Carnival Magic - Slow Service and smelly glass alert.

My family and I just returned from our second Magic cruise in the two years she's been sailing out of Galveston. I knew the shows would be the same as would most everything else but service was definitely sub par.

We dine the Anytime option and regardless of the time and location, food just wasn't coming out of the kitchen smoothly at all last week. The wait staff were great as usual but waiting 15-20 minutes for an appetizer, then 30-45 for dinner and another 30-45 for dessert made for long dinners that seemed to take the entire evening.

Room service was no better. My daughter drinks milk for dinner and room service is the only spot to get it. Our calls were regularly ended with 'it will be an hour to an hour and a half for delivery'. Again the staff was great when they delivered, which is all it takes to make me happy.

Finally, and this one has to be experienced to be believed. My brother in law smelled one of the dry glasses at our dinner table before water arrived. The glasses all have a distinct fishy smell. It happened most every night. That and one dinner glass and one coffee cup had lipstick on separate nights. Wish I knew the brand. It would probably do well to paint the Carnival tail in that stuff.

Would this, in any way, stop me from sailing Carnival? Heck no! We all booked our next cruise while onboard for later this year. BUT, I won't sail the Magic again for a couple of years. My hope is that somebody with authority comes across this writing and can do something about it. In my experience, two years is usually enough time for staff/issues to turn over and correct themselves.

I could send an email to corporate, but again in my experience those emails seem to drop off the face of the digital world. I wouldn't be asking for anything anyhoo.

We still had a great time.

Jesse

January-14th sailing (Key West, Freeport, Nassau)

Thanks for the heads up! Sailing the Magic in a couple weeks and am definitely hoping this was just an off week for them. I will report back with our experience.

Thanks for the review. I do hope the food and service improves.

Thanks for the heads up! Sailing the Magic in a couple weeks and am definitely hoping this was just an off week for them. I will report back with our experience.

I hope it was an off week too! The staff was always happy and friendly. Had I to lay blame, it would be behind the scenes. The kitchen and room service could be run badly perhaps.

The dance show they do around 7pm is fun to watch and the food was as good as I remembered it being on the first cruise I took on the Magic.

Jesse

I hope it was an off week too! The staff was always happy and friendly. Had I to lay blame, it would be behind the scenes. The kitchen and room service could be run badly perhaps.

 

The dance show they do around 7pm is fun to watch and the food was as good as I remembered it being on the first cruise I took on the Magic.

 

Jesse

I have a great patience for waiting for food or things similar to that knowing that these great people are somehow managing to feed 4000+ people in a 3 hour period so I can definitely get over the wait time. But dirty dishes are one thing that are a no-go for me. Would definitely have to bring that to their attention.

Glad to hear the food is still just as good. We cruised RC this past summer and the food was no where near as good as we are used to on Carnival so I was hoping that this was still the case.

Will be on the Magic next week. Hope they just had an off week.

My family and I just returned from our second Magic cruise in the two years she's been sailing out of Galveston. I knew the shows would be the same as would most everything else but service was definitely sub par.

 

We dine the Anytime option and regardless of the time and location, food just wasn't coming out of the kitchen smoothly at all last week. The wait staff were great as usual but waiting 15-20 minutes for an appetizer, then 30-45 for dinner and another 30-45 for dessert made for long dinners that seemed to take the entire evening.

 

Room service was no better. My daughter drinks milk for dinner and room service is the only spot to get it. Our calls were regularly ended with 'it will be an hour to an hour and a half for delivery'. Again the staff was great when they delivered, which is all it takes to make me happy.

 

Finally, and this one has to be experienced to be believed. My brother in law smelled one of the dry glasses at our dinner table before water arrived. The glasses all have a distinct fishy smell. It happened most every night. That and one dinner glass and one coffee cup had lipstick on separate nights. Wish I knew the brand. It would probably do well to paint the Carnival tail in that stuff.

 

Would this, in any way, stop me from sailing Carnival? Heck no! We all booked our next cruise while onboard for later this year. BUT, I won't sail the Magic again for a couple of years. My hope is that somebody with authority comes across this writing and can do something about it. In my experience, two years is usually enough time for staff/issues to turn over and correct themselves.

 

I could send an email to corporate, but again in my experience those emails seem to drop off the face of the digital world. I wouldn't be asking for anything anyhoo.

 

We still had a great time.

Jesse

 

January-14th sailing (Key West, Freeport, Nassau)

You should have just grabbed extra milks from the breakfast buffet and stuck them in your fridge.

