Carnival Fantasy, 12/19 – Progreso and Cozumel... LONG

[pammat]

First let me start out by saying I’m not much of a writer, but because all of you helped me so much before this cruise with your information and advice, I’m going to give it my best shot to say THANK YOU.

 

This was our first cruise on Carnival, our previous two being on RCI. I could make comparisons and might throughout, but honestly we’d cruise either one again because there were things we liked on both. The price was cheaper on Carnival, the food was a little better on RCI (but anything I don’t have to cook is great), I liked out balcony better on Carnival, my husband liked RCI’s better, the activities, kids clubs, staff/service were all very similar, and the sleeping on both is to die for. There is no better sleep than on a cruise ship!

 

We are a family of 4, myself and husband in our early 40’s, and our two daughters, ages 16 and 13. I booked this cruise in April with an early saver rate, and ended up paying about $200 less because of price drops. I booked a suite, as we only cruise every couple of years, and like the treat. This was to be our Christmas present to each other in order to relax and rewind, and spend quality time together. We live in Kentucky, and drove to Mobile, spending the night in Montgomery, and then driving in the morning of the cruise.

 

Day 1:

We arrived at the port at 10:45am. There was a nice lady speaking to each car in line and explaining that the previous cruise arrived 3 hours late, and to please return in 3 hours. We left and drove downtown and parked. We wandered, grabbed a little something to eat at Subway, and visited about 100 dogs in the park. The humane society was having an adoption day. After killing about 2 hours, we decided we would return at least to a side street near the garage so we could get in line easily when they started allowing cars into the garage. They must have just allowed cars to start entering the parking garage, because there was a small line of about 20 cars. We got in line. There were still cars exiting the garage, but we were in a parking space in about 15 minutes. It was all very organized. After we left our car we were on board the ship within another 25 minutes. We had VIP boarding, were shown to a special waiting area where they had snacks and drinks. We were called into a room, checked in, and then shown to the “Welcome Photo” area. One note on VIP boarding. VIP boarding does not mean you show up and get in front of everyone there before you, or that you’ve become “KING” for the day. As we were exiting the check in room, there was this jerk complaining he’d “already been here for 5 minutes” and he was “supposed to be a VIP”. Unbelievable, I guess they are everywhere! Also a note on parking. We chose to park in the parking garage. We paid $75 in cash (as someone noted on here), but the day we parked, we had the option to use a credit card. I asked the woman we paid, and she said sometimes you must use cash, sometimes not… Also for those who may have read about parking under the bridge. We saw this area, and it is very easy to find. It is a very large area across the street from the ship. Definitely walking distance. The area is mostly fenced. There would be two concerns I would have. First, on the day we arrived and the day we departed, there were people walking around in this area that didn’t seem to have a purpose (such as finding or leaving their own car). Second, if it’s raining, this would not be pleasant. The area is part grass, part dirt, so it could be a muddy mess. On the day we pulled into port it was raining and we were glad we didn’t have to carry our bags through all that mud. I’m a very thrifty person, but if I sailed out of Mobile again, I think I’d still use the garage. Just my 2 cents for anyone who’s considering it…

 

Once on board, we headed to Windows On the Sea, found a table on the back deck and proceeded to enjoy our first of many “fruity” drinks. Yes, they also serve “virgin” fruity drinks, and believe me, my girls loved them. About 3:30 we decided to head to our room to see if we could get in. Our cabin was U107 and was great. It was quiet (from above and below) and there was plenty of room for all of our junk. Several of our bags had arrived and we began unpacking. There was an odd stain looking pattern on the carpet, but it didn’t smell and wasn’t damp, not really sure what that was…. The muster drill had been pushed to 5pm. We mustered, without life jackets, on deck 9. It was actually pretty funny because over the loud speaker we listened to each muster station being announced and what lifeboats were theirs. When we were announced (and there were a lot of us), we only had one life boat. We all kind of looked at each other and decided we were screwed if we needed them…. Oh well, have another fruity drink.

