Carnival Ecstasy - Short Review - 12/7/2013

[goofytoo]

I booked a last minute cruise on the Carnival Ecstasy for my DD (24) and myself (50). We sailed out of Port Canaveral On December 7, 2013 for a 5 day cruise. The following is a short review of our cruise.

On Thursday, December 5th, 2013 I left Wisconsin to drive down to Orlando. I tried to leave early enough to avoid Winter-Storm Cleon. However I ran into the storm in Effingham, IL and did not leave it until after Mont Eagle, TN. For those familiar with the drive I found it quite surprising that before I went over the eastern continental divide the temperature was 31 degrees and on the other side the temperature was 65 degrees. I drove straight through to Orlando and arrived there around 7:00 a.m. Friday morning. I slept about 2 hours and then we spent the day at Epcot. We went to bed around 1:00 a.m. and got up at 8:00 a.m. Saturday and drove to Port Canaveral. We parked our car at Park and Cruz and waited about ½ an hour for the shuttle to take us to the ship. I personally thought the wait was a little excessive, but I am just naturally impatient

[goofytoo]

Embarkation - I am platinum and I linked my daughter's sail and sign card to my credit card so she got to board with me. The cruise I chose was one of the cruises that Carnival waived the single supplement, so I booked us each an interior cabin. The price was the same for 2 cabins as it would have been if we had shared one cabin. Embarkation was easy. We walked on the ship around 10:30 a.m.. They were still loading the ship using zone numbers. At that time I think they had called out zone 11 so we were not the first people on the ship. Our rooms were ready when we boarded so we could drop off our luggage. We noticed there were a lot of people still lugging around carry-ons so we were happy to have that perk. I would definitely buy FTTF if I was not already platinum.

[goofytoo]

Food – The food was good. We mainly ate breakfast and lunch on the Lido deck. I had WOK every day and my daughter usually ate at the buffet for lunch. During our cruise we also had pizza, burgers, deli sandwiches and calzones. We had dinner in the MDR every night. On several occasions we opted for comfort food because nothing else on the menu appealed to us. The food was good and we had no complaints. I will even go as far to say that the prime rib on formal night was the best prime-rib that I ever had on a Carnival ship or any other restaurant.

[goofytoo]

Entertainment

 

Cruise Director and Assistant Cruise Directors - I hardly ever saw the cruise director. I think his name was John but I could be wrong. What little I did see of him he kept making comments to the effect that the reason we are on the ship is to get drunk. Don't get me wrong, I like more than a few drinks when I am on vacation, I just never saw a cruise director be so blunt about it before.

 

Assistant Cruise Directors – I have never seen young adults with such a lack of enthusiasm as these assistant CD's had. They all looked and sounded bored out of their minds. Cheer up guys you are working on a cruise ship!!

 

Trivia – Our family is part of that nutty group of people that likes to win a ship on a stick when we cruise. Usually it is the kids that win the ship for us and in this case it was my daughter who won it. We played the 60's and 70's music trivia. She got 19 out of 20 questions. However when she walked up to get the ship on a stick, somebody claimed they got all 20 right so she did not win that one. I was surprised that my 24 year old daughter knew more songs than people in their 50s and 60s including myself. Later we played the 80's trivia. The Assistant CD used her own i-pod to choose selections. Most of the people there never heard the songs she was playing. My daughter won that contest. I think she only had about 13 songs right. Most people only had about 5 songs right. Ship on a stick in hand, we did not attend any other trivia contests.

 

Shows – We went to see the Brits show. It was ok, nothing to write home about. We saw the Hasbro show, again it was entertaining, but not as good as the reviews led me to believe. We did not see the Mo-town show, but we happened to be in the atrium when it ended. The entertainers and dancers ran out into the atrium and finished the show out there. We had a ball singing along and dancing to the music. It was fun and was a welcomed surprise.

Karaoke – My daughter loves to sing. We went to Karaoke several times. There were only about 10 or 11 people that liked to sing so she got to sing a number of songs. She got to sing with a live band at Super Karaoke that was nice and we had a good time.

