fabby50

Must be the part of America I am from (the South), but everyone I know picks up their bacon and eats it, no fork or knife required.  I am a vegetarian, so I have no skin in the bacon game - 

37 minutes ago, tallnthensome said:

I never said it had to be 5 star and I never said that it wasn't buffet food. I'm saying there is not enough of it. Two small stations out of four with both containing the same food is not acceptable when comparing to all my other cruises including even MSC. I'm used to long rows and large selections and variety and ethnicity.  Apparently some are very accepting  of the minimum and even welcome mediocrity. If you love chili Mac,  Cajun poppers, Ziti, white rice,  pot roast  and beans then it may he a home run for you. I doubt anyone standing in front of the buffet as I have the last couple of days would be jumping for joy. Easy to judge from your couch. Its not ruining my cruise in anyway as all other aspects have been wonderful. Just letting people know what to expect. 

I think what some of us are trying to tell you is this is not normal for Carnival or the Panorama.  From my reading of other cruise line reviews at this time, all buffets seem to be minimized and the usual quantity is not there on those lines either.  I agree about the quality, but I don't like buffet food anyway.  I would think when ships return to full capacity and supply lines are also more normalized, you'll see the normal plethora of so-so food as we all have in the past.

We were on the second cruise Panorama did after launch.  I can say, in "normal times" the buffet was full of selections.  I too don't care for buffet food, if we went there, I hit the sandwich station and had the caprese sandwich.  Its a go to on all the cruise lines we've been on, always seems to be about the same no matter what line, and really hard to screw up.  Hopefully, they still had the pretzel rolls somewhere!  The absolute worse food I ever had was on Princess - their vegetarian burger on offer on the buffet was a cold patty made out of leftover mashed potatoes and peas.  First thing I ever ate on Princess and started me out with a bad taste in my mouth 🙂

We are on one of the coastals next year - they changed our port of Monterey to Santa Barbara, not sure where we'll actually go 🙂

We are headed to Catalina tomorrow.  Per our hotel, they are following LA county rules right now, so masking, stay 6 feet away.  You can't make dinner reservations, its walkup only, not sure why, but will know better after this weekend.  Hoping all our dining is outside since I'd prefer to do that anyway, its just a nice place to sit outside.

Lived in Santa Barbara for years.  We were on a coastal cruise a few years ago with Santa Barbara as a stop, ship was having a norro breakout.  It made front page news in their paper and I wasn't sure if we were going to be able to get off or not.  They are very cautious there.

I am generally disappointed in shipboard desserts - always seem like more air than quality ingredients.  The only place I've gotten anything I enjoyed was in the additional cost restaurants and even that is iffy.  OH WELL, I don't need the calories anyway 🙂

They are going to go broke on that key lime pie when I board - that's my favorite dessert 🙂  Thanks for the posting - 

We are on a 9/25 cruise out of California.  From my understanding, right now, Princess will not be testing at the terminal.  We are required to have a test within 3 days before our cruise.  I really wish Princess would institute pre-boarding testing.  My husband is 65, I am 63, we are both in good health and vaccinated, we live in California, so no flying required.  We have every intention of going on our cruise, I just think having data right before everyone boards would be better than having 3 day old data and might prevent some issues.  I am keeping an eye on the Carnival Panorama cruise that just sailed out of Long Beach, CA to see if they learn anything/change anything before we are scheduled to go.

I know they have breakfast specials in the dining room - some interesting choices - I was also wondering if they have specials in Sabatini's or if its always the same?

Dides - thank you so much!

Does anyone have the Sabatini's breakfast menu to post?  Thank you in advance - 

THANK YOU SO MUCH!

Hey!  Question from cruiser that is hopefully going to be on a 9/25 sailing :0  Is the spa open?  We're wondering on our roll call.  Right now, there are no advanced bookings available for our sailing.

