6-year old girl's SENSATIONal review w/pics!

[purplemusik]

Hi all!

 

 

Here from sunny Florida ( as I know much of you up north are going through snowstorms :o ). We just got back from a 4 day Bahamas cruise on the Sensation. I'd love to start off with some background but don't worry, I know most of you are scrolling through and just looking at pictures. Speaking of.... I know once you've seen one of the Fantasy class ships in person, you've basically " seen them all " but there aren't very many Sensation reviews with pictures on here....hmph! No matter the ship, even if there are 10 duplicates, I want to look at MY ship I'm going on- LOL - and I want a variety!

 

Background: My lil' family of DH,DD,DS, and myself were planning on going on a huge family cruise because my Grandfather was diagnosed with lung cancer. He used to be huge into cruising, which got all of us addicted to it, so we wanted to do one last cruise with him ( he was given 1 year ). 2 months later, he passed away. We all decided we wanted to still go to enjoy each other as he would've wanted. That's when everyone started dropping out like flies.

 

First, it was because we were supposed to go on the Disney Dream ( my dad gets a cast member rate but the catch is, you can only book weeks in advance IF a cruise comes open ). We've never had any issues in the past booking this way in the off season. This year, it didn't work out, they didn't have openings. That's when everyone started dropping out as they didn't like Carnival compared to Disney/etc. By this time, the price for the 7 day Eastern hubby and I had our heart set on earlier in the year had gone up and the Disney cruise wasn't an option ( great rates for cast member rates which is why we could afford that one ).

 

 

In the end it was just US going :rolleyes:. My son is QUITE active and we literally would've been chasing him the entire time as we do here. She's unintentionally pushed aside at times because we have to rescue him from being stuck, hurting himself, or getting into something he shouldn't SO..... We decided this would be the PERFECT opportunity for my 6 year old daughter ( I can hear her now," Mommy, I turn 7 next month yanno!" ) to have one on one time with just us before her baby brother was born this summer ( oh yeah, and I'm 20 weeks pregnant )! Now that we knew it would just be us ( and we'd need someone to watch the 2 year old ) we decided to just go with a 4 day local cruise ( local...HA! All ports in FL take no time to get to for us but Port Canaveral is about 45 min away so that's what I mean ).

 

 

 

I also wanted to mention....anything negative I post in my review is just the little annoyances one can have on any vacation, nothing I'd stop cruising over and no issue was big enough where I felt like I wouldn't cruise on this ship again. We had a GREAT little cruise and would go on the Sensation again.

 

 

So, here's our review :p

[purplemusik]

We live rather close to Port Canaveral so we are fortunate enough to have family drop us off and pick us up. A job I would dread to do myself since I already have major cruise fever just reading reviews, I'd hate to drive right upto the ship then drive away but that's neither here nor there.

 

We woke up and had a rather uneventful morning as we packed up the car ( besides the fact I had to make last minute Girl Scout cookie runs that day because nobody wanted to wait 4 days for me to get back...I don't blame them-lol ). Normally, we like to get at the port at 11:30ish however, since I had a few places to run that morning, we didn't get there until about 12:30. I was nervous there would be a wait but we basically walked right on. It looked rather busy but the lines went extremely fast in their new terminal and we never came to a complete stop as we walked through everything ( except for showing passport/ actually getting our cards/ taking pictures ).

 

 

 

 

 

 

[KyWildcatGirl01]

Can't wait to hear more and see pictures. I am a first time cruiser with my dh & ds (2) in April on a 4 day bahamas cruise and I have been searching for reviews and pictures!!!

[purplemusik]

Forgot to mention, since I'm pregnant, they had me fill out paperwork and have my DR. sign it that I wouldn't be past a certain amt of weeks. They called me a few times about this and emailed me and would always remind me I needed to provide the actual paperwork when I checked in. They never asked for it :: shrugs shoulders :: no biggie though, I had it on hand just incase!

