I booked this cruise in a panic on the morning of March 29th when NCL finally announced that the April 2 sailing of the Escape had been cancelled. Our friends (Rxlowry...see "alpacamybagsblog dot com" for their much more professional and detailed review) had planned to surprise my wife and I on the NCL Escape but had to let the cat out of the bag early to make sure we both booked the same back-up cruise.

I hadn't sailed on Carnival since my wife and I's honeymoon in 1999, when we took a 4-day cruise to the Bahamas. We had a lot of complaints on that cruise which I won't go in to, but once we had kids that could sail with us, we started to become loyal NCL fans. After taking 9 NCL cruises in the past 14 years, we finally decided to give Carnival another shot (with a little help from some wind, an incompetent NCL captain, and our best friends who helped to talk us into trying out the Mardi Gras).

Anyway, we were sailing with 4 (me, wife, 17-yr old daughter, and her friend) and had booked a 4-person balcony with all of NCL's usual perks (lots of OBC, $50 per port excursion credit, free internet, free 2-night specialty dining, additional 2 night loyalty program specialty dining, free drink package). So, switching to Mardi Gras at the last minute did mean a few sacrifices: Read more