I've only been on one other cruise prior to this one and that was the Adventure of the Seas on Royal Caribbean (similar ship in size and passengers to the Valor), so all of my comparisons are against that.

I thought the embarkation process took a little long. We arrived around noon and cleared security and check-in fairly quickly. We actually were pretty lucky, because the lines behind us became long very quickly, so definitely arrive before noon to beat those lines. It took a long amount of time to get through the rest of the embarkation process (about 1 - 1 1/2 hours) to get onto the ship. This is probably normal, but it still seems unnecessary. Why can't they take our picture for our id cards at the check-in desk?

The ship itself was decorated beautifully. Some people may feel it's a bit "gaudy", but I liked it. It had a very patriotic feel and it was nice to be on a ship with a true "theme" throughout it. The layout of the ship had its good and bad points. It would have been nice to have a promenade that went all the way around the boat, instead of just up and down the sides. But it was nice that the casino floor was always opened so you could walk through it even when we were in port. The majority of the ship is focused on its "Lido" deck (pool deck). This is where all of the pools/hot tubs are, and where Rosie's, the buffet, is located. It did tend to get a bit crowded on the deck since everything seemed to be happening there. There was a wide variety of clubs/bars to relax in. And overall the ship's decoration and layout was very nice. Read more