This was our first cruise, and we really didn't know what to expect. My husband's greatest fear was that he would fill "trapped" on the boat and would be bored. As we stepped into the grand foyer with it's towering room, we both knew that we would not fill trapped.

Boarding was not a terrible ordeal. We were greeted at the airport by a Carnival representative. We had to go down to baggage claim and gather our luggage. It was our responsibility to get it outside to be loaded onto the bus. We rode over the terminal where we had to visualize our luggage before entering into the building. There were many people inside, but as more entered, Carnival opened more "Q" lines, so the wait to get to the counter was only about 15 minutes.

After getting all our papers we entered the ship and found our room. We had chosen a room with a balcony. We had selected one that was on the back of the ship because they seemed to be slightly larger due to the odd shape of the room. The room was roomy enough with adequate storage. The bathroom was tiny.

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One of my biggest complaints about the cruise were the constant announcements made over the loud speakers, mostly related to selling events. These announcements were not only heard while in public areas, but also in your room. Another big complaint involved the selling of drinks on the ships decks. They would stop in front of each person and ask if you wanted a drink. If you did not answer, they would continually ask until you gave them an answer.

The ship was a fairly new ship at the time, but the pillows and the linens in the room had a very "used" odor to them. There were two days in port where the toilet in our cabin would not flush and had the odor of sewage. There was also a day and a half that the air conditioning did not function in the food buffet area or other public areas in that vicinity. This caused a large amount of flies to accumulate in the dining area where they remained throughout the cruise.

We did not attend any of the entertainment as that isn't our style. We did go to one bingo game once, but left because the whole first hour of the advertised time was just selling other things.

The pools had plenty of chairs to accommodate all the guests. My only complaint was that they closed too early and you couldn't enjoy the hot tubs in the evening.

The food in the dining room was very good. Our waiter and assistant waiter were very attentive. The beef cuts were not extremely tender and were not cooked to order. The seafood was very good, but there were no crab legs or lobster tails. We were seated at a table for 8. One couple was from South America and spoke no English at all. We enjoyed talking with the other couples.

The ports that we visited were Cozumel, Jamaica, and Grand Cayman. In Cozumel, we took a taxi out to a beach at a National Park. It was not crowded and we had a relaxing time with good snorkeling. In Jamaica, we had been advised by the ship's crew to not leave the ship unless we were on a shore excursion. We took a tour of Jamaica with a trip to Dunn's River Falls. In Grand Cayman, we also took an organized shore excursion. Climbing Dunn's River Falls was the most memorable event from the shore excursions. We had to tender in Grand Cayman. That involved being sent, by tour group number, to public areas to wait and wait and wait. We were finally sent to our tender about an hour and a half after reaching the public area we were sent to for our tour group. We had mistakenly thought that having an early morning ship tour would give us priority for going ashore. We were incorrect. Those without tours were able to tender at an earlier time.

Luggage was collected the night before we were to leave the ship. We were given a color code for disembarking. After leaving the ship, we were directed to a huge room to claim our luggage. This was a nightmare. Rather than the luggage being grouped by the disembarkation codes, it was just grouped by the actual color of the bag. Each type of bag was grouped separately within that color. So you would have to wander around in this huge room looking for black hanging bags and locate your bag, then, while carrying this bag, you would proceed to find the black large suitcases and locate your bag. This took a lot of time and was very difficult to walk around carrying large suitcases. Finally, we were able to board the bus for the airport.

The Destiny is a beautiful ship. It was not always as clean as I thought is should be. Glasses and empty plates would sometimes lay on the deck all day. The Destiny holds many passengers, and you are reminded of this constantly with the long lines for various things. If you just want to lie back and relax and not be constantly hounded to buy things, then this ship may not be the one for you.