My wife and I sailed on the Carnival Legend out of Tampa from 8/7/12 to 8/15/12. Overall, we had a great experience, and will undoubtedly cruise again. We are looking at going to Europe in July 2013 for a Mediterranean cruise. We are both in our early 50s and are celebrating our first real vacation as empty-nesters. This cruise served as a belated honeymoon, as we were too broke to honeymoon when we got married! So, we had a lot of expectations.

HOTEL: We did not stay in a hotel. We flew into Tampa the morning of the cruise, taking the 8:15 American Airlines flight out of Chicago. We signed up for the port transfers option, which I highly recommend. A Carnival rep. met us at baggage claim, and the transfer to a bus and then the port was seamless, and no hassle.

SHIP INFO: The Legend is considered a medium-sized ship in the cruise industry. As I boarded the ship into the main lobby area with the Colossus atrium, I looked at the glass elevators going up 9 decks and asked myself "If this is a medium ship, what's a big one look like?" The decor is opulent, and a bit over the top, and reminds me of Vegas. The Legends theme is interesting, with different areas of the ship referring to different types of legends, from Greek and Roman, to the legends of cinema and music (Satchmo's lounge and Billie's (Billie Holliday) lounge). Overall, I liked the decor. It certainly is varied, and in general well-done. At 10 years old, however, it is starting to show some wear and tear. A couple of items that should be fixed immediately are the Colossus Mural in the atrium (The mural panels are starting to shrink with white gaps showing between them) and the chrome panels in the elevators. Every elevator in the midships and forward elevator banks has been vandalized by someone who strongly dislikes someone named Natalia. Come on, Carnival. These things mar the overall effect of the ship and make it look a little seedy. The ship is not too large, though, and by Day 2 I could find everything easily. My wife, who is directionally challenged, had a harder time. I felt that the ship was sized just about right, given the number of passengers on board. Even though I could detect some movement of the ship on the cruise at different times, it was not annoying or disturbing. A Carnival employee shared with me that this was the ideal sized ship. She said that the larger ships have a lot more people, and not that much more public space. The only time I felt overcrowded was at lunch on the day we left. Of course, this was because all 2000+ passengers were at the buffet at the same time. Once the ship got underway, this was not a big issue. Pool areas on the ship seemed crowded, althought there was always plenty of room on the sun deck. Neither my wife nor I are sun worshippers, so this was not a huge problem for us. We had no kids with us, so I can't comment on kids activities. Read more