Well we just returned from our cruise to the Western Caribbean on the Carnival Conquest out of Galveston from April 22nd, 2207 to April 29th , 2007. We booked our cruise through the Carnival website 169 days before the cruise and no the rates never did go down the closer it got to the sail date. We ( party of two my wife of 26 years and myself ) booked a room at the Harbor House Hotel on Pier 21. It was approximately 150 yards from the Carnival pier.
We drove from our home in Louisiana approximately 6 hours to Galveston on the Friday before the cruise. We spend the next two nights at the Harbor House and would definitely recommend it if you are sailing out of Galveston. It was actually out on the pier in a restored warehouse and was well worth the money. Since we booked our room through the galveston.com website our cruise parking for the 7 days of the cruise was free. Cruise parking on the regular lots ranged from $50 to $70.
Saturday night we walked over to the Carnival pier ( remember it was only 150 yards away ) and talked to a porter. He told us that we could avoid the crowds if we brought our bags over at 7:30 am Sunday morning and dropped them off.