 

We had early seating at 6pm, so during sail away we were eating dinner. We usually don’t make a big production of sail away, so it wasn’t a big deal. Felix and Francisco were our waiters and were good, nothing spectacular, nothing bad. We actually managed to eat in the dining room on three nights on this cruise, which is a record for us. Two things I will mention regarding the dining room. The “shows” were odd. Not really sure how to describe them. They were somewhat entertaining, but just seemed out of place. Not sure how to better describe it. Second, and this actually stems from the “shows”. Two nights our waiter had taken our order for dessert (so we had finished eating), but then they had to “prepare” for the show. They delivered dessert to several tables around us (but not all). Therefore we sat during the show watching others eat their dessert. Kind of hard to enjoy the show, while watching someone enjoy their chocolate melting cake…. I guess my feeling on this is that maybe they shouldn’t deliver dessert to anyone, or to everyone, before they begin the show. Just my opinion.

 

We returned to our room and got to meet our room steward, Sansanee. She told us to call her “Sunshine”, and she really was. She was great. She always called us by name, and responded quickly to our 2 requests throughout the cruise for another pillow, and ice in our cooler at turndown. We registered our girls for the teen clubs, O2 and Circle C, they decided to hang out for a while, my husband and I enjoyed our balcony, but we were all back in the room by 10:30, and off to sleep that wonderful “cruise sleep”. One thing I will say about the room throughout the cruise. Except for our 2 days in port, it was always rather cool (it was warmer outside). I am extremely warm blooded, and like “cool”, but even I was cool. We “learned” that the thermostat in the room is actually a knob located on each of the 3 vents that you turn left or right to receive higher or lower air flow. So it’s not really a thermostat, you can’t set a temperature, you can set cool air flow.

 

Day 2 At Sea:

This was truly a lazy day. We slept in, took our time in the shower, my youngest had to try out the jacuzzi tub, and enjoyed breakfast that I was nice enough to go get for everyone, lol, I didn’t even get a tip! At 11am my girls wanted to go to the shopping show, because they like the chance to get free stuff. I’m not big on these, but I figured I could get a fruity drink there, so off we went. Martin Cunningham was our “shopping expert” and pretty much gave us the same sales pitch we’ve received on previous cruises… UNTIL he said (and I am quoting), “Don’t shop in Progreso, save all your money for Cozumel, that is where you’ll want to spend your money.” I couldn’t believe he actually said, “don’t spend your money in Progreso”. Really gave me pause, and quite frankly made me mad. I really don’t think you should be pulling into a port, but then telling your passengers not to support the local economy. For the record, excluding our prepaid activity in Cozumel, we spent 95% of our money in Progreso. First, because everyone here told me before I went, if I saw it in Progreso buy it because it would be twice as expensive in Cozumel. That was true. Second, because of that one statement by Martin, the “shopping expert”, I felt the need to buy all my souvenirs there. Needless to say I needed another fruity drink….

 

We didn’t really do anything else eventful on day 2. We hung out by the pool and watched the Survival of the Fittest show, it was funny. We ordered room service for lunch and the BLT and cheesecake were amazing. The Caesar salad was VERY fishy tasting, a few too many anchovies in the dressing. We all enjoy tea as a beverage, but thought the tea on board was a little too strong, bitter, or something. What we discovered was that if you mixed half tea and half lemonade, you had a perfect drink. One other thing that someone on here recommended that I forgot was to bring a large mug. I wish I had remembered this as it would have been so much easier to be able to go up to the drink machine and fill a large mug with our mixture vs. bringing 2 glasses of tea and 2 glasses of lemonade back to the room… Bring a mug! Dinner this evening was formal. We did “dress up” (again another first. We have ordered room service in the past and did formal night on our balcony – one thing I do miss on RCI, dining room food from room service). Dinner was very good and we also did as someone here recommended. Both our girls wanted prime rib, but wanted to try the lobster. We asked for an additional entrée of lobster and received it without any problem. We did take formal pictures from several different photographers (different backgrounds). I’ve never purchased ship photos before, but we did end up spending $60 on photos. There were some beautiful shots, we thought it was a good souvenir. We also went to bed again by 10:30, as you can tell, we’re not high excitement people. If you’re reading this for show reviews, you might want to stop, because there won’t be any. We didn’t go to any shows while we were on board! We did do lots of relaxing and family bonding, as was our intention. Before we went to bed, we filled out our room service breakfast card and placed it on our door knob, because we knew we’d be departing the ship early on Monday morning.

