kwokpot

One of the worst type of offenders are the ones that say 'I put my stuff down then go have breakfast at the buffet and then come back to my lounger'. WRONG and inconsiderate. Why don't you go have breakfast first, then go and get you lounger? The response is, 'Well, there won't be any loungers available then'. That's because everyone is being inconsiderate and doing the same thing. That's the ONLY reason you see scores of loungers reserved at 8:30am but nobody in them or in the pool. If everyone just went to a pool lounger WHEN they needed it rather than trying to reserve one for 6 hours a day there would be constant turnover of loungers and always loungers available. If someone wants a lounger for 6 hours a day and won't be in the lounger all that time then rent one.

Literally. That's the vibe they were looking for.

Agreed. That's what I do.

I guess you haven't sailed in very rough seas.

Perfect!

Thank you for a more accurate update. We've done over 20 TAs and TPs and can understand rough weather, especially those sailing from NYC on a Northerly route. Why people choose to embellish their reports is beyond(Pun unintended) me. Just report the facts!

If you like at the Costa's Excel Class ships there's four main dining rooms that's part of the included fare. Basically what was done is a third aft dining room was added and the dining room on deck 7 doesn't have a cutout which increased dining capacity. If you examine the deckplans for the Costa Smeralda you'll come to the conclusion that on Carnival's Excel Class Cucina and Chbang will NEVER be a cover charge restaurant.

TBH none of this actually makes much sense. The ship designers knew full well when designing the dining spaces for the Excel class the two dining rooms allocated as MDRs couldn't possibly accommodate all the diners every night at the regular dinner hours. If you compare the sizes of Chibang and Cucina vs Rudi's and the Steakhouse you'll see the former are much larger and not really sized as specialty restaurants like the latter. If the original thinking was to purposely undersize the MDR's to spread people out and FORCE people to pay a Cover Charge, however small, to have dinner at a reasonable hour at larger specialty restaurants that was pretty warped thinking and obviously that plan was quickly abandoned.

What are you nervous about? It's a beautiful ship with tons of food choices and lots of activities. Stop letting people put preconceived notions in your head.

Can you elaborate on this? I don't remember reading any accounts where there's mention of damage to the ship?

I'm sure they will have a good time but you do realize that there's no water park, ropes course, slides and the other bells and whistles.

Because it's an MDR.

Only onboard and only if you have your time dining. If you have fixed early or late dining you can only eat there after 730-8pm

I received my Bermuda Travel Authorization today for next week's Beyond sailing, so we're all good to go!

There will NOT be an upcharge for those venues.

This seems to be common practice with treatments in a cruiseship spa on many different cruiselines.

Yup, at the gym every day. I skip the sailaway party and maintain my daily workout routine (except when the close the gym for the spa raffle🙄).

Which ship will you be on? Always free weights to at least 50 lbs. Always a rower. Cable machine with pullup bar varies and many a time there's barely enough clearance from the ceiling. Usually not a separate calf machine but always a seated leg press which you can utilize for calf isolations. Usually at least 2 benches. Here's a couple of photos from the gym on the MardiGras. Spirit class ships have a funky layout with multiple levels and a tiny free weight area. Vista class ships have an ok layout.

They can also leave it just the way it is. Seems to be working out quite well. As I've said before the current implementation while unique for Carnival isn't for other cruise lines. Lots of things about the Excel class are game changing for Carnival so a new way of implementing main dining options could be just another component that separates these ships from the rest of the fleet.

The Thermal suite on Edge Class ships are not called Persian Gardens but SEA Thermal suite and it was excluded from loyalty benefits from day one on the Edge and all subsequent ships. The exclusion is noted in the description of Captions Club benefits. How were you notified that you had a free visit based on your CC tier? It's literally listed as an exception on all E-class ships.

Yes, whatsmore there's not even a loyalty discount given for the thermal suite passes. Treatments yes, but not the thermal suite passes.

I never claimed it to be a big deal. I was just quoting the statistics that Carnival is putting out to support the view that Chibang and Cucina on E-Class ships are being used as MDRs. If Carnival ever decides to implement cover charges in those restaurants on that class of ships it would behoove everyone to skip YTD and go with Set Dining times. YTD in that scenario would be a fiasco. I suspect that will never be the case and Carnival, with this class of ship and probably any future new builds, will feature multiple smaller dining rooms which seems to be the new ship design with Celebrity, Virgin, NCL, MSC (The last three are using the same basic ship design ).

The 1 free visit is not valid on E-class ships. The morning continental breakfast was in Tuscan but I think it's been moved to the Bistro.

If you look at the deck plans there's actually more cabins on the 2 newer ships.

Carnival's own website.