Breeze Review - April 13 with kids

[kite5280]

Spring break 2013 we went on the Carnival Breeze to the Caribbean. We went myself, my husband, daughter 9 yrs and son 11 months. This is our 3rd Carnival cruise. We had 5 other family members in our group. We flew into Miami the day before the ship set sail. We stayed at the Intercontinental Hotel, it was very nice and a perfect location. We were trying to find a place for dinner that was child friendly and found the Bayside Marketplace, right down the street. In the Intercontinental has some restaurants but they didn't look very family friendly. They were very fancy and the people would probably not deal well with our screaming baby throwing food all over the floor. The Bayside Marketplace was great, perfect family friendly area, seemed pretty safe and had nice restaurants and a lot of fun shopping, music, petting zoo for kids and more. We loved the view from our room in the Intercontinental.

Sunday we took a shuttle to the port to get checked in on the ship. With priority boarding it was great, no line, we walked right on. The ship was awesome looking, I feel it looks a lot more classic, more pretty than the old Liberty or Fascination that we were on before. Those had a more Vegas style look to me, more tacky. Our room was awesome, roomy with couch (extra single bed), coffee table and vanity, big balcony and nice big bath with jet tub and two sinks. Very nice and clean.

Of first day at sea was nice and we were at the WaterWorks water park enjoying the water slides and cooling off when announcements over the ship were saying that there was a medical emergency and we would need to stop at Nassau to get this person to a hospital. As the day went on the itinerary had changed and we would be reversing our stops and going to Nassau first and staying there for 4-5 hours in the late afternoon/evening. All the excursions would be changed since we were originally going to Nassau our last stop and for the entire day. We had an excursion at Atlantis planned with tour of the resort and aquarium, lunch then the rest of the day at their water park. There was no rush to get to the shore excursion desk knowing it was be mobbed with negative angry people. We went later and found out our Atlantis excursion was cancelled and money was totally refunded. We were ok with that, little disappointed but we plan to go back another time and will do it all then. We ended up hanging around the port of Nassau and going to Senior Frogs.

The next day was stopping at Ocho Rios, Jamaica. Since we weren't going to Atlantis we definitely wanted to do something in Jamaica. We decided on going to Paradise Beach, we always book our excursions through Carnival and good thing because in the instance of us not making it to Nassau like we were supposed to our money was refunded. If we would have booked through another tour company I'm not sure we would have gotten our money back. Plus also we look for safe excursions especially since we have the kids with us. It rained for a little bit in the morning in Jamaica but passed quickly and then turned out to be a nice day. Paradise Beach was a 10 min or less ride by shuttle and we were staring directly at our ship. It worked out to be a fun excursion, there was drinks including rum punch and beer for adults and lunch included. The beach was nice, their was a DJ playing music and organized volleyball games, drinking contests and dancing. We didn't go to the shopping area but it was in walking distance.

Jamaica is not my favorite stop. Of all the islands I've been too the Jamaican people beg for tips for everything (or nothing), far more than anywhere else and for any job they do. It highly annoys me. When they are begging me for tips it makes me not want to give them any. grrrrr.

We chose to have anytime dining, for us with my son being so young it worked best. One thing that I really liked about the Sapphire dining room we were in on the Breeze is that we were not all packed into one long rectangular table. We did sit at a round table many nights when we had 6 in our group. Instead of those long cafeteria tables where 12 people all sit smashed in elbow to elbow this dining room has table of 2, 4 or 6 and they are placed close to each other but not push together as one, it gives so much more room to move and eat. It worked out so great for us especially with a baby in a high chair. I wonder if all dining rooms are setup this way on the Breeze or only because we were in anytime dining.

One reason we wanted to go on the Breeze was to go on the ropes course. There is a Sports complex on the 12 level, top of the ship. It was so windy for the last couple days and you could feel it with the ship rocking a little. It was too windy and the SkyCourse was closed every time we looked up there. We played mini golf which had a fun 9 hole course. There was also ping pong, pool tables, foosball, running track, basketball/soccer and exercise machines up on that Sportsquare. I love this ship so many things to do for the whole family.

