Our friends are big cruisers and talked my boyfriend and I into taking our first cruise. We booked the carnival ecstasy at a good price at a great time.

Embarkation was fairly flawless. We had checked in online and It was fast, easy and we were on the ship in no time. Unfortunately, our first impression of the ship was very discouraging. The atriums style was out of date 20 years ago. It was very confusing where to go and the groups of lost people did not make finding you way easy. We took the stairs for the entire duration of the cruise as the elevators always seemed to be jammed with people and took forever.

Our cabin was a porthole room on the Main deck. The room was nice. The beds were comfy, there was plenty of storage and the bathroom was a little on the tight and smelly side, but adequate. I was the most disappointed about what I was expecting and we didn't receive in our room. I had read online that our room would have both hair dryers and mini fridges. We had neither. I had brought along a medication that needed to be refrigerated and we ended up having keep it on ice the entire time. Thankfully I brought my own hair dryer because the hotel style take forever to dry my hair. Otherwise, I would have been in big trouble. We attended the information session when we boarded the ship and were told that we would have robes in our room and to wear them to robe night. Guess who didn't attend robe night, because they were nowhere to be found. Read more