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No picture Dream review from 9/17 sailing

amyotravel

By amyotravel,
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amyotravel

amyotravel

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About us – Late 40s, cohabitating couple of nearly 20 years, no children. I really never do reviews because I am not disciplined enough to take notes or pictures. So just some general overall impressions.

 

Embarkation – Super, super easy. We used Lyft and had one of our very best drivers ever, and that is saying a lot. He took us to the exact spot we needed. We had no priority boarding or FTTF and were on board, I believe, within about a half hour. I am very much liking the staggered check-in times. Only glitch was a couple who walked up in front of us. We had an 11:30 check-in time and it was 11:40. They had a 12:30 time and were told they would have to wait until 12:30 to enter the terminal. This is something we knew about ahead of time, so we had a leisurely breakfast, checked out of our hotel at 11:00, stopped for a coffee, and then opened the app for a Lyft at 11:15. Could not have been easier. But this couple who did it wrong were not having it. Even after the employee patiently explained about three or four times. They were stopping the line from moving. We were next but could not enter until they moved, so I confirmed exactly what the port employee said. The man looked at me and said, “What – you work for the cruise line, do you?” It was rude but I was too excited about getting to the ship to care much. Eventually they did have to give up and go stand somewhere else.

 

Cabin – Typical regular balcony cabin. Deck 8 (Verandah). Worked just fine for us. Plenty of shelving in the cabin and the bathroom. TVs are still pretty small, but at least they are flat screens now! :D

 

Muster – In the Scarlett dining room for us (all were inside in various locations). The usual stragglers made it take longer than needed. Not very informative actually, but once it started it was over quickly.

 

Steward – He was new and very overwhelmed. He was really nice and all things considered did a decent job. He told us he had 36 cabins. Sheesh. He would sometimes accidentally leave random items behind, like one day a package of sheets on the couch, and a glove and cleaning rags on the counter another day. One night we came back after 9 pm too tired to leave again and he had not been there yet. Put “Snoozin” on the door and dealt with it. He did bring us two towel animals the next day. One early in the day and one in the evening (I guess because we missed out). Or maybe he forgot he did one. I could see it being either way. Tipped extra at the end, mostly just because we felt so sorry for the poor guy.

 

Drinks – Bars were very crowded most of the time, making it often tough to get a drink. And I don’t just mean from servers walking around, but when ordering at the actual bars. Noticed an issue with staff cutbacks here, too, like the stewards. Drinks were often weak. I watched several times as in the rush, alcohol would sort of go half in and half out of glasses but they kept right on going without remedying the fact that it was not a full pour. One bartender at Red Frog Rum Bar did not know what I was ordering even though it was on their limited drink menu. I pointed at it for him and he still made the wrong thing and therefore the price was wrong. Even though the original drink he made was cheaper than what I ordered, I had him remake the bill after he fixed the drink so I didn’t cheat them. This was after waiting quite a while for the drink in the first place. As usual, the drinks in Alchemy were better than anywhere else. But they were always slammed, too, and I missed being able to bond with the mixologists like I have on past cruises. They were simply too busy for much chit-chat.

 

Dining Room – We had early seating in the Scarlett Dining Room. I hate eating late and like to sit in the same place every day – just walk up to “my” table! Despite the cutbacks, we LOVED our wait staff. I did miss the old menu some, but there’s always multiple excellent choices. In the past, we have either had no interaction with the maître d’ or have had negative interactions (i.e. cranky when you ask them anything or refusing to even listen to any requests). But this time was a true exception. On the first night, we asked nicely if it was possible to change to a table for two. (We were told it was a four person table, and if it turns out you don’t like the other two, there’s no one else to talk to! But we knew we might not be able to change.) He looked at the computer and it turns out we were at a four person booth – whoa, that could have been even worse. And with no hesitation – and a SMILE, no less – he said how about I just change it to two and I won’t let anyone else sit there. We wondered if that would actually last but he was true to his word. So we had our original table every night but didn’t have to share! Very romantic. I looked forward to dining so much every night and am very grateful to have had such outstanding dining room staff all the way around. We tipped extra on the final night and hugged them all goodbye.

