. However, he has lots of cruising time ahead of him, as he plans to attend the US Merchant Marine Academy for college and wants to go into Marine Engineering. I guess the cruising bug bit him hard! He hung out with kids at Club O2 and we hardly saw him except for meals and shore excursions.

Middle son is almost 13 and in middle school. We gave him more freedom on this cruise than on previous cruises and as far as I can tell he didn’t abuse the privilege. Mostly he liked meeting other teen guys to play basketball. We bought him a soda card, but he did not have charging privileges on his Sail and Sign card.

Youngest son turned 9 during the cruise. He’s a Camp Carnival veteran at this point. We kept him with the 6-8 group and he had a great time. There was a male counselor in Camp Carnival for this group on this cruise, which is unusual in our experience, and son thought he was just great.

Pre-cruise: DH was already in Orlando for a conference the week before the cruise. That meant I was responsible for most of the packing, getting the dog to the kennel, and getting the boys and me to the airport the day before the cruise. It all worked well: DH met us at the airport, where we had hired a car to take us to Port Canaveral, and we stayed at the Radisson at the Port. It’s a very nice hotel; we had a two-room suite for the five of us, complete with hot tub. The pool area is fun, with waterfalls, a kids’ pool, a pool with oversized goldfish (they like crackers), a tiki bar, and nice seating areas. They have parking available for cruise passengers and a shuttle to the port. If you plan to use the shuttle, make reservations early – they fill up quickly. We called the week before the cruise and were on the 12:30 shuttle. It was very well organized, and although we didn’t leave the Radisson on time we were at the port before 1:00.

Embarkation and day 1: Since we booked a suite for DH, youngest son and me, our documents gave us VIP boarding, so when we arrived at the port and saw the line we asked the first attendant we saw where we should go for VIP boarding. She looked down her nose at us and said “if you’re not Platinum you get in this line,” referring to regular boarding. Okay, strike one. The line actually moved very well and when we reached the next attendant we showed her our documents and she sent us to the VIP line. Mostly it moved us up in the security check and gave us a separate check-in desk. It was all very well done, but in the end we boarded the ship the same time that other folks that arrived on the Radisson shuttle with us boarded. In any event, for having arrived at the port shortly before 1, we were aboard the ship shortly before 1:30. We dropped off our carry-on bags and went up to Lido for lunch, and all our checked bags arrived before the muster drill. Disney Magic was also in port, and as we sailed she blew her “When you wish upon a star” whistle. As much as youngest son likes Carnival, he seemed a little wistful looking over at Disney Magic.

In a change from our past experiences, the Camp Carnival registration was at 5:15, before dinner. While not a perfect time, it was better than rushing from dinner to Camp Carnival registration after dinner.

We had 6:00 dinner in the Golden (midships) dining room; for the first time we had a table on the upper level. We were seated with a mom and three daughters from Saskatchewan – really lovely folks. If you think it’s hard to get to a port, try getting to Florida when you live an hour and a half north of Saskatoon. Our servers were Jacobus (Jake) from South Africa and Jarinya from Indonesia – a really great team. I was surprised, though, that this night we were given only two dessert options – the warm chocolate melting cake or the diet orange cake. The regular dessert menu was available every other night.

We went to the Welcome Aboard Show at 10:15. Our cruise director was James Charlton, who was subbing for Butch, the regular CD. James was pretty good, although one passenger left him a bit speechless. Being Valentine’s Day, he called up on stage some folks who had been married varying lengths of time. The man who had been married 40+ years, upon being asked whether he hoped for romance on the cruise, replied “Well, I brought my little purple (sic) pills with me!” I wasn’t sure James was going to recover from that one.

Sunday (Nassau): We arrived in Nassau right on schedule and docked with Imagination and Majesty of the Seas. Since our port time was so limited (8:30-2:00), we decided to do our own walking tour near the pier. We went to Pirates of Nassau first, and the boys enjoyed it. They have some decent re-creations of what life on a pirate ship would have been like. The five of us were admitted for a total of $42 – much less than the ship’s excursion would have cost ($39 pp, which would have included a bus tour of downtown Nassau). After Pirates, we walked up the hill to St. Francis Cathedral for Sunday Mass at 11:00. The boys were horrified that we were making them go to church on their vacation. And this wasn’t your American 50-minute Sunday Mass – it was a full 1 ½ hours, with lots of singing. The parishioners were very welcoming; at the end of Mass, the priest went around to ask each visitor to tell where they were from, and they were very appreciative of the fact that the visitors took time from their vacations to spend with them.

