Florida Beach

Well I made my way through almost 400 posts . :eek: There are many great tips here but I am surprised that nobody mentioned the value of Cruise Critic . Don't roll your eyes at me - I am not trying to be the teachers pet . CC is a great resource for the newbie cruiser especially for the mass market cruise lines . Certain info, especially booking hints , I was completely ignorant of on my first cruise .

Sometimes we miss the obvious :)

In January 2016 I friend and I were on the Splendor in the casino very late, about 4 AM, playing slots and a guy walked by totally naked. We went to guest services to report it and the rep thought we were drunk, until he came walking up asking where his cabin was. Security showed up to escort him to his cabin and the funniest part was they headed upstairs in the atrium GLASS elevators

:D LOL I am glad I found this thread LOL

The walls are magnetic - so you can put the important papers they give you on the wall.

Now that's something I didn't know :-) Thanks

Princess has a similar wine package.

Great. We will be ordering a package in November. Thanks

I am sure that you know there are beverage packages on most cruise lines (RCCL, NCL, etc). We have the option to buy a specific beverage package per person. Would it be easier to save $$$ to just buy the beverage package for one person and order the drinks to share with other guests who goes with him/her instead of buy the package for each person? Is that possible? For example: RCCL have the unlimited beverage package for one person that costs about 40 dollars per day. If this person and his guest (ideally a married couple, boyfriend/girlfriend or two cruising buddies) spilts the costs ($20 dollars per day) to contribute toward his individual package by using his sail pass card to order two drinks from the same drink package that he paid with his sea pass card, that would be ideal to save money instead of buying another package for another person. I've wondered if people have done that. Any risk factors involved with cruisers using the same drink package to share? Thank you in advance for your input :cool:

Since we don't drink a lot, I like the Wine and beer packages on the MSC Divina (no - it's not "unlimited"). The wine package includes 7 bottles ($160 + 15% service charge), we got 16 beer coupons ($59 + service charge). We cruised with another couple, so each night at dinner, we selected a bottle of wine from the wine list, the waiter brought out the wine and opened for us.

It gave me a chill reading about Klfhngr's ordeal. It's a cruiser's nightmare.

OF course they have ice in the water, as well as in the ice tea! They do not serve water with ice in European cruising since you will notice the non -Americans on board drinking bottle sparkling water. We are a fascination to others about our need for cold water I guess and tap water!!

 

You also get an ice bucket in your cabin which will be filled with ice!

 

I would use any of the park and go lots. My friend parked in the port parking thinking it was free if she had a handicap card in the car. Since she had some leg surgery her doctor gave it to her. She read that the port parking was free if you had this. But the kicker was: she read this in October for the cruise in Jan and never checked it out again. Why would anyone recheck? So she parked and got hit with a $280 parking bill ( she did the b2b too, 14 days at $20 a day!!) They changed their rules Nov 2013 and never put any signage about it in the garage!

 

Other friends found a shuttle service to the park and go for a lot less, I think they said 6.99 per day!

 

Enjoy your cruise.

Pointers: The pasta is always wonderful. Go to the back of the buffet for international food. They do serve lunch even on port days in the MDR. Make sure you eat there the day they have coconut shrimp as an appetizer and get many portions and skip the entree.

Order the lasagna, the eggplant and the zuchini dishes. Make sure you eat their panna cotta , it is the best. If you ask the waiter on Baked Alaska night for which flavors they have, he may be able to find one that has the flavors you want. WE wanted one with pistacio and coconut. He found it.

Their Baked Alaska is the best! Not the usual flavors of vanilla, strawberry and chocolate. On the second of the b2b cruises, we got rum raisin and butter pecan.

Go to ALL of the shows.... they are better than words can describe.

DO not miss the Opera night. They have the most wonderful singers, but they have added fantastic dance routines with beautiful costumes.

Their shows are a feast for the eyes. ENJOY!!!!

Thanks for the pointers. We can't wait to experience Divina :)

We just booked (last minutes) for the sail next week (March 1-8, 2014). This will be our first time on the MSC Divina, so we are reading up on all of the reviews. We just want to get away, disconnect from the office for awhile, so if we don't have ice in our water (like one of the posts we saw in a different review), it's still perfectly fine :) We will be driving to the port, still trying to locate a safe parking garage. If you guys have a good, safe parking garage, please recommend.

:) Thanks for sharing :)