Also, when is it you are supposed to get your gold pin? This cruise made me gold on Carnival and I ended up mentioning it when I put money down on my account and he seemed shocked that I hadn't received it yet. It wasn't huge as there isn't anything I'm going to DO with the pin but just wondered when I was actually supposed to get it.

Ok enough about that...more review/pictures!

We made a beeline to the buffet. We usually eat an early/very small breakfast or nothing at all before the cruise so we can basically gorge ourselves immediately. One thing that bummed me out was they were out of lettuce-LOL. I know, petty but I'm pregnant and really, really wanted a buffet salad along with my buffet food! They ended up getting it a couple hours later, thankfully so not all hope was lost!

 

 

 

[purplemusik]

The great thing about getting to the ship later then we normally do was by the time we were done eating, it was time to go to the room! We just did a cozy, intimate inside cabin (I tell myself that-LOL-No, but I really do enjoy the dark inside cabins...love when we get outside for longer cruises but for us, don't see the need for it on shorter ones ).

 

 

 

 

Very pleased to see our free drink coupons and thrilled that DH and DD got one too. To be honest, I only ever looked at what Gold got because I knew I was like a day away from gold...never thought to look at what they got as red :o

 

Room Negatives:

First time EVER on a cruise I could hear noisy neighbors. Really had nothing to do with the actually CABIN itself or the location. Didn't bother us too much, usually only once per day for a few minutes

 

Creeking door ( loud! ) for the bathroom and the sink seemed broke. The thing that plugs it ( sorry, totally female when it comes to what that thing is actually called ) was broken on one end so if the water was on for...oh..more then 5 seconds - it was FULL and you had to shut the water off and let it drain.

 

 

No free goodies in the bathroom! AT ALL! Boooo! Obviously not a big deal AT ALL but I like finding out what we get ;)

 

Room Positives:

Half way between middle elevator for the atrium and half way between the elevators that put you straight into the buffet! Perfect for us!

 

Room Steward was VERY friendly and knew our names somehow when we walked past him BEFORE we even walked upto our door and made a point to speak to us every day- if not more then once. Always very prompt in cleaning the room.

[SMSACE6]

Im enjoying your review! Sensation was my first Carnival cruise way back in 2000! Back then it was a 7 day cruise out of Tampa. I really had a wonderful cruise on that ship and met some great people from all over.

 

Looking forward to more of your review, and of course more pictures.:)

[sjn911]

Thanks for review..really enjoying it too...Sarah

[Mizzouaholic]

Looking good so far!

[Megan_Strick]

Thanks for the review. I have been on the Sensation so many times but never have done a review.

[Rosefloater]

Room Negatives:

 

Creeking door ( loud! ) for the bathroom and the sink seemed broke. The thing that plugs it ( sorry, totally female when it comes to what that thing is actually called ) was broken on one end so if the water was on for...oh..more then 5 seconds - it was FULL and you had to shut the water off and let it drain.

 

 

No free goodies in the bathroom! AT ALL! Boooo! Obviously not a big deal AT ALL but I like finding out what we get ;)

 

 

Did you mention the sink drain problem to the room steward? Sometimes they don't know about some of the problems until it is mentioned to them. This has happened to us a few times and someone from the plumbing dept. had it fixed by the next day.

 

Did you ask about the bathroom freebies? I have asked the room steward about not having any in the bathroom, and have been told they haven't finished with the rooms and we always got them later.

 

Like the review so far.

[LandlockedCruiser01]

Great review so far. Thanks for posting. I'm cruising on Sensation this April, so any first-hand accounts are really helpful. For some reason, I visualized the Port of Canaveral to look more clean-cut and high-tech than it was in the pictures, but it's not a big deal at all.

 

One question: what world region were the Sensation crew members from? On my last cruise, I remember Imagination having a lot people from Eastern Europe working there. Just curious if Carnival recruits people from the same region for all or most of its ships.

