pfleer

This is hysterical.  The Ultra price for a Cove Balcony is twice the price of "Perfect Balance" offer.

thanks everyone for the feedback.  Unfortunately, I won't be booking NCL.  The casino rates I'm getting with Carnival are just too damn good.  Someday I'll give NCL a go, probably when we are sans kids so the price is more palatable.

HI all!  We are a long time Carnival cruising family.  We are trying to find alternatives.  We tried Royal Caribbean last year and while some things were nice, it wasn't worth the cost difference vs Carnival.  We get pretty great casino deals with Carnival.  The biggest issue my family had was that RCCL did not have 24 hour soft serve ice cream.  And when the soft serve was open, the lines were extremely long and you were served tiny cones by RCCL staff (if they didn't run out by the time it was your turn).  Needless to say, my family has threatened me that if we ever go on another cruise without 24 hour ice cream, they will throw me overboard.

So - does NCL have 24 hour, self serve, ice cream cones?  Specifically looking at Breakaway for Thanksgiving, I think.  Was looking at Joy but the wonky pool deck makes that one a no-go now.

Hi all! My husband and I are currently booked on the Freedom out of Port Canaveral for the last week of April for our 20th anniversary.  We also looked at Breeze for the same dates out of Galveston. Had the Breeze been sailing out of a different port, we likely would have booked her instead. I’m getting more nervous about the freedom because of the terrible reviews (which I normally take with a grain of salt). The cruises are very close in price (breeze will be $100 more). Airfare is actually slightly less flying in Hobby. Seems like an easy choice to switch but I’m hesitating because we’ve sailed out of canaveral many times so we’re very familiar with flying into MCO, renting a car and driving to the port. Galveston I have no experience with. We currently have one of those balconies on freedom that is the last one before the aft wrap balcony. So it’s the different shape with the long balcony. We don’t care about the itineraries. We’ve done almost all of them in the Caribbean. 
 

Should we switch from freedom to breeze?? Or is the freedom really not as bad as the reviews say it is?  Is Galveston easy to navigate?  I think I would cancel cheers since we can’t use it the first day out of Galveston and we will have drinks in the casino for both of us (on freedom it would have just been for me which is why we bought cheers). 

We have two rooms booked.  They are across the hall from each other.  My husband is booked in one room with one daughter and I am booked in the other room with our other daughter.  On Carnival, first day, we would go to the customer service desk and they would give us a 2nd keycard so that we could all access each other's room.  Is that how RCCL does it too?

Thanks!

5 minutes ago, hurricane0226 said:

they let me register my grandson who is twelve and vaxed for club C 12-14yr olds, will be 

sailing Sat on the MG.

We will be too!!!

I know camp ocean is closed right now, but are the teen clubs open?

50 minutes ago, ALWAYS CRUZIN said:

I think you mean salt water. Yes!

 A reviewer earlier said the pools were chlorine and not saltwater.  I was trying to find someone else to confirm that.  You say they are salt?

My kids will be so excited if that is true!  

We loved Carnival Sunshine!  Recommend a cabin on deck 5, aft.  There is a small buffet on deck 5 that will serve breakfast and lunch snacks.  Never busy there.  

8 minutes ago, grandmarnnurse said:

This is why YTD is so much better! You eat when you want to eat. Not when someone tells you to eat. It opens at 5:45, but you eat whenever you want, early or late, or somewhere in between. 

We normally get YTD but we have a group of 11 this trip.  Past experience was not good with YTD and large groups.

We are currently booked for the early dining which says 6 online (and this is early for us to eat dinner, but 8:15 is too late!).  5:45 seems so early.  I'd be afraid of missing dinner because of excursions.  I am not a fan of eating dinner at the buffet.

We are a family of 4 and for our next cruise, we actually booked 2 cabins because it was only $200 more in total than having all 4 of us in one room. We booked a balcony for us and an inside across the hall for our daughters. You can also get two connecting inside. Check it out. You’ll be surprised at how small the price difference is for the extra space and extra bathroom. 

Thanks everyone for the feedback! Looks like we’re buying cheers!

