Lou Anne White

Age: 46
Occupation: substitute teacher
Number of Cruises: 13
Cruise Line: Carnival
Ship: Glory
Sailing Date: February 19th, 2005
Itinerary: Eastern Caribbean

While the Carnival Glory is a very pretty ship to view from a distance, closer inspection of the interior shows a ship that appears to be much older than its 18 months. There are many drinks left in the hallways along with food from the numerous buffets. These are left and get spilled by the passengers who frequent the hallways on the way to there cabins that rarely get cleaned. While my family and I have taken at least 1 cruise a year for 20 years this was the dirtiest ship I had been on. The stairs, hallways and common areas where littered with drink and food while the ships' staff walked by. On this particular cruise the ship had trouble with one of the engines. The captain announced to the ship that the itinerary would be changed from St. Maarten and St. Thomas to Freeport and Key West. Individuals who did not like the change were welcome to depart the ship but would only received a credit of 80% even though we left Port Canaveral 22 hours earlier. Once they had packed and departed the ship they were informed that they had to return because there was no flight back to the states. The corporate heads at Carnival were making the decisions and we had no choice. Everyone was given a shipboard credit of 100 dollars that was to be spent on the Glory or lost. The day the credit was added, 70 dollars was removed for tipping. The television showed a credit of only 30 dollars! The complete incident was so poorly handled that the passengers were all upset with the cruise line. It was later learned that the engine was fixed and that we didn't have to forget St. Thomas but Carnival had already paid for Key West and they didn't want to lose their money. To top it all off while navigating the port in Key West they missed the channel and we were stuck on a sandbar for 5 hours. It was a very interesting cruise because I have never been on a ship that made the television or the newspaper before.

Each year a cruise is taken with relatives from Rhode Island. This year I had 13 people fly down and this cruise was what they were waiting for 10 months. I was hoping the Carnival heads would do something to keep the passengers happy and wanting to cruise with them again. I am sorry I was wrong and that Carnivals comments were simply that another cruise line might be more suitable. The ship had additional problems when we reached Port Canaveral but the following weeks passengers were not informed before it left port. Hopefully they will be treated a little nicer. Unfortunately when they don't have to work for tips they tend to take a carefree attitude and not really care if the passengers are happy and the ship is clean. Next year we hope to have a better time and I'm sorry to say we will be paying more because we will have gone to a cruise line that is concerned about the satisfaction of its passengers.

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