This was my fifth cruise. I traveled with my wife and 17 year old son. Two other couples were with us as well.

We drove from NC on Tuesday before sailing on Saturday. We spent one night in Jacksonville and then 2 nights in Daytona Beach. We were hoping to work on our pre-cruise tan, but Tropical Storm Andrea had other ideas. We arrived in Port Canaveral on Friday and stayed at the La Quinta in Cocoa Beach. The hotel was fine for what we needed. Our party of 7 ate at Coconuts in Cocoa Beach that night. Everyone should try it. The food was good and the atmosphere was fun.

We took the free shuttle (Road Runner Shuttle) to the port. We had gotten an email from Carnival telling to arrive after 1:30. We paid no attention to that! The shuttle had us at the port around 11:15 am. We had no lines to stand in. Within 20 minutes we were on the ship! One couple with us had Faster to the Fun so we put our carryons in their room. (An aside -- we actually boarded 4 people ahead of them). Read more