 

Other Dining – I never eat the regular buffet except for an occasional small breakfast (there’s just too much other good stuff), so I cannot comment much on that.

 

I ate the Mongolian Wok for embarkation lunch, but that was a mistake. I thought I should do it before it got too crowded, but it took 40 minutes to get the food with only about five or six people ahead of me. That said, the calamari was fantastic there.

 

Ate a couple of Guy’s Burgers throughout the cruise. Yum as always.

 

LOVE, love the addition of the taco shell bowls at Blue Iguana Cantina. I made the best shrimp taco salad for lunch one day.

 

Ate some arepas there for breakfast a couple of mornings as well. I am a salsa addict so I gravitate to it. And since there are no chips, the shell is perfect to break up for salsa gorging.

 

Had Sea Day Brunch one day and the steak on the steak and eggs was better than any steak at dinner. But there’s one thing I will be sure to let Carnival know on the survey. I went by myself, and just ahead of me another lady came by herself. They sat us at a long table that was for ten or twelve. No biggie, except the wait staff did not even come to take a drink order or bring bread or anything until after they had sat all the seats at that big table. In total, there were about five or six different groups of people that came at different times. THEN, they started taking the orders at the other end, not where the first lady and I sat. So we ended up waiting about 45 minutes just to get juice from the time we sat. I should have just left but I figured it was the only day I was going to have brunch. The table mates were great to talk to and the food was wonderful, but that was just completely unreasonable.

 

Had the pasta bar and tandoor once each. Both were good. Had a room service BLT once and it was so-so but delivery was fast and friendly. Had the pizza once, but even though I did not special order, it took much too long considering the line was the shortest I saw the whole cruise (I had about five or so people in front of me and waited nearly a half hour, despite having no objection to whatever style of pizza showed up.) The pizza was fine but I wouldn’t wait again.

I did not have the deli, but my boyfriend did twice and said it was as good as always.

 

Cruise Director – The Flying Scotsman Chris Williams. Fan. Freaking. Tastic. Words cannot describe so watch his videos on Facebook or You Tube. He even does a one man show in the big theater. When you see him on the ship, it’s like running into a celebrity and you get all blushy and have the giggles. I observed him “in the wild” him a couple of times when there was no other passengers around (very rare moments), and even just in his random interactions with a co-worker, he is as nice as can be.

 

Casino – hands down (no pun intended) the worst smokiness of any ship I have been on, EVER. I could not handle even walking anywhere near it. It permeated so much of deck five and even the stairwells down to deck four. Absolutely disgusting. I usually play a bit, but did not sit down for a second. Which is a shame because the one time I went through it – fast – it looked good and larger than many. But I smelled like smoke for hours although I practically ran through there and only had a few of seconds of actual contact with the area. It makes it tough to get casino offers for those who are bigger gamblers than I am but do not smoke. Even when it looked empty from afar, it was sooooo smoky. It makes it tough also that the casino bar is where the sports are on TV. There is no sports bar on this ship. I heard a lot of complaints from people who were asthmatic and could not watch sports in there. I know smoking gamblers are going to have a hard time refraining from flaming me for these comments, but I really am not exaggerating AT ALL and non-smokers and those who are super sensitive to smoke should really know this information. If you have no issues with smoky places, great – enjoy the casino, as there seemed to be plenty of open seating in there.

 

Piano Bar – Excellent. Set up was great, servers were great, piano player was great. The entertainer was Gregg. He is a little unconventional compared to others I have seen on Carnival. He is not really into the raunchy stuff – not saying he is a prude or anything, but he just doesn’t really do it. He’s so fun, you don’t realize until afterward that it was “cleaner” show than most. He is not mean like some I have seen who kind of pick on people for laughs. But what you should know, is that he is very stylized. Meaning, he has his own way of playing songs and that can at times make it difficult to sing along. It kind of throws you off a little. You get used to it. We went three or four nights.

 

Pools/Hot Tubs – Pools were very crowded, especially adult aft. Didn’t use them or the lukewarm hot tubs because they were not appealing. But didn’t care about being in them anyway, and still had my fill of Lido activities. The same old corny stuff but more enjoyable because of The Flying Scotsman. I have a gesture I do now with my hands indicating “next level” whenever he showed up. Too hard to describe in words, but it was my shorthand to my boyfriend that meant, like, here we go – pay attention, it’s gonna get good!

