"Hey! That's not my port!" -- A Carnival Destiny Photo Review

[DeloreanGirl]

INTRODUCTION:

 

Hi Everyone,

 

I know that Carnival is a hugely popular cruise line and that there are tons of reviews out there, but this was our first Carnival cruise so I’m writing this in hopes that someone who is cruising Carnival for the first time will be able to grab some info from it (or perhaps you're just bored and feel like reading a wacky trip report, or maybe you just want to look at the pictures to get excited about your upcoming cruise!)

 

Let me introduce myself! My name is Emily and my husband is Mike. This is our seventh cruise but first on Carnival. I love Cruise Critic and have used it for nearly all of our past cruises and I get giddy over both reading and writing trip reports.

 

I am going to freely admit that I swore we’d never cruise Carnival since I always heard it was a drunken party boat. We lovingly called any Carnival ship in port with us “the S.S. Booze N’ Gamble.” I’ll cut to the chase and let you know that this upcoming review won’t belittle Carnival in any way since we had a really good cruise!

 

CARNI-VALUE:

 

The idea about this cruise came about last Labor Day when we had out of town friends from Illinois visiting us. We had just finished a British Isles cruise on Princess and were raving about it. They mentioned that they would like to try a cruise someday and hoped to go with us. We laughed it off thinking they were kidding until we realized they were serious! We told them the only way we could pull it off would be to do an off-season date with a shorter itinerary on a cheaper ship. We ended up picking the January 21st 5-day Eastern sailing on the Carnival Destiny.

 

As the months rolled onward, I joined the 1-21-13 Roll Call here on Cruise Critic and kept tally of all the folks joining us on the upcoming voyage. I jokingly wanted to call it “The Midwest Cruise” since the majority of our Roll Call consisted of folks from that region escaping the cold. We agreed to have our informal Meet & Greet on Deck 10 aft behind the yellow jacuzzi’s. Since I had never sailed on this ship before, I hoped even I could find the meeting spot!

 

The days crept by and my trusty countdown clock ticked down to single digits. Everyone on the Roll Call was thrilled to be visiting Grand Turk and Half Moon Cay. I sensed that people dislike Nassau as nobody gave half a care about that port. I must admit that we picked this itinerary because of Turks & Caicos and how beautiful Carnival’s private island looked. We all seemed to have excellent plans for each port. Many of us booked golf carts through Nathan’s Golf Cart Rental for Grand Turk and others had planned to gather at Jack’s Shack for a meet-up. Half Moon Cay sounded equally exciting. Some folks were lucky enough to get cabanas and my friend Kristen and I were looking forward to horseback riding in the surf!

 

 

THE JOYS OF PACKING:

 

When mid-January got closer, I dug our two rolling carry-on suitcases out of the closet and began the fun task of making a packing list. I figured that we could cut costs by packing 5 days worth of clothing in each suitcase and bypass the American Airlines checked luggage fees. This ended up working out perfectly. All of our shorts, t-shirts, shoes and dinner clothes fit in each suitcase and we used a large purse and backpack to hold toiletries, electronics, cameras, and liquids in a baggie for the TSA.

 

On our 5-night cruise, the second night was Formal Night, or “Cruise Elegant” as Carnival calls it. I heard that Carnival was a bit lax on their dress code for dinner, but I wanted to make sure I didn’t under-dress. I watched YouTube videos of dinners in the dining room and noticed that most men wore a nice collared shirt with a tie, slacks, and nice shoes for formal night. I only saw one or two suits and no tuxes. Most women had pantsuits and simplistic dresses. I ended up packing khaki slacks and brown shoes with a nice collared shirt for my husband, and I brought a black dress with black leather sandals for myself. We were really worried about not being dressed up enough on formal night but our fears were put to rest when we walked down to the dining room and saw that “formal” to most people on this cruise was pretty much what all four of us in the group were wearing. Whew!

