JamieLogical's Live from the MSC Divina 2/11

[JamieLogical]

5 hours ago, gizfish said:

Jaime, have you tried to get a lounge chair for that angled balcony?  I asked on Mera and had such a weird response.  Cabin stewardess said she had to ask supervisor who ultimately said it was not allowed.  When I asked at guest services, it was like no one had ever requested this before.  Finally an officer told the guest services clerk that it was not allowed because it could "break the glass on the balcony."  Guess the large balconies and YC balconies are immune to that safety issue.  Wondering if this is a fleet wide thing.  

 

See my post above about the foot stool I bring with me on every cruise.

[notyalc23]

On 2/11/2024 at 12:33 PM, stefmaia said:

One of my favorite hangouts! Which of the beers did you try?

Jamie tried their barrel aged imperial stout (in a bottle), and I tried both their Irish Red and their smoked helles lager. The imperial stout was 14% abv, so one will get the job done 😃.

 

We absolutely loved Lincolns Beard. The beer was spot on, and the vibe there reminded me of some of the independent breweries back home. We definitely have it on our list of places to stop at on our next cruise out of Miami.

[JamieLogical]

Have some bonus pictures from my balcony just now as I am working on my blog. Got to see an amazing rainbow from our balcony.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 13 by JamieLogical

[JamieLogical]

Yesterday was a sea day. We had decided to order our room service breakfast for 6:30 and planned to have a real breakfast in the MDR while they were open from 8:00-9:30. Our room service showed up by 6:15, but that was fine. I headed out to the balcony to start typing up my blog.

 

Once it was closer to 7:00, I decided to head in and work on taking a shower and getting ready. I decided I would be the guinea pig this time since my husband had done the honors of taking the first shower in our hotel room in Miami. So, one thing I LOVE about the Divina is the way the shower doors are designed. There are two separate doors that can push in or out, though, the larger, curved one can’t push out far without hitting the toilet. The nice thing about this is that pushing the doors into the shower makes more room in the bathroom while the shower is not in use, especially providing more room next to the toilet.

 

Since the Divina is not a brand new ship, it’s not surprising that our shower doors no longer form a perfect seal, so some water did get out onto the bathroom floor, but otherwise, they worked well for actually showering. One super disappointing thing that I discovered and foolishly forgot to check for, is that there is no bar for resting your foot on while shaving your legs. I have a suction cup footrest thingy that I used to bring on NCL cruises with me since none of their showers had that. But I stopped bringing it when sailing Celebrity and the Meraviglia, because those ships all had the bar in the shower or they had bathtubs with lips I could put my foot on. Well, It didn’t occur to me to check for that in photos of the Divina bathrooms before sailing and I didn’t bring it. So I will have 11 days of very awkwardly trying to bend over in the tiny space to shave my ankles and calves.

 

After we showered and dressed, I left my blog for after breakfast and we headed down to the Black Crab. We were assigned a sharing table with a German couple who we had a nice chat with about their travels to the US and my travels to Germany. I showed off the three words of German I remember from college.

 

During breakfast, I noticed that there was a ceiling panel missing from the ceiling over near our assigned dinner table and it was dripping water out of it! I tried to take a picture, but you really can’t see the water. They had the area marked off by a ring of dining chairs and ice buckets on the floor to catch the water. This is the first time I had seen any real maintenance issue on the ship, but it seemed like a very new development since it had not been like that the night before when we were eating dinner right over in that area of the dining room.

 

So, a couple of things I noticed that were different from my MDR breakfast experience on the Meraviglia (aside from the leaky ceiling). First, I had brought my own bottle of water, because on the Meraviglia, I was never offered water at breakfast. Lo and behold, when we were seated at the Black Crab, I noticed empty water glasses on the table right away and soon someone came around with ice water in a pitcher and offered it to us. Second, they also quickly brought out rolls and butter. I don’t know why you would have dinner rolls at breakfast, but the butter meant I was already ⅓ of the way to accomplishing toast! Third, they did not have the juice pushers coming around offering you a wide assortment of juices the entire time. Only one person with a tray of orange juice came around one time.

