Musings on the Magic 7-15-2012 short review

[Another ship trip]

So you know our cruise history, this was our 6th Carnival cruise and our 29th overall cruise.

Obviously we enjoy cruising!

Getting there: We had about an 80 minute drive to Galveston. Husband dropped us off with our luggage at the terminal and drove across the street and parked in Cruise n Park (I think that's the name). It was an enclosed pink building and we have parked there before. It has to be the most secure parking as it is a fully enclosed concrete building with a locking garage door. The car is never exposed to the elements and hubby just walked across the street to the terminal after dropping son and me off at the terminal.

 

Embarkation: Could not have been smoother. Galveston has always been easy based on the cruises we have taken from there. We barely had to stop. We had 3 of us and brought three bottles of wine with us. They had us open our luggage and we showed them the three bottles as well as our cokes and 7-Up. The lady was extremely courteous and we were quickly on our way. Since people have mentioned getting surge protector plugs taken, I showed her ours (the traditional Belkin 3 plug with 2 USB port model). No problem. Since it is new and is a surge protector, I am not sure why it would be a problem and it wasn't.

 

A few words about the photos:They took the usual embarkation photo and then we had all green screen photos made individually which served as the photo that is our onboard ID for getting off/on the ship. This same photo was used to make some "magic hat" photos which could be purchased in the photo gallery.

 

This ship uses a facial recognition program and you can insert your room card into a kiosk in the photo area and it will pull up most of your photos. Always some were missing but this is a really cool feature if you hate looking for your pictures amongst the 10's of thousands by mid-cruise.

 

Photos cost 9.99, 11.99. 19.99 and 21.99. I could be off a dollar on one of the first two. They also have a number of 12 x 12 scrapbook albums and scrapbook kits for purchase as well as underwater cameras and regular cameras.

 

We were on the ship lickety split, around 11:20 and wandered a bit, but not too much since we had luggage in tow. We went to the Cucina del Capitan (Italian restaurant) and true to what others have said, there were only three sets of people ahead of us. They open at noon but ended up seating us at about 11:45. They have a pasta bar that is complementary for lunch. Son had lasagna, I had linguini with chicken and shrimp in alfredo sauce, and hubby had something with a tomato sauce. We also ordered lasagna to share.

I enjoyed my entree though the noodles were very al dente, almost crunchy and sauce was not really there. It was almost as if the sauce flavor was baked into the noodle. I would have preferred some sauce but it was good. The lasagna was defintely not to my liking as it had steak pieces rather than ground beef. Son thought lasagna was good though. I had great pictures of my food and the restaurant, but lost my camera in Cozumel on day 6. (already posted about that in another thread) so this cruise I will have no photos of anywhere we have been.

 

Next, muster and dinner.

[Another ship trip]

We were told cabins would be ready at 2:00 so we waited until then and dropped our luggage at our cabin. We had a cove balcony cabin for the three of us. Closet space was just enough for three and I found it interesting that in the first closet the rack to hang the clothing did not go from left to right like a traditional closet dowed does, but was a metal fixture that went from front to back which meant less hanging room for clothing. Also, it meant that you could not see all of your clothes without kind of getting into the closet side ways. It's hard to explain, but the first closet was just weird and I have never seen one like it.

The bathroom was like they are on most Carnival ships with one wonderful addition. A 5x make up mirror is mounted to the wall. For those who are sailing in the deluxe oceanview cabins which have the bath and a half, both of these bathrooms have the wall mounted make up mirrors. I only mention this since I had wanted to know the answer to the question: Do both the full and half bath have the make up mirrors? YES! A group of traveling females together might want to know this information.

 

Regarding our cabin, we were located directly under the first 10 feet of the galley aft and our room was incredibly noisy until about midnight and it started up early around 6:00 am with the very audible noise most mornings. Strange that if I walked out onto my balcony, much of the time I could not hear the noise which was incredibly loud inside the room. I would not recommend getting a cabin under the galley unless you are a very sound sleeper and don't mind wearing earplugs. I can't stand things in my ears including earbuds so earplugs weren't an option for me.

