My unpaid MSC cruise ship review: MSC SEASHORE

I’m on a heated mosaic marble-tiled lounger with the soothing sound of jets bubbling in the background of the onboard spa’s thermal area. Rocking somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico within the 170,412-ton MSC Seashore as we head back to port after nearly a week on this mega-ship — the largest cruise ship ever built in Italy — it’s the perfect place to step away from my family for a bit of me-time to process our experience and start thinking through how to frame this MSC cruise ship review.

I don’t have a lot of experience cruising. House-boating? Sure. Hoteling? Of course. Resorting? Absolutely. But before our recent MSC Seashore cruise to The Bahamas and Mexico, I’d only been on one cruise — and it was far from my favourite travel experience. It gave me so much travel trauma that I still haven’t even written about it. So, add that to the many MSC Seashore reviews I read ahead of our trip and it’s easy to understand that I went into this cruise with some preconceived expectations, hesitations and uncertainties. My MSC cruise ship review that follows is borne out of direct comparisons to our previous cruise experience but also value for money. I’ll also be using a multigenerational travel lens since we were a three-generation group — so strap in!

Here are the things you’ll find in this MSC cruise ship review of the MSC Seashore:

• MSC for Me app
• Embarkation and disembarkation process
• Balcony stateroom pros and cons
• Food and drinks, including packages (I’m a foodie, so this is a big one!)
• Onboard parties, activities and amenities — including the Aurea Spa
• Staff (including entertainment)
• MSC Seashore deck plans
• Elevator tips and tricks
• Wristbands, Photo Hub and Wi-Fi
• MSC cruise excursions
• Ocean Cay, MSC’s private island
• Yacht Club
• Multigenerational-friendly features

An MSC cruise ship review: MSC SEASHORE

I started jotting these notes down on our final sea day, after six nights of swimming, water-sliding, dancing, eating, drinking and hanging out with my 13-year-old daughter and my parents, both in their mid-70s, alongside some friends — new and old. Then I stepped off the ship and spent a couple of weeks making an Instagram video series (in Stories and a Reel) so I could re-live each moment and bring you what I think are the most important things you need to know about the MSC Seashore and our “Antilles & Caribbean” cruise.

MSC cruise ship review: MSC Seashore-specific

With only two cruises under my belt, I’ve come to a (perhaps premature) conclusion: what can make or break a cruise is probably related more to the ship itself than the cruise line. Yes, there will be things that MSC does better or worse than its competitors, but if I judged Royal Caribbean based solely on our Serenade of the Seas experience, I’d probably never sail with RC again. Keep that in mind as you read blanket statements elsewhere about MSC — or any cruise line for that matter — remembering that each ship has its own design, quirks and personality, with both its size and staff likely changing the vibe considerably from ship to ship.

This first section of my MSC cruise ship review, then, is devoted to All Things MSC Seashore and will be the lion’s share of this post. I’ll get to the more general MSC-related things later, though it’ll be a more dressed-down section since this is my first-ever MSC cruise.

MSC Seashore balcony stateroom pros and cons

We stayed in cabin 15101, on the 15th deck. This room is considered a deluxe balcony stateroom. Choosing a mid-ship cabin like this on a deck as high as the 15th is an upgrade — and you’ll need to book at least the “Fantastica” package to get it.

First up, the pros:

• This cabin and those around it are nice and close to a central elevator shaft
• Adjoins to cabin 15097, making it great for families with older kids or multigenerational groups
• Very spacious for a cruise cabin with so much space to properly unpack (again, I only have one other experience, but it was also a deluxe, adjoining balcony stateroom so I’m comparing apples to apples here)
• The room is organized very well, making excellent use of the space available
• We found the bed and bedding very comfortable and, for couples who really need a king-sized bed, rest assured the MSC Seashore offers one (or it can be split into two twins upon request)
• We absolutely LOVED that we could open up our balcony to my parents’ balcony, which meant when we were sitting out there, we could do it together and have a conversation without standing up and looking around a partition (on our previous cruise, the balconies on our adjoining rooms could not be shared)
• It’s so clean everywhere on the MSC Seashore — there’s always someone cleaning, somewhere — and this extended to our staterooms

And the cons:

