travelsizegirl

My husband and I are booked on the Breeze leaving Galveston Sept. 2nd. This will be our 2nd Carnival cruise, 3rd cruise in general.

We LOVE gambling on cruises. We play a lot of craps (we've actually reimbursed ourselves for both previous cruises from winnings on the craps table, yay!), with a smattering of other table games or slots here and there. Last Carnival cruise, my husband was given the Drinks on Us, and some chocolate covered strawberries were sent to our room. (How nice.)

This cruise, we are definitely hoping to get the Drinks on Us perk again, but I was wondering if anyone had any tips or tricks for getting the most out of our casino play. We play for the fun and entertainment, of course, but some perks never hurt, right?!

Is contacting the casino host a good idea, just to introduce yourself? What about sending an email to the casino corporation before our cruise to see if they will gift us anything up front? We are very friendly with the staff and tip moderately to generously when winning, so I feel like we sufficiently get the table staff on our side, but I'm wondering if there's more we can do.

Any tips and tricks from the masters here?

My husband and I were also on the Liberty this week. I was actually very happy with how few children were on the ship, and how easy they were to avoid for the most part. I'm one of those horrible people who don't like children, so if I'm not complaining, I honestly don't see why anyone else would. I didn't go out by the pools much, though, so maybe that made a difference.

We have only been on one cruise before (Carnival), and here are our thoughts on this trip:

We got a fantastic deal booking third party. Not sure about the rules here on naming websites, but we used the same one both times and actually paid less for an oceanview on this ship than an interior on the Carnival ship (I forget which one). Yay!

We were sorely disappointed in our stateroom attendant (Camelot). He was very difficult to understand, and generally gave a lot of lip service about helping us have a wonderful trip, but when we actually asked for help, he gave the minimum effort possible and acted like there was nothing he could do. Something as simple as asking if he had a ribbon or string or something we could tie to our luggage just got a shake of the head and a laugh like we were ridiculous. Our attendant on the Carnival ship was amazing. Sweetest guy, so happy all the time, and went above and beyond at every opportunity. Camelot even lectured my husband when he needed help with his tie, telling him he should know these things for church. My husband is a plumber and doesn't ever wear ties, and we don't go to church. I was offended at his comment, but we still tipped him for the help, thinking that might brighten his day and make him friendlier. It didn't.

We thought the ship was much more well rounded in activities than the Carnival cruise we took. The other ship felt more like a party boat... this ship didn't, which we liked.

We were very happy with the dining room and the Chops steakhouse, but disappointed in the food everywhere else (not including other specialty restaurants, which we did not experience). The pizza place, cafe, and Windjammer were all disappointments for us. And we still can't agree with a cruise line making a burger diner a specialty restaurant. Turned me off just a bit. Seemed awfully cheap on their part.

We loved the casino, but were a little disappointed in the table limits. No idea why they keep letting the Baccarat tables sit empty at $100/hand. Also can't understand why they limit the odds bets on craps so much. Never been anywhere so restrictive on odds. However the casino staff were really great and we enjoyed ourselves. (Even won quite a bit on Saturday!)

We really loved the shows. Slightly disappointed in the comedy shows, but the choreographed shows were fantastic.

Also very happy with the tour guides the ship hooked us up with on the excursions. They were all friendly, patient, and very good with handling groups.

Overall it was a great trip, with a few minor disappointments. Enough that my husband has expressed that so far he definitely favors Carnival, but the jury is still out for me.