Leo's Rule

I am a new cruiser saw carnival fun hub and I am curious do you have to have wifi on ship to use it looks like it could be a great thing for us because we are traveling with a large group

The fun hub is on select ships. You place your phone on airplane mode and connect to Carnival's (server/data?) by using their wi-fi. It's free.

With using it, you're able to see what's going on around the ship. They may have added it now, but you'll be able to view the daily menus in the restaurants.

There is a chat feature in the app that allows you to chat with guests in your cabin or other guests on the ship. The cost for this is $5 for the duration of the cruise.

Of course, this only works on the ship. Also, you should have the app downloaded prior to boarding the ship.

Hope that helps.

My onboard spending fluctuates.

I spoke to someone who handles the complaints and she is the one who told me that when promotions go out, they look at guests who already have cruises booked and remove them from the promotion blast.

I'm not sure why Carnival does that; it really makes no sense.

But to the person who suggested that I play the game with them and go in and play every so often and cash out; I just may do that to get a casino offer. But I shouldn't have to do that.

It's not the casino offers I was hoping to get in the first place since I don't really play; I'd like to be the lucky recipient of the emails that state I can cruise for $100 or $200.

Oh well; guess I should be happy with the other perks they give, because they don't have to do that either.

You can make an 1100am flight if you do self assist. We had a 1245pm flight after our Valor cruise, and based on what I had read on here (SJU being a madhouse on cruise days, and a congested mess, and take forever, etc.) we were nervous. So we did self assist, got off the ship as quick as we could and grabbed a cab to the airport. We were there at 830am and had FOUR HOURS to kill at the airport. There is no free wifi, we didnt have cell service (other than international roaming of course), and most of the stuff in the airport was not even open yet. It was a VERY LONG 4 hours.

 

I don't think I would do anything earlier than 1100est, simply because if something went wrong you would have no wiggle room, but 1100 is totally make able. I would def do self assist though to ensure you can et off quick and not wait for a high boarding zone.

 

Also on FTTF, DONT waste your money on this trip. There are ZERO tender ports on this ship, and since the ship does not depart till 1000pm there is no reason to want to rush and be one of the first ones on the ship since you can come and go as you please. We boarded around 230PM andd there was no line at all.

You had no free wifi in the airport? Did something change? Maybe I wasn't connected via wifi and was using my data, but San Juan is free for me.

And I couldn't agree more on FTTF; total waste of money in San Juan (and any other port, but that's my personal opinion).

Thank you everyone for your input. So, it appears that there is no true rhyme or reason why some of us get the offers and some don't.

Or the flag that's set in their system to remove offers from being sent to those of us who have cruises booked is working for some and not for all.

Those of you getting the casino offers; they don't count for me because I know I'll never get one; I don't play and supposedly those offers are sent regardless of you having a cruise booked.

I normally have 2-3 cruises booked already, but I'm not booking additional cruises outside of the two I already have booked.

I know that Carnival suggests not booking flights out of San Juan any earlier than 12 noon, but I'm trying to decide between a 12:45 flight and 2:45 flight. I'm going into Philadelphia and will have to drive about 3.5 hours home. The two hours would definitely be beneficial in getting me home before midnight, but I also don't want to risk missing my flight in San Juan :D

 

So, a two part question I suppose.

 

One, should I be even considering the 12:45 or is that too early?

 

Secondly, what things can I do to speed things up during disembarkation (taxi vs bus, porter or no porter, FTTF or no, etc) to ensure I could make my 12:45 flight?

12:45 is doable. You don't need FTTF period...but if you had it, it's only good while on the cruise; not when it's over.

If it's offered on your ship, pay to have your luggage sent to the airport; otherwise, take your luggage off the ship yourself instead of leaving outside of the cabin.

Hail your own taxi and don't forget to stop at the agriculture section 1st (once in the airport).

Have a great cruise!

I also have 9 cruises with Carnival and have never received an offer. My husband only has 4 cruises and has not received on offer. My son has no cruises booked and is Platinum and has never received on offer. It seems the same people get multiple offers and others none.