After sailaway, we had our Cruise Critic get-together at the aft pool bar. It was nice being able to put faces and names together!

That night was the first “elegant” night. I can’t say much about the Captain’s reception – DH took too long getting dressed and by the time we reached the aft lounge it was too crowded to get in. They were supposed to have the other aft lounges open, but everyone jammed into the one lounge. We opted to go get some pictures taken and get some drinks at the casino bar before dinner. I can say that by and large, people dressed up for dinner – jackets and ties for the men, nice dresses for the women. This was lobster night at dinner, and our youngest son ate two lobster dinners as well as the shrimp that went with the lobster. We just told him not to get used to it.

After dinner, youngest son changed and we took him to Camp Carnival. They had a late-night party until midnight, so we took advantage and went to the show (Livin’ in America) and then to the Ivory Bar, where “Souldrive” was playing classic rock. This ended up being our hangout for most evenings – they are really good and a lot of fun.

Monday (sea day): We followed our usual sea day routine of Lido deck breakfast followed by coffee from the coffee bar and gin rummy on the Promenade deck. The Purser’s (excuse me – Guest Information) desk still has decks of cards for the asking. After lunch, Super Trivia was scheduled in the Ivory Bar. This is a team trivia event: participants form teams (we had four teams on this cruise) and you are asked questions from 5-6 categories; if you get the question right, you roll a large cube to determine how many points you get. There were three rounds scheduled, all at 1:30 on sea days. We had a fun team: The Glory (Splash) Turtles. Youngest son was our designated cube-roller.

After trivia, there was swimming, followed by Tea time, also in the Ivory Bar. (Can you guess where we spent most of our on-ship time?) We brought youngest son along – he was worried that he wouldn’t enjoy it, but when they serve chocolate cake and strawberries, how could a 9 YO not be happy? Ian, the piano player from the Lobby bar, provided the music for tea time. (Of all things, he played Billy Joel’s “New York State of Mind.” If you’ve seen any of my other reviews, you know that this is my least favorite cruise song, usually encountered in the piano bar. Although I actually like the song, when I’m on a cruise I’m looking to get away from New York and am definitely NOT in a New York state of mind!)

The show this evening was Marcus Anthony’s “Evening of Motown and More.” Marcus is a fly-on entertainer; he does a show on one ship, then disembarks and goes to another ship to do a show. If he’s scheduled to perform on your cruise, do not miss his show – he’s great. Aside from being a good singer, he has fun with members of the audience. I did a bit of wandering after the show while DH got youngest son ready for bed. Gayla in the piano bar was very good – she had quite a following.

Tuesday (St. Thomas): We arrived in port at 10 a.m, but our excursion did not depart until 12:30 so we enjoyed a leisurely morning and lunch on board. Our excursion was the “Castaway Barefoot Sail and Snorkel” through Carnival. St. Thomas is a port where I would ordinarily do an independent excursion (as we did last time we visited), but we found this excursion was cheaper than an independent when you factored in taxi costs. Castaway Girl is a 65 foot catamaran, docked within walking distance of the ship. You take a short sail to Buck Island, where you moor off the island and snorkel. I ended up not snorkeling, but DH and our two older sons enjoyed following the crew to a shipwreck. I was very happy to stay on the boat and drink rum punch – which turns out to be stronger than you think it is. Oldest son watched them make it – two small cans of orange and pineapple juice followed by two large bottles of rum. There were a fair number of folks that were feeling no pain on the way back. The boat was nice and the crew was fun and very capable. After the excursion we just returned to the ship, so no shopping for us – we sat out on the balcony, went to dinner, sailed away at 8:00 (the first nighttime sailaway we’d done since San Juan in 2006), and went to listen to Souldrive in the Ivory Bar once again. We had an early morning in St. Maarten, so we turned in early.