 

 

AND THEN IT WENT SOUTH:

 

Everything was going smoothly until a few days before the trip when the group sailing before us mentioned that they were having “a technical difficulty with the propulsion” and that their itinerary was changed from Key West and Cozumel to Key West and Nassau. I remembered our Princess ship cancelling two weeks of cruises a month before our sailing because of propulsion issues. Getting a refund from Carnival wasn’t a worry, but losing nearly $600 in airfare would have been awful. Everyone on the 1/21 Destiny boards clung to any information we could grab. Those of us on Facebook swapped minute-by-minute updates. Many of us called Carnival directly and spoke with reps, only to be told that they couldn’t see anything on their end that mentioned an interruption in our itinerary. John Heald wrote on his Facebook page that the repairmen were working on the thursters at the moment and that our cruise shouldn’t be affected. The Cruise Critic folks on the ship at the time were logging onto our Roll Call to tell us that divers were in the water at Nassau attempting to repair the thruster. One member wrote that the thrusters seemed to be fixed since she could see them both working at sailaway. We all breathed a sign of relief and celebrated that we would finally be able to get to Half Moon Cay and Grand Turk! I can’t even begin to tell you how many Tums I popped those two nights where I thought our cruise would be cancelled!

 

THRUSTER FLUSTER:

 

Twenty-five hours before sailing… long after people had flown to Florida… long after some had driven from the Midwest to Miami… long after everyone was packed and ready and booked and settled… we got the e-mail. The e-mail that no cruiser wants to get.

 

It could have been worse. It could have been a cancellation e-mail. Instead, Carnival notified us all that Destiny still had propulsion issues and that our itinerary of Grand Turk, Half Moon Cay and Nassau would now become Key West, Freeport, and Nassau. Everyone was offered the chance to get a full refund and not cruise, or to go ahead with the itinerary and receive $50/pp onboard credit.

 

People. Were. Irate.

 

I don’t blame them. We booked this itinerary because Turks & Caicos sounded awesome and Half Moon Cay looked stunning. Our friends had already been to Nassau and so had we on our honeymoon. What are the odds that the least favorite port is the port that everyone successfully gets to? Our friends were sitting in the St. Louis airport waiting on a broken plane (oy, good start to a vacation…) when they got the e-mail. Even worse, they were sitting across from another couple who they overheard talking about how excited they were to go to Grand Turk and Half Moon Cay.

 

“Should I tell them? Should I let them know it’s been changed?” she texted me.

 

I told her that I suppose they should know right off the bat. The couple was let down but rolled with it. Just like we were going to roll with it. We chose to make the best of a crappy situation and perhaps it helped that neither of us had been to Key West or Freeport before. It was upsetting reading the reviews on John Heald’s Facebook page about how awful Freeport was and what a petty distance we’d be sailing for lackluster ports. I felt terrible that people had saved up for a long time to go on this cruise. I felt terrible that this was the first vacation in 10 years for other couples. I felt terrible that some people had booked birthday cabanas at Half Moon Cay for their friends and family as a surprise. And I felt terrible that we were introducing our Midweset friends to cruising by putting them on a broken ship with less than stellar ports.

 

But then we decided to find the silver lining. We decided to make the best of a crappy situation and enjoy the heck out of this cruise. We focused on the positive! We thought about the money we saved with Carnival’s great Price Match Guarantee program and how much onboard credit we would have due to cancelled excursions and how our plane tickets were partially paid for from credit card points. Our friends were happy to be away from the snow and ice of Illinois and my hubby and I were away from the smog and congestion of Los Angeles.

 

It was a vacation. We were together. So let’s get this party started!

 

 

Up next: “Humidity, Boarding, and Soda – Oh My!”

And, yes, there are more photos....

[Colorado Kat]

You are an amusing writer! Keep going please.

[Mizzouaholic]

Looking good so far!

[chosbor2]

Like how you looked for the positive...look forward to reading more and seeing how you dealt with the changes (my biggest fear as an OCD person, don't know how I would handle it)

[silvercrikhix]

Nice start! Thanks for sharing your cruise! Looking forward to more :D

[tinkerbell_82]

Great writing! Cant wait to read more. :)

[Momma1980]

I really admire your 'positivity'! I know I couldn't have handled those changes as well as you. Looking forward to reading the rest of your review:)

[ILCruzr]

Love this review! I have to say that we sailed the destiny back in 09 admist propulsion problems too..and it's sad to see there are still issues with it on her. Luckily our cruise was not affected, but I feel for those who are. On my upcoming glory cruise, we already had a port switcheroo. We were notified a few weeks ago we arent going to Belize,which is a main reason we booked the glory, but costa Maya is fine with me. Another place that doesn't seem easy to get to on a cruises, I'm rolling with it and maybe one day ill get to Belize. I'm looking forward to more of ure review!

