Carnival Magic review April 23-30, 2016

[tayzia00]

Thank you everyone for all the posts and information!!! Really wish I could find the dinner menus for the cruise, but the funtimes are great to have!!!

[DKNE]

Thank you everyone for all the posts and information!!! Really wish I could find the dinner menus for the cruise, but the funtimes are great to have!!!

 

I never think to take pics of the dinner menu. I know each night on the menu talked about a 'theme' of the island we were at. They did have lobster, prime rib (which was soooooooo good ~ the last night of our cruise), your chicken dishes, lasgna, pork and so on. They also had escargot and frogs legs too !

[Port of Tampa]

Thanks for the great reviews and points of view. We are doing the same itinerary in September and are really looking forward to it. Anyone have any feedback on the casino?

 

Cheers and happy cruising!

[GeorgiaMomof4]

We just booked today for next April going to Belize, Costa maya, Cozumel and Maghony Bay on deck 12 in a spa balcony. Does the magic have that comfort kitchen? Any recommendations on what to do in each port, my wife can't walk very good so the Mayans are out. We're both red in the Vifp I have 20 days she has 13, i will hit Gold will they give me the Gold card when I check in

 

 

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I'll offer some recommendations based on what we've done.

 

Belize - I'd say stay on the ship unless you're going to do cave tubing which your wife probably wouldn't be able to do because of her limited walking.

 

Cozumel - we have had a driver for the day there and he is absolutely wonderful. Let me know if you are interested in doing something like that. He was tailor your day to exactly what YOU want to do and it is very reasonable.

Costa Maya - Go to Mahahual and hang out at the beach. God - it's gorgeous. We had chair and umbrella reservations through Steve at Tropicante (a restaurant there) and had a wonderful day at a very reasonable price.

 

Mahogony Bay - we did a driver for the day there too but I can't remember who it was. They do come highly recommended on these board though so I'm sure you can find out by doing some research on the ports of call boards.

 

Good luck!

[GeorgiaMomof4]

We are doing this same itinerary in Feb. 2017 and have booked a balcony on the Lido deck. This is our first Lido deck cabin and we are excited to be so close to lots of the stuff to do. Glad to hear it was a good location and quiet. I was worried about the noise level since it would be the Lido deck.

 

Makes me wish my 270 something days left would hurry up and pass by!

 

Thanks for the review.

[Lb2]

I'm going on the Magic in October and was wondering if the waiters sing in the YTD and if so, is it at a certain time?

[cocacola86]

Where did your driver take you in Cozumel

 

 

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[Keith1010]

Thank you for your review.

 

Keith

[Trumpster]

I'm going on the Magic in October and was wondering if the waiters sing in the YTD and if so, is it at a certain time?

 

Yes they did. We had YTD and entered at 5:45 and never later than 6:15 and the show began when we were usually ordering dessert or eating dessert. One time we were leaving as it was about to start.

 

We found YTD to be very efficient on the Magic, except on elegant night - which was busier than usual.

 

We were in and out in about an hour and 20 minutes on average most nights.

 

So sometime after 7:15 or so? Give or take.

[DKNE]

Thanks for the great reviews and points of view. We are doing the same itinerary in September and are really looking forward to it. Anyone have any feedback on the casino?

 

Cheers and happy cruising!

 

My only feedback is that it took my money ! lol

 

My parents played more then us. At the end of the cruise if you have so many spins, I think for every 100 spins on your card, you get a ballot for a free cruise. But you have to be present for that free cruise calling. It was 11pm on the final night. My parents were there and the first name they called the person wasn't there, so the second person they called won the free cruise !

[DKNE]

We are doing this same itinerary in Feb. 2017 and have booked a balcony on the Lido deck. This is our first Lido deck cabin and we are excited to be so close to lots of the stuff to do. Glad to hear it was a good location and quiet. I was worried about the noise level since it would be the Lido deck.

