Thanksgiving Breeze Cruise Review

[GranthamMommy]

A quick review of our recent Carnival Breeze cruise. We were just on for the Thanksgiving Week, 8 day cruise.

 

There were six of us - two families, three cabins.

 

We arrived in Miami on Friday, the day before the cruise. We stayed at the Miami Marriott Biscayne Bay. The hotel was very nice. We could see the ships arrive and depart from the Port of Miami. There was a Publix within walking distance. We bought snacks and breakfast for our hotel room. They have a large selection of wine to purchase for your on board needs.

 

The hotel is connected to the Doubletree. There are a number of restaurants in the "mall" between the two. We had dinner at Primo. The service and the food were terrible. We don't recommend eating there.

 

Some confusion with the van to the port. We asked when we arrived if they had a shuttle to the port. No, put just come down in the morning and you'll be able to grab one - we had six people plus luggage. Well we went down in the morning to grab one and told we had to wait to 11:30. We said forget it, we'll grab a cab. We went out to grab two cabs and the valet said , oh we have a van you can use. Sure enough, it was with the same driver the concierge had mentioned.

 

All in all, we're Marriott brand junkies, the hotel was beautiful and we'd stay here again.

 

We left the hotel at 11 and with FTTF we were all checked, luggage in our cabin and eating Guy's Burgers around noon time. Check in went relatively smoothly. We had three cabins. Two cabins got priority passes, we got one for boarding group twenty something. But that got changed to priority when we got our sail and sign cards. Two cabins were told to go to the 2nd floor to wait. We were told to go to the Captain's lounge to wait - where we were turned away. No biggie. Just a bit annoying.

 

The Breeze is beautiful. We asked and were told that they were not quite at capacity. 1/3 of the passengers were minors. But I have to say the lines were relatively small and we could always find lounge chairs when we wanted them. Enjoyed the muted Caribbean blue colors over the "old" garish Carnival Orange. We had balcony cabin 8221 starboard/forward. The cabin was very nice and plenty of room and storage for two adults. We also had a pull out sofa. Our cabin steward Heru was great. Room was always clean, ice always full, towels replenished, so we were happy.

 

The food. I pretty much say it was the worst food we've ever had on a cruise. The Service was bad. We had anytime dining (or whatever carnival calls it)

 

Breakfast - We didn't really enjoy the food on the buffet, but "settled" on something. We ate in the MDR several times. The food was better, but the service was so so so slow. The first sea day we were in there for over two hours. At one point another cruiser got up and started serving us water. Over an hour to get a bloody mary. Pancakes were inedible .

 

Lunch - GUY FIERI BURGERS!! Loved them. Quick Service. Just the right about of grease. Great toppings. We ate here.

 

Dinner - Three years ago on the Valor I LOVED the food. Not this time. We started to not look forward to dinner. Really - not like dinner on a cruise. Shrimp cocktail - a few little shrimp like those you buy in the "shrimp ring" at the grocery store. Really. Soups were not very good except for the French Onion Soup. Seasoning on the food was non-existent.

 

That being said - my BIL was in the spice business, my sister writes a food column, our son's are chef's......probably more picky than some.

 

Ports: We did not book any of the shore excursions through the ship

 

1) Grand Turk - Got off the ship, worked our way through the Port/Carnival/Margaritaville madness. Didn't want to swim next to the ship or with 300 others in the Margaritaville pool. Like others have said, walk down the beach 500 yards or so to Jack's Shack. Lounge chairs are free, umbrellas are $10. We had a great time swimming, lounging, playing volleyball. Just enough other people to make it a great morning/afternoon. Listened to island music, drank local beer, ate jerk chicken and fried conch. Great day. We all loved the kicked back day.

 

2) Dominican Republic - ended up being a great day. Hired a taxi driver, George, right there at the port. Drove us around. First stop La Romana Market. Very poor people making the hard sell for nothing we really wanted to buy. We bought a few bracelets and got out of there quickly.