 

Piano Bar – We hung out at the piano bar for about 45 minutes one night. I don't remember the piano-man's name but he was ok and he interacted with the crowd. We left after 45 minutes, because really how much country music can one take. The piano-man asked if anybody liked country music and got a resounding NO!!! and one yes from some drunk chick from Georgia that wished she lived in Alabama. He kept catering to her so we left. It was a good thing we left when we did or we would have missed the Mo-town show in the atrium.

 

Twenty Something – My daughter is 24 years old and single. She commented more than several times that the only people that were her age on the ship were either newlyweds or assistant CDs. She ended up talking to the assistant CDs quite a bit. She said they were nice and pleasant to talk to. They even invited her to the club one night but she did not want to infringe on their time off.

[goofytoo]

Service

Bartenders – They were friendly and efficient. My daughter had the Cheers program and she did not have any problems with it. She was served in a timely and friendly manner.

Waiters – We had anytime dining. We had different servers every night. They were friendly and efficient. I think dinner was really slow one night but the other nights it was only slightly slow. The waiters appeared overworked and did not have time to enter into conversations with the guests. This is something that I would say is pretty normal for most Carnival ships and have come to expect when dining on Carnival.

Steward – This is where my complaining begins. So if you don't like to read complaints you should know that the room was clean and comfortable and skip on to the next section.

When we got on the ship at 10:30 a.m. our rooms were ready and we met our room steward right away. I was still tired from my drive down and subsequent day at Disney World so after we ate lunch and explored the ship my daughter and I decided to take a nap before muster drill. I was awoken from my sleep to find someone standing in my doorway yelling something about a safety drill. Our steward had opened my door and was telling me that I should go to the drill. I know that the stewards are required to check the rooms for people trying to hide from the drill so, I apologized and quickly went to my daughter's room and found out that she had been woken up the same way. While I was trying to hurry her along I noticed that people were still walking in the halls with dinks in their hands and did not seem to be in any hurry to get to the drill. We checked our watches and the drill did not start for another 40 minutes. We were pretty upset that he had come into our rooms especially since we could have slept another 45 minutes.

The next day we were not scheduled to dock in Key West until noon. I woke up at 8:30 a.m. because someone had been pounding on my door. I asked who was there and it was the steward saying he wanted to clean my room. I told him I was not ready. He then moved on and I could hear him knocking on all of the doors down the hall. I was a bit upset because I wanted to sleep in and could not believe he was knocking. I went to get my daughter and she told me that he had actually came into her room to wake her up and tell her he wanted to clean her room. I was quite upset about this. After I settled down, I told her that it could have been a mistake since we did not put our Snoozin sign on the door the night before. That night I put the Snoozin sign on my door and locked the deadbolt.

The next morning was a sea day. At 8:30 in the morning I woke up because my phone was ringing. As soon as I answered the phone the caller hung up. I knew it was our steward because I could hear the phone ring in other rooms as I walked to my daughter's room. Now I was really angry. I had come on the cruise to relax. It was a sea day, no one was going anywhere. My daughter was so upset that she said she was going to leave her Snoozin sign on the door when we were gone because she did not want him in her room. When we went back to our rooms later in the day her Snoozin sign had been turned to "Cruisin" and her room was clean. Now she was really mad and wanted to complain to guest services. I told her, that there was a slight possibility that someone else may have turned the sign around as a joke. Later on that night we ran into our steward and he saw us and started laughing. He asked us if we were enjoying our 24 hours of sleep on our cruise. I told him that we are usually up until 1:00 or 2:00 in the morning and then sleep in the next day, while we are on vacation. He said that he knows there are children on the ship and sometimes they change the "Cruisin" sign to "Snoozin" so he calls his rooms to see if people are in there. If they are not in there then he goes in and cleans the room. The next two days were port days and my daughter and I were awake before 8:30 so we did not have any issues.

The last night of the cruise we ran into our steward and I told him that we had early debarkation and we would be out of the room by 7:15 a.m.. He kept asking us if we would leave at 8:30? (why does that time sound so familiar?) I told him, no that we would be gone at 7:00. At 6:45 a.m. my daughter and I were finishing the packing in my room. We heard some noise and turned around to see our steward walk in the room. He did not even knock first. He saw us apologized and left.

