nancyfromak

Wow, what a disappointment. This is going to be long, just a fair warning. My husband and I are first time cruisers and this cruise will be our last with Carnival. Honestly we had such a bad experience it might be our last in general. Just a bit of background so you know our demographic, we are both 24 years old and from Alaska. Embarkation: Long, blistering hot lines and no guidance whatsoever at the port. We took an Uber/Lyft as suggested by others who have traveled out of this port and OMG what a nightmare. No signs anywhere, and the parking personnel are incredibly rude to non-taxi drivers. One of them told our driver to "get the hell out of the way". Already off to a bad start. We finally get inside and everywhere we go someone wants to take our photo, okay fine it's all a part of the fun. The food at the lido buffet was disgusting. The water tasted like it was heavily chlorinated and the salad bar was nearly empty by the time we got there. We settled with, I kid you not, a few pieces of bell peppers and some sliced onions from the salad bar as that was all that was left. The safety briefing, while necessary, dragged on for over an hour. After half an hour of filing in, they spent another half hour trying to track down guests that were not there and threatening them with a second "shame" safety briefing. Jesus, give them the second briefing and let the rest of us get on with it. Stateroom: When we finally got to our stateroom it was actually decent. Plenty of room for two people and a comfortable bed. The toilet is insanely loud when you flush it and there is only one outlet in the bedroom making it so that we had to switch off who got to charge their phones, annoying but doable. Our stateroom steward was very kind and attentive, however his supervisor was not. Our safe was not working properly so we asked to have it fixed. He contacted his supervisor and they never came. The next day we asked again. Our steward looked flustered and apologized, then contacted the supervisor again. We waited for an hour and then gave up. It was never fixed and we got sick of asking so instead we were forced to carry our passports/credit cards with us everywhere because we didn't trust that our things wouldn't be stolen. Entertainment: The entertainment was decent, we really enjoyed the comedy club and the special guest, juggling comedian. The cruise director, Gary, seemed to really enjoy his job and was very friendly to listen to over the intercom. The pool was miniscule and always packed to the brim with people, same with the hot tubs. This area had tons of screaming children on the loose so we tried to avoid it when possible. The serenity deck was a joke. It was very, very small and only had one small hot tub, again always full. The only time we were ever able to find a spot to lay on this deck was when everyone was at dinner in the evenings. It was also located under the water slide so there really was nothing "serene" about it. The casino and surrounding area REEKED of smoke, so bad that it actually made my husband ill the last evening as we were passing through. As for the casino, I am a huge fan of Las Vegas and visit about once a year to gamble and have fun. This casino was nothing like it. When we hit international waters the payout on the slots, video poker and blackjack etc. was almost non-existent. Beware to all of you who enjoy the casino, this one is heavily rigged. I expected a lower payout on a cruise ship but this one was not normal - take it from someone who loves to gamble every once and a while for fun. This is not the place to do it. Walking past the casino to the coffee bar or the starlight lounge for comedy was incredibly annoying. There is literally a line of employees bombarding you with requests to take your photo over and over. No, for the 50th time (not exaggerating) we don't want a damn photo! Ports of Call: Half Moon Cay was gorgeous, but getting to the island was a disaster. We had to go grab a number from the coffee shop and wait for over an hour for a tender to take people with our number to the island. Getting a number was never mentioned, we just assumed we'd get in line. By the time we got to the island it was already 11:30am, so much for a full day of beach fun. Again, the beach was lovely but if you want some peace you'll have to walk a good ways away from the crowds. The water was crystal clear and incredible, too bad we didn't get to spend a full day here like what we paid for! The island buffet was decent, surely better than that on the ship. Nassau was okay. Very muggy and obviously a tourist trap. We opted not to book an excursion through carnival and decided to do a beach resort day at the British Colonial Hilton to escape the ship. I highly recommend this as the staff are incredibly competent and have good customer service. It comes with a good lunch and drinks too. Freeport we didn't even bother to get off of the boat for. Very industrial and gross looking, so we took advantage of the ship emptying out to spend some quiet time in the gym. Getting off of the boat at every port was slowed down by more employees trying to take your photo to sell back to you as you try and exit. At Half Moon Cay they literally use a pole to stop you and at Nassau one of them rudely snapped his fingers in my husband's face. So rude and inappropriate. Amenities: The gym was excellent, I was shocked. Lots of equipment and a full set of weights. The locker room was clean and had a nice steam room and sauna. This was our solace in our times of sadness (always). The spa was way overpriced and misleading. They added hot stones to our deep tissue massage for $25/person but barely used them! The massage was good but it better be for $200/50 minute couples massage! And then I was not double, not triple but quadruple charged for our treatment! You can imagine my fury when I looked at our account statement on the morning of debarkation. I went to one of the ladies pamper parties that advertised a free makeover. The skin products we used on ourselves were nice but the makeover they promised was them putting this super tan and shiny powder called "California Sun Glow" on our faces and trying to upsell it. I get that they're trying to make money, but that was not a makeover so I call BS on the advertising. I already talked about the pool and deck areas. The mini-golf was fun but had multiple tears in the fabric laid out on the course, it was obviously never maintained. Food: As mentioned before the buffet on lido was horrendous. Inedible, gellified foods that were not even hot most of the time. The pizza was good but very small. The deli was good for the most part. The soft serve was also good. The main dining room was incredibly hit or miss. Some nights the food was very good, others it was either bland or inedible. The two-tops on either side of the dining room were squeezed so close together that you felt like you were eavesdropping on your neighbors and vice-versa. Very uncomfortable seating situation, and if you don't have 3 or more people they will never let you sit by the window - carnival the romance killer. We began asking to sit in the center of the room where the tables are slightly more private. The waitstaff, for the most part, were excellent and tried very hard. Room service became a favorite of ours to avoid the lines and the many non-classy people aboard the boat. I said it, I'm sorry but it's true. This is not the ship you want if you're hoping for a touch or more of class. Alcohol: It started out strong but got weaker and weaker as the cruise went on. We eventually stuck to drinking our own wine from our stateroom. Overall function/appearance: Grungy, outdated, rips in carpet and metal panels missing in places. Multiple elevators out of commission or in the process of breaking down. One lady said that she called the elevator we were riding "the haunted elevator" because the button didn't light up for the Promenade Floor (9). Great. Getting an elevator took forever as well. I listened to other reviewers and booked a cabin in the forward part of the ship and THANK GOD I did. The other reviewers were absolutely right that the mid-section to the back of the ship staterooms smelled like sewage. It was disgusting. Every time we walked through those halls we were greeted by that nasty smell - I feel for those poor people stuck in those rooms. And some sort of pipe burst right outside of our stateroom on the last night so people were running around frantically trying to clean it up and dry the floor. Employees: Overall the staff was friendly (except for those taking photos). Not one of them was American which is no big deal but we found rather odd. I read another review that said they found out from one of the employees that they work 12 hour days 7 days a week and only make $500/month, relying on your tips. How awful!!! What a horribly unethical business practice by carnival, treating these poor employees like slave labor. Value: Not worth even $10 of your hard earned money. Don't spend a cent on this ship or on Carnival in general. We will never sail with this company again and we URGE YOU to learn from our mistakes (and several other reviewers on here!!) and choose a different cruise line! You know it's bad when even the comedians joke about how horrible the ship is!