This is my third time cruising with Carnival. I went with my parents and my grandmother. Our cruise was from 7/1/11 to 7/9/11.

Embarkation: One of the reasons we chose this cruise was because it departed from New York, and being from New Jersey, we didn't have to fly. We got to the cruise terminal around 10:15. Check-in was a pretty smooth process. The ship was late on debarking that day, so we had to wait over 2 hours before people started boarding the ship. It got pretty crowded, and many people had to stand. Other then the long wait, embarkation was a pretty smooth process.

Ship's Features: I consider myself an athletic person, so one of the things I wanted to do on this cruise was play some basketball and go to the gym. I have been playing basketball since I was 6 years old, and I was highly disappointed when I saw the basketball court. The court was no more than 40 feet long and 20 feet wide. And they placed the basketball hoop on the wide side, so the court was actually only 20 feet long and 40 feet wide. They also put up netting around the court to prevent anything from flying overboard. The problem was the netting was a maximum of 12 feet high, meaning it was really difficult to shoot the basketball without hitting the top netting. Additionally, the hoop was approximately 8 ½ feet high. This didn't really bother me, because that meant I could dunk with ease, but some basketball fans may be turned off by this. Read more