Carnival Triumph, 12/28 to 1/2 Review: A Mixed Bag

[tiller]

I was on the Carnival Triumph on the New Year's Eve cruise with my mom, brother, and sister-in-law. While I enjoyed the cruise overall, there was definitely elements that could use some improving.

 

First, the embarkation was the worst I've experienced. I understand that the cruise prior to ours came in late and that may have exacerbated the issue, but by and large the port employees were very unhelpful and didn't make it clear what lines to be in. When my mom and I were called up to the registration desk to check in, the clerk wasn't ready for us yet as there were people in front of us. Then another employee yelled at us to move, even though I was waiting for my mom and had both our Sail and Sign cards.

 

Things were better once we got on the ship, with our cabins being ready as soon as we got there. We had Guy's Burgers for lunch. My first time, as the Carnival ships I've been on prior did not have them. Really liked them, had them a second time.

 

Overall, I thought the food was very good. I especially liked Blue Iguana's breakfast offerings. However, both the breakfast and lunch buffets need an upgrade. The lunch buffet does not offer enough cold options--too much hot and heavy food, while the breakfast buffet needs more variety of pastries. I think we had danishes, plain croissants, and banana bread each day.

 

I enjoyed most of the food in the dining room. We had Your Time dining and only had to wait 1 night to be seated, when we wanted to eat at 7. It was closer to 7:30 by the time we got our table and unfortunately that meal was rushed because we wanted to see the 9 p.m. show. I really enjoyed the warm date and fig pudding, the ox tongue appetizer, the Indian vegetarian, and the iced lychee soup, among other dishes. We had one waiter three of the five nights, Elmer, who was very good.

 

Also had the Sea Day brunch. I liked the Honey Nut Cheerios-crusted French toast but it was too much to finish.

 

The entertainment was pretty good. The Big Easy show was cancelled due to weather but the Wonderful World show had some of the best dancing I've ever seen on a cruise. Tommy Drake was very funny, both in the family show we saw the last night and on Liar's Club. However, Mark Binnick the illusionist was very disappointing. I liked the tricks he did with audience members, but all the half-dressed dancers added nothing and he was also somewhat tasteless during Liar's Club. We went to the piano bar the first night but the acoustics weren't very good. Piano bars should not be that loud.

 

Oddly, there was very little evening entertainment on December 30. I guess Carnival was prepping for New Year's Eve.

 

Now the two major complaints: trivia and dinner dress. Putting trivia in a lobby bar outside the casino, when there are so many available lounges, is a horrible idea. My sister-in-law has asthma and could not bear the smoke. Plus, it was noisy and the foot traffic made it hard to hear the questions.

 

As for dinner, most people looked nice on Elegant night, but a lot of people couldn't even meet Carnival's very lax Cruise Casual dress code. It's disrespectful to the hard work by the kitchen and wait staff.

 

Debarkation was the opposite of embarkation. It was a very smooth process, and my mom and I were at Hobby by 10 a.m. for our 1:30 p.m. flight. That flight wound up leaving an hour late because of the world's slowest baggage loaders, but we made our connection through Vegas and got home on time.

 

Lastly, I thought the Triumph was in good shape. Our cabins's A/C worked fine, and even though we were above the nightclub, we never heard anything at night.

 

Like I said, it was a good cruise overall but there are definitely things Carnival should fix.