 

Entertainment Staff – Went to the theater more than usual because of the cruise director and a higher level of interest. The live music was better than it has been in the past few years. We enjoyed a couple of the duos, particularly “The Cove” and “Country and Wine” enough to seek them out each day in the Fun Times. I got tired of the DJ.

 

Other Passengers – Hit and miss as usual. Met some really nice folks that we had fun hanging out with a few times. (For instance, if you happen to be reading this Mal and Eric or “Katina” and Melissa, you rock!) And then, there’s the “others.’ It happens everywhere and not too many things are worth mentioning. Once, though, we were walking down a corridor near the buffet (not in, but near), and some young girl in her early twenties came up behind us without saying a word and literally pushed both of us out of the way with her hands. There was plenty of room around us, she just wanted to do it. She is lucky we aren’t the kind of people who would do anything about it – if you know what I mean. Someone else might have just clocked her. And she was kind of a little thing. At first we were so shocked, we couldn’t even believe what happened. And to both of us simultaneously? With one of us being an almost six foot tall man? Incredible.

 

And when we were debarking, there was a family (?) of people right next to us, where the apparent oldest one (late 30s or 40s) turned around and told the other two to stop laughing. They didn’t, so she started cussing at them (f-word, slut, etc.) and physically slapping them. Really hard, serious hitting, right in front of dozens of people. I mean she went OFF and I could not believe what was happening. I didn’t even want to look because I was afraid I would somehow get caught up in it. Scary.

 

One funny thing was an older woman on one of the stairwell landings between decks. She was explaining to someone who was with her that so-and-so “went to eat at Mongolian Barbecue” (actually it’s Wok, but anyway…). Then she proceeds to say loudly and with a disgusted face “I don’t like that. I’ve never had it.” No pause between sentences. I started cracking up (not where they saw me) because it just takes all kinds. Maybe you had to be there.

Debarkation – We did self-assist and it sucked. Luckily we had a night in New Orleans after the cruise so we did not have to get anywhere at a certain time. They called by deck, and we were the last group called. It was a madhouse, with way too many people at once (maybe some did not follow the deck order or it just started to bunch up more and more) and some people taking off way more huge bags than they could reasonably carry. It took an hour just to get off the ship/gangway. But, then, once off, it was only like five minutes to get through customs and out to the outside.

I am sad that like all good things, this trip had to end. Hopefully it won't be long until the next one.

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momof4girls

momof4girls

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Thank you for your review:) We cruised the Dream last year, and I agree with most everything you said. Chris Williams is absolutely the BEST cruise director I’ve ever had. He was soooo personable, and we also spent way more time in the theatre due to him. My girls got all excited one night he was walking through the dining room (he did this almost nightly) so he stopped at our table; talked to us for about 10 minutes. We learned a lot about him in that short time, and we were amazed it was his first time as CD.

 

Debarkation was rough for us too. It was a cluster of people standing around the elevators for hours on deck 3.

 

I’m so thankful Carnival has Waterworks because my kids haven’t been able to swim in the pools as of yet. They’re always extremely crowded. I don’t see any solution to it though, so we just deal with it.

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amyotravel

amyotravel

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Thanks for the review. Did you do any excursions?

 

Yes, we did two. Neither of which were through Carnival. We had a hard time finding Carnival excursions we liked/wanted.

 

On Roatan we did Little French Key. It is NOT the same thing as the Big French Key through Carnival. There are threads here on CC about it. A little pricey but not for what you get and highly recommended. We had a wonderful time.

 

In Belize, we had planned on just leaving the port area to find authentic Belizean food and beer and just hang out. We have already done several excursions there in the past (snorkeling, cave tubing). Unfortunately, what we did not know is that day 9/21 was Belize Independence Day. So, we started walking around and all the businesses outside the port were closed. We walked and walked and got very overheated. So we came back to the port area and spent more on drinks than we would have if we had stayed on the ship.