Thank you and I hope it all goes marvelously for you - 

There were quite a few people getting plates of oysters on our recent Panorama cruise, but I did hear a couple of people say that the food was good, but not worth paying extra for.  If they grilled fish instead of frying everything, I think my husband would have eaten there daily, but he doesn't do fried food - 

Hey Rosequin!  If you're looking for a less crowded area for sunning/pool time/hot tub, the Havana area was definitely less crowded.  Sitting on our aft balcony, we looked directly down on the area and it was never very crowded.  There are also buzzers that you can use to call a server over, I think a first for Carnival.  It doesn't exempt you from noisy, drunk people if they are around however 🙂  There is quite a lot of outdoor seating all around the ship, especially on the lanai deck, but it is not pool side.  I don't want to give the impression I didn't like the ship, I thought it was great.  I really liked the décor, all over.  I just thought our cabin was tiny, only 3 small drawers for storage, the bathroom was functional, but still came with the dreaded shower curtain, I just didn't care for the cabin, but I liked pretty much everything else about the ship.

We had to cancel all of our excursions on our recent cruise.  I did it via phone and promptly received an email stating they were cancelled.  About 3 days later, the credit showed up on my credit card.

We had an aft Havana cabin on the Panorama and it only had a chair, not a couch.  Storage space was also limited and the cabin seemed very small overall for the price point.  I really wasn't that impressed with the cabin itself.  I did love the balcony and luckily, the weather was nice enough to sit out there most of the time.  I wouldn't book the room again.

We were on the cruise a couple of weeks ago, had self disembarkation and didn't get off till right around 10.  They had only called two group numbers by that time.  Even though they called deck one disembarkation right at 8 am, they didn't call the next group until about an hour had passed.  Once our number was called, we were off the ship and in the parking lot within about 10 - 15 minutes, that part went very quickly.   Customs was the quickest every - a glance at our passports and that was it.  I wouldn't count on a 10:30 flight.

We ate there twice last week.  I am a vegetarian and they made me great food.  You just need to ask them for what you want.  I had sweet and sour vegetables one night and kung pow vegetables the other.  I am sure they would make him sweet and sour chicken if you ask.  They made me vegetable eggrolls and vegetable soup for appetizers - both were delicious.  We only ate at specialty restaurants on our cruise and all were extremely accommodating.  My husband loved the pork belly also (yes, bacon is pork belly, there's a sauce you can pour over it or not).

We're leaving on the 8th on the Panorama and I live in CA.  There's a unnamed virus going around our town.  Everyone I know who's gotten it has gone to the doctor and they are treating symptoms, not actually giving anyone anything to treat the virus itself.  There's also no pre-shot.  I am taking Airborne and tons of vitamin C and washing my hands at every turn, but there's not much else you can do.  It's just that season.  We will be avoiding the cruise buffet and washing frequently, but its one tiny, tiny virus cell and not much you can pre-plan for.

They have it on the brunch menu.  Haven't tried it yet - three more weeks!

Not everyone who is booking the Havana area is doing it for the exclusivity of the pool.  I wanted to try one of the Havana cabins.  Also wanted to try the Havana bar for Cuban drinks/snacks and nighttime Cuban/Latin music, but that area is open to everyone.  We rarely sit around on a pool deck and in 30 odd years of cruising, we've never been in a pool or a jacuzzi on any ship.  I do like that there's a dedicated adult area, but we could get that on the Serenity deck (want to try the salad bar there, I'm sure no children will be complaining about their lack of access to kale).  About four weeks till our first Havana cabin cruise, so I guess I'll know if it's worth it to us for future cruises after that.

We love the steakhouse on the Miracle - that glass staircase is always fun.  We have a tradition of eating at the steakhouse on the 1st and last night of every cruise.  It starts and ends our vacation mode.  On the first night, there is a free bottle of house wine per table or you can get a discount on a different type instead.  We don't drink wine, so that's not it for us, we just enjoy the atmosphere.

No stores within walking distance that would sell cases of soda.  Your best bet would be to ask  your Uber driver to stop for you on the way.

Glad you made it!  Get some sleep 🙂