You should have just grabbed extra milks from the breakfast buffet and stuck them in your fridge.

in our fridge? hehehe we're poor folk who usually stay on deck 1 with a locked mini bar due to our curious 18mo daughter. Actually there's a reason we stay on deck 1 usually: exit and entry to ports of call.

Where most people are huddled at the Deck 0 elevators after a long day of spending at a port city, my family and I take 1 flight of stairs to our room. Getting off is just as easy since we don't have to watch elevator after elevator open its doors to reveal packed passengers.

Jesse

in our fridge? hehehe we're poor folk who usually stay on deck 1 with a locked mini bar due to our curious 18mo daughter. Actually there's a reason we stay on deck 1 usually: exit and entry to ports of call.

 

Where most people are huddled at the Deck 0 elevators after a long day of spending at a port city, my family and I take 1 flight of stairs to our room. Getting off is just as easy since we don't have to watch elevator after elevator open its doors to reveal packed passengers.

 

Jesse

You can have the minibar unlocked and emptied by your cabin steward for your use of whatever you'd like to have refrigerated.

Jimmy Geegitz was offering you a valid option, regardless of where your room is located on the ship.

We were on the same sailing and we did Anytime Dining as well. About 7:45 to 8:00 PM each night for us and only once did we have to wait at the bar for our table to be ready. We got the same waiter each night and he was awesome. Geraldo or something like that, he is leaving the Magic in two weeks. Service only seemed slow on the first night that I can recall.

You can have the minibar unlocked and emptied by your cabin steward for your use of whatever you'd like to have refrigerated.

 

Jimmy Geegitz was offering you a valid option, regardless of where your room is located on the ship.

whaaaa . . . I know I am by no means a cruising expert but I hadn't even considered this. {{sigh}} We waited on room service and juggled keeping milk chilled for 7 days. Not the end of the world but still. Who doesn't want to see The Hunger Games and Mission Impossible dozens of times.

Seriously thank you for the tip.

Jesse

Well yes, you can empty your fridge. We asked but were told we had to do it and use one of the drawers to store their drinks and put them back at the end. We had no problem doing that, our room steward was terrific.

However if you are worried about a kid getting into the stuff you might need a drawer lock.

in our fridge? hehehe we're poor folk who usually stay on deck 1 with a locked mini bar due to our curious 18mo daughter. Actually there's a reason we stay on deck 1 usually: exit and entry to ports of call.

 

Where most people are huddled at the Deck 0 elevators after a long day of spending at a port city, my family and I take 1 flight of stairs to our room. Getting off is just as easy since we don't have to watch elevator after elevator open its doors to reveal packed passengers.

 

Jesse

I think they had milk on the buffet in the evening as well- atleast on Conquest. I am almost positive. Because after the first evening's dinner when it took about 15 LONG minutes to get milk at dinner, we started bringing our own.

An odor on a glass is caused by either a dirty towel used for drying or that it was not washed completely. Lipstick is just plain gross. I have had a glass of wine ruined by odor. Can't blame you for not liking that situation.

We were on this sailing as well. The first 2 nights we went to dinner @ 6ish and the line was really long but moved quickly. Once we were seated however the service was sloooow. we waited 45 minutes after we finished our appetizers before we got our entrees. On monday nite, our waiter mentioned that the dining room was packed early on but empty at 8, so we started going to dinner @ 8 and the service was MUCH faster. The food was really good for the most part, the only thing I got that wasn't great was the mahi mahi on the last night was really dry but other than that, everything else was very good.

I was on the same cruise and had the late dining and like everyone said, the first night was kind of slow, but found out that they had a lot of new staff come on board, so they were having to learn the dining room (they had to have a map of where the tables were.) After the first night everything was served and we were out by about 9:15/9:30.

Room service was no better. My daughter drinks milk for dinner and room service is the only spot to get it. Our calls were regularly ended with 'it will be an hour to an hour and a half for delivery'. Again the staff was great when they delivered, which is all it takes to make me happy.

Milk is available in the MDR for dinner.

We were on the Magic for the 1st. sailing out of Galveston, my only complaint was the dining room. The service was the worst we have ever had on Carnival and the food was just so so. I placed the blame on it being a new ship in a new port with a LOT of new crew. I thought they would get the problems worked out in a few weeks. Maybe not. Hope they get it worked out before long. Overall we had a great cruise and the Magic is a beautiful ship.

Doug

I had to go to the Lido buffet every night and ask for 3-4 cartons of milk for our little one. Even if I forgot to get it in time, crew was helpful even at the late-night aft buffet station. Pretty sure you probably know this by now after reading your posts in another thread.