kelleherdl

The new garages at Terminal 10 and Terminal 6 are going up much faster than the original announced plans. Just hope we don’t get any severe tropical storms early season that will slow Terminal 10 work. There’s a small disturbance off the coast now with stiff breezes. All the construction is craned positioning of prefab sections, so that can be problematic. The new garages will at least double capacity at both terminals. The newly announced Terminal 8 will also have a huge garage.

We had a long chat with our Butler on our last Seashore cruise. He personally had ZERO interest in moving over to EJ. He very much likes the overall work environment of the YC. We agreed with him on the differing roles of ‘hosts’ on EJ. He believes this is the general feeling among the Butlers in YC. We love both EJ and YC. They both have their distinct appeal to us. We have only sailed OT’s on Explora 1, so we have no experience with Residence Hosts on EJ.

Today we booked a third segment to our original late September Med cruise on Explora 2. Originally we had Rome>BCN>BCN. We added the 7-day from Tarragona>Rome in front. The additional cruise was booked as a ‘new booking’ not an addition to the previous booking. The deal was as noted above, 30% off the already posted summer promotional fare. Make sure your TA or EJ Ambassador notes your prior MSC Yacht Club guest status. The MSC Yacht Club discount is a separate line item in the final fare calculation on our confirmation. For some reason our MSC YC sailings were missing from our EJ profile even though we used the 2023 promotion.

Don’t know if it’s completely true, but any agent said they are instructed to only take new photos if the one already there doesn’t meet spec. Something about reducing the amount of data that goes over the Wi-Fi and connection to the ship’s computer. Personally, they took a new one for my wife when she asked. Not a problem.

EJ announced today a special promotion for MSC Yacht Club previous guests. 30% off for new bookings for Summer 2024 Med bookings.

It might be because only the DD214 is a verification document that does not expire. Both a military ID and Commander letter can be a single use verification based on expiration. I find it reasonable that we are required to submit each time. I know not all use a TA, but this is another advantage of using one. I just have my DD214 with her.

Another benefit of the military discount is that it can be applied to other cabins in your group if linked to your booking. I think it’s up to 8 bookings per qualified military. This is where it may be valuable to have a TA or MSC Concierge representative handle the bookings. I’ve done the group military booking several times. Dennis

I guess some folks missed the news. Captain Di Palma posted yesterday, June 8, on another well known social media page that Explora II achieved her milestone of completed sea trials.

That’s okay. We get enough of you on this board. 😀

Our first MSC Cruise in 2019, we had Vishnu and Arthur and of course the ever Italian host Pepe! Together they hooked us on MSC Yacht Club. Arthur and Pepe have certainly advanced quite nicely within MSC. I keep in touch with both Pepe and Arthur. I always check in with them to see if they are on contract for our upcoming cruises. I still follow Vishnu on Facebook, and love seeing what’s going on in Mauritius.

Okay, this whole Cyrano think just hit me with a little Deja vu. Two nights ago I was thinking about how I came to be a reasonably accomplished public speaker 😀. (I was rehearsing my Mass readings for my son’s upcoming wedding.) Cyrano’s soliloquy was one of my grade school attempts at thespian immortality. Of course, my recollection was that I was outstanding. I also was just at The American Adventure at Disney World yesterday and Mark Twain’s humility almost matched mine.

I can assure you it does happen that zero count is held up looking for regular passenger disembarks AND back to backs that go ashore where the badging out is not recorded perfectly. Yes, there is an also a double check at CPB, but it is helpful to ship and shore staff to have an accurate accountability of back to backs who are going ashore in advance.

If you choose to go ashore for the day just let the officer at the gathering point for ‘back to back’ passengers know that you are going ashore for the day. They do that to account for folks going ashore so that they don’t have to search the ship to find you to ‘zero’ the count. You may disembark with the leaving passengers. Just make sure you have your passport (or birth certificates) with you.

You can sail Explora Journeys for roughly the same per person per day as MSC Yacht Club. Which is considerably cheaper than either NCL Haven or Celebrity Retreat for the same size cabin. EJ uses Starlink WiFi, so streaming is definitely an option for most of the Earth that EJ sails. BTW, MSC is moving over to Starlink as well. I’ve seen some comments on taking along your Firestick, or similar device, if you have one. Personally, I have no experience with streaming. The stateroom TV’s are very large.

