PacificMountain2012

We cruised out on the Panorama on 5/25 returned on 6/2. I've parked at Galveston and Miami, this is the worst. My advice, avoid parking at the terminal, if they are going to send you to 11 Golden Shore. You first have to deal with the traffic getting into the terminal, then drive to the parking lot. When we arrived at the parking lot, the one to the immediate right of 11 Golden Shore, one of the lot workers had completely lost it and was yelling at drivers going in and out of the little parking lot. When we disembarked, no one appeared in charged of the buses that took passengers to the parking lots and airports, as a result you had no idea which bus to get on; they kept changing the signs on the buses and moving people from to another. When we finally arrived at the lot, the bus parked about a block away, at the bottom of a hill. Baggage was a free for all and the same guy yelling when we arrived was at it again and had added the middle finger to his act, as cars tried to get in and out. You might consider parking at Long Beach Airport and Ubering it over, if you can't find a hotel nearby. Our cruise was great though...Have a great cruise!

Just finished the May 25 - June 2 Panorama cruise. Cruise was fantastic...parking not so much. I would advise avoiding Carnival's offsite parking. We received instructions to park at 11 Golden Shore, after dropping off our bags and passengers at the terminal, that part was not a problem and its not particularly hard to find. Once there however, it was a mess. Half the workers were on their phones not paying attention, which led to the guy in charge, I guess he was in charge, to completely blow his top and start yelling at the cars in front of us because no one told them to stop. We were parking in an open lot to the right of 11 Golden Shore, it isn't very big. It didn't seem like they had very much experience directing the parking of the cars, as cars were going the wrong way down tight lanes and cars were having to park really tight with each other, I got lucky and was able to back into the last spot in a line next to a tree. We then made our way to the buses that took us back to the terminal. As I said our cruise was great, however we had to return to the lot. So, you gather your bags, we used a porter, then head outside to the buses. There seemed to be no one in charge, with about 8 or more buses there. Twice we were told to go to buses that were not ours. Finally, our porter gave up, as no one would give him a straight answer. We eventually, after another three tries, found our bus and headed to the lot. After getting dropped off about a half block away we made it back up to the lot, where they were letting cars go into the tight lot as cars were also trying to get out; another mess, no one directing anything. There we got to witness the same guy, supervisor?, giving the finger to four or five cars that were leaving, not really sure why, he was just really mad again. All in all, my advice is to avoid the Carnival off-site lots. Again however the cruise was absolutely fantastic!

Thank you to everyone who responded. After reading everyone's response and talking it over, we are going to go HAL! Now the next hard part choosing the sailing. Again, thank you to everyone who responded, you made my decision a little easier!

I'm hoping to get some thoughts from everyone. I have been put in charge of organizing a cruise to Alaska in July 2025 for approximately 45 people. The cruise is in honor of my father who passed away in February. We will be burying him at sea during the cruise, as we did for my mother a few years back. Here is my question, our party will range in age from 14 years to 84 years. Its pretty well distributed between the years. On Holland, I'm not particularly concerned about activities and things todo for the older guests, but more for the younger, 14 - 28 for example. My family has done Alaska before, so we know what to expect; heavy on excursions, etc.. but I want to make sure we don't have a bunch who are bored and frankly I wouldn't want to subject other guests to number of younger guests running around; not to suggest they aren't well behaved. Would you recommend Holland? Note, I'm posting similar questions on Princess and Celebrity's communities as well. Thank you for your help.

The time you enter the LA Area, that would be Sylmar coming south on the 5, will determine how bad it is for you traffic wise. Obviously the earlier the better. Anytime late afternoon on and you will run into your basic LA freeway gridlock. It won't really matter what freeway you're on or what direction you're are going. If you really want to go to the Santa Monica Pier, you can bite the bullet (you never know maybe no traffic!) and head straight there on the 405 (to the 10 west) and then plan to stay in Santa Monica, Marina Del Rey or the Airport area for the night. Lot's of hotels and restaurants. In the morning get up early and head down the 405 to the 710, traffic should be fairly light, just don't wait too late in the morning. If you can live without Santa Monica, I would stay on the 5 south and stay in the Glendale area, lots of hotels and eating options, not much sight seeing however. Then in the morning you'd have a 45 minute or so drive down to Long Beach (you'll hit some traffic going through downtown LA but that should be it). Sounds like a great car trip you have planned! Hope that helps

Did a 1:50 from Hobby a week an half ago and we were there early enough to make a 11:30 flight. This was during the week though, I don't know how crowded security lines are on the weekends, which could make a difference.

Stayed in the Hampton Inn, Webster probably a dozen times. Its a typical Hampton Inn, but it close to lots of restaurants (good bbq not far away), has the usual Hampton inn breakfast and is typically priced right.

The DoubleTree is a half mile from Hobby and they have a free shuttle from the airport. There is a restaurant on property as well as a bar. Its a nice hotel, not great, but for a night works great. We are using it again this week.