doublek2

So great to have another Jamman review to follow! We were on Legend in July for the second time. First time on her was back in 2009. They have certainly taken good care of her over the years! 🙂We spent a lot of time in the RFP listening to Alter Jam. I really enjoyed that band. they were good enough to keep me out of the casino for part of the evening each night (which is tough to do!) I have not sailed the Canada itinerary in over 20 years. I remember it was a great cruise. It had to be because it was our first cruise and we were hooked after that! 🙂 I also remember the foghorn going off every 5-10 minutes overnight once we were up in Canada and of course I was on deck 10 aft (on Victory). Not much sleeping on those nights lol!! I always wondered if that was common for that itinerary. Thanks to you and Patty for taking us along once again!

Mets game was rained out today. Split Day/Night double header Wednesday. Hopefully you missed the last two games. Thanks once again for taking us along on your trip! It was interesting to see you vacationing in my neck of the woods and getting on a ship that I just got off!! It is amazing how I have lived here all my life yet you found things that I did not even know existed!! Safe travels home and thanks for another AWESOME review! LGM!!!!

Agreed! One of the best shows Carnival has!

They do open the door manually during sea day afternoons so folks can get to Guys P&A for lunch. those doors (on both sides) were out of service since at least August 22nd. RFP door is almost always available.

We loved the cave tours as well. It was a highlight of our trip there!

Great Review! We were on the cruise after yours (and they were still refinishing the railings on deck 11 lol!) and I agree with everything you said. Magic really is a great ship (one of our favorites - we have been on her 3 times) and we had a GREAT time! Sorry about the comedians! It can be hit or miss. we had 3 new ones (to us) on this cruise that were okay. The other comedian we also had on Legend last month and he was pretty good.

That girl can sing!! You will see what I mean when you are at Alchemy and she is in Ocean Plaza!

Thank you!

Thank you. Glad I could provide some insight. Of course, I probably missed a few things!

Thanks Jamman! So glad the weather is finally clearing in Bermuda for you! Hopefully it will be sunny skies and smooth seas back to NY and up to Canada!!

Thank you! I am already booked on that sailing (June 19th). Hopefully I picked the right date! Most kids in NYC finish the following week.

Thank you! I wish I could do more as well! It is hard to find them near the ports I sail from at specific times of the year that I sail. Glad I got to experience it!

Thank you!

Thanks! I overheard folks talking about kids but could not make sense of it.

I only recall seeing this the first night when we were on last week,

Hi Greg, I just got off of Magic Yesterday as you came on. I am still getting caught up on your review but wanted to share this with you. Last night was a great game. Vintage DeGrom, Amazing Nimmo catch and a live performance by Timmy Trumpet!! Wish you were still in NY for this game! https://youtu.be/8BYSp2pzP0Y

Thank you! Yes. the servers almost always ask if you want a second one. My wife usually has two. I only have one because I like the Spaghetti Carbonara which is the same night and very filling!

That sounds about right lol!!

