Carnival’s Brand Ambassador, John Heald, has posted a notice on his popular Facebook page to inform guests that the crew will not be able to get involved in ‘Elf on the Shelf’ activities this festive season.

It comes after a guest made a request via John for their elf, ‘Snickerdoodle’, to be interacted with by the cabin stewards and even senior officers for the entertainment of their children.
“We are leaving a week from Saturday for a 7-night cruise,
“Can you arrange for the cabin attendant to put Snickerdoodle in funny places in the room and do crazy stuff each night. We have early dinner so this will need to be done by 10pm latest. Can the captain get involved as well. The boys would find it unbelievable if Snickerdoodle could be filmed driving the ship.”
The guest’s request
The guest carried on to say that they had been taking part in Elf on the Shelf with Snickerdoodle for six years now and that their two children always looked forward to the “crazy” antics.
However, and understandably, Heald had to put out a message confirming that this wouldn’t be possible.
“Can I let all Mums and Dads know there is one thing I cannot do and since I had the first request for this yesterday I thought I should mention it now… I cannot, I really cannot arrange tricks and jokes for your Elf of the Sodding Shelf.
“I know that if I don’t say no here that I will be inundated with Elf requests so I hope everyone understands… I realize that so many children around the world love their Elf. However, I really cant ask the very busy cabin attendant to add to his or her work load by coming up with different ideas every night.”
John Heald’s Facebook post
Heald did suggest, rather generously, that the guest could consider asking their cabin stewards for the elf to be placed in the cabin in a fun position with a towel animal as a one-time event, but that it was impossible for something to be done every night.
Carnival is a popular family cruise line and so you can imagine how much work would be involved if every family on a cruise wanted their elves positioned in different ways every night.
Cabin stewards are already very hard at work to make sure that cabins are kept at their best and that all other regular guest requests are handled quickly
And the senior officers are certainly too busy to be taking photos of an elf steering the cruise ship!
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Jenni Fielding is the founder of Cruise Mummy. She has worked in the cruise industry since 2015 and has taken over 30 cruises. Now, she helps over 1 million people per month to plan their perfect cruise holidays.
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