Carnival Fantasy 5-9 (originally 5-11) Swine Flu Scare 7 day cruise

[NolaZach]

So this was my first cruise. I am usually a road trip person and have been to 42 states and Mexico and Canada via RV and car. I had originally had a cruise set to sail the first week of September 2005 out of New Orleans (conquest), but we weren't even allowed to go to our homes yet by that time, so we didn't attempt to make the re-scheduled cruise out of Galveston.

 

Originally when my mother and a few aunts scheduled this cruise I was unable to go because of my duties watching my grandfather. Unfortunately he had passed away. Then the Tuesday before the cruise my mother tells me she can get me on as a third person in a room. So I jumped on it, I was added to the cruise the Wednesday before it sailed.

 

Saturday morning my dad dropped me, my mother and my brother off by the Julia/Eratro street terminal.

(not my picture neither is the next one, because I only have film of the terminal)

 

(courtesy Port of New Orleans both images)

 

Webcam of NOLA terminal here

 

There was a line to the right for parking, and the lane to the left was for drop-off. We found it very easy to get to, even though in my 20+ years in NOLA I never knew you could drive on this side of the Morial Riverfront Convention Center. There were many lanes for drop off. We gave our baggage to a porter, I handed him a $10 and then watched him pull our bags all of 15 feet on a cart and put them in a pile. Oh Well.

 

Embarkation: Not too fun, but better than I thought. First we were given forms to see if we had swine flu. Questions asking if we had a fever or diarrhea. Then we had to get in line for the metal detectors. There were four units, but they made the majority of the line go to the furthest one, and then people just walking up were allowed to go right on through to the other three. Well no big deal. The lady here had a horrible attitude, but I didn't need to talk to her. A guy asked her if it was safe to leave his film in the bag, to that she snarled "everything goes through the Xray".

 

So I get up to the detector and the lady is wiggling her finger, as to say keep walking. So I walk through and then get berated because I didn't hold on. I told her about her finger movement, which she laughed off as a twitch. Then on to the next line, just for us on E-deck. This line was prbably the longest, reminded me of a theme park line. Got to the desk, showed them our Birth certificates and me and my Mom got regular S&S cards and my brother got his snazzy gold one.

 

 

 

We walked on the ship at the Empress deck and our room was E170, which was just down the hall. Which was the longest hall I have ever seen.

 

We stopped by our room (this picture was taken after dinner, a unpacking pad was on the bed and not a towel animal also the bed was up at first)

 

 

 

This is the view off the front of the ship:

 

 

The room was a little tight with the Pullman bed down, so me and my Mom just shared the queen sized bed.

 

We had a window, but on my next cruise I wont have one. With the window, I found myself up everyday before 7am. Which wasn't a horrible thing, but I also stayed up past 3am everyday as well.

 

 

 

The window was kinda dirty from salt water, I guess it was nice to be able to look out, but I want to try an inner next time. I will admit I am too cheap for a balcony. I try to find cruises under $500.

 

I need to scan my Capers as I see people like to see those so I will do that tomorrow.

 

I will finish up day one tonight and then try and write the shore excursions tomorrow.

(more to come)

[NolaZach]

So we had some time to walk around before the muster drill. We headed to the front of the ship first. Took a few pictures with the Crescent City Connection (the twin bridges) also known as the GNO.

 

I found this area on the front of the ship in front of the putt-putt course that I really liked. It was a forward observation deck, but was never as crowded as the one on top of the bridge.

 

Though when going to this observation deck at night I would whistle or otherwise make my presence known, as it is rumored to be the "hook-up spot"

 

 

 

This is the putt-putt course as seen through the windows. I spent a lot of time here.

 

 

 

Though I spent even more time here, The Serenity Deck. It is kinda hard to get to, I don't know if that is by design or just a second thought, but many people I talked to could not find it. Which in the end was probably a good thing as I usually found a nice padded chair, with a great view and a proximity to the nearest open hot-tub.

 

 

 

 

Here is a neat view of the rear of the ship, with the water slide and the whale tail. The tops of the cabana huts and palm trees almost give you the beach side impression, when you look down to the Lido deck.

 

 

 

Here is the "whale tail" and the funnel deck, which is no longer top-less as it serves for the entry-way to the water slides.

 

 

 

Here are some more whale tails, actually it is a cool mural on the side of the Riverfront Hilton next to the Riverwalk shopping mall.

