Jump to content
Cruise Critic Community

Carnival Ecstasy Review with Pics and FUN TIMES!! My LAST Carnival Cruise

firstcruiseever

By firstcruiseever,
in Carnival Cruise Lines

 Share

Recommended Posts

firstcruiseever

firstcruiseever

Posted
Posted

Hello Everybody! We JUST got back from our 5 day Carnival Ecstasy cruise that went to Nassau, Freeport and Half Moon Cay. I saved all the FUN TIMES from the cruise and took lots of Foodie pics, so if you're interested I will post them soon! I haven't quite unpacked the camera yet, so I can't post any right now, but I SWEAR I will post them soon. From the title you will see that this is indeed our last Carnival Cruise. We had a BLAST just so you know, but there were aspects of our cruise that made us decide once and for all that Carnival is just NOT for us. Now that means we had some stuff that I will probably rate a 4 out of 10, but 4 is better than 1! And some stuff I am going to rate a 10 because is was spectacular. I also don't post a lot of pics of before or after the cruise. We cruised for the ship, and sailed out of Florida (our home) so nothing exciting happened before the cruise ship. I've gotta go make some delicious homemade food, but I promise to come back and post soon!!!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Lerin

Lerin

Posted
Posted
I'm always surprised when someone swears off of Carnival because of their experience on one cruise. Especially when it's only their 2nd Carnival cruise and it was on one of the oldest smallest ships in the fleet.

 

And they had a BLAST and would rate some aspects a 10. :confused:

interesting

Link to comment
Share on other sites
christmas

christmas

Posted
Posted
Hello Everybody! We JUST got back from our 5 day Carnival Ecstasy cruise that went to Nassau, Freeport and Half Moon Cay. I saved all the FUN TIMES from the cruise and took lots of Foodie pics, so if you're interested I will post them soon! I haven't quite unpacked the camera yet, so I can't post any right now, but I SWEAR I will post them soon. From the title you will see that this is indeed our last Carnival Cruise. We had a BLAST just so you know, but there were aspects of our cruise that made us decide once and for all that Carnival is just NOT for us. Now that means we had some stuff that I will probably rate a 4 out of 10, but 4 is better than 1! And some stuff I am going to rate a 10 because is was spectacular. I also don't post a lot of pics of before or after the cruise. We cruised for the ship, and sailed out of Florida (our home) so nothing exciting happened before the cruise ship. I've gotta go make some delicious homemade food, but I promise to come back and post soon!!!

 

As others said I don't understand why this is your last cruise??? You would rate some things a 10 and it is only your second cruise and it is the 2nd oldest in the fleet you should try the bigger ships like the Dream, Magic or Breeze.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
firstcruiseever

firstcruiseever

Posted
  • Author
Posted

I'm ready I'm ready!! :) So I don't have ALL the fun times scanned yet, but I do have the first one. And I realized that I have a TON of food porn. Mmmmm nom nom. YAY. So we live in Florida, not too far from the port. OCD Packers Please close your eyes for this next sentence: We packed for our cruise the night before we were supposed to leave. Yep, didn't have one thing packed before hand. Printed off Mapquest to find our way to the port. I swear it said 3 hours the night before. So up we get at 6 and we leave about 6:45 ish. We had found out about Park N Cruise from this forum. PAUSE for a minute... The house just moved. No really, I think the whole fricken thing moved. Wait... Okay it's better now. (Now I'm wondering if I really got off the ship... dun dun dun!!) So we are driving down Florida's Turnpike and realize that we are only half hour away from park and cruise and it is only 8:30. I look back at Mapquest and realize it says 2 hours, not 3. I must've been looking at the wrong route. Pull off on banana drive and BAM we are at the parking place... at 9:05AM. They don't even send a shuttle until 10:30. Now, back up a minute. We didn't tell DD (4yo) that we were going on a cruise because we didn't want to hear: Mommy is it time for the cruise yet? Are we leaving yet? We just told the kids that we were going on a vacation. As soon as we pulled into the parking lot DD says "Mommy are we going on the ship now?" This blew us out of the water! (no pun intended) She had not mentioned that she knew where we were going since we had planned this cruise two weeks prior. We tried to play it off like "No honey, we are staying in the parking lot for vacation. We are going to listen to music, and sleep in the car." She didn't buy it. FINALLY after waiting in the car eating m&m's and drinking monster (the kids didn't get any of the latter... MEAN PARENTS) for an hour and a half we were finally able to get in line to board the shuttle. We threw the kids in the stroller, loaded all 4 bags onto the pack animal... I mean husband. cough cough. And set out for our spectacular adventure. Now can anyone instruct me in the art of uploading a photo bucket picture? Thanks :rolleyes:

Link to comment
Share on other sites
firstcruiseever

firstcruiseever

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)

