Oshawapilot

I was tongue in cheek with my "floor to ceiling" comment, but my overriding point is that to a huge portion of non smokers..any smoke filled indoor space is a turn off. Even the most awesome ventilation system isn't going to make it appealing to many non smokers as the smell and smoke are unavoidable.

I never set foot in a casino before smoking was banned in them here.

And I avoid the ship casinos as well for the same reason. Even 10 or 15 minutes in a smoky environment leaves me with a headache and a sore throat.

Put a smoking casino next door and then compare.

Believe it or not only around 15% of US citizens smoke still.

There needs to be a major shift in viewpoints of being worried to alienate 15% of the population while telling the other 85% to "just deal with it" because of such.

Casino's (to use just one example) that don't allow smoking anymore are still doing just fine because the huge majority of the population consists of non smokers. It's simple.

To the contrary of your suggestion above, I would venture to guess that 2 casinos, next to each other, on full of a thick white haze to the floor, the other without any at all....that the non smoking casino would actually be significantly busier. 10 or 15 years ago they might have been a wash, but times have changed.

Canada has banned smoking inside all of their casinos. They are still busy and making tons of money.

Exactly. Basically any indoor space in Canada is smoke free.

Yes, there was a massive uproar when these changes started to happen. Bars and restaurants claimed they'd go bankrupt. Casino's complained they'd lose 50% of their customers. Etc etc etc.

And you know what? Smokers adjusted, and life has gone on. Casino's are still full, bars are still packed, and restaurants still manage just fine.

Same issue on every other ship we've been on. The casino fills up with smoke despite some immaginary separation between the smoking and non smoking sides, and the smoke also drifts out of the casino itself.

Solution: Avoid the casino.

It's possible to get around every single ship we've ever been on without setting foot in it. Yes, they're often designed (not surprisingly) as a convenient route between bow and stern on one deck, but there's always other options to avoid it - go up a few decks for example and cross that way instead.

As for the megaship versus the smaller ships, don't knock the big ones unless you've tried it.

We were on Allure with 6100 other passengers and it was consistently less crowded then many cruises we've done on smaller ships with 1/3 set number of passengers. There simply so much more space as well as things to see and do that it keeps the population of the ship much more broken up versus the smaller ships.

The Hub chat application is completely separate from any of the internet packages, and doesn't even require internet access - it works internally on the ships intranet.

You pay the $5 per device per voyage fee for Hub, and that's it - no internet package required.

Now, on the topic of internet packages...

Whichever one you get just know you’re paying for access to more, not faster speed. Pretty much any package at sea is slower like an old DSL CONNECTION.

Sounds like Carnival hasn't got on board with the highspeed solutions yet like RCI. I had the premium internet package on our last RCI cruise (aboard Grandeur, one of their older ships at that) and the internet was absolutely blistering. Speed isn't the be-all-end-all for most peoples needs, but it certainly is nice in some situations. ;)

I used to think like the OP. We stuck with RCI because of the "cachet" of being a tier member....platinum, emerald, diamond, etc etc.

And you know what? The perks are meh (at least until you reach one of the top tiers) and not worth limiting ones bookings to one single cruise line as a result unless you're REALLY benefiting from it.

So despite being Diamond on RCI, we are trying Carnival. I wish we had done so earlier honestly. We might like it, or we might rush back to RCI, who knows, but I'm willing to give it a shot.

I agree, as a complete newbie to cruising don't get sucked into the loyalty thing quite yet - find what you like before you commit to building it.

6 people in one limo? yikes where is the luggage going?

I think it's safe to assume the discussion was based around a stretch limo.

I have no idea how people keep complaining how they can't find chairs to lie/sit on, I always see an abundant of vacant ones, I cringe when people say they have this problem, just don't understand it.

A chair is not necessarily a GOOD chair, or where someone might want to be.

For example, on RCI the solarium is always high demand, but I've seen "reserved" chairs (the typical towel and book combo) that sit empty for hours at a time while the solarium is packed full and people are very clearly milling around looking for seats.

To suggest that this is just fine because there's empty chairs on the pool deck instead is silly.

If ones desired area is full because there's actually butts in the chairs, fine...but if it's "full" because of people who have plunked down their belongings in the chance that they might come back in 3 or 4 hours, well, I don't think you need to be told that this is a problem.

Where is your origin in relation to the cruise port?

Unless you're talking >1 Hour each way I cannot possibly fathom how you would not save a significant amount of money opting for the limo for the group vs PP on a shuttle, and you'll be riding in style as well. Just be mindful that you probably won't get 6 people's worth of luggage in the trunk so some will probably have to come in the passenger cabin with you - be sure to verify ahead of time that this is OK.

If all you need is person-to-person contact on the ship (but don't really need true internet access or the associated costs), the Carnival Hub app might be your best bet at $5 per device for the entire voyage. It has a messaging feature that reportedly works extremely well, and at $5 for your entire cruise it's drastically cheaper than any of the internet options, the cheapest of which (the social plan) doesn't support iMessage to start with.

https://help.carnival.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/1152

Is this a Carnival thing? We've always brought our travel steamer onboard on RCI and never had an issue.

I'm operating on the very safe assumption that the volatility in one direction (downwards) is far riskier than any further increase in the short term.

In other words, waiting another few weeks to try to eek out another few dollars on every thousand could really backfire if the exchange rate tanks 5-10% overnight instead of going up that additional 0.10% you were hoping for.

It could go down very fast if things go south, and it'd take a long time to recover.

It's not going to go up much more in the short term that I'd be waiting IMHO. I'm going to the bank tomorrow to deposit some funds we'd been saving up and making a payment towards our next cruise while the going is good.

I would buy US currency NOW.