 

[NolaZach]

Here is the picture of the bridges from the deck above the ship's bridge.

 

 

We have two main Steam paddlewheel boats. This one is the Creole Queen which does short excurisions on the river. The other being the Steamboat Natchez, which offers a dinner jazz cruise that would make an excellent evening for those spending an extra day or so in New Orleans.

 

 

At about this time, the muster drill was called. So we all headed down to our cabin. On the way we passed the Galleria shops and I saw this neat lego model of the Fantasy.

 

 

So the Muster drill was quick and easy, our station was F, which was on the Lido deck. So we just sat in a chair next to the Lido Buffet and waited for the all clear. After listening to the instructions of course.

 

During the drill the ship started moving.

I took this picture of the CBD (central business district)

In the center is our World trade Center, the city's fanciest nightclub (by that I mean most overpriced) is on the top floor. It was called 360 because it constantly moves. I used to hate getting drunk there, because the bar stayed still and all the chairs and couches moved, so everytime you re-filled you had to find your group.

 

 

This is the famous St Louis Cathedrial, which is at the rear of Jackson Square. In the center of the square is a statue of Andrew Jackson.

 

 

Sunset on the Mississippi, I stayed up that night on the observation deck with a gentleman from St. Louis; he worked on the river and was curious to see where it ended. I didn't take pictures of the SW pass as it was pitch black. But there was a ton of oil platforms and worker camps out there. It was a lot of fun to sail down the river all the way. Amazing how long it took us to get to Pointe a la hache ( a place where I fish 2 hrs by car/5.5 by boat) and to get to the gulf.

 

[starstruck05]

Looking forward to the rest of your review. We had 179 when we cruised on the Fantasy a few months ago. I hope you had a great time!

[NolaZach]

I had late dining in the Jubilee (aft) dining hall. I spent the time between the muster drill and dinner just watching the scenery. I actually filmed a lot more than I snapped pictures. What stinks is my good computers HDD failed, and I can't edit video on this antique I am using now. I mean its like from 2006, yikes.

 

So at the first dinner it was "come as you are casual", a lot of t-shirts, shorts and flip flops. I had on just a "cuban" shirt and some khaki shorts, no biggie. Our Head waiter was Klotzys (I think, maybe had more constants) and our other waiter was Margo. The head waiter was Hungarian and the other guy was Indonesian, both were awesome. We had a drink waiter Roel, who knew my name after the first night, it was a good ploy as it made me more willing to buy doubles from him. Even though I snuck a lot of crown on board I still constantly spent $11 + 15% for drinks. I think CCL is wise to allow (to sneak) alcohol on board. I was more surprised at all the people bringing bottled water and cokes through embarkation. I will definitely bring my own cokes next time.

Anyway the dining room food was good. I usually tried to order thing I normally would never buy. I also always ordered from the daily menu and not the fixed one. I like everything I ordered from the dining room. Except for the lobster, I just do not like lobster. It is like a tough, large crawfish but with no flavor. I could dip anything in that butter and it would taste good. Then the prawns were tough as well. These are more opinions than complaints. I eat shrimp a lot, and it is always fresh so I guess with shrimp I am more picky.

 

I found the soups every night to be magnificent. They had a strawberry chilled soup that was to die for, and I tried Visscheyshaise(sp?) for the first time and really enjoyed it. I would order a soup and salad and then an entree'. Some of the sides were so so , but I found the food to be good. Maybe not as seasoned as I like, but very good. Better than most reviews made it sound.

I also ordered the chocolate melting cake and didn't care for it. Then the Creme Brule and the Baked Alaska other nights weren't prepared like they would be at a resturant, but that is probably a good thing, as fire and boats don't mix.

 

I have to rate the dining room very highly though. My only regret was not eating there at all for breakfast and only once for lunch.

 

Food options around the ship were great as well. The Sushi was great, (when it wasn't Salmon or Mackerel; again opinion)

 

I did not care for the pizza, the toppings were good, but the Impinger(hot air, conveyor belt pizza oven) was not on the right setting, I think they had it set to, too little time. As the pizza always was undercooked. I told the guy making them to add a minute to the timer, but he said he couldn't mess with it.

Right next to the Pizza station was a Sandwich deli. They had a lot of good choices, and any sandwich could also be grilled. They also had Bagel on lox (for those who like that) and a very good turkey wrap.

