Lets start with boarding the ship. Don't plan on that happening quickly! It took us 3 hours to board the ship! We went to our room right away to drop off carry on luggage. The luggage they carried on for us is just left outside your room which I found a little strange because anyone could take it or something from it. After checking our the room and bringing our luggage in we went to grab something to eat. I was very disappointed in the food. It was the equivalent of a school lunch room. They did have a pizza area but they never had pizza ready. Not pizza anyone wanted anyway. So they would try and "push" you to pick the pizza that they had done by constantly shoving the plate towards you trying to make you take it. My sons room had no AC they kept trying to convince us there was nothing wrong with it even though it wasn't blowing. They finally brought them a maintenance fan that sounded like a helicopter was in their room. After 2 days they did switch them to another room and considered that "prompt" service on a 5 day cruise.

We had booked for early dining and realized at dinner time they had changed us to late dining while the rest of the family was still at early dining. They also had my son and his wife, who were in a different room but were booked with us, at different tables. The first night we went with the rest of the family to the early dining and explained that we had booked early but were scheduled for late dinner. So they told us to just go sit at the table next to the rest of the family. We sat down, got our drinks, our menus, they placed our napkins in our lap and upon getting ready to order they told us we had to leave that it was someone elses table! This was so embarrassing to us and the people who were scheduled to sit there. They kept apologizing and it wasn't even their fault!!! It was Carnivals staffs fault and they seemed to not care. We went to guest services and they said that your diner time you book for is just a request. They do not have to let you have that time nor do they notify you that you did not get that time at booking.

There was minimal (if you can even call it that) entertainment. The most entertaining thing was them having like a talent show and had asked my brother to sing. That I enjoyed! The rest were stupid "games" they played on the stage with the guest and sales pitches. There was very little to do on the ship! I tried to go sit out on the lounge chairs with my family but there were not enough lounge chairs for us to sit together. I felt it went along with their dining plans of separating your family group up!!! There were "enough" lounge chairs but people would put stuff in them to "reserve" them even though Carnivals policy was you could not reserve lounge chairs and that after (I think) 40 minutes the staff would have you remove the thing you had holding the chair. This NEVER happened. So we got VERY LITTLE time sitting out enjoying the view. The best time to do this was in the evening when everyone was eating (because remember we had to eat right before going to bed). Of course by then it was cold but you could still find a chair! The food was very disappointing!!! The best meal you would get was during the dinner and it still wasn't great. But it was the best meal you would get that wasn't so much like school lunch room food. The best service at all on board was the staff that took care of your cabins. When it came time to debark that was another unorganized mess. That took another 2 hours! This is after sitting around for hours waiting to actually get off the ship!! Tip: Just take your own luggage off the ship and don't sit around and wait for all those that were smart enough to carry off their own luggage! Read more