This was my dream cruise. For months I have waited and on October 31, 2004, I took from Atlanta. It took about 4 hours from the time that I stood in line to embark on the Carnival Pride. Reason given: surprise inspection. Very weak excuse. Surprise inspections are nothing new. One would think that they would have handled it better. The had us wait outside. The line was long. The sun was hot. I was sweaty. If it was raining, it was my belief that Carnival would not even supplied us with an umbrella. No food or drink was supplied to the people waiting in line. Instead we were assured that all of the food services on the ship would remain open due to this. I guess no one told them, because when I finally was on the ship, the on board food service was closed. It was the first time that my bags got to my room before I did. That is sad.
I have been on 12 cruises and this was the worst form of customer service that I have ever experienced cruising. It was a total nightmare and Carnival did not care. Totally soured the rest of my vacation. I wrote down all of this on the survey that you are provided before your trip ended. Nothing happened. Carnival was contacted after I returned home. CARNIVAL DID NOT CARE.
If you are looking for excellent customer service from the corporate level, DON'T CHOOSE CARNIVAL. You would think that the more times you cruise on a particular company, they (corporate) would treat you like gold. That is not the case. I was treated like rust.