Disembarkation and Final Thoughts

We were up early and went to the dining room for breakfast.  We came back and got our hand luggage and headed to the Limelight Lounge where the Platinum and Diamond people were to meet.  Since we can now access our phones and emails Teresa finds that a classmate of the twins was killed in a chain reaction crash on I-285 on Thanksgiving day.  Their family was on the way to their grandparents house when it happened.  Her 7 year old sister and 4 month old baby brother were also hurt. Very sad and our kids are understandably upset.

There was a picture of the twins that Teresa forgot to get and they were selling them this morning so we went down to do that.  I thought maybe we could get off but we were stopped and had to go back.  By the time we got back up, they had called our number and we were able to leave and we got the luggage and were through Customs quickly.  Teresa went to get the car and we waited and waited.  Finally she comes and she said the setup took her out of the port completely exiting the garage so she had to go down near the hotel where we stayed and turn around and come back.  Yikes.  We quickly load everything in and tuck and roll.  We were on the road headed home by 8:30 AM.  Just as we were about to merge onto I-75 the traffic came to a standstill and it was stop and go almost all the way to the Georgia state line before we moved at the speed limit for more than a minute at a time.  Long drive and Teresa was tired and it was dark when we got to the north side at about 5:45 PM.  We are grateful we made it home safely and the kids were anxious to see daddy and tell him all about the cruise.  The Kramer's were about 20 miles behind us the whole trip home and poor Beth and her family were the very last to get off the ship that morning.  We didn't get to see a lot of Beth.  Her children are younger and they tended to go to different activities than we did and they also had early dinner.  I met her in laws who are also Platinum with Carnival and they are very nice people.

Obviously the Kramer's were still having fun with
 Susan while leaving the parking garage

Final thoughts...

 

 

Many people have a bad impression of Carnival because of mechanical issues (although it has happened to RCL and upscale lines too but the media doesn't seem to single them out) and it has been known for drunken parties.  I am not going to argue the point but will just say that they have tried hard to make this a family line and I think they do a good job.  The ship sailed full this week so there were tons of children of all ages.  There were some unruly and I have to say that now that my grandchildren are older, I could not sit in the pool area and hear the screaming young children in the pool.  The Serenity area on the other hand was wonderful with nice thick towels, padded seating and lounges, hammocks, bar service etc.  The also don't charge to use it as Princess does.

 

I have stock in both Royal Caribbean and Carnival but again RCL and their affiliates have repeatedly not allowed you to use the shareholder credit because they claim you can't combine it with other fare discounts which they claim you already have received.  I do not have that issue with Carnival or Carnival brands and got the $100 credit for this 7 day cruise as well.  Carnival also gives their Platinum and Diamond cruisers nice perks and gifts.  RCL has cut back on the gifts and on our last cruise with them it was disappointing.  They do have a lounge for Diamond members on most of their ships but they are usually overcrowded.   On a transatlantic cruise that Debbie and I did there were more drunk and obnoxious people on that cruise than I have ever seen on a Carnival cruise.  They were able to have free drinks in the lounge prior to dinner and some would spend 3 hours in there drinking.  Some were removed from the dining room for being too drunk.  On ships that don't have the lounge you do get two free drinks daily between 5-8 PM which is nice.  Carnival does the catered party with free drinks and you get a coupon for one other free drink during the cruise.  We also got a quart bottle of water for being a repeat cruiser (the kids got them too) and I got a plate of desert canapés delivered during the cruise as well and my Platinum gift this time is a 5 x 7 hardcover notebook and pen.

 

Carnival ships are not a plush and luxurious as RCL ships for sure but they have bigger cabins in all categories.  There is also a huge difference in what the cost is with Carnival being much less expensive.  The object here is less than a seven day cruise will definitely get you a different type of crowd on any line.  The more days over seven you go, the less you will generally deal with a ship over run with children...except over holidays obviously.  Personally, I believe that the food is much better in the main dining rooms on Carnival than RCL and generally the crews are friendlier or appear to be happier employees.  Not that there isn't an exception here and there in both lines.

