My daughter and some of her high school friends wanted to go on a senior trip so a cruise on Carnival Valor was chosen. I wasn’t excited about the choice but obliged. The cruise port in New Orleans is a nightmare. If you cruise with Carnival you are herded like cattle on and off the ship. We were supposed to board the ship at 12:30. We arrived at 11:30 and it took over an hour to board. Once on the ship we couldn’t access our room until 1:30. If you bought the cheers package and didn’t have a credit card attached to your account you couldn’t use your drink package the entire first day because, being on the Mississippi River, they needed to charge tax on drinks and had no way to charge so they wouldn’t serve you and were very rude about it...so essentially 51.00 lost the first day.

The ship is old and very dated. The toilet in my room looked like it was never cleaned. It had a black mildew ring in the bowl my entire trip. The curtains in my room looked like they had cigarette burn holes in them. The sofa was dirty and worn. There is only one outlet in each cabin which makes it very difficult to get ready, charge your cell phone, use hairdryers or flat irons... The casino with live entertainment was located directly below my cabin. I had to call and complain about how loud it was nearly every night. I’m ready to sleep by 11:30 and when I can hear a song being played so clearly that I can sing the words it is entirely too loud.

We ate in the main dining room two nights and the food was less than average. I had the lasagna one night and it was a square of ground beef with cheese on top. The second night I ordered the Mahi Mahi and it tased like starkist tuna. It was awful. And the desserts were equally as bad. Read more