PREZIOSA Review 6/9/2017 Late,Late Bus Stop Cruise.

[sidari]

6/9/2017 MSC Preziosa Late, Late, Bus StopCruise.

 

The title will become clear at the end.

 

Itinerary

6th September Southampton Depart 1800

7th September Zeebrugge 0900 to 1900

8th September Amsterdam 0900 to 1700

9th September Hamburg Arrive 1700

10th September Hamburg Depart 18.30

11th September At Sea

12th September Le Havre 0800 to 2200

13th September Southampton Arrive 0800

 

We were traveling on our 5th MSC cruise, the others having been 2 Transatlantic sailings from Barcelona to Fort Lauderdale and Venice to Miami, also Venice to Dubai and Southampton to Norway. After this cruise we would become Black cardholders.

 

This particular cruise Itinerary picks up passengers in at least Four of the ports to be visited, during the run up to the cruise people on the Roll Call had noted changes that MSC had left until the very last minute to pass on, in fact the Hamburg change they never notified passengers of, but chose instead to add some text to the online itinerary.

 

The stop at Hamburg in Germany was to be at 5 pm on the 9th but that was changed to around Midnight in order for the ship to take part in the sail away party with Five others for the Port of Hamburg Blue celebrations something they would have been aware of in advance, one other that they denied until a few days prior to the 6th was that the ship would sail at 6pm despite the Port of Southampton schedule saying 8 pm.

 

We headed to the port in the early hours to avoid most of the Motorway traffic which involved a number of breaks due to having a 5 and a 6 year old with us, a new one for us after around 16 previous cruises.

We arrived at the port at around 12.30 pm handed over our luggage to the waiting porters in the car park and were onboard the ship by around 1.15 pm.

 

As many will be aware the Preziosa is the younger sister of this class of four ships and was originally being built for the Libyan Gadaffi family with it is claimed an onboard Shark tank! After their demise MSC were offered the ship, as it was the same design as the other three Fantasia class ships. As with the other four ships that we have cruised on the ship was certainly very clean although the halo may be beginning to slip, as we did notice a few areas where there was a lack of cleaning.

 

 

Our four sea pass cards were waiting in our cabin on arrivaland the new system for adding your credit card onboard the ship was simple and straightforward.

 

 

Our part of the Lifeboat drill took place in the Theatre and passengers were separated into their respective emergency areas, after everyone had put their Lifejackets on people were taken to their respective areas, ours was the Deck 7 Jazz bar where we were told ok bye that’s it! (Instead of getting the entire group together to tell them this is where you will come in the event of an emergency – Not everyone reads the door cabin signs)

 

We had purchased a drink package for the four of us and madegood use of it, we were happy to see the sparkling wine still available having been told by MSC that it had been removed from the package.

 

Our Cabin 10068 on Deck 10 … A standard Fantastica 2/4 person cabin on Deck 10, size wise great for 2 but cramped for 4 when the Double sofa is made up as a bed, there is also a lack of wardrobe space for 4 people. The bathroom again is the standard size for this type of cabin with the shower doors instead of a curtain. We were surprised to see a kettle, Tea,Coffee and Milk in the cabin, which was a welcome surprise, save ringing room service.

The only issue we had with this cabin was that the sliding door seals are worn and a slightly bowed door that allowed a lot of wind noise and a draught when windy.

The balcony again was the standard size for this class of cabin.

 

We also had delivered a bottle of champagne and two flutes and a plate of Chocolate strawberries courtesy of the CEO of MSC UK.

 

Food … As always this is a subject that will either please or displease people, on this cruise it was somewhat once again hit and miss.

 

The Buffet … Breakfasts for most days were very good although on at least two occasions some of the food was cold! How when it is on a hotplate? Maybe it is down to the plastic plates not retaining the heat..

The lunchtime offerings were fairly good but the evening choice was quite poor and only the front half of the buffet area was being used, on this cruise this area was very busy in the evenings.

Deserts were the same old tired and boring ones seen on our first cruise, time to replace the chef’s methinks.

