Carnival Conquest Review
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Although our cruise departure was delayed because of a tropical storm in the Gulf, we still had a great time. New Orleans is one of our favorite cities so we were excited about having an extra day there. We left as planned on Saturday even though Carnival had emailed, called, and texted us two hours earlier about our cruise being delayed because of the weather. Our now two days in New Orleans were spent at the Marriot Residence Inn in Metairie. It was a nice, clean, comfortable hotel that is easy driving distance to everything. We spent quite a bit of time sightseeing and eating before coming back to enjoy the pool.
On embarkation day, we drove to Fulton Garage where we had already prepaid parking through their website. The garage is pretty close to the port. We chose uncovered parking and the attendant told us that we would have to drive all the way up to the top to park. There was a porter waiting on one of the lower floors to collect our luggage. He told us we would have to walk down a few levels in order to get to the elevators. We parked the car, found the elevators, and made our way down to front of the garage to catch the shuttle. The driver was very friendly. The cruise terminal itself is set up really awkwardly and the driver had to maneuver through some pretty narrow spaces. We made it to the terminal after a few near misses with large motor coaches and entered the building after unloading our luggage.
The embarkation process in New Orleans is pretty similar to what we experienced when we took the Elation out of Mobile. Everyone is assigned a zone and seated. When your zone number is called, you are allowed to get in line. There was a long wait but not as bad as Miami or Mobile. We boarded the ship, dropped off our luggage, and headed to the buffet for lunch. We are used to getting our luggage well before dinner. So, we were not surprised to see our bags already at the door when we got back to our cabin. Our largest suitcase was missing but we just assumed it would show up soon. Wrong. Dinner time came. No luggage. We went to dinner and came back, still no bag. I called Guest Services and was told to be patient, that is should show up by 9 pm.
Cabin Review
This is a standard balcony cabin near the front of the ship on the port side. We have booked this cabin for the past few cruises because we like the location. Noise was not an issue. We are non-smokers and did not have any major issues with people on surrounding baloncies smoking. We did smell smoke while on our balcony but it was often from a cabin on a lower floor or someone a few cabins away.