A Magic Time In The Med: A Semi-Live Trip Report From the Disney Magic

With Barcelona just over two hours’ flight from us, I knew that this was something we had to experience and we were lucky enough to snag ourselves places on the inaugural cruise. Over the last few days, we’ve been amongst the 2,300 passengers, who are the first to enjoy the Magic’s itinerary around the Mediterranean.

At first, it was very hard to believe that we were actually going to board a Disney ship in Barcelona, but those feelings evaporated when we saw the Magic in the harbor as we took a taxi to our hotel. We hadn’t arranged transfers to the ship beforehand through Disney, but if you want to do so and you’re staying at one of the hotels booked through Disney for the night before your cruise as we were, then it’s no problem, they’ll arrange it for you there and then. That’s exactly what we did and it was $50 well spent ($25 for each of us) to have our luggage taken for us and to be dropped right by the port terminal building.

There’s that great sense of excitement as you get closer to the ship, as it’s literally right by the quayside, dominating your whole field of vision. It’s a far more impressive sight than you get as you approach Port Canaveral. It didn’t take us long to clear security, but then we had to go and get our Key to the World card. For some reason, we hadn’t been sorted out at the hotel and they told us to ask at the terminal. The problem was, by then, they were expecting to see your documentation before they’d issue the card and we’d handed that all in at the hotel. That took some explaining, as some of the ground staff don’t have the greatest grasp of English, but if you persist, they’ll be able to summon someone who’ll be able to help you. (This is the type of thing that will get fixed as the cruises continue.)