The final day of this 7-day Eastern Caribbean cruise on the Carnival Celebration saw us heading back to PortMiami with an arrival time of 4:00 am which means this latest adventure is almost over. Just a few things to cover before I get into my final thoughts.
As we sailed off the coast of Cuba the weather was great until we encountered a brief period of rain – the first bit of precipitation we had the entire cruise. While the sky looked menacing, it turned out just to be a quick downpour which quickly caused everyone on the upper decks to run inside which created more chaos than if everyone just stayed outside. Not sure why people tend to run out of a pool when it starts to rain, but, they do.
For those looking to kill time, there were plenty of activities scheduled throughout the day, which you can have a peek at in the FunTimes later down in this post.
The struggles with the young adults in the stateroom next to mine continued even on the last day and I ended up having to call security two separate times. For those who haven’t followed along so far… there are four teenage boys living next to me who have been screaming, slamming the cabin door, and what can only be described as “body slamming each other off the walls” on a daily basis, all hours of the day.
Security addressed it with their parents previously and you would have thought that it would have been enough to stop the behavior. But it wasn’t. Today, when I came back to my room to change for dinner, the screaming and the wall banging were constant. I called for security… they never came.
Later in the evening, at bedtime, the noise returned louder than ever – this time accompanied by music. Another call to security and they arrived. As he knocked on their door, the music stopped, the room went quiet, as he kept knocking until someone finally came to the door.
Once security left, he called my stateroom to tell me, “There are no kids in there, just a man who was sleeping.” I told him he was full of bull excrement as this has been an ongoing issue and not the first time it was reported. It was clear he just wanted to move on.
A quick note on dinner. After ditching Cucina del Capitano last night (read why here), I decided to give it a shot again as it was the one restaurant with the lowest wait time (20 – 30 minutes at 8:20 pm). I got an alert that my table was ready at 8:50 pm and the hostess, the same from last night who told me it was too hot to dine outside, told me that she has a table for me outside (I didn’t request one, by the way).
As soon as I sat down a server came over and asked if I was ready to order! I politely told him that I just got here and haven’t even had time to look at the menu.
I started off with the Caprese salad and Arancini. The Caprese was standard although if they made homemade mozzarella it would have been better. The Arancini were cooked to have a nice crispy exterior, the sauce added some spice and was overall good.
For the main course, I chose the short ribs and a side of baked rigatoni. The short ribs were tender and delicious while the rigatoni spent a little too long under the heat lamp as they were a bit on the hard side and not in an al dente kind of way.
For dessert, I went with the apple torte which was bland.
Service was slow. A drink order was never taken until the main course arrived and then my drink never came, but my water glass was kept full. The time between the appetizers and main course was a bit excessive and another table that was seated at the same time kept asking when their food would arrive. Dessert was put on my table before I even finished my main course.
Anyway, let’s get right to the overall review:
The Stateroom: I have not stayed in an inside stateroom on both of Carniva’s Excel class ships, Mardi Gras and Celebration. Both offer the same amount of space and amenities and are a tad bit smaller than a balcony stateroom (minus the balcony, of course). This particular stateroom, 9364, is a connecting stateroom and also has one upper berth.
Upon embarking, the room was set up to sleep three and honestly, I’m not sure how more than two people could live in a room this small for a week. While inside staterooms are budget-friendly, I wouldn’t like to share them with three or four people as space is tight.
Once the room was reconfigured to have one king bed, there is about 12″ of space on each side of the bed for you to maneuver around. The side with the upper berth is even harder to navigate around as it protrudes from the top half of the wall making the space tighter.
Carnival took into consideration that keeping devices powered is important and all the staterooms in the Excel class have plenty of power and USB outlets. In this particular cabin, a single USB port is located on each side of the bed where the reading light is. The upper berth even has its own set of two USB ports in addition to a reading light.
Over on the desk/makeup area, there are two sets of two USB ports and three power outlets, so there really is no need to bring charging bricks unless you have a lot of devices to keep charged.
Storage space is more than adequate for one or two people – more than that is questionable. The closets are large and have pull-out drawers and plenty of hanging space. Throughout the cabin there are additional drawers and spaces to store items, with beds designed to have suitcases stored underneath so you don’t need to take up closet space.
The bathroom, as previously noted, may be tight for those of size, especially the toilet area. The shower is large by cruise ship standards and has a glass door, unlike other Carnival ships that have the dreaded shower curtain that always finds a way to touch you mid-shower. Bathroom storage is more than adequate for two people.
My only complaint about this stateroom, besides the neighbors next door, was the bed. The mattresses, when pushed together to create a king bed, constantly separated leaving a space between them that I ended up rolling into multiple times during the night. This made for uncomfortable sleeping.
For those booked in 9364 or surrounding staterooms, take note that this block of rooms is directly above Center Stage, and while most shows are over by 11:00 pm, you do end up hearing and feeling some noise from the activity one floor below.
The Food: I’ve touched on the food in each daily review so I won’t go into too much detail here, but once again I give the overall food rating a solid “average.” Most of the complaints I heard from others all focused on the food. While at lunchtime your best bets include Guy’s Burger Joint and Big Chicken, the buffet was a consistent letdown with a limited selection. In fact, whether for breakfast, lunch, or dinner, the food served there can easily be compared to Old Country Buffet.
For specialty restaurants, the best value continues to be Bonsai Teppanyaki at only $38 per person compared to others priced at $48 per person.
