gh1088

Thank you FuddRules. This is great for anyone who wants to take the Portbus too.

Does anyone know which port embarkation is in Barcelona for the Vista this October?

Someone here recommended that you print out your prescription records from your pharmacy, so that you can prove the pills are legally in your possession. It would also come in handy if the pills were lost and you needed to refill them.

Thanks for the great description. I have seen the renderings too. I think we'll like the extra bathroom!

Hi There!

Loving your review. Did you take any photos of the deluxe ocean view? We are staying in one in October.

Thanks

Another fun review! As soon as I started reading this I felt something familiar. Then I realized that some time ago I read your Infinity review from the South/America - Antarctica review.

I highly recommend this review to all of you! Now I will be checking out more.

Thanks for the laughs!

Are you talking about the Vista? When I booked a Havana inside early on, the same window popped up.

I think I even printed the screen. But as time went on, and I did mock bookings, the window didn't come up anymore.

I just assume it was a glitch. Havana rooms have their amenities; spa rooms have theirs so I don't feel the need to pursue it.

My guess is they were referencing either Empress or Majesty, both of which have very small oceanview rooms and neither ship has a standard balcony category without getting a suite. Majesty does have superior oceanview rooms on deck 9 with rooms that are bigger than 114, but still way smaller than carnival OV's.

 

Carnival Balcony and RCI D class Balcony are about the same; Carnival OV is bigger than either because the space of the balcony is inside the room. I've had all of these rooms at some point (Well, not Empress) and RCI rooms are undeniably smaller than Carnival. Carnival standard OV huge compared to anything on RCI below a suite category.

Yes, you are correct...I think she is on the Majesty. I might have confused the interior with the oceanview too. Sorry. So, I'm assuming then, that the room sizes don't influence your decision? Maybe I need to not worry so much about that when considering other lines.

I have a question. When you look at other lines, does anyone consider the size of the staterooms? It seems that other lines have way smaller rooms compared to Carnival. With Carnivals' average room size at 185 sq ft for an inside most others don't even come close. I have a friend that is sailing on RCCL in an oceanview room that is 114 sq ft! And most of Carnival's oceanviews are 220 sq. ft.!

I'm just curious from those who have sailed multiple lines....does it make a difference or are you in the room so infrequently that it doesn't matter?

Just curious...

That slide scared the daylights out of me! It took awhile for my heart rate to come down after that one. Very fast, but so much fun!

While we didn't visit the Queen Mary as a part of a cruise, we did the audio tour and really enjoyed it. It took us about 2.5 hours to complete the whole tour. So much to see. We were in a bit of a rush, but if we had the time, we could have gone slower to catch all of the things to see and read along the way. Highly recommend.

Wow. I doubt very much that someone is going to want the middle seat I am saving for my husband as there is a whole plane of middle seats to choose from. I does NOT state in the Southwest rules that you are required to both purchase Early Saver....Unless you are booked under the same ticket.

Save your indignation for someone else.

Hmmm...I don't always pay for it, but I do when I can't check in at the 24 hour mark for whatever reason.

While you may be right, sometimes I have gotten in the early B group, it is still well early enough to snag two seats together. It doesn't get dicey until the end of B group.

Ultimately, you have to do what is best for you.

I paid for the value plan for my last cruise so I could stay in touch with work, so I was able to check in with Southwest. But, if you don't want to worry about it, I'd pay the $12.50 for early bird check in. Only one of you has to do it and save a seat for the other.

If you are a nurse and are interested, they may give you a tour of the medical facilities. My sons are firefighter paramedics, and asked if they could see the facilities (on the Victory, I think). They had them come back at a designated time and showed them around.

I'm sure this is at each ship's discretion and only if they aren't treating patients at the time.

We watched Mad Max at midnight on the Sunshine in December. We actually took a nap after dinner so we could make it through it.

It was nice laying on a lounger with a blanket. It was relatively crowded.

