Half moon cay tenders

[toothfary7]

We will be on the Magic next month and visiting HMC.   I understand that you need to obtain a boarding number for tenders.  Where do you get these and how early do they start handing them out?

[choppe]

Following as well

[Joebucks]

I have been to HMC once. The arrival time was 7. I hurriedly arrived at 6:45, scared of what the line would be. I was one of the first people there.

[toothfary7]

So they did not give out numbers for what tender you would be on?  I had read this somewhere 

[cb at sea]

If you don't need to be 1st off the ship, there is no need for a number.  Simply get in the tender line and go on the next tender.  Generally speaking, anyone with a ship's excursion (and on HMC, they are ALL ship's excursions) that starts early will be escorted onto the tender to go en masse.....everyone else simply leaves the ship when and if they choose to. Most folks aren't in a rush.

[JandPB]

We weren't on the Magic but when we were at HMC we just waited for the masses to leave and leisurely walked down and hopped on a tender with no wait. We walked down the beach past the ship and found the chairs we wanted and hit the water. 

[leen50]

2 hours ago, JandPB said:

We weren't on the Magic but when we were at HMC we just waited for the masses to leave and leisurely walked down and hopped on a tender with no wait. We walked down the beach past the ship and found the chairs we wanted and hit the water. 

That's what we did in Dec. on Freedom. We don't do the sun, but went for the BBQ lunch. Long wait on line to get back to the ship.

[GradUT]

We got off late for HMC and returned on the last tender.  There were no lines for either. 

[LoungingMcCoy]

We were on the Carnival Magic in January.  There was a board on the Promenade deck, close to the Alchemy Bar, with little cards with numbers on them.  There will be an announcement over the intercom when the numbers are available. 

 

We didn't have any excursions booked, so we just went down after breakfast and grabbed a number.  It was number 46, or something like that, but there were plenty of lower numbers available.  The cruise director would announce which numbers were available for boarding the tender over the intercom.  We were on the island with plenty of time to play in the water before lunch.

 

My advice would be to grab the lowest number available.  When the CD announced the numbers he would say something like "1 through 46 can now board the tenders".  You don't have to board the tender right when your number is called.

Edited February 10, 2020 by LoungingMcCoy