On the Sunday when we returned to the ship from our day out in Hamburg at 5 pm there was only Pizza until 6.30 pm due to the staff being involved in the Lifeboat drill for those who had embarked that day.

On the Friday the buffet was very busy at lunchtime no thanks to people sat playing card games and using Laptops on the tables while others were having difficulty finding somewhere to eat, having made a complaint to one of the managers we decided to instead head to the Dining room. It is beyond time that MSC took control of this issue especially at very busy periods.

 

Dining Room … The Golden Lobster, apart from one meal the food was good with one night being a little better than the others, none of them stood out as being anything

special. The waiters were very efficient and if you have Agung from Indonesia you will not go wrong. There was not one night that the restaurant was full.

 

Formal nights are somewhat odd on this cruise; our First Gala night was the Second night for those that had boarded before Southampton,and our Second night was the First Gala night for those that boarded in Hamburg and Rotterdam! The first night quite a few people dressed up but the second was for many just a normal night.

 

For some unknown reason the ship chose our last night onboard to host the Captains welcome back party with the dress code as Formal!The previous night had been the Formal or Second gala night for us so we chose not to attend.

 

The Theatre shows included Wonderland (kids loved it) Starwalker (again kids liked it) The Mask (not so good) A Sinatra tribute that we did not see and an Italian music night that we also did not see. We had previously seen the first two shows on the other ships.

 

Due to the bad weather most of the time being outside was not possible and the kid’s water park remained closed, the water slide was open though for those brave enough to want to battle the elements.

 

The Late, Late Cruise …

 

The cruise was due to leave Southampton at 8pm despite MSC refusing to admit that their time of 6pm was wrong, there was an announcement made but it was not relayed to the cabins that the ship would not now be leaving until 10pm due to the late return of tour buses that had visited London.

 

This meant that our arrival in Zeebrugge would also be at a later time and the Departure time would now be 9pm Europe time (+1 hour UK time) after a day spent in Blankenburg and with darkening skies it was announced that due to strong winds and bad weather in the Amsterdam area the Preziosa would remain in Zeebrugge the following day Friday, and Departure time would be 9pm that evening.

MSC offered people the chance of a Free shuttle to Brugge on the Friday, sadly it had rained from the previous evening and all through the whole day and into the Friday evening.

The ship did not depart until later that evening which meant the arrival time in Hamburg would be affected.

 

As we entered the river Elbe the ship slowed down to a crawl and it was announced that a medivac would be taking place, we finally arrived in the port of Hamburg at around 7.30 pm some 2.5 hours later than scheduled.

We passed the very large crowds who had turned up to see the Blue light spectacle and the Fireworks along with the parade of ships, Preziosa was turned around using Tug boats as the turn was being made next to Mien Schiff 3 (my ship 3) we were then held there waiting until around 9 pm for the parade to begin.

 

 

Every cabin had been given a Blue light so the passengers could join in with the spectacle, the parade was a great success and the side of the ship was adorned in Blue lights from Balconies, the ships headed upriver followed by a host of other small craft.

Videos of the festival are available on Youtube.

Preziosa then stopped mid channel until all the small craft had all passed and then reversed down the channel into the Steinwerder berth which sadly is about a 15 to 20 minute taxi ride to the city. The time was around 11pm.

 

The Departure from Hamburg was changed to 9pm on the Sunday evening, again an announcement was made that due to a strike at the French port of Le Havre on our last day we would instead be going to Rotterdam with arriva at around 7 am, the ship was once again delayed leaving until around beyond midnight.

The following day was a Sea day and passengers were requested to take their passports and sea pass card to a face to face meeting with the UK Border Security people even for those not intending to visit Southampton who had joined the ship at the other ports.

 

We arrived in Rotterdam at around 7 am with a Departure time of 5pm, the ship was delayed a further two hours waiting for passengers from Le Havre so we finally left at 7 pm with an arrival time in Southampton of 7 am the following morning, due to overnight bad weather the ship has slowed down and the ship did not dock until 10.30 am.

