Craig K.

Age: 27
Occupation: Consultant
Number of Cruises: 2
Cruise Line: Carnival
Ship: Glory
Sailing Date: April 9th, 2005
Itinerary: Western Caribbean

I hope that this review will be as helpful to others as the reviews below were to me. We departed from Port Canaveral on Saturday April 9 for a seven day cruise to Key West, Belize, Cozumel, and Progresso on the Carnival Glory.

Embarkation:

Given the large size of the Glory, (110,000 tons, cap 2,900 passengers) one would expect a lengthy and complicated boarding process. While the process wasn’t as simple as walking up to the gang plank and walking onto the ship, the process was efficiently managed, probably much of the efficiency owed to a large percentage of passengers completing the pre registration materials received in the mail. Overall the process went fairly smoothly with the time from arrival at the port to getting on the ship about one hour.

Layout of Ship:

As mentioned above the Glory is a large ship and at times difficult to navigate, particularly in the first day or two of the voyage. Once the location of all elevator banks are learned and a sense of what elevators reach which rooms and decks the ship becomes a lot easier to get around.

One of the major tradeoffs of the Glory when compared to other cruise ships is that you are unable to walk around the outside of the ship at the top deck level. If you would like to walk around the entire ship on the outside you have to go down to Deck 4 and instead of a scenic sunset you will view the underside of the life boats. The absence of a deck that encircles the entire ship is made up for by the tiered decks around the center of the boat that provide for ample laying out space. In addition on the both the forward and aft sections of the ship there is plenty of room to lay out and with three main pools and one small kiddie pool finding a spot to cool off is no problem.

There are plenty of bars and places to hang out on the boat. At times it feels that the boat is under utilized as many bars have nobody working in them. Some particular favorites included the On the Green bar on the promenade deck and the Cinn-A- Bar which is a piano bar and tons of fun. The White Heat dance club is a little cheesy but fun enough for a cruise ship dance club. Not once during the week did it feel like it was a struggle to get a drink or find something to do.

Ports:

Key West – A great start to the cruise. There is no need to waste your money on an excursion through the ship unless you really want to. Once you get off the ship and are shuttled into town there is plenty to do and see. Walking up and down Duval St. is entertainment enough and it’s nice to be able to grab any last minute items that you may have forgotten about including some soda for your room or that razor or toothpaste you forgot. Someone told me that Key West is similar to New Orleans and I agree with the exception that Key West is a lot cleaner and easier to get around. My advice for this port is to hope off the ship and go bar hoping.

Belize – As one of the comedians on board noted, there’s a reason why they dock the ship a couple of miles off shore. The people of Belize seemed nice enough but the city and the entire country is still underdeveloped. The main issue with this port is the tender process. Belize City is not a place where you can get off the boat and find lots of things to do and see. It is a stop made for excursions and Carnival knows this. We booked a cave tubing excursion through an outside company and while we paid half of what carnival was charging, we and all others that did not book through Carnival had to wait to get off the ship until all excursion people had left the ship. Waiting for tender tickets and then waiting to get on the actual tenders proved to be the worst part of the trip. My advice is to book through a separate company and try and sneak onto a tender with the Carnival excursion people. The tender process is not efficiently run and nobody on the ship’s crew will be able to differentiate an excursion person from a non excursion person.

We went cave tubing and it was a blast. Words can not adequately describe the experience, however please note that the hike to the entrance point is not as benign as the ship and others would have you believe. Any one in reasonable shape should have no difficultly; however hiking 40 minutes through a rain forest might be tough on those with trouble moving.

Cozumel – It’s tough to explain Cozumel to people who have not been on cruises before but it is a typical port town built around the cruise ships. The ship docked right at a pier and so getting off was not a problem. Carnival owns all the shops right at the pier and so they make a big push to have their passengers purchase items there. In Cozumel if you want to go into town and find a bar and drink your face off you can do that; however I recommend doing a little research on beaches on the island, grabbing a cab and getting away from the cruise crowds for at least a few hours. We did exactly that and it was the best part of the trip. If you found this website and review you can certainly find information on the beaches. Some of the excursions run through the ship seemed interesting but given the transportation on the island it would probably make sense to try and book something outside of the ship. Don’t let Carnival scare you into thinking that you have to book trips through them. Many times these local tours will charge significantly less and you go in much smaller groups and since they know that they are dependent on getting you back to the ship, they go all out to make sure you get there.

Progresso – Similar to Belize this is an excursion port. Progresso is a little beach town with very little to do. We went to the Mayan ruins at Chicen Itza and given how far it was from the boat we decided to book it through the ship. If you are worried about the trip to the ruins taking up the whole day don’t be. After talking to the other couples at our table who did other excursions, you won’t be missing too much. The ruins are spectacular and well worth the time invested. At the center of the ruins is a large temple that you can climb up on. It was one of those activities that you are surprised that they still let people do.

Service

As to be expected the service on board was great. The staff, while not all individuals were super outgoing were friendly enough and certainly very accommodating. Our waiter was great and the dinning experience was very enjoyable. The Glory also offers a separate diner club. For $25 extra you get dinner is a special dinning room with some of the best food you will ever have. It is very much worth the extra charge and I recommend going to dinner early in the week so that you can attend the club more than once. Guys don’t forget your jacket when you head to the club, but I can’t stress enough how great the experience in the club was. Amazing food and ridiculous service

Disembarkation

We sailed through a storm on our final night and as a result got into port 45 minutes late. Due to the delay all passengers who needed to get off the boat early and couldn’t wait for their luggage decided to pack the lobby at once. As a result the actual wait to get off the boat was pretty chaotic, however once actually off the boat the entire customs process went by pretty smoothly and the terminal was easy enough to navigate.

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