 

The pizza station is in the Windows on the sea area. This are is where the late buffet is as well as the breakfast and lunch buffets.

 

If you go out the back doors and down the stairs you are on the Serenity deck. If you go out the front doors you are on the Lido deck. Sometimes during the day there would be a Mongolian BBQ set-up on the Lido deck. This is basically a stir-fry, where you pick which vegetables you want buffet style, and then hand the cook your bowl. Then tell him what meat you wanted (usually pork, chicken and Squid, yes squid), and he would cook it up, just be warned, the hottest sauce is very hot, even for us who eat hot food a lot.

 

They would also have a "cuisine of the world" station on Lido, which would include, Mexican, Greek, Caribbean, American and Asian food on revolving days. (when I post the Capers it will list it)

 

I never ordered room service, I just never got around to it as I didn't spend much time in my room.

[NolaZach]

some of my pictures are randomly missing, is there a bandwith requirement??

That would be strange with so many users that have sigs that take up whole screens?

[Patinthehat]

Great review so far, Zach!

 

some of my pictures are randomly missing, is there a bandwith requirement??

That would be strange with so many users that have sigs that take up whole screens?

 

lol!

[getmeontheship]

bring on the rest .great so far.

[yogi2929]

Originally when my mother and a few aunts scheduled this cruise I was unable to go because of my duties watching my grandfather. Unfortunately he had passed away. Then the Tuesday before the cruise my mother tells me she can get me on as a third person in a room. So I jumped on it, I was added to the cruise the Wednesday before it sailed.

 

(more to come)

 

Glad that you had a wonderful first cruise and am sorry about your grandfather.

 

When I travel with my Mom and Sis we keep the beds as twins. A lot more room that way.

[NolaZach]

I should have put "review" in the original title. I went back to change it but you can't edit after a certain amount of time?

 

Man I got a lot to learn about this site.

 

Still have six days left to do (although they will be shorter) and more pictures and some video to post.

 

I'm busy right now, but will get the rest of up here today, I will also ask a mod to put "review" in the title.

[Rachel5309]

great review so far! keep it coming!

[WAcruisers]

Keep it coming

[ShannonP]

Thoroughly enjoying this as I countdown until my own cruise aboard the Fantasy!!!

[artymis77]

Thoroughly enjoying this as I countdown until my own cruise aboard the Fantasy!!!

 

Are you on the June 22 sailing? DH and I will be aboard. I cannot wait. Time seems to have slowed. :D

[tlbuckingham]

Hmmm I do like the idea of the serenity deck. Also if you felt it was tight with the pullman bunk, when you have no windows it seems dark and even tighter (at least to me).

[ShannonP]

Are you on the June 22 sailing? DH and I will be aboard. I cannot wait. Time seems to have slowed. :D

 

 

Yep....and I can't wait!!

[artymis77]

Yep....and I can't wait!!

 

 

See ya there!:D

[NolaZach]

Hmmm I do like the idea of the serenity deck. Also if you felt it was tight with the pullman bunk, when you have no windows it seems dark and even tighter (at least to me).

 

 

It was tight, but the Pullman was only out after dinner and early morning.

My next trip it will be just two of us in a room. But really I did not mind the conditions before. I actually found the room to be bigger than I expected. Surely it is the smallest room I ever stayed in. But I only wanted to be there for sleep. I never even ordered room service because I was hardly there.

Also on the next cruise I am going to be in a 4f. When I was on the ship last time I wanted to stay higher on the ship, and liked the location of the V-deck rooms, so I booked a room on that deck.

 

I was just going to add to this, I kind of been "slipping" on finishing. I was prepared to look deep on page 11 for it and was surprised to see it on page 1.

[NolaZach]

Okay I realize I didn't take enough pictures of the ship. I have three hours of HD footage of the ship on video, but my computer with the video editing software went out and all I have is this little net-book. I will try to add more to it later (although you can't go back and edit on this website :( )

 

So the second day was a sea day. I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. Not trying to be negative, but this was my first cruise and I had no idea what to expect. I was negative in the sense that I had expected not to like the shows, the live music and the "blue team, red team" thing. Which at first reminded me of a bastardized "West Side Story" meets Bloods and Crips. With all the Blue vs Red going on, but it turned out to be a lot of fun.

