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Live MSC Preziosa Grand Voyage


travelberlin
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In two days we will board the MSC Preziosa for a Journey from South America to Europe. I will be posting our experiences during this voyage and try to provide information for all of you, specially those who are considering a transatlantic. Please feel free to ask questions and if someone is on the same cruise, feel free to add your experiences.

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Edited by travelberlin
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Thanks Nimloth, Pluto_fan and Beamafar.

We have just arrived in Santos. Picture will follow once I find this thread in Tapatalk. Somehow I could not find it.

 

We are awake since 2.am. I feel like a Zombie. Our flight had more than two hours delay, apparently because of bad weather in our destination city. However no one in that destination city had heard about bad weather. It was just a trick of the airline in order not to offer a compensation. If the delay is not responsibility of the airline ( and weather related issues never are), the airline does not provide compensation. Many people were really upset. We had decided to take it easy since our arrival in Santos was not in dangeur, just delayed.

 

Very much looking forward to our cruise...

Ivi

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We had a nice evening in Santos enjoying a caipirinha (Brazilian first national drink) and a batida de coco (also a much appreciated cocktail here).

We are staying at the Mercure hotel. If you come to Santos for a cruise, you could stay here.

Here are photos from Santos from our balcony at the hotel.

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Thanks sofsolnanny!

Well, in order to be fair, I have to adapt myself first again to large ships. We have cruised many times with different size ships and we have also cruised many times with MSC. We take MSC to reposition from one continent to the other. Unfortunately last year because of an unexpected illness of my husband we had to cancel our transatlantic with MSC. This means we are coming back after 2 years. In between we have cruised with Mein Shiff, Celebrity, Azamara, Windstar, Royal Clipper. Our last cruise was with the Oceania Sirena a couple of months ago.

The MSC Preziosa has capacity for 4.300 guests and the crew members are about 1300. As black card members we had priority by check in and our boarding, despite the long queues was smooth. It took us about 45 minutes between our arrival to the port and our boarding.

Our first impressions onboard the ship were not that positive.

First impression the security people at the gate, looked stressed and made an unfriendly impression. More like migration officers at airports and not like security personal on ships.

Second the photographers have blocked the main entrance completely, so that they make a picture of you with a ship as a background. You had to stay on this queue even if you did not want to have your picture taken. I think MSC should look into this and improve to give guests a more friendly welcome onboard.

Lunch at the buffet restaurant was fine. Of course very difficult to find a free table due to the amount of people. Waiters were very committed to try to sale drink packages.

Rooms were ready at 14.30. Our room is not in the Yacht Club. This means my experiences are not going to refer to the Yacht Club at all. Our room is a balcony cabin in the category fantastica. It is a very good cabin, which we happened to secure almost a year ago.

As usual after boarding we went to the library to borrow some books. To our dismay, MSC has reduced the size of the library! Very easy to find out that you were not going to find something to read on the library.

On the positive note we met our cabin attendant and our waiters. They all make a very friendly impression. Our cabin attendant is from Brazil and our waiters are from Indonesia. We are glad they are here for us.

Pictures from our cabin and library will follow.

Have a good start of the week. Bye, bye for now

 

Ivi

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The library is disappointing - you'd think they would fill all the shelves at least. That said I believe I read a review where they said that the books were removed from the library when they were in port so maybe there will be more when you are at sea?

 

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The library is disappointing - you'd think they would fill all the shelves at least. That said I believe I read a review where they said that the books were removed from the library when they were in port so maybe there will be more when you are at sea?

 

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Thanks for the tip, I will go back to check.

Ivi

 

 

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Thanks Sidari and Riclop.

We are on our way to Salvador da Bahia. As part of our “fantastica experience” we can order continental breakfast in our cabin at no additional costs. We just had our breakfast at the balcony enjoying the quietness of our cabin and hearing to the waves. It is such a beautiful feeling.

We are still adapting to the amount of people on this cruise ship. Every where queues, specially at the reception. Most of the fellow passengers are Brazilians of all ages. Friendly, educated, and considerate with others most of the time. They will hold the elevator for you, they greet when they come into the elevator and they try to be disciplined at the queues.

Yesterday at lunch time we had a good Ossobuco. It used to be better at MSC ships, but yesterday was quite acceptable. That this ship has not enough personal to offer a good service on board is noticeable. But waiters do their best, smiling and being patient with impatient guests.

We have the cheers package. This means we can have Bier, wines and water at lunch and dinner time. The wines are from a very modest quality. On the reds you can choose between a Merlot and a Barbera. On the whites the option is between a Pino Grigio and a Chardonnay. There is also a rose available.

The MSC Preziosa is a beautiful ship. The lobby displays the famous crystal stairs characteristic of this category ships. Many elegant public areas. In the evening it is fun just to sit in one of those venues enjoying the live music. Last evening we sat on the area near to the reception listening to a talented piano player. One of the songs he played was “What a wonderful World”. It feels like a wonderful world indeed.

Pictures will follow. Bye, bye for now.

Ivi

 

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Last evening we had a very nice show onboard the Preziosa. It was Grease. About 20 young performers. There are two show times. We went to the one at 20.00 and it was pretty full. Announcements were made in 6 languages. This is also a characteristic from MSC. The cruise director is from Brazil and is called Rubens. His face look familiar, maybe we have already sailed with him.

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Thanks again Pluto_fan.

Ok, we have adapted from the small ship to the large ship. Now I am trying to recognize the MSC, which we like and made us sail with them as many times as necessary to become black members.

Some of the people who work here are familiar to us. We recognize friendly and tired faces. It is good to see them again.

Lets start with the food at the main restaurant at breakfast and lunch time. Again queues to enter the restaurants full of hope to enjoy a nice meal. Very few tables for two, mean that you will always end up sharing a table. No problem if at least there were a selection of languages. Funny situation to be sitting with someone who only speaks Portuguese and you do not. Smiles here and then but that is all. Any efforts to communicate die on the first minutes.

The menu you get is of course in Portuguese even though you are talking to the waiter in English. If you wish a menu in a different language, it will be brought to you after 15 minutes. On the mean time, your knowledge of the Portuguese language has improved for sure, since you are almost ready to order on that language (amazing what hunger can do…).

Would you like coffee? Great you get it immediately. If you wish a tea, like green tea, you better start liking coffee…

The main restaurants have become a mixture between buffet with of course again long queues, and a la carte in which you have to come prepared to wait a long time for your meals to arrive.

This is new to us. The MSC we had in our memory was not perfect, but charming with a nice Italian flair to it. Relaxed and easy going yes. Chaotic in very rare occasions. Now it seems to be more chaotic than before through the new system.

Now I am sitting at the Phoenician Plaza enjoying an espresso (paid of course and double the price as it used to be). I am missing the cannoli, the tiramisu, the panna cotta. Instead I see a couple of jelly, and other deserts which would make an Italian wonder if this is an Italian ship.

Ivi

 

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