MSC Meraviglia...Was it that horrible as some reviews stated?

[danny8826]

We have just booked o the MSC Meraviglia for April 18th of next year embark from Genoa and disembark in Hamburg.

 

We are getting ready to buy our non-refundable airfare.

I have read both very good and horrible reviews. In regards to food, was it that bad to the point that it's not eatable? it's hard to imagine that food in both their main dining room, buffet, and specialty restaurants are all not eatable. Some reviewers even said the food are disgusting.

If you have been on the Meraviglia recently, could you please comment?

 

How was the entertainment and the Cirque du Soleil show?

 

Thank you in advance for your input.

Danny

[Skier52]

We have just booked o the MSC Meraviglia for April 18th of next year embark from Genoa and disembark in Hamburg.

 

We are getting ready to buy our non-refundable airfare.

I have read both very good and horrible reviews. In regards to food, was it that bad to the point that it's not eatable? it's hard to imagine that food in both their main dining room, buffet, and specialty restaurants are all not eatable. Some reviewers even said the food are disgusting.

If you have been on the Meraviglia recently, could you please comment?

 

How was the entertainment and the Cirque du Soleil show?

 

Thank you in advance for your input.

Danny

here are the relevant sections from my review of our sailing on 24 Sept;

Note:- We were in the yacht club

 

Dining

 

All our breakfasts and lunches were taken in the YC. What was noticeable was the standard of the food in the YC was a notch higher than we had experienced on Divina and a couple of notches better than the main MDR's we've experienced in the past. Also noticeable was the apparent change in format of the meals. Gone are the old 6 or 7 course with a choice of 2 or 3 items in each course, and in are 3 course menus with 6 or 7 choices in each course.

But to the discerning eye the Appetisers was made up of the old anti pasta, soup and salad courses whilst the main course had the pasta, risotto and meat/fish dishes. The waiters were happy to serve two or three items from each course if you wanted the old 6 or 7 course meal.

 

On three occasions we had dinner in other restaurants. One with the Cirque Du Soleil show ( more on that later) and twice in Butcher's Cut (an American style steak house) for our complimentary Black members meals. A nice touch was we were allowed to take our bottles of complementary Prosecco and Cava in to the diner for consumption with the meal. That touch was organised by our Butler. The Black members menu was a limited section of the a la carte menu and filet mignon was our choice on both occasions.

We didn't try any other dining venues. One disappointment was there was no facility for the complimentary ice-cream you get with certain drinks packages as there was a franchised ice-cream outlet in the main shopping area. I managed to circumvent the no ice cream rule by asking one of the butlers if the ice cream available at lunch and dinner was available at other times, and was told to just ask a butler and some would be fetched from the kitchens for me.

 

Entertainment

 

A) Daytime activities

 

There were the usual activities around the pool:- games, dancing and fitness activities which seemed well attended, but the pool area is relatively small for the size of the ship and the sun-loungers were soon occupied. However there were plenty of sun beds to be had in other locations around the ship.

If you were a keen jogger you would have found the token marked jogging track blocked by sunbeds most of the time and you will also have had people from the adjacent walking track being a nuisance.

There is a large aqua park and Himalayan bridge area on the rear of the ship, as well as a large indoor pool and an indoor sports area, and there is the extra cost activities comprising of the F1 twin cars simulator, the flight sim (out of order when I wanted to have a go) and the full size bowling lanes which are computer stabilised.

So all in all plenty of space and activities for all.

 

B) Evening entertainment

 

There were competing Shows:-

 

1) the additional cost, with either a meal(or a cocktail), Cirque du Soleil shows.

Two different shows, I'm not going to say any more than they were exceptional, so as not to spoil it for future cruisers.

There is an interesting type of dining equipment with the meal, included in the cutlery, a wooden mallet.

 

2) The traditional theatre productions

 

Here MSC have been listening to criticisms, mainly in the US, of the use of canned music instead of live orchestras and now have live music.

The production cast comprised:- six singers; fourteen dancers; an eight member orchestra.

 

We only managed to catch two shows and were disappointed by them. They just weren't up to the standard of our more recent cruises on MSC. The theatre is small considering the size of the ship, which may be a factor. Alternatively, it may be that we saw the two "Cirque" shows first and they were so good that the other shows couldn't compete.

Either way they were a disappointment.

 

The other big attraction was the LED dome which at certain points in the evening showed live views of the guests as they walked beneath it and of course they filmed themselves . It also had some good short films especially created for it, as well as stationary designs and artistic pictures.

you can read the whole review on the following link. (lots of photos included)

 

http://www.cruisingmates.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=270&t=12438

 

 

 

Pete

 

[Bra_BE2014]

Everything about cruising is so subjective! I loved Meraviglia. Some didn't. You will have to discover for yourself! There is also a very active Facebook group about this ship and someone posted that their son's school play was better then cirque de Soleil show, I kid you not. Just to show that it is simply impossible to please every single person.

 

 

Happy cruising!

[famm101]

The food was terrible. There are just too many people on the ship to handle the buffet. The food is lukewarm at best. We had a very good dinner in Butchers Cut and a great brunch in Butcher Cut. You need to ask what day they do the brunch, it is not every day. The show Cirque du Soleil was cancelled the entire week on the ship. We had the drink package and at the bars you would wait for 20 minutes for someone to even make eye contact with you and another 20 minutes waiting for the drink. My son finally started tipping and we were take care of immediately. Just so you know, I have never written a bad review on anything but other than the ship being beautiful, it had nothing else.

 

 

 

We have just booked o the MSC Meraviglia for April 18th of next year embark from Genoa and disembark in Hamburg.

 

We are getting ready to buy our non-refundable airfare.

I have read both very good and horrible reviews. In regards to food, was it that bad to the point that it's not eatable? it's hard to imagine that food in both their main dining room, buffet, and specialty restaurants are all not eatable. Some reviewers even said the food are disgusting.

If you have been on the Meraviglia recently, could you please comment?

 

How was the entertainment and the Cirque du Soleil show?

 

Thank you in advance for your input.

Danny

[sverigecruiser]

We had the drink package and at the bars you would wait for 20 minutes for someone to even make eye contact with you and another 20 minutes waiting for the drink.

 

 

I don't think that we ever had to wait for more than a minute. I guess that we were lucky.

[jkrislc]

The reviews here seem to be much more critical than on other review sites, but it could be that the reviews here have more experience and more to compare with overall. Thankfully, I'm more about the itinerary than the ship, but I have booked a backup cruise with Holland America to Norway this summer in case we decide to cancel our July sailing on Meraviglia after our January cruise on her.

[mistertoaster]

I recently posted a review of our recent cruise in the Yacht Club on Meraviglia( “A Long Strange Trip in the Yacht Club”). Without reiterating the review, suffice to say that service on this ship is a problem. My theory on service is that MSC did not realize the staffing and training necessary to run a ship that has a 50 % greater occupancy than its largest ships. The good news the ship is beautiful and this problem is fixable if MSC evaluates is staffing on training.

 

The bad news is this may take sometime. I presume the ship is fully booked for its inaugural season as folks wish to experience a new ship. Once MSC starts to see bookings drop, that may spur action. Of course, MSC could be proactive and fix the issues now. However, until it hits the bottom-line, most companies fail to act.

 

 

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[riclop]

Always go and form your own opinion.

[nikkiw60]

My boss got back at the weekend and loved it! The only issue they had was disembarking in Genoa because of the weather they missed their plane.

 

 

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[gtalum]

Keep in mind that there are always problems to iron out on brand new ships, and especially on the first ship in a new class.