Pride review July 15-22

[bunnkins]

Hi, I learned so much from everyone’s reviews that I felt I needed to post a few of our thoughts on our recent pride cruise.

My husband and I have sailed with carnival before on a short 3-day cruise but we have mostly sailed on Royal Caribbean. We sailed with 3 of our kids (10,13 and 16). We had a fabulous vacation and would sail with Carnival again in a heartbeat.

 

Embarkation:

 

We stayed the night before at the Marriott. It was okay but far from the ship. We used points so worked out well. We did early check in and everything went smoothly and quickly. We had breakfast on the QM and walked around until about 11:30. Went over to get on the ship and it was a bit confusing. We stood in a big line for a while until my husband asked about early check in quest and then we were let right in the terminal.

 

We were on the boat by noon and ready to start the fun!

Our Room

 

We were pleasantly surprised by the size and comfort of the room. This was our first balcony room and we loved having one and will always have one from now on. The bed was super comfortable. The room was clean and our room steward was Fabulous! Felix was so wonderful!

 

Balcony Partition

 

We requested to have our balcony partition opened the very first thing. It wasn’t done until the next day. It was wonderful once opened because we had 2 balcony rooms with our kids next door that weren’t adjoining. We could just walk out the balcony doors to get to each other’s rooms. I thought the partition would be completely removed but it was only opened and locked up against part of our balcony blocking part or your railing and view. To use it was no big deal as it made it much more convenient

 

Dinning Room

 

We were a bit disappointed that we weren’t seated with anyone else in the dinning room. We always meet such nice people there. Our server was very nice but you could tell a bit reserved. He and the assistant server really were wonderful with our kids and made dinning a special thing for them. On the night my husband and I went to David’s supper club they even cut my sons meat and made sure they all ate. Very sweet. The food was overall very good. The chocolate melting cake has to be the biggest hit. And even if we didn’t order more than one entrée we were always given a couple of extras to try. We never went away hungry! The drink girl remembered what we liked and always had it waiting for us. All in all it was a wonderful experience. We never mad it to the dinning room for breakfast of lunch so can’t say how it was for that.

 

Mermaids Grille

 

If we were to complain about anything this would be the one area we would. The food was okay for the most part. We loved the deli (mmm grilled tuna on rye with swiss0 and the grill with hamburgers and fries. And most of all we loved the ice cream and yogurt! But there was just something missing form it that made it not so enjoyable. It was hard to navigate it thought and always so crowded. And there was rarely a drink person to be found for beer or sodas. Just different than are experiences on other ships. The one night we got back to the ship late from an excursion we ate in the buffet instead of the dinning room. They only had on station open and the deli. It was very disappointing. Breakfast was better than lunch.

 

Activities

 

We love all the silly activities like trivia and name that tune. We enjoyed all that we went to and even won a hip on a stick! It seemed on RC we had more to choose form but we did a lot on the pride and had fun doing them. The amazing race was lots of fun for my 10 year old even though we didn’t win.

High tea was fun for the girls and I to go to. It was a nice relaxing time to just sit and visit.

 

Camp Carnival

 

Our 16-year-old Loved O2! She begged to go be with her friends and loved all the activities.

Our 13 and 10 year old went once and never went back again. In all fairness our 10 year old is shy and would rather hang with his dad who he adores so we didn’t really give that group a fair shot. But our 13 year old is very outgoing and our last cruise live in the kids club. This one she said was boring for her age group and didn’t have enough going on to keep them occupied She did only go one day and I kept trying to get her to go back but she wouldn’t so maybe it got better. Or maybe it was just the other kids that she didn’t fit in with, at that age who knows. I’m sure other kids had a great time because it seemed that there were always a bunch of kids doing things together.

 

 

Piano Bar

 

We loved the piano bar and were sad we dint find it the first night. We always sat were we could talk with Wally and had a great time. I highly recommend going!

 

Shore Excursions

 

PV:

We did the canopy tour and LOVED it! Almost wished we’d done the extreme tour after doing the regular one. It rained but didn’t take anything away from the tour. We had an hour car ride in this funky old Mercedes German troop transport vehicles. At first it was a hoot but then I got cold. I do get cold easily and wished I had brought a lightweight jacket. The zip line tour was fabulous. Our family ranged from the very in shape to the very out of shape and we all did fine. Our 10 year old did well and had a blast too!

