Carnival Spirit Review

4.5 / 5.0
1,075 reviews

Northbound Cruise - The way to see Alaska!

Review for Alaska Cruise on Carnival Spirit
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nycpants
First Time Cruiser • Age 40s

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Sail Date: May 2008
Cabin: Extended Balcony
Traveled with children

The Spirit to Alaska was our 5th cruise on Carnival. It was me and my husband, our two friends, and their 22 month old daughter (we're all in our early 30s). We really lucked out with the weather the week of May 21st. Every day was 70 degrees and not a cloud in the sky. According to the captain (and everyone else for that matter), this was a rare occurrence to have a long stretch of such nice weather in Alaska. It was a great group of people as well. (Not a lot of kids since school was in session.) And it was an easy way to travel with a toddler. She loved every minute of it (unless right before naptime of course.)

Embarkation - Fairly quick and painless. Vancouver is a nice port, pretty well organized. We flew into Seattle a few days beforehand to visit with the same friends. We rented a van from their and took the 3 hour drive to the port. We dropped them off w/ the baby to embark before returning the van to the Hertz office. This was an easy process to leave them at the door, and walk back to the port ourselves. If you need transport from Seattle, it was easy to go through Hertz and drop the car off in Vancouver. This proved to be cheaper than arranging transportation through the ship or with a shuttle service.

The Ship - Very clean, good layout. Much easier to navigate than some of Carnival's other ships. Typical dEcor for Carnival (Las Vegas on water as we like to say). I believe that Royal Caribbean's Serenade of the Seas does an Alaskan itinerary, and having sailed on that ship before in the Caribbean, believe that it would a better way to see Alaska (lots of glass, better views). But the difference in price makes Carnival a much better choice for us. We spent a good amount of time on our balcony enjoying the scenery. Our room was always well taken care of; clean, plenty of closet space. It was also a quiet room. No problems sleeping due to bars, foot traffic, etc.

Cabin Review

Extended Balcony

Cabin 8J

great view, extended balcony, plenty of closet space, comfy bed, quiet room, only downfall is lifeboats are right underneath (did not present a problem with the view.)

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