Carnival Magic Review

Some Good, Some Bad, A Lot of Ugly

Review for the Eastern Caribbean Cruise on Carnival Magic
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biggieboy
2-5 Cruises • Age 20s

Rating by category

Cabin
Family
Value for Money
Embarkation
Dining
Public Rooms
Entertainment
Fitness & Recreation
Service

Additional details

Sail Date: Jun 2022
Cabin: Aft-View Extended Balcony

We chose this cruise as a way to honeymoon without flying as we live close to the port. The price at the time was around $600 per person in an aft-view cabin, which was a good deal for us. However, knowing what we know now, we would have probably paid extra to some other cruise.

Good: entertainment, most of the service, main and specialty dining food quality, drink quality, Grand Turk, and 'fun' aspect. The entertainment was quite good, it was easy to find great musicians and comedians. We particularly enjoyed the violinists and piano bar. The service from many workers was superb, despite them clearly looking stressed. We found great service at the alchemy, coffee, piano, and lobby bars plus we had great servers at the steakhouse and great employees at the spa. We did encounter some rude employees who were trying to pressure us into tipping more, but they were far and few in between. The food in main and specialty dining rooms were of great quality, perfectly seasoned, and with a shorter wait. We did do a set 8 pm dining time so this may factor into my experience. The drink quality was phenomenal. We got the cheers plan and we made great use of it. Outside of day 1, the drinks were strong and tasty (for some reason the drinks were weak on day one). We liked the entertainment team, and we thought they were engaging, funny, and personable.

Bad: lines, buffet food, Amber Cove, and crowding. The lines for Guys, Blue Iguana, the coffee bar, and the alchemy bar were long. The lines did move somewhat quickly. We never waited on a line longer than 30 minutes, except for luggage tags (which I'll get to later). However, we felt that we had to basically excessively tip employees to avoid waiting over 30 minutes for a drink, which hurt our wallet greatly. The buffet food was very hit or miss. We enjoyed most chicken and dessert dishes, but many sauced dishes were overly salty and anything with pork or meat was often bone dry. It was not ideal, but we didn't complain too much. We gave up on the Mongolian wok due to 1+ hour lines. Amber Cove is great with an excursion. However, if you do not have an excursion, the free areas were limited and overly crowded due to other guests from another ship on the island. Finally, we felt that many activities would lead to tight areas to become overcrowded. Anytime they hosted trivia on the deck 5 midship stage you could not get a drink at the alchemy or red frog pub or coffee bars. In fact, it was hard to navigate this area at all.

Cabin Review

Aft-View Extended Balcony

Cabin was an aft-view balcony. To be frank, the room was not to my standards. There was some slime-type substance dripping down the walls, the curtains were covered in dust, and many of the sheets had dried blood stains. The bathroom however was clean and functional, but there was no soap. Another reviewer close to my cabin complained of a sewage smell, and we only smelled that when we opened the balcony door or went outside. The balcony itself was covered in soot and garbage from previous guests. I did not complain about these issues because I didn't want to burden the steward, who was nice but clearly stressed out and always working. The mattress however was very comfortable and the sheets were of good quality and cooling (despite the blood stains). The room was on the colder side, but we preferred that so we were pleased.

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