 

In Cozumel, we did Cozumel Bar Hop. It is a very reasonable price and they are very organized and professional. You go in a nice air conditioned van to the windward side of the island to multiple bars that have no electricity - so take cash! You do get one free shot at each location but you will want to support these establishments. Beware though the second stop had very little breeze and is jungle-y so it was super hot! We all about sweated to death. There are few tourists and no one is allowed to spend the night over there on that side of the island except one very remote hotel and the night watchmen that watch over the bar properties. It is a turtle nesting sanctuary area.

 

Amy

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5ten

5ten

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We were on the same cruise. I agree the stewards were overworked. Ours was great but he also said he had 33 rooms. Crazy!! We just had him come once a day and told him whenever worked for him. We are not picky. Usually he did it right after we left for breakfast and that was fine with us. He would ask us throughout the day when we saw him working on other rooms if we needed anything. Super nice guy. Since we had 2 rooms we tipped him beginning and end.

 

We were also in the Scarlet dining room for early dining and LOVED our wait staff. They were awesome. With our large group of 13, they knew our names by the second night and quickly learned what we liked to drink, eat, etc. I really miss them!! Iounut was the best!! *we also tipped at the end. So worth it!!

 

I agree about Chris! He was awesome and hope to have him again on another cruise!

 

Pizza: we did pizza every night and I have to say I felt for those guys. The line would be so long and they normally gave 2 slices, but people would have them pile it up. They made those pizzas as fast as they could, but with so many getting 2-3 pizzas at a time the line would stall. Those guys never stopped rolling and topping dough. They never talked, sat, drank, anything. At 1-2am they were really slammed.

 

The group you saw at debarkation, wonder if they were part of the group on our deck 6. OMG! The cursing and fighting that happened was crazy. Our friends were in a balcony next to these people and the first couple of days they were fine, but they were also stoned. My friend said they went out on balcony and smelled wacky weed, they couldn't figure out where it was coming from. Happened again next night. Come 3rd day/night no more smelling it and the fighting next door started. They figured must have been them smoking since they probably ran out and then fought daily. We would hear them cursing, banging on door and yelling, "LET ME <insert any string of expletives> IN <insert a couple more here>" This happened many times day and night.

 

Casino was AWFUL!! The smoke was unbelievable. I hated having to walk through there. We enjoyed walking deck 5 and LOVED Guy's BBQ there. My kids would try to hold their breath and run to the doors.

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amyotravel

amyotravel

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We were on the same cruise. I agree the stewards were overworked. Ours was great but he also said he had 33 rooms. Crazy!! We just had him come once a day and told him whenever worked for him. We are not picky. Usually he did it right after we left for breakfast and that was fine with us. He would ask us throughout the day when we saw him working on other rooms if we needed anything. Super nice guy. Since we had 2 rooms we tipped him beginning and end.

 

We were also in the Scarlet dining room for early dining and LOVED our wait staff. They were awesome. With our large group of 13, they knew our names by the second night and quickly learned what we liked to drink, eat, etc. I really miss them!! Iounut was the best!! *we also tipped at the end. So worth it!!

 

I agree about Chris! He was awesome and hope to have him again on another cruise!

 

Pizza: we did pizza every night and I have to say I felt for those guys. The line would be so long and they normally gave 2 slices, but people would have them pile it up. They made those pizzas as fast as they could, but with so many getting 2-3 pizzas at a time the line would stall. Those guys never stopped rolling and topping dough. They never talked, sat, drank, anything. At 1-2am they were really slammed.

 

The group you saw at debarkation, wonder if they were part of the group on our deck 6. OMG! The cursing and fighting that happened was crazy. Our friends were in a balcony next to these people and the first couple of days they were fine, but they were also stoned. My friend said they went out on balcony and smelled wacky weed, they couldn't figure out where it was coming from. Happened again next night. Come 3rd day/night no more smelling it and the fighting next door started. They figured must have been them smoking since they probably ran out and then fought daily. We would hear them cursing, banging on door and yelling, "LET ME <insert any string of expletives> IN <insert a couple more here>" This happened many times day and night.

 

Casino was AWFUL!! The smoke was unbelievable. I hated having to walk through there. We enjoyed walking deck 5 and LOVED Guy's BBQ there. My kids would try to hold their breath and run to the doors.