 

Mazatlan:

We took the Sierra Madre tour. It was a good choice for the day as it rained all day there. We actually had sun when we left the coast and went inland. It was a LONG tour though. All day! We left at 9:30 and just barley mad it back to the ship. We were the last people back on the ship at exactly 4:30! The tour itself it very interesting. You see many small shops and towns. It’s a good thing for kids to see that they would never see in the states! Our kids enjoyed it.

 

Cabo:

 

We didn’t have an excursion here. We just wanted a day to bum around. It was beautiful in Cabo and we wished we had some kind of beachy thing to do but we heard form others that the water was Very cold so glad we did what we did. We ate a great breakfast in town because we wanted to get off the ship before 9. We were in line at 8:20 and didn’t have to wait for a tender boat at all. We shopped and sat at a little bar for a snack on the water. Fun to watch the fishing boats come in and see what they caught that day.

 

 

David’s Supper club

 

We went to David’s on Tuesday. We had a lovely time and the food was good. I’m not sure we would do it again though. I think if you really need to get a night away from the kids or you don’t do restaurants like this at home it’s a wonderful thing. We do get out and do nice restaurants at home and we kind of missed the kids while were there. The food was good but not that much better than the dinning room. The presentation was better and we loved the calm quite of the supper club.

 

Entertainment

 

We went to 2 shows and they were both okay. It was a Vegas kinda feel and the kids really enjoyed being out late. We didn’t see any of the comedians of variety acts. We enjoyed all of the various music around the ship. Our favorite was Wally in the ivory bar! They had 2 midnight buffets. We only made it to the grand gala buffet. It was very beautiful and looked yummy. But at that point we were so full still from dinner (and all the eating on the cruise) we just didn’t want to eat any of it!

 

 

 

Embarkation

 

Well, this was not the best part of the cruise on so many levels. First you are not ready to get off the ship! I guess we were the lucky ones to get the full crew customs check! It did take a long time to get off the ship! We were the very last color called. We sat in the taj ma hal lounge and listened to Jerome. The first hour he was really funny but after 2-3 hours he ran out of material. Not his fault it was just a long wait. It did make the time go faster though. We walked up to get a drink on lido and people were sitting in the sun on lounge chairs. That would have been my choice but no one else want to go. We played cards and read so it wasn’t so bad. We were off the ship and through customs by 1:30. I’m sure it was frustrating for those with fights but for us we just tried to make the best of it. It was fun to run the stairs with the kids one time with out anyone else on them.

 

All in all it was a great vacation. I wished I’d just sat more and taken it all in but there’s always next cruise!

Thank you to all of you who posted and helped us plan for this cruise. If anyone has any questions I would love to answer them!

Marion :)

[pumpkinpie17]

Thanks for the review!!! :) Our Pride cruise is not until January but I enjoy reading about the experience of others.

[JGB]

Thank you for your review! I am going on the Pride in 31 days and each recent review gives more and more life to my future cruise.

JGB

[Stevecruise]

Marion, both Calicruiser and I were on the same ship with you and also offered reviews as well if you want to check them out.

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=597632

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showt...1#post10972123

 

I forgot to comment on Camp Carnival but my 9 year thought it was boring too and did not want to go again...which was fine as she had more fun playing in the pool with the other kids.

 

Thanks for your feedback!

 

Steve

[Calicruiser101]

Hi, I learned so much from everyone’s reviews that I felt I needed to post a few of our thoughts on our recent pride cruise.

My husband and I have sailed with carnival before on a short 3-day cruise but we have mostly sailed on Royal Caribbean. We sailed with 3 of our kids (10,13 and 16). We had a fabulous vacation and would sail with Carnival again in a heartbeat.

 

Embarkation:

 

We stayed the night before at the Marriott. It was okay but far from the ship. We used points so worked out well. We did early check in and everything went smoothly and quickly. We had breakfast on the QM and walked around until about 11:30. Went over to get on the ship and it was a bit confusing. We stood in a big line for a while until my husband asked about early check in quest and then we were let right in the terminal.

 

We were on the boat by noon and ready to start the fun!

Our Room

 

We were pleasantly surprised by the size and comfort of the room. This was our first balcony room and we loved having one and will always have one from now on. The bed was super comfortable. The room was clean and our room steward was Fabulous! Felix was so wonderful!

