We are a married couple in our early 30's, this is our 6th cruise and our first with Carnival. Like everyone else we've read all the reviews but tend to take everything with a pinch of salt. Judging by past experience we find that a lot of people seem to opt for one of the cheapest cruise options but then mark it down for not being on par with the most expensive. Well folks, no offense but in life you get what you pay for. Except, in this case you don’t. You get far more!

We booked this particular cruise because it sailed on the week of our wedding anniversary. It also visited two of my favourite Caribbean islands so seemed absolutely perfect. The prices seemed ultra-reasonable, and for the first time ever we booked the cruise and flights separately, something we’ve never done before. This gave us the flexibility to wait for the cheapest flights during the year, and to make sure we weren’t going to be hit with delays we also booked an additional night before and after the cruise in San Juan. The savings we made allowed us to book a balcony cabin for little more than the price we’d previously paid for interior cabins with some cruise lines.

We live in the UK so I will warn British people now that this isn’t an itinary you’d want to do if you don’t like long flights. I believe you can arrange to board/leave at Barbados, which is a much easier flight option. Flying from Manchester we had to change planes in Philadelphia to get to San Juan (direct flights are rare in the North of England) which left the total travel time at around 15 hours. The connection wasn’t much fun with long lines to get through immigration and having to collect/drop of our bags. Fortunately this isn’t the case on the way back, I think probably because it’s an internal connection within the USA. Read more