swimducky21

Looking forward to the review, sail the Magic in 6 days! 

One question, did you have the Quest?

Thanks for the replies! I'm hoping we get The Quest, it's a favorite of mine.

I'm on the Carnival Magic in a couple of weeks and noticed from John Heald's blog that we have two cruise directors (?), Simon London and Leigh Xuereb. Simon's sign off is 10/6, while Leigh's sign on is 9/22.  Is this something that's normally done when one CD is leaving and the next is coming on?

Thanks for posting! We leave Sept 22, can't wait. 

Sad to not see the Quest listed though, one of my favorites. 

Just curious as to what the cabin is you booked on the Magic? I'm in 2310 and by lookin at outside pictures and county balconies, I think I'm in between 2 lifeboats.

We love the cove balconies, so much so that our next cruise (Magic in September, room 2310) had to have coves on it. We previously were on the Dream, room 2353, and it was awesome. Being close to the water, seeing the dolphins swim next to the ship, and just hearing the waves at night. The room on the Dream was situated under the divider between dining room and galley so after 900 at night, most things went silent. Nothing was ever heard and I'm a light sleeper.

There was a day though that the hall and room smelled like sewage but we said something to the steward. They ended up fixing it and even gave us champagne and chocolate covered strawberries too!

27 minutes ago, SteerageJoe said:

What are you looking for? Budget? Date of overnight?

There will be 4 of us and we're wanting to spend about $50 pp with free breakfast and it would be a Saturday night stay with departure on Sunday. 

Hi all,

First time cruising out of Ft. Lauderdale. Any suggestions on hotels and transportation to and from airport? I was thinking Embassy Suites on 17th St. I saw on their website they offer transportation from the airport to hotel and from hotel to cruise terminal, which is probably for a fee. Also what about after the cruise? Should I Uber back to the airport?

Thanks

That is not true at all! I've booked the Magic in September and already gotten a couple price reductions in wave season through my travel agent and there was no fee involved. 

We're also on Magic in September. Was wondering who the CD would be, thanks.

14 minutes ago, Nic6318 said:

 

Hi

Yes. That is the only way you would know the price has dropped. Remember, it is the total price after port fees (port fees can go up and down as well) are counted. Don't forget, if you originally had a promotion that included an OBC, you would lose that if it wasn't still offered. When you book with a 3rd. party, they need to submit the request for you (Carnival will not deal with you directly).

Costco told me they would deal with everything, I would just need to notify Costco if I see a price difference.

Thank you!

21 hours ago, valandemmy said:

HOME AWAY FROM HOME

Was this through Carnival? If so, how much was it? 

When you see a drop, are you doing a mock booking or what? I purchased through Costco, but they said if I see a price drop on Carnival I can just call them. I'm just not sure what to look for.

On 4/7/2017 at 3:22 PM, Drrandall said:

Good to hear. We are in room 2366 in 90 days.

Did you have any noise when you cruised in this room? Considering same room but on Magic in September.

Thank you everyone for you're input! I greatly appreciate it :)

Hi everyone,

I'm going on a cruise leaving 4/14/18 from the Tampa terminal. Unfortunately, our flight doesn't come in until about 12:30am on 4/14. I have a few questions:

1) Where would you guys recommend staying?

2) How do you get to the hotel?

3) How do you get to the terminal?

Thank you in advance.

2 questions -- I see your cabin was a regular room wth balcony (not suite). I would love to have a lounge chair out on my balcony. I didn't realize that it would fit and they could bring one. Also how did you get all of that stuff?? When you said "they inlcuded" who did you mean?

We asked our room steward to get the chair and she asked her supervisor. If you want a lounge chair need to ask early (around 1) when rooms are open because the supervisor only allows so many. Keep in mind we were also aft on the ship and the balconies are larger in the aft.

By "they included" I mean the packages we got through Costco. The stuff that I listed was included in the packages.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

I just seen your pictures. Some like mine, others different. :)

 

We had an inner room. Did you get "chocolate's" on your bed, as you were in an "elite" room?

On Carnival we weren't in an elite room, we were in a cove balcony deck 2, but we got chocolates there. On RC we in category d1 or d2, neither elite, and didn't bet chocolates. Hope that answers your question.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

I just started reading your review of the FOTS's. We just got off of it (I believe the same itinerary) the 4th of May.

