Anyone been on Carnival Liberty /Mediterranean?
 

We have just booked a cruise for next summer on the Carnival Liberty to the Mediterranean. Can anyone tell me about the ship? Specifically how organized were the excursions? Were there long lines for food and getting off the ship? How was the service? How was the food? Who were the clientele on board? Anything else we should know? I am a little concerned about cruising Carnival and am trying to figure out if it's the right trip for us. Thank you.

I am booked on this for next year as well. I would suggest going to www.cruisecritic.com and you will have all the information you are looking for.
As far being concerned about cruising Carnival, i have been on two of their cruises in the past( Mexico) and have to say i never had a problem with them.
If your reservations are about a "party type" atmosphere, it's not happening in the Mediterranean.( it was not that way for Mexico either) The overall majority of people say its a 40 and over crowd, some people being Europeans but i think the majority are Americans.
I think the the Itinerary is great, the price is fantastic. Overall it has had rave reviews.

I was on the 8/1/05 sailing of the Carnival Liberty with my husband and two daughters ages 14 & 8. This was our 4th cruise with Carnival (Triumph, Victory & Valor).
Embarkation: Although the facilities were hot because the check-in is really under a big tent, this was the smoothest and fastest check-in that we have had in our experience. Since we had taken our carryon bags with us on board, where we had a change of clothes for us there it was not a problem that our luggage arrived after dinner. There is no dress code the first night of the cruise.
Clientele: On our cruise 90% of the clientele were American's. Mostly it was made up of families or extended families with lots of children on board.
Kid's programs: Carnival is great for the kids 3-12, but their programs for teens 12-16 and young adults 17-21 is really lacking. My 8 year old loved the kid's club and had a great time there during the three sea days. My 14 year old, is not into disco, and their programing during the day for this age group is non-existent. I am happy to say that she was happy reading her book and working on her tan during the sea days.
Exursions:
I am a firm believer in utilizing the excursions organized by the cruise. I have seen a number of people left on the docks when they arrived late for the boat because something happened with the home made travel plans. That being said - Carnival's excurions are not cheap but for the most part you do get value for the money. When booking tours I specifically looked for ones that included meals. This added to the cost but felt it was worth it to eat off the ship and not have to search for a restaurant. Out of the five meals on the tours (Sorrento, Taramino, Croatia Florence, & Gardone) all the food was excellent except Florence. The restaurant in Florence was terrible, we left mid-meal and went to get some gelato.
When selecting a tour really look at the activity levels - from what we found they are very accurate. If it says that you will be doing lots of walking up steep inclines, you will be. If you can't keep up the tour guides will loose you and truthfully it would not be their fault, because there are detailed explainations about all tours.
Naples - We went to Capri, Sorrento and Pompii. Although our tour guide was a bit disorganized it was a wonderful tour.
Croatia - went on the country house tour and city self guided walk. Although the weather was a bit rainy we enjoyed meeting the family who ownes the chateau and eating their traditional foods.
Venice - Gondola ride was fabulous at night. 2nd day went on the Venice highlights tour, this was a bit disappointing as it was really a tour of Doge's palace and nothing more. We ended up leaving the tour after going to the Maurano Glass Factory Store and walking to the Realto Bridge. Then ended up walking back to the ship. It was a long walk about 3-4 miles, but we got to see Venice.
Sicily - Mt. Etna and Taramino. Both beautiful in their own way.
Barcelona - Gothic Walking tour -
This was a place where people could not keep up with the tour guide and some got lost and were left to fend for themselves to get back to the ship.
Cannes - Perfume factory and two midieval villages. One of the best tours we went on. The factory was great, the kids really loved it. The villages were quaint. The food in the restaurant was fabulous and our tour guide was incredible.
Florence - this was the worst tour that we took. Highlights of Florence and the Leaning Tower of Pisa. This was scheduled to be a very long day, which we were prepared for. However, due to some problems with customs, no one was allowed to disembark the ship on time and we were two hours late getting to Florence, which is a two our ride from the port. Therefore, we did not get to see all of the sites in Florence that we were supposed to see. There was no time for any shopping on your own and the food was terrible as I mentioned above. We then had a 1 1/2 hour ride to Pisa. There we had to kill another 1 1/2 hours before our tour was ready because we were late getting there and our tour guide had not been given the proper documentation upon our arrival in Pisa. We knew that we were only seeing the tower from the outside and then going into the Bascilica, but given the option, I would have stayed in Florence the extra time and skipped Pisa. We were also 1 hour late getting back to the ship, but because we were on their tour the ship waited for us.
Debarkation: Again this went very smoothly. Our bags were ready at the pier and the buses were there on time to take us to the airport.