 

Day 3, Progreso:

 

Before I begin day 3 you need a little bit of background. From this board I found Sharon Helgason, shelgason@hotmail.com, she runs Chicxulub Food Bank http://www.chixfoodbank.com/. I contacted her regarding a possible donation of my daughter’s high school soccer team’s uniforms. She put me in touch with a couple who is responsible for the soccer program. With Sharon’s help we were able to donate uniforms to the kids in Progreso/Chicxulub who need them. She’s an amazing woman giving a great amount of her time to help those who are less fortunate. Anyway back to our day….

 

Promptly at 6:45 room service delivered our order for breakfast. It was everything we ordered, but the citrus and melon plate were hilarious. On the citrus plate there were 6 very small pieces of fruit, the melon plate was similar. If you ever order this you might want to order several if it’s your main course! We were off the ship very quickly and onto the shuttle without any problem. We arrived in Progreso about 8am. We had about 30 minutes to kill before we were to meet up with Sharon, but we planned to meet with another family from Illinois who was also bringing a donation. We browsed the local market, and then proceeded to a street corner where we were supposed to meet. While waiting and “observing the locals” we met a very nice gentleman from Pablo’s Crater Tours. He had a cute “reindeer” hat and started by wishing us a Merry Christmas. Once he realized that we were there to meet Sharon, he asked what the rest of our plans were for the day, and proceeded to talk to us about Dzibilchaltun. He spoke mostly to our girls, telling them things to look for and history. We didn’t use him for a tour, so I can’t recommend him, but you might want to check him out. Here’s his website: http://rabbit777.tripod.com/pablo/. He was knowledgeable and seemed nice.

 

Once Sharon arrived, we visited for a while, took lots of photos, gave them the uniforms, and met Gustavo, our personal taxi driver arranged by Sharon. Gustavo was amazing. We arranged our “tour” with Gustavo before we left home. For $60 (plus we added a tip), we were to meet Gustavo, he was going to take us to the school where the kids go, to Dzibilchaltun, wait on us, and then return us to the port. We ended up also visiting several other areas, and made a pitstop at a Liquor Store, where Gustavo helped my husband purchase several gifts. Gustavo was an excellent driver, and his English was very good. He explained how he’s working with Sharon in a class where those who speak Spanish are teaching English and those who speak English are teaching those who don’t. I HIGHLY recommend him if you are looking for someone friendly, helpful, and knowledgeable about the area. He has a website: http://www.progressotaxicab.com/. He explained lots about local life and the areas we were passing through. We arrived at Dzibilchaltun before the cruise tours arrived and so mostly had the place to ourselves until we were almost ready to leave. What I’d read before we left wasn’t exactly what we paid to get in. We paid $8 each for my husband, myself, and my 16 year old. My 13 year old (who was then 12, birthday Jan 2nd), was free. Dzibilchaltun was the perfect place to go with the rest of our agenda for the day, and allowed us “a little taste of ruins”. The Temple of the Seven Dolls was really spectacular. We did hire a guide (for $20) to make sure we learned all that we could. I’m so glad that we did, because there were places she took us and things we saw that others might not have. I overheard one little girl say to her dad, “hey, we didn’t go down there, those people went through that door underground”. The museum was not open, we were there on Monday, so I am sorry we missed that. I heard here that it is really impressive. Overall it was a great excursion, and many times we found ourselves saying, wow, they (the Mayans) were really smart…. Anyway, we returned to the port, and there we did almost all of our shopping, you know, to spite Martin. It was a great day, we met wonderful people, saw amazing things, saw some heart wrenching things, and learned how very thankful we are to live the life we do.

 

We returned to the ship, all took a nap, and just enjoyed each others company and reflected on our day. We had dinner at Windows by the Sea, and enjoyed that wonderful soft serve ice cream for dessert! Both girls ventured out to the teen clubs to see what was going on. My older one returned to the room after about an hour, the younger one was gone for 3. Again we were all sleeping by 10:30!

