Cruising: Carnival Radiance Review
For spring break this year, we opted to take the kids on a cruise. Since I am now a travel agent for Expedia Cruises, I have a goal of cruising on every major cruise line. So far I have done MSC and Royal Caribbean, so we decided to go Carnival since we were taking the kids. The best cruise lines for kids are Royal Caribbean, Disney, and Carnival. Lots of people are under the impression that Carnival is just a crazy party cruise line, but I think it depends on the length of the cruise and when you go. We went during the week of the Great Exodus from Utah (spring break when everyone goes to California) so 80% of people on our cruise were families from Utah–ergo not a lot of drinking and partying. Also typically the longer the cruise, the less booze-cruise it will be. So here is my full Carnival Radiance review!
This cruise was on the Carnival Radiance, which sails out of Long Beach California typically on 3-6 night cruises. The most common cruises out of LA will stop in Catalina Island and Ensenada Mexico, but I picked a 6-night which did an overnight stop (2 days in port) in Cabo and one night in Ensenada. This was a pretty good itinerary for the West Coast and was a lot better pricing than the 7 night Mexican Riviera (which ports in Cabo, Mazatlan, and Puerto Vallarta). We chose this cruise also because we could drive to LA when flights to other major ports in Texas and Florida were super pricey that week.
Embarkation
The embarkation for this cruise was the easiest and smoothest I’ve done so far. Carnival still requires printed boarding passes which I thought was pretty outdated since most other lines just use the app. But when we got there, they stamped each of our boarding passes after inspecting our passports and birth certificates and then we had to show them again like five more times but it was easy to just hold the paper in hand and hold it up. The app is great except when the wi-fi isn’t working well and then it takes forever! So I did appreciate how easy it was to get on board. You just have a small security area and then just a long walk to get onboard. I love embarking because it’s exciting and everyone is happy and excited. And when you first walk into the ship, there’s that moment where you just stop and look at the ship and there’s music playing and it feels like a party!
The Carnival Radiance was a smaller ship, it’s the Destiny class and is only 12 decks (compare that to the world’s largest ship which has 20!) Smaller ships can be nice though because it’s easier to learn and navigate and to get places around the ship. I’m pretty sure this sailing was full capacity since it was spring break so it was pretty crowded. That being said, I think I’m more used to the crowds on cruise ships so my expectation is a little different. Think of the public spaces like a theme park–they are just crowded. The Radiance had a total refurbishment in 2021, which helped, but the overall design style wasn’t my favorite. It felt a little cheap in the rooms, especially with the sinks in the bathroom being blue.
Our Cabins
We booked two balcony rooms next to each other and I was hoping that they would allow us to open the balcony divider between our two rooms so we could go back and forth that way but they said they only open it up in port and since our Cabo stop was a tender port (where you have to take a small boat in) that didn’t count. So we wouldn’t only be able to open it for one day, so we didn’t bother. So that was a letdown little. If you can manage, getting actual connecting rooms is so great when traveling with more kids. That way there’s not so much knocking on doors and waiting to answer. But I will tell you as an agent that pretty much the only way to get connecting rooms is by booking early.
The room itself was fine. They had set up the upper Pullman bed (a single bed that pulls down from the ceiling like a bunk) and the couch so my little boys were so excited to sleep in these bunkbeds. My husband and I shared the main bed which was a Queen size (but can separate to be two twins) and it was actually super comfortable. I slept SO well on the cruise and I think it was due to the gentle rocking motion on the ship. Anytime I would lay in the bed to relax and watch TV or whatever, I would end up falling asleep because of the rocking.
There was plenty of storage for us, and the key is to unpack immediately when you get your luggage (which was delivered by 1 pm so we didn’t wait long.) You unpack everything and use the drawers and whatnot and then you can shove the luggage under the bed so it’s out of the way. I told my teens to do this and only my daughter did–of course.
