Carnival Freedom Cruise Reviews - Reviews

Our two excursions had problems because we did not book them through Carnival. Our excursion at Grand Cayman Island started at 1 pm and we had to be back at the ship by 3:30 pm so we missed seeing the world famous turtles. Plus, I spent over $75 in taxi fees because there were no other Carnival passengers to share the taxi with. We docked at Cozumel at 10 am and by the time we were allowed to get off the ship, we almost missed our snorkeling excursion. The cruise itself was a wonderful experience and we dined in the Chic Restaurant 4 of the 6 nights - it was fantastic - great food & great service !!! It was a wonderful experience. The ship's entertainment was not as good as it was two years ago. 

I would take this cruise again in a heartbeat!  Great cruise staff, from room stewards to bar staff, to wait staff, and on and on.  A really great itinerary and Great Food,  the Steakhouse was Excellent, would recommend to all! 

we liked the price. comparable to other cruises we've been on. very friendly crew and helpful. fastest disembarkation we ever had. the food was excellent. Our only complaint we had ocean view the window could have been a lot cleaner, could not under stand announcements on the address systems.

Carnival never disappoints us. We enjoyed every aspect of this cruise. As always the wait staff from bar service to dining room staff were friendly and eager to please. Our room steward kept our room in excellant condition every day. The shows in the lounge were high energy and fun. The ship is kept clean overall with attention to small details. My friend and I enjoyed a spa "special" the first day out and it was wonderful and so relaxing. We traveled with two other couples who were first time cruisers and based on their experience with the Carnival Freedom, they will cruise again. This was our 8th cruise with Carnival.

The cruise ship was nice but compared to others this was small.  Didn't like all the trivia onboard

The staff was excellent!  Didn't care for the layout of the ship. The adult pool was on one end of the ship and the serenity lounge was at the opposite end with the slide right next to it.  Food was not the greatest but I did hear the steak house was worth every penny..  

The staff was amazing... everyone was so cheery and pleasurable! I would recommend taking this cruise but do the research about the ports! Unfortunately, the cruise lines don't do enough education about each port. If you don't do the excursions you're kind of left in the dark and fending for yourself. I would definitely recommend taking cash and NOT your bank card. You'll get back to the states with unforeseen bank charges! Overall the cruise was great but the ports... not so much.

Grand Turk Island, the Dominican Republic, Curacao, and Aruba were excellent destinations, with a good range of shore excursions. Each stop included enough time to do a shore excursion and get a feel for the country. The Grand Turk kayaking expedition and the Dominican Republic Taino cave expeditions are highly recommended.

On board did not have as many amenities as past cruises. Dining hours were more restricted, so that late lunches involved a choice between room service, burgers, or pizza. The meals in the main dining room were excellent but only available at set times. There were multiple "raffles" that later turned out to be irredeemable "vouchers," with the raffles taking over the facility until complete. (We gave up on the gym due to a spa raffle one evening.) Some of the gym equipment did not work properly.

My general impression however was that there were simply too many people on board. This is my fifth cruise, but this one felt overcrowded. Pools were overfilled with people.

We traveled with a 22 year old, who found little to do on board ship, and very few people in his age range. On the other hand, there were also few activities suitable for those over 50. Both groups spent a lot of time in the gym.

The on board shows each evening were smaller scale than usual, not up to the "Vegas" style of Holland America, similar to community theater musical reviews. Each performance was like the lats. The comedy shows were good, but so crowded that seats were not available unless you arrived 40 minutes before the event.  The selection of movies shown at sea was good, with a good variety of movies.

Overall, I was glad I took this cruise, but all three of us decided that we would pay the extra fee to cruise Holland America or Princess Lines next time.

Very enjoyable eight day cruise to varied (not similar) islands in the Caribbean. Highly recommended. All stops were great, but Aruba we enjoyed most. If you like hot temps and beautiful weather, do this cruise in September.

