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Warm Breezes

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  • Location
    Michigan
  • Interests
    Reading, Cruising
  • Favorite Cruise Line(s)
    Which ever one I am on.
  • Favorite Cruise Destination Or Port of Call
    Where ever my cruise takes me.

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5,000+ Club (4/15)

  1. Wow. I can't believe the number of people who say they will cruise/not cruise on a certain line because of the loyalty perks. Perks which when you add them all up really don't amount to much money in comparison to the amount of money you spend on a cruise. We are platinum on Carnival. But out of our 24 cruises, 10 have been on other cruise lines. While I think of the perks as a fun bonus, I do not sail Carnival, or any other line, for them. Many other factors go into choosing our cruises such as cost, itinerary, ship, embarkation port, who we are traveling with....but never what loyalty perks I get on the ship. We have 2 cruises coming up. One on Carnival chosen because Jubilee is a new ship to us and Galveston is a new embarkation port for us. Another factor for Jubilee is we can easily drive to Galveston making it an extended road trip vacation which we love to do since we retired. The other on Norwegian Joy chosen with our friends whom we are sailing with to Alaska which is a bucket list cruise for all us. We just love to cruise and if a cruise fits our wish list for a certain vacation, it doesn't matter what cruise line it is or what the loyalty perks are. But hey, if loyalty perks mean that much to you then have fun on the other lines. I have a great time on them too.
  2. My Perfect Cruise Day was October 21, 2021 onboard the Carnival Mardi Gras. It was our 33rd wedding anniversary🥰 on a sea day. We started out the day with mimosa's🥂 and room service breakfast on our aft balcony. Then we spent a little time in the casino🎰 before going up to the lido for some lunch at the salad bar🥗 in Serenity and hanging out up there for a little while. Then DH went to our room for an afternoon nap😴 out of the sun while I went down to get our free bingo card that we won playing Deal or No Deal a few days before. I found a seat back in Java Blue, the place was packed and I was lucky to find a place to sit. I had to watch the television screens for the numbers because I could hardly see the stage. The first game got started and I was trying really hard to keep up because I had number after number that were being called. After just 7 numbers were called I realized that I already had 4 numbers in a row and I had to stand up. Just as I stood up they called the last number in my row and I yelled BINGO🤑! I was the only one with a winning card and I had won $875💰 Our lucky number is 21. 21 is our anniversary day (10/21/88💍) as well as the day we had our first date (6/21/85). The date was 10/21/21. This was our 21st cruise🛳️. My bingo board had 21 on it. I took the attached picture and sent it to my kids at home. I went back to our room after all the bingo games were done and woke my husband up to tell him I had won. I had to show him my bingo card to get him to believe me. By then it was time for us to get ready for our anniversary dinner in Rudi's. We had a table at their outdoor dining area and watched a beautiful sunset🌅, with a hint of a rainbow, while eating a delicious meal with my favorite crab cake🦀 and his favorite surf🦞 and turf🥩. We ended with evening with a show and well, you know🥰. It was our anniversary after all😉. P.S. I ended up buying a puppy🐕‍🦺 for my husband with my winnings. Pebbles has been a joy to us ever since💗.
  3. I would get them a gift card through AARP. It is refundable in the form of a gift card or they can download whatever they have left unto their account in the casino and cash it out there. You can get them at AARP at a 10% discount.
  4. This all reminds me of my daughters wedding last summer. My daughter wanted pasta for her wedding. At the tasting they served us fettuccini with lots of chicken and baked ziti with a good amount of meat in the sauce. My husband specifically asked if there would be that much meat at the buffet so everyone would get meat with their meal. They assured us it would so we went through them. Fast forward to the wedding. We were the first table to go through the buffet after the head table and by the time we got to the fettuccini, I found one small sliver of chicken and the baked ziti's sauce had no meat. So disappointed. I haven't come across that on Carnival though.
  5. I loved the new crawfish dishes. It was my first time trying crawfish. The crawfish strudel and crawfish fettuccini were delicious. I also loved the new chicken cordon bleu. I can't wait to have them again on the Jubilee.
  6. I switch back and forth between a few different options on a cruise depending on what I am doing or feeling like taking. I have a small crossbody that fits my phone. I use that for going to ports and when I am wearing dress. I have a wrist lanyard and a couple neck lanyards with easy on/off clip for my card to switch out what I am using quickly. I use a magnetic hook to hang them on the wall when we are in are room. I have small pill cylinders that are hooked to all of them carry a couple tylenols and my medication I need to take in the afternoon (so I don't have to go back to the room if we are out and about).
