We arrived Seattle a few days prior to our cruise departure date so we could "tourist" a bit. We loved the ease of taking the Link Light Rail from Sea-Tac to downtown Seattle, where we then went up to the top floor of Westlake Station to grab the monorail to the Space Needle, which is the area of the hotel we stayed at. So easy and so much cheaper to do than grab a cab! Those first days we enjoyed Pike Place Market, Ride the Ducks of Seattle, Seattle by Segway, a Mariners game, and various coffee shops and restaurants. LOVED it all!
Embarkation - we left our hotel at 10:30 a.m.- arrived at terminal by 10:45, where a luggage handler quickly put our Carnival tagged luggage on his cart and headed into the terminal with it. We had a very short walk into the terminal where the Carnival staff were ready to direct us - all had smiles and welcomed us, which I appreciate - check-in at the counter was quick and easy as all areas were open and ready. Yes, the paperwork from Carnival states arrive at noon; however, we have cruised many times and we know the sooner you arrive (within reason) to the cruise ship terminal, the earlier board time number you receive, so we were group 2!! Carnival personnel started boarding the suite passengers, as well as the passengers who have earned the platinum/elite status, then it was the passengers who paid to be "earlier to the fun," then group one and then group two, which we were, and so on. I will say we were tempted when we booked to try the "earlier to the fun" early boarding offered by Carnival for $50/cabin and we are so very glad we did not do that being we were on board by 11:25!! We really enjoyed that sunny day on board to have more time to explore! (Cabins weren't ready but we didn't need them yet anyway.)
We were on deck 7, with an extended balcony, which was very nice to have. I have been on Carnival with the smaller balconies and am glad we paid the little extra for the extended, as we spent a lot of time on our balcony. Our cabin steward was Ruby, who was very good as well as so nice and personable. We really enjoyed our chats with him. I noticed Carnival does have ppv movies now - I saw them for $4.99; however, I was just checking and didn't ever watch TV on this cruise!
We were on deck 7 with an extended balcony. We were in the middle of the section so we had excellent views left and right. Carnival has put up partitions so it's now very hard to see who might be on the balcony next to you, which is just fine by us!