Cruising on the Carnival Sunshine

I just took my first cruise on the Carnival Sunshine!

To celebrate my mom’s 70th birthday, we took a girls’ trip to The Bahamas. This 4-night, 5-day cruise departed from Charleston, South Carolina and made two stops: Half Moon Cay and Nassau.

Pre-Cruise Lodging

Everyone we spoke to recommended arriving a day early and spending the night in town. This helps cruisers avoid missing their trips if there’s an unforeseen issue that arises. One of us had a flat tire and everyone drove through hours of storms on our way in, so the recommendation is a sound one!

We spent the night before our cruise at the Cambria Hotel & Suites in Mount Pleasant. The hotel was 8 miles from the port and offered a “Snooze, Park, Cruise” special, which included free parking for the duration of the cruise and a $25 Uber credit with our overnight stay.

The hotel was located just across the street from a Walmart, which allowed us to pick up some last-minute items for embarkation day.

The next morning, we took an Uber to the port. The drive took about 15 minutes and we arrived well before our designated check-in time!

Carnival Sunshine
Check-In/Embarkation

The Carnival Sunshine is, I think, the only cruise ship that cruises out of Charleston, South Carolina! It will be moving to Norfolk, Virginia in 2025, leaving the port vacant with regard to passenger cruise lines.

Charleston purportedly doesn’t look like other cruise ports, but I didn’t know the difference… even though the check-in area is located in what amount to tented warehouses! Check-in was lengthy, but the process went smoothly.

We spent a considerable amount of time in line, waiting for the drug dogs to sniff our luggage.

With that done, we finally boarded the ship, directly entering the atrium. There, the crew was blasting welcome music and ready with Tervis tumblers full of rum punch (for sale).

Carnival Sunshine
Stateroom

We made our way to our stateroom (#2351) was at the ship’s aft. It felt like we had a private view of the ocean the entire time! Our slanted window was deep set, almost in a miniature bay window. As we cruised along, we watched our wake.

The room had all of the basics: a TV, storage drawers and closets, a cabinet, a phone, a couch, a mini fridge, and a king-sized bed. Our bed could be split into two twin beds and our couch converted to another sleeper. The bed was surprisingly comfortable, so I didn’t need to rely on the couch, which was much firmer, or the floor to keep my sciatica at bay.

The Sunshine is an older ship and has been through a refurbishment already, but its age did show in the room.

Some members of our group stayed in a room with a balcony (8th floor, starboard side). While you can’t beat the views, they did sacrifice square footage. Our room was significantly more spacious!

My favorite thing about the service on the Carnival cruise was our steward. He was helpful and friendly, plus he left us the most amazing towel animals each day!

The Ship

The lido deck of the Carnival Sunshine offered the largest open space to get together. All of the pools are found here, as are a couple eateries and several bars. Main seating areas and Serenity (the adults-only seating area) overlook the lido deck, too.

Dive-In Movies are shown several times daily with showings as late as midnight.

The rest of the ship had bold, bright decor. The spaces were smaller, but they were used creatively and we found many spaces to spend time together and find entertainment.

But honestly, the ripples of this carpet design did not help on our more turbulent days at sea! The storms we drove through made the first few days of our trip more full of motion than we’d prefer.

SportSquare is the Sunshine’s major play area. It isn’t exclusively for children, but it’s nearly always full of them! In addition to the splash pad and racing slides, the area features a ropes course, mini golf course, giant chess board, foosball, basketball, volleyball, and a very short (1/10-mile) walking track.

Before the trip, I assumed I’d spend a lot of time on the ropes course. It’s free and looks like fun! However, once we were on the ship and dealing with wind from storms daily, I changed my mind completely.

When it was time to introvert, I found a couple spaces that were perfect. The muster stations were nearly always empty and offered sweeping views of the ocean from the side. I spent some time here knitting when I needed to gather my thoughts.

We also found a small passenger area on the forward of the ship, just under the cockpit. The view was somehow more beautiful here, complete with “I’m the king of the world!” vibes, but the half wall meant you could only see them if you were standing. We liked to come back here at night to see the stars, which were countless on the open ocean.

Carnival Sunshine
Complimentary Dining

We took full advantage of the included dining options on the Carnival Sunshine!

Lido Marketplace (9 Aft)

Lido Marketplace offers a buffet for each meal, including late night snacks. The buffet had a salad bar, hot bars for mains and sides, and a dessert bar.

