Go for the itinerary, not the ship!
MSC Armonia Cruise Review
Contributor Level:
Purser
Cruises: 7+ cruises
Review: 1
Helpful Votes: 9
7 Night Eastern Mediterranean (Venice Roundtrip)
Sail date: April 08, 2023
Ship: MSC Armonia
Traveled as: Large Group
Reviewed: 1 year ago
Review summary
Overall we had a good time. We had a larger group so there was almost always someone to meet up with. I think that is key, the ship itself doesn’t have much going on, especially since it rained 2 days while we were on it and it was too cold to use the pools. One last thing, the gym area is (surprisingly) is fairly nice - good size and decent selection of equipment.Embarkation
Our cruise departed and returned to Venice. Checking in wasn’t terrible, but longer wait than previous cruises I’ve been on. You wait on several lines, 1 line to check passports (make sure the passport # you wrote down are correct) this took about 20 minutes. Than another to drop off suitcases 7-10 mins, than another to check passports again and get keycard, about 45 minutes. By the way, when you get your keycard, they do not take your CC for room payments. You do that on the cruise later on. Good or bad, not sure, maybe it speeds up the line to get your cruise key card.
After getting processed and everyone gets keycard, we had to take a tender to get to the ship! Didn’t expect this, it was a long ride (approx 35 min) on a boat.
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
Overall the food was okay, some good things here and there, some dishes I would think is easy to make and I expected to be good, not that great.
Buffet: In general, the buffet food is okay, some days are better than others. The one stand out items are the curry dishes, they were very good!
Overall, we found the breads on the ship to be very good. The chocolate croissants during breakfast are excellent, especially if you catch them bringing out a warm batch! They seem to have a good bakery on board. I noticed there weren’t any bagels though.
Main dining room (dinners): This was hit or miss also, the first day, I was excited the see rib eye with chimichurri sauce on the menu, didn’t taste anything like I expected. Steak was very thin and sauce didn’t taste like it was supposed to. But some dishes were very good.
The good: pizza on deck 11 was very good. It’s open from 11:00AM-1:00AM. They had different pizzas on different days. My favorite is the white with onions and black olives. Side note, if you order pizza for room service, there is a charge, €8 I believe, it comes from the pizza shop on deck 11. You can also walk up and grab a few slices anytime.
The bad:
Surprisingly the hot dogs and burgers on deck 11, opposite side of pizza station, were terrible. Not sure why it was so bad, seems simple enough. The burger, if you put a lot of condiments in it, it’s ok.
Onboard Activities
Not too many interesting activities. They seemed to have Karaoke every night. Some fitness classes in the morning. There’s a library in the map, but it’s non-existent. It’s a section next to a lounge and casino with no walls or doors. There are book shelves, but empty. No board games or anything either.
Entertainment
Performances were mediocre, some better than others. The dance performances were generally good. Singing, not so much.
Service and Staff
The staff was okay, main dining room staff was nice and friendly.
Buffet area, they seemed to take their time cleaning tables off. Some days, staff would come over and clear dishes from our table. There’s not enough seating at the buffet, often have to walk around several times to find a seat. A few times, I cleared the table to get a seat.
Ship steward was nice and friendly also. But overall, I find staff in other cruise lines I’ve been on more friendly and harder working.
Ship Quality
Let’s face it, it’s an old ship. It was renovated in and expanded 2014. I feel some parts of the ship aren’t made for the 2500 passengers. Elevators for example are very small. One of the staircases in the didn’t reach the top deck. Possibly due to the expansion. The rooms look old and tired.
The pool deck looks old and worn. When it rained, some covered areas near the pool deck bars, where we sat for breakfast, and ping pong tables, where people were playing, had water puddling up. No staff was present to squeegee the puddles.
The atrium area where it’s usually one of the nicest spots on the ship with music playing, tall ceilings etc, was lacking the glitz on this ship. On the Armonia, it’s 2 floors with an old, tired water feature on the wall. On the 2nd floor, there’s a (old looking) piano on the side where someone was sometimes playing.
There’s only 2 ping pong and 2 football tables on the ship that was always being used.
To sum it up, the ship’s condition is clean, maintenance seems decent, but it’s just tired looking and probably needs another makeover or sold.
Cabin / Stateroom
The cabin is on the small side, we had a window room, the bed is butted up against the window, so if you want to look out, you would have to climb over the bed to get to the window. I’d prefer if the bed was horizontal in the room and you can walk around the bed and sit by the window. There are not many amenities in the room, just a small flat screen TV, refrigerator, a safe (our safe wasn’t bolted down, so theoretically someone can come in and take the entire safe) and 2 US outlets + 2 European style outlets. No tissues, no lotions, conditioner, the wastebasket in the room is a metal pail divided into 3 sections labeled: plastic, food and paper. So I wasn’t able to throw out my soda can, and where do I put garbage that’s not in any of those categories? A bit odd.
Ship tip
Manage expectations. No frills cruise ship, know what you’re getting.
Thumbs up
0
Ports of call
Disembarkation
Very slow and inefficient. We were scheduled for 10:05, actual time 11:10.
1 person scanning people off the ship!
Tender takes about 30 mins. We had friends that needed to get off early to rush for a flight, they were transported via bus to the main terminal. So there’s an option of bus or boat to get to and from the main terminal, unfortunately they choose the slow method for most of the passengers.
Getting on and off at the destinations was also slow, they often have 1 point of exit and entry with 1 person scanning. Terribly inefficient!