My husband and I really enjoyed this itinerary. Carnival made our air arrangements and we arrived in San Juan about 3:40 on the same day the ship departed. We are platinum so there was a special room in the terminal to check in and it couldn't have been easier. In the room were complimentary sandwiches, pastries, and non-alcoholic beverages. This process went very quickly. We turned right around and walked about 4-5 blocks away to the CVS to buy some diet coke and water. (They also had what looked like a complete array of wine as well).
After checking out our balcony room we had our first dinner onboard (anytime) and were on our way. We didn't do any shows or welcome aboard shows. I just set up my internet time while aboard. (240 minutes for $89). We also went to the shore excursion desk to reconfirm our tours that we had pre-booked. Since we had $800 OBC this cruise, we had booked lots of shore excursions. Usually, we research the ports ahead and plan our own.
It was really nice that due to May being off season, we were the only big ship in all of our ports. This made the excursions a lot less crowded and the tour operators seemed to appreciate the business during their slower time.
We had Otama as a steward. He was pretty good though not the most personable steward we've ever had. We did tip him extra.