 

We don't live too far from each other if you live in St. Louis, as we live in Kansas City, and I work close to the airport. The only difference, we fley, and you folks drove.:)

We left May 25th, so probably the same itinerary.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Thanks everyone for liking my review!! It took some time, but I'm glad there are people who appreciate it. Make sure to check out the photos! Also, if there are any questions, feel free to ask.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

The cruise was much better than Carnival, besides the cabins. Our cabin was set up for 3 people with no room for anyone else. It was also in the aft of the ship and for some reason the ship vibrates. I don’t know why this is, but people were complaining and guest relations said it was the way the ship was built. One thing I noticed was on Carnival there was more room for storage, we got a gift package with a bunch of different bathroom essentials when we arrived and when the beds were put down at night, we got Andes mint chocolates. On RC, we didn’t receive the package or chocolates, but instead of clothe curtains, we had a shutting glass door, which was nice especially when we hit choppy waters at night. Behind the shower doors though, there was mold that was noticeable. That was probably the only downfall I saw about the maintenance of the ship the whole time. Our rooms were cleaned every morning, afternoon and put down at night with a cruise compass for the next day and sometimes a towel animal. Even during the day while we were in port, there were staff painting, wiping down the railings and cleaning windows.

On our last day, I guess the lady in the room next to the boys was sick the whole cruise. I wish I would have taken a picture (unfortunately I didn’t) but the room was all torn apart: carpet out, bed out, and disinfectant everywhere.

If I think of anything else to add, I will do it. If you made it this far, I just wanted to say thank you for reading the whole thing! Hope you enjoyed it and if you have questions let me know, I’ll do my best to answer them.

We got up around 7:30 and finished packing before we headed to breakfast. This time, we went to the MDR. We thought it was going to be crowded, but wasn’t at all. Lucky for us, we were in and our in 20 minutes. TIP: if you want to get off the ship fast, do a self-carry off. We grabbed our stuff and just walked off the ship. Since we didn’t want to wait for our luggage, this was the best thing to do. On the way boarding the ship (first day) we overheard someone saying they had been waiting 3 hours for their luggage.

It took us 5 minutes to get through the terminal, until we hit costumes. Costumes were slow because they have to check your passports. TIP: if you have room, pack your liquor in your suitcase. We bought four 1L bottles of different kinds of rum and didn’t have to worry about thing. What was even weirder was that they didn’t check our bags. All we had to do was show our passports and say we had 1 bottle of liquor (a small lie) and we were through. Lets just say that if someone wanted to bring in marijuana, for example, they could have easily done that. Taking the shuttle back to our car was sad, but the driver did drop us off at our vehicle.

Afterwards, we went to the Kennedy Space Center. I’m not going to go into details about that since this is about the cruise, but in my opinion, completely not worth the $50/person we paid.

The last day aboard ☹. TIP: WAIT UTNIL THE LAST DAY TO BUY ANYTHING!!!!!!!!! EVERYTHING IS 10+% OFF, LIQUOR AND PERFUME INCLUDED!! The RC shirts were 2/$20.

The morning started out with waking up at 8:30 after the long night beforehand. The guys wanted to get up and to the stand up surfing before it ended at 11. We went to the Windjammer for breakfast and were out with plenty of time for them to surf.

Afterwards, we went to go look at the shirts and all the stuff on sale in the promenade. Around noon, there was a buffet in the promenade, with delicious food, along with many activities. The officers were there along with the head executive chef; we got photos with both. This was the last time I felt the presence of everyone. It was hard to move around the promenade with everyone at every table. At the booths, I guess you can call them, were different things going on. There was a table with napkin folding and another with towel folding both with pamphlets to bring home. At another table there was a chef carving out fruit for decorations. The last table we saw had an ice sculpture of a swan, which was pretty cool.

My boyfriend and I decided to go lay by the pool when we decided we had enough to eat; another large mistake. Like the first sea day, the pool was crowded and towels were covering chairs like no other. This day was way worse than the first one. I did see a patrol officer keeping watch though. TIP: if you can’t find a seat on deck 11 or 12, try taking deck 12 forward and there will be a staircase going up. It is windy up there, but it was not crowded at all and almost peaceful.

Around 5, the DreamWorks parade started. If you have little kids, this is definitely the one thing you don’t want to miss. All the characters come out. Although the parade doesn’t last more than 20 minutes, but it was fun to see the little ones’ faces brighten up their favorite character walked by.

