Sea days… people love them or hate them. On this particular cruise, we have two of them back-to-back as we head back to Miami to wrap up this 7-day western Caribbean cruise on the Carnival Celebration.
While I love sea days, they have their pros and cons. Some cons, the ship will be crowded and with everyone looking to soak up some sun, finding a spot to lounge around can be difficult. Plus, if you’re wanting to chill in one of the ship’s pools – they will be crowded. I personally find pools and hot tubs absolutely disgusting, so you won’t find me there anyway!
On Carnival Celebration, there is the Serenity deck, an adults-only area where no kids are allowed and it’s usually a little less crowded than the main pool area where there is always something going on poolside and can get a bit rowdy.
The pros of sea days are obvious, they are completely laid-back with no rushing around to make sure you are on time for your shore excursion and definitely no stress to make sure you get back in time! (Yeah, talking about you pier runners.) Plus, on Carnival Celebration there is something going on somewhere on the ship almost every minute of the day – including Sea Day Brunch!
Yes, if you’re looking for that Sunday feeling on a sea day, Carnival offers a special brunch menu in the main dining room:
Whether it’s trivia, bingo, music, dance lessons, cooking classes, or the pop-up Build-A-Bear Workshop that was going on in Celebration Central first thing in the morning, there’s no shortage of activities to keep your sea day boredom at bay.
I started the morning off by heading to my “office” outside Guy’s Pig & Anchor Smokehouse | Brewhouse where it was quiet until they opened around 11 am and people started wanting their share of BBQ pork, beef, mac and cheese, collards, and some southern faves.
During lunch hours, you can head to their quick service spot outside of deck 8 and get your fill. At night, they offer sit-down service inside along with a few additional items such as prime rib and ribs which will set you back a couple of bucks.
I was joined by some of my traveling friends and we all decided to give it a whirl for lunch. I got some pulled pork, smoked beef, chicken, and collards. Once again, I have to say the food here was unremarkable.
The pork was refrigerator cold, considering they just opened for service which was surprising, and it was on the dry side. The smoked beef was tough and although billed as “thinly sliced” it was actually thick chunks. The beef had a nice smoke ring which added flavor, but that didn’t make up for its toughness.
Out of the three types of meat, chicken was the best. The leg was well-seasoned, juicy, and packed with flavor. The collards were a bit of a disappointment, they were bland and the pieces of pork mixed in didn’t do anything to enhance the flavor.
My opinion of the food so far remains unchanged – average at best. Outside of breakfast, the buffet offers a very limited amount of offerings – 10 to 12 at best in addition to salad and desserts. The main dining room isn’t something I’m going to review on this ship, as it’s simply not worth it with all of the other options available for dinner.
Previous cruises on Carnival have shown that the main dining room offerings leave much to be desired, so I would be inclined to say it’s the same on Carnival Celebration.
Top choices for afternoon eats, would be Guy’s Burger Joint, Big Chicken (as long as it hasn’t been sitting out too long, see yesterday’s review), Blue Iguana Cantina for tacos and burritos, and a spot that’s on my list to try today the Seafood Shack for lobster rolls and freshly steamed seafood.
Before I dig into dinner, a word about pizza. There are times during the day and night when the line for pizza is crazy! For example, around 10:30 pm as I was walking around, the pizza chefs could not keep up with the number of people wanting a slice. Seeing there was such a demand for this, I decided to get in line to see what the hype was all about.
At the front of the line, a crew member was just yelling out, “Who wants pepperoni, that’s all I have,” and he would toss out a plate with two slices. Then, “Margherita, who wants?” He did this to try to get people to clear the line instead of them waiting for a specific slice to come out of the oven. It goes without saying, special requests were not being taken!
I grabbed a plate of two Margherita slices as they were being tossed around like car keys during Oprah’s Christmas show and headed off to find a place to sit.
The pizza had a thin crust, that made it foldable like a New York slice, but definitely not New York Style. The sauce was on the watery side with not much flavor to it, and the cheese was your typical pizza cheese. Overall, if you’re trying to soak up the results of overuse of your Cheers! beverage package, or if you’re looking for something quick to nosh on, it fits the bill, but it’s definitely not the best pizza out there.
The best pizza at sea can definitely be found on MSC.
Tonight was the second elegant night of the cruise. Elegant anymore is what you make it. Some people get dressed up and have photos taken around the ship, others go casual, and others go in their best “I don’t give a crap look.”
I’m not big into dress codes on vacation. After all, you’re ON VACATION! Feel free to wear whatever makes you feel comfortable and don’t worry about it. Just remember to follow the minimum requirements for the restaurant you’re dining in which usually is no swimsuits, no sleeveless shirts, and you have to wear shoes.
Pretty simple.
Before dinner, I stopped to see the crew recognition show in Celebration Central. Others I’m traveling with saved a seat for me in one of the stadium-style seating areas on deck 7. Again, seeing a show here is frustrating. Unless you’re on deck 7 seated in front of the stage, you’re not going to have a good view of any of the performances.
From where I was seated, my view of what was going on was the backs and heads of the people in front of me and the very top of the video screens. This isn’t the first time I mentioned the need to rework this space so you can actually enjoy a performance from wherever you sit.
I didn’t stay for the entire show, as after 20 minutes of looking at the people in front of me, I got up and left. I went down one deck and sat at the bar which sits off to the left of the stage and I had a better view of the show from there than I actually did from seats designed to see the show.
Along with the elegant night, it was also the “Feast” night in the main dining room. This is the night when lobster and prime rib are served for dinner. A few months ago on the Carnival Spirt, I did the main dining room for this night and was not impressed with either the prime rib or lobster, so it wasn’t on my radar for tonight.
I took a quick look in the Carnival Hub app to see which restaurants had reservations available and was shocked to see that there was a 60 to 70-minute wait for the main dining room! A few of us decided to head over to Chibang! again and try some of the other dishes on the menu.
We dined at Chibang! on the first night of the cruise, where I had some pretty good duck which was carved tableside. Tonight I decided to try some of the other items on the menu, so I ordered shrimp pot stickers and chicken spring rolls for an appetizer, and beef and broccoli as my main course with a side of Hakka noodles.
The spring rolls and pot stickers were your standard Chinese restaurant quality items. Nothing special here at all.
The beef and broccoli had a kick to it but there were very few pieces of broccoli and the overall portion size was small. I quickly realized I made a mistake by not ordering something else, but it was too late.
The Hakka noodles were good and were the same as they served the other night with the duck. Basically, they’re a noodle version of fried rice.
Others I dined with got the pork belly and lettuce wraps as appetizers that we had the other night, as well as Kung Pao chicken and the steak ranchero. The King Pao chicken was standard and the steak was a bit on the fatty side.
If I were to compare this to a restaurant back home, think Pei Wei or Panda Express.
After dinner, I wandered around the ship a bit where I sampled the aforementioned pizza and before heading back to the room stopped to see the dance party happening in Celebration Central. The DJ kept the crowd energized and people of all ages were getting into the music which was accompanied by an everchanging video wall, laser and light effects, and smoke.
As I sit here writing, the cruise director just announced that the disembarkation talk will be happening in 15 minutes… a quick reminder that bright and early tomorrow morning those friendly smiles we have seen around the ship all week will be getting ready to push us all off and prepare for the next wave of cruisers.