Travel - Cruise 101 - Carnival Cruise's New Debarkation Process

I just got off the Carnival Dream on Sunday and experienced a whole new (and much better) debarkation process. Previously, you had to line up ahead of time to get a time card which allowed you to leave the ship (unless you had special privileges or a shore excursion booked). Now the entire pre-process is done through the Carnival Hub app (which runs off the ship's free wifi).



This debarkation information pamphlet arrived the day before the last cruise day giving us plenty of time to make our selections or to visit guest services if needed.

If you plan to carry your own luggage, you would select "Express Debarkation". This is great for those who need to catch a plane.

If you plan to check in your luggage and pick it up in the terminal, you would select the number of luggage tags you need (one per bag). These will arrive in an envelope at your cabin. The tags should match the debarkation time group you picked. So I picked group 24 and my tags show "24" on them.

(This is my tag showing "24". Inside I filled out the name, phone, address. I then placed it inside my luggage tag holder which was already on my bag from embarkation.)

You will then place them on your bags or in your luggage tag holder. All your checked luggage needs to be sitting outside your cabin between 8:00 pm (ship time) and 11:00 pm (ship time) for the porters to pick them up. If you are late, you will have to carry your own bags.

Every cruise and line is different, but we were given a specific time to evacuate our cabin on debarkation day. The pamphlet shows 8:15 but we actually had until 8:30am (ship time) to leave our cabin. That means everything needs to be packed and taken with you.

There will be some limited breakfast options the debarkation day. As you can see from the pamphlet above, the Buffet (Lido Restaurant) was open from 6:00am until 9:00am (but they did start shutting down at 8:45am and by 9:00am they were telling people, nicely, to leave). The main dining restaurant (Scarlet Restauant) was open from 6:30a until only 8:00am. BlueIguana Cantina served breakfast from 7:00am until 9:00am. We arrived at the buffet at 8:30am and half of the buffet was already closed. The selections were limited and there were lines for the omelets. So it's better to get there early to get a seat and a spot in line.

The rest of the debarkation process was the same except at the Galveston port, they were now implementing facial-recognition cameras. So as you head out of the ship you will come into the area where you have to show your ID or passport. As we went through the line, our pictures were taken. When they matched the picture we took on embarkation, we were allowed to leave. No need to show your ID/passport. That made the process a bit faster. If the picture didn't match then you had to show your IDs.

Overall, I like the new process and it seemed much faster.