We chose this cruise because we were celebrating my birthday on the first day of the cruise and it had an itinerary we were interested in. It so happened to be on the Freedom. The layout was the same as our last ship, the Valor, so it wasn't confusing for us but I could see how it would be for others. The layout is confusing on some decks, as you are unable to walk the length of the ship on certain decks. Overall the ship was fine. Definitely had some wear and tear but going into dry dock should improve that. Great restaurants, shows, and activities. The cruise director, Simon London, was wonderful. There were plenty of activities to keep us busy even with the 3 hour delay due to fog during embarkation. The crew was very informative and helpful during the delay. Sea days were great and weren't dull unless you let it be. The Sun King Steakhouse was absolutely amazing. Worth the $38 pp. The Chic dining room's staff was also attentive each night we dined there. We did run into two issues while aboard but both were handled promptly. Given the opportunity to sail the Freedom again in the future, I would do it in an heartbeat. Read Less

We have cruised 8 times previously and on multiple lines including past Carnival, Princess, NCL, and Celebrity cruises. This is close to the bottom of all the cruises I have taken. However, let me through out a few compliments: 1. Lucky, our cabin steward was exceptional. Even more impressive is her recall of mine and my spouses name by face the second day of our cruise. 2. Simon the cruise director of the Carnival Freedom who self effacive comedy kept things light on the cruise. Now onto the bad: 1. We had cabin 1026 on the 10th floor. The cabin is dated and worn. The sofa is a combination of faded and frayed leather seat and cloth pillows. There was also a constant sewer smell from the airline quality toilets. 2. The food was an atrocious mix of gelatinous chocolate mousse, hard as a brick cakes, dried out pasta dished, and burned apple pie in the Chic Dining room. 3. Tired and worn infrastructure including deep paint chipping on the "whale tail" exhaust and a rusting track for what I assume was a once functioning roof over the adult swimming area in the aft section of the ship. 4. We ran late departing Galveston but no effort was really made to make up the time. Some Cozumel excursions were canceled and refunded but no attempt made to help us reschedule a new excursion at the last minute. 5. The ship continued on a delayed schedule up and through Ochos Rios, Jamaica. Checking in to the tubing excursion some before us were told there were two boarding times and to come buck at 11:00am. As our group moved forward for our 10:00a.m. booking we were told ours was the only group going. Those who were told to come back at 11:00 probably had a rude awakening. 6. As with most cruise ships internet service remains an expensive joke. Having chose the most expensive package I got very slow service. The idea of the HUB app is not well executed. I was never able to connect or find other parties in my group in the texting portion. Then some text messages to people I was connected with were never received after being sent by me. Cruise Critic!! You professional review is a woeful representation of the realities of this ship. Time to send your professional critic back for a reassessment. Read Less

My hubs and I typically cruise with RCI but, because we have exhausted all of the Royal Caribbean itineraries out of Galveston, we chose this cruise to the Bahamas on Carnival. We had only cruised with Carnival once before on a quick 4-night trip so we did not know exactly what to expect. We had heard that the Freedom was scheduled for dry dock shortly after our return so we expected a ship that was a bit outdated and worse for the wear -- not so at all! We really enjoyed our Ocean Suite and will probably never go back to a regular balcony room. The extra space, storage room including a second closet, and tub/shower combo are well worth the extra money. The food was fantastic, although at times the buffet can be unbearably crowded, and our cruise director, Emma, is amazing. However, all of the shows in the theater are of the sing-along type -- good dancing and singing but no storyline. Also, disembarkation was a hot mess from beginning to end. Security at the port were horrible -- angry, screaming at passengers including my 70-year-old parents. I realize the port staff are not Carnival employees but it is worth mentioning because they are atrocious. Overall, a fantastic cruise. More affordable than Royal Caribbean with incredibly friendly staff and great excursions. Read Less