I would definitely do it again if they movie they were showing was worth it.

The Sunshine does not have an exterior promenade like the Dream Class ships do, but it does have an awesome adults Serenity area.

 

I only sail with Carnival and have 36 cruises so far. I was on the Sunshine 2 years ago and unfortunately it's my least favorite ship. They screwed up the main theater by adding cabins on deck 3 forward, which in turn screwed up the vibe at the lobby bar.......it's a hardly used now.

 

With the exception of suites and the new cabins on deck 3 the other cabins don't have a mini fridge or hairdryers.

 

If you can find that same itinerary on another ship I would book the other ship.

We had a hair dryer on the Sunshine (deck 2). But you are correct, no fridge.

I'm sorry I am just posting this review now. It is from two years ago when Carnival was last in Europe. I have the Vista booked over there next year, and since some of the ports will be the same, I went back to my notes to review what excursions we did last time. And I came across this unfinished review.

Anyway, I made some finishing touches on this and thought it might be helpful for anyone traveling on the Sunshine, or on Vista in Europe next year.

This was from the Fall of 2013:

We have just returned from a nine day Mediterranean cruise on the Carnival Sunshine. It’s funny to read other reviews and see things from different perspectives. We heard some negative things about the Sunshine …overcrowding, leaking pipes, smelly spaces, rust (? It’s a boat), and more. But, thanks to the balanced reviews from people with positive outlooks, we went into it with open and excited minds.

I certainly never felt any more crowding on the Sunshine than on any other ship I have been on. Yes, you may have to wait for a few people in front of you to get the delicious Guy’s burger, but you didn’t have to cook it, clean up after it, and it is worth every minute of waiting. And honestly, I had to wait ONCE. The line, if there is one, moves very fast.

We did see the drips and buckets, but honestly all I thought was “oh, so there are the drip buckets everyone is talking about.” It didn’t hamper my cruise one bit. They were just in the hall among the linens and room service trays. I might have had to take a step or two to the side to walk around them, but my goodness, it’s not a big deal at all. I do hope they get the pipes fixed when they can though, because they are spending a lot of time and effort to dry out the carpets.

I did smell the musty or sewer smell occasionally, but no more than on other ships. Not sure what it is, but again, as long as I don’t smell it while I’m sleeping or eating, I can deal with a whif or two as I walk by.

Anyway, I thought I would write about our very positive experience with the cruise. We are 47 and 51 and felt like most of the people on board were around the same age or older. We flew in to Barcelona and arrived the night before the cruise. Not enough time really to adjust to the time change, but since the cruise is so port intensive, we were almost forced into the time zone. The night we arrived, we just walked around a bit, got some euro and called it a night.

Our hotel was near the top of La Rambla. There is a port bus near the Christopher Columbus monument which will take you to the ship. Since the monument was downhill from where we were, we decided to make the easy walk down La Rambla. We were led to believe the busses were right near the monument, but really we had to cross the road toward the water and walk a bit toward the ports before we found the bus stop. I don’t remember how much the bus was, but it stopped at all four cruise terminals (Carnival was last).

I can’t remember when we got to the terminal…somewhere between 10:30 and 11:00. Check in was as easy as everyone says and we were given boarding group number 26. As they were already on number 15 we figured the wait wouldn’t be too long. I think it was less than ½ hour. We tried to use the computers in the terminal for one last internet check, but the system was down.

When they called our number, we walked onto the ship. Since we had an ocean view on the 2nd floor just below the lobby, we thought we’d just pop down and see if our room was ready. The door was closed but when we opened it, we found it had been cleaned and was ready. We simply just dropped our bags and left to wander around.

We LOVED our ocean view room. I have been spoiled with balconies in the past, but when we booked this cruise, we couldn’t pass up the cheap inside cabin price. Our original cabin was 3103 in the very front of the ship. We took a peek at it and it was a HUGE room because it is a handicap room. But, we learned that this room is directly under the nightclub, so when the opportunity presented itself to upgrade to an ocean view room, we jumped on it for the extra $200. We always intended to go to that hallway when the nightclub was raging to see how loud it was, but we never stayed awake long enough! But, as seen in other reviews, it sounds like it was pretty loud.