[jenng1976]

Looking forward to more! :)

 

I read your British Isles trip report (and probably will re-read closer to our BI cruise this fall) and you have a wonderful, interesting writing style.

 

Jenn

[Jamesl5180]

Sorry to hear about the change but glad you guys are staying positive. Great start to the review so far.

[MrPete]

Love reviews with LOTSA pictures.

 

Three words sum it up. PEOPLE. WERE. IRATE.

 

Always the reason I, personally, would always seek a refund and rebook.

 

Sounds like you made the best of it. I look forward to the rest of the review, and the cruise, through the eyes of your newbie friends.

[Cruisin 4 Ever]

Godd review so far Emily. I'd like to add that the Carnival employees, in my opinion, did a very poor job discussing the situation with the guests. Customer service 101 will teach you that you are to show that you understand the customers concern. We took my MIL and FIL who had never cruised before. My MIL desperately wanted to go to TUrks and Caicos, we rented a cabana at HMC, etc. The info we had received from Carnival was there would be no issue on our cruise. Since our tickets were over $2000 for the 4 of us, it was very important we know ahead of time if there were a problem. Up until the morning before the cruise I was still being told all was good.

We arrived in Miami at 2 pm, the "email" had arrived at 12:30.

We decided we could eat the cost of the tickets and go home, or we could hang out in Miami for 5 days or we could go and make the best of it. We went and made the best of it.

But.... when we checked in the employee asked us if we learned of the itinerary change. We said yes and how disappointed we were. She just kept grinning ear to ear saying things, like "oh well, it's still a vacation" "oh well, you're not at work". I felt like saying, so what? what does that have to do with it? If I show up to go to an all incluvie in Barbados and they decide to send me to Ethiopia, should I think that's ok it's still a vacation???

When my MIL said, yes but I really wanted Turks and Caicos, she says "well you'll just have to book another cruise and hope we make it the next time". It was like she thought if she showed any kind of understanding of our disappointment, it would be a bad thing.

We went and the 4 of us all chose to be happy and have fun. WE were angry and disapponited but decided to save that for later and just go and have fun, and we did.

[Cruisin 4 Ever]

Love reviews with LOTSA pictures.

 

Three words sum it up. PEOPLE. WERE. IRATE.

 

Always the reason I, personally, would always seek a refund and rebook.

 

Sounds like you made the best of it. I look forward to the rest of the review, and the cruise, through the eyes of your newbie friends.

I would have loved to rebook. THe problem for lots of folks such as ourselves is the flights are very expensive this time of year. We paid almost $550 per person. Insurance wouldn't cover the tickets becasue the ship was sailing. We would have only had our refund from Carnival.

[MrPete]

I would have loved to rebook. THe problem for lots of folks such as ourselves is the flights are very expensive this time of year. We paid almost $550 per person. Insurance wouldn't cover the tickets becasue the ship was sailing. We would have only had our refund from Carnival.

 

I personally would have persued that with Carnival as well, but usually my tickets are tranferable to be used at a later date for a small fee. Not sure if that holds true up north.

[hancogran]

Can't wait to read the rest of the review! Read your Princess review of the British Isles a few months ago and you did a wonderful job of that. :)

[KirkNC]

Thanks for the report!

[travlngrl1996]

Awesome start. Our last cruise was on Destiny. Can't wait to hear what you thought of her. I'm so sorry for the missed ports. I love your attitude about making the best of a crappy situation. :)

[chipq]

Love your style and waiting for more. Thanks for sharing.

 

 

http://luv2cruise.blogspot.com

[re-re]

Great start, i can't wait for the rest of your review.:)

[MegnJoe]

I happened to stumble across your BI cruise review last week, and I have added that to my bucket list. Thanks for this review as well!

[JaniceB]

Great start to your review, sorry to hear the ship was still having issues.

[DeloreanGirl]

Can't wait to read the rest of the review! Read your Princess review of the British Isles a few months ago and you did a wonderful job of that. :)

 

I happened to stumble across your BI cruise review last week, and I have added that to my bucket list. Thanks for this review as well!

