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Just back from the inaugural December 11, 2022 MSC Seascape voyage in YC Deluxe Suite: the good the bad and the very ugly

alexirina

By alexirina,
in MSC Cruises

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alexirina

alexirina

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We just came back from the inaugural voyage with the Yacht Club "experience" and wanted to share our honest impressions.

(For the reference: this is our 12-th overall cruise and 1-st (and last) with MSC. Our previous experiences included Princess, Virgin, NCL, Royal and Celebrity in Caribbean, Europe and Asia) 

We have heard so many good things about MSC that we finally decided to check this line out. We all know that a maiden voyage can be rocky, yet we were (and still are) so impressed with the inaugural cruise on the Wonder of the Seas (which was absolutely immaculate!) that we decided to go with "double or nothing" Here we are...

  • Good news: we connected with so many good friends (and that is a huge part of cruising for us).
  • Bad news: we could have just went to any fast food place down the road for dinner and had better food and service. Almost not kidding...
  • Ugly news... Our personal impression: MSC really and wholeheartedly doesn't care how cruise works out for us.

 

All that said, here is the first quick walk through the ship with our initial impressions. We have a tour of our cabin coming up very shortly as well as a very detailed review of the cruise.

 

 

Cheers! 

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Georgia_Peaches "Live from...." Rare

Georgia_Peaches

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As a general rule, I usually discount any review that is extremely favorable/unfavorable as they tend to lack the balance required to fairly critique the experience. TBH, I have not watched your video as I just don’t have the time at the moment but I appreciate your posting it and will make time over the holiday. Based on what you’ve written tho, I can say there’s no way I’d discount an Entire cruise line based on the food offered on a single ship.  As you mentioned, inaugural voyages of any new ship are usually quite sub par since there are so many kinks yet to be worked out. I would also love it if you would expand on your assertion that MSC “doesn’t care how cruise works out for us”.  You may have covered it in your video…

 

The good things you’ve heard about MSC likely encompass the entire line and include ships who’ve worked out the kinks and gotten into a rhythm. We’ve had two very successful cruises with MSC, one on seashore and another on Meraviglia, and another booked on seaside in 2023. 

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alexirina

alexirina

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Thank you, Georgia_Peaches!

I hear you: our initial reaction can be perceived rushed and even unfair. We are going to share all the details in the upcoming videos and comments. It was not by any means a terrible cruise, but it was not anywhere near what we were expecting (and paid for in full). Earlier this year we were on the maiden voyage with the Wonder of the Seas and that experience was immaculate. Sure they had minor glitches, but RC certainly worked hard to smooth those over. With MSC we just got a very solid feeling that not a single person on the ship (except our butler in YC) cared about anything... Again, we appreciate all post-sniffles-issues all cruiselines are going through, yet most of the problems we ran into are not something that can't be taken care of before the maiden voyage.

And it was not just the food...

  • Entertainment was at the point where the theater was never full to begin with, and then folks started walking out after the first song
  • Any attempts to contact the YC Consierge with the simplest questions were less than successfull
  • About half of the equipment never worked at all or worked right (elevators, coffee machine, the whole fiasco of disembarcation to mention a few)

 

Cheers and Happy Holidays!

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Georgia_Peaches "Live from...." Rare

Georgia_Peaches

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57 minutes ago, alexirina said:

Thank you, Georgia_Peaches!

I hear you: our initial reaction can be perceived rushed and even unfair. We are going to share all the details in the upcoming videos and comments. It was not by any means a terrible cruise, but it was not anywhere near what we were expecting (and paid for in full). Earlier this year we were on the maiden voyage with the Wonder of the Seas and that experience was immaculate. Sure they had minor glitches, but RC certainly worked hard to smooth those over. With MSC we just got a very solid feeling that not a single person on the ship (except our butler in YC) cared about anything... Again, we appreciate all post-sniffles-issues all cruiselines are going through, yet most of the problems we ran into are not something that can't be taken care of before the maiden voyage.

And it was not just the food...

