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First, you're probably running into higher prices due to the lateness of the booking - the Sensation tends to get full up long before most sailings this time of year. Second, as others have pointed out, you do have to pay double the room rate (plus only one set of taxes and fees) for a single in a cabin. If you book *both* cabins at the same time in the same class/section of ship, then the price for the single person's cabin should be the same as the double minus one set of port fees. If your single person cabin is being booked much later than your original booking, then all bets are off.

The Fantasy class ships (including the Sensation) have a whole bunch of upper/lower bunk rooms that Carnival used to reliably price at only 150% of the main rate for singles, but nowadays it seems you only get about a $10 discount for booking one of those over a typical interior, so I don't think they're worth it anymore. I used to like them in particular - even though they're slightly smaller than a normal cabin, they feel larger because of less floor space taken up by the beds.

Unfortunately no one will be able to tell you because sea and wind conditions vary so much from day to day. That being said, I have made it to Grand Cayman every time so far. What surprised me more was missing Grand Turk which I had no idea was a common occurrence until it happened to us.

And... even if you do make it to Grand Cayman, your excursion may be canceled. Just because it's not rough enough to prevent tendering, doesn't mean it's not rough enough to prevent your excursion, depending on what it is. I'm 2 for 2 in getting onto Grand Cayman, and in both cases my snorkel excursion got canceled due to it being too rough to snorkel.

As for Grand Turk -- I'm 0 for 3 on landing there. I have another Grand Turk stop on my next cruise -- hoping to finally succeed in landing there. ;p

And to the original question... I've heard of a few cases where a non-Carnival excursion did NOT refund due to the ship not being able to make the port, so YMMV. I'd ask the excursion operator what their policy in that case is before booking.

Hi all! I'm booked on a cruise on the Glory in late March, and unlike my usual last-minute booking style, I actually booked this one a while ago. With recent price discounts, I'm now wondering if I booked it Early Saver and can take advantage of that -- I've never actually had the opportunity before now.

But I've often booked with casino rates, or past guest rates, or other special promotional rates and for the life of me I cannot remember what rate I booked this cruise with. So I went looking, and couldn't find the info anywhere - it doesn't seem to be on the cruise booking documents anywhere (although my OBC is...).

Does anyone know a way to determine this short of calling my PVP?

There's no traditional breakfast when they do the brunch because the hours overlap... but that's not an issue since everything available at the traditional breakfast is also available at the brunch... plus brunch specific stuff. Brunch is only on sea days, traditional breakfast most port days except during debarkation.

I've been on both the Grandeur and the Pride. One thing, unless you've spent money for a bigger cabin on RCL, the Pride cabins will all be larger - significantly so. (Grandeur cabins average 145 sq ft, Carnival cabins start at 185 sq ft...) I traveled solo on both, and the Grandeur cabins seemed cramped to me.

I've always preferred all the food options on Carnival. I've always strongly preferred the entertainment options on Carnival -- I was often bored on the RCL ships, whereas Carnival focuses more on fun. The Grandeur's dance club is a better layout, however, than the one on the Pride, which has an odd 2-story layout with the main dance floor down a flight of stairs from the entrance. (IMHO, It's better on every other Carnival ship class -- just the Spirit class which has the 2 story layout...) But aside from the dance club, I prefer the organization of the Pride better than the Grandeur.

I never spent much time on deck on the Pride as I was sailing in January - but I spent a lot of time on deck on the Miracle, which is the same class -- the on-deck layout is comparable, but I like the on-deck entertainment better on Carnival.

Depending on when you're sailing, Carnival and RCL will have roughly the same passenger mix, most of the year. Carnival will have more kids during March and summer sailings, but the rest of the year it's about the same. Carnival seems to have more spaces dedicated to kids, so I don't see them as often on off-season cruises.

I'm not familiar with RCLs current stage shows -- Carnival has revamped them in recent years, and I like the new shows better, but it's been so long I can't really compare to RCL.

Of course, a lot of it will be subjective. Me, I'd take the Carnival Pride (actually, just about any Carnival ship...) over the Grandeur in a heartbeat... but I'm tempted by RCLs new, expensive ships. YMMV.

Judging from the ship position, it looks like the Sensation ended up reversing the port order from the original change. It's in Costa Maya today instead of Cozumel.

I'm on the sailing leaving Thursday, so I've been wondering if they'll speed up to get into Miami early to beat the storm, but I'm not sure they can get in before Thursday morning coming from Costa Maya...

Yes, I know that, they need to change their terms of benefits when it comes to debarkation. We didn't even get off in Cabo. Had the same experience the last time we were there. We are platinum, I showed my card to the security guy, he told me to go to the back of the line. I told him we had first off debarkation privileges and I wasn't budging. The crew has no clue.

Actually, last time I used that, I needed to go to Guest Services - they escorted a group of Platinum people to security and passed us through. So probably not the security guy's fault.

In January when I was on the Breeze, I got the premium ($99) package, and while I didn't do any video calling, I *did* manage to play an MMO game (Elder Scrolls Online) while Skype voice-chatting with three other people for over 2 hours continuous with very little lag or buffering issues. I wouldn't recommend FaceTime, but Skype (or similar) video ought to work with occasional buffering issues.

What's particularly impressive about this feat to me was that I went upstairs afterwards to look at the GPS map and learned we were nearly 100 miles away from ANY island at the time -- we were well north of the gap between the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico.

I still have no good explanation for how this is technically possible -- I'm a computer guy and have been following the research on this for years. I knew MTN (the satellite internet provider Carnival uses) was upgrading satellites, and adding towers on islands in the Caribbean to allow seamless switching for wifi, but I thought you needed to be quite a bit closer to land to use that, and if it had been going to satellite, I'd have expected significantly more lag.

My best educated guess is that they've started putting repeaters on buoys, or undersea cables out to buoys, in order to extend the internet wifi range further from land into the common sea routes.

She's my favorite as well. She impressed me even as one of the entertainment staff on my first cruise on the Splendor, and then impressed me even more on the Pride when she was temporarily acting as CD while the usual CD was off ship for a month. Really the only one which has *ever* made a significant difference to my enjoyment of the cruise.

All times in the itinerary are *always* ships time. In most cases, ships time remains the same from the initial departure port through the return. However, on certain very specific cruises (one way transatlantics and panama crossings, for example…) they may change ships time at some point during the cruise, and it will be very clearly announced when and if they do.

If you use a cell phone or similar connected device to keep track of time, it's very important to be aware that if you enable it's radio at all in a port, the device will usually change it's time to the local port time and no longer be on ships time. I know of people who have missed ships because of this -- I strongly suggest you always carry a basic watch of some kind with you when you go ashore in these cases.

That said - if you book your excursion through the cruise line, it will be scheduled on ship's time, and even if the ship is delayed or there is a delay getting of the ship, you'll still make the excursion. If you're trying to book an early excursion, I'd recommend going through the cruise line in that case.

I'll add that there are different terminals in Miami which do things slightly differently. The biggest change is usually where you actually drop off your luggage, and I've sometimes have trouble finding out where to do that when you get there early like some people are telling you.

If you're there while passengers are still debarking, then there's usually only 2-3 porters taking luggage at that point - most of the porters are assisting people getting off the ship. One of the terminals (when I went on the Breeze) had drop off actually away from the terminal, on the far corner of the bus transportation area for that terminal. Another terminal (when I went on the Splendor recently) had drop off right at the corner of the terminal - and the porter there actually told me I couldn't stop at the point they were at - I had to move further ahead of them instead.

Getting there at 10 or 10:30 will usually mean you get to board fairly early as FTTF, Platinum, or even neither, and with fairly small lines -- but you may have to sit and wait after you check in until 11 or even as late as noon, which is the latest I've ever seen them start boarding in Miami. On the other hand, getting there at 1 or 2 will get you slightly longer lines, but you'll board right after checking in. You'll have to decide which is better for you.

