terigo

We usually take 2 cruises a year. One is our upscale "go somewhere exotic" cruise and one is our "take a one-week break" out of Florida cruise. We often choose Carnival for the latter, and must say that we have never been disappointed in the service, food, cabins, or entertainment.

I agree that the "party hearty" reputation the cruiseline has is not warranted. Yes, there are a ton of activities, but this is not a bad thing at all...especially great for the kids.

About the only negatives to Carnival are the smoking policies and the fact that it seems the passengers have no idea what formal wear is... and for some, that might not be a negative.

We love Celebrity and Carnival. I still don't understand why people denigrate Carnival as much as they do, but I assume it is because they have never sailed on one of their ships.

What time of the year did you take this trip? You guys look pretty bundled up! How cold was it?

Teri

Thanks!

Do you know what these excursions were?

Teri

We're taking a northbound Alaska cruise, so we'll be in Skagway, Juneau, Icy Strait Point and Ketchikan.

We will be there the second week in June. Is there a particular excursion we can take at that time of the year where we will be able to see bears?

It's on my "must do" list.

Any particular tour operator for this?

Thanks!

Teri

no brainer...grab it!

We actually prefer the Tuscan to Murano...so you can see everyone has their own subjective taste.

Used choiceair on our transatlantic and saved a LOT of money on the one way.

We also checked both on our own and choiceair for our upcoming Alaska cruise.

Flying into Vancouver and out of Anchorage, the airfare is almost twice as much on our own as it is with choiceair.

We booked our Alaska cruisetour back in October. We paid $1824.00 each for a balcony cabin (sweet 16 on the starboard side). We also got $200.00 each discount, for the pick one promo, for a total of 1624.00 plus port charges.

Right now, there are no starboard cabins available at all, let alone the sweet 16, and the minimum balcony price for our sailing is now $3409.00 per person...

So, had we waited the price would have more than doubled and we wouldn't have gotten the cabin we wanted.

The other advantage to a large table is, if one or two of the couples chooses to dine in a specialty restaurant, you still have others to socialize with.

 

On this board, the cheerleaders just will not allow for the fact that another cruise line can do a good job.

 

The post you quoted says the opposite, does it not?

 

yes, and that is exactly why I quoted it. To agree that another line can do a great job and that the posts before it were more "rah rah" than helpful.

We just sailed on the Norwegian Breakaway and were astonished to find that the food in the MDR and the entertainment were far superior to Celebrity. We were very skeptical as to whether we would enjoy it before we booked our cruise, it was a last minute booking, but decided to do it as it was out of NYC and it saved us the airfares to Florida. We were very pleasantly surprised by the whole experience and would certainly sail on Breakaway again. Prior to this we had taken 7 cruises with Celebrity over 3 years and thought they were the best.

On this board, the cheerleaders just will not allow for the fact that another cruise line can do a good job.

I have sailed Celebrity, RCI, NCL, Princess, Carnival and HAL. Never had a bad cruise on any of them...and much to the shock of Celebrity people, the MDR food on Carnival's Dream was every bit as good as that on the Equinox we sailed the same year (last year).

In fact, we are on the Millennium for our upcoming Alaska trip because when we booked it was the least expensive for a one way north (the price has subsequently gone up $2000.00). Otherwise we wouldn't have hesitated to take any of the other mainstream lines doing the same itinerary.

I find that often the people who knock other lines have never actually sailed on them.

For just a couple hundred more (for both of us) on a 2 week cruise, we changed our CC cabin for a suite gty on the Equinox, and were immediately assigned a sky suite under the cafe. I was not a happy camper, but figured "ya pay yer money and ya take yer chances". It was still a good price.

A week later I pulled up the booking to print paperwork and noticed we had been upgraded to a celebrity suite. We didn't ask, and we weren't informed, so I called my TA to check it out. She assured us that yes, we were indeed in a Celebrity suite. It was phenomenal! And it cost the same as what an AQ was going to cost when we first booked.

