Joeychgo

We are Carnival Platinum cruisers, and just got off the Vista....

Our impression and the impression of many others was -- the Vista has a terrible layout. It almost appears that things were crammed into spaces without much thought for passenger flow.

If this tells you anything.... I am here looking for information on the escape because I am growing tired of Carnival and its bullsh*t, and strongly considering sailing NCL for our next cruise.

LOL.... so I am taking from your post that you loved the ship?

 

lol --- in short, no. IMO, the décor was cheap and the layout was very inefficient. It appeared slapped together without much thought. It also appears as though they crammed stuff in.

 

IMO, the 80's party wasn't a big deal.

No, it wasn't. IMO it was quite lame.

I didn't like the layout of the ship...not surprised, because I don't like the Splendor either :cool:. I think they needed a bar on deck 5 forward ...the outdoor promenade area. And it was a long trek to the Java cafe (aft on 5) every morning...I am quite used to Java being a straight drop down on the forward elevators.

 

I loved the decor...very sleek & appealing...loved the atrium & casino vortices. And Matt was easy on the ears (and eyes lol)!

 

Thanks again!

My wife and I agree about the layout. It felt very slapped together and not very efficient. Lots of extra walking and lots of things that are needed in places they aren't located at.

But disagree about the decor. The Dining room was described as an upscale high school cafeteria.

 

IMO, the casino appeared smaller than it actually was, maybe having a circular bar in the middle of it gave me that impression.

that and that they have so many machines / tables jammed in the room. If you sit at the back row of tables and play your constantly being bumped as people try to walk by because there is very little room between you and the wall.

You also are not allowed in the staterooms until they are ready unless diamond, platinum, or FTTF. On most cruises, not sure about the Vista, this is usually around 1:30.

Pat

I'm about to go platinum and have never had a problem getting into my cabin. 9 cruises and every time, there was no problem getting in before 1.30

Hi there I am thinking of going on the carnival cruise line for the Mexican Rivera at the end of this summer August time possibly and id love to hear pro's and cons. There's three of us going in one room. I'd love to hear about the boat from personal experience and also get some advice from people who have done this cruise. Also this is our first time on a cruise. Thanks everyone for your help!

It will be quite warm and humid at that time of year...

We were on the cruise also. We got there early so we only had to wait about an hour or so in line.

This was our second tip on the conquest, and IMO it is sub par. I (and other passengers agreed) think its run in a very disorganized fashion.

Some TV channels didn't work for part of the cruise, they locked up all of the mid elevators the first and last day for luggage while other ships only take 2 mid elevators, early morning coffee (pre 6am) was only available on the far aft in the lido instead of midship. All of this made for a lot of unnecessary walking around to find stuff.

One thing that really struck me, we had late dining. They crammed us into a small table upstairs in the mid dining room while leaving all the big tables on the main level empty. When I asked for a bigger table for the 4 of us they wouldn't accommodate. They screwed up our orders and the order of food, and to be fair, they seemed short-handed. I even noticed the maitre d carrying food and clearing tables. This wasn't just one night, but every night we ate in the DR.

The ship is starting to really wear. You can see evidence of it all over. Broken elevator buttons, scratched up doors and door frames, stuff like that. Many of the floor tiles in the Lido restaurant are broken and make noise when you stop on them. The place is really starting to fall apart.

This was my second cruise on the conquest, and both were like this. I told my PVP never to book me on the conquest again.

Hmmm, very interesting looking salt and pepper shakers

 

 

Exact same salt and pepper shakers I have seen on every ship. Is this your first steakhouse on carnival?

If their room is close to yours....

Sneak to their room once they have gone to bed, and hang a room service card on their doorknob. Have it for 6am delivery and a ton of stuff ---

Night before port days -- take the room service card away so no coffee in the morning :) -- or change the time to an hour earlier.

Later on, every time you walk past their door, Take the Privacy door hanger and switch it to *Service Please*

Tell them dinner on the first night in the dining room is a toga party.

My wife and I have been on the breeze twice in the last 6 months and had American Table both times. We both agree we don't like it and that it is a downgrade. The OP put it well so I wont try to compete with them, and just agree.