 

I kind of hope it was the same people. Because multiple groups of people behaving that badly would really be bad. They were all women that I saw; I don't know about your group.

 

 

You reminded me - I had so much good food I forgot to mention I had Pig and Anchor (Guy's BBQ) twice. Duh!! Yep, it was pretty good. Maybe not on the level of good BBQ restaurants at home, but a welcome addition.

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5ten

5ten

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I kind of hope it was the same people. Because multiple groups of people behaving that badly would really be bad. They were all women that I saw; I don't know about your group.

 

 

You reminded me - I had so much good food I forgot to mention I had Pig and Anchor (Guy's BBQ) twice. Duh!! Yep, it was pretty good. Maybe not on the level of good BBQ restaurants at home, but a welcome addition.

 

 

 

Unfortunately our group of bad behaviors included several men. :(

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Geargoesdown

Geargoesdown

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About us – Late 40s, cohabitating couple of nearly 20 years, no children. I really never do reviews because I am not disciplined enough to take notes or pictures. So just some general overall impressions.

 

Embarkation – Super, super easy. We used Lyft and had one of our very best drivers ever, and that is saying a lot. He took us to the exact spot we needed. We had no priority boarding or FTTF and were on board, I believe, within about a half hour. I am very much liking the staggered check-in times. Only glitch was a couple who walked up in front of us. We had an 11:30 check-in time and it was 11:40. They had a 12:30 time and were told they would have to wait until 12:30 to enter the terminal. This is something we knew about ahead of time, so we had a leisurely breakfast, checked out of our hotel at 11:00, stopped for a coffee, and then opened the app for a Lyft at 11:15. Could not have been easier. But this couple who did it wrong were not having it. Even after the employee patiently explained about three or four times. They were stopping the line from moving. We were next but could not enter until they moved, so I confirmed exactly what the port employee said. The man looked at me and said, “What – you work for the cruise line, do you?” It was rude but I was too excited about getting to the ship to care much. Eventually they did have to give up and go stand somewhere else.

 

Cabin – Typical regular balcony cabin. Deck 8 (Verandah). Worked just fine for us. Plenty of shelving in the cabin and the bathroom. TVs are still pretty small, but at least they are flat screens now! :D

 

Muster – In the Scarlett dining room for us (all were inside in various locations). The usual stragglers made it take longer than needed. Not very informative actually, but once it started it was over quickly.

 

Steward – He was new and very overwhelmed. He was really nice and all things considered did a decent job. He told us he had 36 cabins. Sheesh. He would sometimes accidentally leave random items behind, like one day a package of sheets on the couch, and a glove and cleaning rags on the counter another day. One night we came back after 9 pm too tired to leave again and he had not been there yet. Put “Snoozin” on the door and dealt with it. He did bring us two towel animals the next day. One early in the day and one in the evening (I guess because we missed out). Or maybe he forgot he did one. I could see it being either way. Tipped extra at the end, mostly just because we felt so sorry for the poor guy.

 

Drinks – Bars were very crowded most of the time, making it often tough to get a drink. And I don’t just mean from servers walking around, but when ordering at the actual bars. Noticed an issue with staff cutbacks here, too, like the stewards. Drinks were often weak. I watched several times as in the rush, alcohol would sort of go half in and half out of glasses but they kept right on going without remedying the fact that it was not a full pour. One bartender at Red Frog Rum Bar did not know what I was ordering even though it was on their limited drink menu. I pointed at it for him and he still made the wrong thing and therefore the price was wrong. Even though the original drink he made was cheaper than what I ordered, I had him remake the bill after he fixed the drink so I didn’t cheat them. This was after waiting quite a while for the drink in the first place. As usual, the drinks in Alchemy were better than anywhere else. But they were always slammed, too, and I missed being able to bond with the mixologists like I have on past cruises. They were simply too busy for much chit-chat.

