Magic happens in Galveston! 10/11/15 Western Caribbbean on the Carnival Magic

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

 

More Galveston, taken from starboard side, Lido.

 

 

My first Funship Special of the cruise and a Bloody Mary for my mom, taken from Lido under the awning as the sailaway party was going on. Life is good.

 

 

Us leaving towards the Gulf of Mexico. The RCCL ship right behind us. We would see that ship again in Cozumel a few days later.

 

 

Close up of an oil tanker headed to Galveston. Those shipping channels are narrow apparently, nothing but tankers as far as the eye could see for the first hundred miles or so.

 

More tankers, as we head towards sunset. Unfortunately I did not get any good sunset pics as we were on the wrong side of the ship to see it tonight and the weather was bad for most of the other nights.

 

 

The next day's funtimes. Looks weird not being accompanied by chocolates or a towel animal doesn't it? We did get towel animals every night the rest of the way.

[Keith1010]

Enjoying your posts.

 

Keith

[jimbri]

Looking forward to your review :)

[Rudyard]

I like to see how the paintschemes vary for different police cars around the country

 

They've used that paint scheme, or something similar. for as long as I can remember. The city finally decided to change it a couple of years ago and as they gradually buy new cars they are getting them in a more traditional black and white style. The uniform also changed from dark pants and light blue shirt to completely dark blue.

[travelnteach64]

I can't wait to read the rest of your review! I always enjoy and appreciate those who post pictures. I know it can take time and effort, but I like it.

 

What ports did you stop at? We are on Liberty for the Western Carribean in March.

 

I'd also love to see menus if you took pics.

[angelsbz]

Keep it coming! We are going next month can't wait!! [emoji122]🏼

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[loubetti]

A lovely, entertaining, and well-written review! I look forward to the rest.

 

I am a former New Jerseyan myself!

 

Just curious, are you just an "aviation geek" or a certificated pilot? Also, and while it does not bother me, why use 24hr/military time? Let me guess, you were in the military once! As a pilot/aviator for 40 years, please, just don't use UTC or GMT!! :eek:

 

All good, my good man. Waiting for the next installment.:D

Edited October 25, 2015 by loubetti

[wantocruisemore]

Really enjoying the review so far. We're considering magic after it moves to Florida, so anxious to hear the rest. Also excited that JH has said magic will get a lot of the 2.0 upgrades in March drydock.

[watermelonqueen99]

That's funny. The only bad part about the cruise is that they make you get off the ship after it is over, lol. How was your cruise? We had what I guess might have been the early stages of Hurricane Patricia before it drifted into the Pacific and a stalled frontal boundary across the entire Caribbean sea that kept it raining most of the week off and on but the seas were pretty calm most of the time and the cruise itself was great. Thanks for following along and I am just about ready to post my embarkation day summary and pics.

 

We had a fantastic cruise! The seas were the calmest we've ever had on a cruise. The only time I felt even slight movement was a couple times in the shower. Dr. E was your CD, right? He is AWESOME!

[WISH84]

Following.. Great review so far.

[KPfromCT]

Thanks, glad you are enjoying. I have embarkation day all written up and ready to post. I know the Magic is moving soon and the Breeze is taking its place in Galveston, but I didn't know Port Canaveral is Magic's next home port. Which ships are there now, I wonder? I last cruised from Port Canaveral on the Sensation a few years ago, really nice new terminal there. Have fun, July will be here in no time.

 

The ships that are currently in PC are the Sunshine and Sensation.

I know the Sunshine is headed up to NYC next summer, but DAMN....$1300pp for a balcony? SMH

We are in CT and would prefer NOT to fly, but that is steep. And the itinerary is not great.

Someday.......

Patiently waiting for more of your review.

 

:D:D

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

Enjoying your posts.

 

Keith

 

Thanks! I am enjoying writing this review and there is much more to come.

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

Looking forward to your review :)

 

Glad you are interested. It's a work in progress. I will hopefully get to our first sea day either later tonight or sometime this week.

