Carnival Valor Review
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Just returned from the Aug 27th sailing on the Valor, so while it's all still fresh in my mind, here's how our trip went. We had a 9:30am American flight out of LGA in NY on our sailing date. Our flight due to arrive in Miami at 12:30pm arrived 20 minutes early. This was a good start to our vacation. After a 20 minute wait for luggage, we hopped in a taxi and within 10 minutes and $24 later, we were at the terminal. There she was in all her glory, but wait, it wasn't the Glory, it was the Valor. That's right, except for the interior design, the 2 ships are basically identical Conquest Class Ships and very impressive from the moment you see them. Since I am a Platinum Member of Carnival's fairly new Concierge Club, the benefits kicked in here. Priority embarkation means no lines. When we arrived, the line was outside the terminal building. It appeared it was going to take these people hours to get through the line. Thanks to Platinum status, bye-bye line. We were escorted into the private VIP lounge and processed through within a total of 15 minutes. Considering that it looked like half the ship's guests were still outside waiting, 15 minutes was a breeze from check-in, through security, up to level 2 to get the keys and then right onboard to our cabin. We had a category 8B Balcony. As Carnival has the largest cabins in the industry, we had more than adequate space for 2 adults and a 16 year old. Henia and Punji were our cabin attendants and we could have not asked for a better team to take care of us for a week.
I'm going to try and not make this review too long, so here is the rest of the information in bullets.
The Ship: She is absolutely beautiful. The theme of heroism is found throughout the decks. From the Lincoln and Washington Dining Rooms, to Rosie the Riveter on the wall of Rosie's Lido Restaurant, you can feel the pride flowing through you. We were booked to near capacity, but yet you always felt like there was plenty of space for all onboard. Although we had some deck chair hogs, there was still plenty of good sun real estate left to be had by all.