I have been on this ship three times and really enjoyed it.  I thought the up grades around the pool were awesome!  Especially Guy Burgers, they are a great addition to Carnival!  The ports were great and the staff was also great, especially our waiter, Catalin (aka: Bobby)!  Bobby was great and the next time I go on Freedom or any other ship I will definitely ask to see if Catalin (aka: Bobby) is on the ship.  Our food also was wonderful and it seemed like the buffets had a better variety of food this time.

Excellent, All round.

Food: both health and ordinary food was available abundantly.  Carnival cruise line seems up to date with the latest discoveries in health food and does offer very meaningful selection in their very wide and quality assortment of foods on Carnival Freedom.

After this cruse we proceed to the Orlando are for a continuing vacation. It was indeed difficult to adjust to the food that was generally available in the Orlando area even in popularly good restaurants.

Accommodation: Very good and very pleasing.

Crew. All crew members were excellent in all ways.

Carnival cruise line seems to have a very good offering. Their vision is very worthy and practical for everyone concerned including crew members, customs, and Carnival cruise line. It is a service which seriously contributes to stability, health and happiness of citizens and countries.  It is a credit to their astute management and astute innovation that their cruises are affordable. I will them eternal success.

I have always encourage their crews to fully support their management of Carnival cruise line, for

In this day and age, my wife and I give you guys a '10' all the way.

This was my 22nd cruise. I am a 45 year old divorced female, and traveled alone. I chose Carnival due to the reduced rate specials they periodically run for solo travelers. To give you perspective on my review, my favorite line is Princess for food and service, NCL for entertainment and Holland for rooms. Traveling alone this trip it was either NCL or Carnival and NCL was almost double with their solo cabins, so I went with the Freedom. Did 8 nights, and loved the length!! I was pleasantly surprised with the taste of the food, as I remembered Carnival food not being so good. Had very very good lobster, and many very tasty fish dishes. I was trying to eat healthy, and infact lost weight on the cruise (on purpose) because I am on a strict diet and was working hard to stay on track while traveling. I found the service to be good in the dining room, and cabins. I thought the casino staff was friendly. The shops were ok. The ship didn't seem terribly full, so I was able to find space when I wanted it. I didn't like the repetition of activity and entertainment; too much trivia with the staff, too much of the "karen carpenter" duo etc. All good on their own, even twice, but it was much the same people just moved around. Also I didn't like that there wasn't more structure around their "get togethers" from single mingles to LGTB. I am an LGTB ally and was traveling alone, so was looking to meet some people to befriend, and I found that hard to do as a non-drinker on this cruise. I was seated at dinner with other single travelers, which was nice. But we were at a huge table for 10 and there were 4 of us. Noticed this at several places in the dining room. My impression of Carnival went up, as a result of this trip. Would just prefer not to sail them as a solo next time.

This is a cruise designed for under 40 crowd.  Musical entertainment was for the Motown crowd era.

Main show was one of the worst I have seen in 20 some cruises.  Dance shows were ike 10 people doing gymnastics to music. Good features were the food and cabin.  Would not cruise again with Carnaval.

The Freedom, while a lovely ship, was not as impressive nor as well laid out as some of the other Carnival ships we have been on in the past. It seemed like too often you "couldn't get there from here" and had to go up or down elevators and around corners to get where you were going. We also did not like the fact that we had to walk through the smoky area of the casino to get to venues on the same level. There is a walkway so you don't have to go directly through the gaming machines, but it is still in open view of the casino and very smoky at times.

The first night at dinner we found they had split up our party of nine (all family, including children) to three different tables, one not even on the same level. The matre'de did what he could for that night but it was not comfortable. To his credit, he moved us to another dining room and we had a wonderful round table for the duration of the cruise. Our servers were wonderful, especially Arphina. The food was good, but did not seem up to prior Carnival standards, except for the lobster night, which was very good!

Overall a nice vacation, the ports were what we expected, and the processing of passengers was timely. However, future Carnival cruises for us will be on a different ship.