The noise may not be the same depending on what is going on above your room so I imagine not all cabins experienced the same level of noise.

 

Muster: This was one of the only times we did not have to complete the muster drill at the lifeboat stations. Our muster area was in the Southern Lights Dining Room. All muster stations were in dining rooms, lounges, showrooms. We were there for about 20 minutes and released. I always feel like my cruise has really begun once the obligatory muster drill has been completed.

 

We unpacked everything and did a little ship exploration. Be prepared to walk quite a bit which is not a bad thing with the ton of food you will eat. Most areas of activity are loctated on deck 5 (kid's clubs on deck 4) and dining rooms on decks 3 and 4. Decks 10-14 are also where much of the fun happens. There is no deck 13. You know, bad luck and everything, so it goes from deck 12 to 14.

 

Dinner: We had Any Time Dining and ate early this night at 6:30. This first night, suprisingly, none of the main courses appealed so I ordered the salmon as I love salmon and capers. Sadly it was some of the least flavorful salmon I have ever eaten. Dry and no sauce, no capers, nothing. Very fishy/bland, overcooked and plain. Husband and son had the braised beef and it was much better.

I will say that the main dishes were not as good as past cruises overall but I think their soups are fabulous. I had soup every single night and it was yummy every single night. I LOVE their soups.

I had the warm chocolate melting cake with ice cream. It was the only time I had it though it is offered every night on the menu.

 

If you want to see some AWESOME food pictures along with the menus each night, go to zydecocruiser dot net's website. He/she has all the most current menus for Carnival and his pictures are fabulous!!!!! Looking at his pictures makes me hungry~

 

We didn't go to the WElcome Aboard show since it tends to be run on TV the next few days.

 

We did tour the spa. DH loves the sauna and steam and their pay for portion has a fancier version than the one for all the non spa cruisers. One thing that I thought was fishy is that they are now doing dysport (basically botox but faster acting) as well as restylane filler injections. They have a "Doctor" on board who does the injections. The reason I put that in quotes is that I had asked him how much the injections were. He told me he couldn't tell me--I had to come the next day to his seminar so that they could tell me specifically for my particular situation. I then asked him that since restylane comes in 1 cc syringes, doesn't he also have to sell it by the syringe (of course he does) and he said yes. SO I asked the price per cc and again he said he could not tell me--I would have to come to his "seminar" for a consultation. Hey I am here right now!

Okay a doctor who will not, or probably, more accurately, cannot (per Carnival) tell you the price of a product is a very fishy doctor/salesman indeed. These products are all priced by the unit or cc. They vary considerably by the way.... I was just trying to find out how much they were charging. I know it had to be about double the average shoreside prices, much like their spa treatments. There was no way, no how he would tell me the prices-- though all other spa treatments had posted prices. I haven't seen these injections offerered on other cruises so I was curious.

 

They had teeth whitening for the about the same price you can do an intensive treatment at a dentist office. The method they use is exactly the same as I have seen in the center of our local Mills mall but at a much greater cost.

 

While I love massages, the hard sell was on from the beginning and I just cannot handle that. When I get a massage, I don't want to have them diagnose me and tell me all the concoctions that I need to loosen up, tighten up, moisturize up. lose more inches, etc. I just want to totally relax and not think about anything for that hour. Unfortunately those girls/guys are forced to try to sell the spa products and I hate that hard sell so I just avoid it on ships these days. I have gotten shoreside massages that were good though.

 

Next up. First sea day and a spa pass for the hubby.

[jdyer09]

Thanks for posting. We are on her in February and are looking for all the info we can get? Did you guys try the steakhouse. We avoid the spa as well for "treatments", but hubby wants to try the thalasso pool? Any experience with that?

 

So excited to read the rest!

 

Sent from my ADR6425LVW using Tapatalk 2

[erewhon]

Thank you for your cruise reports.