Hi all!  

We are booked on a spring break cruise next year and we booked one of the casino offers that includes Drinks on Us.  We've never had Drinks on Us before (except one cruise where I earned it on the very last day).  For our last couple of cruises, we bought the Cheers package.  This cruise we are also getting two cabins as our daughters are now old enough to have their own room (surprisingly, only $200 more to book 2 rooms, then to book 4 in one balcony).

So, we've been thinking about our drink package options.  We are traveling with 2 other families, so I imagine we will be spending lots of time drinking and not just drinking in the casino (love the piano bar!).  

We do drink throughout the day, but we don't get sloshed every night.  We also like that Cheers includes waters, milkshakes, coffees, etc.

Options:

1. Drinks on Us only and pay as we go when we purchase drinks outside of the casino.  Question - Do we actually have to be playing in the casino or can we just walk up to the Casino bar and order drinks?

2.  Drinks on Us and then we both also buy Cheers.

3.  Drinks on Us and only 1 of us buys Cheers (since we have two cabins).  Seems like this would be a real pain in the butt to try to share the drink package outside of the casino.  Plus, seems a bit shady.  Although, in the past, even when we tried to buy non-alcoholic drinks for our kids, the servers or bartenders just gave us those free included in our Cheers package anyway.

What is everyone's experience with having Drinks on Us and possibly buying Cheers as well??

Thanks in advance!

I will share that when boarded the Vista last year, my husband and I ordered alcoholic beverages for us and virgin daquiries for our daughters, fully expecting to have to pay for theirs. There was no charge and no comments from the bartender.

Did the Steakhouse have the new menu? What did you order and do you recommend? We will be on the Sunshine in 11 days and are booked for the Steakhouse the first night!!! CANNOT WAIT!

Question on the in room tv changes. Will there no longer be those couple of movies that are playing throughout the cruise? This was always nice because it would allow my two daughters a chance to lay down and relax at the end of the day as they are getting ready for bed. Wondering if we should bring a DVD player now.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Omg steakhouse on the valor. We went Thanksgiving day. Check out my review, I posted pictures.

 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2572594

 

 

My cousin had the cowboy steak, we all had other things like lamb chops, lobster tail, lobster ravioli . We could barely finish , stuffed to the gills. We had several desserts at the table, the chocolate sampler was delicious, my sister had fresh berries. I had the crab cake for appetizer and they brought an amuse bouche- a very tiny bite sized burger, I believe it was lamb, since we went the first night, we had choice of free wine or half off, we took free and I was the only wine drinker so I asked them to save the second bottle for me to take and they did. We had two different reservations so they treated as two. But we sat at the same table. Best 35.00 ever! I will try to do the steakhouse at least once every cruise going forward. I will try to book it earlier in the day though, as soon as they open because it was late, on the first day and we were tired.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

Question.....we have Cheers so I was hoping we could just take our free bottle to our room. Can we?

Sent from my iPad using Forums

Thank you!

Hi all! I booked an excursion on Carnival.com last night. I used a carnival gift card for $320 of the $400 charge and then used my debit card for the remaining amount. Just checked my checking account balance and the full $400 charge hit my checking account. Ugh! I quickly went online and cancelled the excursion. Does anyone know how long it typically takes to see the credit back in my account?

Anyone have any tips on getting your family selected? We've never been on a ship with it and my daughters really want to give it a shot on our sunshine cruise in March.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Thank you both! This was exactly the input I was looking for!!

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

I’m trying to decide whether to book a private car, shuttle, or use an Uber from Port Canaveral to MCO in March. Our flight is 11:20, so not a ton of time. I’m curious, what time have people on previous cruises on the Sunshine been able to debark using self assist??

If you are talking about Guys Pig and Anchor BBQ, then yes, the sunshine has it. It's available on sea days and I've also read that it's also available on embarkation day.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Hmmmm, I just checked the carnival website and the pig and anchor isnt listed for sunshine. I know I've read reviews for sunshine where people say there is a BBQ on embarkation day. I'm going on sunshine in march, so I've been reading lots of reviews.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums