momof3cruisers

Good to know. I usually don’t get off the ship in Nassau but this sounds like it’s worth a try. OP, thanks for the review. It seems like the smaller ships are always very friendly. I feel that way whenever I am on Paradise too. Sorry about the motion sickness! That is a bummer! Have you tried sea bands? Those work great for my son.

You might want to check the website for safetourscozumel.com. It’s a wonderful company that offers both group activities that you join others or private tours where you can literally do whatever you want. They will have some suggestions or you can ask for certain things. For instance, my daughter and I wanted to see a grocery store where locals would shop and somewhere that they made chocolate as well as doing a tequila tasting. Trip Advisor has lots of info about what to do also.

Is there anything to see as far as snorkeling at Paradise Beach? Last time I was there, I loved it but didn’t yet have my optical mask. Now that I do, I’d like to get some snorkeling in on my next cruise.

It was just the 15 minute nasal swab.

Yeah, I’m calling malarkey on that. We once cut our tip to the room steward for a host of reasons. One of them being that after he didn’t service our room for two days, he also wouldn’t pick up his phone when I called to get clean towels and ice. He was never in the hall either. But as soon as we reduced his tip, there he was making sure everything was “alright.”

No spa services No talks that are just a ruse to sell you something No bingo No main showroom shows No chair hogging No being bothered by things other people do that don’t affect me.

Drs recommendation.

To answer questions We are both completely fine, thank you. It was really just like a bad head cold. Yes, we were charged the $125 As for why we tested— two reasons. I figured it was the right thing to do and you cannot get any OTC cold meds on the ship without going to the medical center and I had forgotten to restock my supply in my first aid kit. So they would have tested him anyway with the symptoms he was having. We assume he was exposed on the flight from MN to FL. I forgot to say, we did get a FCC of half of his fare. And his favorite Frank Sinatra song is probably My Way. 😎 You can take a home Covid test but they will not accept it for the room service “benefit” or the OTC meds. As for the question about what I am trying to tell the reader, I have no idea what that means. 😂 Seems obvious.

Except how do they know if those cabins would have been unsold? They allow them to be booked out long into the future from what I have seen.

