MAGIC - Our Photo Review of the Inaugural Sailing of the Magic

[kjunea]

Great review!! Looking forward to more!

[tiggerman101]

Thanks for taking the time to do this. We are doing the 12 day on June 12th. It is coming quickly now!

[nathand95]

I'm loving your review so far! I love all the pictures! Keep them coming! I was really surprised with the decor of the ship. It's keeping the typical Carnival-esque feel while also feeling modern. I do wonder WHY IN THE HECK IS THE OUTLET PRACITCALLY ON THE CEILING????? Did that ever make things difficult? The Lido buffet seems to have an excelent layout. The Magic seems like an awesome ship. I can't wait to see pics from Croatia! My best friend is Croatian, so I will be showing her your pictures so she can be like "I've been there!". Haha

[blizzrd]

I love the pics. The magic looks great, I can't wait till we go on her. I absolutely LOVE the pictures of Venice. It's my favorite city in the whole world. They brought back great memories.

[bluedolph1n]

I love your review and pics too, they are great. :) Thank you so much for taken the time to make this review. We are sailing 24th of July with the Carnival Magic, I'm already looking forward to it, but now even more.

[cruisinskier]

Thank you all for your comments. I can't believe we have had almost 12,000 views and haven't even left port yet! Obviously there is some demand for Magic info so we will do our best to provide whatever info we can. Stay tuned as coming up shortly we will provide some pics of the main dining room, the naming ceremony and sail away.

 

Before we leave the Lido area, I have to say that overall food quality and variety was good to very good (for a buffet) depending upon what it was. Having various areas for different types of food helped to dispurse the crowds and kept everything moving fairly well. Yes there were lines but nothing that was beyond a couple of minutes. We really enjoyed the Tandoor food, the Mongolian Wok and the overall variety.

 

Breakfast was basically the same food every day at the Lido (all the standard fare). The one area we felt could have been better was with the fruit for breakfast. We know it is hard to keep things fresh but it seemed to be bananas, oranges, melon and canned peaches. No strawberries, grapes, watermellon, etc.

 

The signs that they used to mark each food area were magnetic so they could change the signs from breakfast to lunch. We did find that the food areas towards to aft of Lido had the lowest crowds (get your omelttes there in the morning with no wait) and it was relatively easy to find a table back there and we typically had 6-8 of us eating together.

[cruisinskier]

Our next stop was the main dining room. As I mentioned we had a group of 12 travelling together. I had called Carnival twice to confirm that our bookings were all cross-referenced and that we would all be placed at the same table. Well despite 2 confirmations, 10 of us were at one table and the other 2 were actually in the other dining room. We set out to resolve this....

 

We had late dining in the Southern Lights Dining Room, table 522. We met with the Maitre D' (Ken from Ireland) and I was ready for a bit of a battle. However Ken agreed to add a table for two to our table so as to fit the 12 of us. However note to anyone else travelling in groups, they typically do not have tables larger than 10 (and we would have been fine with 2 tables of 6 so long as we were all together). Ken made it work and we didn't even have to tell him the 2 we needed to move were also of Irish descent. Ken also sang a few songs during dinner a few times and has an excellent Sinatra type voice.

 

Our waiter for the cruise was Heiyen from China. She did a good job and was working very hard for us. I have to say that early in the cruise the service was slow as this would be the first time they were working together as a team. I also think that Heiyen was not using her assistants enough (typically the assistants should pour water and bring bread but she was doing that in addition to everything else). Over the length of the cruise the service improved as they got comfortable working togther. The first night we were not asked if we wanted tea or coffee until we spoke up. We expected a few minor glitches given this was the inaugural cruise and this is more of an observation than a complaint. Overall food quality was excellent based on feedback from all 12 of our party.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our table (before they added room for 2 more)

[cruisinskier]

Once we had sorted out the dining situation, we headed off to the theatre to attend the Magic Naming Ceremony. Given this was the first time we had done an inaugural cruise we wanted to make sure we witnessed this tradition.

 

Carnival President & CEO Gerry Cahill arrived onstage a helicopter (shouldn't this have been a boat??)

 

 

Cruise Director John Heald welcomes Gerry to the stage

 

 

Gerry Cahill's speech told us all about all the new things on the boat that we already knew were there...we are on the boat! Obviously this was more for the media than the guests....

 

 

Carnival Magic godmother Lindsey Wilkerson was warmly welcomed to the stage after an emotional video. She was a great choice for godmother.

 

 

You can read more about Lindsey here:

http://carnival-news.com/2011/04/06/former-st-jude-childrens-research-hospital-patient-now-st-jude-ambassador-to-serve-as-godmother-to-new-carnival-magic/

[cruisinskier]

Of course, there had to be some Magic as part of the ceremony....

