LaRue1975

1 hour ago, jerseygirlinAZ said:

We're sailing on Panorama 12/30 on a casino deal.  Sadly, we couldn't get the balcony room, but we have an ocean view with drinks everywhere.  Love the Panorama.  Have a great time!

I’m on that cruise, it will be our first NYE cruise. My hubby’s 70th birthday is NYE and 4 other couples are joining us in Havana cabanas and aft balconies, we have the aft wrap. I was able to use a casino discount and did get the free drinks for me but it definitely wasn’t free. It will be totally worth it for the special occasion, I can’t wait! See you on board, it’s going to be a good one! 

5 hours ago, highSeas22 said:

Mine was 100 per person with 200 credit back on board

Today I booked the Panorama 8 day for March 2025 and I have the Panorama booked 5 more times on the same deal. For our upcoming NYE cruise we are in the Havana area and that offer didn’t apply but I was able to use another one with a nice discount and $1500 OBC. I get free drinks everywhere on my offers too, we live an hour from Long Beach and are retired, it’s  a no brainer, lol! If they keep sending me the deals I’ll keep booking them. The Panorama is by far our favorite, we board again in two weeks, can’t wait! Have a great time! 

18 minutes ago, icft said:

You may well be right, but it may be an attempt to both avoid raising prices on the longer cruises and bring the profit margin on the cheers program on short cruises up to the profit margin on longer cruises.

 

I suspect their costs per day for cheers are higher on shorter cruises. A lot of folks can do 15 drinks a day for three to five days, but not for seven days. And when I say "can" I mean do it and not wish they hadn't.

 

Early in our cruising days I would do 15 a day for three days, then cut way back for a couple of days, then finish with a bang. These days I rarely do 15 on any day, but I still let my body recover a bit a day or two in the middle because I'm happier that way. On a three day cruise I would probably be at 15 every day and recover when I got home.

I totally agree and have no problem with them raising the price, just wanted to give everyone a heads up if they didn’t get the e-mail. I still think they will also raise the price for the longer cruises fairly soon, inflation is not going away. We are back over $6 and well  on our way to $7 for gas here in California. 

17 minutes ago, lasvegascruising said:

WHAT?? I have a 5 day booked on the Firenze May 16, 2024.  I have not received an email notice yet.  What will the new price be per day per person?

I have a 5 day on the Miracle November 2nd and it mentions that cruise in the e-mail, encouraging me to buy before the price goes up. But the price hike does not apply to my cruise. They mention saving $10 per day so I think that is how much it’s going up. 

I just got this e-mail, it probably won’t be long before they raise prices for the longer cruises. 

They will definitely have a Halloween themed Deck Party with a Costume Parade and contest. Last year on the Panorama it was in place of the Mega Deck Party and they had contests for children, adults and groups. It was super fun and later in the week they did the 80s Rock and Glow deck party which was even more fun. A lot of people dressed for both events and they had themed backdrops for photo ops too. We’ll be on the Panorama mid October again this year, looking forward to another fun cruise! 

In the announcement for Carnival’s new destination port on Grand Bahama they mentioned that new itineraries would be released in mid September that will go to Celebration Key. It opens July 2025 so I am thinking that Miami’s schedule might be released next month. 

1 hour ago, Old Fart Cruisers said:

I show casino offers through June of 2025, for Hawaii and Australia, so they do go out that far but I don't have Alaska listed yet.  I assume those offers will be coming soon.

 

 

 

That must be a Premier or Ultra offer. The specialty casino cruises do run through 2025 but all the other offers have to be used by December 2024. Also, if you book now for 2025 using an early saver code first you can change it to a casino offer or different casino offer later. My PVP does this for me frequently. 

33 minutes ago, CatieM80 said:

Ohhh that looks awesome! I have one cruise on a courtesy hold right now that is room 6279. I’m wondering if it’s the same category? Off to do some investigating! 

6279 is a premium balcony, it will be more expensive but is a much bigger cabin and perfect for a family. It is about the size of an Ocean Suite but has a standard bathroom so can’t classified as a suite. It does have a large extended balcony. We have 7301, a premium balcony on the 14 day Miracle to Alaska from along Beach in a couple of weeks, really looking forward to it! 6279 is the same layout but I am not sure if it has the top bunk that drops out of the ceiling. The Miracle is a sister ship to Spirit so the cabins are the same. 
 

Not Miami but we did a side to side in Galveston, Vista to Breeze in April. The porter took our bags over to the Breeze terminal, changed out the luggage tags and turned them over to the porters in that terminal. We tipped him well of course and we always use a porter anyway but it couldn’t have been easier. It was not far, the Breeze parks behind the Vista. 

28 minutes ago, luvs2beachit said:

Your posting title says Casino Offer OBC.  I have never heard of the Casino giving OBC.

This would be something new to me.  What the casino promos provide is free play which is to be used in the casino to gamble.  If I were you I would clarify the terms of your offer before you start running up bills for special meals and onboard shops only to find out later that the Casino $ cannot be used towards your purchases.

One of the casino offers I book for cruises or cabins that you can’t use the free balcony offer for includes $1500 OBC. I think I have 4 booked with this offer, it’s $750 for cruises under 6 days. It doesn’t include Fun Play but is 20% off casino rates which works great for suites or a Havana cabin. If you use the OBC in the casino you do earn points which is another plus. 

I just checked the Carnival website again and there are Alaska cruises from April to September 2025. All from Seattle on the Spirit and Luminosa. None from San Francisco, maybe they will add those later? 

Yes, just charge it to your sail and sign card at the machine or buy chips for the tables at the cashier. 

I was looking for the September 14 day Spirit cruise from Seattle they are doing in 2024 but they are not offering it in 2025. They are doing a 14 day Hawaii cruise instead. 

