Cruise stateroom location

PERSonalTime

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I'm thinking about booking a cruise on the Carnival Inspiration cruise ship. I'm looking at picking a stateroom on the empress deck (oceanside view). What are the advantages and disadvantages of booking a stateroom on that particular deck?

If I'm going to book it on that deck, I would probably located in the middle of the ship. Suggestions or reviews from people have been on that deck would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
 
I always booked the cheapest cabins available. If you want to sleep, it is pitch black in the room, no matter what time.

If you want to look at the ocean, go top side. If you are going to stay in the room, you can do that at home.
 
My only suggestion is to be as far away from the elevators as possible. Less problems with noisy drunks at 3 AM......

That might be sound advice on some Carnival cruises. I however try to be relatively close to the elevator on most cruise lines to take me to the buffet, bar and pools. What I avoid is a room above or below one of the nightclubs.

Note: Oceanview on many modern ships means an outside cabin--on lower decks. Just hope you're not on the deck that has the obstructed views out the windows. The upper outside cabins often are outside balcony rooms.

On our 13 day transatlantic cruise in April, we paid a little extra for an inside room that was 1 deck below the pool/buffet/bars--up high.
 
I once was located over the disco .Since then I carefully make sure I am sandwiched between two floors of all rooms .You never want to be above or below the casino.
 
None of these really make much difference to me, but you have several things to consider:

  • Price
  • Exterior View
  • Motion
  • Length of Walks
  • Unwanted sounds
The ship's center of gravity is where you'd expect it to be...kind of in the center. Not top, not bottom, not front, not back. That's supposed to move less. But if it's rough, you'll feel it no matter where you are. And if it's not rough, it doesn't matter how close to the GC you are.



"All" the ships have the pool and buffet up on top and the dining rooms down low. There's usually a couple of public decks down low. I didn't look at the plan for your ship. I find that my trips are from the room to up top for the buffet, pool, and being outside. So if you're like me and you didn't want to walk a lot of stairs, you'd be higher up.


If you are at an extreme end (pointy or blunt), you'll walk a bit more. This wasn't a "thing" in the past, but the dang ships got so big nowadays. I don't care much...you need to work off all of the food you eat, lol!


Already covered, there are rooms above or below the "boom boom" of the disco, or the "slam, bam" of an external door, or even the "pitter patter" of the early walkers on the lifeboat deck. Also the mechanicals (engine noise is down in back and thruster noise is down in front). I kind of like to hear the engines...you know when you're coming into port.

Also, rooms adjacent to the steward pantry, crew hallway, elevators, etc. I've been near elevators and not heard a thing, and I've had "bad neighbors" and heard them returning to their room at the wee hours...nothing you can do about that.
 
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I once was located over the disco .Since then I carefully make sure I am sandwiched between two floors of all rooms .You never want to be above or below the casino.
Totally agree. They put us above a disco and the bass rocked the room. I had to yell at the night manager as they told me there was no vacant cabin. There was, and we got moved the next day. Always pick your room and if you can't get a quiet one, don't go.
 
I have only been twice... the first was on a lower deck in the back... NOT GOOD... when coming into port you not only heard, but you felt the engines....

The second time we were at a higher deck... we were over the forward theater... we never heard anything from it... I would think that a disco would be noisy...


I could care less about being close to an elevator... it is just some extra steps... and in truth almost all rooms are 'close enough'... plus, we took the stairs most times, but they are also at the elevators...

The only thing that got me in a knot was that we were way up front on the ship and our dinner was in the back dining room!!! There is a middle dining room... maybe that is for the suites and higher....
 
I checked out the Inspiration . The Empress deck has rooms below but above it it has a dining room , the show room ,shops and the piano bar . As long as you are not over the piano bar you should be okay . To check out the deck plans go to Carnival's web site and under explore the ships are there ,click on Inspiration and you can see the deck plans .
 
Thank you everyone for your feedback and recommendations. Especially Moemg, Texas Proud, and Animorph. 😊
 
Btw, does anyone have experience on the imagination cruise ship?
The Imagination is a fantasy class ship. I've been on two or three of those.

What is it you want to know? They're old, like from the 90's. They keep them up reasonably well, but things like the plumbing tend to be a bit creaky...you might get a whiff of things you'd rather not smell occasionally.
 
