Carnival Paradise Review
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Well, here is my review; sorry it has taken me so long to write this, just now getting time to.
Day before Embarkation: My family and I flew down to Miami on American Airlines from St. Louis. Security was tight as normal, but wasn't as bad because we had my grandma in a wheelchair, so we went through the metal detectors while my grandma was checked by the portable metal detector. We had 15 bags, so pre-check in was very slow. The flight down was ok except for lots of turbulence. Once we arrived, we had to sit on the tarmac for about an hour; there was an unclaimed bag on one of the planes, so security was very tight after that. While in Miami, we stayed at the Sheraton Biscayne Bay, where we had a very nice view of the port. We went to dinner that night at Bubba Gump's Shrimp Co. in the Bayside Marketplace. I highly recommend this for dinner, the waitresses are so nice, and they actually sit down at the table with you to take your order, and even give you Forrest Gump trivia while you wait for your food. There are some really interesting shops in the marketplace, so I suggest you stop by. If you find the marketplace, they give you free coupons.
Embarkation Day: We pre-registered at 9:00 AM at the hotel, which anyone staying in Miami can do. This made the trip to the port so much easier. We took a van over to the port (5 people, 15 pieces of luggage, we had to have lots of room). We go to the ship around 10:30 and that it took about 20 minutes worth of traffic and fender-benders to get us there. Since we had pre-registered, we drove up to one of the people who took our bags and checked our luggage. He was very kind and helpful. We walked up to the building to go through security, there were hardly any people there. We went through security, which was a very easy process. Since we had already pre-registered, we passed all the lines to register. We went into the big room where you get your Sign and Sail Cards, and received those very easily. We waited about an hour and a half before they said we could board. Since we had my grandma in a wheelchair, we were one of the first people to get our picture taken, and to get on board.