Once we arrived at the San Juan airport, things smoothed out somewhat. Our luggage had made it onto #1299 so we were able to claim it. And, for the first time, we saw a Carnival rep who pointed us in the direction for the terminal to pier transfer bus. Check-in went quite smoothly (since there were many agents but hardly any passengers to check in at that time of night) and we stepped onboard the ship just a few minutes before 10 p.m., stressed, exhausted, and starving.
Now to talk about the ship and the cruise itself.
We thought Destiny was a beautiful ship. Yes, it is a bit “Vegas-like” and there’s no question it is absolutely huge .... but we found everything to be in good repair, nicely put together, and very attractive overall. Although sometimes there was a long walk between one point and another, with our frequent visits to the pizzeria and the ice cream machines, we needed the exercise!
All of the ports of call were terrific. We did most of our souvenir shopping in St. Thomas. Dominica, the only port we’d never visited previously, proved to be absolutely gorgeous and definitely deserves its “nature island” title (I highly recommend the aerial tram in the rainforest). We had a wonderful day in Barbados as well, with highlights for my 17 and 12 year old being Harrison’s Caves and the Wildlife Reserve where there is no separation between humans and animals, including the charming Barbados Green Monkeys. Aruba we know like the back of our hand (this was visit #14 for us, and usually we are there for weeks, not just for a day), so we spent the day at the beach. The opportunity to be in Aruba for New Year’s Eve was my #1 reason for booking our cruise on Destiny. We had dinner off the ship at David’s Place in Barbados (right on the water, gorgeous!) and at Amazonia (Brazilian BBQ at Palm Beach) in Aruba, and it was a nice change from the dining room fare.
The food on a couple of nights in the main dining room was a little disappointing, but not in a way that was really note-worthy. It actually was about on a par with the RCI cruise we did at the end of 2000, but not as good as our experience with Holland America the previous year. All 3 of us agreed that The Sun & Sea restaurant buffet at lunch was pretty awful, but the Grill, the New York Deli, and the Pizza stand (all separate from the main buffet) were just fine so we certainly never went short of food. The breakfast buffet at the same Sun & Sea restaurant was quite alright every day ... we could not figure out how breakfast could be good and lunches consistently so bad. Go figure. The soft serve frozen yogurt and ice cream machines were very problematic, mostly because we couldn’t seem to stop our feet from trekking to these machines repeatedly. One afternoon my slim 12 year old daughter consumed 7 ice cream cones, a record, and I’m reasonably sure that she is hoping we’ll install a soft serve machine in our home sometime soon.
The shows each night were entertaining and varied enough and the cruise director, Jorge, is absolutely a hoot. I gather he was previously a stand-up comedian for Carnival before he became Cruise Director, and it showed.
Page 5 > > Carnival Destiny Caribbean Cruise Review