Wednesday (St. Maarten): We booked the “Shipwreck Beach Snorkeling Excursion” through Island Marketing, which we’ve used for excursions on previous cruises. We had to walk about 10 minutes to a marina to meet the boat – a nice little launch (bio-diesel fueled, no less). First we went to a cove for snorkeling; I thought the water was a bit rough, so I opted out of snorkeling (again) and stayed with youngest son. DH and older sons had a good time – there was a sunken submarine for viewing – but the waters were too stirred up for good fish viewing. After snorkeling, we headed over to Great Bay for some beach time. If you’ve ever gone to the Kroooz-Cams website and clicked on the St. Martin webcam, that’s exactly where we were. Nice beach, great view of the ships and Phillipsburg, and good beverages and snacks. The only downside was that since we went over the side of the boat to get to the beach, our sunscreen washed off. DH and youngest son were okay because they kept tee shirts on, but the rest of us turned a bit red.

After the excursion, we went back to Glory, showered and changed, had lunch, and went back out. This time we took the water taxi over to Phillipsburg, did some shopping, and stopped for beverages at one of the waterfront bars. DH loved St. Maarten and wants to go back; I won’t object. I think I’d like to go to Maho Beach and watch planes land next time.

We booked the supper club for this evening. It’s a wonderful evening, even if this time we were serenaded by George Michael and Air Supply instead of live music. (They did have live music on two nights – Ian, the piano player who usually played in the lobby bar and also provided music for tea.) Unfortunately, between too much sun and too much movement (Glory was sailing through a front with 12-foot seas), my appetite was not what is should have been. I managed the lobster bisque and salad okay, but by the time my steak arrived I just couldn’t eat any more. I felt bad about it – the chef even came out to make sure the food was okay. Lesson learned: I won’t book the supper club on a port day, even if we have plenty of time between re-boarding and dinner. I need a more leisurely day before a big meal like that.

Thursday (sea day): Again, we had a morning of breakfast, coffee and cards, lunch, Super Trivia (our team grew since the last round), the Marriage Show (what a riot) and tea time. This was the second “elegant” night, and the Past Guest party took place right before dinner. The aft lounge was completely full. Now that we’re about to be Platinum, I’m starting to think that there should be a special party for Platinum guests! Our table mates from Saskatchewan did not make it to dinner; as events proved, a couple of them were suffering a bad case of mal de mer. The main show was “Just Rock,” a new show we hadn’t seen previously (pretty good, although not my favorite production show), and after that we headed back to the Ivory Bar for more Souldrive.

Friday (last sea day): Last days always have a different feel to them. You feel as if the crew has already moved on, even though the ship is completely yours for another 24 hours. You try to get in things that you missed earlier in the cruise, go through the photo area one last time (didn’t we get a photo taken with Bahama Mama on Sunday? And doesn’t she look a lot like Tropicana Anna in Belize last year?), and start packing. Starting earlier in the day makes it somewhat less painful after dinner. One last round of gin rummy and coffee in the morning – one last Lido deck lunch – the finals of Super Trivia (our team won!) – the kids’ talent show – and last dinner. This was youngest son’s birthday, and we had cake for him in the dining room. (Camp Carnival took good care of him for his birthday as well.) Bade farewell to the family from Saskatchewan; they’ve decided that although they liked the cruise, they like land-based vacations better. Sons said farewell to their new friends and we spent one last night with Souldrive. Oh, yes – I came out ahead at the casino. DH and I don’t normally spend time in the casino, but I had a handful of quarters left from laundry and I decided I wanted to try my hand at the slots. One quarter went in, five quarters came out. Two quarters went in, four quarters came out. That was it – we were $1.75 ahead. Now I can say I won in the casino.

Saturday (disembarkation): Since we were in a suite, we had early disembarkation, even though we didn’t need it. When we booked our flights, we couldn’t get a flight home on Saturday so we opted for another day at the Port Canaveral Radisson. We were off the ship before 8 a.m. and back at the Radisson before 9. We did have to wait until a room became available, but we had a great time hanging out by the pool. I did a lot of reading, something I haven’t done in ages. The next morning, the guy who had driven us to Port Canaveral the week before picked us up at the Radisson early and had us to the airport in good time for our flight. We were home by midday on Sunday.

