Anyone on the Legend now/Alaska

Just wondering if anyone's on the Legend now, how is the ship and how are the shows, places to eat, etc

We are sailing on 8/15 to Alaska. If I remember I can come back and give you an update.

I'm not on Legend now, but did sail her last year to Alaska, my third cruise to Alaska, all on different cruise lines. In my experience, other cruise lines were better for Alaska. My favorite excursion through Carnival was the Tracy Arm Fjord Explorer excursion.

https://www.carnival.com/shore-excursions/skagway/tracy-arm-fjord-and-glacier-explorer-172060

That being said, no cruise to Alaska is bad. Most repeat some excursions and ports. In my 3 cruises, the helicopter ride to Mendenhall Glacier and the float plane to Misty Fjord (twice) were the best and most worth the money.

Also, in Alaska, onboard shows are an after-thought and should not be a deciding factor in booking. I did Norwegian and Princess the first 2 times I cruised Alaska, and both were better than Carnival Legend. And normally, my cruise preference is Carnival.

Hope you have a great cruise.

I'm not on Legend now, but did sail her last year to Alaska, my third cruise to Alaska, all on different cruise lines. In my experience, other cruise lines were better for Alaska. My favorite excursion through Carnival was the Tracy Arm Fjord Explorer excursion.

 

https://www.carnival.com/shore-excursions/skagway/tracy-arm-fjord-and-glacier-explorer-172060

 

That being said, no cruise to Alaska is bad. Most repeat some excursions and ports. In my 3 cruises, the helicopter ride to Mendenhall Glacier and the float plane to Misty Fjord (twice) were the best and most worth the money.

 

Also, in Alaska, onboard shows are an after-thought and should not be a deciding factor in booking. I did Norwegian and Princess the first 2 times I cruised Alaska, and both were better than Carnival Legend. And normally, my cruise preference is Carnival.

 

Hope you have a great cruise.

Did you see the northern lights? I read that they were visible the last couple days.

Not on it now, but, this is a repost I did a bit ago on another thread. We were on the 7/4 Sailing. We did not see Northern Lights.

We did do the small boat excursion. It does get closer than the ship. I'm glad we did it and I think it was worth the price. We saw two larger ships get much closer than the Legend did so I was glad we spent the extra money.

MDR is a mess. Seriously, a mess. The second night it took about 45 minutes to get bread and water. The staff is as friendly as possible with the chaos, but, it's a wreck. I think it is lack of training and, perhaps, an unorganized kitchen staff that is the cause.

Lido deck food is okay-not great-but okay. No bacon police, but, they are out of bacon FAST! If you take a break to talk the wait staff is there to take your plate. I wish they would slow down on that a bit, but, I appreciate their hard work. The pizza is great. Gluten Free take a bit longer, but, it's worth it. I DO wish they kept Chopsticks open longer. I think they had the best food on the ship, honestly.

Jen Baxter is a hoot! She was born for the job. She is so easy to spot and approach!

The performers are great! There is one young man, Jordan, who should be on a much MUCH bigger stage. He is amazing. The shows are sung live (I don't know if the welcome aboard show was sung live but the rest were), and, we were impressed with the quality of the productions and entertainers.

The children's staff is great! Very patient and they seem to go out of their way for the kids.

The ship itself is a good size. Not so big that you get lost. But, it's good she is going into dry dock. She needs a bit of work. A deep clean will do her good.

Our room staff was alright. Again-not great. A couple of times he forgot to give us a Fun Time. No biggie as they are found everywhere.

The main lobby bar isn't stocked very well so sometimes we were searching for a bar to just get kaluha. Weird, but, again, not major.

The photographers are RUTHLESS! Seriously! It's awful. Getting off in one port they tried to stop of 4 times on the gangway. 4 times. 4 separate photo opportunities. Within about 45 seconds. TOO MUCH! That said, I bought a ton of posed family photos. LOL.

It's funny-people here talk about how there are no suite perks...we were given waters, strawberries, a bag of laundry. We had FTTF so we got more water. We had celebrations and were given champagne and gift cards. My husband and son did the Behind the Fun tour and were delivered a plate of treats. We felt really spoiled.

It's a wonderful trip with amazing opportunities for once in a lifetime experiences. We loved our excursions and really have no regrets.

Adding: Our excursions were the small boat tour, the botanical garden/hatchery/glacer in Juneau (Great tour! Didn't care for our guide, but, the gardens are amazing and really worth seeing!) , we did a private tour in Skagway through Dyea Dave (LOVED IT!!!!!!! Way cheaper and super fun!). We did the crafting at sea thing with Zoe. We did tote bags. Very VERY little instruction but still a fun afternoon with a cool souvenir.

That being said, no cruise to Alaska is bad. Most repeat some excursions and ports. In my 3 cruises, the helicopter ride to Mendenhall Glacier and the float plane to Misty Fjord (twice) were the best and most worth the money.

Also, in Alaska, onboard shows are an after-thought and should not be a deciding factor in booking. I did Norwegian and Princess the first 2 times I cruised Alaska, and both were better than Carnival Legend. And normally, my cruise preference is Carnival.

 

Hope you have a great cruise.

I agree about the Mendenhall Glacier helicopter trip. Hands down, our best excursion ever!! Expensive? You bet! But totally worth it. Our advice to anyone who considers Alaska is to do everything you want in case you don't get back. It's expensive, but there's some amazing things to see and do.

