As neither my fiance or I have any experience cruising we made the decision to take this particular cruise for the price point and the sale date being one that worked for us. As we had no previous cruising experience we have no baseline to judge off of but I can say that we had an incredible trip. I'll cover the awesomeness first before mentioning a few things that left a slightly sour taste in our mouths (and perhaps these issues are an industry wide thing, not a ship issue, I just don't know).

The food was great in whichever venue we dined in, Guys burger joint was an absolute favourite! We ate there 3 times and I'd be tempted to pick another Carnival cruise just for the sole purpose of getting my hands on another one of those burgers. We did the main dinging room 5 nights and on the others we stuck to the buffet as we were just not hungry yet at our seating time of 6pm. We found that often what was listed on the main dining room features could also be found in the Red Sail restaurant only without the loveliness of a plated meal served in a lovely setting.

Our room stewards were friendly and thorough and I delighted in seeing which towel animal they would leave for us each day. It seemed as though they were specters in the night, swooping in sight unseen and making everything neat and tidy again while we were off for breakfast or adventures. If we needed anything at all, it was a quick phone call and they attended to our needs right away. Read more