caryatid

We normally cruise on Royal but decided to try Carnival, needless to say we will NEVER go on Carnival again!

 

To start the cruise off our shuttle couldn't enter the port other then driving around in circles because there was a security beach which was said to be a Bomb threat at first and even the bomb squad came out. After we could finally get into the terminal everyone was told to wait outside then we were guided up to another area were we had to wait for a couple hours until they secured the area, after this ordeal we were then told it wasn't a bomb but a can of something that was spraying in a suit case. Better safe then sorry. Once this was over then we could go inside and get ready to board the ship. In my opinion Port Canaveral is the best port there is.

So once on board we went to our cabin and put our other bag in and headed to eat at the buffet as we waited to leave the port.

 

1st issue Staff and lack of knowing anything when asked and lack of friendliness. This ship had the worst staff I have ever encountered on a cruise. They never smiled,spoke or new anything if you asked them a question. Some were even rude. The only staff member we encountered that was very friendly was our room guy, he was awesome all the time. Spoke to us by name and had a friendly attitude.

 

2nd issue Pools, For a ship that hold 4,500 people and only have 2 swimming pools is ridiculous and what makes it worse is that only 1 pool was ever open at a time. I was only able to enjoy the pool 1 day when in a port because it was not crowded.

 

3rd Issue FOOD, the food at breakfast was the best and made to order omelettes were awesome, best meal of the day everyday. Guy's Burger Joint,Blue Iguana & BBQ place also had great food as well as the 24 hr pizza. We ate all these places several times and they were really good.We also ate at the steak house on wed night for our 20th anniv and it was very good. Now for the buffet, the food was lousy in my opinion with the exception of the desserts and the sandwich bar that had pastrami and corned beef, in fact that is what I hate most the time after trying the other food 1st. I also enjoyed the ice cream machine daily. The buffet was not opened long enough if you wanted it and then only one side would be open at times and you would have to walk a long distance just to get food if you wanted it. Terrible buffet all around except breakfast.

 

4th issue, I believe Carnival Magic has bed bugs because every night when we went to bed and got under the sheets I was always really itchy like something was crawling on me but I couldn't see anything when we looked. On the last night I actually got bit by something and ended up sleeping on top of the covers so the ship is not very clean.

We stayed on the 11th deck in a spa room and had access to the spa which was great, very relaxing and enjoyable. We stayed in 11242 and it was quite noisy at times, kids running up and down the hallway,noise from deck above etc. We were still able to sleep, just a lot of noise.Room was nothing fancy, pretty plain and basic.

 

Entertainment was just ok, nothing special. We did enjoy a few dive in movies and Dr. E was great. The comedy shows were also very funny and we enjoyed them as well. Party's on deck were also ok, I overheard several elderly folks complaining about the type and sound of the music and about it being way to loud. The entertainment staff were friendly.

 

Sadly there was a medical emergency with a passenger suffering a heart attack and dying(At least thats what we were told by several crew members) which caused the itenerary to be changed and the Honduras port being skipped and went to key west fl instead. The ship was diverted near miami to get the ill patient medical care. My prayers are with the family.

 

So we went to Key West Fl, Belize, Cozumel & Costa Maya, We had already been to Cozumel but still enjoyed it as well as the other ports. Really liked Key West and would like to go back there. The ports were the best part of the cruise, other then that the cruise was pretty boring. No adult area other then if you want to nap in a hammock or chair and use a jacuzzi, that is Magic's "adult" area.

 

And to top it all off, my hubby got sick on thursday afternoon and was up all night puking his gut out, not sure if it was from the food or what caused this. I know he wasn't sea sick so the food may of been the issue. Not sure because i was fine the entire time.

 

After being on 3 Royal ships, there is NO comparison with Carnival. I would never go on another carnival ship nor would I ever recommend one to anyone I know. You really do get what you pay for and Royal is in a class all its own. My brother is a Carnival cruiser and he bragged to me about how good they are but now I know for myself, not worth bragging about.Anyway, this is my small review, Happy cruising!

I find your review really odd, because for someone who had such a terrible cruise, you sure do have a lot of positives and things you really enjoyed during your vacation.

The bomb threat at the cruise terminal was certainly unfortunate and I wouldn't be terribly happy about it either, but you can't lay that at the feet of Carnival, so that is a neutral.

You didn't like the staff with the exception of your room steward, who was great, so that is one negative/one positive

You also seem to have enjoyed most of the food on the cruise and only had a problem with the buffet. You mention seven different dining venues/foods that you really enjoyed and one that you didn't, so that is one negative/seven positive

You think there might have been bed bugs, but there was no confirmation, (why you wouldn't immediately pull back all the bedding and inspect the mattress to make sure is a mystery, bed bugs are no joke!) so that will have to be a neutral. You did seem to enjoy your spa access, but didn't like the noise around your stateroom so that is one negative/one positive

You enjoyed a bunch of the entertainment, including the dive in movies, the comedians, the cruise director and the deck parties. Some old people didn't like the music, but old people can be cranky so we'll have to go with a neutral on that one. You also mention liking the entertainment staff (so I guess not all of the staff was awful??!!) So 5 positives/one neutral

A passenger got sick and it impacted your itinerary, which is regretful, but not Carnival's fault so again, neutral

You like the ports but the Serenity area didn't wow you, so one positive/one negative

Your husband got sick, which is always a bummer on vacation, but we can't know what caused it, but being sick is the pits so I'll give you a negative here (even though I don't think we can pin this one on Carnival).

So total you have 5 negatives (one that can only dubiously be attributed to Carnival) and 15 positives.

Sounds like you actually had a great cruise!

I'd be interested too, we're going in Oct.

Thank you everyone! I was hoping that was the case!

I'm trying to decide whether or not to bother with bringing a bottle of wine on our next cruise. We'll be in an inside cabin, so I'm not really interested in sitting in the cabin and having a glass of wine, so I was wondering if it was allowed to take the glass from the room and find a nice area out on the deck to enjoy a glass. I was thinking about buying these really cute acrylic wine glasses so I wouldn't have to worry about taking the glasses from the stateroom. I was also wondering if you could take a glass into the dining room? I know you can take the bottle into the dining room and pay a corkage free, but there is no way I would drink an entire bottle. I don't have a problem with paying the corkage fee, but if I didn't finish the bottle in the dinning room, would I be able to bring it back to my room?

I think Carnival could easily clear everything up by adding "no plastic or rubber flip flops" to their dress code. That way you'd know that shower shoes are a no-go, but dress sandals in a flip flop style would be fine.

Would these be considered flip flops? http://www.zappos.com/p/tory-burch-miller-rosa/product/8461136/color/13609 I would say no, and I was planning on bringing and wearing them for all nights in the MDR, but if these break the dress code I will bring a different pair of shoes. I don't want anyone losing their appetite! :p

We just took a Disney Cruise in the beginning of June, and even as a die-hard Disney fan (100+ vacations, member of the Disney Vacation Club (timeshare) and annual passholder ), I don't think I will be back. We had a wonderful cruise, and while I thought that the service was really good, I wasn't wowed, which I expected for the price paid. The ship was beautiful and everything was in perfect repair and spotless, I really enjoyed the entertainment, and we enjoyed our "magic porthole", but our final takeaway was that it just wasn't worth the price.

To give you an example, when we got off the ship we decided that we wanted to take another cruise, we priced out the Disney Dream for next April and for the 4 of us in a porthole room, we'd be paying $5400. I also priced out the Carnival Liberty for the same dates and basically same itinerary and it was $1600. You'd be crazy not to book the Liberty, so that is exactly what we did! We could cruise Carnival almost 3.5 times for the price of a Disney Cruise, and we certainly did not enjoy Disney 3.5 times more than our previous Carnival cruise. I mean, I loved the Disney entertainment, but with the money saved we could go into NYC for a weekend and see a Broadway show and still have money to spare.

I also found the service good, but not unbelievable, on the Disney cruise. Our waitstaff was very nice and they even did some magic tricks for the kids, but our drink of choice was not on the table waiting for us, and no one cut up my kids food (both which I have heard of happening on Disney). I also found the communication to be pretty poor overall, we had really bad weather so many of the outdoor parties had to be moved inside, which would have been fine if there was any communication. It just seemed really disorganized during many points, which isn't something I usually associate with Disney. It also just didn't seem to leave us with that "magic" feeling you get at the parks, it just seemed like a really pretty ship with some Disney details, which certainly didn't make our vacation or make it worth the price.