  • Entertainment was at the point where the theater was never full to begin with, and then folks started walking out after the first song
  • Any attempts to contact the YC Consierge with the simplest questions were less than successfull
  • About half of the equipment never worked at all or worked right (elevators, coffee machine, the whole fiasco of disembarcation to mention a few)

 

Cheers and Happy Holidays!

Thank you for expanding on your experience. Agree that when the easy things fail (coffee maker, elevators) then the big fails are really big. Disappointed to read about the lack luster service. As for the entertainment in the theater, I will agree that it is quite different from other lines we’ve sailed (Celebrity, NCL, RCCL)… I’m told this is due to the international clientele. Anyway, I look forward to your subsequent postings. Happy holidays!

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styles27 "Live from...." Rare

styles27

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Looking forward to your review as I just booked my brother’s family on this cruise 2/2023

 

I appreciate the video and agree that it doesn’t seem as big and open as I expected it to be for a ship this size. 
 

The casino layout looks awful and the smoke issue would definitely bother me if it spills out to other areas. 

Also we’re fans of aft facing balconies and those are awful. No privacy yikes! 
 

 

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alexirina

alexirina

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9 hours ago, Shippy said:

I think most seasoned cruisers no better than to ever go on an inaugural cruise.

 

I would have agreed before our experience on Wonder of the Seas in March 2022 on her Maiden Voyage. There things simply worked and it was very clear that the entire  Royal crew contributed (or was "stimulated" to contribute). With this sailing we got a feeling that MSC just went with "let's get 3000 strangers on board, give them uniforms and see what happens". 

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JAGR

JAGR

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Posted (edited)
13 hours ago, alexirina said:

We just came back from the inaugural voyage with the Yacht Club "experience" and wanted to share our honest impressions.

(For the reference: this is our 12-th overall cruise and 1-st (and last) with MSC. Our previous experiences included Princess, Virgin, NCL, Royal and Celebrity in Caribbean, Europe and Asia) 

We have heard so many good things about MSC that we finally decided to check this line out. We all know that a maiden voyage can be rocky, yet we were (and still are) so impressed with the inaugural cruise on the Wonder of the Seas (which was absolutely immaculate!) that we decided to go with "double or nothing" Here we are...

  • Good news: we connected with so many good friends (and that is a huge part of cruising for us).
  • Bad news: we could have just went to any fast food place down the road for dinner and had better food and service. Almost not kidding...
  • Ugly news... Our personal impression: MSC really and wholeheartedly doesn't care how cruise works out for us.

 

All that said, here is the first quick walk through the ship with our initial impressions. We have a tour of our cabin coming up very shortly as well as a very detailed review of the cruise.

 

 

Cheers! 

Thanks for the video.  Only thing I would point out is that when you were filming the walk through of the Top 19 Deck, you mentioned that it was reserved for Yacht Club.  Actually, while YC guests would have access to it, the Top 19 is designed as a reserved area for Aurea experience guests.

Edited by JAGR
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JAGR

JAGR

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22 minutes ago, alexirina said:

I did not know that! Thank you kindly for this information, it certainly would come handy as the "upstairs" (I should not call it YC anymore) experience was rather confusing. 

YW!  Typically, MSC would call the private YC pool "The One Pool," and the overall deck (deck 20 in this case) as the YC The One Sun Deck.

 

Glad at least you liked your butler!  Our favorite pool guard/attendant (Onil Jay Pedernal) from a few years ago is now a butler on Seascape.

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Two Wheels Only

Two Wheels Only

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With very early/inaugural sailings, it is common for things to go awry. Problems with the ship, the crew, the procedures, etc. are basically the norm until things get sorted. I like "new" ships but I usually give it a few months before I sail on a new ship.  

 

1 hour ago, alexirina said:

I would have agreed before our experience on Wonder of the Seas in March 2022 on her Maiden Voyage. There things simply worked and it was very clear that the entire  Royal crew contributed (or was "stimulated" to contribute).

 

All lines can have these early sailing problems. Wonder OTS worked for you but people who sailed Harmony OTS on the early sailings might still be complaining. Those issues were sorted out just as other ships on other lines usually sort out their problems. MSC Seaside (first ship in the class) had a sewage problem that took months to correct. I sailed after the problem was fixed. 

