REVIEW OF CARNIVAL PARADISE SAIL DATE: 9/4/06 4 DAYS PORTS OF CALL: CATALINA ISLAND AND ENSENADA MEXICO

This was our second cruise, so I can say that there are things about the Carnival Paradise that I liked better than the previous cruise ship (the Royal Caribbean Vision of the Seas) and a number of things that I found that I disliked in comparison. On the whole, I thought the Royal Caribbean experience was superior. I will not comment on the shore excursions except to say that what we experienced on both cruises were very similar in nature in terms of quality and price. That being said, it appears that the tour outfits service the various brands of cruise ships that pull into port and Ill also say that the experiences have all been good and the tour companies were all professional. Thats it for the intro, and now onto the review.

EMBARKATION -- Lets start at the beginning, at the cruise terminal. The Carnival Paradise sails from Long Beach, near the Queen Mary. We are on the 4 day cruise, with stops in Catalina and Ensenada. There is a large parking structure (vs. just a flat lot for RCI) that you pay $12 per day for. It was easy for us to cart our bags to where they needed to go, but I did not see any shuttles operating for those that would need assistance. Maybe they were there, but I didnt see them. Carnival has acquired the huge dome that used to house the Spruce Goose airplane as their cruise terminal and although spacious, it was hot, hot, hot! A line attendant was even fanning herself with a brochure, and when I commented about not having the air conditioning turned on, she said that it was turned on but that it just didnt work to good. On the plus side, check in was very rapid (faster than RCI it seems). On the minus side, we were made to wait in nice straight lines after check in. The line waiting area was just an open concrete floored room, still hot, with no chairs. There were six or eight lines, 30 to 50 people in each line, all standing around (RCI had good air conditioning, and there were chairs everywhere for you to sit). We were told that we had to wait in the lines because the ship was rocking back and forth, but, this is a flat calm docking area. I didnt buy it. When our line was released, we went in a line to get our pictures taken (the embarkation picture). Clearly, we were held in the nice straight lines so as not to clog up this picture taking area. We then walked up and onto the gangway to get on the ship. The ship was not rocking at all as we were told by the nice straight line guy. There was a buffet already going for those that boarded early and could not yet go to their stateroom. We were told that the staterooms wouldnt be ready until 1:30 PM and Ill note that the luggage was at our stateroom in a very reasonable time although the people across the hall were waiting for quite a bit longer. Read more