Marti

Age: 24
Occupation: Music teacher
Number of Cruises: First Cruise
Cruise Line: Carnival Cruise Lines
Ship: Celebration
Sailing Date: June 17th, 2002
Itinerary: Western Caribbean

I just returned from my very first cruise on the Celebration. To put it simply, my husband and I have already decided to cruise again!

First off, the arrival and embarkation. We are from the southernmost part of Houston, so the trek to Galveston only took 40 minutes. We had a family member drop us off so we didn’t have to pay for parking. A guy met us as we pulled up and put our luggage on our cart making sure we had the correct tags (for our deck, they send you these with the tickets). Be ready to tip this guy! A buck per bag is good. He had us walk with him to the point where he took the bags to be processed and we were to proceed to the line to check in. This procedure is very much like the airport. Security screening with bag x-ray and metal detector, etc. You have to have your passport or other ID as well as your tickets and all of your stuff filled out! Fill out the packet of info before you get there! You go through another line after security and you get processed there before you are sent to the table with your room keys and Sail and Sign cards (AKA: your new cruise identity!). They take a cute pic before you head down the little terminal walkway and then they take a security picture of your face to match to your Sail and Sign. Then it’s welcome to the ship!

We headed first to the purser’s desk to make sure they knew we had pre-paid our tips. All was well with that! You can pre pay so that you don’t have to hand deliver them the last night of the cruise…quite helpful.

Then we made it down to our room. It was way bigger than we had imagined. Plenty of room for the two of us. The two beds push together to make a King. Renato, our room steward kindly did that for us. Speaking of room stewards, they ROCK! I wish I had my very own room steward here at home. Every time you leave the room, you come back to a made bed, emptied trash, even our dirty clothes we had tossed all over the place were neatly folded, and our shoes rearranged neatly! We love that guy!

Next thing was to head to the Lido deck to the Wheelhouse and get some food. It was really good. Food is served cafeteria style up there. There were burgers as well as rice, beef, pasta, vegetables, salad bar, desserts, you name it. They also serve 24 hour pizza, which was pretty darn good.

We then just walked around the boat until they told us to get our life jackets and head to our muster stations. That took about 20-30 minutes, but is a small price to pay for safety awareness.

While doing the safety drill, we heard that the Celebration had just gotten out of dry dock and so the carpet was new and some engine stuff had been repaired. The carpets did indeed look new! The ship was really clean too. We stayed on the Riviera deck which is the lowest passenger deck and it was not very noisy at all. You could hear sort of a hum of the ship’s vibration, but it was almost soothing when going to sleep. Even our dining partners joked about not being able to sit on the bed without falling asleep!

Okay…dining. The food is really good! There are plenty of choices in my opinion and they bring you as much as you want of anything you want on the menu. We enjoyed eating in the dining room! It was fun. We were seated with 4 other newlywed couples (they purposely seat the honeymooners together…it’s fun). We made friends with those people and it was nice to know other people when we went into shore or milled around the boat.

Also, a neat thing food-wise is that there was a sushi buffet every day. It was pretty good. I had eaten sushi quite a bit before, so I knew the “rules”. I had to advise some people that, no, that is NOT guacamole! It is wasabi and it is really freaking hot! By all means, try the sushi, especially if you are new to that.

The fun day at sea was…fun! We were able to get a feel for the layout of the boat and hang out, eat, gamble, etc. You can do as much as you want or as little as you want, that’s for sure! We took a nap every day, which was nice.

Unfortunately, it rained in our ports of call on both days! We were scheduled for the Passion Island excursion, which went on regardless of the inclement weather. At first, we were miserable! (this is NOT Carnival’s fault! They gave us the chance to back out of the excursion). Anyway, we took a bus to the other side of Cozumel and boarded a small boat to the peninsula of Passion Island. The ride was rainy and cold! The first thing we did there was eat (food is provided) and drink (alcohol and other drinks are also free here). Finally it stopped raining and we got in the water which was nice and warm. I actually managed to get burned under cloudy skies here!

When we got back to the boat, we showered and headed out with another couple via taxi to the shopping area. Advice: If you are traveling in twos, share a cab with other cruisers whenever you can! The taxi costs 6 dollars American no matter how many people ride! We shopped a little, but did not buy…there was nothing that I either wanted or had any business buying (besides the cheap duty free store Kahlua). We ate at Pancho’s Backyard as recommended by the Celebration crew for its purified water! It had good food and I really liked the décor…I wanted to buy the plates and light fixtures!

The margaritas there are HUGE and one of the people with us decided that it had done her in, so we split up after that and shopped more until retiring to the boat. We ordered free room service…that’s right, FREE, for a snack and went to bed.

The next morning, we did not go to Calica! Turns out we couldn’t get there, so we put down anchor at Playa del Carmen (a nicer place to be by far!). I say put down anchor, because we did not dock! We had to take a tender from the ship to the shore. Our excursions were waiting for us when we got there even though we were in a different port, so that was okay. We took the Cancun shopping tour, which I felt was a total waste. We should have stayed in Playa del Carmen! There is a ton of stuff to do there.

The next day was a fun day at sea, which was nice, since we were able to relax, gamble a little, keep eating (we ate a LOT!). The waiters are so fun in the dining rooms! Our waiter was Werner, from South Africa. He was really nice and not only brought us food, but answered any and all questions about the boat, ports of call, you name it! The waiters also do little “surprise acts” for you…they are really cute! The maitre ‘d arranged for each honeymoon couple to get a special cake that said “Happy Honeymoon” and it had a candle to make a wish. The waiter and maitre ‘d sang when they brought it!

The midnight buffets were pretty good, the best being the Grand Buffet. It is amazing what they can do with food…that’s all I have to say!

The Astoria lounge is where the show action is at. I am a musician and so I am super critical of shows such as these…I did not attend them for fear of not liking them, but I heard that they were good. I did watch the comedy shows which were funny, but definitely NOT for children! Please put them in Camp Carnival while you go to these particular shows! The comedy ranges from PG-13 to R! We also played BINGO, trying to win the free cruise, which was fun, but alas, we did not win.

Disembarkation…this was soooooo easy compared to the rumors we heard. Don’t be stupid! Fill out your customs forms before you get to immigration…I swear, the only people complaining were those who did not do as they were told! It hardly took any time to do immigration and then we went to the late seating breakfast, then to a waiting area for clearance of the ship. Our level (the lowest one) was called first and we were off the boat, bags found, and through customs in 10 minutes flat! So fast! We had to wait for our ride in the pick up lane, which runs quite slowly, but what do you expect when 1800 people need to leave from the terminal?

Seasickness: We did not feel any ill effects from the motion of the ship. There were lots of people with motion sickness patches, but we did not need them, nor did most of the people who we talked to. The boat did get pitched around quite a bit one night and you could feel it much stronger the higher you got in the boat. But that did not last for long at all. My advice…take some Dramamine along with you and take it if you need it…you probably will not need it!

We had so much fun on this cruise! You should definitely go! We are going to try an Eastern Caribbean cruise next!

Ask a Question About Carnival Cruise Lines

Ever thought about becoming a home based travel agent? Check out my web site for home based travel and cruise agents located at;

Home Based Travel Agent