Legend Review (8/23-8/30)

My bf (33) and I (30) returned yesterday from our cruise on the Legend. This was my 7th cruise and my bf’s 3rd. I am always shocked at how quickly time passes on a cruise. I am one of those people who starts the daily countdown when I am still in the triple digits. The time leading up to the cruise passes sooo slowly and then once it gets here, it's all over in a blink of the eye. I absolutely cannot believe it is already over and I am home again. I think that means we had a good time :)

I was really excited about this cruise, as it was my first time on a Spirit class ship. I’ve been on the Fantasy, Inspiration, NCL Spirit, and Glory 3x. My bf has been on the NCL Spirit and Glory. We both agree that Legend is our new favorite ship!!

Pre-Cruise:

We left Saturday morning around 9 and drove from Atlanta to Tampa. It rained almost the entire way and we ran into a couple of car accidents and lots of traffic, so it was about an 8 hour drive. We got to Tampa at about 4:45 and checked into the hotel. We stayed at the Hampton Inn in Ybor City and we both really liked this hotel. The room itself was very nice and the hotel is in a great location (you can walk to the restaurants/bars) and only about a mile from the port. They offer a park and cruise package – you get a free shuttle to the port and can park your car for the length of the cruise (in a covered parking deck). We booked through the hotel website – with taxes, I think it was about $130. We also were charged parking for one night, but it was only $7. Parking at the port is $98 for 7 days, so the hotel's cruise and park package was a great deal.

After checking into the hotel, we drove around Tampa for a bit to get our bearings. My bf wanted to check out the football stadium as it is the site of the ACC Championship game in December and we are hoping to come back and watch Georgia Tech play in that game:)! We found the stadium and drove around downtown and passed the port before coming back to the hotel. Downtown Tampa appeared to be nice and clean and I wouldn't hesitate to stay in a hotel in that area.

After returning to the hotel, we changed clothes and walked around Ybor City. It’s a really neat area – lots of restaurants, bars, and a movie theatre. The Hampton Inn is only about two or three blocks from everything. We ate dinner at an Argentinean/Cuban restaurant called El Puerto (elpuertoybor.com). It was very good (we both ate steak) and I highly recommend it. After dinner, we went to the Tampa Bay Brewing Company for a couple of beers. We walked back to the hotel and went to sleep in preparation for the exciting days ahead!

I am going to try to post pictures as I go, but I didn’t take any pictures until we actually got on the ship. I will be happy to answer any questions that you may have!

Next up - embarkation day!

Looking forward to your review and photos...the Legend just "might" be our next cruise! :)

It is our next ship so I am very excited to hear more!

Yes, more, more, more. We're going on the Legend on 2-7-10. It will be our first Carnival ship. Can't wait. Love all the reviews people post. Looking forward to your pictures.

Loving your review. I am from Atlanta too, but have not lived there for years.

I agree with Delta Dear! We're cruising at the same time!!

Can't wait...its going to be my honeymoon!!:D

This is our next cruise. Looking forward to reading more. :cool:

Great review so far! We (me 32, bf 39, DS 13) are also from the Atlanta area and will be sailing the Legend in 19 days! Can't wait to read the rest!

Day 1 – Embarkation:

Drink of the Day – Funship Special

I woke up early this morning and went downstairs for coffee to entice the bf out of bed. The hotel offered complimentary breakfast – a mixture of hot and cold foods. After eating, we went back upstairs and packed up our stuff. The girl at the front desk the night before slightly misconstrued the shuttle situation. She told me we could not sign up for the shuttle until we were standing there ready to leave. Well, once we got downstairs, I discovered this was not completely the case. There were people signing up for the shuttle well in advance. We were downstairs slightly before 10 and the first available shuttle was at 10:45. So we sat in the lobby with our luggage and waited. The shuttle was running slightly behind and we ended up leaving around 11.

We arrived at the port at exactly 11:15. All cars pull into a covered driveway and there are tons of porters standing there to grab your luggage. We had to show our Funpass and passports to get into the terminal. From there, we went up a set of escalators, through the security checkpoint, and then got in line to check in. At first, there weren’t many agents checking in, but more came as we were in line. While we were waiting in line, they began calling group numbers for boarding (around 11:30ish). We were given boarding group #8 and waited maybe 10 minutes in the waiting area before our number was called. After our embarkation photo we were on the ship at exactly noon. YAY!

After boarding, we headed up to the buffet on the lido deck (Unicorn Café) for lunch. In the Unicorn, there are separate lines for each buffet. In the middle, they have Asian, Deli, Rotisserie, Taste of Nations and Desserts. Salad and Pizza are in the rear of the restaurant and the Grill is outside by the Midship Pool. There is also a specialty coffee shop located between Pizza and Salad.

