travelgal23

On 6/16/2019 at 10:39 PM, Jayhawk said:

Getting ready to disembark tomorrow and heading straight to work the next day, so I'm including my "journal" thoughts and if I remember, I'll add any final comments later, but here goes for anyone that is interested.

 

Monday, June 10:

Headed to the cruise ship and got settled in.  Everything went pretty smoothly.  MSC doesn't have the reputation of being a "high end" ship but overall a great value. We had initially chosen this cruise because of the Cuba stop, which was cancelled a week ago...so disappointed. Armonia was on the smaller side of the ships we’ve be on, but still maintained well. We thought the food was good and all the staff super friendly. We had dinner with a family from northern Florida and then went to the show the first night.  Our teenagers both went off with new friends they made. They said the teen club was relatively lame but at least afforded a central location to meet up with others their same ages. 

 

Tuesday, June 11:

Today was our first day at sea. We started the morning after breakfast with a CruiseCritic party.  After nearly 20 years on the boards and nearly a dozen cruises, this was my first CC party, and it was very nice, even though there were only 10 of us. They had drinks, a cake and some snacks and the staff and a few officers came to introduce themselves to us. We had some internet connection issues due to my work VPN and spent about 2 hours in the morning dealing with that at the customer service desk.  MSC finally problem solved by giving us two unlimited internet packages.  We then had a pretty lazy day…some time at the pool and we watched “How to Train Your Dragon” in the movie theater. This was the first formal night, we enjoyed dressing up, going to the show (French Follies) and wandering around participating in various activities afterwards.

 

Wednesday, June 12 – Ocho Rios, Jamaica:

Today was our first port. It was a bit of a rough start…the electricity on about half the ship went out right before we docked.  This caused a bit of a backup with disembarkation, which got worse as soon as the internet shut off as well.  We were close to the end of the line (embarkation started at 10:30, we got in line about 10:45, but not off the ship until probably 12:15.)  Long time to stand in line, especially when there was limited air conditioning.  Poor MSC, their staff must be ready to pull their hair out! No compensation other than $100 off a future cruise; wish we could have gotten a $100 shipboard credit. Some passengers had lost lots of patience, so glad it wasn’t worse.  We had a great day in Ocho Rios, still able to do our excursion.  We booked through https://www.excursionochorios.com/ via Richie Brooks.  Richie was not able to join us so we instead had his son O’Neil. We started off horseback riding, including an “ocean dip” with the horses. Then we climbed Dunn’s River falls, they put us in with another tour guide and I felt bad as we didn’t have money on us to tip afterward. The evening theme was “flowers/70s"; we dressed for all the themes although noticed the majority of people didn’t. Dinner included a small lobster tail tonight which was a pleasant surprise and we all really liked the Greatest of Broadway show. Chris and I ended the night playing trivia again, which was fun, and kids were off with teen club/new friends. All in all, nice day.

 

Thursday, June 13 – Grand Cayman:

Today was our tender port. I always hate dealing with the logistics of tenders, especially when it’s a short day (last tender back left at 2), so we slept in a bit and got off the ship about 10, when there were no lines.  We just mostly shopped around and went snorkeling at Eden Dive, which was a short walk from the port: http://edenrockdive.com/. It was very fun but a further swim out to the reef than we thought, so we were pretty worn out after just an hour, but did see some amazing fish and reefs! Back on board had time to relax before “white night”. It was fun to watch the party/dancing on the ship, even though we didn’t directly partake in it. We enjoyed the Addams family show in the theater as well.

 

Friday, June 14 – Cozumel, Mexico:

Today we had a long stop in Cozumel.  Since we didn’t dock until 10, we tried breakfast in Marco Polo, which was nice, although not that much different than the buffet (just easier to find a seat!). For this trip we booked a dolphin interaction with www.dolphindiscovery.com. It was located inside Chankanaab Natural Park. We didn’t take as advantage of the whole park as we should have. It was $318 for the 4 of us (excluding taxi there/back which was $12 for 4 each way). In addition, to the dolphin encounter we had full access to the park/beach/snorkel area (you can rent equipment), pool, lockers, a full lunch buffet, unlimited drinks (I discovered this too late into the day, huge bummer). The dolphin experience was almost an hour behind schedule, but once we started, there were 6 of us that had quite a bit of private time with the dolphins. In addition to the interactions, we did a dorsal tow (hanging on to two of their fins as they swam) and a foot push (the push you to standing height). This is probably the most interactive experience they have with the dolphins with two cool chances to ride (vs one belly or fin ride). The girls so much enjoyed their encounters, even the kisses. We eventually caved and bought the pictures since you couldn’t take any yourself; that’s probably how they make all their money.  Definitely negotiate down…they won’t budge on the pricing but you can get the 2 person price for a family of 4, or a 1 person price for 2, etc. We had meant to go to the beach there and snorkel, but by the time we were done and ate at the all you can eat buffet, it was nearly 4, so we ran out of time.  Shopped for a bit back by port and then got back on vs staying out later – we didn’t have to load until 7:30 at night. Back on board it was Italian night, caught a quick show, and we were worn out!

