I expected a lot more from this ship!
Carnival Horizon Cruise Review to Caribbean - Southern
Contributor Level:
Second Mate
Cruises: 7+ cruises
Reviews: 3
Helpful Votes: 81
8 Night Southern Caribbean (Miami Roundtrip)
Sail date: September 07, 2019
Ship: Carnival Horizon
Cabin type: Balcony
Traveled as: Couple
Reviewed: 5 years ago
Review summary
There really is so much more not so positive things I could add to this review. They are also objective and may not apply to everyone. Carnival needs to improve its lines and crowd management Getting on and off the ship. We did have a good time , but would not sail on this ship again. No Carrot Cake anywhere!!! 4 Past Carnival guest with the same reaction and stating out loud that we will never sail Carnival again.Embarkation
getting on the ship was quick and easy. We arrived early from the airport transfer, and pretty much walked right on. They were asking for donations for hurricane victims which probably slowed it down 30 seconds if any one else complains about that. One side note here. Carnival will not let you carry on water bottles that are plastic anymore. you can bring on soda in cans but not water in plastic bottles.
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
Breakfast buffet was horrible!!! exactly the same every day. 4 stations laid out the exact same. Runny eggs, cold toast, limited fruits and omelet lines that were 40 people deep everyday. no peanut butter, had to hunt down the cereal, found it next to the beer machine. Dining room food was Good to great. Ji Ji was excellent. BBQ was good.
Onboard Activities
skyride still down. After watching them work on this for a week, probably could have taken it all the way apart and re assembled with whatever repairs were needed in less time than they will take to get this back up and running. Main pool area has zero hot tubs !!! serenity area only has hot tubs, no pool. So if you are looking for both, rear tides pool, and havana area are only areas with both. Not sure whose great idea this was. Pools are salt/chlorine mix with heavy on the salt.
Main pool area had big screen in it which was hardly used for anything except commercials and temperature which displayed the same temp every day. no sporting events, no concerts, very few movies . Such a waste in my opinion. Fitness center was very nice and modern. Running track often closed due to lift being used to fix skyride???? Did not try the ropes course although saw a few people on it. Sports area, mini golf, cornhole was often used. There was exercise equipment around track which made for a good workout if you did all that was there. No bands at the pool.
Entertainment
Comedians were just okay. Had one which was good but her shows were the same. 2nd set of comedians were bad. Had a good band in Pig and Anchor . Dj's were only interested in playing 2 am late night dance club thump thump music. Days on the pool deck when they had a good crowd up and dancing to the usual line dance songs , suddenly would change to music that no one wanted to hear and each time I watched the crowd slowly leave the dance floor area. DJ ing is not about playing what you want to hear as a DJ but what gets the crowd up and dancing and for the life of me will never understand a DJ who clears a dance floor playing the wrong music at the wrong time. Again no daytime movies, sports, sunday football, concerts, bands, etc...on main screen or pool deck. Usual pool games that are way past needing to be upgraded to the 21st century.
Cruise director and his assistant... Probably gonna make some people mad here. It seems Carnival is quite okay about their employees expressing their sexuality and making rude and unacceptable comments at every venue and anytime a microphone was turned on. If I was to make even one of the sexually explicit statement to either gender on board I would be arrested and removed from the cruise. Period. It is not acceptable in today's society, but apparently is condoned by Carnival . The game show Quest seems to have been brought back so the assistant CD can ogle the men in the show and make comments again, that would get most people arrested. I DO NOT need to, nor care to know the what where why who and how of any employee's sexual orientation and have no need for it to be rampantly imposed upon me at every venue. Totally unacceptable!!!
Did not use the piano room, IMAX or thrill theater.
Sports bar was so small that people were sitting out in the hallway on football sunday and college football saturday. Bad design and this is the only place to see the games. NO ESPN in your room or on TV???????/?? WHY?????
Service and Staff
Overall the service was very good. The bar servers on deck were great. Chao and Bambang were great. Our room steward was very good. Dining room staff very good. Most every staff encountered was very good.
Ship Quality
layout seemed cramped. My wife noticed that you can't see from one side of the ship and out the viewpoint on the other side. I felt that there was no WOW factor when we first got on the ship. Main atrium area is really small compared to most other grand atrium's . Number one complaint...WHO designs a casino with out a bathroom anywhere near it?? Men and women had to take a hike to go to the bathroom if you were in the casino. And as a smoker who has not had a cigarette for 5 months and 5 days when I got on board , even the casino was really bad for smoke. It seemed it had no where to vent out. Another bad design for such a new ship.
Common areas did not have a lot of seating placed around. I did not have a problem with the elevators but we were on deck 14 and 2 elevators supplied that floor.
The cleanliness on board was well maintained despite the nasty people on board this ship.
Cabin / Stateroom
cabin was fine , everything worked. Beds were well worn for such a new ship.
Ship tip
if you like old stlye cruising and still like grand atriums , good music, entertainment, variety, good food, etc might consider a different ship.
Thumbs up
0
Ports of call
if the cruise ship is refunding your port charges for this stop prior to you leaving miami, and the cruise director tells you for 2 days that there is nothing in the port area such as shopping baubles, beads, and BS and for 2 days tells you the area surrounding the port is is so many words NOT SAFE... then why the hell did carnival decide this was a good port to visit???
went golfing and beach break at the resort. good day... odd time for arrival at 1 30 pm though
So much to do on Aruba. Cant go wrong with this port.
First time ever returning to ship to have a line to reboard that long. This was not Aruba's fault but Carnivals. Only had one set of entry point on to ship open. Line was 500 plus deep and slow to move if at all. 90 degree temps and standing on concrete...Medical issues . A fellow passenger passed out and had a seizure .We assisted carrying him onboard to nurses' station. Carnival must improve this problem. Nasty crew member decided to call me a liar while waiting in line here. Carnival should fire her immediately. A small attempt of an apology after we assisted carrying fellow passenger aboard but totally unacceptable for any crew member or crew entertainment to speak to guests in that manner.
Disembarkation
Port of Miami...no need to say much more. Some of the nasty people who were on board decided to make a scene on disembarkation causing the local authorities to be called delaying departure by about 40 minutes.
4 Comments
tendertee 5 years ago
Thank u Iambibs for your review cause I believe everything u said. A friend of mines went on this same cruise and pretty much said the same thing. He said the CD and assistant were off the chain. Doing the 7pm Atrium party how they were sexual dancing that he left the area with his daughters. His daughter asked him were the 2 guys (CD,Assistant) a couple and he said yes cause of what they were doing. Also other guests who had young kids left too. I love Carnival and will continue cruising on them. I hope this bad cruise will not stop you cause each ship is different.
wanjohn68 5 years ago
I think people they aren't doing they Homework when they going on VACATION. When you going to buy a Car, What you Do? You Do your Homework, So the same thing people you got to do with your vacation and stop being So NEGATIVE AND JUST TRY TO ENJOY AND YOUR BEST TO ENJOY YOUR VACATION!!