Celebrity's casinos are smoke free. Somehow they manage to stay in business.

Compare the price of their cruises. That will explain it.

I am not a smoker but I think this is a "be careful what you wish for" situation. Everyone moaning about smoking on balconies and certain lounges resulted in taking away almost all the inside areas for smokers to smoke.Now the smokers are flocking to one of the ONLY places to smoke that is out of the wind and cold.

 

Now everyone wants that taken away. Then they complain that Carnival is only looking for profits...of course they are! It is a business!

Not everyone, just the ardent non smokers who seem to believe everyone should change or sacrifice except them. I hear it a lot. I cant go in the casino, I cant be on my balcony, I cant do this I cant do that. Nothing makes them happy, no compromise is enough.

Of course, I remember when smoking was everywhere, even airplanes. Amazingly, there weren't a lot of people walking around waving their hands or whining about the smell.

The answer is for carnival to provide some ventilation in the casino. You don't see Vegas casinos with clouds of smoke. They have monster air cleaning systems.

Points? Huh?

Falmouth sucks too - The port is nice, but that's all that is. - The port is fenced in and I didn't feel safe outside of the port fence. - I don't book Jamaica cruises anymore.

we had absolutely no info on faster to the fun, and what it really entails, other then the discription when i bought it, i thought i should have gotten a brochure or something on it at the ship...

 

I also thought since we had a later flight, we could stay on and enjoy the ship until the later dis-embarkation time, turns out the ship is basically closed except the buffet ( we wanted to swim )

 

I will cruise again, but will be doing things different the next time around.

( ex picking my room, fttf, early diembarkation , more spending money etc.)

Yeah, we always stay in the port for a few extra days. We get off this ship at 7am and are through customs very quickly. Last cruise we were off the ship, through customs, got our rental car and were at our hotel by 10am.

You don't have to be FTTF to do this, if you do self assist luggage it works that way too.

You were FTTF -- you could have got off first thing in the morning and been through in 15 minutes.

take the kids on the sunshine. more for them to do and newer ship

I have a copy of the Funtimes from January. It looks like Guy's is open 12:00-2:30 and 6:00-9:30.

 

Outside of the MDR & Buffet, the Blue Iguana Cantina looks to be open the most - 7:30-10:30 and 12:00-6:00.

Why in the world do they do this?

I just talked to someone else that got off the Conquest today. they told me the ship is run down. They also said that food places like Guys Burgers were hardly open.

Any of this true?

While I haven't been on a B2B yet, I can assume the airfare savings is a bonus. For those of us who have to fly to a cruise port, paying one airfare for 2 cruises would save us roughly $800 on average.

I haven't done a B2B but we always add a week or so in whatever port we're in. Last cruise, we spent 6 days in San Juan after. Before that was a week in Miami. Our upcoming cruise we're spending 6 days in LA after.

We find its nice to relax the extra days and its like getting a second vacation. We also don't like the stress of everything involved with getting off the ship, then having to get on a plane, fly and get off the plane too. That can easily end up being a 16 hour day of just travel. So we like to break it up with the extra time in the port area.

the reason oil prices are dropping is because the mid east is not happy that the US is producing enough oil for the US to use. So they have begun producing more oil to lower the cost, in hopes that it is too expensive for the US companies to produce oil at a profit. forcing the US to slow down production.

That's part of it but not all. The Saudis are also about driving the price down to screw with Iran and Russia.

IMO, $100 per day per person is the beginning of 'good' prices. If you keep an eye, you will often find balconies for less then that. $500 range pp

I've read many reviews about a variety of methods to bring alcohol on board and how various people have had things get through and things get confiscated at a variety of ports.

What I'm wondering is anyone who has sailed Carnival this year from Long Beach and any types of experiences they have had. Does anyone know if they have the latest scanning equipment that can tell the difference between alcohol and other liquids or if they are still at the point of hand searching to find things like the Rum Runner alcohol carriers?

Any recent experiences with the Long Beach Terminal for Carnival would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,