 

Compounding the problem with MSC is that MSC doesn't seem to have a standard operating procedure to deal with issues nor does MSC have a consistency that guests can rely upon. A guest might have a great cruise on one MSC ship but have a bad cruise on a sister ship. It happens. Food can differ from ship to ship, week to week, or even day to day. 

 

 

1 minute ago, JAGR said:

Our favorite pool guard/attendant (Onil Jay Pedernal) from a few years ago is now a butler on Seascape.

 

On a different video, I saw my Meraviglia butler on Seascape. I've never had a bad butler on any line/ship but I will be more than happy if I get the same butler on Seascape. 

 

 

I would rack this up as a "bad cruise" but since it is the first MSC experience for the OP, it probably feels like a deal-breaker. 

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alexirina

alexirina

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1 hour ago, Two Wheels Only said:

Compounding the problem with MSC is that MSC doesn't seem to have a standard operating procedure to deal with issues nor does MSC have a consistency that guests can rely upon. A guest might have a great cruise on one MSC ship but have a bad cruise on a sister ship. It happens. Food can differ from ship to ship, week to week, or even day to day. 

 

I could not have put this better! I think it finally clicked with me that MSC simply does not have SOP for anything. Which is fine for many ("fake it until you make it" seems to work for some industries), but somehow bothers folks like myself. And, thank you for tying this together, this is most likely a problem with the food we had. When there is no procedure in place in the kitchen you are very likely to end up with a situation where "your soup is dry" (to quote my favorite chef)...

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alexirina

alexirina

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Check out  our tour of the beautiful Yacht Club suite we stayed in. Suite is beautiful and we enjoyed it very much! Hope this makes up for some of the negative vibes we shared in the original video and few comments above 🙂 Cheers!

 

 

 

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morpheusofthesea "Live from...." Rare

morpheusofthesea

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27 minutes ago, alexirina said:

Thank you so much for your kind thoughts! Just to let you know, our videos are not sponsored or monetized, so either way we appreciate your input!

We plan to be on board on Monday. We have discovered things can change over night.What happens on one cruise, strangely disappears the next with added collective amnesia from the staff of anything happening on the prior cruise. We were all 'bent out of shape' about a post of a case of chicken pox just days before boarding, two months ago. 'Out of sight, out of mind' and had a fabulous cruise. There are 1648 crew on board and from posted photos we only recognize the Captain, hotel director and the future cruise consultant. In any event we will have a great time because we always have a great time in the Yacht Club.

   Love your videos and your commentary. Will continue to follow. Hope more to come.

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alexirina

alexirina

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10 minutes ago, Two Wheels Only said:

19013 is a Deluxe Grand Suite. It's larger than the typical Deluxe Suite. The Grands come in different sizes and some are even wider than the one in the video. 

Thank you kindly! I honestly did not know that even though I thought I researched ship and offerings thoroughly. Indeed there are suites that almost doubled size of ours (we snuck a peek into one as we were walking by), but frankly suite we stayed in was more than adequate for us. 

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alexirina

alexirina

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9 minutes ago, morpheusofthesea said:

We plan to be on board on Monday. We have discovered things can change over night.What happens on one cruise, strangely disappears the next with added collective amnesia from the staff of anything happening on the prior cruise.

Not only that, but experiences undoubtably vary depending on guests you meet onboard (that actually saved this cruise for us) and many other contributing factors from the weather to the overall vibe onboard. We personally are never discouraged when we read/watch reviews, but rather project experiences others have into our universe (if that makes sense). So, cheers, I'm sure you will have fabulous cruise and say HI to Amol -- he was our butler and he is absolutely fantastic!

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alexirina

alexirina

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5 minutes ago, Two Wheels Only said:

 

You probably saw 19025. 😉

You made me look at a deck plan 🙂 I think I happened to had a glance at 19033 (I remember because it was at that weird corner deal they have close to elevator) and that suite looked way too wide. Almost not kidding: there can be such thing as too much room in your stateroom

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