The Splendor did NOT have it when I was on it last week. Reading between the lines on comments from the staff when I was on the Splendor last week, I suspect it won't be one of the earlier ships to get it. The Breeze tested this before, and the Sunshine and Freedom have both had updates more recently - the Splendor hasn't really had any updates in several years.

Beyond that, Carnival has been very tight lipped about what ships they plan to put this on other than in theory, it should be on all Carnival ships by the end of 2015. Keep checking back here - as soon as people report the plan on a ship, it tends to get discussed here, and that's usually the first indication that it's been added.

Making an educated guess, I'd suspect the Magic might be in the mix for the very near future since it also ran tests on this before, but it's unclear whether home-porting from outside Florida is relevant or not. (If the Magic does *not* have it by February, you might possibly expect the Freedom to stop having it after it repositions…)

Aside from that, I'd predict the more recently upgraded 2.0 ships sailing out of Florida (Pride, Ecstasy) and then other 2.0 ships would likely be next, followed eventually by the 1.0 ships, and lastly the west coast ships if they even get it at all.

It sounds from this thread that the new Internet plans which were being tested only on the Freedom two weeks ago are now being tested on the Breeze as well -- anyone know if they're being tested on any other ships?

I'm very glad to head they're on the Breeze - when they showed up on the Freedom only at first instead of the Breeze and Magic (where they'd been tested before), I worried that ships would need a dry dock for new equipment, but it sounds like that's not the case.

To answer yonich: I've only heard about the Freedom (and now through this discussion thread, the Breeze) so far. These plans are being "tested", according to some Carnival people. What that means, who knows - they've been testing high speed plans on one or two ships now off and on for over two years. But they *did* officially announce the new higher speed internet last month and claimed they would be rolling it out across all Carnival Corp ships fairly quickly.

What does that mean? Your guess is as good as mine. I wouldn't assume the plan will be there on the Sunshine in February, but it *might* be. (I wouldn't even make that assumption on the Freedom or Breeze even as soon as a sailing next week -- they've stopped testing these plans without warning several times before…) Don't plan on it, but be happy if it's there.

From everything I've seen posted, it looks like they're using the variation where you can have multiple devices, but can only be using the internet from one of them at a time, logging in to your account from a webpage. Basically, the same mechanism as the slower current access, only unlimited and faster.

They had tested plans a while back which allowed you to use multiple devices, but I'm not seeing evidence of those anymore -- which isn't surprising as people were overloading the system that way.

Two years ago, I was lucky enough to do a sailing on the Breeze with one of the earlier unlimited tests, and it was *exactly* what I needed. I'm an independent software contractor, and work from my laptop. The advantage is I set my own hours -- the disadvantage is that I don't really get vacation days and need to be accessible most of the time. If something comes up during a cruise, they need me to work on it - and something is *always* coming up.

So most cruises I do some work, anywhere from just a couple hours, to several hours a day. It doesn't bother me - after all, working from the Lido deck of a ship or from someplace interesting like Paradise Point on St. Thomas beats working from home any day - and I don't have to worry about food, and have plenty of entertainment when not working. It's a big win.

But half the time, that work needs better internet access than the current slow, per-minute stuff on the ship. I usually get a block of minutes, but for the real work I often have to find Wifi in the ports. But… on that Breeze trip, I did most of my work at sea, was able to fully enjoy the ports, and never felt like I was taking time away from having fun. And I got a lot more work done than I normally could on a cruise - to the point I calculated I could theoretically cruise indefinitely and make a profit doing it, as long as they had that unlimited high speed internet option.

Not that I would - I do too much on land as well. But now that my primary residence is in Florida, I could easily cruise several times more often if they had the unlimited high speed internet available. So I've been paying very close attention to this ever since.

I seriously doubt they'll expand this test plan on any ships but the Freedom before I go on my next cruise on the Splendor (on Sunday), but I have high hopes that it will expand to at least a few other ships by January (when I'm hoping to schedule my next cruise… :D ).

