This was our first Carnival cruise.. I have to say I was pleasantly surprised to find that we actually had a blast. The ship itself is cozy, and easy to get around. Our balcony stateroom was awesome. I loved my Mamosas on the balcony in the early morning..The food was o.k., as I'm used to excellent foods where we live.. For me the only downfall, was the pools. I've never seen such small pools on a ship before.. It was very hot when we sailed, so everyone was at the pool, and in it... Even the adults only pool was always packed, but we made the most of it.. The shows were o.k. also, I've seen much better entertainment on other ships, but again we were there to have fun, and fun, we had.. unfortunately there wasn't much to do for my 17 y/o.. He was either to old for the kids stuff or to young for the 18y/o activities. But he managed to get into most anything, except Frankensteins disco.. not a big problem.. but they should try to accomodate these kids a bit better. He was turning 18 the following week, but was still unable to get in.. All in All, my group of 11 had a blast, and would definately cruise with Carnival again. To anyone who reads these reviews, it"s all a matter of preference. We read that there were a lot of smokers who went on this ship, and I have to say the ashtrays available were always emptied, and we never smelled smoke...The Carnival miracle turned out to be a pretty fun little Miracle ship for us...