The cruisers- Myself(41),wife(40),son(15),daughter(8).This was our 5th cruise,but first with Carnival.All prior cruises have been on RCI.

Pre-cruise - We live in West Palm Beach,so Sunday morning we saddled up and drove down to Ft Lauderdale,planning to arrive around 11:30am to get on board and start relaxing.When we arrived at the port,security told us there had been an accident,several ladies hit by a car,and they were not letting any vehicles in.He advised us to go to the right,exit the port,go have lunch,and come back in 90 minutes.....I looked at my wife and gave her the "I don't think so" look,drove through the gates,and instead of driving to the right,drove straight to Dock 19 where Carnival Liberty was.There was no accident,people were pulling up to the luggage porters,and everything looked normal.We dropped our luggage with a very friendly porter,and proceeded to park in the garage right next door.Fee for the garage is $12 a day,payable upon exit.

Embarkation: Port Everglades is not exactly pretty,and can be a bit confusing,but everything is marked with signs,albeit small ones.After we parked,we walked across the driveway-which is tore up and dangerous,cars entering from every direction,hold small children by the hand!-and entered the terminal.The lines were starting to get long-it was 11:45am,but they moved quite quickly.Agents were very friendly and polite.Before too long,we were walking onto the ship. The whole process took about 45 min. We went and had lunch on Lido deck,and before too long we were ordering our "beverages of choice" and relaxing by the aft pool before the call for muster drill. Read more