 

Balcony Partition

 

We requested to have our balcony partition opened the very first thing. It wasn’t done until the next day. It was wonderful once opened because we had 2 balcony rooms with our kids next door that weren’t adjoining. We could just walk out the balcony doors to get to each other’s rooms. I thought the partition would be completely removed but it was only opened and locked up against part of our balcony blocking part or your railing and view. To use it was no big deal as it made it much more convenient

 

Dinning Room

 

We were a bit disappointed that we weren’t seated with anyone else in the dinning room. We always meet such nice people there. Our server was very nice but you could tell a bit reserved. He and the assistant server really were wonderful with our kids and made dinning a special thing for them. On the night my husband and I went to David’s supper club they even cut my sons meat and made sure they all ate. Very sweet. The food was overall very good. The chocolate melting cake has to be the biggest hit. And even if we didn’t order more than one entrée we were always given a couple of extras to try. We never went away hungry! The drink girl remembered what we liked and always had it waiting for us. All in all it was a wonderful experience. We never mad it to the dinning room for breakfast of lunch so can’t say how it was for that.

 

Mermaids Grille

 

If we were to complain about anything this would be the one area we would. The food was okay for the most part. We loved the deli (mmm grilled tuna on rye with swiss0 and the grill with hamburgers and fries. And most of all we loved the ice cream and yogurt! But there was just something missing form it that made it not so enjoyable. It was hard to navigate it thought and always so crowded. And there was rarely a drink person to be found for beer or sodas. Just different than are experiences on other ships. The one night we got back to the ship late from an excursion we ate in the buffet instead of the dinning room. They only had on station open and the deli. It was very disappointing. Breakfast was better than lunch.

 

Activities

 

We love all the silly activities like trivia and name that tune. We enjoyed all that we went to and even won a hip on a stick! It seemed on RC we had more to choose form but we did a lot on the pride and had fun doing them. The amazing race was lots of fun for my 10 year old even though we didn’t win.

High tea was fun for the girls and I to go to. It was a nice relaxing time to just sit and visit.

 

Camp Carnival

 

Our 16-year-old Loved O2! She begged to go be with her friends and loved all the activities.

Our 13 and 10 year old went once and never went back again. In all fairness our 10 year old is shy and would rather hang with his dad who he adores so we didn’t really give that group a fair shot. But our 13 year old is very outgoing and our last cruise live in the kids club. This one she said was boring for her age group and didn’t have enough going on to keep them occupied She did only go one day and I kept trying to get her to go back but she wouldn’t so maybe it got better. Or maybe it was just the other kids that she didn’t fit in with, at that age who knows. I’m sure other kids had a great time because it seemed that there were always a bunch of kids doing things together.

 

 

Piano Bar

 

We loved the piano bar and were sad we dint find it the first night. We always sat were we could talk with Wally and had a great time. I highly recommend going!

 

Shore Excursions

 

PV:

We did the canopy tour and LOVED it! Almost wished we’d done the extreme tour after doing the regular one. It rained but didn’t take anything away from the tour. We had an hour car ride in this funky old Mercedes German troop transport vehicles. At first it was a hoot but then I got cold. I do get cold easily and wished I had brought a lightweight jacket. The zip line tour was fabulous. Our family ranged from the very in shape to the very out of shape and we all did fine. Our 10 year old did well and had a blast too!

 

Mazatlan:

We took the Sierra Madre tour. It was a good choice for the day as it rained all day there. We actually had sun when we left the coast and went inland. It was a LONG tour though. All day! We left at 9:30 and just barley mad it back to the ship. We were the last people back on the ship at exactly 4:30! The tour itself it very interesting. You see many small shops and towns. It’s a good thing for kids to see that they would never see in the states! Our kids enjoyed it.

 

Cabo:

 

We didn’t have an excursion here. We just wanted a day to bum around. It was beautiful in Cabo and we wished we had some kind of beachy thing to do but we heard form others that the water was Very cold so glad we did what we did. We ate a great breakfast in town because we wanted to get off the ship before 9. We were in line at 8:20 and didn’t have to wait for a tender boat at all. We shopped and sat at a little bar for a snack on the water. Fun to watch the fishing boats come in and see what they caught that day.

 

 

David’s Supper club

 

We went to David’s on Tuesday. We had a lovely time and the food was good. I’m not sure we would do it again though. I think if you really need to get a night away from the kids or you don’t do restaurants like this at home it’s a wonderful thing. We do get out and do nice restaurants at home and we kind of missed the kids while were there. The food was good but not that much better than the dinning room. The presentation was better and we loved the calm quite of the supper club.