 

Makes me wish my 270 something days left would hurry up and pass by!

 

Thanks for the review.

 

My parents had 10290 on the LIDO deck. It was an absolute perfect location to the pool and buffet and also to the elevators. They loved the location. We had a window at the very front of the ship out looking into the sea on the LIDO deck as well. We did not find it rocky at all. We loved our location too, as we were next to the doors that lead you out to the front deck area and we had perfect views.

 

Lido deck is a great deck to be on !!

[DKNE]

I'm going on the Magic in October and was wondering if the waiters sing in the YTD and if so, is it at a certain time?

 

We had YTD and yes the waiters sang and danced and did a couple 'shows'. It was always around 7pm-7:15pm they did this !!

[GeorgiaMomof4]

Where did your driver take you in Cozumel

 

 

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He will take you anywhere you want to go. We wanted to do a tour of the entire island - get away from the touristy part. He took us all the way around the island (to the "wild" side - call it that because of the waves), took us to the Tequila Factory (great tour but it was early and they offered way too many free samples for that early in the a.m.), took us to Playa Palancar for swimming, snorkeling, etc. Beautiful place, good food, reasonable prices and there is a guy there that will go out snorkeling with you and be your guide just for a tip. Our driver stayed right there with our stuff so we could go do what we wanted to do. It's your day, he can offer suggestions or you can do research and do exactly what you want to do.

[riclop]

Thanks for the review.

[tandemcruzr]

Cocacola86,

 

in Costa Maya stay on ship, it is a very long pier to walk, although they have a tram you can wait on to carry you back and forth, really nothing to see or do there./quote]

 

We don't agree with this.

 

If you chose to stay at the port, there is a large pool with swim up bar and all the usual port shops.

 

BUT for a $3 p/p taxi ride to the little fishing village of Majuhual (10 minutes) there are many restaurants. We find one that serves a Whole Fried Fish caught fresh and served with all the trimmings. Reasonably priced drinks and you can see the ship from the beach. Very nice beach area also. There are local vendors with native made souvenirs.

 

The taxi back to the port is $2 p/p.

 

Go explore. :D

[cocacola86]

Thanks for the tip

 

 

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[Teen Travels]

Great review! We're going on the 23rd of April!

 

 

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[Teen Travels]

Great review! We're going on the 23rd of April!

 

 

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23rd of July*

 

 

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[BeachLoverstoo]

Thanks for the review. We are on the Magic for a B2B in November. :) We have Western and then Exotic Southern so there will be lots of interesting "Port of Call" items to try. Fifteen days, seven ports, including four that are new to us. Missed Grand Turk last time, so we hope for better luck this cruise.:D

[IloveBobaFett]

Thanks for the well written review. We sail this trip in October. I can't wait!!

[cocacola86]

Do you know where the Magic docks in Cozumel

 

 

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[Time2CruiseAgain]

Love your review! We sail on 9/3 for my birthday cruise! Our Cabins are in the same area on the Lido deck forward!

[thecruiserofships]

Great review!

[Rookmoney]

Our family of 4, 2A and 2 kids (11 & 12) decided to book a cruise this spring, as we thought waiting till January to go on the Vista was too long of a wait!

My parents also booked this cruise with us! We both had cabins on Deck 10 (lido deck) ours was the very front of the ship and my parents were a balcony. Loved the lido deck, zero noise and easy access to everything. First time on Lido deck and would def book it again. This was also the ships first time sailing out of Port Canaveral and going to our itinerary, so that was kind of neat. We had Dr E as cruise director and he was absolutely fantastic. I never really paid attention to cruise directors in the past, but having Matt Mitchum last year on the Breeze and now Dr E, I can say that they really do help make your cruise so much more fun with all their funny quirks. Can't wait for the Vista in January, which we are sailing with Matt Mitchum again !