Unlike cruising the Caribbean, this ship completely empties out when you reach a port. So much so that the only food available for lunch is at the buffet. We came back early from our tour in Barcelona and were very disappointed becuase we really wanted a served meal and found that we had to go to the Lido deck for the buffet.

When we went it was extremely windy on deck at some points. So much so that you really couldn't sit by the pool becuase you were being blown all over the place.

As far as rockiness of the ship. You really don't feel it because of the stabilzers. My younger daughter who does get seasick wore her seabands and was fine.

The entertainment on the ship was wonderful. From the production shows to the comics to the vocalists. Everyone was great. John the cruise director is in a class by himself. He is the best cruise director that we have ever seen and we have taken 5 crusies in total. Even the audience participation parts were funny and worthwhile to see.

We had a wonderful time and are planning our next cruise for summer 2006.

I just returned from the October 12th sailing of the Mediterranean. This was my second cruise, the first being a cruise of the Indian Ocean on a different cruise line.

I had a good time, but would not do this again. I don't like being on a ship of 3000+ passengers - too much for me. And when everyone gets off the ship...too much for the local community in my opinion.

The ship was very nice - the entertain was great. Food was good as well. What I didn't like:

1. Paying extra for soft drinks. I think that this practice is very cheap of Carnival. I don't mind paying for wine and alcoholic drinks, but paying extra for a coke seems a bit much.

2. The gratuities are an additional $10 per day for a total of $120 for this cruise. Which was fine with me. However, we were repeatedly encouraged to tip to maitre de (who was, for some reason, not included in the group tip). Since I never met him, I didn't tip him (and neither did any of the people that I met on the cruise). Carnival should either include him in the tipping practice or stop soliciting extra tips.

3. I thought that the Carnival tours were a complete rip-off. They tried to put the fear of God into you by saying that if you went off on your own, you might miss the ship. However, the only late people that we had to wait for were people on the Carnival golf excursion in Barcelona. We had to wait for over an hour for them. I'm a very experienced traveler and had no problems doing my own thing in each port. I was traveling with a group - most of whom were too uncertain to travel on their own and they took all the Carnival tours and were very disappointed. I did take one to Taormina and ditched it after the tour of the Greek/Roman amphitheatre so I could stay longer in Taormina. I don't like being on a bus with 50 people and being herded around a guide holding up a sign. Yecch.

This was a good way for me to visit some places that I might otherwise never have seen (for example, Dubrovnik, which I loved). So - I'm glad I did it, but won't do it again.

Lynn:Most cruise ships charge for soft drinks. We cruised on the Sapphire Princess last summer to Alaska and from the moment you entered the ship you were met by personnel trying to sell a soft drink package. It didn't bother us. We said no and went about our business. I am curious as to how and how many times you were asked to tip the maitrte de?

Correction: I meant "who" and how many times.

There were several overhead announcements about it, an envelope in my cabin and an additional announcement in the daily newsletter.

Yes, that's what Carnival does and I agree it is a ripoff. Other cruise lines include maitre d' tipping (50C a day p.p. if I'm not mistaking) in total $10 a day, but Carnival wants it extra. I tipped our waiters in addition to what we were charged because they did a great job, but I did not tip maitre d' as I don't even remember seing him.

I think it would be alot better to just include him in the fees somehow. The overhead anouncements to me are in bad taste, esp. if it is more than one.