 

Is my British Isles review still floating around out there?! How awesome! I loved writing that one and would give anything to sail that itinerary again. Best cruise ever! :rolleyes:

[wbc12345]

This situation is my nightmare. I know it's in the contract that they can change the ports at any time, but it is the most important detail when picking our cruise. It makes it even more heartbreaking if you've picked out your excursions and researched the ports.

 

I love your positive attitude and hope that in the situation I would be the same (although I may fall into the irate category at first ;)). Can't wait to read how it turned out!

[DeloreanGirl]

This situation is my nightmare. I know it's in the contract that they can change the ports at any time, but it is the most important detail when picking our cruise. It makes it even more heartbreaking if you've picked out your excursions and researched the ports.

 

I love your positive attitude and hope that in the situation I would be the same (although I may fall into the irate category at first ;)). Can't wait to read how it turned out!

 

Oh don't worry, I went through all the stages (anger, sadness, embarassment for our friends, blame, etc.) but it was too close to the departure date to dwell on them. :)

 

Hammering out the next section today....

[DeloreanGirl]

Day 1: “Humidity, Boarding and Soda – Oh My!”

 

I apologize if this chapter is short. I’ve bitten off all my fingernails while watching Sunday’s episode of Downton Abbey and my fingers are completely sore. I also came down with a cold, most likely from the generous traveler in 10D in front of me on the flight home. Thanks, 10D!

 

We chose to book a non-stop redeye out of Los Angeles at midnight the night before the cruise. I know this is a bit dicey (almost as dicey as flying out the morning of a cruise – oy!) but I had faith that the unseasonably warm Los Angeles winter weather would hold steady and that there wouldn’t be any storms over the South to slow us down on our approach into Florida.

 

Our friends in St. Louis didn’t have it so easy. Their flight was delayed (but they got to meet that lovely couple from the cruise whom they shared the joys of the port switcheroo with) and they sat helplessly in the terminal while “a man with a large hammer pounded on the open engine.” As I said to Kristen, “there are some things you just shouldn’t have to see!”

 

Luckily both flights ended up airborne while they spent the night at the lovely Hampton Inn near Miami Airport and we slept upright in our ridiculously luxurious (read: sarcasm) coach seats on flight 1790 through the night. We landed at 7:30am Florida time and hopped on a shuttle to the Hampton Inn to meet up with them. And can I just say, holy heck it’s humid in Florida! You gator folks must be used to it but it was like a wet towel in the face to us Californians. ;)

 

{Shameless Plug} The Hampton Inn is really nice! It’s only 1 mile away from the airport, is incredibly clean and modern, houses a warm coffee and tea area with complimentary breakfast and is located across the street from a Publix, Walgreens, CVS, Starbucks, Wendys and McDonalds.

 

Having the hotel so close to these stores was helpful since we could walk across the street and grab breakfast and buy last-minute snacks or toiletries. After noshing on some Egg McMuffins, we headed to Walgreens where we picked up some shaving cream, sun tan lotion, and the most important item – SODA.

 

Thank you Carnival for allowing people to bring soda onboard! I knew that my hubby’s friend was a huge soda drinker and I slipped him the message that he could save a bunch of money by purchasing a 12-pack of his favorite soda for himself. He chose Diet Mountain Dew and was a happy camper walking out of the drugstore with his box of green liquid delight. I think it’s really cool for Carnival to let you do this and not force to you buy a $35/pp soda package.

 

We killed some time in the ultra-modern hotel room (seriously… a giant plasma TV, gorgeous bathroom and super comfortable chairs and bed? Yes, please!) and I told them that passengers usually can’t get access to the ship at 9-10am. But by 11am we couldn’t hold it in any longer and were thrilled to get to the port! Despite noting “free shuttle ride to port” on their TripAdvisor page, the Hampton Inn charges $10/pp for a ride. I had heard that taxis were a flat rate of $24 from MIA to the port so we called a cab and minutes later a yellow minivan taxi pulled up and we all hopped in.

 

The port is 8 miles away from the airport and only takes about 15 minutes to get to on a good day with no traffic. Since this day was Martin Luther King Day, the freeways were open and we were doing top speed past the lovely Miami downtown building in minutes. When we reached the port area, we saw the popular whale tails all lined up in a row as well as Celebrity and NCL.