The activities and dinner menus etc were all confusing and switched around because of our itinerary change. We missed the captain dinner night with lobster. Darn! We look forward to that dinner night. Since we chose anytime dining we didn't sit at the same table with the same wait staff each night. But all the staff; waiters, hostesses etc were so great with my baby, getting us anything we needed and paying so much attention to him. It's nice when we are eating at another table and our waiter/hostesses from the previous nights remember us by name and come over to say hi. We did notice that there isn't whole milk which is what my son drinks in those individual boxes at the buffet breakfasts or room service, but it seemed if we asked for whole and gave them a bottle to fill they could. Skim and 2% were available in those little milk cartons. We always have a container of Cherrios or Kix for my son to snack on throughout the day and there was Cherrios available. We were looking for the regular yellow box of Cherrios and not honey nut, I don't like to feed him the extra sugar. The regular yellow boxes were at each breakfast and easy to get. While we were eating in the buffets having the stroller was easiest. There was high chairs but we usually ate out by the pool on lido deck and stroller worked perfectly. At dinner in the dining rooms we used their high chairs and they had the tray so no need for the disposable place mats I bought. They were clean and brought right over to use immediately after getting seated.

My daughter loved the 9-11 year old Camp Carnival programs. They did scavenger hunts, making towel animals, paper airplane contests, video games, dance parties etc. She went to a few of the night owl parties they had at night after dinner. The one party was till 3am, she loved it. We noticed since 2 years ago when she cruised with us there was parties every night for the kids, now they only had a couple nights of specialty parties. The other nights were just more babysitting, the kids watched a movie or slept. Either way it costs extra which we are ok with.

When we had Grandma and Camp Carnival for sitters we enjoyed the casino. I noticed from the last couple Carnival Cruises we were on that there isn't many waiters around now to get drink orders especially in the casino. That was disappointing because I wanted to stay at the table I was at and didn't want to leave to get a drink. I'm not sure if it's just on the Breeze or its changed on all ships but the wait staff service has changed since the years past ships we were on.

more to come.... later.

[Yoli=)]

Great review! Patiently waiting for more...

[kite5280]

Our last stop and one of my favorites is Grand Turk. It was closed for the last few weeks because of passengers coming back with a GI virus. It was just reopened. The cruise center at this port is awesome, so much to do, gorgeous beach, shops and restaurants you really don't have to leave the cruise center to enjoy an entire day. The water is the prettiest color, bluish green and my photos just don't do it justice. We enjoyed the day at the beach, we rented a tent/shade that went over 2 lounge chairs, it was well worth the twenty bucks. You could also rent snorkel gear, floaties and more.

Our last day at sea we enjoyed the Waterworks waterpark and ropes course. My daughter went around the ropes course 7-8 times. I walked the exercise track with the stroller, it was so nice up there on the top level of the ship. The Waterworks was great for all age kids. My daughter loved the water slides and I did too. There are 2 big ones, one starts slow, and then circles around like a drain at the end. The other one is longer and faster and very fun. The lines for the slides weren't too long. There are 2 little slides for littler kids. There is a ton of spouts squirting water everywhere and a large bucket that fill and then drops all the water in the area.

We did see the show The Brits and sat in the back in case my son started screaming. It was ok, nothing too exciting but wasn't horrible either. I really did enjoy the guy and guitar on the Lido deck in the afternoons. I think his name was Ryan. I think I also read he was playing in the piano bar some times also. My family who was with us saw both comedians and loved them, the shows were packed I heard, best to go early to get a seat. My Mother in Law saw The Divas show. She said wasn't her favorite, just ok. She did really like a lady who would sing most nights in the lounge down by the Red Frog pub. The last night she did a Motown night. We don't really care about the shows since there is so much other stuff to do but she said it has really gone down hill in the past years.

We had a great time. We are planning our next Carnival cruise....

[cruises42]

Thanks for the review. We'll be sailing on Saturday. Did you have any delays at debarkation or at the airport?

[UATLB]

thanks for sharing cant wait to sail on the breeze

[a priori]

Thanks for the good review.

[kite5280]

cruises42-

We didn't have any delays but we did wait until later to get off the ship. Our flight was later in the day so there was no rush for us to go. The airport was a breeze to get through.

 

Have fun!

 

 

I forgot to add the Guy F's burgers are awesome, definitely recommend those, the line goes quick.

[mrypop]

We were on this sailing with you! We also had a great time.

 

We did the sign in at the Miami airport and were able to walk right through security at the cruise port and get on the boat. This was awesome. The fastest check in I have ever had!

[cruises42]

cruises42-

We didn't have any delays but we did wait until later to get off the ship. Our flight was later in the day so there was no rush for us to go. The airport was a breeze to get through.

 

Have fun!

 

 

I forgot to add the Guy F's burgers are awesome, definitely recommend those, the line goes quick.

 

Thanks!