A few things really shocked him
A former cruise ship worker has revealed his ‘shock’ at exactly what it is like travelling on the ‘world’s cheapest cruise’.
Going on a cruise ship holiday can be very expensive, with the rooms alone costing up to thousands of pounds a night.
Then there’s the cost of extras when you’re there, such as whether to indulge in a drinks package or not. And if you do bite the bullet, there’s a simple hack to keeping costs down as much as possible.
Justin Alexander, who runs The ShipLife YouTube channel, is a former crew member who spends him time now as a content creator sharing cruise tips and secrets.
And in one video, Justin shares a 13 minute montage of his time on board the Carnival Conquest, dubbed the ‘world’s cheapest cruise’.
That’s not an over-exaggeration either, with it’s cheapest package coming in at just $11 a night. That’s less than ten quid in the UK. Justin is pretty straight up about what to expect for so little, saying: “This is not Disney World, there are pros and cons to everywhere.”
The journey in question was a four-night sailing on board the Carnival Conquest cruise liner sailing to the Caribbean from Miami, Florida.
“This ship would be a seasoned cruise ship launched in 2002 it has 13 decks holds 3,000 passengers and cost $500 million dollars to build,” Justin explained.
Justin Alexander (YouTube/JSHIPLIFE)
The package taken up by Justin cost $50 per person for an interior cabin, with total costs for the four night stay (taxes, fees and expenses) coming to $192.49 (£153). That did come with a $50 credit voucher to spend on board, so in reality it was less than $150 in actual money spent.
For a four night holiday to the Caribbean, you can’t complain too much at that. After a smooth process getting on board and a great sail away party, which Justin says is among the best you will find on any cruise line.
But despite Carnival cruise line saying they have ‘fun ships’, Justin claimed the employees at port ‘weren’t exactly fun and seemed kind of angry and stressed’.
“Keep in mind this is the largest cruise port in the world so there’s a lot going on,” he added.
On boarding, Justin said he was left waiting for two and a half hours to get in to his cabin and drop his bags off.
Justin’s $11 a night cabin (YouTube/JSHIPLIFE)
“This process is not uncommon on any particular ship but I was a little bummed out that I had to carry my bag around but so did everybody else, so it is what it is,” he said.
He was full of praise for the design of the ship, with bars, swimming pools, retractable roofs for the pool in case of bad weather, night clubs, golf course, hot tubs, and restaurants ‘literally everywhere with everything flowing pretty well’.
Choosing a ‘small uneventful but functional’ cabin, Justin said: “For fifty bucks what do you expect on an older season ship?”
But this is where he highlighted a few issues on the very off-putting matter of foul smells While not an issue on his deck, Justin says ‘it seemed like every other deck’ had a ‘hint of sewage on board’.
He said: “Now I do always say that Carnival’s older season ships are usually pretty well kept. But like I said every other deck you just kind of smell this and for every other deck that you didn’t smell the sewage there was a small hint of Mary Jane on board.”
Carnival Conquest top deck (YouTube/JSHIPLIFE)
On cannabis on the ship, he even claimed someone knocked on his door offering to sell him some.
He said: “When it came to the smoking area, well I gotta say I got contact high just being over there. It was absolutely wild. Like I said you could smell weed in the hallways and believe it or not – I promise you this is true, it blew me away – that there were multiple people that were running around selling weed on the ship somebody even came to knock on my door to ask me if I wanted to buy some weed.”
Things took a turn in the nightclub too, which Justin described as ‘a little hatchet, ghetto and hood up in there’.
“When it came to the nightclub… people were a little hostile from time to time I would see arguments in the smoking area,” he said.
“There was almost a fight in my hallway because there was somebody down the hall that was blasting music. Security would come over and over again. They even came to my room and asked me to turn the music down I didn’t even have a speaker.”
He said tempers flared as the cruise went on and a fight did break out on the final night, saying: “I could feel the steam building up the whole time I was there I knew it was going to happen.”
Despite these incidents, Justin said it was still a ‘great’ experience despite being ‘somewhat shocked’ by some of the incidents.
He said: “I still did have a great time. Overall, were there some issues that took place? Sure. Did I get in a fight? No. Did I have any bad experiences in come in contact with somebody else and have a bad time? No, not at all. I would just say the food was as expected.
“I had some fun on board the Carnival Conquest. Would I do it again? Maybe. I think so. I’m starting to like these older Carnival Cruises, they’re never boring there’s always something going on.”
LADbible approached Carnival for comment on Justin’s concerns.