Just a quick review here since I am already back at work 😞 We just got home Today from our cruise on the Carnival Magic 08/22/2022. This was our 21st cruise on Carnival and one of the best we have had. I did notice a few interesting things on our cruise that I will mention throughout. Day 1: Embarkation. I was really nervous about this given some of the recent reviews I have seen. We arrived at the port at 11:20 and we were on the ship by 11:45!! I imagine it is more congested later in the day. They were checking arrival times and zone numbers printed on boarding passes for everyone including platinum. We had to actually stop and wait two minutes (we had the next zone number being called) This was a nine day Journeys cruise which made the experience and atmosphere a little different and added something to this cruise. It was interesting to see ballroom dancing classes every sea day in the atrium. The captain also came on the intercom every day (all 9 days) to give us our location, sea heights, wind conditions and weather forecast. For the first time you could actually hear the announcements loud and clear from everywhere including cabins. There were several different Q&A sessions with different groups/areas of the crew during sea days. I will cover the rest during the "Throwback Sea Day" on Day 8. Days 2 and 3: Sea Days. Our first two sea days had a bit of rain causing some activities to be relocated or rescheduled. there was a bit of ship movement the first night and first sea day but nothing major. We did go to Sea Day Brunch on the first day and were disappointed to find out that the Chia Seed pudding (or is it parfait?) was permanently removed from the menu. Wife was really looking forward to it 😞. Formal night was first sea day (and again second to last sea day). We had a gentleman at the table next to us that had 5 lobster tails!! MDR service was good to excellent. We had early assigned dining and were usually in and out within 45 minutes. We had 2 comedians for the first half of the cruise and two others for the second half. They were all pretty good. One of them we had just seen last month on Legend but the rest of the ones on this cruise were new to us (Which is rare. We almost always end up with two we have seen before). I must say that we never had issues getting seats for the PG shows - even 5 minutes before showtime and the R shows were not ridiculously packed either, but you still needed to get there about 15-20 minutes early. I really like the punchliner clubs on the dream class ships. They just feel more spacious to me. We also watched the "Flick" show which was very good. I Want to mention the husband/wife singers who performed in Ocean Plaza. They were called "Magic Express" or something similar. The wife who sings has among the best voices I have EVER heard!! There is no way she will last long on a cruise ship. she is simply too good! Since St. Greg will be at Alchemy this week hopefully, he can back me up!🙂 . You cannot ignore her voice - it is that powerful. The other musical groups around the ship were very good as well. This included the regular band, Solo Guitarist, the string trio, Steel drum (who had someone singing with him at times) and Latin duo. Day 4. was supposed to be San Juan. Unfortunately, that was cancelled due to protests in old San Juan (protests were against their local power company) . To make it up to us they gave us an extra four hours in St. Marteen. Day 5 was St. Marteen. We had a nice 13-hour port call there. I loved this! We usually feel so rushed at the beach/in the ports. Today we could relax without even having to check our watches/phones. We took the water shuttle over to the beach in town. 7 dollars PP unlimited trips for the day. We first went to the beach and got chair and umbrella for $20.Drink prices were reasonable as well. I got six waters/sodas in an ice bucket for $10! It was too early for alcohol for us lol! I rented a Jet Ski to take my son on for the first time and it was a blast. We then went back to ship, showered, changed and headed back downtown via the water shuttle. Day 6 was St. Thomas. Went to our usual spot which is Coki Beach. Love it there! Probably my favorite beach in the Caribbean. Nothing like swimming right at shore with thousands of fish. It really looks like an aquarium. There are so many fish that you can see them without a snorkel mask, but I highly recommend using one! Day 7 was Grand Turk. A couple of observations here. First off, all the umbrellas are gone from the chairs nearest to the pier. Instead, they have planted even more palm trees for shade. We did not have to deal with the hagglers trying to get you to their chairs on the front row of the beach. Those folks have moved their operation further down the beach. We passed them on our way to Jack's Shack where we spent the day. We did see Calypso at the bar, but he did not make an appearance on the beach. He will be heading to Canada at the end of the year so I guess we will not see him again. One other note is that they finally opened the Starbucks at the port but of course the coffee machine was broken the day we were there 😞 This is a good place to address one of the issues that I have seen over and over again on these boards. The smell of Marijuana. This was an issue on this cruise. I also experienced this on Legend last month. I bring this up now because when we returned from our day in Grand Turk, they had installed a new sign on our balcony door. I doubt it will make much of a difference, but it says "Whoa! You Heard that Right. there is a $500 fine for smoking on the balcony. Please Don't" The next day I actually witnessed someone smoking marijuana while watching frog racing on Lido deck. He was right out in the open not hiding it from anyone! He was in the smoking section on deck 11 leaning against the railing looking down at Lido in the middle of the afternoon when it was crowded. You would think that he would have at least tried to find a more secluded place on deck to do this! I live in NYC and see it everywhere. I have no problem at all with it, but rules are rules. Day 8. Throwback Sea Day. This was a really fun day for us. We really crammed a lot into this day. It started with an original Carnival Capers delivered to the stateroom the night before. The activities for the day included Horse Racing (Which my son won!), Frog Racing, 70's and 80's trivia. We also had the captain's cocktail party with free drinks, dancing to a band and having the captain and senior staff greet us. It was really not crowded which tells you how many people purchase cheers these days!! These parties used to be one of the few opportunities for free drinks on board and were highly attended. For dinner we had the original formal night menu from back in the day. This menu did have the lobster tails on it, so we had lobster twice on this cruise! Needless to say, the gentleman at the next table was elated! 