Keep in mind that the Carnival 12 day Mediterranean cruise is the most reasonably price of the Med. cruises. It has a great itinerary and on a brand new ship, a combo you can't beat. So if they nickel and dime a little (most cruise lines do)it won't bother me. I'm booked for this cruise next year and as far as tipping, I'll make my own decision based on what the maitre'de does for us. But a $20 bill for him won't affect my opinion of the cruise.

Well said Frank. Personally I am a fan of Carnival and no one crusie line is perfect.

Jacket: We haven't sailed Carnival in 5 years, and all things being equal we would choose Princess. But all things are not equal, Princess has an oldish ship, goes to Greece and Turkey (we're not interested) and charges 20 - 30% more for the same number of days.

On the otherhand we sailed the Sapphire on a 10 day run from San Francisco to the Mexican Rivieria last year and had the best cruise ever, new ship, interesting ports (included Catalina and San Diego) and great price. I guess you just have to be selective and when you see a deal, jump on it. You can't be wedded to one line. Although we do prefer Freestyle or anytime dining on NCL and Princess.

Frank: Thank you the reply. We are thinking of cruising FP on the Tahitian Princess which is an older ship. Have you been on this one? Any thoughts? Larry

Jacket: We've only sailed once on Princess. The Tahitian Princess is a small ship, 30,000 tons, and for us the bigger the better. The ship was completely refurbed a few years ago. Check out Cruise Critic, the ship gets great reviews from previous guests. One warning, smaller ships are more prone to motion. If you are prone to seasickness, be prepared with your meds.

Thank you Frank. :-)

There is a Carnival Liberty Mediterranean Group & Message Board at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Liberty_in_the_Med/join

Hi there, we are sailing on this ship next October and i think the itinerary is spectacular! However we are in stateroom 6319 and have heard it is noisy from the casino BELOW - has anyone stayed in or around this stateroom. Thanks!

Check out the Liberty In The Med Yahoo Group,someone will have the info you require !

FlyCatcher: If you check on Cruise Critic, there have been many complaints regarding cabins on deck 6 that are directly above the casino and show rooms. We specifically booked a week that had deck 7 cabins available.

This is also regarding the Liberty Med. cruise. What type of clothes should we pack ? How to dress for dinner and how to dress on tours so we don't stand out like a sore thumb shouting we're Americans. I would appreciate any help with this. We sailed to Alaska on the Carnival Spirit and really enjoyed ourselves. I packed way too many clothes and need help deciding what to leave home.
Thanks, Joan

Frank: How do you find on cruise critic the specific problem with deck 6? Tried a search but would not come up, can you help.........

vittoria: Just search on "noise deck 6" on the Carnival forum.

Here's an example of what one poster said:

I just returned from the Med cruise on The Liberty and wanted to post a "noise alert" announcement for anyone whose cabin is located mid-ship on the 6th floor.

I was in cabin 6365 which was located just above the area that was directly in the passageway right outside the casino on the 5th deck. Was I surpirsed my first night on the ship to discover that I paid all this money to, what was like, sleeping in the middle of the disco. My room shook from the noice and the BOOM BOOM vibrations of the speaker system, and the loud clapping, stomping, and laughing of guests listeining to the singer. When I complained to the pursers office, I was told "let's wait until 1:00 a.m. and see what transpires. If it doesn't stop by then, we'll send someone around to tell them to lower the music" (quote/unquote). My neighbor across the hall was standing in the hallway in her robe and curlers yelling "what the hell is going on", with other 6th floor travelers opening their cabin doors with stunned expressions on their faces trying to figure out if the band was playing in the hallway outside their cabin door.

Folks...I'm not exagerating! If you need your sleep, have your room change NOW. You will be touring 8-10 hours a day and getting up at the crack of dawn to catch the bus for the next day's excursions. After a few days it can get exhausting, so a good night's sleep will play a key role in you enjoying your trip. Believe me, you won't regret it, because the purser's office didn't seem to give a darn if we couldn't sleep. They got their money, so to heck with us!

Thank you all for responding! I am so glad that you found me out there. I will take in all of the information that you have given. Although I've spent a lot of time on other web sites researching, I always like to hear from the Fodors crowd!