 

We asked George to take us to lunch at a place he would eat. WINNER WINNER Fish dinner. OMG. He took us to a place in Caleta Beach called El Marinero. The dinner was less than $20 pp for beer, appetizers and dinner. We asked George to join us. They had fresh fish, lobster and chicken. We didn't have the lobster (no biggie we're from New England). The fresh fish were unbelievable. Whole-scored-salted and deep fried.Amazing....Nice people under a thatch roof restaurant away from maddening crowd. Highlight of the trip.

 

Not much else to see, and we headed back to the ship.

 

3) Curacao - maybe we should have planned something for here, or maybe not. We arrived at 2pm and there was a huge downpour. Not the quaint little cute town I thought we were arriving at. My problem, I pictured something different. To get to cuteness - you have to walk through the port and then a casino complex.

 

Then you choose between two ways to get to quaintness - you can walk over the bridge, but the bridge was open most of the time to let other ships through. So then you choose the ferry. The ferry is free.

 

Maybe if I was young and on my third margarita I might not have minded. My DH was having a knee replacement after we got home, so the unexpected walking was a bit much for him.

 

Lots of shopping, but we're not big shoppers. We sat along the water at the Iguana Café, drank and watched soccer on the tv (nephew big into soccer) And that was fine.

 

4) Aruba - LOVED Aruba. Everyone is so nice there. Very clean. This was our first time to the island and know we'll go back. Again we hired a taxi driver and saw the island from the calm Caribbean side to the rough Atlantic waters. Definitely some place I want to go back to. Again we asked to be taken to a local restaurant away from tourist traffic. We at the Red Fish. Great fish, conch and local beer.

 

The Comedy Club was great. Four shows a night. The first is a family show. The rest aren't and under 18 are not admitted. Go early if you want to get seats for a particular show. The comedians changed mid week. Probably need to go around 8:45 to ensure good seats for the 9:15 show.

 

The casino was just okay. Plenty of penny machines. One family hit a progressive jackpot of $5000 on a penny machine. They just didn't have the machines I like. The tables were pretty kind to us.

 

Bingo - the first few days there was only one game. Quit playing bingo until the big game at the end of the week.

 

Shows - wow they really cut back in this arena. Not a big draw for us, but typically something to do and pleasantly surprised when they are good. We only went the first night and walked out.

 

Took advantage of the free drinks and appetizers and the VIFP party. We made gold during this trip. Enjoyed the little perk.

 

It was Thanksgiving Weekend, so LOTS of football. The Casino Bar had all the games on the tv and there was lots of cheering going on. It was fun to watch the Cowboy Raiders game on deck on the big screen - only wish there had been nachos and chicken wings close by!

 

Didn't use the Spa or the Gym. Did walk in the morning on the Sports Deck. Shopped a bit in the shops - the usual stuff.

 

The Coffee Bar (can't remember the name) Nothing special here as far as I'm concerned. Can't even compare to Café Al Bacio on Celebrity. Save your money.

 

Back to Miami - this is one of those time where people weren't off the ship early. At 10am, only self debarkation and zones 1-4 had been called. We had a comfortable amount of time to make our 1:55 flight. Luckily we were zone 4.

I would have been extremely nervous if I had an early flight and was zone 22 or something. Felt bad for the FTTF's on the next cruise who probably didn't get on the boat til early afternoon assuming things got moving.

 

Loved the Breeze. A+ for Hotel Staff. C for Restaurant Staff. C- for the food.

 

We did have a great time on the trip except for the food and maybe the adults need to move up to Celebrity and let the boys (19 and 22) start cruising on their own. We did a Celebrity Cruise earlier this year and we felt like a member of the family. The staff knew your name after day one - whether it was the sommelier, the barista, everyone. Prior to this cruise, I thought Carnival had better food than Celebrity....hmmm.

[Cruizinman]

That's a fair review, thanks for posting ;)