 

 

Day 4, Cozumel

 

Prior to leaving home I prepaid for the Dolphin Royal Swim at Chankanaab Park. There was a special offer where we got 30% off the regular price. I’m all about saving money! Also, I pre-purchased photos of the Royal Swim. Both my girls were participating, and I purchased two photos of each of them and the DVD. I think I saved about 25-30% by pre-purchasing. I booked the Royal Swim online (so I could have a confirmation in my email, then I emailed customer service, asking about pre-purchasing photos. They in turn gave me an 800 number to call them to purchase, all they needed was my confirmation number from the Swim. They then sent me another email with photo purchase confirmation. I printed both of these and took them with us.

 

We left our room with our beach bags, sunscreen, and snorkel gear at 9:10am. One note here about sunscreen. I spent some time prior to leaving to find biodegradable sunscreen. We did use this on the day we were there, but no one ever searched our bags to verify that’s what we had. We got off the ship, walked down the pier, through all the shops, to the taxi area. Taxi was $10 to Chankanaab. We didn’t have to wait at all for a taxi, and arrived at Chankanaab Park at 9:40. There was a gentleman asking people exiting taxi’s if we had a reservation. We game him our names, he had a checklist and check our name off, and then offered us swimming with the Manatees for an additional $19 each. We politely declined. I then purchased entrance tickets for my husband and myself (we weren’t swimming with the dolphins). The entrance fee was $16 per person, but I had printed the coupon found on their website for $2 off each person. There was no problem using it.

 

As we approached the entrance to Dolphin Discovery we were greeted by a young man with 2 parrots and an iguana. He sat one parrot on my oldest daughter’s head, handed her the second one and handed my youngest the iguana. It was too funny to see their faces. He offered to take their photos for some amount of money (sorry don’t remember) or offered to let us take photos for $5. We gave him 5 bucks, we could have walked away, but the looks on their faces was priceless. He rearranged the live “props” several times for very cute pictures. Anyway, on to the dolphins. We checked in at the large circular desk. Our scheduled time was 11am, but were asked if the girls would like to go with the 10am group. We said sure, that allowed us more time to hang out on the beach later. As it turned out, this was great. There were only 3 other participants (total of 5 in their group). The girls were taken to a briefing, and off they went. From what I observed it appeared the Royal Swims took place on the sides of the rectangular “dock”, and the Experiences took place on the back of the rectangular “dock”. The sides definitely make for better personal pictures from where we were. If you have a good zoom lens on your camera, you can get good pictures. I laid down on my stomach on the dock (facing the back of the dock), so my elbows could serve as my tripod. My husband thought I was crazy, until he saw the great pictures I took. The girls spent a little over an hour in the water with the dolphins, and got to do several of the “activities” more than once. I think this was due to the small size of their group. They said this was one of the most amazing things they had ever done in their life. I believe it was well worth every penny. When they were finished with the dolphins, their trainer took them to the other side and they got to get in the water with the manatees for about 10 minutes (glad we didn’t pay for this at the entrance). Both my girls said the manatees were “gross”. It was an interesting experience, but no desire to do it again. They said they had “stuff growing on them”, lol.

 

Once they were out of the water they were taken to a viewing room to watch their video. That took about 20 minutes. They were then ushered through the gift shop to view their photos. I met them at the photo counter, pulled out my prepaid receipt, chose our photos and picked up our video. I know some will say the photos and video is too expensive, and the quality of the video is a little shaky in some places, but the angle these are taken from is perfect. Even though I took some very good pictures from the dock, their pictures are better, and the DVD captures things I never could (like the dolphins singing and dancing). I do think prepaid was the way to go if you are going to do this and are interested in saving a little money.

