Review Of our Fantasy cruise- we hit the jackpot

We were on the April 13th cruise out of Mobile to Cozumel with propulsion issues. I will start out with telling you a little about our cruise party. This was my 10th cruise, my husbands 8th cruise and my 10 year old sons 5th cruise. All on carnival. I am 44 and my husband is 50. We also brought along my brother in law and his girlfriend, this was their first cruise. I booked this cruise for a long weekend getaway over Easter and we only live 3 hours from mobile. This was my 2nd time on the Fantasy and 1st time sailing out of Mobile. We had originally planned to get up early Thursday morning and drive to the port but Wednesday night we were packed and ready so we decided to drive to mobile and get a room. We were ready to get the vacation started. Our checkin time was 12:00 and I prepaid our parking at the lot at the port a few weeks before our cruise. We arrived at the port at 11:15 and the line to get in the lot was very long. It moved pretty quick and when we got up close we talked to one of the workers and he said the ship was late getting in and everything was backed up because of that. By the time we unloaded and parked it was 11:50 and we headed to get checked in. We walked right in and the lines were not long at all. We got up to security right at 12 and they asked for our passport or birth certificates. As soon as it came out of her mouth my heart dropped and I realized I had left my sons birth certificate sitting in the counter at home! I had passports for me and my husband but in the hurry of leaving Wednesday I did not put his birth certificate in my purse. This was my 10th cruise and the 1st time this has ever happened!!! I have to say the workers in mobile are by far the nicest workers at any port I have been too. The lady saw the panic on my face as I was telling her I didn't have his documentation. She calmed me down, closed her line and told me to follow her and we would figure it out. She took me, husband and son to a lady at a desk behind one of the partitions. I was already running though in my mind who I thought would be willing to drive me his birth certificate to Mobile before the ship left at 4. I was panicked to say the least. The lady asked me if I had anyone that could text me a picture of his birth certificate. I said really??? She said no as long as they can see the whole birth certificate in the picture that would be fine. I almost cried. I always thought you had to have the original but I was not going to dare ask her that. So I called my neighbor, explained what had happened and she went and took a picture and texted it to me. I showed it to the lady and she said that was perfect. She gave me an email address and told me to send it to that email and they would print it and we would be good to go. I was still in disbelief that they were soooo nice and allowing me to do this. So I emailed it to the address she gave me and within 5 minutes I had a printed copy of his birth certificate. She then escorted us to the beginning of the line and waited with us for the person that checks you in and gives you your sail and sign cards. So we by passed that entire line and she explained the situation to this lady, No problem and checked us in, gave us our cards and off we went. I just can't say enough about how nice all 3 of these ladies were that helped us get on the boat. I texted my brother in law and they were up on the lido deck. They had only been on the ship about 10 minutes before us. So after all of that it still did not take us but about 35 minutes from the time we left our car to the time that we got our guys burger. I told my husband as we were eating this was going to be a great cruise!!! And boy was I right! More to come.....

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Good to hear about Mobile's port! We will be there next month

Thanks for the review.

I'll be on the Fantasy next week 4/27. Anxiously awaiting more of your review.

We finished eating and it was about 1:30 so we headed to our room to drop off our carry on bags. Our room was ready and we met our steward. I know the topic of once a day vs twice daily cleaning has been a hot topic on these boards and I knew if he asked which one I preferred I could tell him both. But we are the kind of people that stay up til 1-2am on a cruise and sleep until lunch. I am also the person that only makes my bed at home if I have company coming over lol. As long as I have clean towels I am good to go. So I told him we would prefer the evening cleaning. I have never been one that liked my room cleaned in the mornings. He asked if we would like anything extra, pillows, towels, ice? I told him no we were good. That was the only time I ever saw him. He was like a ninja. We came in every night to a clean room, towel animals, plenty of towels and we never needed to request anything additional from him. So we headed to the red frog pub and the pool. We found deck chairs and ordered a drink, we all 4 had purchased the cheers program. We were going to hang out and wait for our safety briefing while my son played in the pool and hot tub. I am not sure of the time but an announcement came over the intercom that we were having propulsion issues and unfortunately we would not be able to leave in time to make it to Cozumel. They were still working on the issue and were getting approval to do a cruise to nowhere. They announced we could get off the ship by 9pm and receive a full refund. And if we stayed we would receive a 50% refund on our cruise fare, 50% credit towards future cruise and a $50 pp onboard credit. WHAT?? Is my math correct?? That's like getting 2 cruises for the price of one. And you are giving me $150 onboard credit? That just basically paid for one of my cheers. Could this really be true? Did I hear it right? So I have been to Cozumel 7 times. I didn't book this cruise to go to Cozumel. I booked this cruise to get away from work, sit out on the deck, relax and drink some adult beverages. A cruise to nowhere sounds fine with me. Our 2 first time cruisers were a little disappointed because they did want to go to Cozumel, but I told them with he money we just saved we would book another this fall and go to Cozumel. I was extremely happy with this deal. Heck I would have been happy with just one 50% off. I really think carnival went over and beyond on this. I don't know if all the bad press with the glory dry dock issues had something to do with it and they just didn't want all that bad press. But they really stepped up in my opinion. I would take that deal any day. We did the muster drill and after that we played putt putt then just hung around the waterslide, pool and bar. We were waiting to hear what time we would leave. I heard that about 600 people got off this ship. I can believe it because the ship never felt crowded at all. I never had to stand in line for food or drinks. We ended up leaving mobile around 8:30. Yeah!! We are on our way. I had been worried that they would not get the issue fixed and cancel the cruise. But nope we were headed out of Mobile bay. We didn't do the dining room and decided to just get sandwiches and pizza. My son was ready to hit the kids club so we dropped him off and walked around to get familiar with the ship. We went to several of the clubs and to the adult comedy show. We met the cruise director at the comedy show. I think that's the first time a cruise director has ever come up to me and introduced himself. He would quickly become my favorite cruise director of all time! We wanted to hit the casino but they did not open on the first night. By this time is was getting pretty late so we went and picked up my son from kids club and turned in for the night. I am going to call it a night but will pick up and try to finish the review tomorrow.