We have had people tell us that Carnival is mainly a young, drunk, rowdy crowd so we don't cruise with them. WE don't care how far we walk becase we try to get 20k/steps/day to counteract the calories consumed:))
 
We have had people tell us that Carnival is mainly a young, drunk, rowdy crowd so we don't cruise with them. WE don't care how far we walk becase we try to get 20k/steps/day to counteract the calories consumed:))


Most people that say that have never been on Carnival .Sure the three day cruises are booze cruises but not the longer trips .Last year I went on the Paradise which is one of there older ships and we had a ball. The entertainment was great in all the venues and the price was really right for a short getaway . I would rather be on a fun ship than be bored to tears on a line that caters to older folks and I am 70.I have been on all the major cruise lines except HAL many times and there is not a huge difference between brands..
 
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Most people that say that have never been on Carnival .Sure the three day cruises are booze cruises but not the longer trips .Last year I went on the Paradise which is one of there older ships and we had a ball. The entertainment was great in all the venues and the price was really right for a short getaway . I would rather be on a fun ship than be bored to tears on a line that caters to older folks and I am 70.


I have been on two and both were 1 week.... the thing I did not like is that they have the music LOUD around the pool area... and yes, there are still a lot of drunk people there...

I tend to avoid this part of the ship unless I am walking through to get someplace else...


I do have an older sister who cruises all the time... she does not like Carnival... wish I could remember which one she liked the best... she has been on many... did one on (IIRC) Crystal just so she could see how it was...


The advantage of Carnival is that they are cheap... and if you avoid the places that are wild and crazy you can have a great time... there are things to do for the people who do not want to get drunk...
 
The Imagination just had a major overhaul in 2016. If you want reviews from people that have sailed on it recently go to Cruise critic and look for their review section.
 
I always booked the cheapest cabins available. If you want to sleep, it is pitch black in the room, no matter what time.

If you want to look at the ocean, go top side. If you are going to stay in the room, you can do that at home.

BTW Senator, congratulations on your recent retirement. Hope it feels great!
 
Congrats on your recent one year retirement anniversary. Hope it's going great.
 
Actually the people we met that were talking about Carnival were telling us their experiences on their cruises. They took their teens on a week cruise and 2 old drunk ladies pushed their kids out of line to take their place. We have heard lots of stories through the years. We have found the age range on RC to be between 30-85 and we always meet great people and have a blast.
 
We just returned last week from an Alaskan cruise on the Princess Island. Had a balcony room on the 12th floor near the elevators midship. Very happy with room, balcony and location.
 
Actually the people we met that were talking about Carnival were telling us their experiences on their cruises. They took their teens on a week cruise and 2 old drunk ladies pushed their kids out of line to take their place. We have heard lots of stories through the years. We have found the age range on RC to be between 30-85 and we always meet great people and have a blast.
Correlating clientele with cruise ship brand seems logical, but it's less predictive lately, especially across Princess, Carnival, Holland America, since they're owned by the same company (CCL) and run similarly. And if you add in the other two "bigs" (NCL and RCL), you're up to 90% of the market, and they all tend to be fairly similar.

I've sailed with many brands, across all three big corps and have noticed a correlation between clientele and departure port that seems every bit as strong as the cruise ship brand. Throw-in price per day along with the departure port, and that can account for most of the variation in clientele, and that's ignoring the brand!
 
+2 for the Cruise Critic website.

Try to avoid being under the casino or night clubs. I did a balcony on my first cruise, but never again because like others stated, you can go top side for views.
 
Everyone has different priorities. Some will book an inside cabin because they are the cheapest, and if all you do is sleep or change in there, that is your priority.
We book balcony cabins, because especially on sea days, we can sit out and read, have our mini speakers (very low) for music, a glass of wine, and enjoy the privacy.
On Princess, we want a cabin near the elevators so we do not have to hike to get one. We stay amidships because of the stability, and shorter hikes to the showroom (near the bow) or the buffet (near the stern.
YMMV
 
Having started my ocean liner days back when the ship's engines could be felt everywhere and they just became part of the backdrop, (I still recall sitting bolt upright in my bunk when the Northern Star https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Northern_Star_(1962) pulled into Papeete, at 3:00 a.m. in 1963, and cut the engines.....it was "What the ***?"), I have no particular preference nowadays.....noisy passengers are a far greater irritant.

We only use the elevators once per voyage, and that's when we haul our bags off by ourselves when we make final landfall, so I'd just as soon be as far away from them as possible.

Oceanviews are 'nice', but only if the price is right...otherwise, otherwise.
 
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