[Another ship trip]

No, we didn't do the steakhouse. We would have gone for 25 a person (75 for 3) but didn't want to spend 105 for 3. We are kinda cheap at times! We always go on NCL though and it is very good-MUCH better than MDR as I am sure it is on Carnival as well.

It was the only place onboard that had escargot and I missed not having them. I hear the snails will be back in the MDR very soon though.

 

Spa--Hubby decided to slurge and get a day pass for the spa. The spa girls told us that the first day they will sell up to 50 couples passes to the spa for 249 a couple. After that they will sell up to 10 day passes, first come first served for 35.00 a day. He is usually up early every morning to go to the sauna anyway so he bought the pass. He used the heated stone chairs, the sauna, the steam room, an aroma steam, and fancy showers. He really liked the heated stone loungers and used the THallosotherapy pool several times that day. The jets were maybe a bit stronger on this pool and it supposedly is a mineral pool. He didn't really notice a big difference other than it wasn't crowded like the hot tubs and no kids in sight. He used the fancy showers that have multiple jets too but said they weren't a big deal. He was happy to do the spa pass for the day but said that was enough.

 

I am not into saunas or steam rooms and such and would have only used the Thallosotherapy pool. But for the 20-30 minutes I would have soaked, I just used the regular hot tubs and didn't buy the day pass. If you spend a lot of time doing these amenities though, I think it would be a great buy.

 

Speaking of hot tubs/jucuzzi, there are are two midship on deck 5, two at the aft pool, and two in Serenity but one was never working in Serenity and remained drained. Sadly the temperature was only warm like a warm bath. I would have liked it a bit hotter to soothe those tired muscles! The jacuzzis on 5 often had lots of kids in them and kids in the aft pool tubs as well. In fact the aft pool was pack with tons of men and kids most days and I mean packed!!! I would see about 30 or 40 people lining the entire perimeter of the pool on sea days.

 

Serenity is adults only and I never saw kids in that jacuzzi. The Serenity area is a comfortable niche with hammocks, round loungers and regular loungers with thick padded cushions. It's a wonderful area to get away from the crowds even though it is beside the big waterpark slides. It has its own bar too and service is very fast and good there.

[Another ship trip]

So first sea day hubby did the spa off and on, and I played trivia, went to casino, exlored the whole ship, took lots of pictures, and it was formal night so we dressed up and took a few photos. Hubby didn't look too happy in most of them so we didn't buy those but bought 100 dollars of other photos during the cruise.

 

I only saw a portion of the the The Groove LIne show. Half of the sing/dance shows can be corny, but I liked the music and there were some good dancers and inventive choreography. The Michael Jackson guy with the manikin brothers was funny and cute. I would recommend it if you like that genre of music. I would have stayed the whole time but it overlapped getting to the comedy show and you needed to get there at least 15 minutes early to get a seat.

Our cruise was packed with over 4600 passengers they said. We did go see both of the family friendly comedians that night and saw the adult comedy shows too. Each show was about 30 minutes long. I thought the family friendly shows were much funnier than the later shows. The material was relatable to most people.

 

Tuesday was another sea day. On a ship the size of the Magic, two sea days were fine. My son actually loves sea days and I do too as long as there are lots of activities to do. There were the usual slot, poker, and black jack tournaments, bingo, port talks etc. If you are a new cruiser, the port talks and the shore excursion talks can be very informative and if you plan to shop, go to them. There was Karaoke, trivia, a dance class to learn a dance to be a part of a flash mob later in the cruise, and dancing with the cast to name a few of the activities.

 

The only main entertainment this night was the comedians. There were no shows in the showtime lounge so the Spotlight lounge, which is considerable smaller, was PACKED very early. They asked people to leave after each show so that others could see the following show. Since the two comedians rotated most people didn't want to leave since this was the only show that night.

