Just off 12/26 Carnival Magic...

[tiredmommy]

and wanted to address some issues I saw that came up repeatedly on reviews I read before our trip. Hopefully this might help future cruisers out. I don't have time for a blow-by-blow review, but here are some highlights by topic:

 

(1) crowded elevators: Yes they are crowded on embarkation day. After that, we NEVER had any trouble getting an elevator and I never saw a LINE to get in any elevator. I don't consider it an imposition to actually wait for the elevator that is on deck 10 to get down to me on deck 2. We might have waited TOPS about 60 seconds for an elevator any time we used one, which we did a lot since we were down on deck 2.

 

(2) rowdy kids: We were on a full ship with an announced number of 1600 kids. I have teens myself, so maybe I'm a little more flexible, but I never saw any kids misbehaving or acting rowdy or running around doing anything that annoyed me.

 

(3) disembarkation: We were supposed to get off at 9:00 but didn't get off until 1:00 b/c of fog and late arrival at port. Would have been an hour earlier if we had self-assisted our luggage off. I think I will start doing that from now on on every cruise. We just waited patiently in our room [which is where the announcements said we could stay which I thought was nice]. We had no trouble finding our luggage in section 16 and standing in the "passport line" for about 15 minutes. I'm sure I would have been hysterical if I had a flight to catch; we drove. So, tip for future cruisers: do your best to self-assist and carry your luggage off, and, if you are flying home, make it late afternoon!

 

(4) food: LOVED tandori buffet [aft deck 10], sandwich shop [aft deck 10], pizza always good [deck 10 mid], burrito bar [aft deck 10 -- many people's favorite]. Heard good things about the FREE pasta lunch you can get in the Cucina. All other lido deck food really just ok. I'm happy with fresh fruit and salad and a piece of meat though. Lido deck desserts not really good at all.

 

Yes, there are lines on the lido deck buffet that come and go. Yes, it is sometimes hard to get a table, but we always found one. Don't miss the buffet they put out the night of the Red Frog deck party -- great Mexican food.

 

Main dining room food as good enough. It was not gourmet. I found that the more "fancy" sounding the dish, the worse it was. BUT, they have FANTASTIC grilled salmon and a flat iron steak available every night. We got fresh fruit, a green salad and some kind of grilled meat and veggies almost every night and were very happy with that. The portions are small but you can always order more. Desserts were inconsistent. Everyone in my family is pretty happy with sherbert and ice cream though so this was not a problem. Service was very good but yes it was slow. We just expect that for dinner in the main dining room for dinner so it didn't bother us. I like that it is a long 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 hour dinner that we can all visit over.

 

Disappointed in how minimal the room service menu was.

 

(5) Ship: beautiful and clean. GREAT deck furniture. Lots of upholstered couches, loungers, cushiony chairs. The deck 5 promenade [which is usually covered on other ships] is out in the sun -- so look for extra lounge chairs here; there are four hot tubs on deck 5 as well. My whole family loved the sports deck. I would walk on the walking track while my husband and kids played basketball, did the ropes course, and did the little outside work-out area. The mini-golf area is cute. They need another foosball table and ping pong table though.

 

We specifically stayed on the ship during a port day so we could have the ship to ourselves and were glad we did. The decks are very crowded during sea days and it is hard to get a seat. We weren't really "laying out" on this trip b/c of the season so this didn't bother me, but I imagine this was a big problem for some people.

 

Thought the ship was VERY SMOOTH -- no rocking at all!

 

(6) Red Frog Pub: favorite place on ship. They have dominoes, Jenga [behind the counter], checkers, foos ball and an indoor shuffleboard. Outside the bar, there is a bean bag toss and this very addictive game where you swing a ring on a string and try to hook a nail. We went during the day when it was empty just to play the games. GREAT beer; great acoustic music at night.

