Honestly, if I had to do it all over again with what I know now.. I would have stayed home. The being sick portion of this trip has made me rethink my cruise plans in the future.
Embarkation
1 out of 5
Everything is lines, I know it is a sign of the times but wow! They assign you time to show up to check in which is a start in the right direction. I am assuming that they do it this way because the check in area is so small. This really should have been a sign of things to come. Like I said I don't like waiting in line but do not enjoy when the Roided out rent-a-cop with the dog screams in my face to keep moving. Carnival... The name of the game is customer service, screaming at your customers before they get on your product is not a good way to start.
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
2 out of 5
All of the food, with the exception of the Guys Burger Barn was bland. I get it you are cooking for a lot of people. Our restaurant team with so awful (no personality, get em in, shove some food down their throat and get em out mentality, we asked to be moved to the other dining room. This improved our situation greatly. The Buffet... I can tell you that every cruise I have been on in the past has either hand washing stations, or the hand sanitation balls. Not only that there was someone there to ensure that you used them. I saw none of this, four out of the five folks in our party ended up getting sick. I think I only saw two hand washing stations! Of those two only one kind of worked!
Onboard Activities
5 out of 5
There were plenty of activities, we had our 7 year old daughter with us and she enjoyed the activities at the kids club.
Entertainment
5 out of 5
All of the shows that we attended were very good.
Children's Programs
5 out of 5
We attended two of the activity events with our daughter, the kids club was great
Service and Staff
1 out of 5
Outside of second set of wait staff, no one and I mean no one provided any level of service that felt personal and engaging. Our room steward was nice and very friendly, but I think he was very overworked.
Ship Quality
1 out of 5
So this is where I have the biggest gripes. When we first boarded the ship, the strong smell of sewage was very noticeable. As it was turnaround day, I figured that they were emptying the tanks from the last sailing, and that it would pass. It never really did, we had the smell of sewage for the entire trip. As far as the layout and design goes, the ships layout was fine, being a smaller, older ship it was easy to get around. It was mentioned by several of the crew that they ship is headed for retrofit next year. It needs it, this ship is in pretty rough shape. I think they missed the timing on it by a year or so.
Cabin / Stateroom
1 out of 5
Our room needed a lot of fixing. The door to the veranda was missing a screw so you had to jimmy with it to get the door to open. The carpet strip where the floor and wall come together was all pulled out. With the bed made into a king, there was no way to get around to one side of the bed. The TV base was broken so while the TV was working fine and would swivel, there was no way to tilt it up. As far as cleanness goes, there was an inch of dust where the mirror and the wall meet, it is one of those things, if they are not cleaning the things in plain sight, what about the things you cannot see?
Ship tip
I don't mean to offend anyone: I look at it like this, there are many different level of cruise lines, Virgin, which is like a Penthouse in New York, (with the same price tag). Then there is a line like Royal Caribbean, they are like a single family home in a great community. Then there is like Norwegian, they are a nice single family in a good neighborhood. There are several other lines that are several other steps. Then there is Carnival. Carnival is like an apartment building. The rent is cheaper (cruise price) therefore many other people can gain entry to it. With the lower price, brings folks from all different walk of life, what is acceptable to one group, might not be to another. Having said all of that, we wanted the cheaper price being a party of five. We kind of knew what were getting in to.
Omg, I chose this cruise because a friend asked me to come along now I want to cancel because of this review. I appreciate your honesty and detail but this is terrible. It is I went through cruise line to pay and I am paying 1,765 for this outdated old boat omg Oh my I should have looked at the reviews. My classmattes must have not looked at the reviews smh.
Self fulfilling prophecy here. Considered carnival the lowest class of operators, then pointed out all the reasons why. Although the reviewer mentions virgin and rcl, they only have their low budget carnival trip to talk about. Highly doubt reviewer has ever stepped foot in a New York penthouse or on a Virgin ship. Thanks for speculating on why the other lines may have been better if you had chosen one of them.
Have been on 3 different Cruiselines and Carnival is just as good as the others.... Don't chose a older ship next time.... I was on this ship back in 2009 and it was great. Short cruises and older ships are crappy.... You get what you pay for
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