 

We actually left on the Thursday to make our way down to Florida. We stayed at the Best Western Lake Buena Vista resort near Disney Springs (with the intent of going to Disney Springs that day) but we had a super early morning flight (6am) so we were pretty tired once at the hotel. Kids went swimming while the adults chilled. The hotel was 'ok'. We used aeroplan miles for the hotel, so can't complain too much. No breakfast included. We went a bit of shopping prior to dinner. Did not go to Disney springs, as it poured rain. So we had an early night as we were all tired and excited for the cruise the next day.

 

Day 1 ~ Embarkation day!

Woke up and went to Mc D's for breakfast before heading to the port. We dropped off the rental car and we were at the port by 10:30 (even though our boarding pass said 12:30-3). We were group #7 ! We were on the ship by 11:45 am !! Went to the buffet for lunch and by 1pm our rooms were ready (even though they say 1:30). We were on the Breeze last year, so the two ships are pretty comparable (with the Breeze having nicer decor) but all other amenities were great. We really enjoyed the Magic, there were 4,500 on the ship. A ton of big groups. We were on a sailing with only 96 kids on our sailing, while the prior week had over 900 kids on that sailing! yikes! However our kids still managed to make some friends and hang out with them.

 

We had 'your time dining' for the first time. Loved it. We never felt rushed and we went for dinner anywhere between 6:15-7pm and never waited for tables. Our first night dinner, we sat in an area where the service wasn't too great (they brought out the kids meals and my dh meal), while my parents and myself had to wait 45 minutes for our meals. It seemed ridiculous. The whole 'service' was not the best. They did bring out a piece of pie and a candle and sang 'happy anniversary' to my dh and I. The following night we asked to sit in another section and our waiters were like night and day and were absolutely fantastic (I Wayan, Ezra and Rupling) We asked to sit in their section for the rest of the week, and had a great week with them.

 

Day 2 ~ Sea Day

Literally sat around and relaxed. It was sunny out and weather was perfect. My mom, dh and I decided to go to the shore excursion tour info (even though we didn't buy any) but we entered our names in the draw to win 1 of 24 shore excursions they were giving away. I WON !! I won a shore tour for San Juan, Puerto Rico (couldn't believe it, as that was my birthday that day as well!) Perfect !! Lunch was at Blue Iguana, so yummy. I never had it on the Breeze but really enjoyed it. Kids enjoyed themselves on the rope course, the sports deck area and the waterworks. Something for everyone. This night the waiters brought me a birthday cake and sang for me. That was great. That night we got back to our room and our room steward wrote 'happy anniversary from your steward GEE' on our mirror. What a nice surprise. And GEE was one of the best cabin stewards we've ever had. He also left us a complimentary bottle of wine and a spa gift card. WOW, so touched!!

 

Day 3 ~ Amber Cover, Dominican Republic

Pulling into port, it was really overcast and cloudy. Dr E did mention that the dock was like 'the green mile' and it was super long. They do have guys that will take you back and forth on the dock (they pull you by bike and you are in a cart ~ forget the name lol) and they work on 'tips'. We walked the dock. We only went to the Amber Cove area. Still a lot of stores with nothing in them, but its a work in progress. We went to the pool area and rented an umbrella ($10), pool chairs are free. Kids and dh went down the water slides abit and they also went on the zip line. $6 per kid all day and $12 per adult all day. You do not even need shoes, they will attach your flip flops to your harness so you don't loose them and my son went down with only a bathing suit and no shirt. Just stayed around pool area, swim up bar (drinks were nice and potinent!) Not sure of cost of drinks, as my dad splurged for me lol. Then it monsoon rained!!! We actually stayed in the pool to keep 'warm'. It just downpoured like no tomorrow. Once the rain let up, my parents went back to the ship around noon. We stayed another 2 hours when it started to drizzle abit. Walked around shops, bought a couple souvenirs. Took pics by the 'Amber Cove' big sign and took a ride back to the ship as it started to rain again.

