Carnival Elation Review
Rating by category
Additional details
My mom and dad cruise with Carnival quite often and needed to book a 4 day cruise to receive some discount or offer they wanted on a future 7 day cruise, so she treated me to this cruise!
It was my very first, so I had no idea what to expect. My mom is not as detail oriented as I am, so she told me relatively little about cruising before we went. Since it was just the two of us, though, I didn't let this bother me and just went with the flow.
We stayed at the Holiday Inn Superdome in New Orleans, because she had stayed there previously, and it was fantastic! The room was huge and very clean, the staff was great, and breakfast in their restaurant couldn't have been better! Great experience there!
Cabin Review
Ocean View
The cabin was much bigger than I thought it would be! The bathroom too! Everything was very clean and tidy all the time. We never had to ask for it to be serviced. Never had to ask for extra towels, toilet paper, or anything! Bed was comfortable, big mirror, always hot water, no complaints at all!
Port Reviews
New Orleans
New Orleans is one of my favorite places in the world, so I have only good things to say about it. Stayed at the Holiday Inn Superdome and it was excellent all around(was my first stay in this particular hotel). Ate dinner night before cruise at Red Fish Grill, which is one of my local faves-save room for the double chocolate bread pudding! Taxi service is always abundantly available in this city-no problems!
Arrived at dock about 10:30 to check in and no trouble there either. Got through process quickly to check in, waited all of 30 minutes(took this time to buy lanyard for ship card) and then took about 15 minutes to get onto the ship itself.
Cozumel
We booked a glass bottom boat excursion for this port our first day on the ship, but it was cancelled due to not enough bookings. We didn't let this spoil our good time, though. The process of getting off the ship was no big deal at all-took all of 15 minutes! Hit the shops closest to the pier(?) and had a great time haggling with the merchants. I have no problem with this system-have done it in New York's Chinatown for years and love the thrill of trying to get a bargain. (The thing to remember is to already have a price in mind you are not willing to go over! Walk away and they will usually lower the price. If not, the next guy will!).
Ate at La Mission on the recomm. of a nice jewelry store owner and it did not disappoint! Wonderful atmosphere & delicious food!