The cruises in the Lesser Antilles, Barbados/Point a Pitre/Fort d’France, are done the same as Europe. Barbados is far easier to get to from the US, but the YC suites for Barbados embarkation seem to be ‘reserved’ for UK package bookings.

Divina and Preziosa are pretty much identical. dennis

The MSC version is better in my opinion to the other cruise lines I’ve done. The two day tour may seem strange, but it was really great. More time was able to be spent at each of the areas. More time in engineering and bridge were really nice, with plenty of time for questions. The officers were far more relaxed and interactive.

We’ve sailed Divina and Preziosa on at least two cruises each. Most of the Divina fans are in North America, most Preziosa Northern Europe. We like them both. We always sail YC so we appreciate the evening stroll to dinner. Crew seem to love the Preziosa and Divina as well as they do tend to get re-contracted (I know it’s not a word). The only annoyance for us Yacht Clubbers on the Fantasia class ships is the aft pool, mentioned above. Sometimes the ‘view’ of other cruises can be less than appealing, particularly those that linger into the dinner hour. 😀

When did you sail? On the Iceland to New York inaugural cruise the multi-language books were already in the stateroom. I am very certain that the diversity of books in the room would not have been left by prior guests given the diversity of titles and language, and they were most certainly NEW books. Those of us who sailed on early cruises know the books were already there. Dennis

The stateroom ‘libraries’ have been stocked since day one. The books are not lefts, they are provided by EJ.

As you can see my original post was in June of 2023. This was indeed before MSC US website was updated with the new itineraries. Dennis

Princess, Celebrity, and Holland America really OWN the Alaska market. We routinely sailed Alaska on Holland America in Neptune Suites. In my opinion, neither Holland American nor Princess, even with their most expensive cabins, provide the type of experience you are used to with MSC Yacht Club. A Celebrity ship with the Retreat may come close, but the price premium above MSC YC is sizable. Even Princess and Holland America at their prices are way above YC, with nothing near the same experience. When and if MSC add Alaska I will be one of the first to book. It will give me the reason to do Alaska again. So I think you are left with options among the other mainstream cruise lines with a lesser experience than the Yacht Club.

I found quite a few folks, like me, love the sun. With loungers on all sides of the ship it’s easy to find shade wherever the sun ISN’T. The great number of lounger locations for me is a strong design element. Now if you choose to stay in the same place all day long it can be an issue. The earth does rotate, so as we all know shade will move throughout the day. I’m willing to move with the sun and use the copious availability of towels to set up a fresh lounger.

In our experience you can get yourself off to its best start in Yacht Club starting in the terminal in the Yacht Club area. Be gracious with the Head/AsstHead Butler managing the area. It will be hit or miss you meet the YC Director here. The Head/Asst Head Butler are the NCO’s in the Yacht Club. Also, there will be regular Butlers and Junior Butlers there. Take the time to speak with them. Ask them if they know who your butler will be. They know the room blocks and THEY DO TALK to their colleagues. At your first chance speak with the Concierge or Asst Concierges at the desk. They can be a great help, particularly if you have any special things you want arranged for the week. Let them know early. The Lounge Butlers in the Topsail Lounge are also important to meet. They will make your cruise with their smiles and you will generally get drinks ordered your way after your first trip to the Lounge. Our favorite YC staff are the Bar / Grill / Pool staff up at Pool One. You will see most of them at other YC areas throughout the day. We spend most of our cruise up there. Sit at the bar sometimes. Don’t always wait for them to visit your lounger or table. You will find if you do that during the week that you will be visited as often as you like. And lastly the Hostess/Host at the YC Restaurant. We always visit on embarkation day and let them know we prefer an early sitting with the same fine Waiter/Server team for every evening during the cruise. It does work. We are not particular with our wines so we don’t bother ‘cultivating’ the Sommelier. He/She may be around the Topsail Lounge for your welcome on embarkation day. Chat him/her up and let them if you would like to be served at dinner each evening. We use the ‘envelope’ method of saying additional thanks at the end of the cruise. Others, use the immediate thank you. I don’t think it matters.

I was also bothered by the simple space/passenger computation based on gross tonnage/ passenger count. I think I remember seeing a computation several years ago based on ‘passenger space’ / passenger count. I fully recognize that gross tonnage is directly related to total ship space, but does not take into account ship design that may have been used to maximize passenger friendly space.