I immediately headed to the Asian buffet. They typically offered fried or white rice, a couple of soups, egg rolls, a veggie entrée, and several meat entrees. Here’s the picture of what I ate:

After eating, we walked around the ship to check things out. As I mentioned before, this was my first experience with a Spirit class ship. Now, I read Cruise Critic religiously, so I had read many, many reviews before this cruise. And, consistently people always mentioned that they liked the “small size” of the Spirit class ships. So I was really expecting the Legend to be noticeably smaller than my other favorite ship, the Glory (Conquest class). I was definitely misled by the Cruise Critic comments!! To me, the Legend did not feel any smaller than the Glory AT ALL. If anything, I felt like the Legend had more public areas and places to lounge than the Glory!! I did far more walking on this cruise than any other cruise. I feel like the Spirit class ships are more thoughtfully laid out than the Conquest class ships and make much better use of space.

On the Legend, most of the public areas are on decks 2 and 3. The show lounge (Follies) is at the front of the ship on decks 2 and 3 and the dining room (Truffles) is located on decks 2 and 3 aft. On deck 2, you have to walk through the casino and on deck 3, you have to walk through the photo display area. Both of these areas seemed to cause the most congestion throughout the week.

After wandering around for a little while, it was 1:30 and the cabins were ready, so we headed down to our room. We had booked an inside guarantee and ended up with cabin #4189, which is a 4F. This was a fantastic upgrade!!! The 4F cabins on Spirit class ships are not really “inside” rooms, but obscured view rooms. They look just like balcony rooms but have a set of French doors that open up to a view of a life boat. There is a bar and glass wall outside the doors, so there's nothing to step out on. If you look below the boat, you can see the ocean and the outside promenade on deck 3. We were at the end of the life boats, so we could see around the edge of the front of the last lifeboat. There was definitely more of a “view” than I anticipated. The French doors are nice if you need fresh air and we always opened them when we were putting on our spray suntan lotion in the mornings.

Here are some pictures of our room.

Pic of the room and lifeboat:

View of the port below the lifeboat:

Looking to the right outside the french doors:

Our room was way aft on deck 4. It was a good location b/c we only had to go down one set of stairs to reach the dining room. However, it was a looong walk to the show lounge. We were directly above a lounge on deck 3 and heard no noise from it all week. However, there are no inside cabins across the hall on deck 4. Instead, we were directly across a door marked "crew only." I have no idea what went on behind that door, but we heard a loud, short, yet persistent sound emanating in our room all week long, at all hours of the day and night. To me, it almost sounded like a gigantic bucket of ice being thrown into an ice bin. It woke me up a couple of times at the start of the week, but by the end, I think I got used to it. Other than that, #4189 was a perfect cabin.

Up next - embarkation day part 2....

Looking forward to the rest of your review. We will be making the same drive a week from Saturday - hopefully without the rain!

And, I like your comment about the ACC Championship, since my son (and lots of my money) is at Ga Tech. Go Jackets! :p

That's a pretty sweet "inside cabin" and all of a sudden I want Chinese for lunch, :D

Nice review, keep it coming and coming.:)

I am loving the review. It is getting more excited than I already was since we will be boarding the Legend this Sunday.

Great review so far. Can't wait to read the rest. I will be sailing on the Legend in November and I am looking forward to it.

I was just wondering your experience with the anytime dining. We're signed up for the 6:00 dining but we were wondering how it works if you want to come later. There are times we want to do something different like watching the sun set.

more!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I need more!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Cruising on the Legend in January, also from Atlanta, :D

Thanks for the review. We leave from Atlanta down for our Legend cruise in under 6 weeks. We can't wait. Any info you have from your capers on the poker tourneys would be greatly appreciated :)

I forgot to mention that my bf’s bags were already at our door when we got to the room (mine didn’t show up until after 5). After checking out our room, we headed up to the lido for a drink. We really liked to hang out at the aft bar. My first drink was a Blue Hawaiian. It is my absolute favorite. Here’s a picture:

After hanging out at the aft bar for a while, we had to do the muster drill. It was quick and painless. After dropping off our life vests, we went to deck 10 for sail away. Drink #2 was a Goombay Smash. View of Tampa from the lido:

A Carnival photographer took our picture:

We had hoped to stay out on the deck until after we passed under the big bridge, but by 5:30, I was ready to go back to the room, unpack, and get ready for dinner. I left my bf up there so that he could take pics (I haven’t downloaded his pics yet, but will post some when I get a chance).