 

Carnival should have had some other show going in the main showroom to better control the crowds. Of course the piano bar was busy and there was live music acoustic music in the Red Frog Pub, showband music in the Ocean Plaza, and Karaoke in Ocean Plaza when the band was not playing.

 

There was a great rock and pop band called Music Alterr that played some nights. In fact they played all genres of music. THis day they played out on the Lido from 2-6 so they didn't play that night. They were very good musicians and were a 5 man Philipino (I think) group. I enjoyed listening to them several times during the week.

 

Next: Shore excursions and not getting to dock in Roatan.

[Another ship trip]

So the title says it all.

 

It was too windy to get into Mahogony Bay and they had to cancel the port. We boarded on Sunday and Wednesday was to be our first of three ports but now it was a sea day. They came up with a new Fun Times bulletin within about 2 hours of making the announcement that our port stop had to unfortunately be cancelled. Husband had a dive scheduled through Carnival. It, of course, was refunded. Son and I had a private island beach lunch and excursion we had reserved privately ahead of time. Though I have been to Roatan 10 times, about annually since 2000, we had a brand new exursion so I was bummed. I really like the island of Roatan. It has some of the best scuba diving anywhere in the Caribbean plus lots of options for the land trips and beach trips as well. We actually booked this cruise BECAUSE it went to Roatan and the Magic only calls on Roatan about once a month it seems. Also, I have docked at Coxen Hole 9 times and Mahogony Bay only once. I think Mahogany Bay is less protected and seems those calls get cancelled much more often than than Coxen Hole does. I heard an explanation as to why but can't accurately describe why. I think it has been discussed on the Roatan boards.

 

So now we have another sea day. Trivia challenges ruled the day as far as organized activities were concerned. We heard lots of repeat trivia questions that had been used on the prior two days. The main magician was to get on at Roatan for the night's performance so they had to change the night's shows as well. I figured if the magician was any good at all, he could have transported himself to the ship wiht his fantastical magical skills . (he he!)

 

Also they were to off load the two comedians that had already performed and pick up two new comedians. Since they could not do that, they used the emcee Mark Miller to pick up three shows in the Spotlight Lounge in the evening. He did more close up magic and zany comedy. He did some cute comedy with balloons. He could make a snake with a balloon and a dog. If you wanted a balloon porpoise, he could do it--it was porpoise going to a costume party as a dog! He was a good back up and I was impressed they had something new that they could present in a pinch.

 

One note about shore excursions: Son and I had booked a private tour in Roatan ourselves (as mentioned earlier), except husband had booked a dive through Carnival. If you book privately and your port is missed be sure that if you prepay that you know their cancellation policy in advance. Some folks who booked independent tours may have simpy been out of their money. Do your research ahead of time. I didn't have to prepay our independent tour.

I did not book a Belize tour since we have been many times and have done cave tubing, Belize zoo, blue hole, reef bottom fishing a couple of times *(which is no longer offered), Belize city and countryside tours, etc. But with half of our cruise over and not having yet hit land, we decided we wanted to do something fun. Guess what? Well over half the tours were sold out. I would recommend booking online all the tours that you are sure you want to do. The tours do sell out. They had ruins tours but I have been to Chichenitza (SP??) and that one is the granddaddy of ruins. If you ove visiting the ruins though, those tours were still available. In fact one of the tours we wanted to originally do in Roatan was booked more than two months ahead of sailing.

 

Next up, Belize

[newbieMom]

We were so bummed about Roatan too! Never been there...and it was the only reason we booked this specific sailing (son had to give up summer school. daughter missed the championship swim meet because of it) I should have done more research to know is was an "iffy" port to get into. I cried my eyes out for about 5 minutes then shook it off and went to enjoy another day at sea. We did tons of Trivia too! I know we'd recognize you. I'll post a pic of our family once I get it scanned;) Was your private island called Little French Key? That's where we were going :(

[Another ship trip]

We were so bummed about Roatan too! Never been there...and it was the only reason we booked this specific sailing (son had to give up summer school. daughter missed the championship swim meet because of it) I should have done more research to know is was an "iffy" port to get into. I cried my eyes out for about 5 minutes then shook it off and went to enjoy another day at sea. We did tons of Trivia too! I know we'd recognize you. I'll post a pic of our family once I get it scanned;) Was your private island called Little French Key? That's where we were going :(

 

YES!! We had planned to go to Little French Key too!!