 

Now, this ship.  Teresa and I cruised on this ship when it was the Destiny.  Carnival spent huge amounts of money revamping this ship and it really has many nice features.  The Ocean Plaza is on deck 5 and houses the upper level of the lounge, most of the shops, the casino, coffee shop, Shake shop, Taste bar, Alchemy bar and Red Frog Pub going from front to back.  This is generally the hot spot for activity at all times but especially at night.  The Alchemy bar is like the martini bar on Celebrity without the frozen top.  There is an area between the Alchemy and Red Frog Pub with a stage where Deja Vu played most nights.  They also had the meet the officiers event in this area.  The Taste Bar was free and had different kinds of food nightly in small portions.  They Hub or internet area with computers was in front of the Shake Shop and Java Café which were both $ and you could get both with or without alcohol.  Across from there was the hostess desk where people that had Your Time Dining would come to sign in and get a vibrator to be notified when their table was available.  There was always a long line there.  I don't know how long most people waited but it appeared most had cocktails in the Alchemy bar while waiting for their tables.   The casino had a non-smoking side but that was futile.  All smokers congregated in there so they didn't have to go to one of the outside decks to smoke so it was horribly smokey and you had to walk through the middle of it to get to the atrium and front of the ship.  Another quick comparison though is that Carnival gives it's gamblers free cocktails if you have gambled on prior cruises...RCL does nothing equal.  The show lounge on this ship is unique.  Small and the chairs on the bottom are removable and can be reconfigured for different events.  It also has a bar and is used late nights  as a dance venue.  The Sports deck had racer slides complete with timers and a couple twister slides as well.  They had a children's area with bucket dump as well as small pools for toddlers.  The Ropes Course was a big thing and everyone seemed to like it and want to try.  My only complaint here is that they need to rethink the height of the people they allow to use it.  Although they have a height requirement, in some cases this was not enough.  If you had short arms, you couldn't reach the hold ropes on some of the features which caused huge backups since the crew member had to go "rescue" them or move them to the next part.  The boys loved playing in the basketball area and they played ping pong too.  Teresa and the kids played golf which was on the very top and the last hole had a feature where the ball dropped down a deck to finish the shot...very cute.  They had pool tables and a hot dog stand up there although I never saw it open....there were a couple picnic tables as well and a foosball table too I think.  The movies on the big screen were actually good ones all week.  Due to us having late seating dinner that late movie was often too late for me or the weather was not good so I missed the Minion movie...bummer!  Some of the others and the kids did go up a couple times.  The popcorn was free.  There was a bar at the back of Lido called the Havana Bar and we had breakfast in there one morning.  That was something that was different on this ship.  The buffet on Lido was really not crowded as it is on most ships.  They have breakfast in the Havana Bar where they had omelets stations, and in the Taste Bar they had Continental breakfast but also had bacon, sausage and eggs and the dining room was also open.  At lunch, the deli, Blue Iguana which served fresh made tortillas for tacos and burritos.  They had a salsa bar for dressing them....the fish tacos were wonderful!  Then of course there was Guy's Burgers which were oh so good and they had a separate area with condiments for your burgers and fries as well.  Guy's was probably the only place you had to wait for food on the entire ship and that was during the main lunch hour or when people were returning to the ship from being in port.  Of course they had the self serve soft ice cream machines which stayed busy continuously.  They were on both sides just before the doors that entered the buffet area.  I can't imagine the number of cones they go through on a cruise.  The deli was on the starboard side before the actual buffet line so as not to interfere with the flow there either.  The pizza was all the way at the back of the buffet in a separate area as well.  It all seemed to work really well and considering the number of people on our cruise, I was surprised at how well it all ran.  The music on the ship was excellent and the shows were good.  Our dining room experience was so much better than our Brilliance cruise last year.  We weren't crowded even though there were 11 of us at the table.  It was easy to get in or out since the tables were not crammed together.  Our waiters were fun and thoughtful and we enjoyed them.

 

 It was definitely a different cruise for me.  Since the kids all had friends on this cruise it presented different dynamics.  The boys (Chris) were anxious to go off  upon waking in the morning and not care if they saw the adults again until dinner.  I missed him hanging around with us.  He also was different with his sisters.  He usually loves to get dressed up and get photos done with them.  Because he had friends that didn't think this was fun, he really wouldn't participate which made me sad.  The girls stayed with us more often which was fun.  I prefer cruising with them without the distractions of friends.  I guess it's just hard to accept that they are growing up...sigh.