Ok, I see I'm not alone. I guess it's odd that your son has never received one.

I have 14 and DW has 15 cruises. The only offer we have ever received is the Platinum Vista offer.

We're in the same boat. My coworker gets offers and only has 2 or 3 cruises with Carnival. My friend took her 1st cruise in August and she's getting offers from Carnival.

I don't mean the ones that appear in the VIFP Members Offers section; I'm referring to the ones that appear in the My Special Offers section.

I've been on 10 Carnival cruises and have yet to have an offer appear in the My Special Offers section, only the VIFP section.

I've inquired about this and was told the reason I don't get the special offers is because I already have cruises booked, but I've seen posts on here where people have cruises booked and get the offers. (Or that's what it seems to be)

What has been your experience? Are the special offers you're receiving Casino offers or are they some other type of offer? Also, do you have a cruise booked when you get your offer?

Thanks for your input!

Would you really leave Carnival and choose another cruise line if you don't have chocolates on your pillow, or towel animals, or complimentary robes, or turn down service, or a 'reward' for being a return customer, or any of the other little "services" that have no impact other than they are a nicety?

I've already contemplated leaving Carnival; actually, I've made up my mind to do so and not because of chocolates. I could care less about the chocolates; I'm not fond of chocolate candy to begin with.

All of my cruises have been with Carnival and I don't feel appreciated as a past guest. I want to feel appreciated by them. I spend my hard earned money on a Carnival vacation and would love to receive some type of incentive to return.

I would have been none the wiser had it not been for the many posts from people who state to check their offers...I have none and I'm told I have none because I already have a cruise or more booked. That's not right IMO.

And judging from some of the posts, it seems that some people are still getting offers even though they have a cruised booked. I'm referring to the non casino offers.

I've booked every single one of my cruises as Early Saver cruises once they came out with the program with the exception of 1 cruise. In the past if it was before final payment I'd call my PVP and he'd take care of it. After final payment I'd complete the form and submit it. In the past year they've made it so we have to submit the form after booking and the pvp wasn't supposed to do it.

 

I downloaded Chrome because none of my browsers would let me submit the form myself. On my last 4 requests for price drops on various sailings I've been denied. Resubmitting did not help. I had to call the number on the denial email and explain my current booking and they were able to take care of it. One of those calls was over an hour before it was taken care of.

 

Submitted a price drop last night knowing it was going to kick back as denied today and sure enough it was. Called the number on the email and the person who answered walked me though each step of completing the form again. She gave me actual booking codes which would make whoever processed it aware that I had help with the form. She said I should have no issues. Sure enough they rejected my claim again. She told me to call her tomorrow and she'd do it herself if there were any issues.

 

My question is why is this happening over and over again? Friends of ours are in the cabin next us to us theirs went right through with no issues. The person I spoke to today gave me the exact amount the price drop was and it's the same as what they received.

 

I booked while on another cruise they did not. We are paid in full and I'm not sure if they are. Does paying in full in advance make it harder for Carnival to see that we paid more than the current price? Is booking while on board messing up what they are comprehending on their end?

 

I'm not sure why I bother using a PVP or transferring my booking to him if he's not able to help with price drops? Anyone else getting denied each time they submit a price drop request?

I thought when you paid in full the difference was applied to your card you used, but I'm not sure why your claims are being denied.

Is it me or did the pics get deleted?

Yes, they were deleted, but not by me.

Yes, I stayed up all night reading your reviews as well as a couple of others reviews. Even though I have been cruising for the last 8 years, this has been a way for me to learn of other things and places to see and do.

 

Thanks!!

I feel honored. :D. I need to get back in the swing of things and start my reviews again. And I too learn of different things to do from reading about other's experiences.

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They were deleted. I looked at an old thread I follow and notices those pictures were removed too. Maybe the moderators are making room on their servers? Who knows?

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Thank you; I'm glad you enjoyed it. Have fun on your upcoming cruise!

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I guess I am the only one having problems with seeing your pictures. I have viewed one other of your reviews and I couldn't see your pictures there either. I have also tried going to other search engines(IE, Foxfire, etc.) and I had the same issue. I would love to view your pics especially since I will be going on the Breeze in a few months.