If I had to put stars on the various restaurants, they would be:
- Main Dining Room (Free) – did not experience
- Cucina del Capitano (Free) – ***
- Rudi’s Seagrill ($48 pp) – did not experience this trip, but ***** on previous
- Fahrenheit 555 ($48 pp) – ****
- Bonsai Teppanyaki ($38 pp) – *****
- Emeril’s Bistro 1396 (ala carte) – did not experience, ala carte pricing would be more than the cheapest specialty per person charge for dinner
- Guy’s Burger Joint (Free) – ***
- Big Chicken (Free) – ***
Overall, service in the restaurants was good, however, since this was a packed ship, there were times when service was slower than expected and servers were struggling to keep up.
Fellow Passengers: Let me start off by saying, the ship was more than full. 6,374 passengers were on board and most were families with kids and large family groups. The age range for this cruise was all over the board! I will say that cruising out of Miami attracts more of a party crowd than cruising out of Port Everglades!
Let me touch on weed. During my last sailing on Carnival Celebration, there was weed smoking on balconies, in smoking areas, and even right out in the open on the Lido deck. During this cruise, I didn’t smell weed once. This may be due to the drug-sniffing dogs at embarkation and Carnival’s stepped-up efforts to tackle this problem that is common on their ships. But whatever they’re doing is working.
Sorry, there were no fights on this cruise and the guests were pretty much under control except at debarkation. More on that in a bit.
Entertainment: Once again, Carnival excels are keeping guests busy and entertained all day long. The production shows are generally good, the game shows (Deal or No Deal and Family Fued) are entertaining, and the comedians are doing their thing every night – and sometimes during the day.
If you want your days to be packed with fun stuff to do, this is the cruise line for you. If you want your days to involve just laying in the sun, Carnival has you covered with that as well. There’s truly never a dull moment on board.
Embarkation: For me, this was a little out of the ordinary. My booking was made a day in advance, and as I discussed in the Day 1 report, I encountered some issues at check-in which required me to have some “special handling” during embarkation. However, the process was smooth, and with Carnival’s electronic check-in and facial recognition, it’s super quick.
Thankfully I was driven to the port this time and avoided all the hassle that comes along with parking at PortMiami. If you’re parking your car there, pack your patience as well as your swim trunks.
Debarkation: Here is where there was a bit of an issue and it involves technology, fellow passengers, and the ship’s procedures. I chose self debarkation which means you carry off your own luggage and are one of the first to get off the ship.
We got clearance a little after 7:00 am for debarkation to start. First off were Carnival’s Diamond and Platinum level cruisers as well as those who paid for “Faster to the Fun” (an expedited embarkation/debarkation upsell), and suite guests. Everyone else was to remain on decks 7, 8, or in your stateroom until general boarding was called and you were to proceed to deck 6.
Of course, nobody listened and deck 6 was flooded with EVERYONE trying to get off the ship regardless of status. People were cramming stairwells, blocking entrances/exits, and trying to get off with the priority guests when they were not priority. Crew members did their best, but they were just getting rushed by guests from every direction.
General debarkation began roughly at 7:20 am and stopped shortly thereafter. An announcement was made that a “technical issue” arose and debarkation was stopped until the IT department could get things running again. About 15 minutes later, the line started moving, and then stopped with another announcement citing “technical issues.”
This is when things got a little out of hand. Guests were getting upset, people started arguing with others trying to get through already overcrowded spaces, and elevator alarms were going off because doors were being held open because there was no room for those getting out to go! During the last announcement from the cruise director saying things were stopped again, one “gentleman” shouted, “If he was here right now I would punch him in the face!”
It was around 7:45 am when the line started moving slowly as the cruise director announced that they were able to get one line up and running for guests to debark. It wasn’t until 8:20 am that I was off the ship and in line for customs and immigration.
Technical issues aside, the debarkation process was very disorganized and while the crew did their best, guests just didn’t listen. While self-debarkation is great, calling those who chose this method by zones or floor may be a better option rather than making it a free for all.
Once in the terminal, facial recognition made it just a matter of minutes to be clear and on the way home.
Value: As I mentioned previously, I was given a free interior stateroom as part of a last-minute casino offer, I paid the solo rate of $100 per person, which was given back in the form of $100 in onboard credit. I only had to pay the $144 in port fees and taxes.
Here’s what this cruise cost me at the end of the day:
- Cruise Rate – $0 ($100 charge was refunded as onboard credit)
- Port Fees & Taxes – $144
- Premium WiFi – $130
- Bottomless Bubbles Non-Alcoholic Beverage Pacakge – $67
- Gratuities, Special Dining Charges – $620 (does not including gambling money)
- Port Parking – $0 (I was driven to the port by friends)
The total for this cruise came to $961. In comparison, my April 7-day Western Caribbean cruise on Carnival Celebration came to $3176 for a balcony stateroom and all the above except I had the CHEERS! beverage package for drinks.
Now, let me briefly mention the casino. I ended up spending a little more than my last cruise in the casino because this one was just not paying out. As I mentioned yesterday, my casino points on this cruise were not multiplying like they were on my Mardi Gras cruise two weeks ago. For every $2.50 cycled through a slot machine or table game (cash money or win spend), you earn one point. I earned 84% LESS points on this cruise! I did not win ANYTHING.
Overall, I feel bad doing this, but this particular cruise gets a solid 6 on a 1-10 scale which is a bit low for me. If it weren’t for the number of guests on board, some long wait times to get into restaurants at dinner, congested interior spaces during the evening, slow service at dinner, and the inability for Carnival to solve the issue of the kids in the stateroom next door to me, it would have been an 8.
The ship itself is definitely a 10, although Carnival loyalists who love the older ships would strongly disagree with me. The crew gets a 9 as almost every interaction with a crew member was a positive one.
Thanks for following along on this latest cruise vacation, stay tuned for the next one!
FunTimes for Day 7:
The FunTimes for June 10, 2023, can also be downloaded as a PDF by clicking here.