Anyway, our cabin was 2196…it’s a great location mid to forward. Our cabin steward was excellent and brought us anything we requested. The bathroom was good sized. I loved the new muted colors of this ship. Cheery, yet relaxing. It felt a little more sophisticated than other carnival ships.

Noonan was our CD. He was fine I thought. He made the important announcements, etc. I find it funny when other reviewers say ‘we were never told…’ when really you just had to pay attention. We went to his port meeting and learned some things and all the shore excursions were listed in a booklet in our cabin. I felt like all important information was given to us, told to us or both.

The ship layout was similar to the other Carnival ships we had been on so we found it easy to get around. The dining room/galley that blocks the way on level 3 was similar to the fantasy class ships too. Since level 2 went the length of the ship, we just walked to the best elevator/stairs we needed.

We loved the new waterworks and sports deck area. How fun. In fact, we enjoyed sitting back there on sea day….there are tables with umbrellas back there and it was fun to hear the kids laughing and playing (by the way, there were hardly any kids on this ship).

Crowded on sea day….is this any different on any other ship? When we were on the Victory in May, the pool was literally standing room only filled with college aged kids having a ball. It was fun to watch for awhile, but it got old. Neither of the pools on this ship had a lot of people in them. We did go into the adults only pool on the serenity deck and it was warm, so cold water wasn’t the reason. Yes, serenity was full, but expected. There were chairs all throughout the ship. No, they cannot fit 3,000 people around the two pools, but they seemed to have enough chairs all along the sides and back of the ship.

Food…hmmm…I almost hesitate to talk about it. It is so subjective. We did the steakhouse Farenheit 55??? the first night…got our bottle of wine and had a delicious meal. We would definitely recommend it.

We only made it to the dining room for dinner twice. We chose anytime dining and liked that a lot for the flexibility, but honestly, we were so tired after each port that we didn’t always feel like having to get cleaned up and changed for dinner. I was pretty sure that once I took a shower and got into one of those comfy robes, I wouldn’t make it out of the room again!

So, we would grab a snack (split a guys’ burger or slice of pizza, or deli sandwich) – all of which I loved, and then later we’d pick and choose what looked interesting in the buffet. Some was o.k., some was good, some was GREAT. It’s really all about what you are hungry for, right? I did not feel that it was the same menu each night, and always found something to satisfy. We have never cruised for the food…but we have also never left one hungry.

I loved the new layout of the buffet with the different stations. You didn’t have to wait in the long line to get at the bacon (no bacon police on this ship) and the yummy chocolate chip cookies.

Breakfast was great…we ate most of the time back in the Havana area. They do made to order omelets and eggs and there was a great aft view there. Even if we just grabbed something from the buffet, we ate back there.

We did try the Blue Iguana on sea day and thought it was great, fresh food, although I didn’t love the breakfast burrito in the morning. We tried JiJi twice at lunch and loved the stir fry and tried the Italian restaurant Cucino del Capitano for lunch as well a couple of times. Any combination of pasta, veggies, meats, sauces you want. The Bolognese is excellent. Both of these are free at lunch and are fee restaurants at night…we never tried them at dinner.

We did room service twice for breakfast…everything arrived as ordered and served its purpose of sustenance. Really it was just an easy way to have coffee brought to me on the first few days that we were still adjusting to the time difference.

We didn’t really see the shows….we saw a couple of comics who were funny, and some of the live bands/singers were good. But, as I mentioned, with the amount of ports, and the amount of walking we did in each one, we were in bed early most nights.

We did really enjoy the Flamenco show they brought on board for the first afternoon. They must have done a dozen costume changes. We wanted to see flamenco while we were in Barcelona so we were thrilled to see this!

