Stick with Royal, Carnival, Virgin, Princess, any line other than MSC. This was our 16th cruise, we know what we are doing. I called MSC 6 times over the course of 9 months to ensure we had prepaid our tips, because I never saw them listed specifically on any documents, and I was always told "tips are included in your fare, we don't do them separately, like other cruise lines" with pride they said tips are included in the base fare. On day 3 we were hit with over $300 of tip charges because we had not prepaid them!!! I will never sail MSC for sure because of this. They lied to me for months and I knew that I needed to prepay tips and I tried repeatedly to prepay and they said I didn't need to.
Embarkation
1 out of 5
Chaos. Total chaos. The exiting guests from the prior cruise are directed right into the traffic of the incoming passengers. People physically crashing into each other, cabs & shuttles creating a traffic nightmare because arrivals & departures are right on top of each other. A total mess.
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
5 out of 5
Food quality and selection was excellent and the only positive I can point to
Onboard Activities
1 out of 5
From trivia, to the gym, to musical acts, there were constant disappointments. The audio systems were impossible to hear. Hosts had such thick accents that their English could not be understood. I asked one host to speak in Spanish, so I could actually understand them. I appreciate their effort to speak English, but no one in the crowd could understand what they were saying most of the time. Musical acts were so oppressively loud, it was not possible to enjoy the music.
Entertainment
1 out of 5
Weak performers, weak content and scripts. I don't expect Broadway level productions, but I expect Carnival level at least, and they were far below that standard.
Children's Programs
1 out of 5
My teen (14) attended Teen Club and observed several fights, one attempted rape, one kid sent to the infirmary with a broken arm from a fight. My teen was harassed intensely for their autism. All of this occurred while the staff watched, and never intervened. After day 3, our teen and several others essentially formed their own teen club and hung out together, outside of the teen club, so they could have fun and be safe.
Service and Staff
1 out of 5
Our room steward had no idea how to do his job. Maybe this was his first cruise, but our room was constantly missing towels, the bed never had a sheet on it. He took clothes off our bed and sent them to the laundry for some reason. We never filled out a form nor did we put the clothes in a laundry service bag. He just took them.
Ship Quality
4 out of 5
The ship is gorgeous and clean, but this does not overcome the other issues.
Cabin / Stateroom
1 out of 5
Smaller than a typical Carnival cabin, even with the balcony. Clean, but tight with half the closet space of standard Carnival or Royal cabin.
Ship tip
If you are traveling with kid, be aware, that MSC will not allow your kids to access the chat function in the app, so you cannot communicate to your children who are under the age of 16. This was so upsetting to us. The solution MSC offered was for all of us in our cabin to pay for the wifi package. Since it is a simply programming fix within the app, to allow chat only between members of the same cabin, this is not truly a safety issue. It's a money grap by MSC to force you to buy the expense wifi package if you want to communicate with your kids
Water is great, food options are too limited. Limiting drinks on the island is pathetic. Don't buy the drink package because they will only let you get 2 drinks total on the island, but you spend 11 hours on the island.
A total mess. Disembarking guests and incoming passengers are all mixed together, on top of each other, fighting for space. It is too crowded and too small of an area for the number of passengers moving on and off the boat.
This sounds like someone not wanting to pay tips. We went on this ship and did not encounter any of this. We got on and off the ship with not any problems. Had a GREAT time and will go again.
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