Let me begin by saying that I have been on two Royal Caribbean cruises and decided to give Carnival a try. We found ourselves comparing the two cruise lines, even though we tried not to.
My husband and I were traveling with our daughters, age 25 and a friend age 26. We stayed in a suite and the girls stayed in a balcony cabin. There was one advantage to having booked a suite - you are taken to a separate VIP check-in area and don't have to stand in long lines for as long. Eventually, you are going to be standing in a long line at embarkation but honestly, it was no big deal.
When we arrived in our suite we were pleasantly surprised with the large size, 2 closets, jacuzzi tub and marble countertops. Really nice! BUT when the ship started to move, our cabin made a terrible creaking noise along with a tapping and sometimes pounding. We were miserable the entire 7 nights! Our daughter's cabin did not have the noise. Our cabin must've been cursed! Another problem encountered with the cabin was the our steward never replaced burned out lights that I requested. I also asked for bar soap several times and he indicated that he couldn't provide it - there was a problem. We never got a single bar of soap all week! Enough about the cabin...