My family and I (4 adults) have been bitten by the cruise bug, and wanted to do something a little different for Christmas. This was our third cruise, all with Carnival, as we had an excellent time on our previous two (the Paradise, which is a bit tiny and outdated, but still managed to provide some fun; and the Magic, which was fantastic and definitely made my mom's 65th birthday special). We excitedly booked a cruise for Nassau, Bahamas, on the Valor, which has recently been upgraded.

Imagine our disappointment when we received an email in the early morning hours of November 11th, informing us that the Valor was suddenly moving to Galveston, Texas, as the Valor "is better suited to operate at the higher speeds required for the four and five-day Mexico itineraries from Galveston." This was their polite way of saying that the Liberty, which was the ship we were assigned to, had a problem reaching top speed, a fact I discovered after doing my own digging through Galveston newspapers; the last cruises from Galveston were actually cut short as the Liberty was unable to reach the farther ports and return home in time. The email went on to reassure us that the Liberty is a sister ship to Valor, and also will be in dry dock prior to our departure date to "be refreshed for our guests."

Gee, Carnival, I think we have differing definitions of that word, "refreshed." Firstly, the Liberty is one of the last in the fleet to NOT have the HUB app available, which allows you to keep abreast of all things happening aboard on your phone. How hard could it have been to connect this whilst the boat was supposedly in dry dock? In the end, compared to other problems we experienced on board, this is not a huge deal, but it's definitely in the "con" column when the company states that it's JUST like the Valor. Read more