 

I went with my usual order of an omelet and white toast with jam. My husband decided to brave the eggs benedict. I received my toast ahead of my omelet and was bright some jam soon after. So I accomplished toast on my very first try! My omelette came out and other than the filling sort of all being concentrated in one end of it, it was very good. My husband was disappointed in his eggs benedict. The english muffin wasn’t toasted and they were too skimpy with the hollandaise sauce. I promised him we could do the buffet next time.

 

After breakfast, I went on a quest to find a mimosa blossom. Cafe Italia was open but did not have a visible bottle of Galliano, which is a very distinct, tall, skinny bottle that won’t fit on most normal bar shelves. Next, we checked Piazza Del Doge and I spotted the Galliano bottle right away. I confidently walked up to the bar and asked for a mimosa blossom and the bartender looked at me as if I had sprouted a second head. He had never heard of such a thing. Turns out, the Mimosa Blossom isn’t on the generic bar menu for this ship! I tried to explain to him what I was talking about and another bar server overheard me and she was familiar with the drink (presumably from another ship) and told him how to make it, but this bar didn’t have any Absolut Mango. I ended up settling for something that consisted of normal Absolut, Galliano, Prosecco, and a splash of orange juice. It was decent, but I didn’t bother asking for it again.

 

We sat there and had our drinks while I finished my blog and then we moved on back to Cafe Italia for some normal mimosas and to play a board game. My husband had bought the travel version of Catan, which has slightly different rules to accommodate two players. I had only played the normal Catan once in my life and my husband was frustrated with the differences in the two-player rules and experience, so I would say it was a miss overall.

 

It did, however, take quite a long time to learn, set up, and play, so by the time we were done, it was almost time for lunch! We checked out the MDR lunch menu on the app and initially decided to go to the buffet, but I decided I really wanted to do the MDR since we have a lot of port days coming up and will only have the buffet option.

 

We dropped our stuff at our room and headed back down to the Black Crab. This time we were seated at a two-top near the entrance in between two other couples who were obviously further along in their lunching than we were. We waited and waited and waited. A woman came along much later than us and was seated on the other side of the couple to my left by herself. She was immediately offered water and something else to drink and we still waited. Finally, someone brought us some water and asked if we wanted anything else to drink, but still no sign of anyone taking our order. Finally, I looked at my watch and told myself if no one came to take our order in the next 5 minutes, we would head up to the buffet. Three minutes later, someone finally took our order! I went with the white bean soup, the meatball sandwich, and the Boston cream pie. My husband went with the soup, the couscous, and the Boston cream pie. I am so sorry that I forgot to take pictures of our entrees! The couples to our left and right had finished their meals and left. The woman who was seated way after us was finished with her appetizer before they even brought ours out. But we did eventually get food and didn’t starve. The soup was REALLY good. The meatball sandwich was decent. I liked the very baked, melted mozzarella, but it wasn’t as saucy as I would like. My husband really liked his couscous. And the Boston cream pie was delicious.

 

After lunch, I decided it was time for a nap, so I headed back to the room to lie down while my husband ventured off to ply his Steam Deck somewhere. I woke up around 2:45 and texted my husband asking where I could meet him. He was actually already on his way back up to the room to wake me, which was unfortunate because it meant he had relinquished his table at Cafe Italia, which is where I intended to head for my afternoon coffee. So he came back to the room and we headed right back down, this time with Splendor Duel.

 

I had my coffee and lost our Duel. I really do like that game. It’s more complicated than the original Spendor, but a lot of fun. We will definitely be playing more of it this trip! After losing Splendor, I decided I wanted to play some Rummy, so I went back to the room to drop off Splendor and pick up a deck of cards. During this time at Cafe Italia, we had some mighty drinks and we were feeling very drunk. We were getting very bad at Rummy.

 

We dropped the cards back off at the room and went up on deck to watch the sunset before our 6:00 reservation for sushi. Oh! I forgot to mention that while we were waiting endlessly at lunch, we looked at the MDR dinner menu and it was Italian Night, which I am usually pretty excited about, but this time there really wasn’t anything on the menu that was appealing to me. We had decided to try for a sushi reservation and my husband made that reservation while I was taking my nap.

