My husband and I went on a vacation without children this August. We picked Carnival because the price for a balcony was good, and we looking forward to being on a new ship. Our travel agent assured us that the "party" reputation of Carnival has changed over the years, and we would be pleased with the changes. We drove to Galveston from Dallas the day of embarkation; parking with EZ was quick. We were on board by 11. We had several carry-on bags that were a pain to lug around. We went to eat on the Lido deck and ended up getting into our room at 12. Nice surprise! Our steward Harry was excellent, friendly,and truly indicative of our experience with Carnival staff. ALL staff we came into contact with (even just sharing an elevator ride) were tremendously polite and friendly.

Since we were traveling sans kids, we spent a lot of time in the Serenity Adults Only area. I loved being away from all the kids. I wondered why some parents would bring their teens to the Serenity area (??) For some reason the hot tub temperature was lukewarm rather than hot. This may seem like a nit-picky thing to say, but it's experiences like this where things were just "off" or "missed the mark" that make me not want to cruise with Carnival again. The other hot tub was broken all week on the serenity deck.

We ate the first night in the steak restaurant. Definitely book it the first night--we got a free bottle of wine. The food was delicious, except for the shrimp cocktail. A little strange texture. We loved playing Black Jack in the casino. Dealers were friendly as were the other players. Read more