Nice Itinerary

Carnival Magic Cruise Review to Caribbean - Southern

Cruises: 7+ cruises
Reviews: 10
Helpful Votes: 136

Overall rating:

3.8 out of 5
Carnival Magic

8 Night Southern Caribbean (Ft. Lauderdale Roundtrip)

Sail date: May 25, 2019

Ship: Carnival Magic

Traveled as: Singles/Friends

Reviewed: 4 years ago

Review summary

Nice cruise for the most part. I played in the $100K slot tournament and placed #34 (actually received a little money for that). That was fun!! The itinerary was great. I had been to all islands except Curacao. What a beautiful island!!! I purchased shore excursions for Aruba and Curacao. I was a little disappointed with the excursion for Aruba which was called Top 10 Best of Aruba....we just couldn't figure out the top 10 from the excursion. I loved the excursion in Curacao which was called See and Sea. The underwater part of it was amazing!! My cabin was fine and we had a great cabin steward (Gloria). I did not care for the food too much on this cruise. I discovered the Mongolian Wok for the first time and fell in love with it as a lunch offering. The service in the main dining room for dinner was quite slow except when I sat with a particular waiter (Ismail) and his assistants. When I sat with them, service was fast and efficient. When I sat with others, it was extremely slow and I would watch the food come out and sit for long periods of time before actually served to people. Embarkation was easy because our check-in was done at the airport when we went to the Carnival stand for our transport to the ship. That was my first time experiencing an airport check-in. When we got to the ship, we were directed to the holding area for priority members and embarking began shortly thereafter. Disembarking was quite chaotic. We had zone 1 but zone 2 and 3 were called when we were called. The luggage area was completely overwhelmed with people and the line for customs was excruciatingly long. I was told that as a result, Carnival did not call 3 zones at a time after that. Overall, it was a good cruise. The Magic is an okay ship but not my favorite.

Embarkation

5 out of 5
Outstanding - First time experience check-in at the Airport

Ship experiences

Food and Dining

3 out of 5
MDR at dinner was very slow except when I sat with a particular waiter (Ismail) and his assistants. I constantly watched food being brought in and sitting for long periods before being served.

Onboard Activities

3 out of 5

Entertainment

3 out of 5

Service and Staff

4 out of 5

Ship Quality

4 out of 5
I saw folks cleaning various areas constantly.

Cabin / Stateroom

4 out of 5
My Cabin Steward (Gloria) was great.

Ports of call

Ft. Lauderdale (Port Everglades), Florida

3 out of 5

Oranjestad, Aruba

4 out of 5
Purchased an excursion and the tour was just okay. I have been to Aruba before and I like this island

Willemstad, Curacao

5 out of 5
I really, really thought this island was beautiful. I purchased an excursion that was really nice. I was able to experience underwater in a semi-sub and it was quite amazing.

Disembarkation

2 out of 5
I had zone 1 but zone 2 and 3 were called at the same time. There was a lot of chaos in the luggage area and the line for customs were extremely long. I don't think they called multiple zones again after this happened.

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