I sailed on the Carnival Glory last week with my mom to celebrate the new year. Embarkation was a breeze. We arrived to the port of Miami at 11:45 and were on the ship by 12:10, even though our assigned check-in window was 12:30-1. We always wear our swimsuits onto the ship so that we can take advantage of a near-empty pool. They were handing out free champagne on the pool deck, I am assuming because it was a New Year's cruise. We went down to our stateroom at 1:30, which is the earliest you can get in, and our bags had already arrived.

There was plenty to do onboard at all times- trivia, games, poolside entertainment, comedy shows, lobby parties, deck parties, movies at the pool, casino events, shopping giveaways, etc. Our cruise director, Dustin, was absolutely amazing. You could tell he loves his job and he was always laughing and having a good time.

Now we did two shore excursions that I did not book through the cruiseline. One in Grand Cayman and one in Belize... the two ports that required tendering, of course. Now, if you booked through the ship, they made sure you were on an early enough tender to make it. If you did not book through the ship, you had to go to the Alchemy bar and get a number sticker to determine when you would be allowed off the ship. We got up super early in Grand Cayman and got number 2 (they generally let off 1-6 first) so we had no issue. In Belize, however, we were a little more relaxed and ended up with number 12. We've never been to Belize so we didn't know the tender ride was 20 minutes. 1-6 was called and I assumed we would be able to get off the ship next, but we waited 30 more minutes and still hadn't heard our number, and our excursion was leaving in 30 minutes. We went to Guest Services and told them what was going on and they put us in the priority tendering and we were off the ship within the next five minutes. We were still 20 minutes late to our excursion, but thankfully so was everyone else, so they waited for us. Moral of the story: Talk to guest services. They won't be mad you didn't book through the cruiseline. Read more