We were on the Victory January 15-22,2006. It was my fifth cruise, the third on Carnival. We arrived in Miami the day before our cruise. We stayed at the Holiday Inn Port of Miami. The rooms were very small but probably adequate for 2 people. The hotel had 1 working elevator for the guests. (In addition there was a service elevator and an out-of-order elevator). Everyone had to wait long periods of time to go anywhere. The housekeeping staff urged us to use the service elevator which we did. It still took about 10 minutes to get down to the lobby.
We arrived at the port around 11am and the US Coast Guard had just showed up to do an unannounced inspection. Carnival staff indicated that the additional wait would be about 45 minutes. Even with that, we were able to eat lunch around 1pm.
The ship looked tired. Seating on the Lido deck could have used reupholstery. The carpeting in the hall on the Rivera deck had an unknown food item that should have been cleaned up and shampooed at sometime during the week but was not. In our cabin, 1401, the floor had a soft spot about 1 foot in diameter. It reminded me of walking on a sponge. I did not say anything to the room steward because I felt he knew about it; it was that obvious. The hallway a short distance from our room also had a soft spot. Our room steward brought his supervisor in to view the soft spot during the week, but no repair was made before we left on Sunday. By the 3rd or 4th day, there was a wet spot on the hall carpet, as if there was an overflow or leak of some kind. The leak continued to grow and by the last day, when you walked on it, it made a slurping sound.