 

Our reservation was at 6:00, which just happened to be almost the exact same time as sunset, so we watched that from deck 15 and then tried to figure out how to actually get to the Galaxy Restaurant. We ended up just having to wait for an elevator because we could not find any stairs leading up to 16.

 

We were the only ones there and got great service. Our waiters asked us what we were doing for Valentine’s Day and we explained how we never do anything special for Valentine’s Day because our anniversary is 2/18. They promised us that if we came back on the 18th, they would give us champagne and sing for us, so we are definitely going to do that! They were so much fun to chat with and I am really looking forward to seeing them again.

 

The sushi menu was the same as what we were used to on the Meraviglia, so we knew exactly what we wanted. It was all delicious and we ate WAY too much and it only cost us $24, so we left a nice tip.

 

After dinner, we decided to go down and see what was happening at the various venues on Deck 7. Black & White Lounge was supposed to have the Groovy Band from the previous night playing at 7:30, so we decided to stick around there (it was after 7:00) and have some drinks from the very unbusy bar. We poked our phones and chatted and drank some drinks.

 

When the Groovy Band finally came out a little later than scheduled, their first song was an instrumental polka…. It was weird. The second song was a little more Latin sounding, but also just an instrumental. For both songs, the singer just kind of walked around the stage and occasionally did like a little shoulder or hip wiggle to the beat? The third song actually had vocals and was recognizable, but then the fourth song was weird again. So we decided to move on. We walked past the atrium area where there was a nice female vocalist performing, but the area was very crowded. We walked through the Golden Jazz Club where there were some steel drums (not our thing).

 

Then we ended up at La Luna where there was no one playing at the moment, so we were able to get a good little table. Soon the duo came out with the electric guitar player and female vocalist and they were good. It was pleasant for sure. But then the theater show let out and the place became a madhouse. We stuck it out until the post-theater show crowd cleared out. But we did get to meet Mark and his wife as they left the theater. After the duet was a pianist, which was also pleasant. We acquired more drinks whenever the crowds dispersed. And we just ended up hanging out there until my husband had to call it a night and I headed down to the casino to pay my tithes.

 

I burned through my cash quickly and then ended up at the late-night snack where I ran into my husband. Turns out they DO set up a dessert area there, but not until 10:30. I had been there around 10:00 the night before. My husband managed to get some peanut butter cookies, so he was happy. I got a slice of pizza (though I did have to wait a bit for them to put out more pepperoni) so I was happy. And then it was off to bed!

 

Day's Drinks: Mimosa Blossom, Mimosa, Americano w/ Bailey’s, Absolut Cosmo, Double vodka & gingerbeer, Mojito, Bailey's Alexander, Lemon Drop, French 77, Bailey's Alexander, French 77
 

[JamieLogical]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 13 by JamieLogical

[DaKahuna]

51 minutes ago, JamieLogical said:

The sushi menu was the same as what we were used to on the Meraviglia, so we knew exactly what we wanted. It was all delicious and we ate WAY too much and it only cost us $24, so we left a nice tip.

 When we had lunch there an 18% gratuity was already added and there was no place to add an additional tip.   
 

54 minutes ago, JamieLogical said:

I burned through my cash quickly and then ended up at the late-night snack where I ran into my husband

 

Can you do charges against your room or can you only use cash?  I’ve not been to the casino yet but want to try it tonight.

 

[TrinaLC]

13 hours ago, copper6606 said:

Great advice . I do have one Adaptor and an Inverter - perhaps I should get another. 

We are not in YC - Do "we peasants " get dropped off in the same area . Wink Wink😁

😀

 

You don’t need an inverter for iPads, iPhones (and their android counterparts) just fyi. As I learned when doing the ”research” for this trip they are made ‘dual-voltage’ so you only need an adapter …

[JamieLogical]

7 minutes ago, DaKahuna said:

 When we had lunch there an 18% gratuity was already added and there was no place to add an additional tip.   
 

 

Can you do charges against your room or can you only use cash?  I’ve not been to the casino yet but want to try it tonight.

 

 

We left a cash tip because we took noticed there was nowhere to write in a tip.

 

As for the casino, yes, you can use your key card to charge funds against your onboard account. No need for cash, but I always bring cash so I can stick to a strict budget.

