Carnival Cruises, Triumph, Western Caribbean

My wife and i took our first cruise together to celebrate our Ruby wedding anniversary in February this year. I must stress i can not fault Carnival Cruises, the ship the food the excursions all surpassed my expectations the only fly in the ointment was Tanzanite/Diamond international.We were informed at the information session on board prior to arriving in St Thomas that the jewellery was tax free and worth an estimated 60% more when valued at home, but to bargain with them to get the price down. I ended up with a 65% reduction on the original asking price of $10000.00usd, for a tanzanite and diamond ring i purchased ffor my wife, when valued at home was told it was worth only £150.00 pounds more than i paid, didn't even cover the cost of the valuation. BE WARNED DIAMOND INTERNATIONAL/ TANZANITE INTERNATIONAL ARE TO BE AVOIDED. KEEP YOUR HARD EARNED CASH IN YOUR POCKET. CARNIVAL CRUISES I CAN NOT STRESS WHAT A FABULOUS TIME WE HAD AND WILL SAIL WITH YOU AGAIN IN THE NEAR FUTURE. I just feel people have to be made aware. I was offered $250.00 dollars compensation to stop me coming on review sites and telling my story, as you are reading this review it is obvious i did not accept.

When they told us they were cancelling the Grand Turk port. They offered us $20.00 a person, just like they did with the Bahamas port. Can you believe that, from a $2000.00 dollar cruise, I saw 2 places, and got $40.00 bucks back. All my excursion were cancelled, and it took days to receive my refund. Which still has not posted to my bank account. I won money in the casino, which was great, but no where near compensated for the time, money, efforts, and everything else I put into trying to make this a nice cruise for my boyfriends birthday. I would have been happier staying home. I felt totally freaked out by all the characters they had as well, they would pretty much force you to take pictures with these creepy looking things. So annoying. Someone trying to sell you something everywhere you looked. The sushi was the worst, totally fishy, and pretty much I had the worst vacation of my life. I have cruised Royal Carribean before, and it was a wonderful experience, in fact it was also in hurricane season, Septemeber, and it was an amazing time. The ship was cleaner, the food was soooo wonderful, the service/people working on the boat was wonderful, the activities were amazing ;) If you want to cruise, take Royal Caribbean ;)

I loved our Carnival Triumph cruise. For the money, you can't beat it! At less than $100 a day, you can't stay in a hotel for that today! I booked this through the www.allaboardcruisescorp.com who are Caribbean Cruise specialists. All Aboard Cruises Corp. beat the cruise lines rate and also gave me a $200 coupon book to use on the ship. These guys know cruises!

This was my first cruise for our whole family. On Apr.16, 2005 The Carnival Triumph was supposed to leave Miami port at 4:00PM. But instead of leaving the port, there was emergency drill. We didn't know what happened. So we left there as well. I left my chair one minute and immediately realized I didn't take my camera with me so I went back to my chair. MY OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA WAS GONE!!! Also came with bag I had three memory cards and cable and rechargeable battery. I went down to purser information desk. but they didn't want to do anything for me. My camera was on ship for seven days but no one returned it. I don't know if it was taken by crew member or passenger. The moment I left the pool area there were a few crew members but didn't see passengers around that area. I was very upset and sick about this and it destroyed my entire vacation. I can't recommend this to anyone and our family don't want to return to Carnival anymore. I feel really bad. I wish customer support could help me. I don't hold my hope that you could find my Olympus Digital Camera with three memory cards. This emergency drill was not in the plan. 4:00PM should we should have left the port, not emergency drill. I complain about this.

My family and I just returned from a 7 day Western Caribbean cruise on the Triumph. We had a great time. May I also add that we cruised during Spring Break with many college and High School kids. Never did we ever feel that we wished we chose another week. The ship is large enough that at times you didn't even know it was Spring Break. Being from New York we are used to a fast pace and do not have a lot of patience to wait around for service of any kind. I must say that we were served with a smile by our dining room servers and always in a timely fashion. Our servers were very nice and always remembered our names and what we drank nightly. Never did we have to ask twice for a refill of any beverage. There were never any long lines to wait in at any of the buffets, cafe's, pool bars or shore excursion desks. Our cruise director Chris Jefferson was around quite a bit and never did we feel that we could not approach him. The asst cruise director Jimmy was also easy enough to be found and he was very social with passengers.

I can not say enough about the cleanliness of our cabin. Our steward was great & most days he made up our room 3 times always with a smile. He also took the time to surprise our young son with some great animals crafted from towels. We did see the ships cleaning crew out and about often cleaning hand rails, elevator buttons and many other frequently touched items. This I am sure was to keep Norwalk Virus (cruise ship sickness) away. All in all I can not complain about this cruise, its staff, or the food offered. The entertainment in the Rome Lounge could use some help. The dancers were not that good at all, sorry. Other than that it was a great vacation. As I said we are from New York and are picky and impatient at times. We never found our family/group waiting for anything. I think this cruise was a great value for the super saver price we paid.

**Note to future cruisers. Don't hesitate to travel on board the Carnival Triumph it is a great ship with a great staff on board.

After 30+ cruises we are disappointed to say that our cruise on the Carnival Triumph was the worst cruise experience that we have had. We booked a "suite" on the ship, an expected a similar experience as on other ships.

Our cabin was filthy. When we first entered the cabin, there was glitter on the heavily stained carpet, there were holes in the walls, the upholstery was heavily stained, the laminate covering the cabinets was torn off, there were bobby pins on the stateroom counter (left over from the previous guests), and there was a deodorant bottle left in the bathroom cabinet. The bathroom was dirty. We almost couldn't see out the windows and balcony door, the balcony had used matches, and food crumbs on the deck.

That was the first half hour. Sad to say the rest of the cruise followed the same un-acceptable attention to basic service and design. Never again, time and money wasted!

My wife and I were disappointed in the mediocre level of service on the Carnival Triumph. We had been led to believe that you will be pampered on a cruise. Not on the Carnival Triumph. The cruise director openly begged and coached audiences to give "exceed expectations" ratings on comment cards, but never explained what to do if one had a problem. By the way, the purser informed me the cruise director was not available to speak to me, at any time.

Lines of 15-20 minutes were the norm on ship. From late morning until late afternoon, the snack bars averaged waits of 15-20 minutes. Perhaps another person working at these stations would have been considerate for the passengers. I experienced similar long waits at the bars by the pools, taking as long as 15 and 20 minutes for a bottle of beer. Schedule 40 minutes for a beer and a hamburger.

Breakfast and lunch food quality was on par of a Circus Circus Casino $1.99 buffet. The service would be better at Circus Circus. At the sit-down offerings, service was slow and indifferent. One day we waited 40 minutes for breakfast. As we had an appointment to make, we finally asked for a cup of coffee to go. The maitre'd merely shrugged at the slow service, and indicated they don't do coffee to go. Food was sometimes cold and dry from too long under heat lamps. A second cup of coffee or juice was the exception, as servers didn't return after delivering food or just didn't return after requests. Orders were in error or forgotten, but again servers didn't return so orders went uncorrected. A local coffee shop on main street would never survive with service like that.

Dinner was also slow and indifferent. Yes, we did arrive timely for our 8:00 pm sitting. And in fairness, others indicated their wait staff and service were excellent. At our table, seldom were drinks refilled, and we poured our own wine as no one bothered to come by. It wasn't unusual for our main course to arrive at about the time others were receiving their desserts and the staff was beginning their entertainment for the evening. Cold prime rib with coagulated au jus-yummy. Why didn't I send it back? One, it was already late, and two, our server wasn't to be found. Our dessert was offered as the staff was resetting surrounding tables for the next day. Only once, all week, did our server return to ask how our meal was, and that was at the end of the meal. When I did make mention to the purser about the service, the maitre'd and our server both acknowledged our concerns by scolding us for complaining.

The work out area could be quite nice. Unfortunately, the equipment was dirty, a number of pieces of equipment were broken, and there were no staff available in the work out area. The manager sniffed that the equipment was "checked and cleaned daily." During a subsequent walk through with her, she acknowledged the equipment was getting old, observed several pieces which weren't working, a quick wipe with a towel showed the grim (imagine what you couldn't see), and she acknowledged they were short staffed. But she assured me, that by next week the equipment would be repaired, cleaned, and they planned on having more staff.

The ship's daily news lists activities on the ship, including bar specials such as five different champagne drinks. Unfortunately, on two occasions, the staff was not aware of the special (we had to point it out in the publication), nor did they know how to make the drinks.

I did attempt to express my concerns to the purser. Again, the norm was a 15-20 minute line for the purser's desk. We had tried to call several times to avoid the lines. Unfortunately, they weren't answering calls. One time I had a staff member standing with me by a house phone across from the purser's desk, while it rang for over 15 minutes. The staff member just shrugged, he didn't know what to do either. The manager in the work out area also said they oftentimes could not get through to the purser. As an example of the purser's indifference to the needs of the passengers, when we disembarked at the end of the trip (a busy time at the purser's desk) there were only two people working the desk while the line snaked back and around to who knows where.

The purser told me it's a big ship, expect lines. She saw not problem with the waits for food, drinks or levels of service-including the difficulty of reaching the purser. Finally she begrudgingly said she'd "file a report" but no one would follow-up with me, that is not their procedure. (She was wrong; we did get a follow-up, the scolding from our wait staff.) We did get the obligatory form letter offering us 15% off on a future cruise. I asked to speak to the cruise director, and was told that wasn't possible, that I was talking to the purser and that is all their procedure allowed for. I also asked for a follow-up in my evaluation form, but I subsequently learned from Carnival's "guest relations" that Carnival's procedure is to not respond to requests for follow-up.

I will say the ship itself is a marvel. Our room was enjoyable, and steward was excellent. I actually relaxed and would enjoy another cruise. But it is clear that for the level of service that one is led to believe exists, you will need to search out a higher level of cruise line. I would insist on a cruise line that has a customer service operation that is readily available and responsive beyond sending form letters of acknowledgement. If you will note, Carnival Cruises does not prominently list their customer service phone number on their literature or web site. When I did track down a phone number, I was on hold for some 15 minutes (surprise).