For this cruise, we chose the Anytime Dining. Half of the upper level of Truffles is reserved for this and you can eat any time between 5:45 and 9:30. You can choose to sit by yourself or with other people (we always got a table for 2). I’m still trying to reach a definitive opinion on Anytime Dining. My bf liked it, but as he pointed out, he’s only had one previous cruise with the set dining time (his only other cruise was on NCL). Anytime Dining does have its benefits, but also a few drawbacks. We were able to eat between 7 and 7:45 every night (we had to wait twice, but never more than 5 minutes) and it was nice to eat on our own schedule. In addition, the meals were far shorter than my experiences with set dining. Most nights, we were done with dinner within an hour. We had three different waiters and all were very efficient. I figured out fairly quickly that the waiters sometimes grabbed "extra" appetizers when collecting the food from the kitchen for their other tables, so that we almost always got our first appetizer immediately after ordering. On the downside, I would describe the dining experience itself as somewhat frantic (and I’ve never described any cruise dining experience like that before). I guess I am easily distracted by what goes on around me, but it seemed like there was always people walking past our table. There was just constant commotion with people coming and going the entire dinner. We were always seated next to a walkway, but in reality, there are very few tables on the upper level that are not located on a walkway. Also, i think this contributed to the noise level - it seemed louder than on previous cruises and I had to strain to hear my bf a few times. In addition, it also seemed like people dressed a lot more casual for the Anytime Dining - lots of people wearing shorts. I wore a dress every night and was overdressed compared to most people. Overall, I think the positives outweigh the negatives and I would probably choose Anytime Dining again, but I missed having the single waiter and the slow, more peaceful meals.

Overall, the food in the dining room was very, very good. I think Carnival really shines with their appetizers – they were all really good. For dinner the first night, I had the chicken tenders, Caesar salad, flat iron steak, and crème brulee. Chicken tenders and salad were very good. My bf also had the flat iron steak. It was, by far, our least favorite thing that we ate all week. It was just not a good piece of meat. Neither my bf nor I ate very much of the steak. Thank goodness, we ended the meal with crème brulee; it is my absolute favorite dessert – it was sooo good.

I must also say that the upper level maitre d, Desi, was outstanding. I’ve never had any interaction with a maitre d before, nor have I ever seen one moving around the dining room. Desi is a very hard working woman and was all around the dining room all night. She was clearing tables, serving desserts, and interacting with everyone. I was so impressed with her. The other ladies at the hostess stand were also very sweet and hard working.

After dinner, we went to watch karaoke in Satchmo’s Lounge and then went to the Welcome Aboard show at 10:30. The show featured the singers, dancers, and comedian Thomas Brown. I thought Thomas was incredibly funny, but I don’t really remember the rest of the show. After the show, we went immediately to sleep.

I guess I’ll comment here about the cruise director, Jen. I had read numerous, numerous opinions here on Cruise Critic about Jen and, across the board, people labeled her as “annoying.” I really had braced myself for the worst, but she did NOT annoy me AT ALL. Jen has a pleasant British accent and her voice did not grate on my nerves. I really thought she did a good job; her announcements were a little on the long-winded side, but I didn’t think they were overly intrusive.

Next up – first day at sea…

Looking forward to the rest of your review. We will be making the same drive a week from Saturday - hopefully without the rain!

 

And, I like your comment about the ACC Championship, since my son (and lots of my money) is at Ga Tech. Go Jackets! :p

That's awesome about your son! My bf and I both graduated from GT.

The construction on 75 btw Macon and FL is still on-going. We saw lots of cops, so watch out for the speed limit changes in the construction zones!!

Thanks for the review. We leave from Atlanta down for our Legend cruise in under 6 weeks. We can't wait. Any info you have from your capers on the poker tourneys would be greatly appreciated :)

OK, I just quickly glanced at the capers for the poker info. I only found three tournaments:

First night (Sunday) - tournament at 7:30 ($30 buy-in for first 10 players)

First sea day (Monday) - tournament at 11 AM ($60 buy-in for first 10 players)

Second sea day (Saturday) tournament at 11 AM ($150 buy-in)

OK, I just quickly glanced at the capers for the poker info. I only found three tournaments:

First night (Sunday) - tournament at 7:30 ($30 buy-in for first 10 players)

First sea day (Monday) - tournament at 11 AM ($60 buy-in for first 10 players)

Second sea day (Saturday) tournament at 11 AM ($150 buy-in)

Thank you.

Going on Legend out of Tampa in Jan, 2010 - Love your review - keep it coming.

Love the review! We're directly across the ship from where your cabin was, we booked a 4f as well for our cruise! So excited when I saw the pics!

I've got to chime in and say the Legend is also my favorite ship! Looking forward to the rest of your review and pictures. Can't wait the hear what all you did in the ports.

Lol I suggest you speed this review up. It is a very nice review so far and me and my gf are heading out the Legend on Sept 20th. The reason I say speed it up is because if you do not then nobody will read it cause it will constantly keep being moved back. I woke up today looking for this review and didn't find it until the 3rd page. So just a little quicker, as I am sure your life does not revolve around the review lol.