 

Wow! Yes, I like Roatan. It is very poor in most areas but has so much natural and rustic beauty.

[newbieMom]

I still feel sick about missing it....(or maybe it's that I STILL feel the ship motion! ) Anyhow, I'm going to find a way to get there;) This will sound sort of weird, but my desire to get there was all about my daughter being a mermaid! LOL! She loves this show called "H2O Just add Water" about 3 teenage girls that turn into mermaids whenever they touch water. When she was younger she said she was going to be a mermaid when she grew up;) Well, she found a video on youtube about how to make a tail to swim in and I just had to try it. It took two attempts, but the finished product is pretty amazing. I wanted her to really feel like a mermaid for a few hours in the Carribean with clear water and beautiful fish.....Little French Key was the place to be and they even have a bronze statue of a mermaid there! She ended up wearing the tail at Mr. Sanchos in Cozumel (after we did the Amazing Race) and it was good....but no Roatan:( I'll post pics of her in the tail later...right now it's too daunting of a task to organize the photos. I shot a ton around the ship and in port...I'd be happy to send you a disc of them if you'd like some that show the actual ship/day/weather of our cruise. I'm still sick for you about the loss of those pictures!

[chipq]

Thanks for sharing your cruise. Having to miss Roatan gives a good reason to book another.

 

http://luv2cruise.blogspot.com

[Another ship trip]

I still feel sick about missing it....(or maybe it's that I STILL feel the ship motion! ) Anyhow, I'm going to find a way to get there;) This will sound sort of weird, but my desire to get there was all about my daughter being a mermaid! LOL! She loves this show called "H2O Just add Water" about 3 teenage girls that turn into mermaids whenever they touch water. When she was younger she said she was going to be a mermaid when she grew up;) Well, she found a video on youtube about how to make a tail to swim in and I just had to try it. It took two attempts, but the finished product is pretty amazing. I wanted her to really feel like a mermaid for a few hours in the Carribean with clear water and beautiful fish.....Little French Key was the place to be and they even have a bronze statue of a mermaid there! She ended up wearing the tail at Mr. Sanchos in Cozumel (after we did the Amazing Race) and it was good....but no Roatan:( I'll post pics of her in the tail later...right now it's too daunting of a task to organize the photos. I shot a ton around the ship and in port...I'd be happy to send you a disc of them if you'd like some that show the actual ship/day/weather of our cruise. I'm still sick for you about the loss of those pictures!

 

There is news back from Isla Pasion that they say they found my camera! I have contacted Carnival giving all the details about the media, camera, booking number, address, etc. It may be that the operator still has it and may have to get it in two weeks. I am not sure but am sure hopeful that it comes back home!!!

 

I spent an hour with a very nice Carnival rep this afternoon and forwarded the email from the representative from Isla Pasion after someone gave me the idea to contact them. Thanks for that!! I am waiting to hear what the next step will be. Since Carnival Magic does not call on Cozumel this week, but will next week on August 3rd, it may be then. I will let you know. I am so very hopeful Ig et my camera and media back!!

[Crusin Karen]

Enjoying the review. I guess I missed something about the camera because I'm totally confused :confused::confused:(which isn't unusual! :p)

[PathfinderEss]

Enjoying your review.

[newbieMom]

There is news back from Isla Pasion that they say they found my camera! I have contacted Carnival giving all the details about the media, camera, booking number, address, etc. It may be that the operator still has it and may have to get it in two weeks. I am not sure but am sure hopeful that it comes back home!!!

