My wife and I started cruising in 2003 and this was our 11th cruise over all and 8th with Carnival. I can't say that we like Carnival better than the other lines but I can say that we have enjoyed every single cruise. For us Carnival is just a better deal. About 8 weeks ago my wife told me that we needed a vacation and we just had to get away from work. (We are residental property managers) She suggested that we do something besides going on a cruise this time. So we looked and looked and we just could not come up with anthing that we thought would be better than going on a cruise. We have sailed out of Galveston two other times but have never sailed on the Conquest before so we booked it. When ever we can we always drive and because you have to fly to Houston to get to Galveston and we find it more relaxing to simply Drive from Denver. Generly we stay over night in Houston and take our time on Cruise day. We do everything we can to not become part of the rush. So on the day of embarcation we arrive at Galveston park and Cruise and are told to go enjoy Galveston for a few more hours because the ship has not come into port yet. Of course they didn't have to tell us that as we already noticed that the ship was not in yet. We droped off our bags. We then went to the Wallmart to buy more things to carry on to the ship, had a good lunch and washed the car. We noticed that the ship had arrived so we drove back to the Galveston park and Cruise. Waited in line to park for 2 hours. Seems they didn't have any open parking spaces because everyone was so slow in getting off the ship. We were still in a good mood when we finaly got parked. We walked to the terminal and found ourself in a line that was way outside the building. I am not kidding when I say it took us another 2 hours to get on the Ship. We were in no mood for the embarcation picture! Carnival did give everyone $15 credit to the Sail and sign because we had to buy our own lunch in Galveston. Up front I thought that was nice of them. For dinner that night it was open dinning and we boarded just in time to go to dinner. After dinner we calmed down and we did realize that Carnival can not control the fog that caused the delay. We also noticed that after dinner it was foggy again and now we could not sail. We found our bags at the door to the cabin when we finished dinner so we unpacked. I must say that Carnival Cabins on most of the newer ships are the same. We never lack for storage and the cabins are always comfortable. We have always gotten a balcony or suite but are now thinking that for all we use the balcony we might try a O/V in the future. In this cabin we for the first time noticed the smell of sewer gas. I poured water in all of the drains and it still smelled. The next day it smelled and it seemed like there was nothing I could do to make it go away. I then realized that after you flushed the toilet there was almost no water in the bowl. I realized that the shower head could reach the toilet bowl so I added water to the toilet bowl and the smell went away. Ok there were some problems but What the heck we just decided to enjoy ourselves no matter what besides we now had $15 for each of us to drink up. the first night we went to bed around midnight and the woke up the next morning at sea. Some time around 9 or 10am they did the muster dril and it was painless because we did not have to bring the life vest to the drill. I don't know if that is something they just stopped doing or if it was this one time. We enjoyed the sea day just doing things around the ship and reading. Let me say something about the service. The cabin steward Franklin was very good . Our room was very clean, we were never bothered and the towel animals were some of the best we have seen. What we asked for the first day was that we always have fresh ice at night. For the most part we had fresh ice most of the time. In the dinning room the service lacked a lot from what we have come to expect. We always had good service at pools and the bars. I also found this ship to be clean and the crew seemed to be working almost all the time doing something. The food. There was plenty of it but this is the first time I thought that the food in the main dinning room was not all that good. Wasn't bad, it just was not that good. We had dinner in the buffet a couple of nights and found that it was OK. We had a great day in Jamaica. I can't say enough about how beautiful this island is. We did not go to the beach or down town so we were not bothered like I heard some of the other cruisers talk about. We visited a plantation and really enjoyed our time there. The people there were great and the food was even good. It was a long bus ride to get there but that gave us the opportunity to see the country. It also gave us an appreciation for the life we have . The poverty is just, I don't have the words. Grand Cayman we had planned to go to stingray city and snorkeling but the excursion was canceled because of high sea's. The Sea's were bad and the tendering was the worst we have experienced. I am surprised that no one was injured. It was that bad. In Cozumel we did the Mayan Ruins of Tulum. Alot of time was taken up with the ferry and bus ride. It was a beautiful day and we did absorb some of the history of this area. The ruins were amazing. I know that there are better ruins but the location and the condition of these ruins were well worth the trip. we did go to the Casino more than we should have but did not lose that much so we had a good time. The entertainment was fairly good and we did go to the shows and enjoyed them. There was a guy that played guitar and sang in the casino and other lounges. His name was Bruce I liked him. Ok we had one last fun day at sea , packed our bags and got one last good nights sleep. We did the self assist in getting off the ship and by 9:30 we were on our way home. Did we like the cruise? you bet. Was I disipointed with the ship? Somewhat. Would I sail Carnival again. Ya we have already book the Spirit 8 day on the Mexican Riv for next Jan.