Moral of the story ? – Keep your deadbolt on at all times you are in the room and take your phone off of the hook if you want to sleep in.

[goofytoo]

Shore Excursions –

Key West – We rented bikes for $15 a day. Most people got them for $10 a day but I do not know where they rented them. Any way we rode around the island and went to the southern point and to fort (something?) park to see the beach. We decided not to swim and took our bikes back before dark. We then visited Hard Rock Café and Margarittaville. Neither place was busy and we had a nice time chatting with the bar tenders.

Nassau- I saw a shore excursion for power snorkeling and told my daughter that we could probably get that excursion for a lower price than the ship was charging. When we got off the ship I could not find anybody offering it. I asked at the tour information place if they knew where we could find someone offering power snorkeling. He said it would be $10 higher in price than the ship was charging. (That was the first time I ever was offered a price for a shore excursion off of the ship, higher than what the ship was charging) We declined and took a two hour tour of the island instead. We saw Fort (something?) and the Queen's Stair Case as well as Paradise Island. The tour was $25 per person. I enjoyed the Queens Stair Case just because I did not realize that it was carved out of the side of a hill. I thought it was just a stair case. I guess technically it is just a staircase, but I still enjoyed it. My daughter enjoyed the excursion more than I did. She liked hearing the history of the island. We had some drinks and snacks at Sharkies (?) and went back to the ship.

Free Port – We were determined to go snorkeling. We got off the ship and ran into a man advertising snorkeling $35 per person. We said were interested and were loaded into a van with another couple from our ship. We took the 25 minute ride to Paradise Cove. The snorkeling was from shore. The price included transportation and all equipment. When we got there, there were only about 10 people there. The facilities were OK. It was a little run down and not what I am used to, but they had bathrooms, showers, a bar and snorkeling, what more could you want? We rented a locker $5 and got our equipment and went snorkeling right away. The reef is what I would consider a fair distance from shore. They offer a boat ride out to the reef for $4. My daughter and I are strong swimmers and we did not have any problems getting to the reef. The snorkeling was nice. We saw a lot of fish. I would say we were in the water for about 1 ¼ hours before we started to shiver. So we went to shore and rented beach chairs for $3.00 per person. We had a couple of drinks. Beer $3.50 and blender drinks $6.00. When the driver dropped us off he told us he would pick us up at 2:30. We saw the couple we came with and told them if they wanted to go back earlier than that it was all right with us. The driver was very surprised we wanted to go back early, but he took us. We were back on the ship around 1:00. There were about 70 people there when we left. We noticed two large groups of people one had Carnival towels and the other had RCCL towels. So I deduced that this location was offered as a shore excursion, but I did not check to see how much the ship was charging for this excursion.

Edited December 26, 2013 by goofytoo

[goofytoo]

Debarkation – Let the complaining begin again. I am platinum so I qualified for early debarkation. I went to guest services and explained to them that my daughter was in the same car. I asked them if it was ok if she left early with me. We were given approval. We went to the meeting place about 7:10 am and saw that the bar that was designated as the meeting place was full so we sat in some chairs outside of the bar. There were about 40 people sitting outside of the bar around 7:25 a.m. when a staff member came through and told everybody that in order to begin the debarkation process, everyone had to squeeze into the bar. So every one left their comfortable chairs and crammed into the bar that had standing room only. So we stood there for about ½ hour to 45 minutes. Meanwhile the late comers saw how packed the bar was and sat down in the chairs outside the bar to wait. Guess who were the first ones to get off the ship? The late comers who were sitting in chairs outside of the bar.

Moral of the story – sit in chairs outside of the bar and ignore staff members who ask you to move into the bar.

Over-all – I enjoyed the cruise, got some sun and the price was right. I would do it again

[Kfoot]

We were on this same cruise. The CD name was Jorge I think. We went to the adult comedy club 2 nights / 3 shows, and the director for comedy each night he comes on to introduce the comedian he keeps on saying 'yes guys I'm a homosexual'. Frankly I could care less what he is, but after the first night he doesn't have to repeat it for every show. I was so tired of him.