We just got off the Silhouette a week ago. We were in a Sky Suite, and we had dinner in Blu most every night, well...except for 3 specialty restaurant nights. There was NEVER a line. The maître de, Fernando, always greeted us warmly and always asked us if we were okay with the $5 surcharge, and we assured him we were. By the way, he always kind of said it very quietly, and in retrospect I see he probably did that so as not to alert any Aqua passengers that we were the dreaded suite guests. ;)

 

To be honest, if there had been any kind of line, we would have been happy to go elsewhere, to the MDR or whatever. And this is because I was aware of the controversy before we ever got on board the ship. However...only on the very last night of the cruise was the restaurant really full, and even then, no one had to wait. So for us it was a win/win.

 

I understand that Reflection is a bit different because they now have Aqua SUITES. I suppose that when the new suite restaurant is created, they will do away with Aqua Suites. Or maybe I should phrase that as a question. Will they?

What surcharge? They did away with that. We were charged nothing as a suite passenger to dine in blu.

We were in a Celebrity Suite on the Equinox and ate in Blu twice with no problem.

At the risk of going against the tide, we preferred the cuisine in the MDR, which is why we only tried Blu twice on a 14 night cruise.

I kind of think the offhand use of "Carnivalization" is a bit misguided.

We have sailed both lines frequently.

Last year we sailed on both the Equinox and the Carnival Dream. Here are the differences...

Food. Equal. Yes, I said equal. The specialty restaurants were comparable and so was the main dining room. I find that most of the people here who knock Carnival food have never sailed on one of their ships.

Service. Equal. The staff on both ships knocked themselves out to be accommodating.

Cabins. Equal. Both roomy and comfortable with lovely beds.

Smoking policy. Celebrity wins hands down for this one.

Entertainment. Carnival has the best comedians at sea. The production numbers are about the same.

Ambience. Celebrity has a more high-end feel to them.

Dress code. Much more closely adhered to on Celebrity. On Carnival, my husband and I joked about people wearing their dress flip-flops on formal night.

Yes, there are poolside games on Carnival that do not exist on Celebrity, but ya know what? Even this old couple in their 60s find these entertaining.

Never found any more drunks on one line than the other.

Bottom line? Fewer differences than one would think.

Hamburger...Coffee......Bacon

 

 

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oddly enough, those are 3 of my favorites....

That cruisetour has been that price for over 2 months...I keep waiting for someone to figure out the mistake and change it.... but then again, nothing ever gets corrected on that website.

No, the robes are for your use while cruising, but they stay in the cabin when you leave.

They are then laundered for the next passengers

We found that one of the advantages to Anytime dining is you can wear the same outfit for both formal nights, because you will have different tablemates and they will not have seen you the first time :)

However, on our last cruise, I wore what I thought was a lovely beaded jacket with a velvet skirt, and a woman wearing the EXACT same outfit was seated right next to me. We looked like frick and frack!

We both laughed at being seated with people of such impeccable taste, but what are the odds?

Just to clarify, there is no longer a $5.00 fee for suite passengers to eat in Blu. You can go there whenever you choose, on a space available basis.

We were in a Celebrity Suite and ate twice in Blu. This may be the minority opinion, but we preferred the MDR.

Yeah, I wasn't very specific...We booked a suite guarantee and got the sky suite. 4 days after booking the gty, we got upgraded to the celebrity suite. Lots more perks with the CS than the SS, unless you are elite, in which case you will get the same perks.

We did a suite gty on the equinox 14 day transatlantic and were immediately assigned a sky suite. 4 days later it was changed to a celebrity suite. We did a happy dance like you can't believe!

I have done all of the above, and have not been able to book excursions for our June Alaska cruise for the last 2 months...still can't get into it.

Some day, someone is actually going to do something about that site.

We were in a Celebrity Suite on the Equinox, with select dining. We were on the same line as everyone else.

Also, you cannot order as many entrees as you wish in the specialty dining restaurants. You are, however, allowed to order as many appetizers and desserts as you would like.

I have tried Chrome, Firefox, and IE....same problems with all of them. Let's face it...there's no nice way to put it...the Celebrity site just sucks.