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Carnival Cruise Line
Imagination Cruise Review
Western Caribbean

Jennifer Pritchett
Age: 35
Occupation: Self Employed
Number of Cruises: 4
Sailing Date: March 26th, 2007

Embarkation; went fairly smoothly, although we’ve decided the port of Miami is our least favorite port. After waiting for a bit in the terminal, we were ushered onto the ship. Staterooms were ready early, and luggage delivery was punctual.

Dining; We actually felt the first night in the Spirit dining room, that it was the worst service on a cruise ever. My son asked for water three times. The waiter actually stood beside him with a bottle of water once, only to leave without pouring him any. We did not get water/tea etc until the appetizers were brought, and were not offered bar drinks all evening. Five appetizers came out 7 minutes before the sixth person's appetizer. Just generally not a good night in the dining room. We spoke with the Maitre'd about it, and it did seem to get better after that.

The Lido deck food was what you normally expect from the food on the Lido. The kids LOVED the pizza bar. I am surprised at the quality of the pizza. It’s very good.

Camp Carnival;  My ten year old son went to CC for the first time on our last cruise, and he LOVED it. Wanted to go all the time, and was full of stories about it when we picked him up. This cruise, however, after his first visit to CC, he informed me it ‘wasn’t as fun as last time and the people weren’t as nice’. He went back one more time, and informed me when I picked him up that… ‘The counselor said the ‘P’ word. She told us ‘Don’t piss me off’. And so, he and I hung out for the rest of the cruise.

Club 02; This is the 15-17 year old version of camp carnival. Both of my older two went to Club 02 on our last cruise in October, and they had a blast. Told all their friends about it when they got home, and about how cool it was. Unfortunately, this was not the case on this cruise. While we were waiting in the terminal to board, my daughter and I got to talking to another girl her age(15) , and her mother. Her mother was very nervous about letting her kids go off on their own on the ship. I told her about Club 02, and how much my kids had enjoyed it, etc etc. Sadly, the girls came and found me after the introduction night at Club 02, both of them very upset over the way it had gone. After listening to their stories, I asked them to write it down, and went to the Purser's desk, extremely upset. They wrote, a letter describing the events. (For the readers; the letter is not published here due to graphic content. )

I spoke with the Purser, made certain she understood I was very angry and concerned about this. She assured me someone would come and speak with me the next day. What I got instead was a form letter slid under the door in the middle of the night, apologizing that our experience was not what we’d hoped it would be. This made me even angrier. For this matter, my husband and I now plan to e-mail the head of ‘Cruise Directors’ as well as the CEO of Carnival. I can live with a lot of things going wrong on vacation, but this was beyond any level I felt normal or acceptable. My husband and I actually approached Ari to discuss the situation with him. His answers were, essentially ‘Well, you know how teens are.” or “ I must have been signing kids in when that happened’.

The rest of the cruise was average for a Carnival Cruise. I was extremely disappointed in the Camp Carnival / Club 02 issues. We spend a great deal of money taking a family of five on vacation, and one of the reasons we continue to choose Carnival is for the kids activities. Carnival has done nothing to resolve this.