knagl

You're certainly going to smell smoke in the non-smoking side of the casino. It's just not as bad as the smoking side. The main walkway through the casino separates the smoking vs. non-smoking. The section to the right of the green line in the map below is non-smoking.

On the Spirit in December that was definitely not the case -- servers had to ring in the drinks on their computer, the bartenders could not.

For whatever it's worth, in case you decide you do want to do some of your own laundry so you can wash in cold water, the laundry room on deck 5 aft of the Spirit was pretty spacious. Also of note, the dryers got extremely hot even on the medium heat setting. We brought laundry detergent pods and dryer sheets with us and we were happy with the experience.

I had chosen my cabin for a cruise, and then later Carnival changed the ship on us and randomly assigned us to a similar room on the new ship. Unfortunately, the room they assigned us to was a connecting room and I have read enough here to know that such a room is less desirable due to possible excess noise from the neighbors. When a nearby cabin in the same category became available after final payment, I contacted my PVP and he was able to do a "cabin swap" for me with no issue. It was not a cancellation and rebooking, just assigning us to the new cabin. Our booking and casino offer remained the same. Maybe the front-line folks at the 800 number don't have the ability to do that, but it was done without hesitation when I asked my PVP to do it.

The gray areas on the map above OPs cabin are spa treatment rooms, so they shouldn't be noisy. The running track on Spirit is on the 11th deck. The deck above OPs room is an infrequently traveled open deck area that doesn't even have any seating if I remember correctly. Noise from above shouldn't be a concern for cabin 8120 at all.

Thank you for taking the time to post your excellent report and pictures. The all-inclusive places looked great. If we ever travel to those ports I'll look into them for sure. As far as the MDR goes, we ate there every night during our back-to-back on the Spirit in December. Food generally ranged from good to great. Service times ranged from great to slow-ish, but we were overall very pleased with our anytime dining experience in the MDR on the Spirit. Richard and Ardeen were great and we asked for their section if they had an available table.

The replies here have covered pretty much everything I experienced on my recent first-time B2B, where we also had to switch cabins. We packed everything up at the end of the first cruise, tagged it with the new room number, and our steward from the first cabin coordinated the move of our stuff to the new cabin. In our case, she called the new steward on the phone and had him come to the room to move our stuff. I'll add, if you're planning to do laundry, I suggest waiting until the first or second night of the second cruise -- you'll have the laundry room to yourself as the majority of folks will have just boarded and won't be washing clothes. Also, you'll want to make sure your cruises are linked as B2B. If you booked with a PVP it should already be done, or you can call customer service to attempt to have them do it. It isn't a horrible idea either to stop by guest services during a slow time on the first cruise to verify that they show you as B2B.

In Miami they had a line for on-time arrivals, and a separate line for early/late arrivals. We had a 12-12:30 time slot but got there around 1:00pm. We used the unoccupied "early/late" line and actually walked past a couple of groups in the on-time line. Nobody even batted an eye at our arrival time, and once our paperwork was checked out, we walked through security (no wait) and directly on to the ship. In general, the later you board the smaller the crowd, and it's not a big deal if you're outside your assigned window.

I never bought anything there so no firsthand experience. If they don't have a computer there, it would be easy enough for them to write your folio number down along with whatever it is you're purchasing, and turn it in at the end of the shift to get charged to your account.

I took this photo in December of 2022 on the Carnival Spirit. It was a reference sheet posted for employees in the pizza place. If it's too small to read, it lists Miller Lite, Peroni, and Blue Moon as available beers.

Carnival Spirit is the only ship in the fleet that has it, to the best of my knowledge. Spirit doesn't have the "upgraded" tables installed yet, so every meal uses tablecloths, just like in the olden days.

An unofficial list from an unnamed social media site says that "Tatsu" is the scheduled piano bar entertainer for your cruise.

^^^ this is correct. There is table service, you fill out the paper order sheet and get made-to-order pasta brought to your table by a server.

Our cab ride from MIA to PortMiami in December was about $35 with no significant traffic. 👎

We were in 6232 on the Spirit in December and had a similar issue. We told the steward but nothing seemed to get done. Later we talked to someone at Guest Services who sent a HVAC guy to the cabin. His thermometer showed it at 74° with the thermostat set to cold. He opened up a damper in the vent which made it mostly tolerable for the rest of the cruise, but still not as cold as I would have liked. In contrast, our first room (we were B2B) on the 7th deck got really cool.

On embarkation day, you can avoid the chaos and crowds by going to Cucina Del Capitano for lunch (free -- lunch there is included with your cruise fare). The lido buffet was a madhouse, but we nearly had the Cucina to ourselves with plenty of room for our carry-on bags next to us at our table. It was a nice, relaxing way to start our trip while waiting for our stateroom to be available. As others said, the spa facility on the Magic is excellent. If you're a spa person at all, consider getting the spa pass (or book a spa cabin which includes access).

Flat rate pricing was eliminated by the Board of County Commissioners as of July 19, 2022. (Source: https://www.miamidade.gov/global/service.page?Mduid_service=ser1572618493969359 ) To the OP: Carnival Celebration is scheduled to be docked at Terminal F on February 26, 2023.

Yes, although generally speaking I didn't think the prices they were charging were anything too special. I would suggest taking note of the prices of any tequila you might be interested in at your local liquor store to compare if the savings (if any) are worth the hassle of transporting it from the ship back home.

Drink service on the Spirit in December of 2022 was a little hit or miss at times, but mostly good. I tipped $2 cash on every drink, and a couple of times had a server stop me as I was randomly walking through the casino just to see if I wanted a drink.

For it to be a constant thing for years on every ship, they must be making a decent profit on it. If it wasn't making money, it wouldn't be there. Same with the Iffy jewelry.

Agreed with this. Any of them in the green rectangle are acceptable. 5236 is a gem if you can get it with the bowling alley balcony. You can also see where the gaps are between the lifeboats for slightly better views, although ultimately any of them are decent. You can see out, just not down.

That is referring to transportation from the airport to the ship at the start of your cruise, not the other way around. Yes, you could typically make a noon flight out of FLL from PortMiami, but it'll be a little tight. As others said, do the self assist debarkation and get off the ship as early as you can. We used SAS Transportation this past December to get from PortMiami to FLL and we were pleased with their service. Their website looks like it's from 1996, but they're still in business and I would use them again.

Carnival Spirit had Let It Ride as of December 2022. $5 minimum.

No there is not. I would recommend bringing your own bottle opener as I have heard mixed experiences about obtaining one from your room steward or room service once on board.

Nate is correct. The casino is divided by a main walkway, and the port side of the walkway is smoking permitted (left of the red line) while the starboard side of the walkway is non-smoking (right of the green line). All of the table games are in the smoking section, although a few had signs designating them as being non-smoking tables.