And yes, the shows were fine last year, nothing spectacular. We kind of joked that this is where they sent the entertainers who couldn't quick cut it on the big ships.

I do have a trip report in my signature as well, but the pictures are gone because of Photobucket. :mad:

I just got back on Tuesday, August 8th. The Legend was much better than some of the reviews I read but I agree that the decor is strange and a little dark. There were plenty of places to eat with a variety of food. I really enjoyed Nancy the on board naturalist and Jen the cruise director. We had beautiful weather. My only complaint is that the windows needed cleaning. Not just the ones in public areas. Our balcony windows were also dirty. Make sure you download the Carnival Hub App. It was very useful. We had a great time.

I just got back on Tuesday, August 8th. The Legend was much better than some of the reviews I read but I agree that the decor is strange and a little dark. There were plenty of places to eat with a variety of food. I really enjoyed Nancy the on board naturalist and Jen the cruise director. We had beautiful weather. My only complaint is that the windows needed cleaning. Not just the ones in public areas. Our balcony windows were also dirty. Make sure you download the Carnival Hub App. It was very useful. We had a great time.

What was the weather like temperature wise? We are used to going to the hot places and aren't really sure about Alaska. LOL! What did you wear in ports? Shorts and tank top or pants and long sleeve? Thanks! :)

What was the weather like temperature wise? We are used to going to the hot places and aren't really sure about Alaska. LOL! What did you wear in ports? Shorts and tank top or pants and long sleeve? Thanks! :)

Alaska is all about the layers! We were there in July and it was chilly almost every day. I ended up buying a good coat on the ship, it was on sale! And being from Chicago, I'm able to use it again. But we wore jeans, boots, long sleeves almost every day. Except in Skagway, in port, we changed when we got back as the sun was out and it was about 70! I could have left a few of my short sleeve tops at home.

LAYERS!!! It was cool in the morning so I wore a sweatshirt over a short sleeved shirt and cargo pants. But it quickly got to warm for the sweatshirt. We had lows in the mid 50s and highs in the upper 60s. On sea days I wore shorts and a tee shirt around the ship. The only day I wore a jacket was on the Tracy Arm Fjord small boat excursion to the glacier. I took rain gear and it never rained. Everyone kept telling us how lucky we were to have such great weather. I hope you have good weather too but even if you don't you'll enjoy it. The scenery is breathtaking.

We were on the Legend on the 7/11 sailing. I am working on a review to be posted. I shot 2000 photos and need to thin them down just a bit.

It was a great cruise, by the way.

I was on Legend- sailed 8/8 and just got back on the 15th. I'm trying to catch up on things at work right now but I do plan on writing a review and uploading all of my funtimes (I also have Sharks activity schedule from Camp Ocean- this is age 9-11, and also Circle C- which is 12-14 year olds).

Just a brief recap- I agree about the MDR. It took forever! Food was same as I've had on every other Carnival cruise- some dishes are better than others but overall it was very good. Our waiter Jacob was awesome so it was totally not his fault- but the time between courses was so way too long. 20 minutes between dinner and dessert is just crazy- by then I wasn't hungry anymore (I mean- I still ate it... but jeez!!! LOL!!)

Bonsai Sushi- not worth the extra money IMO. It reminded me of sushi one would get from the grocery store. Just my opinion- I know some folks enjoyed it- I just was not one who did (and I personally love sushi!) And plan on spending a solid 2 hours there- even if you are the only diners in the whole place!!! Even the cruise director Lee walked out because it was taking forever for someone to come greet us and take drink order (his schedule is a lot busier than ours so I understood why he decided to eat somewhere else!!)

Legend is definitely showing her age- she is still in decent shape and I never felt unsafe, but peeling paint/wallpaper, stained carpets, etc... she will definitely be looking better after her drydock/upgrades.

We hung out in the Piano bar with Billie, played corn hole and trivia in the Red Frog pub, played Bingo, etc. Oh- and Atlantis bar which is right next to Art gallery- serves the Alchemy bar menu- they even have a cool light up bar menu. The Remedy was one of my favorite drinks. I did have cheers- and I don't think I even came close to breaking even- but my husband definitely got his money's worth and probably made up for me too LOL!!

Too cold for water slides IMO so we did not use them. Pools were chilly but people were in them every day (especially the covered one). My daughter swam one time and said it was too cold. My 14 yo son didn't swim at all. If you plan on swimming, don't forget your goggles.

Laundry is $3 per load- it's charged to your sign and sail cord so no need to bring quarters. The dryer took 3 cycles to dry my load so be forewarned... and there were only 2 washers on deck 5- and 1 was broken!!

Well- any questions, let me know. I'll try to have a review and my scans and pictures (I have over 1200 to go through between the cruise and our 3 days in Seattle) up by next weekend.

Oh one last tip- save your shopping for Ketchikan if you can. The port time is the shortest so if you have an excursion planned you may not have much time, but I felt they had the most shops and the best prices. Especially if you pick up one of those coupon booklets in front of the shops and head to Tongass Trading company. Ulu knives for $1.79, shot glass for 99 cents, sweatshirts for $6.99... I seriously needed a whole suitcase just for all of the stuff I bought LOL!!!