peder

Did you end up booking? I'm having trouble finding much info about the Bellissima's jaunt around Asia. I assume different social media apps are used, but you'd struggle to even know this ship is in operation based on how little info there is out there.

I meant crowded outside by the pool areas, despite the Seaside class ships have the highest percentage of outdoor space in MSC's fleet (similar to the Prima/Viva and a few other ships designed in the same era). I never experienced any crowding inside.

Yet another data point that the move of the Seashore to Port Canaveral has been a disaster, at least at the start. OP, you'll get some resistance here, but your comments on this sailing are echo'd by many others that were on these initial Port Canaveral sailings.

I am, but I hate using TAs. Give me direct control over my booking any day of the week without needing to go through a middleman.

Ah, sure. Each one I've ever used always says I need to "Request a Consultation" to continue, and that's usually when I stop searching. It's weird because Explora is trying to appeal, I assume, to younger audiences, but I'm not just going to jump into purchasing a cruise without getting exactly the cabin I want, without needing to chat with a TA or jumping through hoops finding the one website that lets me search inventory. They need to make things super simple.

I get bombarded by their ads on social media and YouTube

Are you able to see which cabins are available via the Explora website? When I do a mock booking I can't select my cabin.

It was designed for sailing in the Caribbean with fair weather everyday. So there's plenty of places to walk around, but none are covered, as far as I recall.

I really don't think large, modern cruise ships are a good fit for this YouTuber. I've seen how crowded things can be on the Seascape/Seashore, with even the Aurea and Yacht Club areas feeling plenty full on sea days. I imagine it's worse on the Meraviglia-class ships since there's less outdoor space per passenger.

It does not sleep 5. MSC perhaps originally planned to allow the Royal Suites and Owners Suites to sleep 5, but they do not in practice. Your upgrade offer will go nowhere, even if the room is available. Interestingly, the MSC website still lists in some places that the rooms sleep 5 but won't let you book them as such.

There's no covered walking deck, no

The weird thing about the chimichurri... do MSC chefs not have social media, do they not have the ability to see what these dishes are universally agreed upon to look like/taste like? Like, nowhere else in the WORLD can you get dishes that MSC will sometimes serve up. Nobody thinks these dishes are supposed to be this way EXCEPT for MSC.

I wasn't sure if anyone's been able to arrange anything with MSC beforehand so that the cruise doesn't start until a later date

Looking at the Bellissima in Japan, trying to finagle what would effectively become a back-to-back but can't make the dates work exactly.

Lots of discussion on Facebook that the Nov 16th Seashore sailing was a bit of a hot mess, with even a few new complaints that I don't think I've heard before about MSC (i.e. room service breakfast never showing up, reported by many guests). Hope things are a bit smoother in YC and otherwise smoother overall on this sailing.

Anyone have experience doing initial boarding after a few days into a cruise? We have a tight travel window that we're trying to make work, and the cruise is sold out at the port we'd like to embark at. Has anyone booked from an earlier, different port then boarded later?

The date filters now work reliably!

There could be some.... extracurricular activities going on with MSC that benefit from transatlantic sailings between South America and Europe. But it's probably as simple as seeing where the puck is going: an area underserved by the cruise industry despite a growing middle class. MSC wants to build a loyal customer base when the other, more risk-averse cruise lines won't go to Brazil.

I consider that a rounding error at these sizes 😅 Agreed there's a good chance that World 3/4/5 are a "World Plus" class, following the Meraviglia Plus and Seaside EVO classes before them. I just hope they add more connecting staterooms, but I think at least one of the ships will try to copy Icon of the Seas' Surfside Neighborhood for families in the aft of the promenade.

I don't think they'll be any bigger, but I think they'll continue to make small changes. Specifically the promenade toward the aft of the World Europa seems so plain that I think we'll see quite a few changes back there.

The Oasis and Icon class ships have done interesting things with the Y-shaped design... I wonder how creative MSC will get with the remaining ships in the similar-ish World class.

I'd also recommend this space. I've seen them doing activities here during the day (I think they did some sort of trivia or one of the Kids Club activities?), but it's empty more often than not.

Anyone have experience with best/worst locations on the ships for wifi? Any thoughts on if this is dependent on which ship you're on?

Yep, especially this close to the sail date, could easily be sold out. One last anecdote: I'm pretty sure my Seashore sailing this summer disappeared a few days about 30 days out. It wasn't sold out, and re-appeared a few days later. My memory on this isn't perfect, but I think I had been trying to find which staterooms were still available for purposes of an upgrade, and I was unable to do so because my sailing briefly disappeared. I assume they were doing some batch job close to the sail date that temporarily locked the inventory.

Cruise Plum listed two YC categories for sale, and they refresh every 12-24 hours. I would find it a bit odd that just overnight both of those categories were suddenly sold out. It's possible, I suppose, but I've seen these inventory fluctuations happen a lot with Euribia sailings (you can see my own posts here on the topic). They have some obscure business rules and/or contracts with travel agents and major 3rd parties that cause rooms to appear and disappear, and sometimes even entire sailings. I don't think we'll ever get very clear information from MSC for why this occurs.