unisphere-roy

Hi,

 

I am already missing our October Hawaii Cruise so another bucket list is New Orleans. I would travel around mid to late November 2018. There are 7 days cruises on the Dream from New Orleans > Montego Bay > Grand Cayman > Cozumel > New Orleans for $1233 Oceanview and 5 day cruise on the Triumph > New Orleans > Cozumel > Progreso > New Orleans for $791 Oceanview. I would like to explore New Orleans either before or after the cruise so the shorter one might give us more time. We are in CA so airfare has to be factored in.

 

Which would you choose? I have never been on either ship or either location and my Mexican experience has only been Ensenada and we don't even bother to get off the ship! I've only been on the Miracle, Imagination and Inspiration with Carnival but we just turned gold so thinking its a good idea to stick with one cruise line.

I'm not sure what travel agent you are using or if you are booking directly, and I don't know if the $791 you mention is per person or for two, but I'm seeing Oceanview cabins on the Triumph sailing on 11/24 (Saturday) for $400+ pp online including taxes and fees. You'd be back in on Thursday morning and then have all day Thursday, Friday and Saturday and could fly home Sunday. Three days in New Orleans would be my choice! Have a wonderful trip whatever you decide!

Triumph in 5 days! So excited!

Single Digits for me and my DH for the Carnival Triumph out of NOLA. So Excited!

I'd call them and ask them directly if I were you!

The Triumph is scheduled for Dry Dock from 3/2/19 to 5/1/19. I can't find any cruise for March or April of 2019 on the Triumph where I looked.

Wow! As the original poster, I feel honored to be post #100 to this thread. I never would have imagined the twists and turns this thread has taken - Pigs in chairs, Origami, $2 bills, metric measurements, Birthday cake, delicious chocolates, eye shadow, neckties, ammo, craft beer, 8x10 glossies, coasters, posts with a dose of snark and well meaning ones just trying to help me understand their point of view. If i missed mentioning something that was in your post, I'm sorry...it was unintentional. Cash is King (or Queen!) and I have always known that. I will not hand out candy or lipstick. I have met the nicest people on cruises...both guests and crew and my intention was to share the blessings I have in my life with others. Now, How do I get this thread LOCKED as there is absolutely no way anyone else could shed any new light on this subject!!!

I use these, and they are free at the office!

As the OP, I want to say Thank you all for giving me your thoughts and reasons for handling this question as you do. I appreciate your time and effort. I don't think more needs to be said. :-)

I enjoy tipping and like to be generous when good service is provided. I have no problem with the gratuities that the cruise lines add onto my bill. I sometimes tip additional cash at the start of the cruise to crew members such as the cabin steward and a special bartender and have noticed that the service for the rest of the cruise seems to be better than if I don't. A friend mentioned that many of the crew members, with guest contact, are appreciative of things such as hard candies or chocolate bars. They may have a hard time accessing these items or they have to pay for them directly and don't feel a splurge is good since they are not paid well to begin with. Has anyone heard the same thing and if so, what type of items did you find that were most appreciated or wanted? Thank you all in advance.

Third time cruiser here and new to Carnival. My husband Billy and I will be joining our friends Abner and Mary to celebrate her birthday which takes place during the cruise. We will be flying in from the Washington, DC area and enjoying the weekend in NOLA before the ship sails on Monday! Hope to meet other GLBTQ CC members and enjoy some R&R. Never been to the Yucatan before and wondering what day trips would be enjoyable and not too expensive. If anyone has suggestions, let us know! Looking forward to a great trip. Roy

Pictures are available at shipcabins dot com and you can judge for yourself. Have a great cruise!

If anyone was interested about the shore excursion site the original; poster mentioned in the review, it is not shorexcursioner dot com but actually

shoreexcursioneer dot com

I was interested as we are going on the triumph in February and for some reason Google could not handle that spelling! This will be our first time on Carnival and first time to these ports.

Here is a copy of Fun Times from September from a link by another poster:

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2542870

Thanks for the comments. When in Bermuda, I plan to be on the island as much as possible so the casino being open does not mean much to me. I guess the cruise lines generate lots of dollars to the local economy so if they wanted it, they got it! Can you imagine them being open while in the American ports? Too bad you couldn't make it this year but I'm sure next year will be fantastic for you!

Community Theatre! I've been involved with Prince George's Little Theatre for 14 years and I'm currently the president. We are going to be starting our 55th season in the fall! http://www.pglt.org

I much prefer behind the scene jobs such as producing, set decoration, set construction, costuming and props. Small parts are fine, since I hate learning lines! Looking forward to our trip and meeting you both.

Roy (and Billy)

My husband and I are going on our second cruise. We will be celebrating our 4th wedding anniversary on June 18th. In November we will have been together 21 years. We are looking forward to having a great time in Bermuda and would love to meet any other GLBT cruisers that might be on board. Post here and say hi! :)

We were invited to the captain's table on RCCL's Enchantment of the Seas 12/31/11-1/7/12. The invite was for Wed. 1/4/12 and included a reception in the Champagne Bar prior to dinner. We had sent the captain a vintage 24 page brochure for a 54 day Mediterranean cruise in the early 1950's that we had found in an antique shop for $20 a few months before our sailing. I thought it would be fun to get it for the captain as a Happy New Year's gift. It turned out that the captain was a cruise ship history buff and had heard alot about the ship in the brochure but had not seen any paper items about that ship. I honestly had no ulterior motives when we bought it.

At the table (this was the only night that the captain dined at the Captain's table) we discovered that all the couples had 30+ cruises under their belt. We could only assume that our gift had been the reason we had been invited. This was our first cruise.

At dinner that night the captain invited all of us to tour the bridge on Friday afternoon before we arrived in Baltimore Saturday morning at 7 am. The best gift we ever gave. The captain and all the other (straight) couples were very welcoming and made us feel relaxed. It was obvious were were cruising newbies and nervous. One couple had just had their 24 year old son come out to them and wanted advice on how to handle things even though they were already very accepting of him. Great experience! Now we are saving up money to go on cruise #2!