Carnival Ecstasy Review

[teknoge3k]

I am just off of a 7 day on the Ecstasy out of Charleston so I figured I would leave a review for CC and future cruisers! Let me know if you have any questions and I will do my best to help.

 

Prior to the cruise: We stayed at the MainStay Suite in Mt. Pleasant which was a super nice hotel. It is just at the end of the bridge from downtown. Very close to everything. We paid $112 a night for our suite which was 2 bedrooms with queen beds, and 2 bathrooms and a kitchen and living room. We left out car here for the week which is in a very secure location. They do not have a shuttle to the port, but Uber costs us $14 for an UberXL (we had a ton of luggage) Our Uber driver had a new Yukon Denali that still had new car smell in it. Very nice and very nice driver as well. He got us to port fairly quickly, although we weren't far from port. 4 miles I think? I highly recommend this hotel to everyone.

 

Our embarkation was delayed by 2 hours due to Tropical Storm Bonnie. We arrived at 12:00pm (they said to arrive no earlier than 1, but nobody listened and there were quite a few people already there. We dropped out luggage with the porter and went inside. There were probably 500-600 people inside, the place was small and PACKED. The line was forever long. However we had FTTF and went straight to the front of the line. We got our documents, and was on board by 12:15. We went to our room and dropped off our carry on since we had 4 12 packs of soda. We checked it out then waited for muster. Finally muster happened, then we watched Charleston float away in the distance.

 

The first 2 days at sea, I am not sure if I was sea sick or I had a bug. I think it was a bug but I stayed in bed. I was miserable. This is in no fault of Carnival or the boat though. I was just sick.

 

Grand Turk This was our first stop. Now every port has a Margaritaville and Senor Frogs so we skipped the chain stuff and wanted to see things on our own. We had rented a golf cart from Karib ($100/day) and drove around the island. We went to the lighthouse, Her Majesty's Prison, and ended up coming back to Jack's Shack for lunch. The island is very run down and poor but the natives are super nice and friendly. The island runs on cruise money apparently. If you do this method of a golf cart, when you go to Jack's Shack on the road it's very ghetto where you go in and park. Not safe looking, but it was fantastic on the other side. VERY humid though. If you head to GT, I recommend a golf cart from either Nathan or Karib and explore the island on your own. See the salinas, the shops, and their way of life. Oh and the donkeys everywhere. Donkey, horse, and dogs run free all over the island. It's really cool!

 

Half Moon Cay (which is pronounced Half Moon Key despite the spelling) is simply amazing. This is paradise. The sand is like baby powder, wasn't even hot to walk on when it was 90 degrees the day we were there. The water you can see your feet when you walk out chest deep. A stingray swam between my wife and I and another was near me on the floor. It moved when I went to get a picture though. We had a cabana here (#13 I think) which was far enough down the beach where the rest of the ship wasn't on top of us and we had plenty of space to ourselves. We didn't even go get lunch because of the fruit and veggie trays provided to us. We also had the sodas and waters as well in our cabana. I recommend a cabana because you can keep your stuff there and it is pretty secure plus it gives you shade and a fan and A/C. I absolutely love HMC.

 

Nassau I couldn't care less if we didn't return here. The port is so busy (there were 2 other ships docked with us) and there is just a million people there. We ended up going to Atlantis and just walking around. Atlantis is a nice place, very big. We did some shopping there, then headed back to port. It didn't impress us at all. On future cruises, if Nassau and/or Freeport are on the stops, we'll find another cruise.

 

Dining The food in the MDR was good. We had YTD which was great. We never waited more than 5 minutes to be sat, not once. Not even on formal night. I primarily ate steak and shrimp. The warm melting chocolate cake was amazing also. The dinner shows were pretty cheesy but still fun. Oh and our cruise did have table cloths for the 7 people who cried over table cloths, lol... I couldn't care less though if they were there or not. Food on the lido was just okay. It was like Golden Corral. My son did eat 897 ice cream cones though.

 

Formal Night I was worried about this one. I am a simple man, I do not own dress clothes, and in fact I have one tie to my name (which I did not even take). They did not expect you to "dress up" which was fantastic. I wore some Tommy Hilfiger polo colored shorts and a polo shirt and some tennis shoes and was fine. Many others were dressed the same. There were some people who really dressed up though. It was probably 70/30, 70 being those that didn't dress up.

