Carnival Ecstasy Review
Our first cruise - loved the Carnival Ecstasy!
Rating by category
Additional details
Overall - we thoroughly enjoyed this ship. It was our first cruise, as I've been hesitant for many years about being out in the middle of the ocean. But my husband decided it would be a great birthday surprise for me, and he was right!
We stayed in a Miami hotel where there was low-cost parking along with the room and a free shuttle to the cruiseport (but no return) check out www.Stay123.com, the night before, which really helped us arrive to the port on time and relaxed. Having talked to many guests onboard who arrived exhausted and frazzled from flying and driving to the port, I felt like we made the better decision.
We were excited to sit in the terminal and see our ship waiting for us. Getting on was fairly simple, and we were glad we arrived at noon as there were lots of people behind us. We saw lots of people carrying on cases of bottled water (we took on a bottle of champagne), which seemed odd. We drank lots of ice water on board it tasted fine to us. Again, I was glad we didn't hassle with the cases of water.
Cabin Review
Our room was small (185 square feet) but fine for the 2 of us. We were really only in the room to shower and sleep. There was ample hanging space and shelving, our suitcase wouldn't fit under the bed, but it stood up in the corner just fine and gave us a place to rest our phones etc. We took a extension cord as we knew there would only be one plug in the room, and was glad we did, as we had 3 things to plug in. The bed was comfortable (and the steward made it every day, I loved that!), the room service was great. The bathroom was about as big as a bathroom on an airplane, a little tight! There is nowhere to put your make up, etc. but there is an ample counter in the room. Next time I'll take an over the door shoe hanger so I can store deodorant, brush, toothpaste in that. The room is very dark, but we left the bathroom light on, with the door mostly closed, and that was fine. I liked the fake window curtain, it gave the illusion of a window, which helped, psychologically. I also liked the webcam channel on the television. We left it on and watched the bow of the ship the whole time, so there was always movement on the horizon. Apparently this is the way to combat motion sickness, to always let your eyes see motion so that your inner ear fluid realizes it really is moving. This was very helpful, particularly in an interior room. We were on deck 6, and it was also helpful to know that ALL of the decks are way above the water line. For some reason, I thought the low decks were in the bottom of the ship (below the water line) and that is not true. Our room was completely quiet, even though the ship was full. I liked being midship as the front of the shop does seem to have a bit more motion as it hits the waves first, or something like that! There was a safe in the room which worked well for us, but no hairdryer, no coffeepot. There were 2 bathrobes, lots of towels, soap/shampoo dispenser, a retractable clothes line. All in all, it was fine for us, I think if you're a bit on the heavy side, it might be a bit cramped, as we did bump into each other and we're just average size. I liked being this close to the elevators and the stairs and the main Lido deck.