[goofytoo]

We were on this same cruise. The CD name was Jorge I think. We went to the adult comedy club 2 nights / 3 shows, and the director for comedy each night he comes on to introduce the comedian he keeps on saying 'yes guys I'm a homosexual'. Frankly I could care less what he is, but after the first night he doesn't have to repeat it for every show. I was so tired of him.

 

Oh Ok,

 

I forgot to say we went to the comedy show one night. I think I saw him there. I thought it was Shane that kept telling everyone he was homosexual. I forgot about that. I just remember that lady comedian wasn't very funny. Just my opinion, everybody's tastes are a little different.

 

Did you enjoy your cruise?

Edited December 26, 2013 by goofytoo

[RuthlessBoss]

I was on the same cruise and after reading my debarking platinum (or thought they were) instructions, mine said 8:30 at Neon bar. Yes, I read the instructions. Apparantly they were not the correct ones and we didn't get picked up till well after 9!!. By then, the bar was full and people winding around the walkway too. It was my first platinum debarking.

As for food, it was all excellent though ate mostly buffet because I was solo. I was lucky on ATD on elegant night and got a large table with really nice people.

This was my most low keyed cruise on this ship, it my 4th time. Part of the problem was my own fault, I had an orthopedic previous injury and pain thought it should accompany me wherever I went. Really put a damper on things.

[goofytoo]

I was on the same cruise and after reading my debarking platinum (or thought they were) instructions, mine said 8:30 at Neon bar. Yes, I read the instructions. Apparantly they were not the correct ones and we didn't get picked up till well after 9!!. By then, the bar was full and people winding around the walkway too. It was my first platinum debarking.

As for food, it was all excellent though ate mostly buffet because I was solo. I was lucky on ATD on elegant night and got a large table with really nice people.

This was my most low keyed cruise on this ship, it my 4th time. Part of the problem was my own fault, I had an orthopedic previous injury and pain thought it should accompany me wherever I went. Really put a damper on things.

 

I think the 7:15 debarkation was for self assist. The zone 1 debarkation was later.

[Kfoot]

Oh Ok,

 

I forgot to say we went to the comedy show one night. I think I saw him there. I thought it was Shane that kept telling everyone he was homosexual. I forgot about that. I just remember that lady comedian wasn't very funny. Just my opinion, everybody's tastes are a little different.

 

Did you enjoy your cruise?

 

I'm sorry. I meant to say Shane (who is in charge of the comedy club) was annoying, due to the fact he keeps telling everyone he's homosexual. I prefer the lady over the male comedian. I wanted to walk out during his set.

Overall I had a nice cruise. I enjoy Key West and Freeport.

Edited December 27, 2013 by Kfoot

[valandemmy]

Oh Ok,

 

I forgot to say we went to the comedy show one night. I think I saw him there. I thought it was Shane that kept telling everyone he was homosexual. I forgot about that. I just remember that lady comedian wasn't very funny. Just my opinion, everybody's tastes are a little different.

 

Did you enjoy your cruise?

 

It was shane...Shane from Wisconsin....

[carolej126]

I was on the same cruise as well. It's funny ... while the last couple of cruise directors made a good impression on me, this one did not. Different people, different styles, I guess. Our room steward was okay, although we did find nail clippings left on the floor from a previous guest, so the room wasn't vacuumed very well between cruises. The food was okay - we were surprised to see at least one of the menus repeated during the cruise - and the entertainment was okay as well. We used FTTF for the first time on this cruise, and it was nice to be able to get on board earlier, leave the carry-on's in the room, and head for the lido for lunch without worrying about crowds. We were in the first zone to leave after self-assist, and had the same issue - told to go to the library, which was very, very crowded, but in our case, because we were forced to stand outside the room about an hour, we were the first ones in the group to head for the "door." :) Our favorite part was probably the time we spent in the various ports - we didn't pay for any excursions, just walked around and took our own tours. We did end up purchasing a photograph, but used our OBC to buy it, so we didn't really use much "out of pocket" money on this trip. We were happy with the fare aswell - we booked ES, and made four early saver claims, saving $180 in total, plus gaining a $25 credit.

[riclop]

Thanks for the review.