tweak89

We use the Carnival tumblers we picked up a few cruises ago.  We mix our wine/sprite or just pour wine and wander about no issues.  Even brought the into the main dining room a couple of times.

21 hours ago, vwrestler171 said:

So you book a flight that is risky to arrive as it is, then expect Carnival to pay extra because you think that they should drop everything to get you there on time, but YOU are the one that chose to fly in the day of the cruise.  

I never understand the logic with this.  Why on earth, no matter how you book it, would you choose to arrive on the day of departure.  Way too much risk.  We fly Southwest almost exclusively for domestic travel and have had our last 3 flights changed without notice (and always changed to a bizarre connecting flight from direct).  A simple phone call to Southwest has gotten us on a comparable flight without extra cost. 

8 hours ago, jgmpuma said:

 

6. We like to mix a drink in our cabin while dressing for dinner. We have a Rum Runner. Will it be found?

 

 

I'm curious, do you bring the allotted number of wine bottles with you?  We bring sweeter wines and sprite/ginger ale to make what are essentially wine coolers.  No sneaking needed.  

On the couple of occasions that I've done it I've never had any issues sneaking in liquor (in a small plastic flask) but it's just a small amount for 3-4 drinks.   I've never tried the rum rummers.  The bottle cost from Carnival is bonkers and we don't need a full size bottle anyway.

13 minutes ago, groundloop said:

 

 

(sigh)..... I thought this thread had died peacefully several months ago.

 

John Heald explained quite a while back that this policy was a result of needing to dedicate extra resources to the additional cleaning requirements for cabins.  It had nothing to do with anything in the terminal.

 

(Personally I wish Carnival would take a look at how their sister company, Holland America, assigns boarding times and then allows guests to go straight to their cabin the minute they board.  I just got off my first HAL cruise and it was a much smoother embarkation process.)

This is essentially what I was told by two different CSR's when I called about my September reservation.  We have used FTTF on all our prior Carnival cruises and was looking forward to using it again.  When we didn't see it available, I asked about when calling for another reason.  I had to call again for something else and asked again (sometimes you get inconsistent info) and the explanation what the same.  

Both CSR's made it sound unlikely it would be back this year.

6 hours ago, ALWAYS CRUZIN said:

As I mentioned. Compared to individual drinks unless you only have a few or the package it comes out a lot less. yes $85 is expensive but the other way is far more.

Oh, I know.  It's the same thing with dining plans at theme parks.  You have to really try to break even and it's even harder to come out ahead.  But my comment wasn't really on the Carnival plans, just the ridiculous price they charge for a $20-30 bottle of liquor. 

17 hours ago, ALWAYS CRUZIN said:

I think I posted this before. I am a RUM drinker. You must call or email prior to your cruise. I purchase the bottle of rum from the ships store. $85.00 and it will be in your room when you arrive. Only one catch. It must stay in your room. I also purchase the Bottomless Bubbles package. So the price of the RUM and the drink package is way lower than the package or purchase each drink separate. Wife does not drink, so this for me is a no brainer. You can purchase whatever alcohol the ships store sells and ahve it in your room. Prices are $85 to about $110 depending.

And folks wonder why others try anything and everything to smuggle liquor on board, lol.  The prices they charge per bottle are laughable (and amount to robbery).  Wife and I bring our wine bottles and sprite to make wine coolers.  Although it's tempting to try out the "underwear flask" with strategically placed spigot, lol (and yes, it's a real thing on Amazon).

Not sure I understand the question.  If you have a group of folks traveling together, you don't have to book excursions together.  Those that want to can participate, the others are free to do what they want (another excursion, stay on the ship, explore the port area).

Might want to inquire with the driver what kinds of calls he can take (Messenger, Whatsapp, Duo, Facetime, etc.) and try and use one of the many free wi-fi spots near the Grand Cayman cruise port to make contact and avoid paying for international plans.

We had Verizon for a short period of time but since they are CDMA and not GSM they are pretty useless when traveling.  T-mobile includes international roaming and I've never had an issue in any of the countries I've visited (including India, Croatia, Colombia, Ecuador, Oman and every Caribbean cruise port).  

Hopefully this works for us, as it would open the door to a lot more cruising!   I do wish we had better short-term destinations to choose from (it's either Cozumel or Progresso for the 4-5 day cruises) as we've been to those to ports/places many times.   But hey, for $200 and under per person, I'm sure we can work with it, lol.

Thanks again for the continued feedback.  I hope having a pitch-black room helps trick my body into sleeping in, lol.  I'm an early riser, and sometimes wish I could sleep in especially when I'm on vacation.  