• I’m not sure what it’s like in every room on Deck 15, but in ours and my parents’ cabin, we could hear loungers scraping along the floor above where the pool deck is late into the night (past midnight) and again very early (starting around 4 a.m.) — and others in our group who were below the buffet had a similar experience. Even with the white noise machine we use on every vacation, Miss Q woke up the first night and thought it was thunder. We did eventually learn to ignore it for the most part, but I would personally look closely at what’s above any staterooms I consider for future cruises
• Unless one person is on the toilet and the other is in the shower, the bathroom is a one-person-at-a-time kind of situation! The shower itself is small; taller/larger people will find it quite tight. And, strangely, there isn’t any conditioner in the showers — only shampoo and body wash
• One of the closet doors, in both of our cabins, was really hard to glide back and forth (so tough that I broke two nails trying to open it one day)

Food and drinks

As I mentioned at the beginning of this MSC cruise ship review, I’m a foodie. What does that mean in terms of a vacation, you ask? It typically means I prioritize food quality, variety and creativity above almost everything else. At a beach-centric resort, for example, great food is more important to me than a great beach. It also means that I’m the kind of person who reads restaurant reviews and wants to check out a menu and start dreaming about what I’ll order ahead of time.

With that in mind, it shouldn’t be surprising that I spent weeks looking at other MSC reviews specifically for notes about the food. And, frankly, it didn’t inspire confidence. I read things like “the food on MSC is pathetic,” “I had to visit the speciality restaurants for a decent meal” and “people who say the food on MSC is bad aren’t joking.”

So, I had…expectations. Low ones. I even warned my parents (who are, incidentally, not foodies. My Dad in particular is a meat-and-potatoes kind of guy and they aren’t nearly as snooty as I am). I came out of our first full day on the cruise, having only tried the buffet and our assigned dining room for dinner, wondering one thing: WERE THESE REVIEWERS AND I EVEN ON THE SAME BOAT?! 

Then, it continued — day in, day out I tried to find all of this “pathetic” food about which so many people felt compelled to complain online. But the bircher muesli and caramelized banana bread pudding at breakfast, artisan pizza that transported my mouth to Italy at lunch, and perfectly done prime rib, creole lobster, beautiful soups and other nightly specials at dinner kept on getting in the way. And that’s all without including international brunch on sea days or the optional specialty restaurants.

The buffet options alone were staggering and provided basics like burgers and fries to DIY salad bars with the freshest ingredients and international dishes, too. And there were new options every day so it never got boring.

OMG, and the bread! At dinner, bread is freshly made for each of the three seatings. So even if you have the latest dinner time, you’re still getting fresh-from-the-oven bread baskets.

In the 15 included meals I ate onboard, there was one piece of fish I felt was overcooked and I found our dinner the first night a bit too salty (but I was the only one at our table of six who thought so). I enjoyed everything else. Then there were the three additional specialty dinners we tried — at The Butcher’s Cut, KAITO Teppanyaki and the seafood restaurant, Ocean Cay (not to be confused with MSC’s private island by the same name, which I’ll get to later). All of them? Excellent and certainly worth the upsell.

Could the food be different on other MSC ships? Of course. But on the MSC Seashore as of August 2024, I can tell you that the food was very good across the board — and it wasn’t just me and my family who thought so. I walked away truly perplexed about how so many bad MSC food reviews could possibly exist.

Some pro tips:

• Don’t miss the first or last nights in your main dining room nor the formal night. The first night has a delicious prime rib on the menu, the last night is Italian night and offers a fantastic menu and farewell experience, and formal night is when beautifully cooked lobster will appear on your plate, if you wish

• If you do want to try some specialty restaurants, book your dates and times as soon as possible; if you leave it, you’ll find very few remaining reservation times available after the first day
• There’s a dedicated kids/family area in the Marketplace Buffet that leads directly to and from the Jungle Pool Lounge and there are kid-friendly staples like chicken fingers available here daily
• The best dishes — including the round pizza (not to be confused with the other pizza at the buffet, which is fine but nothing like the big round ones with the most perfect dough) — are all at the back of the buffet, so keep walking…and then walk some more
• If you have allergies, ensure guest services knows ahead of time and that you also inform serving staff; MSC takes allergies seriously and have separate areas in the kitchens to protect guests
• The biggest downside to eating in the buffet is that there aren’t enough servers taking drink orders and the buttons on the tables to summon them don’t seem to work, so if you have a drink package and don’t want to use the self-serve beverage areas, bring your drink of choice with you from one of the 20 bars or lounges onboard
• Caribbean Night in the main dining restaurant is the weakest of the plated dinners included with your base cruise package; plan for a speciality restaurant that night but if you only do one, make it The Butcher’s Cut if you’re a steak lover or Ocean Cay if seafood is your jam. And if you decide to do none, rest assured that 96% of everything we ate at dinner was restaurant-quality
• Venchi Chocolate is not included in any package, but if you’re a chocoholic, I urge you to splurge! I’m still dreaming about the dark chocolate blood orange chocolates I had

As for drinks, with 20 bars and lounges from which to choose, I couldn’t even get to them all on a mere one-week cruise. There was only one disappointing experience I had the entire week and that was the makeshift Tiki Bar that was set up adjacent to the permanent bar near the main outdoor pool. They ran out of mint to make mojitos and the cocktails were slapped together without much care (or ice, in 40-degree heat), but it was day one and VERY busy on that deck thanks to the Sailaway Party; I didn’t have another experience like this one elsewhere on the boat for the rest of the week, so it really was a one-off.