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

They've used that paint scheme, or something similar. for as long as I can remember. The city finally decided to change it a couple of years ago and as they gradually buy new cars they are getting them in a more traditional black and white style. The uniform also changed from dark pants and light blue shirt to completely dark blue.

 

It waa my first time in Houston so nothing to compare it to but I get what you're saying. That is usually how departments do it, at least around here. Maybe update the paintscheme when the cars go in for major maintenance also. Kind of how they repaint planes when an airline gets a new livery. No huge hurry to get it done I guess. Philadelphia and the NJ and PA state police haven't changed their paintscheme in a long time if ever. However a lot of local districts around me change theirs every few years it seems. It's just something that I'm interested in and it's not hugely important in the grand pictures but still worth a mention. I also posted a pic of a police car in my Alaska cruise review from May, in Ketchikan lol.

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

I can't wait to read the rest of your review! I always enjoy and appreciate those who post pictures. I know it can take time and effort, but I like it.

 

What ports did you stop at? We are on Liberty for the Western Carribean in March.

 

I'd also love to see menus if you took pics.

 

Thanks for following along! It does take quite a bit of time and a little effort getting all the pics organized to post but it's worth it. Nothing like seeing first-hand experiences from different cruisers to give you an idea of what a particular ship or port will be like. I even like seeing the same ship and itinerary from the perspective of multiple people if you're lucky enough to get reviews of the same ship or cruise from different people. I might be able to get to working on our first sea day later tonight or tomorrow if I get a chance to sit down and write for a while, hopefully.

 

We had a sea day followed by a stop in Cozumel, a stop in Grand Cayman, a stop in Montego Bay, then two sea days on our way back to Galveston. I have many more pics to post from the rsst of the cruise, but I unfortunately did not take pics of the American table menus. I did take pics of ny dinners most nights and I did get multiple entrees most nights and I generally can remember what was on the menu most evenings. So maybe I can help if you have a question about a specific item. I was pretty happy with the American table, minus the fact the portions seem to be smaller but that's fine if you want to try more than one thing out at dinner. I figure carnival thinks this way also, less waste this way.

 

Have fun on your Liberty cruise, it's a nice ship albeit not brand new anymore and stay tuned for the continuation of my review and thanks for reading along!

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

Keep it coming! We are going next month can't wait!! [emoji122]🏼

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Absolutely! I am enjoying reliving my cruise as well. Have fun and make sure you take advantage of everything the ship has to offer. I will try to get this whole thing done before you leave for your cruise but that thing called work gets in the way all tbe time, lol. I gotta get that money so I can pay for my next cruise.:cool:

[dawnb72413]

Enjoying your review so far! We're doing the same itinerary on the Magic next March, so looking forward to reading the rest!:)

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

A lovely, entertaining, and well-written review! I look forward to the rest.

 

I am a former New Jerseyan myself!

 

Just curious, are you just an "aviation geek" or a certificated pilot? Also, and while it does not bother me, why use 24hr/military time? Let me guess, you were in the military once! As a pilot/aviator for 40 years, please, just don't use UTC or GMT!! :eek:

 

All good, my good man. Waiting for the next installment.:D

 

Thanks for reading along, it's my pleasure to write these reviews and share my experiences and memories with other cruisers. I've lived in a few different areas oger the last decade but I found my way back to NJ. It really is the garden state and the shore is awesome even though there is a ton of industry and things like refineries. Everything is just really closely bunched together and congested. I laugh when they talk about bad traffic when we visit island ports and ride to the ports in various cities to board the ships at the beginning of cruises. Lol. Traffic is a part of life.

 

I am not a pilot, never had the chance to train years for it or the money. However I will just put it at that aviation is a major, major part of my everyday life but that at the same time I consider myself an aviation geek and a little bit of a historian.

 

I wasn't in the military but I do come from a military family (Air Force) and I do use military time in my daily work so it's second nature to do it on these reviews also. I think it's easier to tell time as it's impossible to confuse AM with PM using the 24 hour clock. It would be way too confusing to go with UTC on this review because ship time differed from local time and local time changed depending on where we were during the trip Lol :D. Even I would have a hard time converting the times to our local times then.

