newpherchris

I'll throw my two cents in - In the past year I've been able to make WiFi calls using the Value plan while out in the middle of the ocean on both the Valor and Sunrise but noticed that the time of day definitely mattered. The calls were crystal-clear very early in the morning when few others on the ship were on the WiFi. As the day progressed and more people were up and on the WiFi, the calls would become increasingly more difficult to connect, and once connected were prone to dropping or sounding choppy / garbled. That said, I never expect to be able to make ANY type of call on a value plan w

After 21 years of cruising exclusively with Carnival since I was 28, last May I finally crawled over 200 nights to Diamond VIFP status. My first Diamond cruise was a six-night out of Norfolk on the second sailing of the Sunrise; while the service was as great as I've always come to enjoy with Carnival, I didn't notice (or expect) anything else out of the ordinary that would reflect my shiny new status (i.e. above and beyond Carnival's documented Diamond benefits). I was invited to a tea service with the captain along with a handful of other Diamonds, but only received the invite a couple of ho

So, I had a 'placeholder' for a 5- night on Feb 15 out of Jacksonville on the Ecstasy. Originally supposed to go to Nassau and Princess Cay but got an email from Carnival that the itinerary has been updated to Nassau and Freeport. "We're confident you'll love Freeport because ...." It's by no means am even swap, so we're going to cancel. Fortunately we booked with the slightly more expensive Past Guest option so we'll just move the deposit to something else. The punchline: the price for the New and Not-At-All Improved itenerary for new bookings went UP since yesterday.

I've been on 34 cruises (all Carnival) and was on the second sailing of the Sunrise, and we loved it. We wondered if the staff would be inexperienced / not able to handle the larger crowds but they were great. Never had to wait 45 minutes for the Liquid Lounge shows (saw three); walked in 15 minutes before show time and always got seats with a great unblocked view in the 'nosebleeds' (which aren't far away considering the smaller size of the theater). We actually PREFER the smaller theater, as it makes the shows feel a little more intimate. Yes, some buffet lines could get long but there were