3Travelers

What happened to the Roll Call for the December 1, 2018 sailing???? I was following it for weeks and today noticed it is not showing up at all in the Roll Calls!!!

Thank you for your balanced and detailed review.

 

I'm good with everything except:

 

 

"3. Keeping everyone healthy should be a priority. To that end, passengers should be asked to use hand sanitizers upon boarding from any port incl embarkation. Someone should monitor the entrance to buffets to ask passengers to wash hands or use sanitizers."

 

 

I think it would be perfectly acceptable to encourage hand washing or hand sanitizer but one of the things I am very much looking forward to on Seaside is not being accosted physically by hand sanitizer every time I get near the buffet. I wash my hands every time I use the bathroom and right before every meal. On a Royal ship I had a crew member armed with a large bottle of hand sanitizer pursue me into the sink area. When I politely fobbed off her request I use hand sanitzer after she just watched me wash my hands the woman chased me down and assaulted me. She dumped it into my hand as I was reaching to the hand dryer to dry my hands.

Some people cannot use hand sanitizer due to health reasons and I am one of them. If I used it twice in a day my hands start to crack wherever my fingers and palms bend. They burn and itch and it takes several days to heal them. Although I washed my hands to remove the sanitizer it still made my hands chapped and sore.

 

After that experience I perfected sticking my hand under the spout on the sanitizer station and pulling it away as I press the button so that the sanitizer missed my hand.

And just FYI Hand Sanitizer as used by everyone I've ever seen use it won't keep you healthy anyway. No one uses enough or rubs it around enough anyways. When missused it does not kill noro. And even when used as directed it would still be better to wash your hands thoroughly.

And it is bad for the environment and long term health. Chemicals from it are being found everywhere in freshwater. It has been shown to be contributing to resistent strains of bacteria and causing problems with teen hormones. The CDC has issued warnings as has Poison Control due to many poisonings in children and teens, either from licking it off their hands or drinking it. Little kids drink it because it is bright colored and tempting. Teens try to use it to get drunk. It does not contain alcohol that is ok for people to drink. It doesn't take much at all to lead to blindness, organ failure, or even death in small people. Personally I'd be happy if it fell off the face of the earth and we never spoke of it again.

And that's my soapbox for tonight. ;p:cool:

I totally agree hand washing is best. Seaside has sinks by the buffet entrance, unfortunately, few people coming in use them, hence my comment. On the Princess and Royal Cruises we went on they encourage people coming in to use the sinks at the entrance of buffet. I still recommend they do the same on Seaside.

Thanks for sharing your review ! Love your positivity ! I hope someone at MSC reads your suggestions . You have some very valid points .

 

Were you given a survey to complete ?

Yes, we did get a survey to complete and I offered some of my suggestions

Great review and well balanced. Thanks for sharing. I'm in agreement with pretty much everything you wrote.

 

I'm not sure if anyone realizes this, but two of the elevators in the more aft bank are actually panorama elevators that look down into the atrium lobby. It's the two on the most forward end in each bank. You could see the black elevator shafts on either side of the bar in the atrium all the way up, but these elevators never worked. I wonder if it has something to due with the fact they are panorama elevators? Maybe something is misaligned with them?

 

It's funny about the drink coupons. I didn't have those but I would find that backward as well. Especially considering that Seaside was one of the most technologically advanced ships I've ever sailed. Overall I was impressed with the technology, right down to the cordless camera phone in my cabin that I've never seen on another ship before. Having paper coupons seems crazy.

We did go on one of those panorama elevators a couple times so one worked during our cruise.

I have never written a review, but seeing so many negative reviews for the Seaside that if I had not been in full pay mode I would have canceled. Now that we sailed on this beautiful ship I am glad we did and want to let others know our impressions of positives and the few negatives so they won't be afraid to sail on her. As always with all matters, each person has their own perception based on their personal likes and dislikes. To help you relate to my comments here is our background with cruising - we have been on approx 20 cruises. We have cruised on Carnival, NCL, Celebrity, Princess and Royal Caribbean (Oasis class ships only). We have had balcony cabins as well and mini suites, full suites and on NCL we have had 2 cruises in the Haven. Our favorite cruises have been the NCL Haven class and Royal Caribbean's Oasis, Allure and Harmony. On Seaside, we were in a regular balcony cabin with Fantastica experience.

What we liked about Seaside - 1. it's a beautiful ship with nice spaces to explore. If you like taking pictures on a ship, there are plenty of "photo ops". 2. We enjoyed all the theme nights and found them to be a lot of fun. The entertainment staff was very energetic and they work hard to get the passengers involved (especially if they perceive that you have an interest in their activities - which we did). 3. We enjoyed most of the main theater shows: Wizard, Fly, My Life in Music, Timeless, Frank Sinatra tribute. While classical music is not necessarily "my thing", I attended several late show performances and if you enjoy classical, then you will enjoy these shows. I read a few comments from people saying that if Seaside wants to appeal to the American market, they should not include these type of shows. Frankly Americans are diverse and many Americans enjoy classical as well as Opera, so don't find this to be an accurate statement. I attended half of Butterflies (modified version of the Opera Madame Butterfly). Again, this was not my thing, but the auditorium was filled to capacity. I interacted with some passengers during the cruise and a family from Idaho with young kids was happy to have the opportunity to expose their family to an Opera. The same with a mature couple from Kentucky who did a B2B cruise and enjoyed all the shows. Keep in mind, the main shows were more traditional cruise offerings and the classical/opera shows were usually shown during "off-times" that way passengers can choose what form of entertainment they prefer. Perhaps MSC is trying to tap to a market that is not being represented by other cruise lines (although Celebrity and Princess also have had classical performances in their cruises - but not as many as Seaside). 4. Service staff - we had an excellent room steward who was very responsive to our requests. The MDR staff was also excellent and attentive. We loved Venchi and their staff was also excellent. If you love chocolate, gelato and cappuccino then give them a try. The beverage coupons for Fantastica were good for some of the items on their menu like the cappuccino and gelato. I saw many negative comments about service staff in other threads. Seaside has a large mix of nationalities in service staff just like all other cruise lines. We had no communication issues and found almost everyone very friendly (the DJ in Garage Disco not so much as he refused to play a good dance song at our request even when the disco was virtually empty). I think a lot has to do with a passenger's attitude toward staff members. If you smile and are courteous to them, they will be very friendly and courteous in return. I always say hello to all staff members no matter what their position and whenever they would see me even in other parts of the ship, they all made a point of waving and saying hello to me. I found overall the staff on Seaside to be very hard working and willing to please the passengers.