 

Anyway. Thanks for following along and I don't know when I will get to the next installment, hopefully soon, but hopefully you will enjoy it as much as you have enjoyed the first few parts of the review and as much as I have enjoyed writing it.

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

Really enjoying the review so far. We're considering magic after it moves to Florida, so anxious to hear the rest. Also excited that JH has said magic will get a lot of the 2.0 upgrades in March drydock.

 

Thanks, glad you are enjoying. If you've ever been on the breeze, you will probably like Magic. Especially after Magic gets the update next spring. It's a somewhat larger version of the Liberty/Freedom etc. class and it has everything the older ships have but lots of cool new and modern stuff like interactive televisions and stuff like that. Guarantee you won't go hungry as there are so ma y different food options on there that it's almost impossible to try everything. I will hopefully get to the next part of the review in the next few days if not sooner. Happy cruising!

[saltybones]

I worked for a major printing company for many years before I recently retired, and we used military time too. It takes getting use to, but, like you said you won't mix up the am & pm.

Loving your review!

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

We had a fantastic cruise! The seas were the calmest we've ever had on a cruise. The only time I felt even slight movement was a couple times in the shower. Dr. E was your CD, right? He is AWESOME!

 

Cool. Did you arrive back in Galveston late or is it just usual to see people still leaving the port at noon after debarkation? I surely noticed and I guess that is why they are trying the staggered check-in at that port. The seas were a little rocky on our way back to Galveston but I have experienced much, much worse and considering all the rain we had, the gulf and the Caribbean were really quiet. We did have Eversen as our CD and he definitely has a different style than a lot of other CDs. I will get into that more later as I get deeper into the review. Anyway, thanks for following along and hope you continue to enjoy reading about my adventures.

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

Following.. Great review so far.

 

Thanks! Glad you like it. I have lots more to come, I'm just getting started. :)

[FlyingCruiserNJ]

The ships that are currently in PC are the Sunshine and Sensation.

I know the Sunshine is headed up to NYC next summer, but DAMN....$1300pp for a balcony? SMH

We are in CT and would prefer NOT to fly, but that is steep. And the itinerary is not great.

Someday.......

Patiently waiting for more of your review.

 

:D:D

 

Yeah, $1300 is steep. I would probably not pay that as I could go on a land trip for that probably. Not to mention the outrageous taxes you have to pay out of NYC. Honestly NYC isn't a huge market for Carnival. Going on a cruise from there would mean I don't have to fly to port but it is still cost prohibitive and the itineraries aren't that great unless you want to do Bermuda or Canada The Sensation is a nice old ship and although I never sailed the Sunshine, I have seen it a few times when we were in key west on other ships. The flying into a port isn't usually an issue but I don't like flying out of the northeast in wintertime as it's easy to get stranded trying to get to the cruise or trying to get back home afterwards. Anyway, glad you are enjoying and I will be getting to the next part of the review as soon as I can.

[nybumpkin]

I've lived in a few different areas over the last decade but I found my way back to NJ. It really is the garden state and the shore is awesome even though there is a ton of industry and things like refineries. Everything is just really closely bunched together and congested. I laugh when they talk about bad traffic when we visit island ports and ride to the ports in various cities to board the ships at the beginning of cruises. Lol. Traffic is a part of life.

I had to laugh as well when I read this. You may have seen from some of my posts that I'm a South Jerseyan by birth. Grew up in Burlington County, went to college in Philly, and law school in Camden. I was always used to traffic. When I was in law school, my daily commute was 13 miles and took 35 minutes. Then I moved to upstate NY. My daily commute is 25 miles and takes me 35 minutes, even with construction.:p I have people constantly ask me, "How in the world do you do such a LONG commute?" Honestly, I don't know what they're talking about. But I do know I don't miss Route 130 at all.;)

 

I'm enjoying your review - we did a cruise out of Galveston on Conquest in 2010 and had a great time. Thanks for sharing your review and photos.

[SHORTKATHLEEN]

I am enjoying your review! I have sailed the Magic 3 times and have always had a good time.