We took this cruise as part of a specialty group, which had to get permission for onboard activities, thus we were limited to this particular itinerary. Both my partner and I have traveled on Carnival for some time... I turned Gold on this trip, and she turned Platinum. We had a balcony room on the 8th deck, and it was certainly a nice room, with a great view. The ship is still in great shape, and was very enjoyable, however there were a few things that I didn't like. First... the NFL football playoffs were not available unless you went to the casino, or to the sports bar. The casino was filled with cigarette smoke, and the sports bar was just filled beyond capacity. Because Dallas was playing in the Saturday night game, there was a LOT of interest in the game. Carnival no longer has local channels on their shipboard TV (speaking of which.. the choices for in-room entertainment are very slim). Unfortunately, in todays world, its almost impossible to get totally out of touch, therefore internet is a necessity, not a luxury. However, the shipboard internet is woefully lacking. Download speeds were as bad as a 1200 baud modem at times, and never got any better than decent dialup (for those old enough to remember that). This was a nice itinerary, although The Bahamas was not as much fun as it could have been, due to cruising in winter. Although the outside temperature was nice (70s), the chill on board ship was not fun. And water activities were uncomfortable at best. I would not consider cruising in winter again, unless it were a special activity. Read Less

My hubs and I typically cruise with RCI but, because we have exhausted all of the Royal Caribbean itineraries out of Galveston, we chose this cruise to the Bahamas on Carnival. We had only cruised with Carnival once before on a quick 4-night trip so we did not know exactly what to expect. We had heard that the Freedom was scheduled for dry dock shortly after our return so we expected a ship that was a bit outdated and worse for the wear -- not so at all! We really enjoyed our Ocean Suite and will probably never go back to a regular balcony room. The extra space, storage room including a second closet, and tub/shower combo are well worth the extra money. The food was fantastic, although at times the buffet can be unbearably crowded, and our cruise director, Emma, is amazing. However, all of the shows in the theater are of the sing-along type -- good dancing and singing but no storyline. Also, disembarkation was a hot mess from beginning to end. Security at the port were horrible -- angry, screaming at passengers including my 70-year-old parents. I realize the port staff are not Carnival employees but it is worth mentioning because they are atrocious. Overall, a fantastic cruise. More affordable than Royal Caribbean with incredibly friendly staff and great excursions. Read Less

The staff was nice most of the time, the balcony room was fair. We only got a few channels on the TV, not that we were there to be watching TV but come on. The food was terrible!!!!! I was told that cruise line food was amazing, even the fine dining was not very good. Im sure I dropped some weight. The bar tenders are inconsistent my wife and I had the cheers package and some of them would not let me get my wife a drink even if I had her card with me. The casino bar tenders were top notch they know how to treat people. The shows were hit and miss, lip sync was good and the bands were good especially the violinist. It really seems like you get nickel and dimed to death and they don’t tell you about the extra costs, they are sneaky about that. I won’t cruise again for awhile, we are looking for all inclusive destinations from now on. If I do cruise again it won’t be with Carnival. Read Less

They managed to get over 2800 guests along with their almost 1200 employees onboard and mobilized, and it set us up well for a smoothly run resort on the water. The three destinations to Cozumel, Grand Cayman and Jamaica were short, and involved a lot of process and security checks getting on and off the ship, and reminded us that the point of the cruise was less about seeing and experiencing these destinations than enjoying the ship. Carnival Cruise offered very little in the way of educating us about the locations we were visiting and we had to figure much of it out on our own. Carnival spent considerable time trying to sell us expensive excursions offering us North American versions of these countries. We avoided them and explored these places on our own and were left with little time to do so. However, we made the best of it breaking through the tourist facade of these port of calls, and found some pretty places to see and learn about. If you like alcohol, 18 hours a day of loud rock or Latin music, gambling, smoking in the casinos and on some decks, eating a lot of amazing food, plugging in to online cable or internet or shopping, swimming and hot pools, cruises are for you. The pop culture is alive and well here. It is a perpetual party. The cruising culture is set up well to captivate people with all of these options with a quick up-sell on almost every opportunity. Alcohol could not be brought on board and we were held captive by some steep alcohol prices or all-inclusive charges. With this being said, there were some real gems in the cruise experience for us granola Canadians. The gym was five star and we appreciated the peace and quiet of this relatively unused space along with the sauna and steam rooms. Once we got used to lining up for everything, the food was good. The dining hall offered us terrific food, but we had to wait. I can not speak highly enough about the amazing staff. This cruise line has employees well-trained to serve in a service industry with a relatively demanding North American clientele. They got things done and made us feel very welcome on board. The cruise director was high energy the entire trip. We could hear her cheerful voice making announcements and participating in high-energy activities that might wear the average person out. The commitment of this Carnival Freedom Team was impressive, and we were amazed at how they entertained everybody right to the very last minute. There truly was something for everyone and my husband and I were continually finding new places on the ship to explore. We managed to come away from the cruise with a very conservative bill at the end. We chose not to buy internet, cable or all/inclusive drinks and soda pop deals. We also did not pay for expensive excursions because we have an aversion to line-ups and being herded through experiences. We appreciate the security of choosing this option, but we chose to explore places on our own. We gambled very little as our thirty minutes of gambling glory cost us 50 dollars. We shopped only at the end a bit when the shops were offering clearance specials. In a nutshell, we viewed the ship as a way to see the ocean and three ports of call with some wonderful food in a spacious state room that was always sparkling clean. We enjoyed our cruise and feel very happy to have been blessed with such a great experience. We feel well-rested, well-fed and amply entertained, but with this being said, we will not be cruising again until we are much older, and will likely do so on smaller cruise lines geared for a more mindful crowd. We are glad to have crossed it off our bucket list. We enjoyed the journey. Read Less