 

This as you would expect caused chaos with the Disembarkation with everyone’s scheduled time at the designated lounges pushed back by 2 hours, so 10 am became 12 pm and so on. There was no organisation in the Safari Lounge on Deck 7 and people were getting fed up, at around 11.15 the first group, Red were called, at around 11.45 the next group Grey were lead out by a member of staff. Due to the distance we had to drive to get the kids home we decided to join this group and headed off the ship, our cases were already waiting despite our colour group still being onboard waiting to be called, it was as well we made the decision to go because due to heavy traffic the kids arrived home at 8pm from 12.30pm and they were back in school the following morning.

 

We know that MSC cannot do anything about the weather just like other cruise lines but what they can do is be honest with their passengers, they would have known when we arrived in Zeebrugge on the first day that we would have to stay the following day so why wait until the evening to inform us, they also must have known about the strike in France so again why leave it until the evening to inform us.

The one good thing they did do was offer 100 Euro to every cabin for the delays and changes to the itinerary; sadly they still seem to care more about Image than the little things that help passengers in their decisions. At least two people from the Roll call missed their return flights to the USA because of indecision by customer services regarding the time the ship would dock in Southampton and could have altered their flights for the same day, instead they had to fly home on Friday the 15th.

 

 

Anyone considering this itinerary next year on Magnifica in September be sure to be on the one that visits Hamburg port when the Blue light theme is on again.

 

 

Next up is MSC Seaside on December 23rd 2017.

Edited September 19, 2017 by sidari
Word spacing

[Danem7683]

I was on this same ship and have a different review, I feel you may have been to kind, having only been my second cruise I was pretty disappointed but I won't litter your thread with my thoughts- all I will say is never again with Mystery Ship Cruise Prisonza [emoji30]

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

[Beamafar]

Hi Dave ............... thanks for posting your review. :)

 

Did the flutes you received have the MSC logo on them? I haven't seen them given out in quite some time. Even when we received the bottle of champagne from the YC director as compo we didn't get them. Not complaining, mind, as we have a few of them already. Just saying!

[sidari]

Hi Bea ... yes they had the logo on them ... :)

[Beamafar]

That was an extra nice touch, so! Nice glasses for Kerry to enjoy her sparkling wine from. ;p

[sidari]

We brought it home with us, will have it at some point not sure when yet though ... :D

[riclop]

Thanks for the review.

[Clarea]

Appreciate the detailed feedback.

[lisa12000]

have to echo almost all your thoughts as you well know - i, too, think you may have been too nice haha; alongside the above we were shouted at by waiting on staff when they forgot one of our drinks, got told not to overreact when we asked about the lateness, was part of the mass huddle trying to disembark when people with pushchairs were getting pushed towards the stairs etc. i was shocked at the lack of transparency and organisation when things went wrong (and yes they were out of their control) - we got champagne as well but didn't get the flutes with logos on

[Beamafar]

Sounds like the whole situation was handled very badly. Compare and contrast it to the experience of those on-board Divina during hurricane Irma! I, personally wouldn't tolerate being shouted at by any member of the crew - I would have sought out a manager and had a word (or two)!

 

Dave .........I have 2 different types of flute. The one on the left we used to get complimentary with the Black Card bottle of bubbly, so I have a few of those; the one on the right was given to us (as part of a pair) on Valentine's night 2014 by the MDR maitre'D on Splendida.

 

 

Sent from my SM-G935F using Forums mobile app

[sidari]

Bea ... Only got a quick look at them before Kerry his them away so the kids didn't break them, will have to get a photo of them for you, have a feeling they were like the tall ones in your photo.

 

Lisa ... Never ever had an issue with waiters, the review is how we saw the cruise and although we have been to Amsterdam we were disappointed that we had to miss it.

[sidari]

Bea ... The two glasses are the same as the one in the left of the photo you posted.

[Beamafar]

Bea ... The two glasses are the same as the one in the left of the photo you posted.

 

I had a feeling they would be. I haven't seen the ones on the right in quite some time. Maybe I should be ultra careful with them as they may become collectors' items LOL! :rolleyes:

[sidari]

Brought back up due to the current number of questions re Preziosa ... :cool:

[easyboy]

Thanks for your review.