 

The Shows were pretty good, especially the Beatles tribute show. I lied it a lot more than I thought I would. Two out of the three comics were hilarious, the third was so, so. Happy Cole was by far the best, and I swear I have seen him before. The thing is every comic does a family show and an R-rated show. Knowing I wanted to see the R-rated shows, I skipped the "family shows", which I was told were not as good anyway.

 

 

The second night was also the Formal dinner and Captain's reception. We all got nice and dressed up and headed to the forward lounge for 7:15(we had late dining, first reception was 5:15). Waiters were constantly walking around with free drinks. The thing was, I drink Crown and Coke and not much else. The only whiskey option was a whiskey sour, so i had two, I also tried a Martini, a screwdriver(forgot what it was; Vodka+OJ) and glass of champagne(that nasty house Brut again). So if you want free drinks, you can get them. If you want to order your drink of choice, you are out of luck. I had a good time, it was funny how many pax were worried about who was "driving the boat", I kept hearing that question asked all night, and apparently people forget that the 904 employees were not all on stage.

 

Then we went on to dinner, I felt bad because we stopped three time to take pictures, which held up our table from ordering. (though they repaid the favor a couple a days later playing the BJ tournament). I liked the backgrounds and photographers they had on the ship. You don't have to buy the pictures, and some of them are really nice. If you want a family portrait done you can get it done here. Most pictures for formal night are sold on 8x10s for $22 and on other nights it is a 5x8 for $9.95. I found it better just to take the pictures and then look at them later and decide if I want to buy it, though it would be awesome if they just sold digital files as well.

 

Anyway back to the dinner. This was "Lobster night" so of course I ordered the lobster and was reminded again that I really don't like lobster, it is like a tough flavorless crawfish, the shrimp it came with were just okay, because they were big prawns and were very tough. This is all my opinion and I am sure most will enjoy the lobster. Though they bill it as Maine Lobster, yet it is under the size allowed by both Canadian and US laws(Discovery Channel teaches you so much), so I think it is really another type of lobster. I had a chilled strawberry soup that day which was really good. I have to say there was nothing I ordered that was "bad", but some things were not to my taste. It was also mother's day so all the Moms at the table got a special cake and I go the Cheescake, which I liked.

 

Played at the Casino and saw the R-rated comedian after that. The next day was Key West, and we had booked a Kayak tour.

 

 

(Pictures in next post, trying to host them now)

[ShannonP]

Yeah...you finally posted more.:D Keep 'em coming!

[CFLSUSAN]

Oh Zach, where are you?? We are waiting for more! :)

[NolaZach]

My favorite view from my favorite place to hang out. On a chair on the serenity deck looking out at open sea.

 

 

 

But sometimes a familiar sight would come into view.

 

 

That is the Holiday, it was behind us at one point.

 

Here is the captain speaking at the reception. Didn't think of taking pictures of the actual food at dinner, but after reading the forums, I see that is what people want to see. *note to self for 8-31-09*

 

 

 

This is the Fantasy, behind the Holliday at Key West.

I really like Key West, alot. I could see living there, it is like a nicer, cleaner, tropical french quarter. Lot of fun to be had on Duval street.

 

 

We decided that we would rent bikes and ride around, as our shore excursion wasn't leaving until 11:30 and we got off the boat at 9. It was $12 for all day, I could have got the scooter for twice that, but we wanted the slower pace of a bike, plus Key West is tiny and on top of that I really needed to work off the boat food.

 

 

 

This is the view from the "Southernmost beach in the continental US". Key West has no natural beaches, it is a limestone island with mangrove swamps. So it doesn't have nice beaches like Miami, but it does have nice views, and the chilled out Caribbean atmosphere.

 

 

 

I am on a netbook, so I have to get my portable CD drive to upload some pics. As all the pics I did on the excursion were on 35mm, and I had the pictures developed to CD. We went Kayaking through the mangroves,and it was really cool. Didn't take too much effort and you got to see the sea life up close.

[NolaZach]

So the reason I booked this trip was a little bit of communication error. My Mom told me to book the clear kayak excursion in Key West. Well the clear Kayak excursion was in Nassau, so I booked this excursion. I then went to the room and found that my mom had bought tickets to the one in Nassau as well. Having never have Kayaked before I was a bit apprehensive about doing it, but found it to be fun, a good workout and the best way to just take it slow on the water and get a feel for your surroundings.

