carolphoto

With the Fantastica Experience you can choose your location so you will be fine. If you look on the deck plan on the MSC site, the cabins with a solid white balustrade are shaded grey. They are at the front of the ship, with a very long walk to the elevators. The best locations are between the two sets of elevators. You can also see where the white panels are as white trim if you look at a side view of the ship. Other cruise lines would have sold these as an Obstructed View cabin, at a lower price than a “Deluxe Balcony Cabin”. I was told onboard that my sailing was overbooked. I was limiting comments here to my own solo experience to keep to the topic so I won’t go into the other details. I am sure you will enjoy your cruise.

I am just back home from a 15 day MSC Seashore cruise out of Miami (Oct. 29 to Nov. 13). Having had a great solo experience on the Meraviglia three years ago, I had no worries about this one. I asked for a dinner table sharing with other solo passengers. However, I dined alone, except for two nights when a lively British lady joined me. She found 5:15 too early however, so chose a later time. When I asked the Maître D for dinner company it seemed to be impossible. My table was fully booked, but the others never came. Single get togethers were at the same time, 5:00 p.m. I did go to the hosted singles cocktail party, very nice, the second week, and was surprised to see about 70 people there. The MSC hostess, in a short speech said that MSC was working to expand solo cruising. It really does make a difference to meet others onboard. At lunch time I always asked to share a table but only rarely did that work out. Other solos said they had the same experience. Fortunately I had two fantastic Balinese waiters at dinner time, so that helped. Also, even though my cruise contract said I had a Deluxe Balcony Cabin, it had a solid white panel outside that I had to stand to see over, and about 30 feet of bow extending beneath it instead of ocean. All of the passengers I met who were given similar balcony cabins in that area were solo travellers. All attempts to change cabins were refused. It is a beautiful ship but it has many problems.