  7. I have to agree. I loved a lot of the Emeril selections especially the crawfish ones. They were delicious.
  8. Lol. Our last cruise was on Carnival Horizon this past October. I loved the sandwiches at the deli (as did a lot of people because the line was usually long) and my husband was very disappointed in the tomahawk pork chop he got at Cucina del Capitano. To each his own.
  9. I have to agree. We are not loyal to Carnival. I have also had great cruises on NCL, MSC, and Disney (Princess was ok). Having said that we have sailed the most on Carnival, our last cruise was Carnival and our next cruise is Carnival. In fact 14 of our 24 have been on Carnival since we started cruising in 2001. IMHO Sparks is correct in saying there have been changes but not a degradation at Carnival. In fact our last cruises on Mardi Gras and Horizon have been 2 of our favorite Carnival cruises. I am looking forward to sailing on Jubilee next year. There have been changes both positive and negative since our first Carnival cruise in 2005, but IMO the positive far outweigh the negative. We will keep sailing Carnival and any other ship, no matter what the line, that meets needs/wants for that vacation. But that is us. We do what makes us happy. Everyone else needs to do what makes them happy. It is as simple as that.
  10. We just went on our first MSC cruise on Oct 2, 2022 on MSC Divina out of Port Canaveral. We are also Platinum on Carnival with our last sailing on them being the Mardi Gras in Oct 2021. I will start out by saying this was a free cruise for us through the myVegas games. We only paid $298 in port fees and taxes for the 2 of us (plus gratuities) using 1.5 million in our gold coin rewards and received an extra large balcony with 2 loungers in addition to the normal 2 chairs and stool (cabin 12220). It was also the first sailing after the port opened up after Ian and the ship was at most 1/2 full. While we get some pretty decent deals with Carnival through their casino packages this was the best deal we have had so far through any cruise line. They even status matched our Platinum status to Gold on MSC. Over all I would say the demographics were older on MSC with less of a party atmosphere than you sometimes find on Carnival depending on the cruise. The dress code was the same. They have a Captains Gala with free drinks that you no longer see on Carnival. We were also invited to the past guest party since they status matched us to Gold. I found the dancers and singers comparable to Carnival but the acrobatic acts they had were the best we have seen on a ship! Better than the ones I have seen on NCL which I thought were good in the past. The comedian and other shows like Love and Marriage were also comparable. I thought the pizza on MSC and the buffet itself better than Carnival but I was getting tired of seeing the same items on the buffet by the end of the week. I also thought meatloaf at the carving station was pretty strange. I have never seen meatloaf on a carving station before anywhere. I found the food in the MDR was comparable to Carnival. They do have Surf and Turf on gala night with lobster and steak included. I found the service also similar although they do make up the room 2 times a day instead of once a day that Carnival started doing. We loved MSC's private island Ocean Cay. Our cruise stayed there overnight so we had a light show from the light house that we could see from our balcony. I liked this island much better that Half Moon Cay. The casino was the smallest one I have ever seen on a ship. We ended up breaking even at the Casino. I normally come out a little ahead on Carnival but this was a free cruise! I had no complaints!
  11. Just a follow up on this. We were on our cruise Oct 2-9 on MSC Divina. We went to the MDR upon boarding and found our table was a table for 6. We met with the Maitre'd and he was able to get us a table for 2. No problem.
  12. Do you charge to your room for slot play bank (like Carnival) or do you need to bring Cash (like NCL)? Is it an electronic bank (like Carnival) or do you need to cash out and get tickets (like NCL)?
  13. Before the advent of Anytime Dining (on Carnival and Princess) and Freestyle Dining (on NCL) I would have agreed with you. However, times have changed. My husband and I have been on 22 cruises (Disney, Princess, Carnival, and NCL) and 10 of them (after 2013) have been with just the 2 of us (on Princess, Carnival, and NCL). On all of our couple only cruises we have had no problem getting tables for 2. We were not on luxury lines or in a higher category within a ship...we did not need to pay the high prices to get these tables. This is our first MSC cruise. We are not in YC or Aurea, we got a Fantastica Cabin with early dining, so I know we will not have the flexibility of having anytime dining on MSC. My hope is that we will be able to meet with the Maitre'd after boarding in order to get a table for 2 if we are not assigned one initially. If we can't then we will probably not be eating our meals in the MDR since we are uncomfortable dining with strangers. We prefer not spending our vacation time trying to make small talk with people we don't know. We wouldn't do that on a land vacation and we don't want to do it on a cruise either. Just our preference and since it is a free cruise we will make do with eating in other venues if the Maitre'd can't accommodate our request.
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