We just returned from the Nov 6 sailing on the Fantasy. My wife and I travelled with our 2 year old son and her Aunt and Uncle. It was our 3rd cruise (2nd w/ Carnival) and the first one for our Aunt and Uncle.

All in all, everything went very smooth. We live less than 1 hr from the Port of New Orleans. We left the house at 10:00 and arrived at the port at 10:50. The port seemed to have their act together as we were on the ship before noon. We went to the Lido deck and had some lunch by the pool. It was very good. We then went to the room to unpack and off to explore the ship... The ship looked very good for an older, relatively smaller ship by todays standards. The ship was very clean and the layout was easy to navigate. We never had to wait too long for an elevator. The rooms were very quiet. We did have some engine noise in the cabin, which I liked (white noise). There were no bad smells as some of the previous reviews indicated and everything was operational. The water park and hot tubs on Serenity were all on when we boarded the ship. The food ranged from very good to excellent. It was better than we expected and the service was beyond excellent with no exceptions. We ate most meals in the Jubilee dining room as the food was better than the buffet (although what we did eat in the buffet was pretty good). Our dinner servers were Ida Iyo (don't think I spelled that right) and Arnold. We loved them both. Our 2 year old seemed to be popular with all the staff and most of the passengers. The crew was excellent with him. While I expect them to be friendly to him, I feel they went way and above the call of duty and seemed to be enjoying him rather than just accommodating him. We sampled pretty much everything in the dining room and the chocolate melting cake was awesome. Our cabin steward Wade was excellent, also. Big Tex and the tex messages was a little corny for me but he did fine overall. My wife did try one spa service because it seemed like a good value knowing she would be upsold. We even thought that if the upsell wasn't too outrageous, she may purchase something. But she was, in her words, livid at a $1400.00 (not Pesos, but US dollars) for some creams. My wife is an extremely healthy person. She works out regularly and eats extremely healthy. I can not imagine her needing or spending $1400.00 worth of vitamins and creams to make her healthier. The entertainment was pretty good overall. Always something going on. Anyway, overall we had a great time and would do it again...

ps: sorry if this review sounds a little unorganized, but I am back at work trying to catch up and wanted to get the review out while the cruise was still fresh in my mind...