EMBARKATION:

We boarded our ship at Canada Place in Vancouver, BC. It was a nightmare! We had booked a guarantee on our cabin. This meant we did not know our cabin number until arriving at port. In Miami you simply find the person at the dock with the clipboard, get your cabin number, retag your luggage and leave it with the baggage handlers. Well, at Canada Place there was no person with a clip board and only 2 baggage handlers for 3 ships! I stood with our luggage while my husband entered the building and located someone from Carnival to get our cabin number. He got tags for retagging and we finally had waited long enough to get help from a baggage handler. Then the waiting began. There had to be several hundred people waiting in the first line. Turned out it was for all 3 cruise ships and everyone had to go through this single security line. After getting through this line we were separated to individual ship lines. We then were told to sit down and wait to go through immigration. No one ever came over from immigration but, after sitting for abour 20 minutes we were directed to another line to check in with the ship personnel. I use my credit card to secure my sign and sail card. Their machine was down so they told me they would manually verify my card. After checking in with this desk we were finally directed to the immigration line. There they checked our birth certificates and photo identifications. Carnival had made a big deal about their 'Fun Pass'. Saying it was necessary to have this done prior to coming to port, print this out and bring it to check in. Well, not one single person looked at, or even asked for, this 'very important' fun pass. Finally we get in line to board ship. We insert our sign and sail card for our portrait and are told we have to check in with the pursors desk. Another line. There they had to do the manual verification on our credit card and we finally got to our cabin.

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