Costa Luminosa -Feb. 5 – 15, 2014  Bahamas, Grand Turk, Grand Cayman, Ocho Rios, Roatan and Cozumel.

Embarkation : Our hotel assigned a leave time of 10:45 a.m. so we arrived early (11:30) to the terminal. Porters there to take our luggage....we're coming and departing passengers are trying to get away. Bit confusing. We stood around for about ½ hour and then entered the building, we were given our “section” number and sent off to fill out our health forms. Then the “Disney” style line to the counter where we showed our passport, boarding form and health form. Once our papers were stamped “completed”, we were directed to go and sit in our “numbered section”. This is a bit of a joke....there aren't near enough seats and the representative couldn't keep track of where everyone was going and many just stood or parked themselves on the floor. Very disorganized and I'm not sure why this seating was necessary. Refreshments were available as were bathrooms. DO NOT TAKE PHOTOS. Someone took a photo of friends/family sitting in the chairs and a rep almost broke her neck to get there and tell them not to take any more photos. Started boarding the ship about 1:00 p.m. We showed our passport and boarding pass and our photo was taken for our “key”. Our rooms were not ready, so we were sent to deck 9 to Self Serve Restaurant.

Room 4336 : An announcement was made about 2:30 that we could get in our rooms. Our luggage, cabin key cards, lifeboat drill card and dinner seating info were all in our room. 4336 is an outside obstructed room with a huge floor to ceiling window...there is a lifeboat outside, but it is situated so that we could see thru the windows of the lifeboat to the shore or water. Don't leave the curtains open....they clean these boats at 7:00a.m.! Lots of light. Queen size bed, plus the couch will open up and another bed will drop down from the ceiling. There is only a bottom sheet and then a duvet on the bed.....we asked for a top sheet, it was handed to my husband and he threw it on top of the bed. There was a large desk area with mirror, storage under the desk, a couch and small table, tv, safe, hairdryer, lots of lighting, beach towels, and a refrigerator full of beer, pop, water, liquor and candy (we saw no price list, but I'm sure it's not cheap). We asked to have our refrig emptied so we could use it for our own things. There is a three section closet....2 sections for hanging clothes and one section with 5 shelves and the safe. Bring some hangars (14 in our cupboard and one was broke). Nice sized bathroom with lots of hot water and a high shower head. There was a small square of soap for the sink and there is liquid soap in the shower. On this ship, the spa does not supply “samples” for your use. I suggest you bring your own shampoo/conditioner and soap. Our soap square got very thin and was not automatically replaced....my husband had to ask for another one. There was no washcloth....I carry the little compacted ones that revive with water and when the cabin steward saw it, washcloths were put in the room. However, the dirty ones would disappear and not be replaced. (Washcloths are in some of the public restrooms and are used to dry hands....I snitched two and kept them in our room just in case.) All in all, a really nice, big room we were very happy with. Our cabin steward was another story....at midnight, that top sheet was still on top of the bed as was the luggage cloth....and he either didn't sweep our room or the sweeper was useless. There were plastic clothing tags on the floor when we moved in (which we left) and they were still there when we left and yes, we did ask to have the room swept. My husband wanted to steal a sweeper and do it himself! The ship sailed at 11:00 p.m. (yes, you read that right). You do get to see Miami with all the lights on and there's not much to do all the time you're waiting for the ship to leave so you have lots of time to unpack and get situated in your cabin. Read more