 

(7) Other entertainment: The staff needs to move the events they hold in the spotlight lounge [magic show, comedians] to the big theater when there are no shows being held. This venue was always so crowded you could not find a seat. The band that played in the Ocean Plaza at night [blood Power] was AWESOME. The outside "Red Frog" deck party they had one night was the highlight of our cruise. DJ played music while we danced with our kids for about two hours. They need more opportunities for families to do stuff together like this -- we could dance in Vibe disco or they could hang out in Club 02 and dance -- but there was really no other "family party" we could attend other than the Red Frog party [there was a big New Year's Eve party too but that won't be on every cruise]

 

(8) summary: beautiful ship, average food but we were happy with it, fun sports deck, family atmosphere [didn't see a lot of rowdy drunks/shot drinkers like we have on other Carnival cruises from New Orleans], needs a few more family entertainment options at night. We enjoyed our cruise.

[jburk]

GLad to hear! We sail on her in june.

[themnms]

sounds like a great time!!

[scottcruises]

and wanted to address some issues I saw that came up repeatedly on reviews I read before our trip. Hopefully this might help future cruisers out. I don't have time for a blow-by-blow review, but here are some highlights by topic:

 

(1) crowded elevators: Yes they are crowded on embarkation day. After that, we NEVER had any trouble getting an elevator and I never saw a LINE to get in any elevator. I don't consider it an imposition to actually wait for the elevator that is on deck 10 to get down to me on deck 2. We might have waited TOPS about 60 seconds for an elevator any time we used one, which we did a lot since we were down on deck 2.

 

(2) rowdy kids: We were on a full ship with an announced number of 1600 kids. I have teens myself, so maybe I'm a little more flexible, but I never saw any kids misbehaving or acting rowdy or running around doing anything that annoyed me.

 

(3) disembarkation: We were supposed to get off at 9:00 but didn't get off until 1:00 b/c of fog and late arrival at port. Would have been an hour earlier if we had self-assisted our luggage off. I think I will start doing that from now on on every cruise. We just waited patiently in our room [which is where the announcements said we could stay which I thought was nice]. We had no trouble finding our luggage in section 16 and standing in the "passport line" for about 15 minutes. I'm sure I would have been hysterical if I had a flight to catch; we drove. So, tip for future cruisers: do your best to self-assist and carry your luggage off, and, if you are flying home, make it late afternoon!

 

(4) food: LOVED tandori buffet [aft deck 10], sandwich shop [aft deck 10], pizza always good [deck 10 mid], burrito bar [aft deck 10 -- many people's favorite]. Heard good things about the FREE pasta lunch you can get in the Cucina. All other lido deck food really just ok. I'm happy with fresh fruit and salad and a piece of meat though. Lido deck desserts not really good at all.

 

Yes, there are lines on the lido deck buffet that come and go. Yes, it is sometimes hard to get a table, but we always found one. Don't miss the buffet they put out the night of the Red Frog deck party -- great Mexican food.

 

Main dining room food as good enough. It was not gourmet. I found that the more "fancy" sounding the dish, the worse it was. BUT, they have FANTASTIC grilled salmon and a flat iron steak available every night. We got fresh fruit, a green salad and some kind of grilled meat and veggies almost every night and were very happy with that. The portions are small but you can always order more. Desserts were inconsistent. Everyone in my family is pretty happy with sherbert and ice cream though so this was not a problem. Service was very good but yes it was slow. We just expect that for dinner in the main dining room for dinner so it didn't bother us. I like that it is a long 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 hour dinner that we can all visit over.

 

Disappointed in how minimal the room service menu was.

 

(5) Ship: beautiful and clean. GREAT deck furniture. Lots of upholstered couches, loungers, cushiony chairs. The deck 5 promenade [which is usually covered on other ships] is out in the sun -- so look for extra lounge chairs here; there are four hot tubs on deck 5 as well. My whole family loved the sports deck. I would walk on the walking track while my husband and kids played basketball, did the ropes course, and did the little outside work-out area. The mini-golf area is cute. They need another foosball table and ping pong table though.

 

We specifically stayed on the ship during a port day so we could have the ship to ourselves and were glad we did. The decks are very crowded during sea days and it is hard to get a seat. We weren't really "laying out" on this trip b/c of the season so this didn't bother me, but I imagine this was a big problem for some people.