The EA sports bar was great to check in on scores. We are from Chicago and there was a Sunday night game on….at 2:15 in the morning. I woke up around 3:00 or so with the beginnings of a sore throat and couldn’t sleep, so I went to check out the game. I was the only one in there and got to watch a great Bears game! It is next to the casino…I was surprised at the number of people in the casino until about 4:30 or so. It was funny to see the workers rush to clean up and close up once the last gamblers left.

As far as the ports go, one was just as amazing as the next. I’ll just briefly mention what we did at each one. There were so many options for each one, it was tough to decide what to do.

Marseille: We did a private wine tour with Provence Wine Tours. They are highly recommended on Trip Advisor and I would definitely agree. There were six of us in a van with our tour guide Eric. It was beautiful driving through the Provence countryside. We stopped at two wineries…one we took a tour of and had a tasting after, and the other we just did the tasting. Both were fun, informative and delicious. We bought wine at both and had no problem bringing it (or any alcohol for that matter) on the ship. We also stopped in Cassis, a cute port town where we walked around and had lunch.

Monaco: From the port, we took a train to Nice. The area surround the train station was rough, but as you got closer to the water, it got more beautiful. Seems like a nicer beach town with a great boardwalk (cement walk) all along the water. We climbed (o.k. we really took the elevator) up to Castle Hill, which was a surprisingly large and peaceful park with great views of the city and ports. When we got back to Monaco, we walked around and in the casino of Monte Carlo and picked out our retirement yacht. Holy cow….talk about mega yachts!

Livorno: This was the only port that we did a ship tour. We went to Cinque Terre. By the way, the ONE time I wasn’t paying attention…if your tour says it is departing at 7:15, that means you are supposed to meet at 6:45 (half hour before). It does say it on the ticket, but it shows the 7:15 in large numbers first, so that was all I saw. We were gently scolded by the carnival employee but made it out to the bus on time, with plenty of people who came after us. Cinque Terre (5 villages) is beautiful, and I’m glad we didn’t try to manage transportation on our own here. We took a bus, train and boat on this tour so it was fun to see if from different vantage points. We walked around 3 of the villages, and got off for a photo op at the 4th. The fifth one is high up on the hill…over 400 steps up….I don’t think anyone was disappointed we couldn’t go to that one. This is not a tour for someone with mobility issues. There is a lot of walking on uneven surfaces and many stairs/steps up and down in these villages. The towns were cute, but somewhat touristy, at least in the areas we had time to see, but definitely worth seeing if you have the chance.

Civitavecchia: Since we had been lucky enough to have spent some time in Rome before, we decided to rent a car and drive into the Italian countryside. We rented from Hertz before we left and found the Hertz store a few blocks from the port. We loved zipping around in our little Fiat. It was easy enough to figure out the road signs and where we were going. We headed to Orvieto, an amazing medieval town on a hill. I only wish we had more time to explore here. Complete with surrounding wall, narrow streets, well preserved buildings and of course churches….just fantastic. From here we drove to Tuscania, another ancient town that was remarkably well preserved.

Sicily/Messina: We were supposed to be in Naples this day, but because of berthing issues there, the captain chose to go to Sicily first, and then back track to Naples. Again we were informed by announcements and letters in our rooms. We didn’t have any tours planned so for us, this was not a problem. I did talk to someone who had an outside tour planned and they said that Carnival was VERY accommodating…even let them use the phone at the guest services desk to make the changes.

We had heard so much about Taromina that we decided to take the train/bus there on our own. This is an old resort town complete with cute shops and eateries. It was VERY crowded and hot the day we were there. I cannot imagine it during the high summer season. We walked around a bit, but felt like it was pretty touristy with the same stuff, shop after shop. We decided to go back and explore Messina a bit. There is a cute wine shop right across from the gate to get back on the ship.

