WhiteWineInTheSun

You had to remind me of the coffee, American Bear.

Just got confirmation today, we'll be on the Divina again in 2015, probably early November. Now I just need to figure out an excuse to get aboard before then-the gelato is calling me.

Wookie, I'm more partial to Jamaican rum than Jamaican bacon. ;)

You are all responsible for my decision to make breakfast for dinner. The bacon is roasting right now...

No the 14 year old does not have it right. If any pig product cooked could substitute for crispy bacon at any time and for any meal then OK.

 

Bacon and eggs, pork chop and eggs, ham and eggs, pork sausage and eggs, ham hocks and eggs, pigs ears and feet and eggs are all piggy yet not the same! Not in taste or how its cooked.

 

No no no...you cannot substitute piggy and simply call it good.

 

A BLT cannot have ham or sausage as a piggy substitute.

 

If your in Canada and order bacon and eggs and they substitute the piggy's snout on the plate would that be the same?

He's basing this on the fact that we've made all the types of 'bacon' described, plus he has the benefit of having Pernil, and barbequed pulled pork on a regular basis.

This is mainly relating to the breakfast discussion, that boy would eat pulled pork for three meals a day, same goes for ham, loin, bacon, and most of the traditional meats. Haven't fed him ear, snout, or feet-but he might surprise me, he's my adventurous eater who is looking forward to trying escargot on the next cruise.

Holy moly! Our pork loin is 'on special' at $22.99 per kg!!!! How come yours is so much cheaper?

I suspect your lamb is much cheaper! Are there many hog farms there?

For instance, I look at his price, and it's nearly double what I pay here. Supply and demand.

And I demand all the meat products in that advert! ;)

I thought the proper term for bacon served in Canada is back bacon. (thank you, Bob and Doug McKenzie)

My 14 year old's response? "I don't care what you call it or how you cook it-just give me piggy."

I think that there are fewer nightmare cruises than there are nightmare passengers.

Spot on! The bad part is that many of the nightmare passengers will never see themselves as the cause for their own problems.

We were getting to bed around 4 and up around 10am, then on the go all day long. First meal of the day was lunch. :) Then off to see performances all day (26 bands on the cruise, got to see 13 shows in 5 days, and hang out at the nightly 'jam' until 2 or 3am)

The last night, we ran into someone I hadn't seen in 30 years (what are the odds), so we ended up talking until almost 5am, then snuck into the buffet and husband grabbed a bowl of cereal and we both had some pastries.

Going on a cruise next month that will consist of mostly relaxing and we might actually eat breakfast all three days. Siestas are definitely on the agenda!

Maybe mine was different because of the charter? I really don't see why that aspect of checking in would be different.

American is the home of many culinary atrocities. Pumpkin flavored everything is one thing that comes to mind! :p

I dread the fall. While I do enjoy a slice of pumpkin pie, please don't put pumpkin spice in every food product from September to December!

As for bacon, I'm equal opportunity, so long as it isn't burnt. Back bacon? Sign me up. Country slab bacon? Yep. I've taken to roasting mine in the oven to get crisp, but not dark, pieces of pork goodness.

Alas, we were never up early enough to have a meal that contained bacon for the entirety of our cruise! Many late nights were responsible.

I am sure if they made it as spicy as I like, they would have had many complaints and possibly pending lawsuits.

 

Overall. I am looking forward to another MSC cruise.....Sorry for sounding like it was an "MSC Lovefest". :-)

I hear you on that. If/when you return, they had a Samoan rice/chicken dish in a tomato base that had a really nice bite to it, the tongue was tingling afterwards.

At my former job, they were amused by the perpetual bottle of cholula on my desk. Hot is good. :D

Hmmmm. Maybe not.

 

This is the big boat we were on:

 

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This is the beach where we played in the water and in the sand:

 

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Here is the nice man that made us yummy hamburgers;

 

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This is where we got the yummy hamburgers from:

 

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.....I wish the jerk chicken was spicy instead of mild. It was still yummy so I didn't complain.