 

Entertainment

 

We went to 2 shows and they were both okay. It was a Vegas kinda feel and the kids really enjoyed being out late. We didn’t see any of the comedians of variety acts. We enjoyed all of the various music around the ship. Our favorite was Wally in the ivory bar! They had 2 midnight buffets. We only made it to the grand gala buffet. It was very beautiful and looked yummy. But at that point we were so full still from dinner (and all the eating on the cruise) we just didn’t want to eat any of it!

 

 

 

Embarkation

 

Well, this was not the best part of the cruise on so many levels. First you are not ready to get off the ship! I guess we were the lucky ones to get the full crew customs check! It did take a long time to get off the ship! We were the very last color called. We sat in the taj ma hal lounge and listened to Jerome. The first hour he was really funny but after 2-3 hours he ran out of material. Not his fault it was just a long wait. It did make the time go faster though. We walked up to get a drink on lido and people were sitting in the sun on lounge chairs. That would have been my choice but no one else want to go. We played cards and read so it wasn’t so bad. We were off the ship and through customs by 1:30. I’m sure it was frustrating for those with fights but for us we just tried to make the best of it. It was fun to run the stairs with the kids one time with out anyone else on them.

 

All in all it was a great vacation. I wished I’d just sat more and taken it all in but there’s always next cruise!

Thank you to all of you who posted and helped us plan for this cruise. If anyone has any questions I would love to answer them!

Marion :)

 

Great review. My neice is 12 and she had the same problem as your daughter and my DD and nephew also hated their Camp Carnival experience. They gave up after about the 3rd day.

[blkbrnfam]

My husband and I were on the Pride on 6/10. We also loved dining in the dining room.

[Calicruiser101]

Just wondering if you or the other poster Steve noticed that on the last sea day the buffet was not serve yourself? I guess they put up a sign that said something about the fact that the ship's infirmary has noticed an increase in the number of GI patients and so there were servers serving the food. My brother in law started feeling sick on Friday night and he is still having some problems today. He is better than he was but still feeling a little under the weather. No one else in our party had any problems.

[Jayfo]

Now I'm starting to panic a bit...:eek:

My flight is at 1:05 out of LAX. Is the disembarkation process always this long? I could always carry the luggage off myself, but I'm trying to avoid that option.

[Stevecruise]

Cali, yes we noticed the self-serve option was not available that last day - we were thinking maybe someone picked up something when they were in one of the ports (mantezuma's revenge). Did you bil make sure he didn't eat or drink anything questionable when he was in any of the Ports? We had our AAA tour book with us so we just ate at the places they recommended when we were in the ports. Cabo is probably the safest of the ports in terms of their water system but PV and MZ are definitely high risk areas to eat or drink anything from a "vendor selling stuff on the sidewalk." It could have been something on the ship as well.

 

Either way while the food lines were longer and it took a while to get lunch I would rather be safe than sorry and avoid the chance of having someone else pass it on to others by sharing serving utensils and touching the food...yuk...

 

Steve

[Stevecruise]

Jayfo, we had to deal with the crew having to go thru customs as well which is not normal - another poster said that is something all ships go thru every 6 months and we just happened to be the lucky ones that were on the cruise when all 980 crewmembers had to go thru customs which really slowed things down for us.

 

The key is if your flight is before 2pm you should automatically qualify to go with the 1st round of dembarkers. If your flight was at 2:05pm (like my FIL's) you are stuck waiting for your floor to be called unless you do self-assist which is a pain.

 

You should be ok with your 1:05pm flight as they should put you in the 1t group to leave plus the Pride won't have to put their crew thru the customs process again (they are probably 33% of the people on the ship so that is the equivalent of increasing the # of people to go thru customs by 33%!! - Customs only has a limited number of agents and windows to process everyone getting off in LB so if you increase the volume of people to process by 33% the de-embarkation process becomes very long and drawn out).

 

So we suffered for you so you won't have to endure that pain - you can thank us by buying us a nice extended balcony or suite for our next cruise...:)

 

Steve

[bunnkins]

Our 16 yr old heard from her O2 leader that there were people quarentined for flu like illnesses and that's why they did the no self serve thing in mermaids grill. Now this is coming from a 16 year old so I cant be for sure but it makes sense. Our son the last day of the crusie did not feel well and threw up once. he was in the bathroom alot but was better by monday afternoon. On Friday Our 16 year old starting throwing up and was in the bathroom and her's lasted over 24 hours. Not sure if it's related but was no fun. Hopeing we're done with that! First time we've every had any sickness near or on a cruise.

I checked out both or your reviews and they were great! fun to read others from the same cruise you were on! Marion:)