 

Day 4 ~ St Thomas

Arrived in port at 12pm. Norwegian Escape and the BREEZE was in port with us. Captain had to paralel park between the 2 ships. It was an overcast.... on again and off again sunny kind of a day. Once off the ship, flagged down an open air taxi (total mayhem there!) and for $9 per person, he took us to Coki Beach. By the time we got there, the beach was pretty packed, but we found an area by the rock area (to the right of the beach) Fed the fish food, it was super cool having the fish eat out of your hands and the kids had so much fun. We had lunch there (just had hotdogs $8 for fries and dog, $5 for just a hotdog ~ service took a long time!) Didn't reserve a taxi back, but there is a dispatcher when you arrive and hanging out there all day and when you want a taxi they call for one. We waited less then 5 minutes. $9 return trip. I had asked the driver to take us back to the ship by the way of Skyline Drive, as I wanted that awesome view of the ships and everyone on the open air taxi was so thrilled for that pit stop (we tipped the driver extra$!) He dropped us off in Havensport shopping area and we shopped for abit and made our way back to the ship. We set sail at 7pm. The Escape was to leave at 6pm, but they didn't leave till after us. The Breeze was still in port too. So we were last to arrive and first to leave lol

 

Day 5 - San Juan, Puerto Rico

Arrived to yet again, overcast cloudy skies. As we pulled into port, the skies opened up. However the MSC Divina was pulling into port, and they had to close our gangway while they docked next to us. We waited for 45 minutes for our gangway to reopen. I had won a shore excursion for this port, so we found our driver easily, the 'bus' held about 25 people. We had the 'top 10' of San Juan tour. It was really interesting, learned a lot about San Juan, saw some beautiful sites and views. However we could not go to the forts as their was a military presentation going on and even though our driver 'tried' to drive into the forts, there were tons of police presence and told us 'no' can't go in. The traffic was chaotic. So it was sad we didn't go to the forts. The tour was $69 per adult, $59 per kid. 3.5 hours, but ours ended being just over 4 hours due to traffic etc. It was a nice tour, however if we had to 'pay' for it, we probably wouldn't have done it.

After being dropped off in town, we walked the streets for shopping. San Juan was not like I remembered it back in 1990 (my first time there) it was really poor and a ton of homeless people on the streets. A ton of shops were closed up and there wasn't really any 'deals' as per say. We went to 'touch of gold' and the 'deal' we got was $899 for a gold chain for my dh. We passed.

However we did go to Barrachina's, the birthplace of the Pina Colada. Seeing it was my birthday that day, I treated myself to a Pina Colada lol and we ordered lunch. As it was another overcast day, the waitress wanted to sit us inside 'in case it rained', I told her I came to sit outside and insisted, and we sat outside on the patio. So glad we did, as it didn't rain while we were there. We ordered a sampler platter for $22 and it had grouper fritters, calamari, turnover, pork in a pastry, shrimp, stuffed plantains, and other things I can't remember. Kids had grilled cheese and fries for $8.99 each. My pina colada was $7.50.

After our late lunch we headed back too the ship, tons of vendors along the sidewalk selling things. Sailed out of San Juan and saw the Royal Caribbean 'serenade of the seas' (sailed on her in 2008) in the middle of the ocean just sitting there, not sure why! Because it was my birthday that night, my daughter told the waiter to bring out a cake 'on my mommy's real birthday' lol, so they brought out another cake and sang again. Again, our waiters were awesome!)

