When it comes to boarding a cruise, there’s always something funny that we never quite understood.
Show up right when the boarding window opens, and you’ll no doubt be met with huge crowds as people clamor to be among the first to board. It leads to long lines and waits. But if you wait until later in the day, you can typically breeze through with no lines or crowds.
The real benefit of boarding later, however, is that your room is ready and waiting for you.
Just hours before you arrive for your cruise, there were thousands of passengers ending their cruise. During that time, the crew has to get everyone off the ship, prepare thousands of rooms of new passengers, and then welcome new guests onboard.
Given the time crunch, rooms are often unavailable until in the afternoon. Typically this is around 1-2 p.m. The doors leading to the cabin hallways are usually closed and have signs asking passengers to wait to enter the area.
This means many passengers have to explore the ship with bags in tow.
Of course, there are always some people who try to skirt the rules and access their room early. They open up the doors to the hallway, find their cabins and enter even if they might not be ready just yet.
Often it is simply to drop their bags off, but there are stories of some passengers that enter to change clothes or take a shower or a nap. This makes it very awkward when the cleaning staff enters to prep the room and find someone already there.
Carnival is trying to put an end to the problem.
Carnival Makes it Clear Passengers Should Wait to Enter Their Cabins
The cruise line’s Brand Ambassador John Heald made a post on Facebook addressing the issue of passengers entering cabins early.
The post shows an example photo of the sign telling passengers the staterooms won’t be available until 1:30 p.m and to please not enter.
Then there is the message from Heald. “This sign is for everybody,” he wrote. “Everybody please follow this sign and the rule that it says on that sign.”
The only exceptions that he lists are if you are:
- Diamond or Platinum status in Carnival’s loyalty program
- Staying in a suite
- Have bought “Faster to the Fun”
For everyone else, the message is clear. Give the staff the time to prepare the cabins.
“I am posting this again at the bequest of my colleagues on board and for the benefit of our brilliant cabin attendants and housekeeping staff. Some people will think that sign does not mean them, I know that, but I have to try and help the crew,” he added.
You can see the full post below:
It’s understandable that passengers want to get into their cabins as soon as possible. But it’s also understandable that many people simply want to drop their bags off when they get on the ship so they don’t have to lug them around.
Still, most commenters were in agreement with the statement.
“I get very aggravated when people do this,” wrote one poster. “I can’t imagine what the crew members feel. The room stewards are trying to turn over rooms in little time. If you go through the corridors, you are in their way. If you drop things off, your stuff is in their way. You are slowing down the process, and the same people breaking the rules are likely the ones that complain that the rooms aren’t done in time.”
“I bet if they started sending any bags found in a room that wasn’t diamond/platinum/FTTF back down to lost and found since they obviously must belong to the previous guests this problem would stop,” said another.
Our solution? If you simply wait until later in the day to board, the cabin will be ready the moment you’re on the ship. As a bonus, it’s also much faster to get through the check-in process in the terminal.