We tried the Chef's Table (at $75.00 per person plus 18% gratuity) and found that it was nice to be part of a small group of 14 guests, but there were too many courses and too much food for the 3 hour ordeal. Yes, the food and wine were good, but after course #7 or so, we were ready to go. If you are a gourmet foodie or if you want to be, then try to get an invite to this while on your cruise. You will love it! It's just not for everyone. If you don't want to be around a lot of noise and kids, try the Serenity areas on Decks 11 and 12. Truly an oasis on the ship! The kids have their Camp Ocean and the larger pools to have fun anyway. We were in Balcony Cabin 6319, and we had plenty of storage space for all of our stuff, and there was cabinet space we didn't use. Our room steward was Semadi and he worked hard to provide us with clean towels, clean cabin and a cheerful response to each request. He helped make our voyage more pleasant with his positive attitude and assistance. The carpet was showing its age, but it was clean. The rest of the cabin was clean too. We tried the Steakhouse on our last night aboard, and it was just OK. The steaks were good, but the sides and appetizers were sad and not up to expectations. I had the iced and smoked oysters, and they arrived with pink foam on top. I actually choked on the smoke foa when I tried an oyster. The chocolate dessert was not as good as the Carnival Melting Cake with vanilla ice cream served in the main dining room. At the 3rd deck bar in the Atrium, Putu is a great bartender - as are the bartenders we met at other places on the ship, but he was really great to us and we gave him a nice tip at the end of the cruise. I'm going to miss his friendly helpful service. Read Less

WoW! I can't even begin to explain how spectacular our Carnival Cruise vacation was. What an amazing experience we had. Right from the start we encountered a very warm welcome and an amazing greeting from the entire Carnival staff. As food was already prepared, we devoured a Guy's hamburger followed by flutes of champagne to amp up the beginning of an unforgettable cruise. Emma, the irreplaceable cruise director, was the highlight of our trip. With her positive energy and remarkable attention to detail, she didn't miss a blink. Every trip to the guest services line was a breeze. With members such as: Olga, Patricia Zaafar, Maria Guzman, Blib Grabovskyi, and especially a HUGE shout out to Tejesh Arjala for being a true stand up guy. He was there for me and my lady every step of the way, and provided exceptional service throughout the duration of the cruise. Thank you again Tejesh! As far as the Red Frog Rum Bar on the lido deck goes, I want to send a special shout out to Luanea "Lu Lu", Ruki, Shakiron, Sanket, and of course the brilliant bar waiter Mr. Glenford Hemmings. This group made us feel like we were hanging out with family the whole time! To conclude this comment, I want to also send a very special note to our briliant Steward and friend, Mr. Silfredo Nelson for his patience and humble spirit. What a blessing to have been on a ship with such as incredible group of people. Happy 2019 to all, and thank you again for all of your hard work. We will see you soon! - Bye Lovlies :) Read Less

We chose this cruise for New Years getaway. The service and food was not as good as in the past on other ships. The dining staff messed up orders in main dining, some food had no flavor or dry and some things ordered were never served. The staff was not as friendly as on other ships. The dining staff took a couple days to warm up and really get into the fun. Even with some bumps along the way we still enjoyed our vacation. We enjoyed the New Years balloon drop and deck party. The cruise director Emma was very energetic and seemed to really enjoy herself and all the guests. We also enjoyed all the art work and art auctions on board. We learned albeit several new artists . We will be back on Carnival in the future. We will not let 1 not as good cruise stop us from sailing again soon. Read Less