I'll try to be as informative as possible. I travelled with my daughter (21), my mom, (73), my friend (49) and her three daughters (21, 15 and 13). We have all travelled on Royal Caribbean and four of us have travelled on Princess. This was everyone's first time on Carnival. My mom, my daughter and myself are well-seasoned cruises. With that said, we were very disappointed with the Carnival cruise line. We chose Carnival because it left out of NY and we live on Long Island, as well as the price (you get what you pay for)!

Parking and Embarkation: I found municipal parking on 51st and 12th for $96.00 for the four days, but at the last minute we decided to use the cruise terminal parking for $120.00. The good reason to use the cruise terminal - we were off the ship at 8:00 a.m. and we were in our cars and on the 12th Avenue at 8:10 a.m. The draw back to using the cruise terminal parking - it took 45 minutes after we dropped off the family members with the luggage to park the car. They use dogs to sniff the cars and this held the line up for a long time. Once we arrived at the embarkation desk the process was quite smooth. Unlike other cruise lines there was no formal sign-up desk for the teens with someone explaining the different clubs (someone grabs you as get on board and gives you a newsletter). We were familiar with soda cards from our past cruises, but again, there is no formal sign-up table in the lobby with a souvenir container. You have to go to a bar to sign up.

Pool and Sail-Away Party - The party did not have the same ambiance as we've experienced in the past. The crowd we were with for the most part lacked in polish (and that's all I'll say about the crowd). We were disappointed with the pool deck as it was not very inviting or resort looking. We are used to Princess and Royal's lido deck lay-out. Luckily for us, the next day out to sea we discovered the Azure Lido (retractable awning pool at the back of the ship). This area was resort-like with a crowd that was more like us. We were extremely lucky as the weather on the first day out to sea was hot and sunny so the awning was off. The pool was still too cold to swim in. The day out to sea on the way back from Canada was overcast and raining so the awning was on and we were told that even though the day was turning out to be sunny and hot, they never keep the awning off on the return trip. Once it got hot and sunny the awning made the back of the ship feel like a sauna. Read more