 

Dining Room – We had early seating in the Scarlett Dining Room. I hate eating late and like to sit in the same place every day – just walk up to “my” table! Despite the cutbacks, we LOVED our wait staff. I did miss the old menu some, but there’s always multiple excellent choices. In the past, we have either had no interaction with the maître d’ or have had negative interactions (i.e. cranky when you ask them anything or refusing to even listen to any requests). But this time was a true exception. On the first night, we asked nicely if it was possible to change to a table for two. (We were told it was a four person table, and if it turns out you don’t like the other two, there’s no one else to talk to! But we knew we might not be able to change.) He looked at the computer and it turns out we were at a four person booth – whoa, that could have been even worse. And with no hesitation – and a SMILE, no less – he said how about I just change it to two and I won’t let anyone else sit there. We wondered if that would actually last but he was true to his word. So we had our original table every night but didn’t have to share! Very romantic. I looked forward to dining so much every night and am very grateful to have had such outstanding dining room staff all the way around. We tipped extra on the final night and hugged them all goodbye.

 

Other Dining – I never eat the regular buffet except for an occasional small breakfast (there’s just too much other good stuff), so I cannot comment much on that.

 

I ate the Mongolian Wok for embarkation lunch, but that was a mistake. I thought I should do it before it got too crowded, but it took 40 minutes to get the food with only about five or six people ahead of me. That said, the calamari was fantastic there.

 

Ate a couple of Guy’s Burgers throughout the cruise. Yum as always.

 

LOVE, love the addition of the taco shell bowls at Blue Iguana Cantina. I made the best shrimp taco salad for lunch one day.

 

Ate some arepas there for breakfast a couple of mornings as well. I am a salsa addict so I gravitate to it. And since there are no chips, the shell is perfect to break up for salsa gorging.

 

Had Sea Day Brunch one day and the steak on the steak and eggs was better than any steak at dinner. But there’s one thing I will be sure to let Carnival know on the survey. I went by myself, and just ahead of me another lady came by herself. They sat us at a long table that was for ten or twelve. No biggie, except the wait staff did not even come to take a drink order or bring bread or anything until after they had sat all the seats at that big table. In total, there were about five or six different groups of people that came at different times. THEN, they started taking the orders at the other end, not where the first lady and I sat. So we ended up waiting about 45 minutes just to get juice from the time we sat. I should have just left but I figured it was the only day I was going to have brunch. The table mates were great to talk to and the food was wonderful, but that was just completely unreasonable.

 

Had the pasta bar and tandoor once each. Both were good. Had a room service BLT once and it was so-so but delivery was fast and friendly. Had the pizza once, but even though I did not special order, it took much too long considering the line was the shortest I saw the whole cruise (I had about five or so people in front of me and waited nearly a half hour, despite having no objection to whatever style of pizza showed up.) The pizza was fine but I wouldn’t wait again.

I did not have the deli, but my boyfriend did twice and said it was as good as always.

 

Cruise Director – The Flying Scotsman Chris Williams. Fan. Freaking. Tastic. Words cannot describe so watch his videos on Facebook or You Tube. He even does a one man show in the big theater. When you see him on the ship, it’s like running into a celebrity and you get all blushy and have the giggles. I observed him “in the wild” him a couple of times when there was no other passengers around (very rare moments), and even just in his random interactions with a co-worker, he is as nice as can be.

 

Casino – hands down (no pun intended) the worst smokiness of any ship I have been on, EVER. I could not handle even walking anywhere near it. It permeated so much of deck five and even the stairwells down to deck four. Absolutely disgusting. I usually play a bit, but did not sit down for a second. Which is a shame because the one time I went through it – fast – it looked good and larger than many. But I smelled like smoke for hours although I practically ran through there and only had a few of seconds of actual contact with the area. It makes it tough to get casino offers for those who are bigger gamblers than I am but do not smoke. Even when it looked empty from afar, it was sooooo smoky. It makes it tough also that the casino bar is where the sports are on TV. There is no sports bar on this ship. I heard a lot of complaints from people who were asthmatic and could not watch sports in there. I know smoking gamblers are going to have a hard time refraining from flaming me for these comments, but I really am not exaggerating AT ALL and non-smokers and those who are super sensitive to smoke should really know this information. If you have no issues with smoky places, great – enjoy the casino, as there seemed to be plenty of open seating in there.