Well, I hope that more people read this! I hate to write an entire review for nothing... So I think I will pick up at the parking garage. Cruise and park was $55 for the 5 day cruise (not bad!!) and they shuttled us to the cruise port. While on the shuttle met some nice people that we saw throughout the rest of the cruise. Arrival at the port was quick and we disembarked. The luggage porters were there to collect our bags immediately. It was so nice to just drop off our bags to them and not worry about them. We then proceeded to the security. Since we had a stroller, and I had a cane, they put us through the special needs line. ALL lines were almost empty, so everyone that got off the shuttle at that time literally swept through security. It was quick and painless. Checked in with our online check in printed out boarding pass. (Don't forget that! The lady at the counter said more often than not people forget it and it takes longer to get checked in.) Sped up the gangway and onto the ship. IMG_2465.jpg We were greeted by the beautiful Atrium on board. This ship was great. Neon decorations everywhere, but very fun. It was kind of like a mini vegas style strip. Super cute. First things first. We headed to Guest Services and asked if there were any upgrades available that we could pay for (ocean view or balcony) They pretty much laughed us away from the desk. Told us the ship was full and that was that. Found out later from another guest service lady that the ship was not full. (more on that later!) After that we headed down to check out where our room was. The sign was up and the door closed, but we snuck through just to see where our room was located. When we got there Javier was cleaning our room and setting it up. We asked him to split the beds into a twin. He threw his arms up in the air, sighed and started muttering about not enough time, too much going on etc. DH looks at me and we both stifle a laugh. We turned and left, hoping that he was just flustered from being super busy and not normally like our first impression of him LOL. We went back up to Lido deck to get some food. Let's see..... the Rotisserie was all but empty, no line at all, so we put some food on our plate and tried it. There was some chicken, mashed potatoes and corn on the cob. It was typical buffet fare. Typical of most all you can eat buffets such as Golden Corral. Kids weren't digging the potatoes, so I went to get mongolian grill. Everyone has RAVED about this so I was looking forward to it. I put some chicken and shrimp, and half black bean, half thai barbecue sauce. And Here is what it looked like: IMG_2467-1.jpg

It looked delicious. Kids tried it. They are usually not too picky, but this was a bit too spicy for them. Plus my daughter seemed to have an issue with the glass noodles. They looked a bit funky. :p DH and I dug in and quickly pushed the bowl away. It was good veggies and meat, but the sauce was bland. Not a whole lot of flavor. We have Mongolian Grill at home and it is spectacular, so maybe I was a bit spoiled. :roll eyes: Well we still had the stroller and two of our bags, so we decided to see if our room was done yet. We strolled down to the Riviera and went to our room R99. It was dead center interior with two pullman style bunks and a king bed. We decided to have the twins pulled apart so that the kids could share one and we could share the other. Before you call us INSANE, (maybe we are just a bit) we didn't want DD (4) and DS (3) to fall off the bunks. they are restless sleepers and I thought we might be able to make this work.IMG_2515.jpg NEXT UP: The fun times, the good times and the very bland times... You wondering why we aren't going back? Stick around... Maybe you'll understand later?

Edited by firstcruiseever
Link to comment
Share on other sites
2 cruzen

2 cruzen

Posted
Posted
im just waiting for the food porn! ;)

 

Me too. :eek::D

Thanks for the larger font. One request, could you please space between paragraphs some. Easier to read. Again, thanks.

 

Sorry your cruise wasn't great. Most of us are addicts, but I understand that it's not for everyone.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
firstcruiseever

firstcruiseever

Posted
  • Author
Posted
Me too. :eek::D

Thanks for the larger font. One request, could you please space between paragraphs some. Easier to read. Again, thanks.

 

Sorry your cruise wasn't great. Most of us are addicts, but I understand that it's not for everyone.

 

Will do with the paragraphs!

 

Actually we LOVE cruising!! There were just things about the Carnival ship that I think would be better on Disney :) So our next cruise in the fall will be Disney and we shall compare from there! We say better to go on one Disney versus two Carnival if we are happier with the Disney experience and from what I hear I think Disney will be more to our taste... But to each their own!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
matondo

matondo

Posted
Posted

I was on the Ecstasy on Nov 9. It was my first Carnival cruise!! I loved it!! Great value for the money. I paid almost 3x more for a 3 night balcony on Disney that was cost per person for 3 people as compared to a 5 night oceanview sailing solo.

 

I felt the two cruise lines were like comparing apples and oranges but that is only my opinion. Just sayin'

Link to comment
Share on other sites
valandemmy

valandemmy

Posted
Posted
Will do with the paragraphs!

 

We say better to go on one Disney versus two Carnival if we are happier with the Disney experience and from what I hear I think Disney will be more to our taste... But to each their own!

 

You will probably be happier with Disney...but its only about 4 or 5 times what you paid for that inside cabin on the Ecstacy... I have always said..you get what you pay for... I would rather go on the two or three carnival cruises than a single cruise anytime.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Georgiagolfer

Georgiagolfer

Posted
Posted
I just got back from the same cruise (my first!) and had an unbelievable time.

 

Welcome to Cruise Critic, as I see this is your 1st post.

 

And this is the difference in ones perspective (opinion). One likes while another doesn't. Same cruise, same ship, different thoughts.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
firstcruiseever

firstcruiseever

Posted
  • Author
Posted

So I promised to post the Fun times and here they are! This is for the first day. IMG_2528.jpgIMG_2527.jpgIMG_2526.jpgWe had a nice basket of goodies in the bathroom. There was two kinds of toothpaste which came in handy since we forgot ours!! There was a bit of Bonine and some shampoo and conditioner. IMG_2520-1.jpg We left our stuff there and decided to go up on deck. There was a shuttle launch to take place at 1:30 pm. It was pretty neat! Couldn't see a TON, but you saw the huge cloud from the fuel burning and after the shuttle was out of sight, the sonic boom hit the ship and you could feel it in your feet! IMG_2500.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
 Share
Go to topic listing
  • Forum Jump
    • Categories
      • Welcome to Cruise Critic
      • New Cruisers
      • Cruise Lines “A – O”
      • Cruise Lines “P – Z”
      • River Cruising
      • ROLL CALLS
      • Cruise Critic News & Features
      • Digital Photography & Cruise Technology
      • Special Interest Cruising
      • Cruise Discussion Topics
      • UK Cruising
      • Australia & New Zealand Cruisers
      • Canadian Cruisers
      • North American Homeports
      • Ports of Call
      • Cruise Conversations
×
×
  • Create New...