Random thoughts:

Food: No complaints from me as to either quality or variety. We ate all breakfasts and lunches on the Lido deck – burgers many times, also enjoyed the chicken fingers they served at the grill. I’m a fan of the “Taste of Nations” line, and Glory did not disappoint. The “French” day was particularly good; I’ve also liked “Indian” and “Caribbean” in the past.

While the dinner menu is now divided into “starters” and “entrees,” you’re welcome to order more than one in either category. Our oldest son regularly ordered an appetizer and a salad. I ordered two appetizers the night they offered the tomato/mozzarella and the wild mushroom soup. The lobster was paired with tiger shrimp and the filet mignon with braised short ribs on the two “elegant” nights; I hadn’t thought about their pairing a smaller expensive cut with another less expensive one (Dr. Jack Daniels, sailing on Legend the same week, made that observation), but he’s probably right – the filet got smaller, as did the lobster tail. However, I really liked the short ribs – they had great flavor. The side dishes are more uniform now – if they’re serving creamed peas with the chicken dish, the peas are probably also being served with the fish. I wasn’t fond of the mac and cheese side dish, but then I don’t order an entrée based on the side dishes anyway. As noted at the beginning, I was a little surprised on the first night when we were offered only our choice of diet orange cake or warm chocolate melting cake for dessert, and I was a bit apprehensive that this would become a regular practice for dessert – but not to worry, they had the full dessert menus the other nights.

Service: Again, no complaints. Jake and Jarinya provided great service in the dining room, as did Carolina the bar server. Both Jake and Jarinya worked on the Lido deck cleaning tables near the pool. Jake told us his schedule – long hours, starting early morning on Lido, then a break in the afternoon, then on to the dining room. His hope was to be out of the dining room at night before the crew’s buffet closed. The food available after that wasn’t nearly as good. Our room steward (I wish I could remember her name – she was very visible and a really nice person) took very good care of us. She saw me coming down the hall with an armload of just-washed clothes and went right over to open the cabin door for me.

Entertainment: All of the entertainers we saw were enjoyable. As noted above, Souldrive was our favorite. Their music was 70s-80s classic rock, but our kids liked them as well. (Mostly they were trying to get tips for Guitar Hero.) There was a duo going by the name “Euphoria” that did “romantic dancing” music, and they were very good. Gayla in the piano bar has a great voice and is very entertaining. The nights I saw her, she had a good crowd. I did notice a lot more “doubling up” among the entertainers – one night the Lido calypso players were performing at the casino bar, Souldrive did a Lido deck performance when we sailed from St. Thomas, Ian the cocktail pianist also did turns at tea and in the Supper Club – you get the idea. No jazz group on this cruise, or a classical trio. However, the ship’s orchestra did some big band and jazz concerts to take the place of the jazz group. To be honest, I thought I would miss the jazz trio in the cigar bar (cigarettes permitted – no cigars), and I thought it was wrong to put the cigar smokers in the sports bar – but Souldrive brought more people into the cigar bar space than I ever saw with the jazz groups. Maybe the powers that be actually knew what they were doing, aside from cutting costs.

Kids’ Activities: One thing that keeps us coming back to Carnival is the kids’ programs. The counselors generally are top-notch and have a good variety of activities available for the kids. Our older sons were in Club O2 and Circle C and they enjoyed both programs. If they weren’t doing program-sponsored activities, they were hanging out with other kids from the program.

Youngest son stayed with the 6-8 group; we could have moved him up since he turned 9 during the cruise, but he – and we – really like the 6-8 program on Carnival. Summer is soon enough for the 9-11 program for him. He had a great time. He went to two “late night” parties, participated in the talent show (a group number), had lots of craft projects – he was busy.