If the NAFTA talks go sour the CDN$ will take a dive inside a few hours, and probably not a small one, either.

As others have said, you need not spend a penny while onboard if you don't choose/want to.

Simply have the discipline to do that, and you'll be fine. Don't fall into the trap of upcharge dining, photos, the casino, and all the other nickel and dime options.

As for ports, there are plenty of free things to do - simply investigate it here.

If funds are critically tight you could inquire about cancelling the drink package and using those funds to pay the gratuities instead.

I was curious myself so I did a trial booking for a seven-day on the Dream for October 18. Four in a room was $322 p/p, two in a room was $444. So roughly $500 total more for four people.

First and second passenger in a stateroom are the expensive ones - third and fourth are often a pittance in comparison.

Booking 2 separate staterooms means that you are paying that much higher first and second passenger rate for all 4 people in the end.

Really? Well what in your opinion is okay to be upset about.

NO food, food that makes you sick, or a complete and total failure of the ships systems, IE the infamous poop cruise. That I'd be upset about.

My comments were somewhat tongue in cheek, but honestly....my egg not being perfectly cooked to order or my pie not arriving for an hour and a half (Really? I'd have polity reminded the wait staff after about 15 minutes and problem solved, not just sat there and stewed) is NOT worth being upset about while on vacation.

I have a question about air conditioning on the Carnival Breeze. I know that your stateroom lights turns of when you remove your Sign & sail card from the wall slot, but does the air conditioner turn off also ?

HVAC runs constantly in staterooms. Without it they would turn into sweltering hotboxes that would take hours to moderate again afterwards.

Three in a Balcony nearly drove us insane.

As has been mentioned, it's only a bigger issue if you spend a lot of time in your stateroom.

Personally, we spend very little time there.

I waited an HOUR AND A HALF for the waitress to come back with the egg and I said thanks. Well....that thing was nice and hot and HARD BOILED. If you couldn't do it correctly then don't make me wait for you to try. I could have just pulled this off the buffet.

 

I'm also still waiting for my banana cream pie from that breakfast and Mom had waited an hour for choc melting cake before giving up and missing half the evening show.

 

I also got a nice $50 spa certificate delivered to my room the night it expired. I walked in at 10:00 ish after the comedy show to see the great grand gesture of an expired coupon. Wonderful, thanks for the free toilet paper I guess.

Wow, it sounds like your cruise was positively ruined because your egg wasn't boiled right, your pie and cake order got mixed up, and you only got a $50 gift certificate for the horrible inconveniences, presumably after you ripped some poor employee at guest relations a new orifice?

Sweating the small stuff on a vacation never fails to amaze me. Ones eggs not being cooked exactly to ones liking classifies as "the small stuff" to me. :rolleyes:

Relax, enjoy yourself. Food should be the last thing to get upset about on a cruise ship, of all places.

Alcohol before 21 is not the end of the world. Yes, we fully respect the 21 rule aboard the ship (and when travelling in the USA), but my point is that introducing kids to alcohol before then is not a big deal within reason. The mentality of strictly restricting booze and keeping it a mystery until they're in the 20's causes kids to suddenly go out and get completely plastered (or worse) as soon as they're legal because they don't understand it's effects, or respect it.

Personally, we carefully introduced our kids to alcohol (via a sip of beer or wine here and there) in their mid teens...and yes, drinking age here in Canada is 19. When we were in the Caribbean my son enjoyed a beer at (gasp!) 18 and my daughter enjoyed a (weak) slush drink last year at 17, but the laws are of course a little more lax down there, and they were in our supervision the entire time. They got a kick out of it and maybe the slightest of buzzes, but that was it. The horror.

They're both still perfectly healthy and the "mystery" of alcohol is no longer a big deal to them. My son is now approaching 21 and drinks very responsibly, and my daughter no longer thinks it's a big deal and is mostly indifferent now honestly.

Reality is many kids are drinking long before 21 anyways, whether or not parents want to to believe it.

You may want to search in the ports of call forums - both ports have been discussed at length countless times there.

Forget about an exceptional amount of privacy with 4 people in an interior - aside from the bathroom it's entirely unworkable otherwise without unfairly impeding on others you're sharing the room with.

And yes, organization and cleaning up after ones self is ESSENTIAL. One person leaving their dirty laundry strewn about or leaving a sloppy mess in the bathroom after having a shower leaves the others sharing the stateroom less than happy. This goes for any stateroom for that matter, but especially an interior.

We've done it many times with our teens, which for all intents and purposes are adults.

It's fine. I agree with others, pack EXTREMELY carefully as there is a distinct lack of storage in an interior. Earplugs are helpful if you're a light sleeper for sure. And the suggestion to use the showers elsewhere on the ship is also great as it will reduce the crush as well as the times that the stateroom bathroom is otherwise unusable.

If there's unnecessary furniture in the stateroom that can be removed (a small table or a chair) the stateroom attendant will sometimes remove them on request and that can make a big difference on sheer floor space for the inevitable times when all 4 of you are in there.

The most important suggestion I could make is plan on being in the stateroom as little as possible aside from the essentials. We always went with that approach and it's been perfectly workable.

I also turn the AC down quite low - sometimes it's barely adequate to keep up with the heat load from 4 people and the shower heat/humidity, etc. Sometimes it makes it a bit too cool through the day or at bed time, but it doesn't get uncomfortably hot through the night that way.

And yes, air freshener is a good idea as well as is making sure the exhaust vent in the bathroom is open 100% to maximize the amount of air being drawn out of the stateroom as a whole. ;)

How do you get here to Gold Rock Beach?

Just Googled it - 43KM and about 30 minutes by car. Probably not a taxi ride type of destination for sure.