Meraviglia, Port Canaveral Immigration

[Fogfog]

Does immigration at the the port/berth for the Meraviglia have facial recognition etc?

 

So much faster for immigration at other ports

[Cruisergal1208]

Have asked a friend on Meraviglia now and he said he’d let me know when he gets off Thursday. 

[dexddd]

They did in September.  We were some of last off and it took us maybe seven minutes from ship exit to outside curb.

[Morgsmom]

Yes they do at Pt Canaveral. 

[mscdivina2016]

11 hours ago, Fogfog said:

Does immigration at the the port/berth for the Meraviglia have facial recognition etc?

 

So much faster for immigration at other ports

2 days ago they did

[Fogfog]

Great.

It was the one "hole" we felt really detracted from our MSC sailings in Feb 2020...though wasn't an MSC issue as much as US immigration/customs. The line in Feb 2020 was LONG, slow and folks were cranky.

[Motegi]

Just disembarked Meraviglia at Port Canaveral today.  We were one of the last off the ship.  They had several face recoginition stations but they had our group of 5 bypass the electronic terminals and manually checked our passports.  No lines.  Only took a few seconds.   Fastest disembarkation ever!

[quattrohead]

Hi Motegi,

How is the Meraviglia ?

Thinking of doing one of the weekend cruises in February to check her out, looks lovely.

[Fogfog]

17 hours ago, Motegi said:

Just disembarked Meraviglia at Port Canaveral today.  We were one of the last off the ship.  They had several face recoginition stations but they had our group of 5 bypass the electronic terminals and manually checked our passports.  No lines.  Only took a few seconds.   Fastest disembarkation ever!

Good to know

We are in YC and can stay "late" (or used to be able to pre cvd)

And the last time we did that--the lines were outrageous and incredibly long--and everyone so unhappy... No face ID, not citizen vs visa holders lines..just one big mess

[Motegi]

2 hours ago, quattrohead said:

Hi Motegi,

How is the Meraviglia ?

Thinking of doing one of the weekend cruises in February to check her out, looks lovely.

Meraviglia is a beautiful ship.  The entire ship emphasizes the interior space on decks 6 and 7.   We’ve been on Mera twice.  I think you two will really enjoy it.  
 

The Sky Lounge on deck 18 was a nice quiet place to relax with a great view.
 

The cruise director, Sara, was wonderful.  Way more polished and enthusiastic than Monica that we had on Divina in our opinion.    
 

However, we aren’t sure if it was because of Omicron, but there seemed to be far fewer activities and musicians onboard than we had on Divina.  We did not have a Voyagers party during our cruise and there weren’t as many trivia’s, dance lessons, or game shows.  And even with ~750 passengers onboard this cruise, because Mera is a much larger ship than Divina, it felt quite empty.  If you do decide to go I highly recommend catching the band “Off the Record” in the Carousel Lounge at night. It’s a great venue (lighting and sound made for Cirque du Soleil) and the band has a fantastic stage presence.  Their Disco themed performance was our favorite.
 

COVID protocols were much the same as we had on Divina in November with the exception that they have added an additional mandatory antigen test at the terminal before check in.  Daily temperature checks were still in place.   There also seemed to be better adherence to masking indoors among passengers. 
 

The level of service onboard was exceptional once again.  We also heard some of the crew from Divina just transferred onto Mera this month.  
 

The prices for Mera are incredible right now so we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to get onboard again before MSC takes her back to Europe in the spring. 

 

Edited January 21, 2022 by Motegi

[Fogfog]

@Motegi

 

"The Sky Lounge on deck 18 was a nice quiet place to relax with a great view.
 

The cruise director, Sara, was wonderful.  Way more polished and enthusiastic than Monica that we had on Divina in our opinion.    
 

However, we aren’t sure if it was because of Omicron, but there seemed to be far fewer activities and musicians onboard than we had on Divina.  We did not have a Voyagers party during our cruise and there weren’t as many trivia’s, dance lessons, or game shows.  And even with ~750 passengers onboard this cruise, because Mera is a much larger ship than Divina, it felt quite empty.  If you do decide to go I highly recommend catching the band “Off the Record” in the Carousel Lounge at night. It’s a great venue (lighting and sound made for Cirque du Soleil) and the band has a fantastic stage presence.  Their Disco themed performance was our favorite.
 

COVID protocols were much the same as we had on Divina in November with the exception that they have added an additional mandatory antigen test at the terminal before check in.  Daily temperature checks were still in place.   There also seemed to be better adherence to masking indoors among passengers. 
 

The level of service onboard was exceptional once again.  We also heard some of the crew from Divina just transferred onto Mera this month.  
 

The prices for Mera are incredible right now so we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to get onboard again before MSC takes her back to Europe in the spring. "

 

TY for this... glad to hear the CD is good

Sad that Cirque isn't back. Hopefully they can become solvent and come back-- we saw them twice for dinner/show and it was a lovely evening both times

Will check out the band. Did you need reserv for seating or is the seating and tables changed?

Bar service?

 

When and how do they do temp checks? Do you have to go by a desk or certain officer?

[Motegi]

46 minutes ago, Fogfog said:

 

TY for this... glad to hear the CD is good

Sad that Cirque isn't back. Hopefully they can become solvent and come back-- we saw them twice for dinner/show and it was a lovely evening both times

Will check out the band. Did you need reserv for seating or is the seating and tables changed?

Bar service?

 

When and how do they do temp checks? Do you have to go by a desk or certain officer?

Having seen one of the first Cirque shows to reopen in 2021 after the bankruptcy reorganization, Mystere in Las Vegas, we are confident that they will return to the ships once they are at full capacity.  Cirque needs to ensure profitability so they are targeting the larger venues with bigger profits right now.  