One thing concerns me, though -- I was wondering why they were testing this on the Freedom instead of, say, the Breeze or Magic again. The only thing I can think of is that Freedom has gone through a makeover dry-dock this year, after the MTN contract was renewed. Makes me wonder if the Breeze and Magic were testing the Harris CapRock tech which was abandoned when they renewed with MTN. In which case, we might not see it on other ships until their own dry-docks.

If the Legend (which dry docked earlier in the year), or especially the Pride, Elation or Ecstasy (all of which dry docked in the last two months) is the next one we hear about, then that would lend a lot of weight to ships needing a dry dock before they can get the unlimited internet -- and that could take years to get on all the ships. Any other ship, and we can hope for a much faster rollout. Cross your fingers.

Just got confirmation that it's currently only on the Freedom (both the unlimited packages being tested, and the higher speeds announced earlier this month), but JH has said "that will change in days ahead", and that the unlimited plans were proving very popular.

He also made a comment in reply to a question someone had about onboard cell phone messaging support (instead of trying to use walkie talkies) that there is "news on this coming in the days ahead", which might be relevant. I've thought for years that Carnival could make some kind of Carnival on board app which would let you do just this with your cell phones over the ship's internal wifi. (I even briefly flirted with coding it and selling the result to them -- but I didn't have the time to invest.)

That said… I've been inquiring about internet stuff for two years now ever since they were testing it originally on the Magic and Breeze, and new news about unlimited plans and the like has always been something in the "days ahead" for that entire time, so your guess is as good as mine on whether these things will ever be done.

I'll add my voice to those suggesting you really ought to just pay the final payment before you leave. If it's an issue with not having the money in your bank account before that date, then I strongly recommend doing the payment online on the ship rather than relying on internet in port.

I've used internet in Cozumel a number of times - but depending on any number of factors, it's often highly unreliable at best. Señor Frogs will give you their wifi access information if you order a drink - but the last time I did that, it took somewhere on the order of 15-20 minutes to actually get the connection working, and it was slow as hell after that. Also, many financial sites will lock you out if you're trying to log in from foreign countries.

(The user/password issue mentioned above isn't really as serious as you think if you're going to a secure site, like most financial institutions - because your connection is encrypted on those from the browser to the website. That said, CC is *not* a secure site - they hash the password before transmitting it, but that's not, IMHO, secure enough, so you probably don't want to log into CC from a public access wifi connection… :D)

So… if you're paying online, use the ship's connection. Be patient - I've seen them go down for a hours to a full day at times, but usually you can get access when you want it. If you're paying via credit card on the Carnival.com site, you can even use the internet for free to do it. No brainer. Using your laptop or the internet cafe's machines is up to you - they work pretty much the same. I'd recommend your laptop for security.

If you're paying through another site or your financial institution, you'll need to pay for your internet access through your Sign and Sail account, at $0.75 a minute, although you can buy pre-paid packages of minutes for a discounted rate. Don't expect it to be fast - satellite internet is notoriously slow - probably slower than anything you've ever used before. But it should be sufficient to get the job done.

Aside from the Passport and Credit Card, which someone else mentioned above (heck - with those, I can probably buy anything else I forgot in a port… :D ), I'd say the most important item I pack is my small fan and extension cord.

I have a lot of trouble sleeping in silence - any random noise in the area will wake me up, and a cruise ship has a LOT of random noises, ranging from ship movement sounds, to people running up and down the hall. A small fan puts out pink noise which masks out other ambient sounds and makes it very easy for me to sleep.

Depending on the ship, and often the specific bar on the ship, I've had them use chilled cans. No, it's not the best way to serve soda, but I've seen worse.

As others have said, if you average 3 or more glasses of soda a day, the bottomless bubbles package pays for itself.