 

The ride was around $25 total which came out to $6 a person plus tip. The port was already bustling at 11am and porters and workers were whistling, laughing and yelling at the swarm of cars and taxis pulling through the lanes. We left our carry-on bags and their two large bags with a porter and tipped him for his service. We scurried with excitement over to the building which had clearly marked signs with arrows guiding us to the entrance for new cruisers. I’m actually surprised the port wasn't more chaotic since I thought for sure that we would run into the overflow of cruisers that were leaving that day.

 

I cannot even begin to tell you what a thrill it is to walk into that beautiful, open terminal and see zero lines and all of the representative windows open. The joy that we cruisers get from zig-zagging through the empty queues straight to the window is such a fantastic start to the vacation! The benefits of getting to the terminal early are endless. Poor Simeon, my husband’s friend, lugged his green case of Mountain Dew all throughout the terminal. I realized that our rooms wouldn’t be ready yet and he’d be carrying that poor box throughout the day. But hey, cheap soda!

 

Carnival does a great job of walking you through all the steps online that help you fill out your boarding pass. By registering a credit card, entering in your flight number and passport number and printing out the final paperwork in one neat packet makes it easy for both passenger and representative on embarkation day. I think we were only standing at the check-in window for a mere 5 minutes before we were led through the hallway to take our picture and board without any crowds.

 

The embarkation photo is always my favorite. People are either incredibly tired and cranky and disheveled from traveling all day and night, or they’re fresh-faced and chirpy and wearing huge smiles. Us four were running on such an adrenaline high that we squealed when the photographer asked us to join in for a group photo. At the last second, my husband yelled, “Make sure you get the Mountain Dew in there!”

 

 

Yep, you can tell that photo was easy to find on the photo wall. “Just look for the picture with the soda box, that’s us!”

 

From there, it was upstairs to the hallway that grants you views of half the ship. Moments later, we were in the glass walkway that leads you to those precious sacred first steps onboard the decks. Hallelujah we were finally here!

 

 

 

I must apologize for two things: first, the blue tint in the first photo because it was taken in the awesome glass hallway, and second, for my husband “photobombing” our friends in their entry photo. Yes, we’re “that” group.

 

The moment you step on any ship, regardless of the cruise line, the thing that usually goes through your mind first is, “WHERE IS THE FOOD?!” Am I right?

 

We were at that awkward hour where our rooms wouldn’t be ready quite yet and I vaguely remember something about a dining room not being open. I believe we headed straight to the Sun & Sea Restaurant (that’s fancy for “it’s the buffet”) and grabbed a lunch while looking out at the Miami skyline. We later decided to do some laps around the boat to learn where things were.

 

Ah, look at our men. Mine is wearing my girly pink backpack and poor Simeon is still stuck carrying that box of heavy soda around. I’m so glad my husband brought jeans and a fleece on a tropical vacation…

 

 

By roughly 1pm, just as others had stated, our room was ready. We had side-by-side balcony rooms and were thrilled when we learned through Cruise Critic that most of the rooms on Deck 6 had already been upgraded early as Destiny was slowly becoming Sunshine. Our rooms (6222 and 6226) were mid-ship and they were beautiful!

 

Crisp modern artwork, new looking carpet and bathrooms, a pleasing color scheme, a very nicely sized plasma television, and a decent sized balcony greeted us. I was mostly excited to lie on the bed, since our last cruise had a horrible mattress. To my delght, the mattress was incredibly firm but comfortable. But the best part? Oh my good lord, the best part was.... THE FULL-SIZED SHOWER.

 

Royal Caribbean and Princess cannot touch the awesomeness that is the full-sized Carnival shower. Disney has 2 bathrooms in their staterooms and that's mighty impressive, but I made a mental note to give a bear hug to whomever decided to put a normal-sized shower in these bathrooms. Thank you!

 

 

We met our room steward, Jerry, and asked him if he could open up the partition between our two balconies to create one long balcony. He left to get a key and promptly came back to open it. I love that this can be done as we spent a ton of time on our cruise out there on that balcony!

 

Up Next: “So This is What Miami Looks Like at Night.”