Chose this cruise simply because it was an inexpensive short cruise that I could book at the last minute while spending a month or so in Florida. I had never cruised on Carnival and thought it might be a way to give them a quick test drive. Little did I know that this "test drive" would turn out to be the "cruise from hell".

I should have suspected something was wrong when they double charged me for drinks at dinner the first night. I discovered this when I went to the customer service counter at 3 AM on the first night because I couldn't sleep on the thing they called a bed and was unable to find anyplace open for a cup of coffee. They informed me that nothing was open from midnight to 6 or 7 AM. This is something I have never encountered on any other ship. There is always someplace open 24 hours a day. My inability to sleep was due to the beds having so little support that you dare not sit on their edge unless you wished to find yourself sliding onto the floor. After two nights of this I was ready to get off the ship and fly home until they finally agreed to replace the mattress in our cabin.

The sliding door to our balcony was in severe need of attention as it was almost impossible to operate due to being off the track. They kept trying to tell me that it was supposed to be this stiff. I kept working my complaint up the chain of command until they finally came and seated it properly in its track on the last evening of our cruise. Read more