MSC Poesia Questions!!! HELP

[cruiser4life04]

I am not new to cruising, but I am very new to MSC. I am looking at booking the MSC Poesia Dec 20th 2009 christmas cruise for ft.lauderdale. I have previously sailed on Carnival,Costa, Royal Carribbean, and Holland America but most with Carnival. Will I find MSC to be WAY different then Carnival and it wont be as good or is it similiar. Does any of MSC operate like Carnival in dinning options and activities or is a TOTALLY different experience? Since this is a Carribbean sailing and in North America will it be different from some of the reviews posted from Europe sailings? Can you please post any pictures of the ship if you have any...THANKS

[AmoMondo]

From what I've read, researched and observed it will be most like Costa. definitely not at all like Carnival. My friend was on Carnival recently and I've been moored aside carnival ships often and could notice the differences easily. Carnival is a fyun, party ship with lots of activity and noise. That great if that is what you enjoy - iu hate that so much prefer the more low key and much much quieter atmoshere on MSC.

As for changes between Europe and caribbean, yes there are a few. This is based on my experience of sailing in both areas for the past 3 years. They make make further changes this and next season to cater for the US Market.

 

main changes are

cruise card bill in US dollars instead of euros

they don't charge for room service, sauna and steam room in the caribbena

Free iced tap water available in the caribbean (in Europe it isn't and you have to buy bottles of water)

There is sometimes a buffet open early evening (mainly during ist seating of dinner) in Europe its just the dining rooms at dinner

meals tomes at dinner are a little bit earlier than Europ (just 15-30 minutes)

The other main change that you would notice is the passenger mix - there will be far more English speaking passengers in the Caribbean than in Europe. In Europe we are often in the minority (sometimes only a dozen or so). However there will still be fairly large groups of other European nationalities, so all announcements etc will still be in at least 5 languages as will entertainment etc. You are more likely to get English only events though such as shore excusrsion presentations, art auctions and the like)