I *do* bring some bottles of Caffeine Free Diet Coke to supplement the package inside my room -- sometimes I don't want to go out to get something to drink, and sometimes they don't have the Caffeine Free stuff at a particular bar, so I often need to have my own to cut back on total caffeine intake. (Too much caffeine makes me ill…)

I also often bring a bottle or two of root beer or birch beer, which I then use for ice cream floats… :D

In the fall of 2013 Carnival signed a contract with a new ISP, Harris Caprock. I believe Carnival is in litigation with their previous provider. Equipment has to be installed on all their ships.

Looks like whatever problem Carnival had with MTN has been settled: http://www.mtnsat.com/mtn-news/carnival-corporation-and-sign-agreement-internet-services-and-extend-broadcast-services-agr

So much for the Harris CapRock plan. No predicting what will happen any time in the near future now.

Looks like the earlier plan of Carnival switching it's service over to Harris CapRock has been nixed. According to This MTN press release from last week, Carnival just renewed their Internet Service provider agreement with them.

Looks to me like we won't be seeing any change in service plans soon, then. Although we might see something in 2015 when MTN Nexus service is made fully available. (I suspect the test plans they did on the Dream, Breeze, and Magic last year, and are still doing on the Magic, uses a prototype of MTN Nexus service, but can't be certain…)

A bit of a pity… if they ever get a solid unlimited internet plan in place, I could cruise a LOT more often than I do currently.

Oh, and to answer the original question -- no passwords for the Wifi connection -- you just select the ship's Wifi (available just about everywhere on board), and you're connected.

But if you want to go outside of a few specific websites (the FunHub, which is the ship's site, carnival.com, and a few others…), you'll need to click on the link on the main FunHub web page to connect to the outside world. It'll prompt you to make an account, link it to your sign and sail portfolio, and either buy a plan or pay for things minute by minute. After you make your account, you log into it any time you want outside access to start billing.

But VERY important no matter what plan you choose -- *always* remember to follow the log off instructions or it will continue to bill you minutes even if your laptop is put to sleep or shut down.

If all you want is to upload a bunch of photos, though - you may be better off waiting until a port, finding free or less expensive WiFi at the port, and using that instead. Nassau has free wifi in the main building at the port - although it's often overloaded by all the crew and passengers using it. St. Thomas has some cafes with WiFi, but I found awesome free high speed WiFi at Paradise Point last time I was there. No idea about St. Maarten -- didn't go looking for Wifi when I went there last.

Some time in the very near future Carnival is switching service providers. When that happens, I expect significantly faster speeds, and quite likely new and better pricing plans.

Alas, I just asked JH about it on his Facebook page last week, and he said an announcement would be made in the next few weeks… which suggests we won't actually see it on the Dream when we sail on the 11th.

Still, cross your fingers -- it *could* happen on the Dream first, considering that the new satellite internet provider is located in Melbourne, FL, which means the Port Canaveral ships potentially will get the new setup first.

I'm cruising on the Carnival Dream on Saturday, and am highly likely to be putting in an offer on a house a day or two before the cruise. There's a reasonable chance a counter-offer might come in or some other bit of paperwork which requires me to print out some document, sign and/or correct it, and fax it back, while I'm on the cruise.

My fallback is to bring a portable printer and scanner along and do everything via email - but I'd like to avoid that if possible.

So, is there a way to Fax something from the ship? I vaguely recall seeing something about it, but can't find it in the Carnival FAQ. Also, can I *print* a PDF or scanned document on board? And in both cases, does anyone know the fees involved?

Most of the year, I'd strongly suggest flying in the day before the cruise for ANY cruise. During winter, where a major storm could cause more than a day's delay (even if the storm doesn't hit your area - since flight delays tend to ripple across the country…), I'd fly in *two* days before the cruise to be safe.

I'm cruising next Saturday - and flying to Florida Wednesday to be absolutely sure I make it. :D

Yes, turn on Airplane Mode after Sailaway, and leave it on until you return to your home port. If you still want to use the Wifi on the ship or in a port, you can leave Airplane Mode on, and then go to settings and turn Wifi on as well -- Airplane Mode ON + Wifi ON is a pretty safe bet.