 

Day 6 ~ Grand Turk

Arrived in Grand Turk at 12pm - 6pm. Spent the morning relaxing and hanging out on deck, while approaching Grand Turk. And it was super sunny and blue skies....our first day of true sun lol

We were really super lucky as we made our way down the gangplank they closed it off after us and then let us off but everyone else had to wait and we were one of the first 17 people off the ship!! Totally awesome. We spent the day at the beach right at port. Had so much fun. Chairs were free, umbrellas or 'cabana' were $20 to rent. Margarittaville was right behind us so we grabbed lunch while in port. My daughter got her hair braided for only $25! And they did an excellent job! Left the beach area to do some shopping, not many stores to go into, but enough to grab a few souvenirs. We had to be back on board for 5:30 and we were at the loooong line up by 5:10. We got on the ship at 6pm !!! And we asked how many people are after us and they said over 100 more people to go. CRAZY !! But we all made it lol

 

Day 7 ~ Sea Day

Literally did nothing, relaxed on deck chairs on deck 12 and had lunch at the Pig and Anchor seaside bbq. It was super yummy. The workers serve you, unlike the seaside bbq on the breeze where you served yourself. Mind you, being served, the lineup went super fast!! My daughter and I went to the towel animal learn how to make. That was fun, and then my daughter went up on stage with Dr E and made towel animal friends (along with other passengers too). She had so much fun. Final night dinner all the waiters sang 'goodbye' to us. So sad. Always do not like the last day, but its gotta end sometime.

Because this was the inaugural sailing out of Port Canaveral they had people fill out little papers that said 'the best part of my cruise was________' and put it in a balloon. There were hundreds of balloons on a net, that they later released that night from deck 10 to the atrium area. It was so packed and 'loud' as in when the balloons dropped everyone was popping them and it sounded like a wack load of fireworks going off. A lady next to me got my sons 'best part of the cruise____' how ironic is that, and my son also found one of the balloons he filled out. It was really neat.

 

Day 8 ~ bye bye day

We did self debarkation. If you put your luggage out the prior night, they didn't start doing debarkation until about 8:45 or 9am. We needed off by 7:45. They started self debarkation with deck 12, and we were deck 10, so we were off by 7:45 no problems at all. Waited maybe 15 minutes at customs and were in a shuttle to the car rental by 8:10am!! Rented a car, took my parents to the airport (they had an earlier flight) at 10am and then we headed to Disney Springs. We hadn't been there in 4 years, and wow has it ever built up. We ate lunch at T-Rex restaurant. Kids liked it and so did we as it was over 90 degrees out, sunny and super hot! lol Our flight was at 9 pm, so we were at the airport at 4:20 and literally took 2 hours to check in, check our luggage and wait in the loooooong security lines. We were eatting dinner about 6:30pm at McD's ! lol

 

Overall ~

Loved the Magic. We had a great cruise, really no complaints about anything.

We went to some of the shows at night. My daughter got chosen to go up and assist the 'Magicians' show and she was thrilled to no end. There was an illusionist show (was pretty good!) and my dh was chosen to go up at the end when the illusionist was in a handcuffed cage and he had to confirm he was handcuffed. So when the girl came to get my dh, he put his fist in the air and said 'yeah baby' LOL Saw the Carnival Legends show. It was good. They had passengers 'audition' to be part of this show, and it was basically a karokee and some of them were really super good and others well.........they were brave to get up in front of everyone and perform.

I participated in Bingo once ($20 for 3 cards). Did some on board shopping but there wasn't a whole lot that caught our eye. Played in the casino 1 night (only $20)

Did a ton of 'pixels' gallery photos. I am really into photography so I made sure we did a ton of portraits to choose something decent out of all of them. They are quite expensive. I did suggest making 'collections' for those that purchased a lot of sheets. We bought 14 portraits and cost us $303 !!! They did tell me that Vista has gone 'digital', so you only print what you buy. And that the other carnival ships will follow suit soon. Prices are 8x10 $21.99, port pics and dining room are $17.99 and 'fun shots' were $13.99. This is each!!

 

We had a fantastic time. And now can't wait for the Vista! I will see if I can add photos to this later on !! If you have any questions, please do not hestitate to ask. I would love to help out any of you who have questions ! :D

 

 

Thanks for a great review! I am considering a lido balcony change and was wondering if you felt a lot of movement in your room. I get motion sick a little but would love to be on Lido.

 

 

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