 

It was 11:30 and we were off to find a nice area of beach and a little bit of food. We followed our map and ended up at the Restaurant El Bucanero for lunch. The four of us shared 2 fajita plates and one plate of fries, plus drinks. It was plenty of food. We spent about $60. It was very strange signing the receipt in pesos (600). We then walked toward the water and found 4 chairs with an umbrella. The girls got their water shoes (I do recommend these as it is a little rocky), and snorkels, and we walked to several vendors to ask about renting snorkel vests. Definitely talk to several, I was quoted anywhere from $20 each down to $5 each. We went with the $5 each, and off they went. They each had an underwater camera and took some beautiful photos. There were lots of fish, several underwater statues, and reef. They’ve never been snorkeling in the ocean before (have only used snorkel gear in the pool), and did just fine. They did say it would have been nice to have fins. We enjoyed the next 3 hours on the beach in the sun. There were plenty of waiters walking around to take your order if needed, but we had brought our own drinks, so after having lunch, we were fine. Leaving Chankanaab was no problem. We went back to the taxi area, were immediately ushered to a taxi and back to the pier in under 10 minutes. We did browse some of the shops on our way back to the ship, but had completed most of our shopping the previous day. It was amazing how the same items were available here, but more expensive. We did stop in Del Sol to buy a color changing headband as a final gift.

 

It was a simple evening, we ate dinner in Windows by the Sea, and then decided we were going to play mini golf. This turned into one of the most hilarious times on the cruise. There was about 45 mph wind under the lights. Once you putted, your ball continued to roll, sometimes faster than you had hit it to begin with. We had the best time, and needless to say, we were almost completely alone, there were 3 other people several holes behind us. It was great! We ventured through the photo gallery on our way back to the room and, oooh, it was a late night, we watched UP (the movie) and were sleeping by 11pm!

 

Day 5, Day at Sea

 

We had hoped that today would be the day that we were finally able to enjoy the waterslides. The only day that was warm enough to do this so far was our day in Cozumel, and we weren’t on board. We all slept in and then enjoyed “take out” from Windows. Once we stepped outside on our balcony we realized that it just probably wasn’t meant to be. My oldest and I decided we’d take a book and just go lay out. All of the pool side chairs were taken so we ended up on deck 11 near the smoke stack. It was very windy and we quickly realized that our shoes should go under the edges of our chair, otherwise they’d blow away. It was certainly warm enough to lay out, but not quite warm enough to waterslide. There were a few brave kids and we watched for a little while. It definitely looked fun, just had to pass this time. We enjoyed a fruity drink and Mongolian barbecue for lunch. I have to say of all the choices of self serve food, this was definitely my favorite. It was very good. You choose your veggies, choose your meat, choose your sauce and they cook it for you. The line was always very long here and I wish they’d been open for more than just lunch. Both my girls favorite self serve foods were either the American food line (chicken strips and fries), or pizza from the pizzeria. We did discover that even if there wasn’t someone standing at the pizzeria to serve you, that if you rang the bell, someone would come out to serve you. The bartender gave us this tip. Also in the morning this is where you could have a fresh, made to order omelet. These were very good. Nothing else very eventful to share for this day, we spent the rest of the day exploring the ship and being lazy. We decided since we were on the 6th floor we would participate in the self embark. We were supposed to gather on the 7th floor and figured we only had to lug our bags up one floor.

 

Day 6, Debarkation

 

We enjoyed “take out” from Windows one last time. Took our time packing our last few items and about 7:30 headed out for our gathering place. As it turned out there wasn’t anyone really “gathered”, and there were only about 15 people split between two lines. We asked if we were supposed to wait to be “called” and were told, no, we could go ahead and depart. Customs was a breeze, my husband had filled out our card the night before, and we were in the car and on the road by 8am. Definitely very easy. Overall this was a very enjoyable, relaxing cruise. There weren’t tons of bratty kids or party people keeping us awake at night, although there was a little girl next door who enjoyed coming out on her balcony occasionally and barking like a high pitched dog. Scared the crap out of me the first time she did it, but you know it was her cruise too, it wasn’t a constant issue, just weird. Once or twice about 9pm someone above us forgot to tell their kids not to stomp on the floor (I always remind mine not to drag chairs or drop things like you might at home), but again, not really an issue, it lasted about 5 minutes each, and then the parents had them tied up again.