 

I spent an hour with a very nice Carnival rep this afternoon and forwarded the email from the representative from Isla Pasion after someone gave me the idea to contact them. Thanks for that!! I am waiting to hear what the next step will be. Since Carnival Magic does not call on Cozumel this week, but will next week on August 3rd, it may be then. I will let you know. I am so very hopeful Ig et my camera and media back!!

 

that is great news!!!!!!! I'll be crossing my fingers for you!

[Texarribean Chick]

FANTASTIC news about your camera!!!!!

Girl - you better buy a lotto ticket tonight - how lucky can you get? :D ;)

[TexanTodd]

Loving the review so far!

[Another ship trip]

Been busy with an Aerosmith concert trip (they were awesome and seats were primo!!) and life. Now back to Belize.

Since this is a tender port, son and I slept in a bit, ate breakfast and got onto a tender. They give out tender tickets and will not give tix until your whole party is there. Since I hadn't been off the boat for five days and this was our first port, we got off at the tourist village. We would have done an excursion but nothing was appealing that could definitely get us back in time. We have been there many times so not a big deal. Went around the shops and went to the bar upstairs there at the pier. Had a couple drinks and some nachos. Bought a bottle of liquor, had a nice rain shower, and headed back to the ship.

 

Husband dove in Belize (about his 7th time diving there) and said it was okay. Saw mostly small fish, nothing really unusual. But he just enjoys the diving and the dive boat picks up and returns divers directly to the ship.

Saw comedian shows that evening and their main magician's show was in the main theatre. It was a good show for being on a ship and I enjoyed it. Made something very large appear on stage but I won't ruin it for you.

 

Day 6: Cozumel

Today we had a trip to Isla Pasion by Twister planned. We met on the pier around 8:15 and soon we were on our speed boat to the island. We twisted a few times getting absolutely soaked and it rained a bit on the boat trip over. Once we arrived, we gathered our dry belongings from a storage area the boat has and headed into the island. It was pretty cloudy but we got a seat. 10 minutes later it started to rain. Everyone gathered up their things and moved under the food cabana. We stayed there for about 30 minutes or so and then went back out. Time was very short being on the early trip and really thought our time was much too short. I think we stayed a total of maybe 3 hours. They asked us to reassemble to go back to the ship around 12:40. We were back to the ship around 1:45. There was an excursion that stayed longer.

 

Now the bad....I left my camera in a plastic bag on the island. I realized I had left it immediately upon return to the ship. I called guest services to let them know. They called back at 3:06 with a message to my room that the camera was not found. after returning home, I contacted Isla Pasion directly and they found my camera, case, etc, right after we left. They said it was returned to Carnival but 16 days later, still no news from Carnival. I hope they have people who actually care about getting found items back to their owners. I am still waiting. This kind of put a damper on this day so I really didn't enjoy the rest of the day though I really tried to. We went to the shows that evening but I wasn't too into it that day.

 

Day 7: Sea day. I was trying to shake of the loss of all my media, camera, and vacation photos and do something fun. We did trivia, I did a little in the casino, got some "do over" pictures with a small "not so good" camera and a disposable I picked up but all my towel zoo, dress up pics, candids, food, and general fun pics were still gone. Pulling self up by bootstraps and enjoyed the rest of my day.

 

We started packing in late afternoon and after dinner. We were going to do self assist so had to get it all in the suitcases. I do not pack well to go home. Stuff just gets thrown in willy nilly and it is quite an adventure to unpack at home. I always get a little blue that last evening knowing that it is almost over! I have done 8, 9 and 12 day cruises and do like having a couple more days. I am usually not ready to go home after 7 days!

 

The alcohol we bought in port and at the Carnival shop was delivered around 8:00. Interestingly there were lots of kids running loose throughout the ship and some pods appeared drunk around midnight-1:30. I think they may have gotten into their parents' bottles! We found mail delivered to ohters dropped in dirty plates left outside doors. There were a number of adults complaining to guest services about the kids running crazy that night which we hadn't really seen so much other nights.

 

Next post, debarkation.