Naples – Sorrento – no Almalfi coast:

I was really looking forward to Naples. We had ambitious plans to see the Amalfi coast, Sorrento and Naples. We even had the trains/buses/boats all figured out before we left. But when we got there, we realized with the sheer amount of travel time this would take, we wouldn’t have time to enjoy much. So, we decided to take the ferry to Sorrento and take our time there. How could you not enjoy a place that hands out Limoncello tastings at every other shop! Arriving there by ferry, you are greeted with a nearly vertical cliff. We could either walk up the winding walk way or pay the 2 euro to take elevator up. Of course, we chose the elevator! This is a great town to get lost in. We actually followed one of Rick Steve’s walks and really enjoyed it. We found a grocery store to get a cheap bottle of Limoncello to take home. This was cheaper than buying in one of the boutiques.

We took the circum??? train back to Naples. We were warned about this train being a pick pocket haven, so we were aware and careful. The train got really crowded as we picked up people, especially at the Pompeii stop. There were also a lot of teenaged kids on the train. We had no problems and it was good to see some of the coast and see where the locals live.

In Naples we searched for a recommended pizza place, but it was closed until dinner time. But, being that it is Naples, there seemed to be a pizza place on every corner. So we chose one with some outdoor seating and enjoyed pizza and beer. We walked back to the ship through the old part of Naples…gritty, dirty and full of life! At times I felt like we were invading their homes by walking down their narrow streets. It’s exactly what we imagined NYC would have been like in the early decades of 20th century. What a great experience. We never felt afraid …just out of place for a bit. But it didn’t take long to find more tourists and make our way back to the ship.

Palma de Mallorca – train to Soller: This is a beautiful train ride through the countryside. The market was booming when we got to Soller. We found some tasty treats and cute trinkets.

We never took the time to eat in many ports (except Pizza in Naples of course) and instead opted for a quick sandwich or local snack. We often found grocery stores and could easily buy snack food and inexpensive “beverages” to bring back on board.

Barcelona – Debarkation was a breeze. We had a later time (8:00 I think) so we were able to have a leisurely breakfast, and go back to our room to pick up our bags. We stayed in Barcelona another 3 nights. Barcelona is just amazing. Here we were able to go explore, but come back to the room for a cool beverage and maybe a siesta, then head back out in time for tapas and more wandering. There is so much to see in this city. It was a great way to end our trip.

I really hope that Carnival reconsiders and chooses to go back to Europe. They are the best value going and for a trip in Europe you really get to see a lot for your buck. It was fun to navigate through the public transportation and deal with language barriers. We found that almost everyone we encountered was friendly, welcoming and helpful.

We would choose another itinerary in Europe in a heartbeat if Carnival decides to go back.

**Clearly we chose to go back! We are doing the Athens to Barcelona, and the TA (we'll need that one to rest).

Feel free to ask questions, but some of the details I'm sure have faded by now.

I was able to get some today, but they limited me to 5 - $100 cards a day. I don't know if that is how it always is.

Hi Legally Blonde,

Can you tell me what type of room you had on the Oasis?

We did the Fun Cruise & Snorkel trip through Carnival after we found out that Woodwind was sold out. We had a great time. Lots of fish and coral.

Hubby might also like our interpritation of bundling too.

Bundling is a tradition of wrapping a person in a bed accompianed by another as part of courting behaviour.

Ha! Love it!

It's different, you don't need the packing cubes to bundle. The video above shows the bundling method.

Ahhh....I see. Sorry I didn't watch that first!

I can see how both methods could work. Hubby liked the bundling method.

Thanks!

I employed the "bundling" technique last cruise...and, like you, I was amazed at how many items this method will accommodate. I took the added precaution of using tissue paper...minimal wrinkling.

 

Patsy

 

 

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Hi Patsy....so is "bundling" the same concept as using the cubes?

I see that many of you use packing cubes. I have been rolling my clothes for years, but wondered if there is a particular advantage to using cubes? Other than keeping like stuff together?