Now, here is where we go back and realize when trouble started. That morning my son had commented that our cabin was so dry and his throat was kind of sore. And then, on the shuttle back to the ship, we shared a bottle of water. He had been fine all day. We were planning on dinner in the MDR but he said he was tired so we decided to get some room service. Then he was going to karaoke and I wanted to check out the main show. Part way in, he messaged me and said he wasn’t doing great and was going back to the cabin. I didn’t like the show so I decided to check on him. It was 7:30 and he was sound asleep! Huh. Weird. So I left and went to the casino, then hit the piano bar for awhile before heading back to the cabin for the night. (Piano bar guy was FANTASTIC! His name was Rawl.) aAt about 4 in the morning, my son woke me up and said, “I need help. I need advil but I can’t move. My head hurts too much.” This is not a kid who complains so I was very concerned. I got him advil and sort or rearranged his bedding for him as he’d been tossing and turning. Then I basically laid there waiting for 8:00 so I could call the medical center. In the morning he was absolutely burning up. And was achy and coughing but not a lot. I called medical and said I thought he had Covid and wondered what the protocol was. The guy said “Well, we can test him but it’s $125.” I said okay, did they come to us or did we go there. He said for us to go down there and if we had masks, he should wear one but if not, they would give him one when we got there. Okay….so we headed down. I’ve been traveling with masks since the lovely epidemic so we both wore them. Had the kiddo put on a clean shirt so maybe he’d be more comfortable but by the time we got to medical, it was soaked through. Poor guy. Medical was a little odd. They had us sit in the regular waiting area and fill out the paperwork. When I mentioned again that I was concerned about Covid they told me again that if I wanted him tested it would be $125. Are they trying to discourage testing? This was odd to me. But it seemed like the right thing to do so we did it. We got into a room and I mentioned that I’d like him tested for the flu if it wasn’t Covid. Oh, that’s free. Wha? Whatever. So, the kid gets a positive Covid test. They didn’t do any kind of an exam but did give him a variety of OTC meds. And said he was confined to our cabin but I was not. However, if I wanted, they could move me to a different cabin. No thanks. Also said, his meals would be brought to him on a schedule. That didn’t sound right to me but okay. I figured I could bring him what he needed. later that morning, I went to guest services to see if I could somehow either use his card or get his soda package transferred to me since I didn’t want to pay but he couldn’t leave the cabin. The woman I spoke with was fantastic! So helpful. She gave me a code so he could have premium Wi-Fi, and explained that he could order anything from anywhere on the ship via room service. From Guy’s to the MDR to sodas etc. And she explained what the process would be to disembark the ship at the end. The next two days, I mainly stayed in the cabin to keep him company other than going out to get meals myself. And lots of OJ for him each morning. We relaxed and watched TV, he played on his phone and messaged with his brother and we read. And he slept. A lot. His fever only lasted one day thankfully. I was able to get clean sheets from our steward to remake the bed as the steward couldn’t come into our cabin of course. Room service was so helpful and kind. And the guest services gal called a few times each day to check in and make sure we had everything we needed. Everyone was very caring and made the situation much less difficult than it could have been. All of his meals were delivered on disposable dish ware and we were given a red biohazard bag to throw the trash into. (The steward gave me one for the sheets too.) On the last morning, I was told to wait for last call to get off and after everyone was off, someone would come to get the kiddo. Also, we had to carry off all of our luggage. So I did that and we agreed he would text me when they came for him so I could go get the car. It took a LONG time for them to get him. I was through customs and sat outside waiting for 45 min before he let me know he was on his way. I hiked over to the ramp and then made a wrong turn and then couldn’t find him. Eventually, we were on our way back to my Orlando condo. He was supposed to fly out that night but we had to change that of course. He stayed with me an extra 6 days and in the meantime, I got sick. I mean, after that shared bottle of water AND sharing 180 sq feet of space for 3 days it was pretty inevitable even after my six vaccine shots. Thankfully, we are pretty easy going people so we still felt like we had a nice time just hanging out together and we got some yummy food and pretty views out the window. And truly, our experience in Grand Cayman was such an awesome day. I’m bummed he didn’t get to see Cozumel and that I lost my prepaid entrance to Paradise Beach, but things happen and we’ll just have to plan another trip. And I’m so pleased that my previous experience with everything onSpirit seems to have been an off couple of weeks not the new normal. I already have a cruise booked on Breeze next winter.

I came home intending to do a quick report but then I caught Covid from my son who came down with it on the cruise and writing this up slipped my mind. I took my son on a 5 day cruise on Paradise that sailed Feb 5th (6th?). Anyway, sailing to Grand Cayman and Cozumel. We had an ocean view on deck two. The occasion was for his 21st birthday. On the cruise he had, I believe his third drink with alcohol. Lol. It was a Funship and he did like it. We didn’t get Cheers because he’s just not interested in drinking but he did have the Bubbles pkg and got good use out of that. A caveat that I went into this cruise with—my husband and I spent 14 days on Spirit in October and it honestly sucked. The service was terrible. Other than our room steward on the first leg who was fantastic, and the lobby bar staff, we ran into so many rude, slow uncaring crew that I was shocked. I had been on three cruises prior to this since the restart but things were so lousy on Spirit that I was seriously ready to write off Carnival. But this one was already booked. So, I went in a bit worried. This was my first cruise as Platinum and we got our early boarding time arranged. I was staying in Orlando this winter so we drove over that morning and parked in the port parking. Tampa sure has a weird set up for that! It’s a long walk from parking to the entrance! There was construction at the time so that made it longer. I checked my Fitbit when we got to the building and it was a three quarters of a mile! So don’t do that f you have limited mobility! The Port of Tampa staff really seem to love their jobs and make the wait fun. Very soon we were able to board and headed straight to our cabin to drop off backpacks etc. That is a nice perk. We then wandered around the ship seeing stuff and sat outside for awhile before going to grab some lunch. We then sat outside again close to the aft bar in the buffet so the kid could take advantage of the package and drink Pepsi to his hearts content. This was a very chill trip. He did karaoke a few times. He loves Frank Sinatra and has a great voice. I played trivia a few times, and went to comedy. We spent our sea day listening to our books and enjoying the sunshine. I did find that the schedule was really lacking in activities. At least two nights there was no comedy scheduled, one night there was only one show, the club didn’t open until like 11, and even trivia was very limited. They had sports trivia everyday. 🤷‍♀️ The big thing though was that service was STELLAR! Back to what I have always seen from Carnival. Fast bar service, everywhere was clean, our room steward was fun and thorough. It restored my faith in the line. Food was hot, things were open when they were supposed to be and the crew seemed happy to be there. Our first port was Grand Cayman. We were going to use the priority shuttle and go to the Turtle Center on our own with a quick stop to see Hell. But our time in port was short. Only until 2:00 and I was getting worried about the schedule. We ended up skipping Hell and booking a ship excursion to the turtle center that included snorkeling in their lagoon. We had a fantastic time! I honestly expected the lagoon to be a little lame but it was incredibly cool! Not only are you swimming with the green sea turtles but there are a ton of other fish n there as well. My only regret was that I forgot to bring my camera in with me. I was really glad that I had decided to stick with a ship excursion because there was quite a bit of traffic on the way back but I knew we didn’t have to worry about being late.

