It Was Fine Until We Moved! – My Magellan Baltic Cruise

Just back from a 12 day cruise around the Baltics on board Cruise & Maritime’s Magellan.  Now  I will do my best to give you  a balanced view of my time on board, however, be prepared, because there’s not many positives I’m afraid….

Just to put you in the picture, I have stayed overnight on this ship before – see my previous blog regarding the Gala Night Celebrations Magellan so I thought I knew what to expect.  I knew for instance that although she’d had a refurb, this was limited to the public areas, bars, lounges, and restaurants.  I knew she wasn’t a ‘new’ ship, just a ‘new addition’ to the CMV Fleet in 2005.  (she entered service in 1985 as MS Holiday owned by Carnival)

I knew the cabins were pretty basic, but spacious, with plenty of wardrobe space, comfy beds, adequate bathroom,  albeit with those awful plastic shower curtains, so no surprises when I entered Cabin 6162 on Atlantic Deck 6.  It is situated right by the entrance/exit to the elevators & lifts, so I was  bit concerned about the foot traffic backwards and forwards outside in the corridor.  (That turned out to be the least of my concerns…)     Although having said that can you just bear in mind that when you are congregated in the lift foyer area late at night, to keep the chat down please? People are trying to sleep!  Trying being the operative word.

So first night all tucked up in my nice comfy bed when my attention was drawn to the noise of rattling and squeaking coming from  the Air conditioning unit above my head.  Tried to turn it down so the fans didn’t spin so fast, but that just turned the cabin into a sauna!  Ok fair enough – had this problem before with newer ships so,  earplugs in, eye mask on and get some shut-eye, with note to self:  Drink more wine in evening to create wine coma….

The real fun began when the ship entered the North Sea en route to the Baltics.  So when the Captain ‘put his foot down,’ and ‘opened up the engines’ the noise and smoke coming from the funnel was truly deafening at times!   I thought I was on a Tug Boat and not a so called luxury cruise ship! Consequently, I hardly slept, what with the flap-flap-flapping of the air-con and the loud humming-chugging-rattling of the ships engines, which are situated mid-ship so no escape, wherever your cabin was situated.

Unless you were a very heavy sleeper, or sedated (which I suspect some of the older passengers may have been….more of that later…) there were very few passengers opting for the ‘Early Birds’  breakfast the next morning I can tell you!

We were on  Deck 6 with 3 passenger cabins below us plus the crew cabins, so I didnt expect to be subjected to so much noise.  However it seemed Deck 6 wasn’t the worse affected.  My fellow dining companions had paid a higher price to be on Deck 7, only to have their sleep interrupted by the noise of trolleys and crew in the service corridor above their heads going to/from the Restaurants on Deck 8.

There was no shortage of conversation around the table at dinner I can tell you! Sleep or the lack of it was definitely top of the Menu.  Talking of which – the food.  – In fact that deserves a blog of its own – so I’ll keep that for my next instalment.

To summarise then:  Be Prepared! Just because you pay a higher price for a higher deck, don’t think you will escape the noise.  If you do, count yourself  extremely lucky!  Take Ear Plugs! The ship is old, and although the public areas where they like you to spend your time and money are nicely decorated, the rest of the ship looks tired, and dog-eared, windows in need of a good clean, pools need a lick of paint,  WD40 on the aircon and  a new engine.

And yes it was a cheap cruise, 2 for 1 (for me especially as I only paid Agents Concessionary rates) and yes I know, you only get what you pay for, but come on CMV! Sort it out!

Next time: Food! Glorious Food! or How To Be Imaginative With Leftovers