Now that the Galveston sailings have dropped through April 2026 will the other port’s cruises be released soon? Specifically Miami, I want to book the Horizon in May or June, 2025. 

Someone from my NYE cruise Facebook page is on the Panorama now and has said nothing about a change in itinerary due to the hurricane. Everything seems fine, he posted pics from Mazatlan yesterday and mentioned Cabo this morning. I think they are on schedule, it is the cruise departing Saturday that may have issues. 

On 7/19/2022 at 5:19 AM, jimbo5544 said:

15th floor ones are the best

After reading your review I booked a 15th floor Exel Aft for the second leg of a B2B on the Celebration in May. It’s the 6 day day and I had a free balcony casino offer that brought it into my price range, got it for $3600. It will most likely be the only one for us but I am so excited. I’m not planning anything except hanging out on that balcony and ordering lots of room service! 

Thank you for posting and I hope you get it straightened out. I have read numerous times on the forum about people buying Carnival gift cards with OBC at Cherry On Top. We have a cruise booked under a casino offer in early January that has $1500 OBC. I was planning for the hubby and I to each buy a $500 gift card and use the other $500 on board. Like you I was going to use the gift cards to pay down the balance due for another cruise. I would be super bummed if they didn’t work, please come back and let us know of you were able to get your card activated.

6 hours ago, pc_load_letter said:

Was on Radiance the week before you. We prefer Radiance over Panorama. We had great food at Shaqs and pizza was good and quick to come out.

 

The only negatives we had was the group with the wireless speaker in the aft pool area playing hardcore rap. I informed the pool attendant. He called someone who instructed them to turn it off. They did, but later when someone in their group asked what happened to the music....she said "that white b**** complained" lol. We got a chuckle out of that.

 

It wasn't all sunshine and rainbows though. The fight in the dining room was a new one for me.

 

All in all, we love Radiance and will be on it again soon. Can't wait for Firenze to arrive next year.

 

*Question...a waiter told us that Panorama was going to leave to asia when Firenze arrives. Anyone hear that?

Panorama is going to Singapore for a dry dock the end of August 2024 but will be back in October. She will be carrying passengers on trans Pacific cruises over and back. 

Thank you for your review, I agree completely with your assessment. I was on the Vista in April 2022 and 2023, she really went downhill aesthetically in the last year and is overdue for her dry dock. I honestly felt like I was sailing on a rust bucket. Everything else was good, no problems at all. We were in the Havana area this year which was fantastic and that area was in much better shape than the rest of the ship. In between those two cruises we sailed on the Panorama and oh my, she is Cinderella and Vista is the ugly stepsister, lol! I love the Vista class too but Panorama has so much more to offer, especially dining options with Pig & Anchor, Bonsai Teppanyaki and JiJi’s, we enjoyed them all. My grandson loved the trampoline park and I am looking forward to booking one of the cooking classes in the Carnival Kitchen next time.
 

I live an hour from Long Beach and have four more cruises booked on Panorama. There is a bit of variety in the the 6, 7 and 8 day cruises but it is still all Mexican Riviera and can’t compare to the Caribbean ports IMO. So that’s a contest the Vista and Horizon win hands down. I recently booked  a B2B on the Horizon for April 2025, we will be in the Havana area and it will be our first time on Horizon, can’t wait! Oh, and service and crew members were fantastic on both ships, probably the thing I like most about cruising. Enjoy your next cruise! 

The post was in the VIFP Facebook Paige. I’m not a member but my friend texted me the screen shot because she was concerned our grandsons might not be safe on the cruise we booked for next summer. Even though the name has already been posted I cropped it out but it certainly looks to me that the story is legit and Carnival did not handle the situation properly. 

8 hours ago, mz-s said:

 

That would be like pulling the slot machine for someone else assuming you're doing this so you can accumulate points under one account. I could definitely see the casino denying a payout if someone was doing that.

The hubby and I played on my card in all the Vegas casino groups for a decade with no problem. He got a hand pay at the Cromwell but wasn’t using a players card because we were staying at the Cosmopolitan and Cromwell is a Caesars property. When they were paying it out I told them he didn’t have his Total Rewards card with him but I had mine and they took it.  When I asked for the extra players card at the cashier on the Vista and Breeze I told them I wanted it so hubby and I could play together on the same card. In my experience they don’t care, we already share the comps regardless of whose name is on the offer. 

8 hours ago, amcankid said:

Thanks. And good advice. 
In answer to your question as to what one would do as the other gambled, we’d sit at the machine (as we usually do anyway) but take turns using the same card as opposed  playing machines side by side. Wouldn’t matter whose card we pick, but whoever’s card it is we’d stick with it for the entire cruise. Which gets back to the original question. Is it better to put all the eggs in one basket or share the wealth looking to have different offers to each of us.

You can go to the cashier and ask for an extra card to use in the slots for one of your accounts, They will make you a blank card that is linked to the account. We use mine because I sometimes cruise without hubby. The card allows access to the players bank and you can play side by side and accumulate points on the one account. I had read about doing this on here and Facebook but the first time I asked a casino host instead of the cashier and she said no. The last two cruises on the Vista and Breeze I asked the cashier and got the extra card without issue. I just had to wait  a bit for the tech person to make the card. 

$1500 from a casino offer on Vista last month and I’m using the offer again on the Panorama NYE cruise. The offer also includes a nice discount on the cruise fare and free Cheers for me. Happy New Year! 🥳

That is an excellent location for a cove, ours was in that area, very quiet and it’s nice to be so close to the atrium. Also, there is a gap in the lifeboats and a good chance you will not have them above you so you can see the moon and stars at night. I say go for it!