This was a different experience and a new boat for us. I certainly learned the hard way about using gift cards to fund my sign and sail pass. Bare with me through the rant. I was short on cash this trip-and unlike the previous sailing on the liberty of the seas, I had always just used a credit card attached to my sail pass. I was on a budget this year-and needed to use gift cards.

1. you cannot load cash into your sign and sail with giftcards from the carnival website-you must go to the guest services desk and have them load them onto your account. This is where all the trouble began. I literally had SEVEN $100 gift cards. So the gentleman loaded them all and then he said to me 'better keep them on hand just in case'. Literally by the next day my sign and sail card was declined and I had to go to the desk again. None of the mastercards went through-ONLY the american expresses took without issue. The girl behind the desk let me use their satellite phone to call the credit card company. I was told there was a 7% fee for using the card, so when the gent first loaded them-none of them took.

The girl then had to reload ALL of the mastercards for a lesser amount. When I got home I checked all the balances leftover and they were crazy all over the place. Moral of the story? Don't save your gift cards, just use cash or one credit card if you can help it. Read more