Carnival Inspiration Review
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We live locally so the morning of December 19th we awoke, finished packing and loaded the car for the 1 hour drive to Long Beach and the start of our cruise. We have never cruised in the month of December before. Our past cruises have been summer cruises - June and July - on either Carnival, Disney or Celebrity. We booked this cruise because there was no airfare required, it was the week before Christmas and we though a nice pre-Christmas get away would be relaxing. Because we had taken a big family trip over the summer - Carnival Dream cruise followed by one week in Disneyworld we booked an inside cabin for the 4 of us. Mom, dad and two teenagers age 13 & 15. Usually the kids sleep and that is it in the cabin. My husband and I usually hang out at various times throughout the day on previous cruises on the balconies so this would be a new experience for us in an inside room.
Embarkation was a disaster but I don't know who was to blame for this. The computer system they use to check you in was not working at all. : ( Everything had to be done manually which resulted in long lines and longer waits. From the time we arrived in the parking lot until the time we boarded the ship it was 1 1/2 hours which is not normal for this port. Once we were on the ship we were greeted by Welcomes from many crew members and directions to get to the buffet for lunch, which is where we headed. After lunch the rooms were opened so we headed down to our room. We knew an interior would be a different experience for our family - we usually book balconies and only a couple times an ocean view room and this was an interior on the bottom deck midship.
The room was very clean, had more than enough storage space to place our clothes and suitcases fit perfectly under the bed. We met Raul our room-steward who was great. We ran into him a few times during the cruise and the room was always clean, ice in the bucket and clean towels in the bathroom even though we hung the used ones up to save water. No complaints here.
Cabin Review
Interior
Cabin M184 was mid-ship. We didn't feel any motion from the ship in this room. The halls were quiet for the entire cruise. There is a storage area or something right next store to this room. Occassionally we would hear the door slam shut from someone entering or exiting the room but only during the daytime. There were 4 of us. Lots of closet space, hangers and shelves for our clothing. The desk has limited counter space for items as does the bathroom but we made it work. We did bring a lighted alarm clock as the room don't have any clocks. We also brought a nightlight and a power strip to plug these items in as well as charge cell phones, IPods etc. The safe is a decent size and unlike some of the other ships we have been on it requires you to lock it using a magnetic strip vs. entering a personal code. This required us to 'hide' the card we used so anyone of us could enter the safe during the day. This room is small and if you are claustrophobic it might pose a problem. We used the room for sleeping and changing clothes only. For this it was fine. The room is for 4 people and there is a queen bed set up during the day and at night the two pull down top bunks are lowered making it quiet cramped to move around at night time.