[Andrea J.]

On another thread Aruba Lisa asked if anyone have been on Carnival Cruises.
Paul, Kevin and I have been about 20 cruises and 12 of those have been Carnival. The others on NCL and Holland.
Destinations have been to Canada, Caribbean and Berumuda.

Carnival has changed its reputation for the better!
In the 80's and early 90's it was primarily WILD and we had been on a few of the wild ones (young folks with lots of booze)
Eventually Carnival began to spruce up their image as they began to gobble up smaller cruise lines and those that were financially unstable and CCL then became the cruise line mega company that it is today.

We never had a bad experience on CCL. We have always found customer service to be outstanding. We have always found the food and beverages outstanding. We have always found reasonable pricing.


We stopped cruising for 2 reasons.

• The ships became too large for our liking. We got tired of being lost onboard!
• We decided that going to Aruba was more laid back and a better relaxing trip for us. We got tired of trying to keep up with a cruise daily schedule, fighting for chaise space around the pools on the cruise ships, got tired of having to DRESS for dinner, got tired of having to pack a ton of clothes.

We have stayed in regular outside and balcony ~~ the balcony units were the best!!.

Bottom line, we prefer Aruba and being on dry land.
I ALWAYS got seasick, no matter how large or small the ship. Flat seas or swells! I always ended up getting the shot of Phenergan for seasickness.

disclosure** we have a friend that is on a FJORD cruise on a Norwegian ship now. Paul has said repeatedly that this is a cruise that he MUST do, or Alaska. I am sure that the Alaska or Fjord cruise is in his retirement plan.

and...........our son a marine engineer, interviewed for engineering positions with RCL and Celebrity (both owned by RCCL) he was offered positions with both which he declined.
CCL and its ships do NOT hire Americans for any positions in Engineering, dining, transportation. The only Americans employed by CCL are on the "hotel" part of the staff. The entertainers are contract eployees.
They don't hire Americans for the food service, propulsion or navigation of the ships.
Andrea