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Carnival Ecstasy Cruise Review to Caribbean - Bahamas

Cruises: 1 cruise (first)
Review: 1
Helpful Votes: 48

Overall rating:

5 out of 5
Carnival Ecstasy

5 Night Bahamas (Charleston Roundtrip)

Sail date: March 20, 2018

Ship: Carnival Ecstasy

Cabin type: Oceanview

Cabin number: M182

Traveled as: Family (young children)

Reviewed: 6 years ago

Review summary

This was our first cruise and we really enjoyed ourselves! It was my fiancé and I and our 4 year old daughter. Getting on and off the ship was easy and had no complaints. Once on the ship we explored and loved everything it was very exciting! I was a little skeptical at first to let our 4 year old go to the camp because the thought of leaving a 4 year old with strangers on a ship was scary but we wanted to play bingo and didn't think that kids were allowed (they were!) so we took her to camp and as soon as we walked in I felt extremely comfortable they have it closed so the kids can't just walk in and out (its locked three different ways) and there were at least 3-4 people there to watch and play with the kids at all times. Our daughter absolutely loved it and told us she wasn't ready to leave yet when we went to pick her up! The food was good, drinks were amazing! There was always something fun to do. The only negative thing I have to say about the entire ship is the smoking on board. We had to walk through the casino area quite a bit to get to parts of the ship and they are allowed to smoke at the bar down there and it was terrible having to walk through the smoke. They even set up a Guess Who game right next to the bar we wanted to play but we had to leave due to the smoke. The lounge chairs and pool sections were always clean and put together after each use of the loungers. The workers on the ship were always soooooo friendly and happy and amazing a lot of them even know our daughters name and everything we would see them they would say hi and give hi fives it was great! Our steward was awesome and knew our names every time we seen him and always had a different towel animal in our room each day. I can't say enough great things! We stopped at Princess Cay and Nassau and both places were amazing and again super easy getting off and on the ship. We will definitely be cruising with Carnival again. I think we will try a bigger ship only because I felt a lot of the movement and experience motion sickness a few times (we also left during a storm). All in all the ship was great, the workers were amazing and we had an amazing first cruise! Thank you Carnival!

Embarkation

4 out of 5
We took advantage of the Faster to Fun pass and everything was super smooth and fast.

Ship experiences

Food and Dining

5 out of 5
Everything was excellent! all the food was good, lots of options. Drinks were always on point!

Onboard Activities

5 out of 5
We took advantage of Bingo, Hasbro Game Show, Kids Camp Ocean, Swimming (our daughter LOVED the hot tub), Water Slides, etc.. We really did take advantage of almost everything!

Entertainment

5 out of 5

Children's Programs

5 out of 5
Camp Ocean was amazing for our 4 year old! She absolutely loved making new friends and being able to play and make crafts and watch movies. She didn't want to leave with us at one point she wasn't ready to leave yet. Felt very safe leaving her there.

Service and Staff

5 out of 5

Ship Quality

5 out of 5

Cabin / Stateroom

5 out of 5
Our cabin was great! It was plenty big for my fiance and I and our 4 year old daughter. Our daughter absolutely loved her bed since it was like being on a bunk bed. This was our first cruise so I read a TON of reviews and suggestions and a ton of people said to bring an extra outlet, magnetic hooks to hang things and over the door shoe storage for more storage, and a hang mirror but we found that there was plenty of room for storage we didn't even use the hooks we bought. There were hooks on the door to hang stuff, the shower had a wire that went across to hang wet clothes, there was plenty of bars to hang stuff in the bathroom and there was a huge closet with shelving and plenty of space to hang clothes. There was plenty of outlets two by the bed and one in the bathroom. There was a huge mirror over a desk (that also had drawers for storage) and a mirror in the bathroom as well. Needless to say we packed and bought more stuff than we needed to! the bed was super comfortable (a little hard but comfortable) the only thing I really had a complaint if you even wanna call it that was that the air conditioning in the room didn't really cool it off a ton, I woke up sweating a couple of times but like my fiance pointed out I do get hot when I sleep naturally anyway so could have been just me :)

Ports of call

Charleston, South Carolina

5 out of 5

Princess Cays (Cruise Line Private Island)

5 out of 5
Princess Cays was beautiful we took advantage of the beach and swam in the ocean!

Nassau, Bahamas

5 out of 5
Beautiful place! We swam with the dolphins and took advantage of Atlantis, walked through the aquariums, went to the lazy river and layed out in the sun for a bit.

Disembarkation

5 out of 5
Smooth and great.
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5 Comments

lisamhelmick    6 years ago

I also agree about the smoking, as a smoker I wished it were at the back of the ship and not in the middle for everyone to walk through, we also do not smoke in our house so my kids aren’t subjected to that much smoke ever... I also wish that there were a child’s play area some where on 9 so that the kids have something to do, while parents smoke. I hated asking my kids to sit 6 windows seats down from the bar and watch how bored they were for 5 minutes. I will say though that there are 8 air machines around the bar that actually do an amazing job keeping the area cleared. I would be so much worse without them

marques41    6 years ago

cruzelady777    6 years ago

Thx for great review & Happy you enjoyed your cruise. We love Carnival.

VacationBusy    6 years ago

Awesome review!

PaulDW    6 years ago

I agree with you about all the smoke in the casino/bar areas.

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