 

Piano Bar – Excellent. Set up was great, servers were great, piano player was great. The entertainer was Gregg. He is a little unconventional compared to others I have seen on Carnival. He is not really into the raunchy stuff – not saying he is a prude or anything, but he just doesn’t really do it. He’s so fun, you don’t realize until afterward that it was “cleaner” show than most. He is not mean like some I have seen who kind of pick on people for laughs. But what you should know, is that he is very stylized. Meaning, he has his own way of playing songs and that can at times make it difficult to sing along. It kind of throws you off a little. You get used to it. We went three or four nights.

 

Pools/Hot Tubs – Pools were very crowded, especially adult aft. Didn’t use them or the lukewarm hot tubs because they were not appealing. But didn’t care about being in them anyway, and still had my fill of Lido activities. The same old corny stuff but more enjoyable because of The Flying Scotsman. I have a gesture I do now with my hands indicating “next level” whenever he showed up. Too hard to describe in words, but it was my shorthand to my boyfriend that meant, like, here we go – pay attention, it’s gonna get good!

 

Entertainment Staff – Went to the theater more than usual because of the cruise director and a higher level of interest. The live music was better than it has been in the past few years. We enjoyed a couple of the duos, particularly “The Cove” and “Country and Wine” enough to seek them out each day in the Fun Times. I got tired of the DJ.

 

Other Passengers – Hit and miss as usual. Met some really nice folks that we had fun hanging out with a few times. (For instance, if you happen to be reading this Mal and Eric or “Katina” and Melissa, you rock!) And then, there’s the “others.’ It happens everywhere and not too many things are worth mentioning. Once, though, we were walking down a corridor near the buffet (not in, but near), and some young girl in her early twenties came up behind us without saying a word and literally pushed both of us out of the way with her hands. There was plenty of room around us, she just wanted to do it. She is lucky we aren’t the kind of people who would do anything about it – if you know what I mean. Someone else might have just clocked her. And she was kind of a little thing. At first we were so shocked, we couldn’t even believe what happened. And to both of us simultaneously? With one of us being an almost six foot tall man? Incredible.

 

And when we were debarking, there was a family (?) of people right next to us, where the apparent oldest one (late 30s or 40s) turned around and told the other two to stop laughing. They didn’t, so she started cussing at them (f-word, slut, etc.) and physically slapping them. Really hard, serious hitting, right in front of dozens of people. I mean she went OFF and I could not believe what was happening. I didn’t even want to look because I was afraid I would somehow get caught up in it. Scary.

 

One funny thing was an older woman on one of the stairwell landings between decks. She was explaining to someone who was with her that so-and-so “went to eat at Mongolian Barbecue” (actually it’s Wok, but anyway…). Then she proceeds to say loudly and with a disgusted face “I don’t like that. I’ve never had it.” No pause between sentences. I started cracking up (not where they saw me) because it just takes all kinds. Maybe you had to be there.

Debarkation – We did self-assist and it sucked. Luckily we had a night in New Orleans after the cruise so we did not have to get anywhere at a certain time. They called by deck, and we were the last group called. It was a madhouse, with way too many people at once (maybe some did not follow the deck order or it just started to bunch up more and more) and some people taking off way more huge bags than they could reasonably carry. It took an hour just to get off the ship/gangway. But, then, once off, it was only like five minutes to get through customs and out to the outside.

I am sad that like all good things, this trip had to end. Hopefully it won't be long until the next one.

 

Hey! Mal and Eric here! It was so much fun meeting you and hope to do it again soon! BTW, Little French Key was soooo much fun! . Also, I agree with the casino! I can tolerate a smokey bar, but the casino was ridiculous! I almost threw up walking through there!

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jasong38501

jasong38501

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I was on the Dream the week after you. I agree completely about Chris. Took the cruise to a whole different level. He is wanting to be named cruise director on the ship coming out after Horizon. There is now a FB page you should go like to support him, just search for #chris4vista3 on FB to find it!

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amyotravel

amyotravel

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Hey! Mal and Eric here! It was so much fun meeting you and hope to do it again soon! BTW, Little French Key was soooo much fun! ��. Also, I agree with the casino! I can tolerate a smokey bar, but the casino was ridiculous! I almost threw up walking through there!

 

Great to hear from you! I hope we sail together again soon. Or, if you ever find yourself in Albuquerque for any reason send us a message! :D

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