 

We really enjoyed Cirque’s “Sonor” in the Carousel Lounge during our last cruise before the pandemic in 2019 and had tried to catch the other show as well but they cancelled the performances in the latter part of our sailing. 
 

For the MSC cast shows in the Broadway theatre we made reservations through the MSC For Me app.   The did scan our cards one night as we entered but didn’t for the other two.   There were plenty of empty seats for the late “fully vaccinated” show every night.   All seating was available with no mandated social distancing.  However most groups left two or more empty seats in between.  
 

For the Off The Record performances in the Carousel we did not make any reservations and there were a decent number of empty seats.  
 

All bars and lounges encouraged guests to be seated and a bar server would come to take your order.  Most seats at the bar counters were blocked off as they didn’t want passengers congregating there.   Things did get a bit confusing at certain areas like the Banboo pool bar where we tried to grab a drink while passing through.   Apparently there was an informal queue to the right of the bar which we were not notified of until we noticed that we had been bypassed by the servers several times for people who had walked up after us. But as soon as we walked over there we were able to order.  Certain bars did run out of some selections throughout the cruise which we felt was odd for the very small number of people onboard.   For example Baileys and Disarono Amaretto were in short supply at many bars.  Coke Zero was out of stock sometimes as well.  Many of the bottled beer selections in the Pub sold out and some of the wine by the glass selections in the MDR were no longer available.  However, for the most part the bar staff would make every effort to locate those items even if it meant that they would have to run to another bar to retrieve a cup of it just to prepare our drinks.   The level service onboard this cruise was above and beyond all expectations. 

For the temp checks, as we had in Divina in November, there are staff stationed outside the dining areas at breakfast who will scan your cruise card and check your temp with a wireless IR thermometer.  For this reason, the flow of passengers at the buffet has been made one way with entry through the center and exit from the sides.  I would assume that if you are febrile the would then direct you to the medical center for an antigen test.   However we were always normal temperature.   If you miss the morning temp check you can ask them to check at lunch.  They were able to check us at the YC Concierge desk as well on Divina.   

 

Edited January 21, 2022 by Motegi

[Fogfog]

@Motegi

 

TY, I guess the YC concierge will chase everyone down daily or we have to swing by sometime before lunch

 

 

[mscdivina2016]

5 hours ago, Fogfog said:

@Motegi

 

TY, I guess the YC concierge will chase everyone down daily or we have to swing by sometime before lunch

 

 

Never had a single check in YC on Meraviglia last week

[Fogfog]

@mscdivina2016

how did the tracker vs card work out?

From a recent youtube vid--the tracker she wore looked like a fitbit and was different from the wrist bands we wore in YC Feb 2020

[mscdivina2016]

2 hours ago, Fogfog said:

@mscdivina2016

how did the tracker vs card work out?

From a recent youtube vid--the tracker she wore looked like a fitbit and was different from the wrist bands we wore in YC Feb 2020

I refused to have any of it.

It did look like a Fitbit.

I never wore it and I never used my card in casino machines.

I took a 500lb magnet Incase I needed to kill bracelet and I brought my Dec Seashore card to put in slot machines if they insisted.

I was not able to play table games as they wanted my card. I said I don't have it on me. They asked for my room number. I said nope, they said they can't give me chips. Their loss, I left.

[Fogfog]

2 hours ago, mscdivina2016 said:

I refused to have any of it.

It did look like a Fitbit.

I never wore it and I never used my card in casino machines.

I took a 500lb magnet Incase I needed to kill bracelet and I brought my Dec Seashore card to put in slot machines if they insisted.

I was not able to play table games as they wanted my card. I said I don't have it on me. They asked for my room number. I said nope, they said they can't give me chips. Their loss, I left.

TY

 

Glad you had a nice cruise

Am confused as we aren't gamblers

Thought you could get chips from the "cage" and cash out/back to acct...at the cage

 

So who knows really (video and security surely do--know everything about whats on a ship)

 

[Motegi]

Yes the new contact tracing wristbands on Meraviglia look like fit bits.  They are waterproof and we thought that they worked better than the old rubber bands that they had aside from being a little chunkier.

 

Unlike mscdivina2016 our group still wore ours around most of the time during the cruise as the bands were easier for some of us to access than their cruise cards.   Also two of our cruise cards failed during the cruise and needed to be replaced so the bands were helpful in those situations.  That being said we did forget to wear our bands on occasion and no concerns were raised by any of the staff.  

 

Staying aware of our surroundings we never sat in one location for more than 10 minutes outside of the dining room.  Usually we would sit down for a drink and then move on to the next lounge.  At the buffet we found that the seating areas to the left and right forward of the main buffet were usually devoid of passengers.  In addition we didn't interact much with other passengers outside of our group of five.   

 

I truly feel that MSC's reintroduction of another layer of testing at the terminal prior to check in will dramatically reduce the number of passengers needing to be quarantined onboard as more will be screened out before boarding.  This will also, in turn, reduce the number of passengers needing to be placed in isolation because of contact tracing as well.  And it will reduce the likelihood that the ship will be forced to make itinerary changes by staying below the onboard positivity thresholds set by many ports of call. 

 

 

Edited January 23, 2022 by Motegi

[Fogfog]

@Motegi

 

Hope so

We are endemic now not pandemic

Good pt about choosing to stay more spread out

Changes the dynamics of social fun and cruising yet better than isolation 

[dexddd]

We sailed September Mera and you got the Fitbit bands as you got on ship and gave back last day at exit.  I don't recall scans of Temps other than maybe going to dinner.

 

On Divinia, no bands since not smart ship.  They did take Temps every night at Le Muse.  

 

At OC, YC got the old blue bands which seemed harder than before to try to get to snap.  That was for Divinia.