Thanks for the tips / suggestions so far everyone!  I never would have considered buying some cheap click lights to put around the cabin that's a fantastic idea. I am shopping the sunrise alarm clocks now, I couldn't remember what they were called.  Maybe I'll bring a poster of an ocean view portal to hang on the wall, lol (runs off to the fathead website).

I'm an early riser so I do know I will miss having the balcony that I can sit on while my wife sleeps in. But, in this case the deal was too good to pass up and it's been a hot minute since we've done a meaningful long trip.  This will be a very casual one for us no shore excursions since we've been to both these ports so many times we're just going to wander around and find nice local place to eat at each port.  

We did choose to have it assigned, when do they assign your cabin and is it possible to change it around if it's in a bad location?

Wife and I are taking a cruise on the Breeze August 29.  This is our second cruise on the Breeze, and will be our 5th overall cruise.  This will also be the first time we've stayed in an interior stateroom (we've only every done balcony rooms).   We went with an interior (at a ridiculous price of $204 per passenger) as my wife retired this month and we've started our own business, so we are being budget conscious.  So are there any tips/tricks for making a stay in an interior stateroom comfortable?   Any recommendations for alarm clocks with lights that get stronger (since it will be pitch black).   As an aside, DANG!!  I didn't know that Faster to the Fun had been suspended, so this will also be our first cruise with "regular" boarding.

Thanks!

We bought the 7 Day Couples Spa Pass for our cruise on the Breeze last week (Thanksgiving). The way it works is you present your sail and sign card(s) and they put a spa sticker on it and you get a wrist band. So, in essence, it's restricted to whomever's cards are given the sticker. The wrist band color changes daily and you have to leave your card at the counter when using the thermal suite. Since the number of passes were so limited, they recognized me each time I went in to use the Spa, so I don't know if you'd be able to do any switcheroo on them for a day or two.

On the subject of the Thermal Suites (which I used almost daily) my only complaint is that the staff doesn't do much to keep the suites quiet. When I'm tyring to relax I DO NOT need to hear the latest personal family gossip or raucous laughter. Luckily it was only about three occasions and I was able to move on to the next room to get away from it. Aside from that, very relaxing after a workout.

I was wondering this just this morning! We've gotten in the habit of laundering our clothes the night before ending any trip. It's nice to come home and not have to worry about laundry.

Just curious, have you ever used FTTF? For the price, that cost covers the entire room not just one person, it's fantastic. You basically walk on to the ship, your room is ready when you board, you also get priority on ports that tender, and of course, priority to disembark. I don't know about you, but standing in lines is not how I like to start my vacations!

It's not like checking the website, even daily, takes more than a few seconds. So for me, personally, it's totally worth the small amount of time it takes to check for it.

In the past, when I haven't been able to get it when I book, I just continue to check. Just keep checking under excursions for the home port. I booked out Thanksgiving cruise (on the Breeze) a couple of months ago and FTTF was sold out. I check almost daily, and today, it was available and I snatched it up!

So, just keep checking. I did this for my cruise last year as well and up being able to book FTTF well after my initial reservation.

We, for the most part, enjoyed our time on the Liberty last November (Thanksgiving cruise). Our issues were with the itinerary changes (related to the much publicized propulsion issues that hastened the move to Florida from Galveston).

As for the ship itself, we enjoyed pretty much everything we tried (from food to activities). There were some minor upkeep things (some of the public area restrooms could use some maintenance and more regular cleaning, recreation/putt putt area needs a refresh). We heard some complaints onboard with breakfast in the main dining room (eggs tasting funny) but we didn't experience that (maybe a bad batch, as several tables around us sent back the eggs). I would assume the maintenance stuff was taken care of during it's December dry dock.

Overall though, I wouldn't hesitate to sail the Liberty again.

When it comes to reviews and using them to help plan or purchase anything, there is weight to both sides of the review coin. You just have to sift through the emotional aspect to get to the real issue, good or bad. Some folks are just pre-disposed to overlook the small stuff, others are not. Does that make the folks that are bothered by problem "X" a less valuable resource than someone who just loved everything? I think not.

When it comes to spending my money on things like vacations or large purchases you can bet I do a lot of research. There is no way you can completely judge something by it's reviews, but you can glean certain information that might apply to how you like to travel and what you expect and use it as a guide. If I'm picky about noise, then I will pay a little more attention to reviews that point out noisy locations for rooms. If I sleep like a log, maybe I would overlook complaints like that. If I had a finicky stomach or was picky eater, then comments on food variety/quality would carry more importance.