In that case, I’d definitely go for it! As someone said, that guest services priority line on an 11 day might be very much appreciated. Plus the chocolate treat would be a nice extra on a longer cruise. I just did my first Platinum cruise in Feb and while I forgot to get most of my benefits (I’m sad about the pin!) my son got Covid (thus why I forgot) and being able to speak with guest services quickly was awesome. I had to go twice and no one else was in that line. It definitely relieved some stress of worrying about my kid.

They definitely are there in the ports to find marijuana. My friend was cruising out of Canaveral and two people were pulled out of line. One of whom she knew and he was not allowed to sail. He had a vape with marijuana cartridges.

Actually, I’ve been midship and aft on 8 and it was pretty quiet. Midship a lot of the area is under the buffet which is surprisingly quiet and aft is under Serenity. You just have to watch for where the pool areas are. It’s an interesting layout for sure!

Well, I’m back from my first Platinum cruise and sadly, I forgot half of my perks. My son got Covid midway through and other than the water and a drink at brunch, that was it. Didn’t get my pin, or gift, or chocolate. Didn’t go to the party as I mainly quarantined with him even though I wasn’t required to. I couldn’t see going to a party while he was sick in the cabin.

May I ask, what is a daycare cruise?

That’s very good to know! Thanks for sharing that tip!

I have gone to a couple of art auctions. The first time, it was too hot outside for me on a sea day and the games they had going weren’t for me so I figured why not? It was very interesting. The guy did a good job educating the crowd about the artists and I felt like I learned a lot. Got free champagne., Paid the little games to win the door prize tickets, walked away with nothing free and no money spent. Cracked up at the ridiculous starting prices but felt it was worth my time. The second time, it was boring! No info about the artists or their styles etc. Just one over priced “auction” after another BUT I did see several people making purchases. I figure I don’t need to go to anymore.

I have seen cases opened in Miami, Port Canaveral (lots of people there) and Long Beach several times. But last time through Miami, we had a 12 pack of Coke and a bottle of wine in a small rolling carry on and they didn’t even open the bag. You never know I guess.

Did you also get the free drink at brunch?

Dilemmas, dilemmas! I’ve been looking forward to this review to hear about the experience on Spirit specifically. Baited breath.

It is quite the waste of paper. I always use my own pen to sign. Did that LONG before COVID. Who knows what icky stuff is on there? For a time, years ago, you didn’t have to sign. The first time we got our kids the bubbles pkg they didn’t have to sign anything, the next time they did. I suspect it is because many more people will leave a tip when signing as opposed to just walking away.

Oh now, that’s just a slap in the face. Seriously.

I did mean Grand Cayman. Anyone want to tell me how to use the water shuttle? Lol thank you all for all of the answers and info. Are the gifts at the picture place like the pins?

Hello all. My son and I are sailing on Paradise on Feb 6th and the lucky boy gets to accompany me on my first Cruise as platinum. I know they have reinstated the priority line but since we are in the first arrival window, I’m guessing that won’t matter much. These are the other things I know: We can drop our carry one in our cabin when we board (will the door be locked though? The only carry one we bring are medication and electronics) I have to get my pin and I think the gift at Pixels I get the bottle of water at any bar i will receive an invite to the party (5 day cruise) We could do laundry but I don’t see us needing it I know there is something to do with chocolate and a casino tournament or free play or something but not sure how those are handled. Anything I’m missing? Also, we are going to Grand Turk. How does the priority tender thing work?