bguppies

I've ordered a toasted PB&J dozens of times after getting back to the ship after a hot day in port, call in the order, shower and voila, food arrives without having to trudge down to the buffett or Guy's for food. But the one thing used to be, about half the time, the chips or cookies would be stale. (usually the chips) I couldn't careless when it was free, i'd just eat the sandwich and leave the stale chips or cookie. If they are going to make you pay for super simple stuff like a PB&J and chips, they'd better prepare to serve much better quality food if you're going to force people to pay for it.

I wandered down to the beach before the DJ got started so I can't speak to how it sounded down there. I was stunned that it bothered me so much, as I grew up going to loud concerts and clubs from 16-30 years old and now suffer from tinnitus because of it, but the dance music was strangely annoying. (but I think its more about how annoying music since 2000 has been more than decibels.) As long as people enjoy or at least don't mind modern club music, they should have a fine day. It just took my enjoyment of the day from a strong 100/100 to a 75 or 80 out of 100. I would highly recommend anyone not sure, to give it a try for themselves, the pool facilities there are that nice. And the price after the golf cart rental price hike recently, kind of priced us out of trying other smaller beaches around the island. (which was our original other option when it was $69 to rent a cart all day.) The small amount of extra $$$ for full use of the pool and other areas semed well worth it to us.

Please let us know how the seaweed is in November. DW and I are going the first week of December and are curious about the seaweed that time of year. Plus dying to know all the up to date details for Krazy Lobster in gerneral.

If you'd feel fine walking around any other medium-large city in the US. you'll enjoy it. Everyone speaks English, which is frequently the biggest obstacle in many foreign coiuntries. Just use common sense , do a little research, and stay on your chosen path. 6 hours is a pretty short day in port ( as it usually takes 20-30 minutes to get off if everything goes smooth and they usually want you back on board 30 minutes early) Nassau is a pretty small town. Most suburbs shopping area dwarfs Nassau. I've done walking tours multiple times and had a blast. Done the pirate museum once. If you have a kid who is a pirate nut they will probably like it. I found it to be just MEH... Ardastra Gardens and Zoo was a fantastic day which could easily be done in a 6 hour port stop. They have a trained marching Flamingo show, a cage where you could walk in and hand feed some Lorry (small) Parrots. It is different from a big, US zoo, as many animals are in pens mere feet from the fence. Not 20 feet away behind a huge moat or something. (like they had a small pen of Meerkats behind a farm like fence rail.) Full Size Parrots flying free and just sitting around snack bars etc. The Flamingoes just wander the park on their own between the shows. Not a ton of animals but what you get to see is up close and personal. If you have michevious or uncontrollable kids, might not be the place for them as they might get into trouble. If your kids are well behaved and would appreciate up close contact with animals, then they might really enjoy it.

We were a couple in our 50's and for mobility issues it was fantastic. Ramps in most places (only 4-5 steps at most places.) wooden boardwalks running through the sand around the pools and close to the pools on the beach for ease of walking and being able to roll walkers and scooters if you needed. They even had a mat that rolled right down to the water if the sand was too soft for some to walk on. Plus 4 railings in each pool with large slightly sloped stairs to enter the pool. Plenty of Loungers and umbrellas and other shaded areas. (sofas, clamshells, etc.) The only thing that ruined an otherwise wonderfully relaxing day, was the DJ showing up and started playing 2000's thumping dance music after 10AM. (we even knew in advance he would be at the end of the right hand pool when we entered and we went as far away as we could. To no avail) The only song we knew the entire day was Montell Jordan's "This Is How We Do It" from the 1990's. Just "THUMP< THUMP< THUMP" all day. (one song finally started slow and I joked where was the Thump and 5 seconds later, there it was) If you enjoy current, autotuned, thumping dance songs, you will probably LOVE IT. If not, it might lessen your enjoyment on the day, but the place is so nice it won't kill it. If you have any specific questions I will try and answer them for you to see if this excursion would be a good fit.

DW won a trivia less than 7 days ago on the Sunshine and the guy had her write down her cabin number on the scoresheet and took it. So we assumed he just forgot to bring a Ship on a Stick when he came up for trivia. We stayed for 3 more trivias and no one else got one either with other hosts.(Or medallions) None of the trivias were much fun or conducted well so for the first time in any of our cruises we quit going. As of Sunday we hadn't received anything yet, so DW went down to Guest Services and they called down to somebody on the Fun Team and said something would be sent to our cabin. Woke up on Debarkation Day to find somebody had let themselves into our cabin while we slept and left 3 chocolate covered strawberries (which we should have gotten anyway as Platinum, but don't like anyway)and a note saying thanks for playing trivia. Thankfully she had already won a Ship on a Stick for her collection on a Sunshine cruise in March. (She had one for every cruise she has been on up until this cruise, but at least she still has one for every ship she has been on now) Seemed more like the Fun Team have been told to only give them out for larger (theater sized trivias, etc.) and to not give out decent prizes at the smaller trivias. I'm sure saving a $1 ship on a stick versus giving $0.50 medallions versus giving leftover chocolate covered starwberries getting ready to be trashed is the latest cost savings.

From the CPAP Solutions thread a few down the page, I'd say yes.

It was a private, walled off beach before the hotel closed, so I'd imagine its the same now, just without the hotel guests mingling the the handful of cruisers they used to book. As long as the pool is kept clean and there is a functioning bathroom to use, should be a pretty quiet day. (that is why we used to like it) Was a gorgeous pool area and a nice small beach, the couple of times we used it when the hotel was open. Hopefully somebody who recently has used can verify the conditions for you before your cruise.