After the parade, we went back to the room to get ready for the goodbye show before dinner. The show was something you don’t want to miss. It’s really interesting if you want to see almost everyone who is in charge of making your week a good one. The show finished just before dinner, when we found Casey and snipped a photo with him. He said he’d seen us at many of the shows and thought we were a well-behaved group of teens.

At dinner we made the best of times with our waiting staff before saying goodbye. TIP: there is a $12/day/person gratuity. With our Costco amenities, we did however; pay the most of this with the $500 we received. My dad also gave a tip to the head waitress, our waitress, and our assistant waiter, as they were very kind and knowledgeable about what was on the menu. At dinner that night, they honored the waiting staff and all the hard work they do, which was well earned. For dinner I had Caesar salad and rigatoni pasta. The pasta was bland was bland but after adding some pepper it did get a little better. For dessert that night I had apple strudel, and it was fantastic. After dinner, the guys played Blackjack, nothing new here, but afterwards is when the fun started.

So at the goodbye show, we sat second row. The adult comedian was there for about 20 minutes giving us a preview of what his show was going to be like. In the middle of his act, he started making fun of my brother’s friend, calling him a punk because he was 19 years old. So for the adult comedy show, we decided to sit front row. TIP: get there early as it fills up fast. This was probably the biggest mistake we made all cruise, mostly because it was just plain embarrassing. For the 45 minutes that he was on show, I’d say about 20 of them, he was making fun of my family. An example of this was my dad’s shirt. It was his last clean shirt, and probably the ugliest thing anyone has ever seen. My dad is from Wisconsin, so we are Green Bay Packers fans. His shirt, was a Hawaiian Packers shirt. I really don’t think I need any more explination. The comedian made my dad stand up after describing the shirt and everyone went wild. After the comedian, my parents went to bed and the kids stayed up for a little longer to pack ☹.

This morning, we went to the Windjammer for breakfast. Again, we didn’t have a problem finding a seat. I almost wonder if the people who say the Windjammer is busy are trying to sit by the windows, because those were almost always full.

We got off the ship around 10:30 and took a taxi ($22 total for 6) to Chankanaab (Cozumel National Park). It was about a 10-minute drive, nothing bad. My immediate family has been here before when we chose Carnival. This time, we were just going to sit on the beach. My mom found a coupon online at their website for $2 off the $21 price for adults, so we paid $19/person for my mom, dad and myself. The boys wanted to do the Royal Swim with the dolphins. Through RC excursion it was $185/person, whereas we paid $115/person going through their website.

When we got to the park, a worker who was very informative approached us. My boyfriend is a certified scuba diver, and the whole cruise he was saying how mad he was that he was going to Cozumel, but was not going to scuba. Come to find out, this worker told us at the national park, its $45 for certified scuba divers (must show proof) and $65 for non-experienced for an hour underwater, plus a class beforehand. A certified diver tour guide does go with you showing you around. The four kids did the scuba diving. I must say if you have a herniated disc like me, or even a bad back, it might not be the best thing because you have to walk a 30+lb oxygen tank plus gear about 200ft walk to the water, but once in the water it’s ok. I must say this was a very cool experience and probably something I’ll never get to do again. We got to go about 30ft below water and in a cave where we saw a thermal climb of salt-water (clear and warm) change to fresh water (foggy and cold). There was another tour guide taking pictures of us and if we wanted to buy the photos it was $60. I couldn’t bring my camera down, as it only goes 12ft.

Afterwards, the guys had the dolphin swim where they got kisses, pulled and pushed by the dolphins. Two years ago, I got to bring my waterproof camera into the area and take pictures/videos myself, but this year I couldn’t. They weren’t even allowing people to bring their own cameras in. If I wanted to watch from the side, I had to pay $5, but I still couldn’t bring my camera. They had people there taking professional pictures, but at the end they were charging $185 for a CD, plus the photos were washed out in color. TIP: the price for the discs is not final, barter with them!!! With the Royal Swim there is a buffet that comes with it in the building right behind the dolphin area. TIP: if you have people who have the royal swim wristband, have them go get food for you if you’re hungry, it is a buffet after all. Otherwise, the price of a plate of nachos is $8.