Save for one day when I really wanted an Aperol Spritz and the ship seemed to have run out of Aperol, which was fixed by the following day, drinks were easy to come by and prepared well. The only ingredient I wish they’d had onboard — and I did ask in at least six different bars — was coconut cream; I’m a big fan of ordering my own concoction of Malibu rum, coconut cream, a nice splash of pineapple juice and two freshly squeezed limes — but, alas, I had to stick with the 60+ other cocktail choices on the menu. Yes, this is sarcasm.

You’ll need to do the math to see if a drink package is right for you, but do note that only the highest-tier drink package ensures you get the best California cabernet sauvignon available by the glass (Oberon, $16/glass) as well as the in-room mini bar. This and all of the other alcoholic and non-alcoholic drink packages include bottled water, fresh juices and specialty coffees, but if more complex cocktails and the priciest by-the-glass wines are a must for you, then take a closer look at the Premium Extra Package.

Before wrapping up this section, the Brooklyn Cafe (pictured in the bottom-left image in the grid above) deserves a special shout-out for its specialty coffees and freshly squeezed juices and protein shakes — all of which are even included with the Alcohol-Free Package, by the way! — which became part of our pre-breakfast routine en route to the buffet.

Onboard parties, activities and amenities

This section is devoted to hot tubs, pools and Pirates Cove Aquapark; the Bridge of Sighs; entertainment; the casino; arcade; the sports arena; kids’/teen clubs; the gym; and theme nights and parties.

Hot tubs, pools and Pirates Cove Aquapark

Coming from another cruise ship where there was only one pool in which children were allowed, it was so nice to have not only two pools — indoors and out — but also an entire waterpark.

There are two pools that any guest can use: the outdoor Long Island Pool on Deck 18, which I’d call the “main pool” and the Jungle Pool on Deck 16. Both feature two different depths — one that’s about half a foot deep and one that’s got to be more than six feet deep, because I didn’t come close to touching while treading water or holding onto the ledge. While the MSC Seashore is specially designed to navigate warmer weather, there is a magrodome atop the Jungle Pool that can be closed to turn it into a partially or fully indoor pool if needed.

Deck 8’s Infinity Pool is for the 18+ crowd and I never made it there because I wanted to spend most of my time with my kiddo. It looked beautiful every time I saw it from the aft Panoramic Lifts (glass elevator), and my friend Jaime — who wrote about our MSC Seashore adventure in French, here and here — confirmed that it was very chill and quiet, and the perfect spot to sit and do some reading in a shaded lounger.

Overall, pools are on the small side considering the ship holds nearly 6,000 people but it’s nice to have both covered and sun-soaked options. The Jungle Pool bar in particular has great proximity to pool loungers for families who want to be close to the action, but be warned — the Jungle Pool Bar has gorgeous-looking gelato right there for all the kids to see and it’s not included in any package, so the temptation will be omnipresent.

The waterpark is awesome and we spent a LOT of time on waterslides. Everything is organized well but do note that you and your children all need to sign a waiver to get a wristband to use any of the slides. It will take less than a minute and the bracelet will stay on all week, if you wish. If you don’t, it’s easy to get a new one. There are enough features here to keep toddlers, kids and teens busy for all of your sea days and then some. It’s basically a resort on a boat.

I also didn’t do more than simply look briefly at most of the hot tubs; a couple of classic round ones on Deck 19 near the Top 19 Exclusive Solarium, reserved for guests with the Aurea package or Yacht Club members (see below), and two sleek side-by-side infinity-esque hot tubs on Deck 8. The only hot tub I experienced was in the Aurea Spa’s thermal area and it wasn’t very hot at all, so I’m not sure how hot these hot tubs were either but I was surprised seeing how busy they were every day considering we had very hot weather at every port and on sea days.

Bridge of Sighs

Deck 16’s Bridge of Sighs has a glass floor and provides a spectacular view from the ship’s stern. It’s just a neat little feature that you should check out at least once. I featured it in one of my Instagram Stories about the MSC Seashore.