Overall I'm really glad we tried it, and we did have a really nice vacation, but the fact that my family (the Disney obsessed), is coming back to book another Carnival cruise, speaks volumes about the value.

We booked a cruise on the Carnival Liberty for next April. I see online that there is an option for on-line check-in and I had a few questions. 1. When should I complete the on-line check in? Can I do it now, even though we are 200+ days from Crusing? 3. Is on-line check in where you choose your time to get on the ship? 4. We would like to get on the ship as early as possible, so should we check-in now to get an early time?

A lot of things have changed in the 10 years since we cruised Carnival, so I'm sorry in advance if this is a stupid question, I'm sure I'll have more coming!

Thank you everyone for your responses! I will definitely request twice daily service, or at least ask that the beds can be put away in the morning and taken back out in the evening. Having the beds out just makes the room feel so much smaller, plus then I have to keep telling the kids to not play on the ladder, and "NO you can't jump from the top bunk to the king bed", and all the other fun parts of having a 4 and 7 year old boys ;) Putting the beds away and removing the temptation will make for an easier vacation!

I also have no problem extra tipping the room steward for the extra work. We plan on pre-paying our gratuities, but will there be envelopes on the last day so we can give them extra for the extra work?

Its been 10 years since I last cruised on Carnival, long before the switch to either morning or evening room servicing. We will be crusing with our two kids, so we'll have the fold out beds. If we choosing morning servicing, will they put the beds up in the morning and then come back to put it back down in the afternoon, or will it stay open for the whole cruise? I was also wondering when you receive your fun times if you choose morning service? Will we still get towel animals if we choose morning? If we choose evening do they still do the chocolates on your pillow or has that been phased out completely? I know that chocolates and towel animals are silly, but my boys LOVED the animals on our last Disney cruise and they thought that getting "special" chocolates at night was just the greatest thing ever, for kids its always the small things :)

I am well aware that there will be a big difference between our Disney cruise and our Carnival cruise, and with the Carnival cruise being 1/3 the price I'm totally OK with that. I just am curious what to expect so I can plan accordingly.

I am so glad you made it to the ship! I would have been a nervous wreck! Forgive my ignorance, I'm still new to crusing, but why wouldn't someone like a cabin in a lower deck at the front of the ship? Congrats on the big gambling win, that must have been really exciting!

Those loungers do look pretty rough, I don't think I would want to sit on them. I can understand being surprised by their condition, I would hope for better upkeep as well. It certainly wouldn't ruin my cruise, but you can both notice things that need extra attention and still have a fun vacation.

We just got back from a fantastic cruise on the Disney Dream, and now that we know that our kids are good cruise partners, we want to plan our next cruise for Spring Break next April. I am looking at doing either the Liberty or the Sunshine because both of those ships would work for our dates.

We were docked next to the Liberty in Nassau so I was able to do some reconnaissance, and I also saw the Sunshine when we were leaving Port Canaveral. They both look like really great ships, but for those of you "in the know" which one do you think would be better for a Spring break cruise with a 5 and 8 year old?

I initially was drawn to the Sunshine since I know my boys would love the ropes course and the waterworks area, but I've read some reviews that say that the ship's layout is awkward and can get very difficult to maneuver and that with only one pool for kids, it can get super crowded. I know my kids will want to be in the pool, so that is an important consideration, but my husband likes that the Sunshine is a 5 day vs. Liberty's 4 day.

What do you guys think? My main concern with the Sunshine is crowding, and now that we know that our boys enjoy crusing, I know that there will be many more in our future so we could save the Sunshine for a vacation at a different time. Where we live school gets out much earlier than in the NE, so we could always do Sunshine right after school lets out in May in the next year or two, and there will hopefully be less kids on board.

Thanks for taking the time to do this review! We are thinking about doing the Liberty next April for a 4 night cruise and hearing people's experiences really helps. We were deciding between the Liberty and the Sunshine and I think that the Liberty is going to win out because of the extra pools that kids can use. We'll be traveling during Spring break with our two boys and I want to make sure they'll be able to actually get into the pool on our sea day. I've read that the family pool on the Sunshine can get too crowded, and with it being spring break week, I'm sure there will be TONS of kids on board.