 

 

This excursion was $39 a person and well worth it. They picked us up at the boat and brought us to a Marina on the other side of the island. I noticed that this marina had the deals on Jet skis and boat rentals, and was a lot cheaper than what was offered by the boat. We also noticed Bike and scooter rentals got cheaper the further away from the cruise ships you got.

 

 

We would stop every so often and one of the guides would take something out the water and pass it around. I think this was a sea-cucumber, we also passed around a star-fish, a jelly fish that didn't sting, a sponge, and some mollusk.

 

There was some paddling in the channel and some slightly open water, but most of it was through mangrove "caves" which was were the trees formed a canopy over you.

 

 

There were many first time paddlers so there were a lot of traffic jams, and once you got stuck in the mangroves it was hard to get out. I started to get the hang of it and was paddling backwards to take this picture of my mom. This was at what they called "the creek" it was a long path covered by mangroves. It was hard at first to get through and we had to go single file.

 

 

There were boats tied down back here as well, most were small cabin boats, but there was one large catamaran. The guides say these guys don't pay a cent to tie down there and just move when they are told too, but one has been there three years. For some reason those pictures didn't come out(I hate getting pictures developed).

The Mangroves provide protection against the winds, so it is the safest place to park boats on the island.

 

This is what the sea floor looked like, I can't tell what that is a picture of, but it is the only underwater picture I took with my underwater camera on this excursion.

 

[NolaZach]

The ride back was in a large 15 passenger van, which had no A/C. So the driver rushed us back instead of taking the scenic route. We had a place to change at the marina, so when we got back to the ship, we got our bikes off the rack and went back out exploring the city.

 

You just have to take a picture here while in Key West, just take Duval street all the way down.

 

 

Everyone who goes to Key West seems to either go to Sloppy Joe's, Hogs Breath or the other place that used to be Sloppy Joe's.

 

We went to Sloppy Joes, and had the sloppy Joe.

 

Then went and got some of those yummy Key Lime pies, and I bought some of the juice as well so I could try and make my own.

We then returned the bikes and went to the Daiquiri bar across the street, then took the long way back to the boat.

 

We got on the boat at 4:25, so we cut it close, but we were within sight of it and there were some cool shops right by the boat.

 

So here we are pulling away, you can see the Holiday in the back getting ready to leave as well.

 

 

 

 

This here is the USAFS (an Air Force ship??? yeah I never heard of those either) Vandenburg. We were wondering why this big clunky ship was at the Navy dock. It even had some crylic written on it, so at the time we thought it was a foreign vessel, but come to find out it just played a russian vessel in a movie. Well You can read more about it and watch them sink it here

 

 

 

This guy here on the 30caliber machine gun flanked us on the way out of Key West, whenever a boat would come into the channel this guy would position himself between the boat and the Fantasy. Right after we passed the last channel marker he turned around and went back. I don't know if this is common, or if there was a threat, but I guess the USCG wants to make sure no one rams a cruise ship.

 

[NolaZach]

So after Key West we were tired, we did Dinner at 8:15(didn't like the late dinner that much, the majority of our group were cruise veterans and preferred it, so I don't know.

 

Then went to the Serinty deck until I was kicked out (actually all they do is close the tubs, and pick up most of the chairs), I never understood why they picked up the chairs when people were still using them, I also don't see the need to close the pool when there are at least two security guards out there all night. Again there was a lot I had to get used to, but it seemed like they funneled you into the Casino late at night as nothing else was open.

 

I think with only the small pool on the Lido deck, they should have an "Adult Swim" after 9pm. Of course I never really got to enjoy the pool as I spent more time in the aft hot tubs. I did the the ship needed more pool space, the lone pool (they call it two pools but it is one pool split in half) is small. I am a first time cruiser with not much to base it on, but I think there was a definite need for more pool space.

 

On the morning of Day four we awoke to the faint view of Atlantis off in the distance.

 

 

 

Nassau sure has one of the nicest harbors I have ever seen. Nice view pulling in. At first when I saw three other ships, I thought the city would be too crowded to enjoy it, but it wasn't bad. Though I assume evey one was on Paradise Island, and I never made it over there.

 

 

 

After looking at the Carnival ship in port, I thought it looked like the exact ship as ours, but with Balconies added on the sides. Later I found it was a Fantasy class ship, that indeed has balconies added on it.

 

 

 

In this last photo you can see both the Serenity deck and the Waterslides, so it went through the same overhaul as the Fantasy, yet this ship got balconies.