This was a very enjoyable cruise. Miss one port due to high winds, but crew put a day at sea together very quickly. crew was handing out a new plan of the day within a hour and half.  All shop and bars opened up 8 hours early from planned opening to ensure all were happy. Well done cruise director  (Jenn) and all her other activity leaders. Only problem I saw were teens wasted on something other than booze. As law enforcement deputy, security should be able to spot this and have a policy for safety of others. Late night dance was fun until the young ones attempted to assert themselves aggressively but older passengers let them know it was not going to be tolerated. 1 Security agent stood at door and played it off.  It does come down to parents doing there job, but make an after midnight policy for non-escorted teens so security can keep adults from having to deal other peoples kids. PLEASE.

This was a very relaxing much needed cruise  I do think that they should change the shows from previous cruises.  We were on this ship for 8 night cruise in June.  The shows were the same as this time.  Disappointed.  The new cruise director was great.  It wasn't a full ship, that was good for us.  The Serenity Area was nice and quiet  The room steward needs a new job or a lesson how to clean.  The June 1st trip, our room was in tiptop shape.  Food was great.   The lobby singers great.  Customer service very helpful.

Lots of smoking everywhere.  Also, I got very sick after the trip, catch a virus shingles during the cruise.  I would recommend to make a cruise line as a non-smoking place, for healthier environment.  In the past cruising with Celebrity, we had more entertainment, with a professional shows and performances.  Also, our cabin was the last on the hallway, and we did not like that.  I'm not sure if we ever will book a cruise on a Carnival Freedom.   I had my 60th Birthday during the cruise and asked if there is anything special they could do for a birthday, but was told that I should buy a cake or campaign on my own. I would recommend to provide at least glass of wine for the birthdays during the cruise, people would remember that gesture.  Thank you for asking my input.

We had a really nice vacation this past Labor Day. The crew was nice and our room steward was the best. I was traveling with my son who is 4 years old and every night he had an animal on his bed. I know they do this for all the quest but every night they did not re-make it them they let him collect them so by the end of our trip my son had a zoo! How cool is that, every night my son look forward to see what  was left on the bed. The Camp Ocean team was so good he cried a couple of times as he did not want to leave the new renovated Dr. Seuss play area. My only disappointment was the short time in Puerto Rico would have liked to be in port a lot longer than a few hours and least time at the beach in Grand Turk. This is one of the better Carnival Cruises and the upgrade to a balcony was worth its weigh in gold the room was roomy and I loved not having beds hanging off the wall.

We had really  GOOD TIME. This was fantastic. We sure will go again on Carnival.   Also good food,services, shows.Cruise staff was BEST.Over all we had BEST time. 

My husband and I loved the 8nt cruise. We decided to cruise to celebrate my birthday/1st anniversary. Did not enjoy the long process to get checked in. I think things could be done a little smother to avoid such long lines.  I also appreciate Carnival for advising us of Tropical Storm Cristobol before we sailed.  Once on the ship there were always interesting things to do everyday. Loved our cruise directer Jen!!! Shout goes out to the baddest DJ on the high seas DJ Jessen. The food was GREAT for us. Nightly movies for families were great. The ports of call were beautiful. I think the prices for the excursions are a little steap. Would have liked to have more time in Puerto Rico. Returned home ready to cruise again. Trying to decide where to go for a family cruise 2015. All and all had a wonderful time!!!!!

The important things, 1. Cabin: the beds are very hard (ours was anyway) in our balcony stateroom. Water from the shower always ended up on the bathroom floor no matter how we tried to keep it away from that side.Hated standing in wet while I was getting ready. Crew were good however, always brought ice when we needed and kept cabin clean. Deck 7 was a good deck, no noise. 2. The food was ok, not great. Did not realize that sit down breakfast is only 8-9 AM and no sit down lunch. All the meals, except dinner, are at the buffet. Would have liked the option to sit down and get served rather than have to stand on long lines to get a meal. 3. Entertainment: the shows were ok, again not great. The only great part was the Punchliner comedy club. That made up for it. 4. Ports of call: Aruba and Curacao were great, Dominican Republic and Grand Turk did not have much to offer.  This was our first time on a Carnival cruise although we have sailed on other lines (Holland America, RCL,Princess), I think we would be hard pressed to do another Carnival.