Pre-Cruise: We left CA for Fort Lauderdale on July 24 with plans to drive up to Orlando to visit Universal Studios. We stayed at the FLL Airport Hilton (great!) the first night and had an outstanding blue crab dinner at the Rustic Inn about 2 miles from the FLL Hilton. I would highly recommend it.....you are given a bib+ wooden mallet and just crack away at those blue crabs. We cut our Orland trip short as it only took us about half the time we needed to see both Universal Parks, so we headed back to FLL early and spent an extra day at South Beach and Fort Lauderdale Beach.

Embarkation: Got to the terminal around 11:30am and zipped through the VIP line to the ship in approx 15 minutes. The general boarding line was moving very fast as well. Port Everglades didn't have a separate room for the VIP check-in like Long Beach or Galveston, but either way, we got on the ship very fast.

First Impressions: Once on the Liberty, they had the halls to the cabins closed up until 1:30pm as they were finishing up the housekeeping. We hung out on the Lido, had a few "funship specials" and explored the ship. We were impressed right off and had no complaints, although the Lobby bar area didn't seem as open and expansive as the one on the Carnival Pride. Read more