We just cruised on the somewhat crippled Liberty(before dry dock and port swap). My research (taking into account both the good and bad, including an altered itinerary) swayed me into keeping that reservation and taking the cruise. It went well for us, but I can see how there might be more than a few things that could result in a negative experience for others. So, does the fact that I had a good cruise invalidate someone else's bad experience? Nope, because reviews area personal thing. If you disagree with a review, that's perfectly fine, but because you disagree doesn't mean that the reviewers experience was not valid based on THEIR reactions, expectations etc.

I'm doing my preliminary research on the Breeze and will hopefully be able to balance out the hyper positive from extremely negative and make an informed decision. Luckily I have plenty of time before I need to seriously think about booking.

Just wanted to post some thoughts about the cruise so far while I'm waiting for our Behind the Fun tour to start. As you all probably know, the Liberty had to alter it's remaining itineraries due to propulsion issues. This was originally a 3 port 7 day that was charged to two ports (Cozumel being the only unchanged port).

Other than moving really slowly, we've had no issues at all. I'll get into more details with an actual review once we back. But, in addition to the $50 per person credit offer, we also got a credit for the port fees of the 3rd port that was eliminated and found a nice additional mea culpa gift in a fleece throw and picture frame in our stateroom. Also, they brought on board country singer Hunter Hayes (think young Keith Urban/Brad Paisley in that he sings and plays a pretty mean guitar) for a couple of concerts. We had not really heard of him, but judging by the screams, anyone female and under 30 seemed to know who he was, haha.

So, anyone who is booked on the Liberty for the next sailings before it's December Drydock and subsequent move to Florida, fear not, the ship and all it's facilities are working just fine.

18:18 is UTC time and equals 12:18 PM central standard time. Almost 6 hours before our boarding time.

Aaah, thanks!! I knew something didn't jibe with it's position and ETA. Dang 'ol multiple time zone conversions!! Whew! :eek:;):D

Soooo....I was watching the Liberty on various ship trackers (only sea-scanner show it in port, which we know is incorrect) and noticed that they all estimate it's arrival today at 18:18 :eek: That's 6:18pm for us common folks, which is one hour after boarding is supposed to start for today's departure....

Is anyone else seeing the same thing I am??

If a plane would still stay in the air if it lost that one engine, sure, I'd go. But we all know the difference between planes and ships. :rolleyes:

What if the ship was disabled, but not sinking, and Celine Dion was onboard doing 24 hours of My Heart Will Go On? :eek:

I would take the one engined, and likely crashing, plane! :p

I would have absolutely no problem with this itinerary change. Carnival can add more sea days and take ports from my cruise anytime, but how can anyone complain about this compensation? What more could Carnival be expected to do here?

 

Guests sailing on this voyage will receive a $50 per person credit to their shipboard accounts and a 25 percent discount on a future Carnival cruise. Guests also have the option of cancelling and receiving a full refund.

I think those that aren't actually affected see it a little differently. The ability to cancel is great (we have since decided to go). But, as I stated in a previous post, the one thing I think is out of proportion is the onboard credit. I think it should scale to the length of the cruise. $25, $50 and $75. The 25% off, IF it gets used is nice, we will make 100% sure it gets used. But, many folks are on what will likely be their only cruise ever for whatever reason, imagine this scenario from their point of view.

As for my dissatisfaction, it's a matter of this cruise not being what we payed for. Regardless of anyone else's opinions of the original ports, my wife and I wanted to see them and that's why we booked this (original) itinerary. Now, we essentially get Cozumel south in place of Jamiaca and Grand Cayman, haha. Heck, at least do Progresso, Cozumel and Costa Maya so we still have a 3 port itinerary. But, it is what it is. I hope they (Carnival) step up their maintenance game, as they have had more (visible to the general public) mechanical issues then other cruise brands. We've enjoyed our previous Carnival cruises quite a bit and we hope that once onboard, this fiasco will start to fade into memory.

I called to verify the boarding times since our boarding passes still show our original choice of 2:30pm-3:00pm (even though we added FTTF) and was told boarding will occur between 6:00pm-9:00pm.

We will probably roll in around 7:30 or so as we will be able to board when we want with FTTF.

Well, the excitement continues!! As we ave decided to go after all, this situation didn't affect me but I'm sure it may have affected others. The deadline to cancel (according to CSR's) was midnight of the 15th, eastern time. Well, I wanted to log into my account and check a couple of things before turning in and lo and behold, their system was down so you couldn't access your booking. What time was it? Right about midnight eastern time! :eek:

Now, was it a coincidence? Probably so, but can you imagine you are a customer that finally decided you've had enough with the Carnival shenanigans and decides to cancel by the deadline only to find out you couldn't because neither you or customer service could access your booking!!??!!!