I have noticed more efforts to “sell” to the younger crowd – build-a-bear, Freddy packages, and photo shots. Youngest son had a photo done with a ship’s background and it was very good – in fact, we decided to buy it in place of the photo package done at his school the week before. It was a nicer photo and about half the price! There was no pressure to buy anything, but it does seem apparent that this is being viewed as another available revenue source.

The Ship: We liked the “colors” theme. Usually there’s at least one lounge on a Carnival ship where I say to myself, “What in the world was Joe Farcus thinking?” I didn’t find one of those lounges on Glory. The ship is well maintained and aside from normal wear and tear (the camels in the casino are starting to show the effects of people sitting on them for photos) is in great shape. I did notice a few things different on Glory than Valor and Liberty – no rest room in the supper club, for example. And I found I missed the Lido deck movie screen.

The Passengers: There was a wide range of age groups on this cruise – lots of young families, families with school age kids (since it was President’s Week, there are some states – ours included – where the kids are off from school the entire week), couples without kids, and seniors. There was a group of older teens who were rather annoying – sitting on the tables in the Lido restaurant, racing up the stairs (they almost plowed down a man in a wheelchair once), and there was the two thirtysomething couples who got into a fight over deck chairs by the aft pool, but aside from those instances I didn’t see any “over the top” behavior.

Overall: This was the first Eastern itinerary we’d sailed since 2006, and we loved it. We liked having three full sea days. While my first thought for next year was Pride out of Baltimore because we can drive to the port, I’m thinking that this same itinerary on Dream would be a lot of fun. And Glory is coming to New York in summer 2010 for the Canada itinerary, including the 9-day Quebec cruise that ended up getting cancelled this summer. Stay tuned…

 

Thanks for sharing, great review. Will be on Glory this summer. Can't wait!!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
venusjems

venusjems

Posted
Posted

Thanks for the review we did the glory about 3 years ago and will be doing it again this time with our children, so it is nice to see what others did with children the similar age (14,12,10 and 1!)

 

Did you happen to keep the capers, that you could post for us?? I can only find older ones and from western itn online..

 

thanks!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
adamsfly

adamsfly

Posted
Posted
Thanks for the review we did the glory about 3 years ago and will be doing it again this time with our children, so it is nice to see what others did with children the similar age (14,12,10 and 1!)

 

Did you happen to keep the capers, that you could post for us?? I can only find older ones and from western itn online..

 

thanks!

 

Email me adamsfly@bellsouth.net and I'll gladly send them to you.

 

Laurie

Link to comment
Share on other sites
finoky Great Review Rare

finoky

Posted
Posted

Thanks for the review. We did that exact itinerary on the Glory a couple years ago and loved it. I see today mother nature is giving you her special "welcome back" up there in New York.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
nybumpkin

nybumpkin

Posted
  • Author
Posted
Thanks for the review. We did that exact itinerary on the Glory a couple years ago and loved it. I see today mother nature is giving you her special "welcome back" up there in New York.

I could sure do without the welcome back! However, having a week in the Caribbean sure helped break up the winter. No one in my office gave me any sympathy on my sunburn.;)

 

venusjems, I do have the capers - I'll try to get them scanned this week.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
nybumpkin

nybumpkin

Posted
  • Author
Posted

Right now I'm going to put the Capers in my bag for work tomorrow and scan them - I keep forgetting to bring them in. I have all 7 days plus the Camp Carnival 6-8 group. (I'm afraid the Circle C and Club O2 capers must have stayed in older sons' cabin through - I haven't found them in any of the suitcases.:()

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Go to topic listing
  • Forum Jump
    • Categories
      • Welcome to Cruise Critic
      • Hurricane Zone 2024
      • Cruise Insurance Q&A w/ Steve Dasseos of Tripinsurancestore.com June 2024
      • New Cruisers
      • Cruise Lines “A – O”
      • Cruise Lines “P – Z”
      • River Cruising
      • ROLL CALLS
      • Cruise Critic News & Features
      • Digital Photography & Cruise Technology
      • Special Interest Cruising
      • Cruise Discussion Topics
      • UK Cruising
      • Australia & New Zealand Cruisers
      • Canadian Cruisers
      • North American Homeports
      • Ports of Call
      • Cruise Conversations
×
×
  • Create New...