Michelle Ritchie

Age: 36
Occupation: Computer Analyst
Number of Cruises: 4
Cruise Line: Carnival
Ship: Inspiration
Sailing Date: September 25th, 2003
Itinerary: Western Caribbean

Myself and 2 other females from the UK booked onto this cruise which was to follow a week in Orlando. Check-in was quick and smooth. We had to provide our passports because we were not US citizens , and they were returned on the morning we were leaving the ship.

The Carnival website promised up to 50% larger cabins than other operators, but we found the cabin to still be small when all 3 of us were getting showered and ready for dinner.

The ship was larger than the 3 previous ones we had been on. Clean enough with good facilities. Food was very good and plentiful. Talking of food, we were automatically allocated the early dinner sitting, which we asked to be changed. The maitre’d insisted that as we were 3 single ladies we had been allocated a table with other single people – in fact 4 single men who were all in good cabins. This intrigued us slightly so we agreed to try it. Turns out at least 3 of the men were obviously gay! For all I know they might have thought we were too. The other 2 table-mates were correctional officers from New York. Lovely girls. Anyway we stuck with our table mates for the week and had a great time at dinner.

The day at Grand Cayman was good, although we visited Captain Marvin to try to get a trip and he had gone earlier and wasn’t doing any more that day. Should have booked it on the internet!

Couldn’t dock at Costa Maya due to stormy seas so it was straight to Cozumel after Grand Cayman. We were able to spend all afternoon and evening in Cozumel which was great! We had some very large margaritas in the tequila bar there and watched the flying men go round the pole. Fantastic show. Then Fat Tuesdays for more drinks and Nachos before stumbling back onto the ship to the deck party and more nachos. Great time.

We were docked beside the Carnival Glory and the Sensation and could see the size difference – the Inspiration was the smallest.

For the Belize stop my 2 friends did the ruins and river trip and said it was wonderful. They saw wild manatees and loads of other animals and sights. I just took the tender to the shopping centre, which was very pre-fabricated and obviously just built for the cruise tourists. I bought a couple of souvenirs to remind me of the trip. The tender was a very powerful speedboat which took us the 7 miles to the mainland. The tender ride was most enjoyable.

General comments on the cruise: Good food, good cabin, good entertainment and friendly staff. Ship-mates were very friendly, very few children (great!), good bar-staff in the Violin bar but the pianist could do with smiling every now and then. Dave in the piano bar was young and had some good lines and songs. He’d only been there 2 weeks and was obviously eager to please and looked like he was genuinely enjoying himself which made us enjoy his playing and sing-a-longs all the more. Lots of photographers around and we bought quite a few of our portraits as they were so good.

One of the best points of the ship is that there are loads of sunbeds everywhere. It was great not having to search for one during our days at sea.

We all enjoyed ourselves and would definitely sail with Carnival in the future.