I can't see any of the pictures either and I would love to....

I'm not sure why my pictures are no longer showing...I just looked and they aren't there anymore. I'm sorry you two couldn't enjoy them, but hopefully you enjoyed the review.

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This is what I recieved to book all my cruises with Carnival and Princess. Is this enough evidence to prove I booked a Princess cruise for just taxes plus $100obc

Maybe I read the person's response wrong, but for some reason, I think they thought you guys only spent $200 in the casino to be offered the casino rate, but I could be wrong.

This is why I wasn't a fan of Carnival's Price Match guarantee; I knew there was an ulterior motive on their end. They are trying to see who their competition is, eliminate them, and force us to book excursions directly through them.

One company I used in February now has a contract with Carnival. They wouldn't take any new bookings for Carnival cruisers. And the sad thing is Carnival charged the same price as the company but some activities were removed.

I'm booked with Captain Marvin and I know I stated I was arriving via the cruise line. I think I booked them back in May for a tour this month.

Try Dolphin Discovery instead of Cove. Different Company. I don't know about carnival but they booked me and I am on a RCCI ship.

Carnival has a contract with Dolphin Discovery...if you're talking about tours in Cozumel.

Curious as to what they will do with tips. Especially those who have pre-paid already. We did not pre pay. I would assume Cheers is what it is, 6 days or bust. (If you buy it day 1 of course.) Can Cheers be pre purchased?

No, you can't pre purchase Cheers.

They have changed our Feb 23rd booking to Magic, no new booking number and the cabin

assigned is in the same position as we had on Triumph, but I'm not totally happy so don't

know if I will stay with it. Would sure like to know where Triumph is going that week.

Maybe the ship has been chartered?

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I don't, sorry

Ok. Thanks.

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Just a few notes and thoughts about our journey. Sorry no pictures. 5 day out of Galveston. This ended up longer than I thought hope it doesn't bore you too bad.

 

Did Faster To The Fun and was on by 11:30 and of course enjoyed all the perks of having it EXCEPT we did not get our luggage until around 5:30. This caused some distress but after our second trip to service desk they put a search out for them and refunded the $$ for FTTF as they agreed we should have had them hours earlier. Didn't have to ask for refund they just did it. Come to find out the baggage guy did not mark them appropriately. So all was good in the end.

 

Guy's was awesome (grease and all). Had at least a little something from there each day. Burrito bar was good, enjoyed the Chopped Stick's and Pizza Pirate was good. Had the taste bar three nights and enjoyed it as well.

 

Tried the buffet once and it was nasty also walking in there during the busy times make me lose a little faith in man kind. Feeding trough is what comes to mind.

 

Room service and deli was good as far as food goes. As far as service, room service sucked for morning delivery out of five days they got it right once. One day was late, one was WAY early and two days they didn't even have our orders.

 

Our past couple cruises we have lost hope in eating in the dinning room. The food has been so so or worse and the service was really bad and VERY slow, but we tried the dinning room mid week and it was GREAT. Wonderful service and good food. I only had one dish that was just warm, everything else was hot. We ate there for dinner the rest of the week for dinner. Brunch is another thing. Tried it on last sea day; we ordered Eggs Benedict, and I ordered mine with the sauce on the side. Did it come that way? No, it was like two golf balls with dried browning yellow stuff on them. The wife said the Canadian bacon wasn't bad. Luckily I ordered Mac and cheese with steak also and it wasn't too bad. The biggest thing I missed as far as food goes was the steak house.

 

We did Cheers and Carnival won. We tried to get our money's worth but couldn't. Will go back to Bon Voyage booze. Glad we tried it to see. We figured it was a good time to try as it was a five day cruise and couldn't buy it until the first day after sailing because it left from Galveston.

 

The ship is showing its age in places like the state room but clean and really liked it. Didn't have the water park but the slide would get up and move. We did miss having the sports deck as we like the ropes course. All the staff was friendly. Did not do any production shows, but did both family friendly comedy shows on last day and one was really funny on was funny. Can't remember there names one man and one lady. No crowds for these don't; know about adult only as we where in bed by then.