The Food
The best part of cruising as I’m sure you’ve heard, is the food. And that’s because it’s all included! When you purchase your cruise fare, it includes all the food you would need and you can access it pretty much anytime at the buffet (called the Lido Marketplace on Carnival) or at meal times in the Main Dining Room. You request a specific time for your dinner time and then you just show up at that time and you will have the same servers every night at the same table. Otherwise you can do the flexible dining option and you just have to wait a short time and will sit in different spots. If you’re traveling with a group, you will definitely want a specific dining time and have your bookings linked so you can sit together every night. Ask your TA to request bookings to dine together.
The thing that’s cool about Carnival is it has a bunch of extra Specialty casual dining which is included in your fare (most specialty dining costs extra). All of these spots were right next to the buffet so you could just walk a short distance and grab an amazing burger, pizza, tacos, or bbq. On the Radiance there is Guy Fieri’s Burgers which were super yummy as well as Guy’s Pig & Anchor bbq–I wasn’t quite as impressed with this and only tried it once. There’s Shaq’s Chicken which was also pretty good and my family loved it. We also got tacos at Blue Iguana but my husband grabbed these for me so they were kinda cold when I finally sat down to eat. But I do think they were still decent tacos.
The Main Dining Room is my favorite part when cruising with my kids. This is because it is a dedicated time for everyone to come together and just talk and laugh and eat. They can pick whatever they want from the menu which is great for picky eaters and older kids who want more food and want to try new things. My sons have tried escargot and frog legs. They are more adventurous than me for sure! The food here is decent and I don’t really have any complaints but it’s definitely not like five star. We did enjoy the various desserts, especially the Carnival Melting Cake–which was sometimes runny like cake batter and other times thicker. Tip: Download the Heads Up game to play when kids start to get bored. We played this every night and my little boys loved it.
The Entertainment
The entertainment on this ship was a little bit of a letdown. We went to a PG comedy club one night that had a funny comedian, but the second one we went to was definitely not as good and these shows were SUPER crowded and hard to get into. We also went to a couple of shows in the main show area and the first one was pretty boring–just some lady singing a bunch of songs we weren’t familiar with. The second one was pretty good though.
As for other activities, they were okay, but since the ship was so crowded we didn’t participate as much. They had a ropes course which we did once but once was enough–just not quite thrilling enough to want to bother again. We hung around the pool and laid out but the weather wasn’t always great. That is a factor of sailing in the Pacific, it’s just colder. They had a basketball court which my 8-year-old really wanted to play in but it was always dominated by older kids who didn’t always let him play. The mini-golf was also worse than on other ships because the balls were so light they went flying at the slightest hit.
My little ones went to the Kids Club only once and were so relieved when we came to pick them up. They said it was super loud and crowded and there were a few little kids using foul language, which is pretty sad to me. So they did not want to go back ever.
The Itinerary
We stopped for an overnight in Cabo, which was fun. The one caveat though is that since Cabo is a tender port, tendering takes up a lot of time which you have to factor into your day. I also learned that we needed to get a Sea Pass the day before we reached the port and we didn’t do that. I went to Guest Services on the morning of Cabo to get them and he said they were gone. But the announcement kept repeating about getting them so my husband went and they had them! But by then they were basically the last boarding group so it didn’t help much. We didn’t get to Cabo until almost 1 pm and then had to walk about a mile or more to our excursion meeting point.
The second day in Cabo we didn’t need a Sea Pass but we ended up waiting in an extremely long line for awhile. So my recommendation is to get going early on these days. That being said, we could only go as early as the tender boats were ready. The second day we just took a water taxi and went to Medano Beach which was crowded but a lovely beach. Unfortunately there were jellyfish in the surf and several of my family members got stung! They were fairly mild stings though and didn’t require medical attention. We also had to leave after only two hours because the ship left at 3 pm. I think Cabo would be a fun place to go as a solo destination trip.
Summary
Overall this was a fun and memorable trip for us. I love how affordable this was (minus all the money we blew on souvenirs!) and a great way to spend spring break with the kids. We had sun, food, relaxation–all while seeing some new places in a different country. Cruising a great way to introduce your family to new countries. I hope my Carnival Radiance review was helpful for you to help decide if this is something you’re considering to do with your significant other and/or family! And as always, I’m happy to help you with booking the trip. Just email me at hferguson@expediacruises.com.
