shunter2309

I find this thread very interesting and very funny at the same time

 

Never thought coffee will be hot topic like this :-) but again I'm not coffee junky I can't go with out drinking coffe for weeks

 

I'm form Canada and never find as good coffee to drink in vacation in the USA.

 

 

I don't like Starbuck coffee ider I call it burn coffee how are the cappuccino and espresso compare to MSC ?

I agree! Being a Brit living in Texas, I am more used to being concerned about the quality of my hot tea (with cold milk). I avoid Earl Grey English Breakfast and all that other 'fancy' stuff whenever possible. Cheaper and darker the better when it comes to this Brit and her morning cuppa!

In the past on Poesia, I made do with Lipton. I assumed that Divina would have Lipton also but NOOOOOO!!!!!

Can't remember the brand, but it was some sort of English Breakfast tea. A little wishy-washy. Serves me right for not taking my own tea bags this time. But I survived - barely! ha ha ha ha

2 questions. Going to YC this Saturday. Do you get free laundry? Did they include all drinks even premium?

 

Thanks

we were surprised at the quality of quantity of drinks that were included in YC. It is probably a good thing that my husband discovered that Manhattan's were included towards the end of the week!!!

Thank you from an equally cold and foggy Dorset, UK for your great review. It was constructive, objective and whilst acknowledging some issues it was clear you had a fab time! We fully intend to fully enjoy our once in a life time holiday and will probably miss the soft serve too (for the same reason!!!)thanks :)

If your going to miss the soft serve - make sure you pay $1-2 for the gelato - to-die-for good ;)

Do they check you at the door???

I do not understand how if you brought another person with you to either the restaurant or lounge ,they would know.

Also, you get an assigned table in the restaurant ?

I was hoping to go to the main dining room a few nights to be able to sit with other cruisers.

Were usually ask for early dining, large table when we cruise in order to dine with others.

We are in a YC cabin this time.

As I stated above, dining in the main dining room may be difficult. Check with the Maitre D and your butler upon boarding and keep your fingers crossed. Maybe after our experience they have changed the process in your favor.

In Le Muse, your butler will escort you down the first night. You have the same table and wait staff every day. They will know if you bring in extra guests! Your table will be set for the number in your group, if you spring extras on them they'll know! La Muse you can go whatever time you want, the evening meal starts at 6.30pm.

As for the Top Sail Lounge and The One pool bar, again the waitstaff will know you. They all know who is in YC, and you will always be greeted courteously and friendly every time.

That said, we did on occasion take non-YC guests in with us. We didn't abuse this in frequency or amount of drinks. We were never questioned about it.

I wouldn't want to say what would happen if you turned up at Le Muse with non-YC guests. You may be get lucky and they make room for your guests, or they may have to turn them away.

Maybe.

We were on Divina over Thanksgiving, traveling with non-YC friends. We checked with MSC before sailing and they told us that it was no problem, our friends could come and dine with us, $20 each. "just let your butler know when". MSC also told us that the regular dining rooms have a spearate area for YC guests who chose to dine with non-YC friends in the main dining rooms and again, to just tell our Butler and we could go dine with our non-YC friends.

Well, you get on board and it's totally different. Basically, there is no area in the main dining room for YC guests. We were basically told it was not possible. After insisting politely, they were able to move our friends to another table that could accommodate us also. But I got the impression that this is NOT something they would be willing to do on a regular basis.

The one night we wanted our friends to come dine with us, we let concierge know in the morning. But there was no room in La Muse for our friends to join us. Now, we were a large group (4 in our family + 6 non-YC friends). In La Muse you have the same table nightly, so unless you have a large enough table to accommodate guests to start with, then I don't think it will work. They don't appear to have extra tables.

La Muse opens at 6.30 and always seemed busy at this time. Dinner can take AT LEAST 2-3 hours (unless you specifically ask for faster service). So tables won't start to be free until at least 9.30-10pm. if you are prepared to eat that late, then you may be able to get a larger table.

My advice is to ask at least a day or 2 in advance of the day you want to dine with friends, be prepared to be flexible with regard to timing, and don't be upset if they say no. It's not because they don't want to help you, it's because they just can't.