Going back to port, we stopped and looked around at the shops. TIP: the shops in the Carnival duty free terminal had better selection and prices than the Royal’s terminal. By the time we got back to port, it was time to start getting ready for dinner. Like I said before, we had 2 redemptions for Chops. This night, my parents were kind and said my boyfriend and I could use the reservations. That food was delicious I must say. For an appetizer I had grilled black pepper bacon, oh. my. god. It was delicious. For dinner I had spicy jumbo shrimp. They weren’t kidding when they jumbo. There were six shrimp and I only ate 4 of them. Dessert was awesome with red velvet cake. We were lucky to have sat next to the captain and his crew. I wish I could have talked to them and gotten a picture, but I didn’t want to bother them at dinner.

After dinner it was time to go to the ice show. TIP: make the reservations for the ice show online. Right after dinner, we went to the ice show to grab seats and there was a line about 100 people deep waiting to get into Studio B. The people who had reservations could get in first and get good seats, while the people who didn’t get first couple rows and had large poles in the way. The ice show is a must. There are some parts that are slow, but for the most part, it’s amazing how these skaters are doing spins, twists and even flips on a swaying ship.

Another must event is the 70’s Dancing in the Street party, which lasted about an hour. If Casey is your cruise director, oh my, you’re going to have a good time. I was lucky enough to catch a shirt. The whole dancing is a huge party in the middle of the promenade and the cruise staff is awesome, just make sure to look up. The guys decided to do on last night at blackjack. My boyfriend didn’t want to spend any more money, so my brother’s friend lend him $5. Lets just say my boyfriend was up to $140 in a matter of 30 minutes, but cashed out at $100 giving back $20 to my brother’s friend. By the time they were done, it was past 1 and time for bed.

I think this day, we went to the MDR and had breakfast around 8, with the first tender leaving around then go to go the port. Lucky for us, we were the only ship in port that day (our taxi driver said that’s unusual). Breakfast was nothing special again, almost repetitive.

We left around 9 to go on a tender to Grand Cayman Island. All we had to do was go down to deck 1, wait in line for not even 10 minutes and take a ride. The ride was only 5 minutes long, if that, and we were on the island. Doing some research before hand, my mom knew about the taxis versus the local transportation. TIP: The taxis in the port are $8/person, but if you leave the port and ask the security people, they can direct you to the local transportation, which is $2.50/ person (cheaper if you go a short distance). Keep in mind that this is a public transportation, so there will be locals getting off and on.

We had the cab driver take us to the best beach for snorkeling, which was Cemetery Beach. Governor’s Beach is extremely crowded and not the best for snorkeling. Cemetery Beach had less than 20 people the 4 hours we were there. After a while, we got bored decided to walk to Governor’s beach, 2 miles down the beach, in the hot sun. Lets just say everyone felt that walk later in our legs and ankles later that night.

We picked up a taxi from there to take us to the shops. TIP: IF YOU ARE GOING TO BUY ALCOHOL, IT’S ABOUT 20% CHEAPER HERE THAN ANY OTHER PORT AND EVEN ON THE CRUISE SHIP!!! My parents were going to buy Grey Goose (1L). It was $35 on the ship and $28 in Grand Cayman. For lunch, we skipped eating there because it’s so expensive. For a burger at a restaurant it was $16, so it would have been around $120 for all of us to eat. Instead, we went to the Windjammer and ate lunch for free.

After lunch the guys wanted to go boogie boarding and surfing, again fun tow watch them last for no more than a minute before they wipe out. For dinner, it was formal night again. All the chefs from the kitchen stood on the grand staircase while we listened to their positions. The chefs did have different neckties on. There were yellow, red, and blue. I know yellow was for the newbies, but I can’t remember what the red and blue were for. As an appetizer I had creamed wild mushrooms and slow roasted prime-rib for dinner. The second formal night is when they have the fisherman’s plate, which included lobster tail. The tails are small and my brother’s friend ordered 3 plates.

After dinner, the guys decided to play Blackjack in their suits before the Quest as they thought it was good luck. The quest starts at 10:30, and when they say “recommended for adults” they really mean it. TIP: GET THERE EARLY! We got there at 10 and studio B was almost already full, no kidding. I don’t want to spoil this activity for you, but let me just say this was another one of those games were I was laughing the entire time. It was just plain awesome. Soon after the Quest everyone went to bed to get ready for Cozumel.