 

Mobile was a very easy port to get into and out of, arriving and departing was a breeze. For us, the size of the Fantasy was perfect. We never felt like there were another 2000+ people on board. The staff was very friendly, and yes as someone else reported, you can get a deck of Carnival playing cards just by asking at the information desk. We did automatic tips and felt everyone deserved them. We left something extra for a couple of people we felt went above and beyond. We’ve always booked cruise excursions, but decided because of our donation in Progreso, and the location of our ports in relation to each other, we’d try venturing out on our on this time. After doing it ourselves, I don’t think I’ll ever book a cruise excursion again. The ability to do things on our own time was fantastic, and the savings were substantial. I believe the trick to doing it on your own is being able to connect with people here and planning. We left the ship early and then planned to return to the pier/shopping area an hour and a half to two hours before we were to leave. That meant if there was an issue we had time to spare, if there weren’t any issues, we had time to shop. One final thing, almost forgot. Four days before we were to leave I got a call from Carnival asking if I’d like to upgrade to the owner’s suite. She was a great salesman, describing the “hugeness” of the cabin, the floor to ceiling windows and the gigantic bathroom. She told me how we’d be met when we arrived and would be escorted to our room because there wasn’t a room number…. etc. She then proceeded to tell me that we could upgrade for the low price of an additional $2000. I politely told her no thank you, because that was almost as much as I paid for our cruise. She told me it was a once in a lifetime opportunity, I said no thank you and that was it.

 

If anyone is interested, I’ve posted some (lol, 71 to be exact, and those are only the ones I think strangers might be interested in) of our pictures that might be helpful or of interest here: http://s950.photobucket.com/albums/ad342/pammat/?action=view&current=Day1PC190416.jpg&newest=1.

 

Again thanks to everyone who helped me, and please be kind for any misspellings or grammatical errors, I did my best, told you I’m not a writer!!

[greenboi]

thanks for sharing your experiences; I loved your pictures.

[airlink diva]

First of all, thanks for the great review Pammat!! I sailed on the Fantasy in May 2009 and enjoyed her!

I really want to thank you for the great info concerning Progresso! I emailed Gustavo right away hoping that he has an opening for the date that my ship is in port. While I would love to do the ruins,I really don't think that person that I'm with will. But we both want to visit Merida for a few hours.

I also heard that the shopping is much better in Progresso than Cozumel. Of course the ship shopper will tell you Cozumel is better for shopping because of all of the ship recommend shops (i.e. diamonds international!!). I admit that the only ship recommend shop that I normally visit is Del Sol for nail coating.

I loved the photos for the dolphin swim. That is one of my goals for either my winter cruise or 2011.

Thanks for all the great info!!

[bankerlkd]

Thanks for the great review !!

[pop5]

Great pictures!

[DemonPeeves]

You are far too hard on yourself, it is a great review! And thank you for taking the time to do it for us! I am about 34 days away from our cruise aboard the Fantasy and can't wait.

 

Thank you for the pics!

[jetskier]

The reason the ship recommends the shops in Cozumel is because they get a cut of the revenue. It is one of the reasons I do not support any of the places listed. I normally go a block or two away from the water in Cozumel to the shops that are truely owned by the locals and not some mega corporation.

 

Dave

[KroozFoolz]

Wow, what a great review! YOU ARE A WRITER!!! Great details - interesting to read and very useful information!

Sunshine was our cabin steward on Fantasy last February - she is a sweetheart!

 

Thanks for taking the time to write and post this!

Now I will look at your pictures!

[pammat]

I totally agree that shopping is better several blocks from the "main" shopping areas, that's what we've also always found. I wasn't surprised to hear an "expert" shopper "push" certain shops because I'd read about that here, I was just floored when he said "don't spend your money in Progreso". I'd never heard them say "don't".

 

Also wanted to let you all know that I've updated my photos with scans of all the Capers, Circle C, and O2 schedules, a map of Chankanaab Park, and Debarkation procedures.

[airlink diva]

I totally agree that shopping is better several blocks from the "main" shopping areas, that's what we've also always found. I wasn't surprised to hear an "expert" shopper "push" certain shops because I'd read about that here, I was just floored when he said "don't spend your money in Progreso". I'd never heard them say "don't".

 

Also wanted to let you all know that I've updated my photos with scans of all the Capers, Circle C, and O2 schedules, a map of Chankanaab Park, and Debarkation procedures.

 

Thanks!!

I would ask a shopper if you stated why not to spend any money in a certain port, why is the ship stopping there????

[bankerlkd]

Thanks again especially for adding the capers and map!!