Most of the meals we ate here were okay. They seemed to lack seasoning, particularly salt, which we attributed to attempting to appeal to a range of palates and dietary restrictions. There were a couple standout dishes, such as the Szechuan shrimp and Celebration Cheesecake. However, as a whole, we found the value in Lido Marketplace to be in the quantity rather than the quality of the food.

Sunrise Dining Room (3 Aft) and Sunset Dining Room (3 Fwd)

The Carnival Sunshine offers dining room service for Sea Day Brunch and dinner. Diners are assigned a time and table for dinner, but brunch has a flexible time window (which requires a check-in process on the app) and you may be at a different table each time.

We had a difficult time finding our way to these similarly-named dining rooms, which are both located on the third floor, separated by the galley. This means there is no way to cut through if you went to the wrong one, which happened to at least one member of our party each time. In particular, I was unable to wrap my head around eating breakfast in the Sunset Dining Room and dinner in the Sunrise Dining Room, so I frequently found myself taking the stairs down a floor, cutting over, and climbing them back up.

The food in the dining rooms was significantly better than in Lido Marketplace and the service was exceptional.

Standout dishes for Sea Day Brunches were the 12-Hour French Toast, brûléed grapefruit, skillet cake, and huevos rancheros. The only disappointment was the chicken and waffles. (We didn’t expect wings!)

Dinner standouts were the stuffed mushrooms (appetizer), corn chowder (appetizer), salmon with sweet potatoes and asparagus (entree), any “Featured Indian Vegetarian” (entree), melting chocolate cake (dessert), and baked Alaska (dessert).

The desserts without added sugar were not impressive, but we understood why! We steered clear of them after the first day.

We also loved the view from the Sunset Dining Room, where we had our Sea Day Brunches. It looked out over the back of the ship, just like our room!

Guy’s Burger Joint (9 Mid)

When Lido Marketplace closes after lunch, Guy’s, which is located right outside, is one of the few places still open for complimentary dining. Lines can be long. Luckily the service is also speedy!

The burgers are good, too. They’re cooked from fresh ground beef in large batches on a long griddle. They come out hot and taste fresh; they reminded me of burgers from Five Guys.

Pizzeria del Capitano (9 Aft)

We were surprised by how good the pizza was at Pizzeria del Capitano. The lines could be long, particularly at night, so we didn’t get a chance to eat it as often as we’d have liked. Our favorite was the Quattro Formaggi (#4).

Carnival Sunshine
Onboard Entertainment

We spent a considerable amount of time exploring the entertainment on the ship. There were several activities daily. It took us some time to figure out what we’d enjoy.

One of the on-deck activities that we attended was ice sculpting! The area was very crowded; it was overwhelming. We expected the rest of the cruise’s activities to have the same crowds and were initially discouraged, but we soon discovered that the biggest crowds were on the lido deck.

We tried bingo next and were more successful, crowd-wise. Bingo is a longtime favorite of mine and I thought I’d play daily. However, the bingo on board was a bit louder and more amped up than I’m used to. We only played once.

One night, we watched a version of a Newlywed Game. It was absolutely hilarious! The couples were selected from the audience and competed to match answers. It was good-natured entertainment with some adult themes.

We participated in an explicit adults-only scavenger hunt, too. No photos were permitted! It was racy, but I haven’t laughed so hard in a long, long time. This is the type of interactive show that you may want to avoid attending with your parents (or your children).

On our last full day at sea, we attended an art auction. We didn’t buy anything, but we enjoyed watching others bid! Also, the ship’s gallery holds a few sketches by Salvador Dali and seeing them up close was a highlight of our trip.

The Sunshine had several opportunities for karaoke and shows by live (professional) musicians. We saw a few.

Luckily we struck gold with the comedians on board! We attended the PG and adult versions of the shows.

Both comedians and both types of shows were wildly entertaining and more on par with the type of entertainment I’d seek if I weren’t on a ship. They were my favorite type of on-board entertainment!

Carnival Sunshine
Excursions

On each day we were in port, we did an excursion. Both were excellent!

There is so much information to cover for each excursion (and each island!) that they each deserved their own posts.

Overall Impression

The Carnival Sunshine was big, bold, loud, and fun! I enjoyed my time and I am happy I went. I don’t think I’d book another cruise on the Sunshine, because it doesn’t really match my vacation style, but I wouldn’t discourage others from booking if it matches theirs!

Plan Your Cruise

The Carnival Sunshine
Charleston, South Carolina (through 2024)
Norfolk, Virginia (2025)
website