Areas that MSC can improve upon: 1. On embarkation, register the payment options especially if it's going to be a credit card. Why make people stand in line at a kiosk on board to swipe their credit card??? It should be done by the agent at check in. 2. Drink coupons were cumbersome to use. Why not load the drink coupons on the room keys??? 3. Keeping everyone healthy should be a priority. To that end, passengers should be asked to use hand sanitizers upon boarding from any port incl embarkation. Someone should monitor the entrance to buffets to ask passengers to wash hands or use sanitizers. Unfortunately MSC may not change procedures until they have a huge case of norovirus on their hands. If you sail on Seaside, I highly recommend you wash or sanitize after using the serving utensils to keep yourself healthy. 4. Cabins are pretty much same size as other standard balcony cabins but storage space is tight. MSC should consider adding additional drawers to the desk and night tables in new ships they are building. Shower also seemed a bit small even to us and we are fairly slim in build! 5. Food on the buffet was not so great. The pizza was very tasty but we cannot eat that every day. MSC needs to add a few more choices and include more salad ingredients and healthier options. Fresh fruit was available but I suggest more options be added. 6. Food in MDR was overall good, but not great. (Better than MDR food on NCL, but certainly not as good as Celebrity or Royal or even Princess). Some dishes we found were very good like the Chicken Parmigiana and gnocchi. Tomato sauce on penne pasta was also very good. Breads were good, not great. PS they DO have butter on the table now in MDR for those that commented on that issue before.....lol. Elegant night selections were not impressive. Beef tournedos - meat quality ok but not great and sauce was "so-so". I had salmon 4 nights from classic menu as I found no other interesting options. The salmon while very good was prepared somewhat differently each time - so consistency is an area that needs improvement in the kitchen as well as improvement in presentation. 7. MSC for Me app needs tweaking to make it more user friendly and have additional functionalities added like dinner menus.

A couple major issues on the ship that were commented in past threads:

Elevators - yes, a few were not working during our cruise and yes that was frustrating at times. We saw people working on them, but still some did not get fixed! This issue really needs attention.

Septic smell - we did note a foul smell but not as intense as some described. We noted the smell in the Adventure Park area a few times and very briefly a couple times when we entered our cabin on deck 14. It went away in seconds, so not sure what the issue was but it was not an issue for us.

Toilets not Working - yes one night half of the ship did not have working toilets for approx. 4 hours. We have had toilets not working on other cruises but usually got fixed sooner. Not sure what caused this issue but fortunately got resolved. Staff claimed passengers flush items they should not be flushing and causes clogs in drain lines.

In summary, based on past experiences with cruises on other lines, we have not experienced yet a PERFECT cruise and so we don't expect perfection. We wanted to have a new experience so we decided to try this brand new ship. Overall, we had a very good time. Cabin was comfortable and clean. Food was generally good in MDR. Staff was attentive and very nice. Entertainment had a lot of variety and enjoyable. And the ship was beautiful to experience.

Thanks for the info - MSC customer service assured me we could use at Venchi as they claim it applies to any and all drinks that were not "top shelf" alcoholic drinks. But from the many comments on cruise critic, I have come to not trust info provided by MSCs own customer service. I was tempted to buy the coffee package but again it sounds like that too may not work at Venchi.

With our Fantastica "experience" we get 12 beverage coupons. Has anyone that has been on Seaside tried using these coupons at Vencchi for hot chocolate or specialty coffee, or gelato shakes?

Anyone that requested distilled water for medical reasons - did you get an actual sealed container labeled distilled water or just a pitcher with water and told it was distilled. We absolutely must have distilled water (not for CPap) and only feel comfortable using water in a sealed and labeled container to avoid a health problem. Any feedback from people on recent Seaside cruises - help!!!

Any updates from anyone currently on board or those that sailed last week? If there are any other problems we should be aware of, or any suggestions, kindly post a response as we are scheduled to cruise next week!!!

We are sailing on the MSC Seaside 1/27/18. Since we are new to MSC we signed up for their status match and we qualified for Silver status. According to their grid of privileges, we qualify for an additional $50 OBC per person. MSC is saying that since we got the Military discount of 10% (which is same discount as we would have gotten as Silver members on this sailing) we do not qualify for the OBC. Has anyone else had problem getting an OBC for their Voyager's Club status and if you were able to get it resolved, please tell me how you went about it. My travel agent is not being too helpful with this matter.