 

 

Next up was the Captain

 

 

The Captain and Lindsey officially named the Magic and pushed the button to smash the bottle against the bow

 

 

And they showed the bottle smashing on the screen and dropped confetti, etc in the theatre

[Froufie]

Wow - very impressive review and pics!! Loving it!

[cruisinskier]

After the Naming Ceremony, it was time to head to the CC Party that had been arranged on our roll call. We all met on the Aft of deck 10. It was great meeting more new friends as well as reconnecting with some old friends from the wine crawl (it had been a few days ago!). A special hi to all the other Canadian friends we met.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[cruisinskier]

Ok, so went half way around the world for this trip and we are on the stairs and I hear my name.....I turn around and it is old friends of ours who live about 30 minutes away. We had not seen each other in about 10 years but it was great to reconnect. they were onnboard celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary.....we arranged to send a bottle of champagne to them to help them celebrate!!!

 

 

Here are the 4 of us together on the aft deck 10 as we had told them we would be out there for the CC party. In additon, they were sailing with a group of friends (including Dick and Aneta Little for those of you who made it to the Welcome Aboard show :D) and some of our group of 12 knew some of their friends so it became a bigger party. It truly is a small world. (...something is wrong though.....I am the only one without a drink! ;))

 

[cruisinskier]

The Venice port was busy that day.....we watched others sail away and it was now almost our turn :D:D

 

 

 

 

 

 

[1965]

I want to add our thank you for the wonderful pix. You are doing a really NICE thing for all us still at home awaiting our turn on the Magic. When I woke up this morning I could't wait to get to the computer to see if there were more pix. THERE WERE!! How long did it take you to get your bearings and remember how to get from place to place?

[cruisinskier]

Also in port that day was the Pullmantur Zenith. Six members of our small group had sailed on the Zenith back in 2006 when it was part of the Celebrity fleet. It was interesting to see it rebranded however we recognized that boat as soon as we saw it....

 

[cruisinskier]

I want to add our thank you for the wonderful pix. You are doing a really NICE thing for all us still at home awaiting our turn on the Magic. When I woke up this morning I could't wait to get to the computer to see if there were more pix. THERE WERE!! How long did it take you to get your bearings and remember how to get from place to place?

 

1965, glad I can help out all my fellow future Magic cruisers. More info to come as I try to get as much done as I can before reality hits tomorrow as I have to return to work :(

 

It was fairly easy to find our way around the Magic. We have done some other larger boats (NCL Epic and RCL Freedom of the Seas) so we know you need to spend a bit of time getting familiar with the deck plan. But once onboard there are signs and maps to assist in pointing you in the right direction.....

 

 

 

 

 

 

[cruisinskier]

After attending the muster, we headed back out to Deck 10 Aft for sailaway from Venice (this would become a regular meeting place for us for all sailaways throughout the cruise).

 

Almost ready to release the last ropes...

 

 

There it goes.....

 

 

Being towed out of the dock area...

 

 

And cruising through Venice......every needs to do this at least once!!!

 

 

 

 

And St Mark's Square for a final time....

[cruisinskier]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our tug heads back to the port

 

Goodbye Venice (and Murano in the distance)

[cruisinskier]

We headed back to our cabin to find our suitcases waiting for us inside. We unpacked some and got ready for dinner. As I mentioned earlier, the service wasa little slow but the food quality was very good. Tonight was the first of a few Warm Chocolate Melting Cake :D

 

After dinner we wandered a little and ended up in the casino for a little while. Around midnight we headed back to the cabin to call it a day. It had been a very busy but very enjoyable first day on the Magic!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hat Trick Bar in the casino

 

 

There were Magic related items around the casino if you looked for them...

[ruthie101]

WOW!!! What a great review and fantastic pictures!!

We are going on the Magic for the last med. cruise and the ta to Galveston and reading your review and looking at your pics. makes the anticipation that much greater!!!

Love your caption on the pics. Makes them mean so much more!!

Thank you once again!!!:):):)

[Prairie_Gal]

Man I love this review! I know they are a lot of work, and I just wanted to let you know that I really appreciate it.

[pomm1972]

Thanks so much for a most excellent review. I so look forward to the rest of it.

[spacepotatoes]

Your pictures are beautiful! Thanks for taking the time to share them.

[dogbert's mom]

Thanks so much for your great review. I have always wanted to visit Venice and now I have added the desire to cruise from there.

Your pictures of the Magic are beautiful.

Edited May 15, 2011 by dogbert's mom
bad sentence

[enjoyinglife]

Thanks for the wonderful and time consuming review! I might be going on the breeze and this is so enjoyable!

 

By the way, I love your little saying at the bottom of your posts...it sums up my belief in life, "the best things in life are not things." That is how I feel but would never have phrased it that way...it will also be my new saying! :D