Entertainment

From the Atrium to Times Square to Madison Theater, the entertainment aboard the MSC Seashore was nothing short of outstanding. The ship welcomed a new entertainment director the week before our cruise set sail (the first American in that role across MSC’s fleet to date) and he is simply TERRIFIC.

The entire theatre cast, filled with talented singers and dancers including an award-winning Latin dance couple who were fuego, were better than I’ve experienced at any resort, anywhere; their shows were consistently excellent, felt high-budget and had a freshness every evening that was especially impressive considering they performed two shows a night. There was also a comedian (which we missed because we went to the beach party, noted below) and an excellent illusionist.

Pro tip: use the MSC for Me app (detailed below) at dinner every night to book your shows for the following day or they will probably be “sold out.” However, if you miss the window and it does show as fully reserved, hang out near the Madison Theater lobby five minutes before showtime and they’ll let you in if there are empty seats.

Every night in Times Square there was a Duelling Pianos-style show, which sounded great each time we passed through. And the Atrium constantly had solo performers singing and/or playing instruments. It seemed there was entertainment at every waking hour and it was consistently great.

Oh, and you too can become the entertainment. As a wannabe Broadway star, I was thrilled to find karaoke available every evening. And some of these singers were REALLY good — with plenty more awful, so don’t worry if you can’t carry a tune.

MSC Signature Casino

I’m not a gambler and have a strict $20 budget for casino play, so if you’re looking for detailed information about the MSC Seashore casino, I’m afraid I’m not your girl. But the good news here is twofold:

1. Kids are allowed in the casino, which has not ever been our experience on another cruise or at any resort. So if you just want to run a few quick penny slots, your kid can tag along. Whether they’re allowed at the poker tables and the like, I’m not sure, but no one took issue of Miss Q walking through the casino floor or sitting beside me at the slot machines.

2. There’s a smoking side and a non-smoking side of the casino and the air-filtration system is so good that you can’t smell smoke when you’re on the non-smoking side.

Hall of Games Arcade

The arcade is pretty extensive and not overly expensive considering you’re basically captive for a week, and there are packages that include game credits and the other pay-to-play experiences just outside the arcade, including a 4D interactive theatre, an F1 race simulator game and a VR raft ride.

We loved the 4D theatre where we got to shoot some bad guys; racing games have always been my favourite, so I had a blast in the F1 race, though Miss Q had a hard time navigating the controls; and we both felt the VR raft ride was too pixelated and basic to really enjoy. So if you have to choose one “specialty” arcade experience to omit, toss the VR.

Aurea Spa

Like restaurant resos, make all of your desired spa reservations on embarkation day as soon as you can. By the end of day one, there were no spa times left and guests had to hope for cancellations later in the week.

The spa boasts a series of massage rooms, a thermal area, beauty salon and nail boutique, plus there’s also a Barber Shop just outside the spa’s waiting room. There are both single and double massage rooms, making it possible to do side-by-side couples’ and mommy-and-me massages, which Miss Q and I got to try. Massage prices are typical of what you’d see at any upper-scale hotel or resort, but do keep your eye on the daily specials, which offered better value.

We did a Balinese massage, which is a holistic deep-tissue massage that started with a lovely foot-cleansing ritual. It was a great massage in a beautiful, dimly lit, quiet space — perfect for disconnecting and unwinding. And I also did an 80-minute facial that was a huge highlight of this trip; it started with what had to be a 20-minute back and neck massage, a wonderfully thorough facial (without extractions) and scalp, hand and arm massages in between different facial treatments. It was so fabulous that I would suggest if you can only choose a single spa experience, make it this facial because it includes the best of the massage elements anyway!

I also had an opportunity to try the adult-only thermal area, which has a Snow Room (with actual snow!), a Finnish Sauna, a Himalayan Salt Room, Sensory Steam Baths, Aromatherapy Showers, a hot tub, relaxation areas and more. Overall, I thought it provided a good circuit with some variety for hot and cold cycles but the temperature of the hot tub was disappointing; it was merely like a warm bath. But the heated stone loungers along each side of the hot tub made up for it — I could have zoned out on those all day!

Like the drink packages, spa treatments have gratuity factored into the final price, so you don’t have to worry about doing math when your brain is still in a blissful post-treatment haze.

MSC Sports Arena

There’s a really well thought out sports zone on Deck 20 called the MSC Sports Arena that overlooks the waterpark. Essentially a basketball court and indoor soccer (football for the Europeans) field in one, it’s outdoors so nice and breezy but fully caged so you don’t need to worry about balls falling out of the ship or hitting unsuspecting guests.