I was very interested to read all the comments about Liberty. We are four older Aussies who are booked for a cruise in June - it seems we will definitely be in the minority group among all you Americans!! Go for it we love you and we are very excited about our cruise. Looking forward to meeting some of you among the 3000+ passengers!! SK

Well back at ya! When we were in Fiji some yrs. back we had a blast meeting so many Aussies and Kiwis as well. G'day! :-)Wish I was cruising with you. Have a good one. Larry :-)

We sailed on the Liberty on her second week maiden voyage in Aug. It was our first cruise and after reading some not so good reviews about Carnival, I was a little apprehensive.

I am happy to report we had a great time and a vacation I will never forget. Our cabin was beautiful. We stayed on the 7th floor midship, outside suite, balcony. I thought I would really enjoy that balcony, but sat very little out there. It WAS fun arriving in Venice in the afternoon and standing out on the balcony enjoying a spectacular view.

We booked a lot of excursions with no problems, except for one. The time had changed and we, plus 2 more families did not get the announcement. We missed our excursion and we had to go on another one. We had the option of joining our group later in the day, but we decided to stay with the group that took us in. However, Carnival refunded all of our money on this excursion which was pricey. We also went on our own with a private driver. I hear that is risky, but we never had a problem. The drivers waiting at port may not speak English, but they know how to communicate with you and we never felt ripped off. In fact they always took us to great places and seemed like they enjoyed what they were doing.

The food was so so.....the main dining room food presentation was very good, but the food did not quite live up to my expectations. Probably because food had been built up so much to me that I was expecting something extraordinary. I live in a city that has fantastic food so I'm a bit more hard to please in that category.

We had two incidents happen on this cruise. A honeymoon couple went off on their own in Croatia searching for a waterfall. They rented a car (bad idea) and the car broke down in the middle of nowhere. By the time they got back to port...the ship had left. The story goes they met us back in Venice $3,000 lighter. I have no idea if that story is true, just the one that was circulating around the ship. The other happened one evening as we were leaving Venice ( I think it was Venice...not sure now) A man had a very serious heart attack. The ship turned around and headed back to Venice. All was handled very professional.

I would say if there is any downside to this ship.....it would be the SIZE. It is tough traveling with that many people, but not as bad as I feared. Carnival really knows how to handle mass amounts of people. I would say the only thing that would irritate me would be passing a kid on my way to the inth ice cream machine (because they tend to stay empty)and this kid has a vanilla ice cream cone spiraled up past his head. No wonder they stay empty...lol.

As large as this ship is, it still rocks at times. We had a couple of really rocky nights. Very nearly slid off my barstool a few times. Good thing I had a slot machine in front of me to brace my feet against. Ha!

Every staff member I met was delightful! I wish I could remember their names. Our steward kept a very watchful eye on our cabin. It was cleaned as soon as we stepped out and cleaned again while we were dining in the evening.

My favorite ports were Croatia (really enjoyed the Delta Wetlands excursion)...Sicily (we hired a driver that took us to Taormina. I would also reccomend going to the Montserrat Monestary while in Barcelona. Very beautiful scenery.

Gosh I didn't mean to rattle on, but this was truely a very wonderful experience and I think you'll enjoy this cruise very much. The itinerary is fabulous.

We are going back on a different cruise next Sept on Holland America but this one will tour the Greek Isles along with my two favs...Sicily and Croatia.

Its good to hear you had such a wonderful time. Have you considered posting a review on cruisecritic? Cheers, Larry

No I haven't, Larry. I have read and enjoyed many reviews, but I don't have the confidence to do one myself. I tend to forget a lot of details and hit on the highlights.....then as I get into the memories.....well, I just go on and on....I figured I would lose my audience...hehe.....I can say this with confidence....this one cruise made us cruisemates for life. My husband and I really took to this and I might add that my husband is an extreme clautrophobic which is why we haven't tried cruising before. Much to my husbands delight, our cabin was plenty big enough. I believe it was 340 sq ft. Thank you for your confidence, Larry. I may take a peek at Cruise Critics and stick my big toe in to test the waters.....sincerely, Theo

I agree. Cruising can be very attractive. And I think you would make a fine reviewer! Cheers, Larry