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Good to hear about Mobile's port! We will be there next month

Even with my issues it was the easiest embarkation and debarkation I have had in all of my 10 cruises. Such nice people and a very nice port.

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I'll be on the Fantasy next week 4/27. Anxiously awaiting more of your review.

You will have a blast! The crew is wonderful, food was good and they fixed the propulsion issues so you should be good to go!

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First drink at the red frog pub! My favorite is the rum treasure

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putt putt

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another rum treasure

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first of many, many ice cream cones

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That's awesome. I hope we miss Cozumel and get half off our cruise in July. Lol

Really looking forward to your review....so glad to hear it turned out great!!

glad you enjoyed your time in mobile,al.

thanks for the review.

I sleep so good on a cruise. The dark cabin, the gentle sway rocking me to sleep. The air on full blast and the beds are comfortable. At home I never get to sleep late. I work Monday-Friday and up early for church on Sunday. My only day to sleep late is Saturday but for some reason my son is up at the crack of dawn wanting breakfast. This is the same child I drag out of bed kicking and screaming during the week to get ready for school. But not a cruise. We all sleep until 11 or so and it's great. So me and D (my sons name is Dalton but we call him D) got up at 11 and headed for the lido deck to get some food. Dad stayed in bed. He likes to sleep even more than I do. D ate a burrito from the blue iguana every day. He liked the fact that he could pick what he wanted in it. He always got Steak, chicken, shrimp, cheese and rice. We both ate burritos this day and they are really good. I spotted our 2 first time cruisers, Vicki and Stanley by the pool after we ate. I walked over and talked to them for a few minutes. There was a Chair a few down from them empty so I was about to go get it and the Woman sitting next to them made all her kids move down one and gave me the chair next to them. This was noon on the lido. Normally no chairs in sight. But that's the way this cruise went. Everyone was so nice, never had a problem with chair hogs, always able to find a chair. No crazy out of control kids, no ride cruisers. It was great! So D headed to the pool and I sat back, ordered a drink and started on reading my book. The music is pretty loud around lido so I did not get into my book and instead ordered a drink and just sat back and relaxed. We enjoyed the mixologist contest and hairy chest contest, it was so funny. Dad finally showed up and he found a chair behind us in the shade. We enjoyed our afternoon of fun and sun and adult beverages. The newbies decided they needed a nap before dinner. We had planned to go at 6 because D wanted to be in the kids club no later than 8. This was the captains dinner and It would be the only night he went to dinner with us and I had to make him go. I don't know what all they do in the kids club but he stayed from 7 to 1am every night. D decided he had enough of the pool and wanted to go play ping pong. So we headed up one flight to the ping pong tables. They have some cushioned chairs around the tables and I found one and watched D and dad play. Then we heard the announcement. They came on the intercom and said that we had received special permission to dock in key west tomorrow!!! The whole ship exploded in cheers. It was like a football game and your team just scored the winning touchdown type cheers, me included. So we went from a cruise to Cozumel, to a cruise to nowhere to a cruise to key west. We are still getting all the discounts, are you kidding me. I had never been to key west, always wanted to go so I really feel like we hit the jackpot on this cruise. We were all excited to say the least. So after the ping pong games we headed back to get ready for dinner. We make our way to the celebration dining room at 6. We had YTD so I was prepared to wait. We walk right up and they seat us immediately. Never on any other cruise on elegant night have we not had at least a 20-30 minute wait. I guess it was because of all the passengers that departed and the cruise was not sailing full. But whatever it was, it spoiled me because we never had to wait to be seated in the dining room and I liked that. The dinner was good but I do miss the lobster on the shorter cruises. I had the mushrooms, salad and grilled shrimp. Then finally what I had been waiting for... warm chocolate melting cake. I had that for dessert every night. After dinner we changed clothes, dropped D off at kids camp and went to the bar outside the casino for a drink. There was a country music group singing and they were really good. We sat there and listened to them for a while, went to the piano bar and then made our way to the casino. The dealers were all very nice and I enjoy taking to them. We all played 3 card poker and my husband hit trips that night so we were winning and decided to leave with some money and head to the night club and dance. We were having alot of fun but I wanted to go check in on D and make sure he was not ready to leave around 11. He saw me, waved me off and told me to come back when it closed at 1. So I went back and found the others and we danced some more, listened to the band some more and went back to the casino. At 12:45 we all were craving some pizza so we headed to get D then all went to get pizza. We all loved the pizza and ate it at the end of every night. By this time it was about 1:30 am and time to hit the bed. Luckily for us we were not docking in key west until noon.

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That's awesome. I hope we miss Cozumel and get half off our cruise in July. Lol

Yes I would take that deal again anytime!!

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ping pong

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Captains dinner

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all dressed up

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my favorite!!

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We are sailing on the Fantasy in 17 days! Loving your review and I can't wait. This will be our first time on the Fantasy and first time sailing out of Mobile.

Really looking forward to your review....so glad to hear it turned out great!!

Thanks

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Thanks for the review.

You are welcome

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We are sailing on the Fantasy in 17 days! Loving your review and I can't wait. This will be our first time on the Fantasy and first time sailing out of Mobile.

You will love Mobile and the Fantasy! Have a great trip. I am currently planning my next one and I think we may do the 5 day on the Fantasy.

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