A New Year’s Eve Cruise is the perfect way to ring in the New Year. A vacation and a fun New Year’s Eve party all rolled into one, a Carnival Cruise is a great way to spend your time off around the holiday and an easy way to ensure the best party at midnight. We have taken several New Year’s Eve Cruises on Carnival over the years and they are our favorite way to spend the holiday.
This is what you can expect on a New Year’s Eve Cruise on a Carnival Cruise ship:
New Year’s Party Favors
For our first New Year’s cruise we brought our own party favors onto the ship, but this is unnecessary unless you want something special. Carnival provides hats and fluffy tiaras for New Year’s Eve. They are usually placed in your room by your cabin steward on December 31st. Most people do wear these to the midnight party.
A special menu at dinner
The dinner menu is usually special on New Year’s Eve. The menu for New Year’s Eve is usually a little smaller than a typical menu, on special paper and feels fancy. Just know the menu for that night might not be what you see on the Hub App!
Lots of free champagne
Around 15 minutes before midnight the waiters start walking around the decks with trays full of champagne glasses. Don’t expect high quality champagne, but there is plenty of it! They tend to keep walking until they literally can’t give it away any more. It’s basically all you can drink champagne for about 30 minutes.
A huge deck party
The pool deck is where the midnight party is! The crew clears away the deck chairs and everyone stands around and dances to the tunes provided by the DJ. It really starts to fill up around 11 so make sure you head up to the deck by then! As you would expect, the bottom is much more crowded than the top so choose your spot based on how crowded you want to be, but expect that more people will suddenly appear a few minutes before midnight then disappear again.
The best trip home after midnight
One of the worst things about going out for midnight on New Year’s Eve is figuring out how everyone gets home safely, but on a cruise it’s easy. You just take a quick walk back to your room. The deck party tends to clear out within 30 minutes after midnight so don’t expect to be dancing out on the open deck until the small hours of the morning, but it does continue in the club if 12:30 is too early for bed!
Warm Weather
This only applies if you are on a Caribbean cruise for New Year’s Eve, but this is a great time to break out the small, shimmery, sparkly dresses. You don’t have to worry about being cold, but it can get really windy in the Caribbean in the winter! This also means that you can enjoy the cruise the rest of the time. It’s still warm enough for a beach day and water activities. Make sure you plan some of those in addition to trying to figure out your New Year’s Eve outfit!
Check out What to Pack For a Winter Cruise in the Caribbean!
Final Thoughts on taking a New Year’s Eve Cruise on Carnival
A New Year’s Eve Cruise on Carnival is a great way to ring in the New Year. It is fun, it is easy and feels very safe. There is a giant party that you stroll to when you are ready. You get complementary (included since you technically paid for it in the price of the cruise?) champagne and then you can go back to your room when the night is over.
I don’t think it gets any better than that!
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Why you should take a Caribbean Cruise in the Winter
