Written by Kim
We really enjoyed our cruise on the Seashore. Here I will provide a review of our experience. We are leaving on RCCL Independence of the Seas tomorrow. After that cruise we will do a comparison of our experiences in the 2 lines. Overall there were both positives and negatives as you would expect but more to come on that.
MSC Seashore, launched in 2021, is part of the Seaside EVO Class and represents an evolution of MSC’s cruise ship design. The ship is inspired by New York City, featuring areas like a replica Statue of Liberty and a Times Square-themed entertainment zone. She is not a small ship but not the largest in the 23 of MSC fleet. She is 170,412 gross tons and holds 5,632 passengers although there were only about 4,300 on our sailing.
Embarkation – embarkation was very smooth except for a short delay getting into the parking garage. Port Canaveral is quite a busy port with lots of construction happening. Some of the delay is caused by prepayment of parking to get through the gate. From exiting the car to getting on the ship took about 30 minutes most of which was walking. We liked that they allow you to go straight to your room to leave your carryons and put money in safe, etc,
Rooms – we had a balcony room. They had good storage with drawers, shelves and plenty of hanging space. The bathroom was tiny which is typical on most ships but my over the door shoe holder, which I’ve used for many years, was perfect for all our toiletries and meds. They had a usb port in the light by the bed which was great for charging devices, especially because I bought my 3 headed cord that charges my phone, iPad & watch all in one cord. One thing I didn’t like is that I couldn’t switch the wifi on my devices. Usually we buy a 2 device plan and Alex uses one. I use the second one but can logon and off switching from iPad to phone. You are locked to the device you register first. Good thing I did my phone and just had no service on my iPad.
There is a whole area called Yacht Club which is like a ship within a ship similar to special areas for suite guests It’s all inclusive with drinks, wifi, special pools, spa and restaurants.
The ship – The ship was beautiful . The pools were a bit different to us. There were 2 on the top deck, one was kind of inside but not covered because other decks were above it so very shady. Also it was 6 foot deep without any seats so not relaxing unless you want to do laps. It was empty most of the time and we never went there. Seems like a waste of space. The pool on the top deck was sunny with no areas for shade or umbrellas. It was nice but small and had a drop off from 4 to 6 feet that wasn’t marked in any way which seemed dangerous to me. Alex walked right in and went under not realizing so anytime we were in the pool we were warning people. It did have nice steps to walk in and benches all around to sit . The 3rd pool was on the 8th deck aft. It was a shallow infinity pool. The water was freezing cold but refreshing. There were also no umbrellas or shade here. There were lots of loungers at the pools or on the side decks by hot tubs so seats at the pool were never an issue. Pool towels are in your cabin when you board and you can exchange them on the pool decks but I never asked if you could get more than 2. We usually like 2 each for our chairs. There were several kids water slides and a fantastic water park. I’m sure our grands would have loved that. The atrium was a great venue to listen to music or see various games, etc, it gave lots of people good viewing in a vertical fashion. The elevators were odd. You entered the floor number on a key pad and it told you which car to enter. There are no buttons inside the car. They were fine if the ship wasn’t crowded on a port day or odd hours but I don’t think they were efficient. Bathrooms in the common areas were our biggest challenge. They were hard to find and often only 2-3 stalls especially by the theater so you normally had to wait in line. They could use more bathrooms for this size ship.
Food – we found the food to be very good (8 of 10). We were concerned before sailing because many people told us it was awful. We are not terribly picky but eat out a lot and found it very good. The buffet is huge and a bit overwhelming at first. The salad bar was excellent with lots of fresh veggies, beans, artichokes, cheese, and about 3 types of lettuce, spinach and 6 different dressings, Once Alex found the make to order breakfast omelets (all the way at the back) he was happy. While the buffet was crowded at times you never struggled to find a table. We enjoyed the main dining room too. Our servers were excellent, food was tasty and always hot (maybe because we were near the back closer to galley?). What I liked best about the MDR is you could eat at any hour. They were set seatings every hour in one of the dining rooms. Only people with their highest loyalty status can do my time. We ate at 7 which is what we like but you could choose between 5 and 9 any hour. When we got onboard we had 5 pm but had it switched. Because we switched we were seated at a table for 4 which was fine except the other couple weren’t native English speaking and I believe the man suffered from dementia so we didn’t hav4 any conversation. We did 3 of the specialty restaurants, the steakhouse, seafood & Mexican. All were good and worth the up charge. They didn’t have any alternative food venues for pizza or snacks but the buffet was open pretty much all the time. I think that was ok because we didn’t grab an extra slice of pizza or cookie on the way to the show, etc, I did love all the cappuccino. You could get them everywhere.
Entertainment – the entertainment was good but not quite the variety or quality you get on the bigger ships with Royal. It was all production shows, old school magic and contortionists. The sets & costumes were simple with mostly video graphic background. The talent was very good but the dancers sometimes were out of sync. I enjoyed it but you need to book all the shows because the theater is small. I never struggled to get a seat and liked that all how’s were at either 7:30 or 9:30 so it was easy to remember. They didn’t do some of the game shows they do on other lines like Love & Marriage and Majority rules. They also had a comedian that did both a family friendly and adults only show.
Casino – the casino was a bit larger than other ships we’ve been on and there was an open atrium that made it feel less claustrophobic. There was a good selection of slots that we did ok on. We ended up net net winning a bit in the casino. It’s always great if you break even and we did a little better partly because Alex won on Texas Hold ‘em a few times. They also had a great Sports bar with a big bar and lots of pods wheee you could watch whatever game you wanted. Some pods sat 2-4 others sat 10-12. They had sports betting and slot machines in th3 sports bar which was smoke free and we liked that because the casino tends to be smoky.
Ports – We have done a similar itinerary in the Caribbean in the past. The ports were not our favorites – Costa Maya, Belize, Roatan & Cozumel. We knew we didn’t plan excursions for the ports so we bought the drink package and planned to sit by the pool. Normally, we don’t choose a cruise based on itinerary so it was fine, the positive was it was southern Caribbean so very warm in January. The Bahamas can be cold this time of year.
Disembarkation – was a breeze. We used the walk off program and were in our car on the road by 7:30 to catch our flight out of Lauderdale. We had a bit of a delay getting an elevator from our floor but otherwise just a brisk walk.
Overall – we enjoyed MSC and it gives us another option to Royal as we feel they are pretty equivalent. Our loyalty with Royal gives us 5 drinks a day but if the price is right we can buy the drink package. We got this cruise comped by the casino so the price was right to give it a try.