Also if anybody has mobility issues, the resort with the pool access was nice. Ramps and boardwalks through the sand to everything. Also hard mats through the sand right down to the water for walker access. 4 railed, stepped access to each pool. Plenty of loungers, umbrellas and shade. Again, just remember it is owned by Branson and Virign, so the asthetic is more geared to 20-30ish crowd, but very accessible to geezers.

Yeah the floor to ceiling windows were great but the constant Lido door slamming and people running up the hall all day and night was a little bothersome. (just like any cabin under the lido, or buffett or theater, etc.) Figured if I could find something similar in other parts of the ship would be nice. Just didn't want to paint those cabins as perfect.

This is what we do, a hardside carryon with wheels. Then use the extra room around it for our meds and a change of clothes if our bags are late. Used to use a small, collapsible, travel dolly we got at Wal-mart by the luggage years ago. Folds down to like 8x10 or 10x12 inches to put in other luggage on the way home. But the small, wheeled carryon sized luggage is perfect.

Thanks for pointing out something good.

I have to admit even though I didn't 100% like the experience, but the menus and funtimes for the entire cruise in advance (as soon as you board) was an incredinly nice feature.

No. Watched two guys setting up the buffet Sunday morning, stop and check the one guys phone and laugh at whatever they were checking out. Then scroll a bit and laugh some more. Went on for a few minutes until one of the ladies working down there started walking towards them and the one guy pocketed his phone. Saw another guy while cleaning the railings on a stairwell early one morning leaning down in a corner scrolling through his phone for a couple of minutes, then pocket it and got back to work. Also saw employees on their phone in the Alchemy bar area, Guys burger joint and the guy cooking in the Mongolian Wok station, while he was cooking. (that was actually impressive) Phone out of his pocket repeatedly checking messages with one hand while cooking with a spatula in the other.

Don't count on the QR code working or Guest Services to help. (didn't for us this past weekend) Find out which perks you want pre-cruise and find out where to get those. No water in the room and we never got ours. I knew to go to the casino and we got our $25 cash the night before we debarked. Knew to go to pixels and got our "gift" (koozie) and pin. If there was anything else we wouldn't know and received no assistance from Guest Services.

Please don't give them anymore ways to squeeze more $$$ out of pockets. (no longer nickle and dimeing)

Yeah the QR codes in our room didn't work this past weekend. If I didn't hang out in here prepping for the cruise I woiuldn't have had a clue of what to do. We headed down to Guest Services and the gentleman behind the counter just handed us an outdated sheet of paper (pre-pandemic) about platinum benefits, when we told him our QR codes in the cabin werren't working on either of our phones, what were the current platinum benefits. He simply told us to go to Pixels to get our pin. Nothing else. We did that and got our pins and koozie, but had to wait 5 minutes while the girl working Pixels finished putting out some photos until her surpervisor asked what we were there for and then yelled at her for making us wait. Luckily I knew to check the casino so we got our $25 each a couple days later. Basically if you ask for any assistance, you seem to be putting people out. I was stunned how bad the help has gotten around the ship. Our room steward and waitstaff were great. But more than half the workers all around the ship were busy looking at their phone everytime you passed them or just not friendly towards their guests. (probably due to being overworked)

This past weekend's cruise was a wake up call, to the new Carnival for us. Yet another dilution of the product doesn't surprise me. None of the things they have been reducing or taking away, affect everyone, but at some point Carnival will get everyone with something that will detract from what they enjoyed about a Carnival cruise.

DW has always ordered chocolate cake on every cruise until this past weekend. (We had no way to order as the QR codes left in our room did not work and the phone had no button for Room Service)

Thank you for that. Was driving me crazy ***** you were supposed to do with this hunk of neoprene. Maybe I can use it on the exposed pipes of my water heater outside this winter. (both weeks)

We got back from Bimini on Monday morning in Charleston, SC and when we got off the ship, we just picked up our luggage and walked straight out of the terminal. NO Customs check at all. Never seen that before, by, air, sea or car.

OK just got back Monday from our Sunshine cruise. Platinum was a total $h!t show. The QR code in the cabin wouldn't scan to let you know where and what you're platinum gifts and benefits were. Went down to Guest Services and the guy just handed me a handout from pre-pandemic days which was zero help. So we wandered to Pixels and got our Pins and the NEW platinum gift. We have yet to figure out ***** it is....LOL... It is a 9 inch by 3 1/2 inch piece of like mousepad material. (If it was square I'd think mousepad.) Has a cartoony picture of a beach with Carnival VIFB club written on it. DW thought it was maybe a wristpad for your computer, but it's too short. I don't know what you are supposed to do with this thing. The Koozie may have been junk, but at least you knew what it was. (At least I could have given the Koozies to someone) Did remember a couple days in to stop by the casino and collect our $25 cash each. (at least that was still going)

Here is a video that shows the nets through drone footage. Seems to be a pretty clear day from other videos I have seen on you tube. The brown clumps you see in the water is seaweed and if you look to the right of the screen as the drone rises you see the seaweed accumulating at the edge of the nets and some slipping through. One video I saw, the seaweed was so bad at the time, the inside swimming area was pretty heavy with seaweed, but outside the nets it was so thick, large iguanas were running on top of it, as if it was a land mass floating. I'd imagine this video is a truer version of an average day in Mahahual. If that level of seaweed would ruin your sxperience, (it would for DW) then you may want to try another excursion. If 5 small beers for $5 is the most important part of your day, (I know it was for my brother) this is probably your idea of a great day.

Don't you still have to wait in line to make your selections before you sit down? (I know we had to on Freedom or Glory years ago. Had to wait in line and make our selections at the Pasta side and then take a beeper to go back up and pick up our food on the Sunshine this weekend. JiJi's side on the Sunshine was just wait in line the entire time your food was prepared.)

Excellent tip.