No lie, hands down, our honeymoon was the absolute BEST! Now don’t get me wrong it cost a small fortune and thanks to the wonderful generosity of some of our friends who chose to contribute to our honeymoon as our wedding gift – made it all the more special that we could manage it.
Neither of us had EVER been on a cruise nor to the Caribbean and it did NOT disappoint!
From the first moment the shuttle from the parking lot we hired dropped us at the Miami port of call and we identified as having paid extra for ‘Faster To The fun’ we were pleasantly, professionally escorted past every line and right through security and baggage drop off like we were special. Once through security we took a quick escalator upstairs and were quickly ushered to a counter past people snaked around guide-lines to other counters. No one was in line at ours.
There they took our pictures, reviewed our passports, checked our tickets and printed and gave us our “Sail and Sign” cards. These we were told would be our onboard credit cards, passports and ID’s. We took seats as directed and watched as several thousand people slowly made their way upstairs and into which ever line they needed to be in to do what we had already done.
Now the wait here was about an hour long and judging from the time line that we had previously been given they must have been running a bit late, but we were so excited we didn’t care. They began calling the Platinum, Gold and FTF folks and soon we were on our way to board Carnival’s ‘Glory’.
Pictures were taken before embarkation. Pleasant friendly staff directed our group onto the 3rd floor lobby of the ship. We were told that our staterooms were ready, so we all dispersed. The husband and I took the glass elevators up to the 7th deck and quickly found our stateroom. And to our surprised our good friend had sent us several bottles of wine, and roses as a wedding gift to wish us a happy honeymoon, so we popped one open. Our cabin was located aft of the mid ship on the starboard side. We had a nice balcony and the room was actually much larger than I expected.
After looking out of our balcony and down onto Miami’s port of call we decided to take a tour of the ship and check out all the places that my husband had found online that were little tips and tricks. One of which was the 7th level forward bow, so we watched the ship pull out of port and said goodbye to our short visit in Miami from the bow of the 7th floor of the ship. It was beyond beautiful and VERY romantic.
The ONLY complaints we had during the ENTIRE trip was that the cabin is not very sound proof and we unfortunately had a family next to us on the side where our headboard was that seemed to have A LOT of children who felt compelled to scream bloody murder off and on with ZERO discipline from the adults. So it happened over and over and over again. That and people walking up and down the halls talking very loudly late evening and early morning was about it as far as the cabin went.
With the exception of the bar personnel at the adult pool on the 9th deck, every employee we encountered on the Glory was genuinely friendly and professional. I absolutely adored the cabin steward and would have brought him home with me if we were allowed.
Our 7 day cruise consisted of the following stops; Grand Cayman Island, Mahogany Bay in Roatan, Honduras, Belize and Cozumel, Mexico. We enjoyed every one of the ports but enjoyed Cozumel the best. Belize was a little scary at times, but only because we were told repeatedly how poor the country was and we found our interaction with them to be very aggressive.
All in all, from the warm weather, beautiful sandy beaches, the snorkeling to the shopping we enjoyed every minute of each of our stops. In some cases would have preferred that the stops had been longer, like in Honduras and Cozumel.
The only thing about the cruise that kind of shocked me was the food. It wasn’t very good. The one night we went to their 4 star restaurant was phenomenal, but the everyday food served at the buffets and at dinner was just lack luster. I’m shocked only because I had always heard that the food was really great. I guess you can’t win them all.
It’s been exactly 1 month almost to the day since we set sail and I miss that vacation so bad I can’t stand it. I am eagerly awaiting the next time we can possibly afford to go again. It might not be for ten years, but who knows.
The moral of this post is if you get the chance – do at least one cruise in your life.
Kat Devine
Team Devine Wedding Website 