So, when we wanted to dine with our friends we went to the main dining room, and another night we ordered pizza in our cabin - which is totally amazing and as good, if not better, than everyone tells you it is! (don't expect a US/Domino's style of pizza either - this stuff is so fresh and amazing!)

Enjoy your cruise, we had a totally amazing experience in the Yacht Club!

We just got off the Divina, I wish we had known this before - sounds like a great tool!!

(But, it's also kinda nice being able to turn off your phone and put it away for a week too :) )

We were able to get tokens to play the bowling on the 2nd sea day. We went back on the last day, but couldn't play. The steward in the sports bar told us that only about 10 games had been played the whole ship.

For some reason the bowling game takes tokens, that you exchange Euro's for. They obviously hadn't figured out the whole Euro-$-token conversion thing. All other games in the arcades use your card, this would seem to be the logical conversion they need to make.

Talking of the arcade ....... be careful with your card there! It will allow you to make multiple swipes, so if you are rushing you can do multiple swipes to get one play, but get charged multiple times. Unfortunately this happened to friends of ours and their son. An expensive lesson he won't repeat.

If you have kids, get them the pre-paid cards, avail in $30 and $50 (I think). Once they reach this limit of spending they are cut-off until you refill the card again.

We asked this specific question before the 11/23 sailing, as we were in YC and travelling with friends who wern't.

MSC told us before we left that the MDRs have specific areas set aside for YC members to come down to dine with friends. Great, so we booked YC.

Unfortunately, once we were onboard we found out this isn't the case. We wouldn't have worried about it except that we had specifically asked prior to booking YC. We didn't want to do this every night, just once or twice.

After a little back-and-forth, and speaking with an officer, our friends in the MDR were moved to a table that could accommodate our whole group. YC members do NOT get complimentary drinks in the MDR.

There is also the option of inviting friends to join you in La Muse. This is $20 pp. We were going to invite our friends to join us, but again they couldn't get a table to seat us all. There are limited tables and you will dine at the same table every night, so if you want to invite extra guests it will be dependent on them finding room. Give LOTS of notice (at least a day or 2) and even then it is not guaranteed.

I know the staff onboard were pretty frustrated with this. Hopefully they will speak with the call-center people to set them straight. I have to commend the onboard staff though, they did everything they could to accommodate us given that it was MSC who gave us inaccurate information. The normal concierge and reception people were a straight 'no'. But if you escalate issues higher up the chain, then they are very accommodating. Not sure how much of this was becase we were YC.

Capt Francesco Venero :)

He was also captain of the Poesia last year.....

We crusied twice with MSC and twice steward introduce himself. why peopole need to see them all teh time I don't know .:confused:

ha ha, i know - right?!!! It's not like when you are staying in a hotel you are hanging around expecting to see the girl who comes to make up your room. It gets done when its needs to be, and all is good :) Get out and enjoy your cruise!

With regard to the ice - I'm from the UK originally, so don't take ice in my water or soda. My husband, American, used to laugh at me. But now he rarely has ice in soda - it just waters it down and you get less.

Chuck?

 

 

See you Saturday - I wonder if we share our butler or each room comes with one.

 

PHIL

 

 

I read somewhere that there is 1 butler to every 4 cabins or so. Compared to 1 steward toe very 20 cabins outside of YC

We sailed on Poesia last Christmas and there were a lot of kids.

It's the Holidays and kids sail free. I doubt the YC will be as crazy as the rest of the ship, but I think you should just get used to the idea now, "just in case".

If the thought of children worries you that much you may want to consider sailing when the bulk of kids will be in school.

I understand what you mean by "unruly" kids, honest I do. Some parents do seem to let their kids get away with behavior that I would consider unacceptable (mine are 9 and 7 and by no means angels - I apologize now to anyone in YC over Thanksgiving, LOL!). But, kids will be kids and it's just part of sailing over the Holidays. It is their vacation too, so I try to let me kids get away with a little more than they usually would do at home.

Interesting....We were told by MSC USA that late dining for our cruise from Miami on Divina 12/10/13 was at 7:30pm for sure.

