Who remembers the Airtours Carousel???????

This was my 1st ever cruising experience….

….So what happened to this ship????

The carousel was built for Royal Caribbean in 1971, she was called the Nordic Prince, she was sold to Airtours in March 1995, she did a lot of Mediterranean and some Caribbean itineraries.

In 2004 The Carousel was sold to Louis Cruise Line and renamed MV AQUAMARINE

She was an elegant ship that after she was lengthened, she went from accomodating  714 passengers to 1231 passengers and cruising at a speed of 21 knots.

The itinerary i did, was as follows: Palma, Rome, Florence & Pisa, Genoa, Monte Carlo and Barcelona.

There was 3 entertainment lounges and 6 bars, the entertainment lounges were small, so you had to get there early, one night we were late having dinner as I had been on an excursion to Rome, got to the entertainment lounge and had to stand at the back, which I wasn’t pleased about. The entertainment back then was like a holiday camp in comparison to what is offered today.

The food was good and lots of it, all buffet style where you just help youself, you could eat morning, noon and night. The midnight buffets were amazing, one night it was CHOCOLATE!!!! lets just say that didn’t help my Diabetes.

I had an inside cabin,which was very small. I wasn’t in my cabin very much, just to sleep and shower so that didn’t bother me, but when you compare the standard or accomodation to what is available today, it was very dated. They didn’t have any balcony cabins onboard the Carousel. There was no privacy in these cabins as you could hear everything going on, good job i was on a company trip. There was only 5 different cabins types and the size of them were all practically the same.

All in all, I had a fabulous time and was an ideal opportunity for my first cruise…………………………………………………………………………………………………..