 

The sound level on lido was overly loud as usual when the DJ was playing, but when the big screen was on or the solo guitar performer was playing it was load but bearable. The live music options that we saw all seemed to be pretty good. Not great but we enjoyed.

 

Carnivals customer service seems to be great. Of course we had the issue with bags, but also had a couple little things in room that needed attention and was taken care of ASAP. Also ran across some folks from home on ship and they had a couple issues and Carnival bent over backwards to help them. They even gave them a new room. We didn't have any ice in our room but just a quick request to or steward and had a full bucket the rest of the trip.

 

This was our first shorter cruise and it ended way to soon. Will stick with 7+ days unless a great deal comes along as in the case of this cruise. It was one of the "free letter" cruises.

 

Love to people watch, and the best I could tell there was not anymore drunks on the five day than a seven day cruise. Watched one group of younger girls and guys get wasted on the lido; grabbing each other in many sexual ways and walking around with one of the 101 once Red Frog tubes getting strangers to drink out of it. Love watching people get on the ship and pier runners. Had a couple runners (nothing bad) and watched a coupe people get carted on with a wheelchair from being wasted. Saw a couple guys wasted trying to smuggle something on in there shorts. The guy drops it onto the net under the gangway collects it up and best I could tell got on with it. And some of the outfits people wear should be outlawed. They must not have friends to tell them they look awful or mirrors to look in so they can see them selves. I can only imagine what people say about me.

 

I guess this was our first time to bring booze back from Galveston. Be warned the state of Texas will charge you taxes on each bottle you buy if your honest and stop when they ask if you bought any (which we did/are). Tobacco too.

 

We went to Progreso and Cozumel. Didn't do anything in Cozumel. Took the 4 mile bus ride into Progreso from pier. All I can say about this place is it will make you appreciate everything you have.

 

Debarkation was fast. Off and in car by 8:45. Did self debarkation.

 

This is all I can think of now. Will add more if I think of anything.

Did you keep your FunTimes? If so, can you scan them? Thanks

I am trying to possibly plan a trip this fall for my boyfriend and I leaving Galveston and the prices are confusing me.

 

 

All I know is I was Born To Cruise..

Love,

Miranda

Out of Galveston, the 4 days leave on Saturdays & the 5 days typically leave on a Thursday. The powers that be knows more people will leave on a weekend vs a weekday; hence the higher price.

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Thank you! But what do you mean by a refundable fare? Like if I bought insurance?

Past guest, fun select, residents rate, etc. Those are refundable; you can cancel with no penalties as long as you cancel before final payment is due (get your money back). You can also make changes to names with no penalties.

Early saver has restrictions; no name changes & $50 per person tajen if you cancel, plus whatever additional funds you've paid are held by the cruiseline for you to use on a future cruise. Let's say you had an $800 deposit, and you made a payment of $200 towards your cruise. If you canceled it, Carnival would keep $100 (assuming there's two of you) & the remaining $900 can be used for a future cruise, but you only have 2 years to use it. If you want to switch your sail date; $100 is kept.

Hope this helps

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Rob and I

My bed mate

Sunday, February 23, 2014 (Debarkation Day)

Boo hoo is all I can say. I wasn’t ready to leave. I got ready for the day and I called Ashley to see if we were still meeting for breakfast and we were. We enjoyed our breakfast and then went our separate ways. I wasn’t in a big rush to get off the ship since I was headed to my hotel, so I camped out on the Lido Deck for a while. Eventually I said the wait was for the birds and I decided to disembark.

Can I just say that I hate the Port of New Orleans? The whole process is just off to me; I can’t really explain it other than the fact that there is one line leading to the Customs Officers and it’s a mess to me. But once you made it to that area, there were several lines to leave. Thankfully I paid a porter to gather my one bag; that made the process a little better.

