We took the 8 night Southern Caribbean cruise on the Carnival Miracle leaving Port Everglades on March 13th. This was the first run after a two week dry dock to repair a propulsion problem that had prevented the ship from running its usual 3 Saints run of St. Maarten, St. Lucia, and St. Kitts.

The ship was lovely fabulous shape, and kept super-clean. We were expecting a young spring break crowd but were surprised to see very few spring breakers on this cruisein fact it seemed a bit "older", in discussing it, we decided the 8 day cruise with a Friday departure might have eliminated some of the spring break goers more likely to take a Saturday to Saturday cruise.

Our flight from RDU was uneventful and we had a $12 cab ride to the hotel. We stayed at the Embassy Suites on 17th street, and could see the ship from our balcony across the harbor. The room was fine, booked with Hilton points, and we were very pleased with the hotel and its location. The hotel arranged transportation to the port for the following day for $16 for the two of us which was a fine deal. We shared a shuttle van with another company taking a Princess cruise. Read more