[DaKahuna]

10 minutes ago, JamieLogical said:

 

We left a cash tip because we took noticed there was nowhere to write in a tip.

 

As for the casino, yes, you can use your key card to charge funds against your onboard account. No need for cash, but I always bring cash so I can stick to a strict budget.

Thank you.  We noticed that the OBC from our TA is showing as non refundable so we, as discussed with Mark last night, plan to recycle as much as we can through the casino and use some of it for any additional gratuities.

 

Looking forward to catching up with you later today. 

[Homosassa]

About the port problems on Sunday, February 11, and the Goodyear blimp:

 

There was a collision between a tour boat and a private boat in Fisherman's Cut. Over thirty people were injured. People were transported to local hospitals and one was airlifted  out.

 

Staging for first responders and rescue personnel was the Port of Miami docks.

 

Unsure of the exact time of collision. The information was released to the media at 3:15 PM.

 

The Goodyear blimp was probably capturing video the scene and rescue.

[notyalc23]

27 minutes ago, Homosassa said:

 

There was a collision between a tour boat and a private boat in Fisherman's Cut. Over thirty people were injured.

Hopefully everyone is alive, and none of the injuries were serious! 

 

The Miami-Dade Police definitely weren't giving any hint of what was up, but we suspected it must be something serious. 

[not ice cream]

The night we saw the Groovy Band they opened with a Blues instrumental that showcased the lead guitarist. He’s very good and I gotta bet that was better than the Polka mashup!!!😳

[copper6606]

3 hours ago, TrinaLC said:

😀

 

You don’t need an inverter for iPads, iPhones (and their android counterparts) just fyi. As I learned when doing the ”research” for this trip they are made ‘dual-voltage’ so you only need an adapter …

Yes , one inverter seems enough... I just need it for my hair "tools" LOL

[DaKahuna]

I have one European to one USA and two USB, one USA to three USA and two USB A. 
I also have a USA to 4-USA and three USB-A adapters.  Way more tan I need but I’d rater have and not need that need and not have.

 

[rxlowry]

I might have to buy Splendor Duel now.  We have Splendor but I keep hearing Duel better than two player regular.  But it’s a great game for a cruise!!  

[TrinaLC]

58 minutes ago, DaKahuna said:

I have one European to one USA and two USB, one USA to three USA and two USB A. 
I also have a USA to 4-USA and three USB-A adapters.  Way more tan I need but I’d rater have and not need that need and not have.

 

You may want more Euro to US - all of the housekeeping receptacles are euro so there are lots of those!

[JamieLogical]

1 hour ago, DaKahuna said:

I have one European to one USA and two USB, one USA to three USA and two USB A. 
I also have a USA to 4-USA and three USB-A adapters.  Way more tan I need but I’d rater have and not need that need and not have.

 

 

Both of our converters have one EU to two US, plus a USB and USB c.

[DaKahuna]

1 hour ago, JamieLogical said:

 

Both of our converters have one EU to two US, plus a USB and USB c.

I think I am set but will keep it in mind.

 

[Mark_T]

1 hour ago, JamieLogical said:

 

Both of our converters have one EU to two US, plus a USB and USB c.

This is our current favorite for USB when traveling…

 

35W PDQ USB C on the side, 2 more USB C & 2 USB A on the bottom and it plugs in to US/EU/UK/AUS outlets and has a universal pass-thru on the front. 

[Beamafar]

Thanks for explaining how you upload the photos.  I sometimes write up my posts in Notes, then copy and paste for the same reason - wifi drop-off.  Lost so many long posts before, so - lesson learned. 

Edited February 13 by Beamafar

[gizfish]

23 hours ago, Nikita4 said:

Only cabins in YC and Aurea Suites have lounge chairs. So more you pay, more you get… its like other cruise lines!

Actually, we have cruised more than 30 times across all mainstream lines except Celebrity and I have always requested (and tipped for) a lounge chair.  This was the only time I asked the room steward for a lounge chair and was told no.  (BTW to make my long story short I didn't mention the stewardess' supervisor said she couldn't okay it but I should ask at guest services.  I didn't just go there trying to manipulate, complain, etc.)  Also the officer's reason was due to safety, not due to the class of room.  When people ask where we are going on our cruise I jokingly say "the balcony and buffet."  Seriously I spend most of the cruise on the balcony and ake all my naps there. I'm thinking of bringing one of those folding camping lounge chairs next time, as even with my feet up, the regular chairs are too uncomfortable to nap in.  We also found the beds on Meraviglia to be horribly uncomfortable.  So good napping is a deal breaker.

