What is this obsession with fun? And why do Carnival think that loud pop music, gambling and smoking constitute fun? And what is a fun shop? It's just a shop!

Perhaps it is just cultural thing because we were Brits on an American ship but we definitely will not be going with Carnival again. The ship is clean and we enjoyed the ports visited but we would no more choose this type of cruise again than we would choose to visit Butlin's. It is obvious that we were in the minority, however, and most people enjoyed it. I also don't want staff to know my name and call me by it constantly. I just want them to do their job unobtrusively and leave me alone! Food was also to American tastes (well the ship was full of them, so why would it be otherwise?) i.e. very sweet and calorific. The seafood was pretty good though (smoked salmon and cream cheese bagel excellent!) and we liked the Mongolian Wok and the Indian section.

We chose this cruise partly because we were going to New York and Niagara first and we knew they wouldn't expect bowties and ball gowns, however, there is no enforced dress code at all and some people dined in shorts and tee shirts. The trouble with this is: the more they let people get away with, the scruffier they become and there were a lot of scruffy people on this ship. Read more