 

Looking forward to more posts.

[shof515]

how does that free drink work? Where do you redeem, what kind of non-alcoholic drinks can you get with it?

[chipq]

Great start and looking for more. Thanks for sharing.

 

http://luv2cruise.blogspot.com

[KirkNC]

Thanks for the report!

[battchief1]

Thanks for the review.....love to read them

[purplemusik]

Did you mention the sink drain problem to the room steward? Sometimes they don't know about some of the problems until it is mentioned to them. This has happened to us a few times and someone from the plumbing dept. had it fixed by the next day.

 

Did you ask about the bathroom freebies? I have asked the room steward about not having any in the bathroom, and have been told they haven't finished with the rooms and we always got them later.

 

Like the review so far.

 

 

To be honest, we didn't. I guess my thoughts at the time were..." Hey, no biggie- if this is the worst thing that could happn, it's a great day!" and being in customer service, I'm always self conscious about being THAT customer but you brought up a great point, if he didn't know it was happening, I could have saved the next person from seeing it.

 

I didn't mention the freebies either :o

[purplemusik]

Great review so far. Thanks for posting. I'm cruising on Sensation this April, so any first-hand accounts are really helpful. For some reason, I visualized the Port of Canaveral to look more clean-cut and high-tech than it was in the pictures, but it's not a big deal at all.

 

One question: what world region were the Sensation crew members from? On my last cruise, I remember Imagination having a lot people from Eastern Europe working there. Just curious if Carnival recruits people from the same region for all or most of its ships.

 

Looking forward to more posts.

 

 

Compared to the way Port Canaveral was set up before, it's a big improvement. It looked very clean and new. My pictures are kind of dark and they stopped me from taking pictures in there ( for some odd reason ) but it was really big and a lot more " high tech " then before. When we went in June, it consisted of a small, old dome building you just showed your ID in, then a tent walk through where you do your pictures, then up a ramp and onto the ship with an older, outdoor bridge. Here's some pics from that one:

 

 

 

 

Where as now it's all indoor and pretty :)

 

It seemed to be pretty diverse as far as the regions people were from but quite a bit from Eastern Europe and Western. BUT, a lot of the waiters/room stewards ( that we had/saw ) said they were from the Islands ( Jamaica/ Haiti/ etc )

[purplemusik]

how does that free drink work? Where do you redeem, what kind of non-alcoholic drinks can you get with it?

 

Since my ship wasn't an upgraded ship, we had to ours on the sea day at breakfast or lunch. It said on there you could use it at Punchliner comedy brunch or comedy show if your ship had it. I was worried about using the coupons because I read on several reviews they would go to breakfast/lunch and nobody was around to take their coupon but this was NOT the case on mine. There seemed to be even MORE bartenders around walking up and asking if you had one. You can get soda, non-alch. bev, or an alch bev.

[SweetpeaOne]

Very nice review. Thanks for sharing.

[elaineb]

Keep it coming! Can't wait to see more. Doing this cruise in March as a little b'day present for my DH. And after this blizzard, palm trees and sun are starting to look sooooo nice!

[Cupcrazy]

Great review so far. Looking forward to more. Thanks for taking your time to post

[bartrise]

Thanks for posting going on a b2b this Sept for my 9th and 10th cruise to make platinum :) on this ship!

[PathfinderEss]

Enjoying your review, looking forward to more of it.

[CanWeGoYet?]

Alright, I'll bite. I'm enjoying the review but curious why you titled it 6 year old girl's sensational review? Because she is on the cruise too? Just curious.

[LandlockedCruiser01]

Seconding CanWeGoYet's question. How did the thread title get its name? The OP's posts don't look like they're written from a 6-year-old's point of view. There is no mention of Camp Carnival, the WaterWorks slides, 24-hour ice cream, etc. (Apologies for stereotyping, but I'm sure most kids would pay a lot of attention to those things.)

 

OP, care to share the secret? :)