[Nikita4]

3 minutes ago, gizfish said:

Actually, we have cruised more than 30 times across all mainstream lines except Celebrity and I have always requested (and tipped for) a lounge chair.  This was the only time I asked the room steward for a lounge chair and was told no.  (BTW to make my long story short I didn't mention the stewardess' supervisor said she couldn't okay it but I should ask at guest services.  I didn't just go there trying to manipulate, complain, etc.)  Also the officer's reason was due to safety, not due to the class of room.  When people ask where we are going on our cruise I jokingly say "the balcony and buffet."  Seriously I spend most of the cruise on the balcony and ake all my naps there. I'm thinking of bringing one of those folding camping lounge chairs next time, as even with my feet up, the regular chairs are too uncomfortable to nap in.  We also found the beds on Meraviglia to be horribly uncomfortable.  So good napping is a deal breaker.

They want that you buy more for a better suite with a lounge chair, not only a tip 🙂

[JamieLogical]

Yesterday was our port stop in Ocho Rios. We didn’t dock until 10:00, so we were still enjoying the ocean views from our balcony as we had our room service breakfast and I typed up my blog. As you saw from the photos I posted earlier, we got to see a full rainbow from our balcony. I could even see both ends of it and, unless the pot of gold was on a sunken pirate ship at the bottom of the ocean, I think I have been lied to my whole life!

 

After a lazy morning on the balcony, we got showered and dressed and made the TERRIBLE mistake of trying to hit the buffet for breakfast at 9:00. I think every single human on this ship was at the buffet at the same time. We walked the full lap around and didn’t find a single empty table. Not even one that was just waiting to be cleared. And we couldn’t even find empty seats at any of the high-top counters around various areas that no one ever sits at. I don’t eat breakfast in my real life so I was okay with just giving up on breakfast. I headed back down to the room. My husband was more desperate so he fought to get a few items on a plate and brought it back down to the room to eat since there was nowhere to sit. We even looked for tables outside around the pool deck with no luck.

 

So, we ended up back on our balcony for docking. Since the James Bond pier was damaged by a collision from the Carnival Magic last week, we had to dock at the Reynold’s pier. This is actually the pier I have docked at on every single one of my stops in Ocho Rios. I guess I am just unlucky. But, this time it didn’t matter to us, since we weren’t planning to get off the ship anyway.

 

After docking and breakfast, we packed up some games and headed down to  Caffe Italia. I was surprised it wasn’t more packed, because they still hadn’t started letting people off the ship. But it seemed everyone who was waiting to get off was either up in the buffet or down in the atrium on Deck 6, as we could hear a lot of noise coming up from there.

 

I had decided to experiment with mimosa flavors, since it seemed I was not going to be able to get mimosa blossoms on this sailing. When we got to the bar, I asked Reynald what juices they have for making different mimosa flavors and he mentioned mango, so I asked for a mango mimosa. He said, “what about a mimosa blossom?” I said I thought you couldn’t make them because I didn’t see any Galliano at the bar. He pulled out a bottle of Galliano from a cupboard under the bar! He proceeded to make mimosa blossoms for us with the slight twist of using mango juice instead of orange juice and it was even better than the normal ones! Raynold has been my favorite bartender on the ship since he was the first one I met and got my first drink of the cruise from and he memorized my name that very first encounter. He always shouts “ma’am Jamie” every time he sees me. Well, needless to say, he has now cemented his place for the entirety of the cruise.

 

We hung out at Caffe Italia all morning. It was completely dead once they started letting people disembark. I think there was only one other couple there the entire time we sat there playing our board games and drinking our mimosa blossoms. Unfortunately, after our second round, Raynold ran out of Galliano, so he had to get creative for our third round. He used some Absolut Vanilla and managed to make something that tasted kind of like a creamsicle.