Thanks for the pictures, now I know what to expect if we do another cruise.

And your complaint about the jerk chicken was my complaint about the souvlaki-it seemed like the spices were 'dumbed down', but I grew up eating a lot of Greek food. The rest of it was fine, though.

I have yet to try it, every time I looked, I would get a blinking 'chat is offline'

They were raffling off a MiniCooper to one of the passengers for Cruise to the Edge, with all the raffle earnings going to a charity for pediatric cancer.. I didn't win, but it went to a good cause.

She did state, among the 4 in her party, they had completed over 200 cruises. My thought is, how much could you not know after going on that many cruises and what would you need to prep for??? I mean really, what could you possible not know by that point in time other than maybe the number of ply in the toilet paper each cruise line uses??? :cool:

Especially the issue with the elevators/lifts?

I'd heard horror stories from others about cruise ship elevators (too small, not enough) that I was prepared for a week of waiting a half hour for each trip outside my stateroom. That was not the case at all, and debarkation, despite waking at 8, was rather quick. We were out of the room at 8:20 and through customs and at our car by a few minutes after 9am.

It would be ridiculous to schedule a flight before noon. If she did, the fault lies completely on her.

Great point, Amo!

Our vouchers were booked through the charter at rates close to MSC's in books of 50 alcoholic beverages. Loved the no service charge aspect of it, and must remember that if we get to cruise with them before the next CTTE.

I'd suggest emailing MSC, since there is never anyone available on the chat option on the website.

Closed-loop cruises in the Carribbean do not require passports. Friends cruise often with another company and no one in her family has theirs.

This is true. We had pre-purchased our drink vouchers, which would have been our biggest expense. ;)

There was a raffle on our cruise, I knew I'd spend $100 on our chances for that, and we planned to go to Eataly for dinner. A few cappuccinos and food from the Sports Bar, and we nearly hit that total.

Don't know, Amo. We were asked as we were checking in 'Normally, we block $100 for your charges aboard ship, is there a different amount you would prefer?' I said we would like to put $250 on our room charge.

I've read here that sometimes they arbitrarily block the amount of one person's fare for a room, and I was prepared for that, but we were asked specifically.

You can visit the concierge desk to add funds at any time. We verified how much we had spent on our fourth day aboard, just to be sure that we were okay, and they offered to add funds.

I think if you go over, they call your room. At least, that's what has happened at resorts when we've traveled.

No, you can't go wrong with that at all!

The only thing I'll do differently next time is get the soda voucher pack. There were a few of our drink vouchers used for cokes.

I was told that all voucher pickups are done in the casino.

FTR, some of the bars and lounges will only have two beers on tap, you will quickly learn which have your favorites! That said, the Heineken on tap was so different from what I've had on draft or in bottles here in the US-not the slightest bit skunky.

Our CC information was taken at the terminal, and we were asked how much we wished to put onto the account.

I suppose that you can use a credit card aboard, but we opted to use our room key anytime we incurred an expense (meals at Eataly, appetizer at the Sports Bar, for instance.)

MSC will inform you that the room charge authorization will say France, and we informed our CC company that there would be international charges. For that reason, our goal was to just use one card for the entire trip. Thankfully, we estimated well and only had $30 left of our deposit.

That amount was credited back about 3 days later, though others have said it can take up to 2 weeks.

We did not get lanyards from MSC.

However, ours was a charter, so it could be a case of the charter provided lanyards (with our show attendance info) superceded ones that MSC might give out.

Happy birthday to your husband!

Our cruise on the Divina was our first, so I can't really give you a comparison to other lines. We loved it. Other than the events on our cruise, our favorite thing wasour dinner at Ristorante Italia. Based on our events, we spent a lot of time in La Luna lounge, and really enjoyed the service team there.

Enjoy!

Our cruise was a bit of an early celebration of my husband's 50th, which is the day you depart. Loved the Divina and looking forward to returning next year.