mz-s

Those of us who have cruised Carnival for years can recognize the marked decline in their food quality, especially in the past few months and years. The buffet serves more and more rice and other cheap foods. The "sausage" on the breakfast buffet is often just cut up hot dogs, but that's not new (I experienced that on the Fantasy in 2014 as well). The shrimp in the MDR shrimp cocktail are smaller and you get fewer of them. They've shortened hours and cut out some meals out completely. Nothing is available 24/7 included in your cruise fare anymore for example.

https://www.carnival.com/vifp/benefits

Carnival's current MDR food is not worth a $5 upcharge. I have been on 4 Carnival cruises since the restart and I can unequivocally say I get a better meal at the local Golden Corral. It's a matter of time before Carnival outsources their MDR food to Denny's or TGI Friday's.

On a 5 day cruise you'll typically have two cruise elegant nights, one will offer prime rib the other will offer jumbo shrimp and often times beef tenderloin. My advice - if you still have OBC and have prepaid tips, cancel that for a refund and let Carnival pay for your tips with OBC.

carnival is no longer a special vacation in my opinion. I put up with the cut-rate experience with Spirit because I am flying somewhere I need to be. I don’t need to be on a cruise so I do not need to put up with the cutbacks.

they seem to be in no hurry to convert the remainder of their fleet. But they can institute cutbacks like this overnight.

bottle filler dispensers would be nice.

you cannot refill your bottle at the buffet. There are signs saying to use a fresh cup for each drink.

I really don’t want to hear about waste from Carnival as long as they’re still printing 10,000 photos during every cruise - the vast majority of which are simply thrown away.

30 billion plus in debt and no sign of profitablity yet…expect more of this until they’re the Spirit Airlines of the cruise industry.

I doubt he will care unless Carnival's checks start to bounce.

Anyone who has talked to crew, especially newer crew, knows how true that last sentence is.

Guy's is just one venue that has markedly declined in quality all around the ship. Too much to discuss and more coming every day.

Carnival should be congratulated for making cruise vacations affordable for more people. I think they should work on amplifying their VIFP program so that those who are ready to move up are incentivized to do so under the Carnival Corp banner.

Yes there are many more slot machines than there are table games.

Well it’s not a penny per spin because you can’t just bet one penny. Maybe that’s what they’re talking about.

I drive in the morning of, arrive around 12:30-1 or maybe a little later around 1:30. Not much of a line by then. Have fun!

It’s roughly lunch hours. I don’t recall exact hours. And the funfetti cheesecake is frankly one of my favorite desserts all cruise. Only served on embarkation day.

You can order a bottle of water with an alcoholic drink and like all other nonalcoholic drinks they are unlimited. But as with all Cheers purchases you must wait 5 minutes between orders.

The canned gravy would be a marked upgrade for Carnival.

It’s only the social plan that Carnival says iMessage isn’t supported.

Bathing suits and no shoes in the Lido buffet, swimsuit coverups in the MDR - anything goes on Carnival.

It worked on the Sunshine in May, but not in September. So my guess is they figured out how to block it. And while people are saying to buy the Social plan for iMessage and FaceTime - that's great if it works for you. But Carnival says it's not supported. So YMMV. Refunding the plan purchase at Guest Services is always an option if you get on board and find out it isn't working.

Right, as I recall the $50 OBC was not an automatic thing. We did have to call our PVP at the time and request it.

John Heald said that any time you give someone a tip it goes directly to them. And that’s been told to me by bar waiters before. Tips may have been divided in the past but my understanding is now they are kept by the individual bar waiter.