 

Disembarkation This went slower than anticipated, even with FTTF. People carrying their luggage off went first, and started somewhere in the 6am hour. I want to say it was around 9 when we got off, but could be wrong. The line was so long getting off the boat and then in port. However UCBD was very quick and easy. Once we were out of the building, I called for my Uber and he was there within 4 minutes. Again it was an UberXL and it cost $12 and this guy had a nice new BMW X5 I think it was. Very nice SUV. We got back to the hotel and found out a bird had vandalized our vehicle. Aside from that, the car was safe.

 

Overall The cruise was fantastic despite being sick for 2-3 days. That's not CCLs fault though. I will definitely always have FTTF when cruising until I reach diamond/platinum. I also will always have YTD. I don't understand sitting with strangers for a meal and I don't understand being told an exact time I have to eat. But that's me, and everyone is different. Some people enjoy it, it's just not for me.

 

Up Next! We did take advantage of the $100 OBC to book our next cruise. We're sailing out of Ft. Lauderdale in May of 2017 on the Splendor going to St. Kitts, St. Maarten, Grand Turn, San Juan. I am excited!!

 

Hopefully my review could help someone! Have a great day. :)

[simplelife]

We are doing your May itinerary in January.

[Swedishndn]

We leave Charleston in two weeks for Nassau and Freeport. I'm really hoping things go smooth......Smooth sailing! Excited for a break from the usual grind!!

 

Thanks for the review!!

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app

Edited June 7, 2016 by Swedishndn

[riclop]

Thanks for the review.

[mtsnd1900]

Did you enjoy the ship, the entertainment, etc?

 

Kids club - did it offer enough for the kids?

 

Love the port, hoping they can update it in the near future though. thanks for the review.

[Swedishndn]

At MainStay Suites - did you have to ask them about leaving your car there? Or pay extra to leave it there?

[teknoge3k]

Did you enjoy the ship, the entertainment, etc?

 

Kids club - did it offer enough for the kids?

 

Love the port, hoping they can update it in the near future though. thanks for the review.

 

The entertainment was good, although I must admit we didn't do a ton of things that involved going to shows. What we did go to was good though.

 

As far as the kids clubs, my youngest is 4 years old and he seemed to like the kids club. He went one day and really enjoyed it but the rest of the time he stuck with us. He's a clinger though even off the ship so this wasn't because he didn't enjoy it. He did talk about it a lot.

 

My oldest is 12, he didn't go to the kids club, but we rarely saw him. He ran free on the ship with friends and lived at the ice cream machine. We forced him to eat dinner with us once, but aside from that and port days, we didn't even see him. He had so much fun though!

[teknoge3k]

At MainStay Suites - did you have to ask them about leaving your car there? Or pay extra to leave it there?

 

They let you leave your vehicle there for free, no extra charges or anything. You just fill out a form telling them you're keeping your vehicle there and you're good to go. We pulled our vehicle in, in the spot directly across from the doors so the front desk would have an eye on it the whole week. While they didn't have to watch it (nor did we expect them to), it would maybe deter any bad guys since it was in front of an active lobby. If only it had deterred that darn bird.. ;)

[LIV_N_SC]

Would you tell me what FTTF is? Thanks.

[teknoge3k]

Would you tell me what FTTF is? Thanks.

 

FTTF is Faster To The Fun

 

You pay for this, but you get:

 

-Priority embarkation

-Room ready as soon as you board

-Priority line at guest services

-Priority tendering at ports with tenders

-Dedicated number to guest services

-Priority dining time choice

-Priority disembarkation

 

Keep in mind, diamond, platinum, weddings, and suites have priority over FTTF. But FTTF has priority over hundreds/thousands others. It's also very limited per ship. (I believe only 40 were available for our ship)

 

You pay per cabin, NOT per person.

[JGlennCruiser]

We took the same cruise and you're right on the money with your review. I would add the Juggler (Dana Tison) was absolutely great entertainment. He involved members of the audience and had a fantastic wit.

 

We had a 5 year old grandson along and had to give up on the water slides the morning of the second sea day when we saw lightning in the distance but considering the storm that blew through Charleston the day we left we had great weather overall.

 

I loved that this cruise went as far south as possible then worked its way north, the 2 sea day at the front of the cruise were great. We've taken similar cruises out of Charleston that started in Nassau (which I can live without also) and liked this much better.

 

The big LEARN for me on this cruise is to check on local holidays, it turned out to be Labor Day in Nassau with a parade down Bay St and many shops closed for the day. I think the parade was more fun that the many shops selling the same crap so even though it was a surprise it was a good one.

[JimAOk1945]

Thanks for your review. It sounds like you had a great experience. We enjoyed two cruises on the Ecstasy when she used to sail round trip out of Galveston, TX.

 

Your upcoming cruise sounds fantastic. Happy sailing!