delacruz

@KaiBlue - At first glance I thought the decor was a bit over the top, but it has grown on me. Our only previous Carnival cruise was on the Pride, and I thought it was rather dark in the interior spaces - the Venezia looks much more interesting @dferreira7- Dan & Donna - looking forward to getting a first hand report on the ship from you for your 2023 sailing!

A handy bit of information if you are 50+ and a member of AARP. (and if you are 50+ but NOT a member of AARP the annual membership is usually $16/yr, but currently on sale for $12/yr: AARP sells Carnival Cruise Gift Cards that can be purchased at a 10% discount. They come in $500 and $100 value, so they cost $450 and $90 respectively. As opposed to some other cruise lines that only let you use gift cards for your initial down payment and nothing else, or only OBC, there does not seem to be any limitation to what you can use this on. We splurged a bit on this sailing with a wraparound Premium Vista balcony in the Terrazzo Carnivale section, and plan to purchase the Cheers Beverage packages (celebrating a big birthday and a retirement), so getting 10% off makes a nice balance.

We have ~the same number of cruises under our belts as you, but this will only be our 2nd Carnival Cruise - the first was the Carnival Pride in 2009. There were things we liked about that cruise (always being able to drive to port is a big plus, and much more so with so many major flight glitches the past couple of years), but there was a huge group of Baltimore Ravens fans onboard, and at times it felt we were at a really bad frat party. After years of Royal Caribbean, as much as I've enjoyed all the sailings, it's starting to feel like the 'same old' thing, and we're looking forward to so much that will be different and new to us on this ship. That's wonderful about your niece's intro to cruising. I love seeing multi-generational family groups on cruises and miss out on that - we have some family members that are afraid they will be seasick and some that don't enjoy cruising or visiting the same warmer climates that we do, so we haven't been able to organize a family sailing. 'Welcome Aboard'! We never get bored going to St Thomas and San Juan and are really looking forward to the 3 new ports for us - T&C, HMC, and Amber Cove.

My husband Paul and I just booked this cruise! We were looking for a sailing with a stop at Turks & Caicos, which along with HMC and Amber Cove are the few ports we've not yet visited. This ship and itinerary checked all the boxes for us. Looking forward to chatting between now and then!

Hope the OP is on board and having a great time. We ALSO sailed out of San Juan in Oct 2019 and 2018 on RCCL, back when we didn't have time slots. Both times we wanted a leisurely morning and brunch in OSJ, so we didn't rush to board, but my photos show that we were checked in and enjoying our first drink at 11:55am and 12:55pm respectively...lol! (Can you tell we are creatures of habit?? 🙂 )

We stayed at the Courtyard by Marriott in Miramar in Oct 2018. We were budgeting and liked that Miramar was closer to OSJ than the pre-cruise hotels we had been staying at before in Isla Verde. The hotel itself was just fine, and we found the restaurant 'Comedor' to be excellent for all meals. We enjoyed the little gourmet market diagonally across the street for coffees, snacks and takeout. However, it may be because we were there a couple of years post- Hurricane Maria, but we found ourselves a bit uncomfortable with the number of panhandlers in the immediate area. The following year we stayed at the Decanter Hotel in Old San Juan and loved everything about it.