Once outside, I was shuffled around a bit because I was by myself and my porter kept trying to get me a shared ride, but I ended up in a taxi by my lonesome. I saw John Heald hop in a limo as I was leaving. My hotel was maybe a 5 minute drive from the port. When I entered the lobby it was packed. So many people were checking in or trying to find a room. I gave my bags to the staff since my room wouldn’t be ready until 3 and I camped out in the lobby and worked on my review. I could have gone out for the parades, but it started to rain and all I had was my small umbrella. I logged on to FB and discovered Kevin Z (a crazy guy I met on the ship) was staying in NOLA with some of his friends who were also on the cruise and we decided to meet up for dinner later that night.

The hotel staff called me and informed me that my room was ready. “Pretty Ricky”, the flirtatious bellhop, took my bags to my room and I tipped him for bringing them up. I felt like a celebrity because we passed many rooms on my floor, but in order to get to my room you had to use the room key to get through a bank of doors. I really enjoyed my room. I needed to charge my phone, so I spent some time charging it and I needed to rearrange my luggage and place the alcohol I purchased onboard in my luggage. While I was in my room I thought I heard a noise, but ignored it. Then the noise seemed like it was taking place in my room, so I walked around to see what was going on….why was someone entering my room!!!! It was the maid and we frightened each other. She said she was told to come clean the room. I should have called down to the front desk to see if they had in fact sent her, but I brushed it off. She apologized for the mixup and exited my room.

After that I had to find some place to hide my valuables since there was no safe in the room. That was a first for this chain because all of their other hotels I’ve stayed at always had a safe. After securing my valuables, I head out of the hotel and surprisingly I was able to catch the tail end of some of the parades. I caught a bag full of beads, but had to give it away because I couldn’t carry it on the plane; I already had my carry on, my purse, and I was only paying for one checked bag. After watching the parades I headed to Café Du Monde for beignets. When I arrived there the line was crazy ridiculous, but I waited and it was worth the wait. I purchased some jewelry on the way back to my hotel and put it away. I had a couple of drinks at the bar and phoned Kevin to make sure we were still on for dinner.

I believe I left my hotel around 7:30 pm or 8:00 pm to meet them at Harrah’s hotel. We ended up going to Manning’s for dinner. I wasn’t that impressed with their food, the burger I ordered was ok. But I was blessed because Kevin’s friend paid for our meals. We hung around a little bit and then we all went our separate ways. I was a brave soul because I walked back to my hotel in the 10’oclock or 11’oclock hour by myself. I showered and called it a night. Technically I should end it here, but I have to talk about the awesome breakfast that was served the next morning. The cooks deserve an award for that breakfast. If I find myself in NOLA again, I will definitely book there again. I’ll end by saying that I made it home safely and I thoroughly enjoyed myself on BC7…so much so that I’m booked for BC8.

If you have questions, please free to ask.

My goodbye to my bed mates

The hallway where my room was located

A glimpse of my room

Airport bound...figured I'd spare you the pics from the parade

Thanks for reading the review

The food!

Debbie and I. Our hostess had to tell us to turn the signs...we originally had them where the word "Ho" was read. Oops.

After dinner at JiJi’s I head to my cabin to grab my light-up cup; I figured why let my glowing accessories go to waste. When I arrived to my cabin I noticed that my liquor had been delivered, so I spent some time getting my luggage in order and then I placed what I didn’t want to lug around outside my cabin and headed to the 10:15 comedy show. It was a full house; not a seat to be found, so I stood in the corner and watched Rob Little’s performance. Rob is an absolute fool; I enjoyed his show! At one point he was picking on someone in the audience and she threw him off guard because she told him to eff off. You had to be there; it was funny. But why did I know the person he was teasing? I teased her about it on social media once I made it home.

After the show I posed for a picture with Rob and then I walked around the ship a bit before heading to my cabin to call it a night.

The new mascot for Carnival. I had to be sneaky to get this...they wanted the professional photographer to take the photo (he did), but I wasn't paying $15 for this...no way

Pictures of the JiJi Menu

The numbers you see in the circles corresponds to the region of Asia the foods were "born"

 

Well if it smells anything like when we sailed on the dream,we'll be fine,lol

 

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LOL. I haven't sailed on Dream yet, but since she's in NOLA now, I may do another cruise from there...we'll see.