 

We finally called it a morning and headed back to the room to drop off our stuff before hitting the buffet for lunch. It was night and day from our breakfast experience. It was completely empty and we had no problem finding a table and no lines for food. I was surprised to see mussels on the buffet. I had three of them and they were very good in a spicy sauce. I also had my requisite slice of pizza, some mac & cheese, and some various “toppings” for my mac & cheese. There was a “Mexican Bean Stew” that had black beans and carrots. There was something with beef strips and peppers that had kind of a teriyaki flavor to it. And there was some Morrocan lamb. All were delicious in their own way, but I think the beef strips were my favorite.

 

After lunch, I headed back down to the room for my afternoon nap. My husband went back down to Caffe Italia to play his Steam Deck and ended up meeting @DaKahuna while he was there. I slept longer than I probably should have and finally got up at 3:00 to head down for my afternoon coffee. By now it was raining outside so a lot of people were coming back onto the ship. We took our games and still managed to snag a table at Caffe Italia again where we spent the afternoon drinking rum & cokes and vodka & gingerbeers.

 

We had a 6:30 reservation at Butcher’s Cut, so we came back up to the room to drop our stuff off and watch sail away from our balcony. The weather was rainy and foggy and the island looked very cool through the haze, but unfortunately, I don’t think any of that came out very well in my photos.

 

Down at Buthcer’s Cut, we briefly got to chat with @DaKahuna and his wife while we waited to be seated. They had a 6:30 reservation as well. My husband and I were seated in a section where there were no other passengers. We had the whole room to ourselves for almost the entire meal. We were doing this as my free Diamond dinner, so we had to order off of the “Dining Experience” menu. My husband had really wanted a ribeye, but they don’t have that on the experience menu and even with the 50% off, it would have cost $34. I kept telling him he could go ahead and order it, but he really couldn’t justify the cost. Plus it was a 20oz steak which is WAY too much steak and he didn’t want to end up wasting ⅔ of it.

 

I had asked if I could do two appetizers instead of an appetizer and and entree and was told I could. So I had the baked goat cheese, tomato soup, and the peanut butter cookie sundae thing. My husband had the chop salad, the NY strip, and the banana date thing. We also shared an order of deviled eggs. For drinks, I had the Bee’s Knees and my husband had the Aviation. Note that we were charged the full $14 each for the drinks. We were not discounted $10 for having the drink package.

 

I loved all of my food, though the tomato soup was SUPER spicy. It was much too spicy for my caucasian spice tolerance. I was only able to eat it by dipping my grilled cheese in it and soaking it up. The baked goat cheese was as delicious as ever. I keep saying I am going to go there sometime and just spend the $14 to order that a la carte, but I have yet to do that. Maybe later in the cruise. And, of course, the cookie sundae was insanely good. My husband was less happy with his meal overall. He wasn’t much for the chop salad and wished he had ordered the Caesar instead. His steak, which he had ordered medium, was rare and he ended up having to send it back to be cooked a bit more and that never really works out well. He did at least love his dessert as well as the several bites of mine that he ate. Oh, and the deviled eggs were also very good.

 

After dinner, we headed over to the Black & White Lounge, which was the most packed we had seen it. The Groovy Band was playing again and they were playing fun music that everyone can dance to. I ended up line-dancing to Achy Breaky Heart again. When they left for their break, there was another dance class on offer. This one seemed to be some kind of polka dance maybe? Initially, I thought it was going to be easy, but as I watched them add on more and more combinations, it got very complicated and most of the passengers seemed to struggle with it, but they all also seemed to be having fun.

 

We decided to call it an early night since we were going to have to move our clocks forward an hour overnight. I headed to the casino where I stayed longer than I should have, and then it was up to bed.

 

Day's Drinks: Mimosa Blossom X3, Americano w/ Bailey’s, Double vodka & ginger beer X2, Bee’s Knees, Hugo Spritz

 

Edited February 14 by JamieLogical

[JamieLogical]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 14 by JamieLogical

[DaKahuna]

It was great meeting you and your husband.  Hopefully we’ll run into each other again and be able to chat longer.  
 

I mad a sacrifice to the casino daemons last night as well.  I played the bubble roulette for the first time.  It will not be the last.