 

Saturday, June 15 – Costa Maya, Mexico:

This was our “make up” port for Havana.  While we were so disappointed about Cuba, I have to say, the make up experience was pretty good.  We booked a tour (with only 24 hours between the time we found out the new port and when we left, so thanks to those online that helped me) with Natural Choice: https://www.thenativechoice.com/tours/chacchoben-ruins-tour.  We chose the 5.5 hour option for a guided tour visit to the ruins, which was 1 hour away and lunch with a local family.  It was so cool, great personalized experience that included 13 of us, including 4 people we had dinner with each night from Northern Florida who I told about it. While the ruins were cool, honestly the kids and even us enjoyed the lunch more than anything.  They taught us how to make tortillas and we cooked them together over an open flame, had a great local meal, ground our own chocolate, pulled up water from a well, explored the grounds and a small brightly colored village and enjoyed interacting with everyone.  We rested back on ship and prepared for our second formal night dinner. We ordered a cake and the wait staff sang Happy birthday our 17 year old.  We skipped the show this night and instead went to watch “the Quest” which was kind of like a scavenger hunt contest on board.

 

Sunday, June 16 – day at sea:

This was supposed to be Day #2 in Cuba.  Would have been nice if they could somehow squeeze something like Key West in, but I’m sure that would have been hard. One pleasant surprise for us was mass offered on board.  We’ve cruised a lot and almost never seen this. We had a church picked out to attend in Cuba Sunday morning so were grateful for the mass option. Evidently it wasn’t normal, just a priest who was traveling with family and he was also planning to go in Cuba, so when it was cancelled he offered service. It was super cool, maybe 15 of us, with normal French bread!  Rest of the day was lazy, including nap and a few shipboard activities like trivia, while DH watched two movies in the theater. It was Father's Day so we let him have that time.  After a nice final dinner, we attended the last show, which was my favorite – the contortionists were amazing, and ended with evening trivia.  Trivia had become a thing for our family and it was fun and competitive. Overall, I think MSC did a great job given the challenges handed to them by our government.  Here’s hoping for a fast debarkation tomorrow to make our 9:55 FLL flight!

 

Great review.  I enjoyed the cruise also.  My only complaint would be the organization of the excursions.  We booked ours through MSC.  Not including the day the power was out, it was chaotic in the theater where they had everyone meet.  It was unclear what you were supposed to do when you got in there.  The information screen was not updated regularly.  A woman we met at breakfast one morning said an employee gave her the wrong sticker so she ended up with a 2 hour Spanish tour group instead of a 4 hour English tour group.  By the time the error was realized, the other group had already left the port.  On the cruise line we typically travel on, they only have 2-3 groups meeting in a location rather than everyone meeting in the same location so it was easier to communicate information.

12 hours ago, Jayhawk said:

We did not.  To be honest, it mostly got eaten up with the service fees (tips).  For us that was $87.50 per person and there were four of us - so that was $350.  We ordered a birthday cake, bought cough medicine and maybe 2 drinks the whole time.  Going into the last night we had a $7 credit...but then we decided to buy a couple pictures so wound up owing $50. I didn't keep the disembarkation sheet of paper but seemed to remember if we wanted the credit, we had to go downstairs before the end of the cruise and get it "in cash" which I thought was odd (it said even if you paid with a debit or credit card). Maybe I misread it but that seemed odd.

This was the first cruise where I walked off with more cash than I walked on with.  There were only 2 in our cabin and we had scheduled 2 excursions for Cuba which they also refunded.  Gratuities and 1 bottle of water were the only expenses to offset what they owed us.  It was refunded in cash which I also thought was strange since we had paid for everything with a credit card.

On 6/17/2019 at 3:33 PM, Jayhawk said:

That's a good question...I thought the same but they never did.  Do they post them here?  Bummer to miss that pic.

We were told at the Meet and Mingle that they would deliver a copy of the picture to our cabin.  We never received ours either.