Roburt

OK, I made a small mistake with the ships name (if you're gonna get all anal) ... It was the Magnifica we were just on, not the Magica (but I'm sure you'd have realised that). I'd thank you for your input but I wouldn't mean it, so I won't.

As I've already said, we booked our MSC Caribbean cruise ahead of taking the recent one on the Magica. The Magica is a smaller ship, so hopefully the theatre performers / shows will be of better quality (& not so old fashioned) on the Davina cruise. When the US came up with the worlds' best music (blues, gospel, R&B & soul) and a ship is sailing out of US ports for a whole season, it seems perverse to me to ignore local musicians & import 2nd rate ones from Europe ... MSC do seem to totally ignore the fact that the Beatles & UK beat groups happened and that they successfully sold US black music back to America & to the rest of the world.

BTW, we have no problem with cruising with any other guests (including Europeans). After all (despite Brexit), Brits are Europeans ... we just like the greater proportion of Americans / Canadians you (usually) get on Caribbean cruises. The ports of call are great on the upcoming cruise (as they were on the Magica cruise), thats the main reason we book a certain trip (the ports of call). Would love to do a cruise out of Cuba but as we winter in Florida, guess that's not gonna happen under the current US regime (& flying to a 3rd country to then just move onto Havana seems a little excessive). JOHN; Bolshy Brit.

Beth, thanks for your input. I'm sure we will enjoy our upcoming MSC cruise.

I can appreciate your point of view but can't say I agree with it. Being a Brit, I enjoy the different mix you get on Caribbean cruises with the US based lines. We actually booked the MSC Caribbean cruise ahead of going on our recent MSC trip in Europe.

If we hadn't already booked (& the itinerary of the MSC ship hadn't been perfect for us), I'm sure my wife wouldn't have agreed that we went on MSC again so soon.

Can only hope that the MSC Davina experience is better than the MSC Magica one & that the section heads actually do their jobs and don't just strut about (full of their own importance).

That's good to know. Don't think I'll spend much time (if any) in the Rolling Stone Room, I'll stick with the great music in B B Kings' on any future HAL ship cruises.

You might want to look for the two other threads on this same subject.

No idea how to find them. Looked down the list of recent HAL threads & can't find anything applicable.

That's disappointing as on previous Caribbean cruises, we've really enjoyed the company of the many Canadians & US citizens. Hopefully less Europeans will be taking this particular cruise. The recent MSC cruise we took was a bit different to our experiences with Princess, Celebrity, Holland America & Royal Caribbean. On our recent MSC cruise, just about all the on-board teams were led by Italians ... these guys seemed to love being in charge but didn't actually really lead their teams effectively. Lots of waiters standing around in groups chatting, entertainment & reception staff giving you what they had decided you wanted even when you made it clear it wasn't what we actually wanted and ... MANY RULES just for the sack of it.

We docked a few times ahead of schedule on our recent cruise but although everything was ready, we couldn't leave the ship till the original stated time was reached. The food was out & ready in the buffet at breakfast but we weren't allowed to start serving ourselves till the stated opening time (6.30am). ALSO, you had to pay for every single thing on board ... films on the TV in your room, ice cream on deck (none available in the buffet), courtesy buses to & from the ship and use of the steam / sauna rooms. Most disappointing. JOHN SMITH (ROBURT)

Up till now, we've only taken MSC cruises in Europe ... one a few years back and a 10 day northern Europe cruise that ended only a week ago.

We've now booked a Caribbean cruise with MSC ... sailing out of Miami on MSC Divina on Thursday Feb 21st. We enjoyed our recent cruise with them apart from a couple of aspects of it. The chefs attempts at British meals were laughable (crispy fish & chips that were totally soggy & Yorkshire puddings so heavy they could easily have sunk the ship) but our main complaint was the awful on-board entertainment. In 10 nights we failed to sit through more than 10 minutes of the shows in the theatre (operatic style singing, ballet inspired dance routines, boring jugglers & trapeze artists, etc) and it wasn't just our opinion as the venue was less than half full for every show. The on-board live music rooms were no better; MOR crooner type shows, string trios, boring piano players and an Abba tribute duo (I hate Abba pop songs).

Hopefully, with the majority of cruisers with MSC in the Caribbean being Americans / Canadians, the entertainment can't be as dire & old fashioned when their ships sail out of Florida ... or can it ??

I noticed that from December Nieuw Statendam and Koningsdam will have the above live music rooms. Will these be replacing the existing B B King's Blues Club rooms ??

My favorite thing on the Holland America ships is the entertainment provided 3 times nightly in the Blues Club rooms. If these are being replaced by a room which features just boring live rock groups, then I shall be giving Holland America a big miss in future.

The UK is still in the EU, so at present we don't need anything extra to visit Holland. I will check further though with their Embassy. MANY THANKS for the reply. ROBURT.

In late February we're due to cruise with Celebrity to Puerto Rico, St Thomas & St Maarten.

We're both UK citizens with UK passports and both have a current US Esta ...

Do we need to apply for Visas or anything similar to visit any of these 3 destinations ??

CHEERS Roburt, UK