 

Guess the fireworks extravaganza on the 11/20 cruise will take the place of any "sailaway activity" when the ship leaves at 7pm?

 

Enjoy your cruise!

It sounds like these activities are just for the first departure from Miami.

Thank you very much. I am going to post this on our Roll-Call. We are still concerned about the drink packages and dinner though. It seems that everyone at the table is supposed to be on the same package to eat together. Do you know about this? What if the non YC friends have a drink package, Can you still sit together even though being in the YC you do not get free drinks in the MDR?

I can't see how that could apply to an occasional dining. If you sat together every night, and requested a table together then the rule that tied bookings need to all have the same package would apply.

I have 2 questions regarding yacht club

1. where do they do muster? do you stay within YC, or do you have a muster station outside of YC?

2. disembarkation. is the process any quicker/easier being in YC? Do you get to wait in YC on the last morning?

Thanks in advance

We were on MSC Poesia last Christmas (2013). I can tell youa bout that, but haven't cruised any other line over the holidays.

The decorations were lovely. Lots of them, trees everywhere. Lots of lights. Really pretty.

Christmas Eve they had on the Animation team guys dress up as Santa. Pretty pathetic costume, but they weren't really trying to be 'authentic' (also remember that St Nick, or Father Christmas in Europe is very different that the US Santa). He gave out gifts to the kids which was nice. Long lines, but our young ones enjoyed it.

Not sure if this was just our perception, or if others felt the same, but we got the impression that the crew just weren't "into it" much. It felt kinda flat. We were also on board the following week for New Year, with the same crew, and the atmosphere was totally different, it was an awesome vibe - lots of fun and excitement.

I wonder just how much the crew miss their families at Christmas (even those who don't celebrate)? Its got to be tough on them.

Not many people decorated their cabin doors. We did ours, and got lots of positive comments. Just a little wreath, nothing much. Lots of Christmasy t-shirts and Santa hats to be seen.

It was fun, but I think I would prefer to do New Year over Christmas next time.

Thank you very much. I am going to post this on our Roll-Call. We are still concerned about the drink packages and dinner though. It seems that everyone at the table is supposed to be on the same package to eat together. Do you know about this? What if the non YC friends have a drink package, Can you still sit together even though being in the YC you do not get free drinks in the MDR?

I couldn't comment on that, you would be best to call MSC.

However, we've traveled with friends and have all had different packages and it hasn't mattered in the past. Not saying it won't in the future.....

I would think since you are just dinner guests for the evening it woulnd't matter unless your bookings are linked together.

We sailed on Poesia 3 times, and have always had to go to our muster station (NOT a lounge) prior to sailing. You HAVE to wear your life vest, and they seem to enjoy sending a photographer around to document how ridiculous you all look :p

We're sailing Divina on 11/23. I'm not sure how it will all be handled - especially those with early dining at 5.30. Will be interesting to find out, for sure!

We are traveling in YC, but have friends who aren't. We specifically asked MSC how this will work for dining, and this is what we were told.

You have 2 choices:

Your non-YC guests can join you in YC for $35 each. Or,

If you want to go the main dining room just let your butler know. Each dining room has an area set aside for YC guests. You and your friends will all be taken to this area of the main dining room to dine.

In the Caribbean they do - only if you want them. If you don't want them to they certainly don't push you to have them taken.

In the Caribbean they do - only if you want them. If you don't want them to they certainly don't push you to have them taken.

I'm confused.

That looks like the YC area. Are they selling it out to everyone else now? Will it still be available as an inclusive for YC members?

Oh, phooey, we are in 13150 -- should we move??? Looks like that is an impacted cabin... Getting leery about this whole booking.

We're in 13108 and not at all worried. It all depends on how much you plan on sitting on your balcony to enjoy the sun. For us, not much. We'll find a deck for that. We just enjoy our balcony for a quiet drink and to enjoy the view on port days, an overhang doesn't affect that really.

If however you plan on using your balcony for sunbathing, you may want to reconsider.

I am European and was also on that cruise. I can only say that if all Europeans are rude then all North Americans are greedy and obese. It's only the French who are rude :)

Thank You, Thank You, Thank You - LOVE IT!!!:p