Louisiana Cruisers Losing Sleep Over Carnival Cabin Changes

Louisiana's Port of New Orleans is fast becoming a "home port hub" for a variety of cruise ships. The port on the Mississippi River currently offers ocean-going voyages on Carnival, Norwegian, and Royal Caribbean. The port is also an embarkation point for river cruisers on the American and Viking Cruise lines.

Currently, Carnival Cruise Lines operates two ships out of New Orleans. They are the Carnival Liberty which has a passenger capacity of 3,756 and the Carnival Valor which has room for 2,974 passengers. Norwegian Cruise Lines operates the Getaway out of New Orleans with service for 3,963 passengers. The Getaway is the largest ship currently offering sailings out of NOLA by the way. And, the Brilliance of the Seas, part of the Royal Caribbean International fleet also sails from the Big Easy, the occupancy is listed at 2,466 for that vessel.

As you've probably figured out, tens of thousands of cruise guests embark and disembark in the Big Easy but not everyone returning from what is supposed to be a relaxing experience is coming back refreshed. Or in the future, they won't because of a tiny change that Carnival Cruise Lines is making to the cabins on every one of their vessels.

If you've ever been on a cruise the first observation you'll make about your stateroom, most of us call them cabins, but to the cruise lines, they are staterooms. They are small. Especially when you compare them to a typical hotel room. For general purposes, a cruise ship stateroom is about 160 to 185 square feet, that is about half the size of a typical hotel room.

And, when you consider that in many of the staterooms, there could be as many as four adults staying the night you can understand the need for added safety when the lights go out. That's why Carnival has announced plans to outfit each stateroom on every one of their vessels with a small but very important safety feature. As is usually the case, when anyone makes a change, some are not going to agree with it.

The change, being made in the interest of safety is the addition of a night light. No, it's not as big as the one in the picture. And, yeah, there are people upset about a night light. The night light is motion-activated and will only illuminate when there is motion in the cabin. If you've ever tried to negotiate a trip to the bathroom in a cruise cabin and not disturb your partner or break a toe adding some light seems like a great idea.

But based on comments Carnival's Brand Ambassador, John Heald has gotten via social media you'd think these little lights will destroy the entire cruise. Many suggested via the comments if they wanted a night light they would bring one. This is puzzling to me as an experienced cruiser because there are only so many plugs in each stateroom and tying one up with a night light probably means someone's phone or tablet or laptop or camera would go uncharged at night.

Not all the Carnival Ships have these features yet but eventually, they all will and the folks that are whining about it can get happy in the same cabin that they got mad in. It's a safety feature and not designed to be intrusive.

Perhaps if the Carnival clientele, some of the most entitled cruise guests in the business if you ask me, wouldn't file so many lawsuits or demand so many extras because they tripped in the dark this wouldn't be necessary, but it is.

One commenter stated that he brought electrical tape to cover the light. You're probably are the same guy who hangs his coat from the fire sprinkler and drapes his towel and wet swimsuit over the balcony rail. Yeah, the rules are for others, not for you. We all have been on a cruise with that guy, haven't we?

So, that's your "big controversy" for this week. Next week it will probably be something else like the seagulls are too loud or the ice cream is too soft or the stairs made someone tired.

You see, the only real problem with going on a cruise is the other people. If they weren't there it truly would be relaxing and fun.