🙂 One comment here. They need to bring back the Rocky theme for the baked Alaska parade!!. That evening we had the staff and crew 50's show in the lounge which was good. There was also a sock hop on Lido deck. By that time, I was in the casino, but the wife stopped by and told me it was not very crowded. Throughout the day there was a lot of oldies music all around the ship. Lido deck was filled with tons of 80's music. There was plenty of 50's to 70's as well. Day 9. Final Sea Day. We relaxed, packed and picked up some formal pictures we had done. We had not done a formal picture in years, so we decided to do a few on this cruise. This was a bit confusing to say the least. Magic went over to the digital pixel's studio several years ago. For this cruise they displayed the photos old school as well, but they only displayed a few photos from each group, so you had to figure out which ones to order and print and which ones you wanted to take right off the shelf. I assume they did this as part of the Journeys cruise, but I am not 100% sure. In the evening we saw "America Rocks" which is one of my favorites of all the Playlist shows. Just a great fist-pumping energy to it. Later that day the captain announced that we would be returned to NYC a little early due to strong currents in the NY area. They closed the Casino at 1:30AM because of this. By the time I went to bed around 1AM we were already close to the harbor with the Verrazano Bridge in the distance. We docked at 4:00AM and had a smooth trip in. Actually, this was the smoothest cruise we ever had going back to NY. the seas were calm, and the wind direction was pushing us up the eastern seaboard. We did have one very scary incident on the last night. It was about 11:00PM, I was in the casino, so I did not hear the initial announcement, but a crew member came on the intercom and said there was a man overboard on the rear of the ship. Everyone was running around talking about it and a crew member confirmed the announcement to me. I heard the captain come back on the intercom about 20 minutes later and he said that all passengers were accounted for and that everyone was safe. I tried to go upstairs on deck but everyone else had the same Idea and there were lines to get an elevator upstairs, so I gave up. I never heard anything else about this. Perhaps someone else will post what exactly happened. Day 10. Home. Debarkation. We debarked around 8:00AM. about half the muster stations had been called by this point. It took quite a while to get an elevator down but once we made it to deck 3 the line constantly moved right through the ship, through the terminal and customs and out to the street. very organized. Took about 15-20 minutes to get an elevator and 10 minutes to get from ship to street. Final Thoughts. No Cruise is perfect. None of the two dozen or so cruises we have taken have been perfect but when you have 3000-4000 people on a ship you are going to deal with a few bad apples. Some unruly kids and of course, lines. For the most part the kids seemed behaved. in the NYC Metro area about half the kids are back in school and the other half return next week so there were less than a typical school break cruise. As far as lines are concerned, we never had more than 10 or so people ahead of us at the buffet. We did eat breakfast in the MDR on 7 of the 9 days and had guys for lunch (with no lines) on a few days and late sea day brunches on a few others. We do try to avoid the buffet as much as possible and always do assigned dining so as not to deal with waiting. Our Cruise Director Ryan was very good. I was really impressed with him. He had a great energy and was everywhere. When we returned to the ship after our day in St. Thomas, he was out there on the pier sweating like crazy walking up and down the line handing out cups of water. Real classy guy! He was very approachable, and we spoke to him several times throughout our cruise. We are pretty easygoing. We do not let the little things get in the way of us having a great time! The best thing you can do is set reasonable expectations for things that are part of many mainline cruises be it crowds, food, cutbacks, etc. and just focus on having a great time and making sure you bring home nothing but positive memories. I did not mention food because it is subjective but everything in our opinion was average (buffet) to good (Buffet deserts) to very good, (MDR (most meals), Guy's, Deli). Most crew we encountered had a smile on their face and greeted us. Our Stateroom steward was excellent as were our MDR team and the bar servers at various venues around the ship. I will admit that I was nervous reading the not so nice recent reviews of the Magic but once we were on board and in cruise mode this cruise was not much different than any other cruise we have taken on CCL or RCL. We had taken Magic twice before out of Port Canaveral (where she consistently had good reviews) and this cruise was not much different except for having more of the fast-paced, outspoken and energetic NY clientele which gives it a slightly different vibe. We are an energetic bunch up here. That is big city living for you!! 🙂 We can't wait to cruise on Magic again next summer. for now, I will just have to live vicariously from all the reviews on this board. Special thanks to St. Greg (who just boarded Magic as I departed), Sid, Megan, Jimbo and all the others who put so much work into their live reviews (and Jamman for his famous in-depth post cruise reviews). I have read every review you all have done over the years, and it really does help to bridge the long gap (generally over winter) between cruises for me, so Thank You, Thank You Thank You!!!