 

Thought the ship was VERY SMOOTH -- no rocking at all!

 

(6) Red Frog Pub: favorite place on ship. They have dominoes, Jenga [behind the counter], checkers, foos ball and an indoor shuffleboard. Outside the bar, there is a bean bag toss and this very addictive game where you swing a ring on a string and try to hook a nail. We went during the day when it was empty just to play the games. GREAT beer; great acoustic music at night.

 

(7) Other entertainment: The staff needs to move the events they hold in the spotlight lounge [magic show, comedians] to the big theater when there are no shows being held. This venue was always so crowded you could not find a seat. The band that played in the Ocean Plaza at night [blood Power] was AWESOME. The outside "Red Frog" deck party they had one night was the highlight of our cruise. DJ played music while we danced with our kids for about two hours. They need more opportunities for families to do stuff together like this -- we could dance in Vibe disco or they could hang out in Club 02 and dance -- but there was really no other "family party" we could attend other than the Red Frog party [there was a big New Year's Eve party too but that won't be on every cruise]

 

(8) summary: beautiful ship, average food but we were happy with it, fun sports deck, family atmosphere [didn't see a lot of rowdy drunks/shot drinkers like we have on other Carnival cruises from New Orleans], needs a few more family entertainment options at night. We enjoyed our cruise.

 

We were on the ship with you with two younger kids, I just put up my review as well. We had a blast. Same notes as you, they need to dump the outside gym equipment. Not smooth, wasn't used much and prime spots for more foos ball, knock hockey or pool tables. Elevators were fine, we were on deck 10 and rarely waited. Debarkation..I'd go your way and do the one you did. Self assist was a nightmare but that was a function of the late arrival. We couldn't get into or out of an elevator for 20 minutes. I attribute this to the foggy arrival, once we got off the ship it was fine.

 

We went into the Red Frog early and it was way too loud. We checked it again later and liked it but we missed most of the fun. Loudness on this cruise was a problem day 1, and seemed to get better. We missed something here but made up for it with time in the aft lido with what has become close friends. Reading your review I feel like we missed a gem.

 

On the Lido there was a noticeable rock days 1/2. It could make some sick, we were fine. The lower we went into the ship the less it was. Didn't bother me but I do see what others were talking about.

 

Unruly kids, like I said 10 out of maybe 1500. Nothing the ship can do about that. Agree on the rowdy, in Costa Maya it was a whooping good time until the Conquest debarked and all the partiers left. Good crowd but that was clearly the more "fun" ship!

[Kaki]

Great review!

[Soonerbaby]

Thank you both for the great reviews! We are on her in 76 days and love the positive reviews.:):):)

[scottcruises]

Thank you both for the great reviews! We are on her in 76 days and love the positive reviews.:):):)

 

For future readers here's both reviews. I'll cross link to make it easier.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1540191

 

We loved it, you'll love it, enjoy. I'm picky and this was a perfect cruise, we loved the group of people we met, the kids, the staff. A+. Not sure what would make it better other than free drinks!

[txstarla]

Awesome. Leaving Sunday on the Magic and can't wait!

[FloridaGators]

Thank you for the review! We leave in 19 days!!

[salcruizer]

We were on the same sailing and agree with the points made. We were very happy with the ship, service, food, etc. Agree that the acts held in the showtime lounge should have been in a bigger/better venue. First time I've ever seen signs outside the door saying "Venue Full"...which means get there early if you have your heart set on something fun. I too heard that there were about 1500 kids aboard .... I cant believe that!! -- where did they all go? There were some groups of kids here and there, but they did a great job at keeping most of them busy. Even the pools and water park were not that crowded (chairs are hard to find close to the pool, but go down to deck 5 if you want sun and quiet).

 

The debark, as I mentioned on another post, was a disaster and we missed our flight, and then missed our re-booked flight becuase of lost luggage. I'd love to sail the Magic again, but not from Galveston.

[LBumb]

great job

[cruzkitty]

Great Reviews! Thanks for taking time to post them.