My husband, myself and our 2 boys (15 & 12) cruised on the Fantasy on July 28th. We're from Houston, but have family in New Orleans, so we saved over $500 by taking the Fantasy instead of its sister ship out of Galveston. My sister and a friend came along too. My husband & I cruised RCI for our honeymoon 20 years ago and then took a Carnival cruise a few years later (pre-kids).

Embarkation - we arrived at the port around 11:30. The line was pretty long even then. We got on the ship around 12:30 and went straight to the Lido deck for hamburgers. We tried to go to the rooms around 1:15 but were shooed away until 1:30.

We had an inside cabin on the Main deck (my husband likes it DARK when he sleeps). Thought the cabin would be really claustrophobic with all 4, but they kept it so neat and we were there so little, it was fine! We had towel animals in the evenings - that was a highlight for all of us. Read more