MSC kids’ & teen clubs

Before we boarded, Miss Q told me how excited she was to go to the teen club and meet some friends, but she ended up having so much fun with her grandparents and me that she ditched that idea pretty swiftly. All that to say, the only thing I can tell you about the kids’ and teen clubs are that we walked through the individual spaces for each age group and they looked really well-appointed. I saw a lot of teens hanging out together by the end of the week and can only surmise they met at the teen club.

The only other things I know are what you can find out on the MSC site about the various onboard kids’ clubs; babies as young as six months old and teens as old as 17 all have dedicated spaces and programming that’s included as part of your cruise fare. One thing I really like about the way they’ve structured the age breaks is that 7 to 11 year olds are grouped together, as are 12 to 14s and 15 to 17s. Most resorts put 13 to 17s together, which I think is much too broad and could encourage inappropriate friendships to form between the youngest and oldest members.

MSC Gym Powered by Technogym

I walked through the gym to film it and passed by it to go to the spa on two occasions. It was busy as early as 6:30 a.m. and never seemed to have a lull. It’s big and has loads of fancy machines and apparati — including battle ropes, which isn’t something you see in the average hotel or resort gym. There are cardio machines that line a strip of floor-to-ceiling windows, which provide a beautiful view.

You’ll have to look this up online because I wasn’t comfortable taking photos of a bunch of sweaty strangers who were just trying to sneak in their daily workout.

Theme nights & parties

MSC did theme nights and parties really well on the MSC Seashore. From the Sailaway Party on day one with a DJ at the main pool as we left Port Canaveral for The Bahamas to the Italian-themed dinner on our final evening, it’s clear there’s a lot of thought and planning that goes into these guest experiences.

Two very notable parties include the beach party, which is actually not held on the ship at all, and the white party. The beach party takes place the evening you dock at MSC’s private island called Ocean Cay; after dinner, you can make your way to the beach that sits alongside the dock where there are bonfires, a DJ, disco lights and some of your entertainment staff there to lead conga lines and teach some Caribbean-inspired dance routines. Plus a laser light show on the lighthouse! Do not miss this party — it was so much fun and probably the most memorable one of all.

The white party, also called White Night, sees guests dress in all white attire, covering the entire pool deck on Deck 18, with a DJ and entertainment staff whooping it up. It reminded me of the super-fun white night at Club Med. My only criticism is that (at least during our itinerary) it was held on the Thursday and Friday was an early-morning port day and we had an excursion with a meeting time of 7:45 a.m., which meant we couldn’t stay out late or risk a hangover. It would be amazing if this were moved to the night before the final sea day.

If you can even believe it, there are more things onboard that I can’t even mention here because I didn’t have time to get to them. You’d really need to do three separate one-week itineraries onboard the MSC Seashore to actually feel like you’d done everything at least once, I think. (Hey, there’s two extra reasons to book a new trip!)

Interestingly, here’s one thing you won’t find on the MSC Seashore, or any other MSC ship: a Deck 17. Deck 13 exists across the line but 17 is an unlucky number in Italy.

Staff

From our room stewards to our restaurant servers to all of the bartenders throughout the ship, the staff aboard the MSC Seashore are kind, attentive and thorough. When they couldn’t fulfill a request — like the day the boat’s delivery of Aperol was delayed and it became a Spritz-free zone — they made every effort to come up with an alternative. Making us happy consistently seemed to be every staff member’s No. 1 priority. Whether that’s excellent hiring or stellar training, or a fine combination of the two, I have no critiques whatsoever.

MSC Seashore deck plans

You can find the MSC Seashore deck plans here (just scroll to the DECKPLAN section), and veteran cruisers will notice that there are few common areas where you can walk all the way around the ship. That proved confusing for us time and again as we oriented ourselves onboard; running into dead ends and turning around to find a different hallway continued nearly until the last day. We learned that not all MSC ships are designed this way, so it’ll be interesting to see what guest feedback contibutes to design in the years ahead.

MSC Seashore elevator tips and tricks

You’ll find a number of complaints about the Seashore’s elevators in one MSC cruise ship review or another. But I don’t share most of those complaints at all, because I actually prefer the system employed on this boat. Like some newer hotels we’ve stayed in lately, MSC has implemented a system whereby you press your desired deck number before getting on. This eliminates “cattle calls” by overzealous children (or drunk adults) who step into an elevator and light up the board. Overall, I found the elevators efficient.

Where it gets tricky is on extra-busy days (like embarkation day) or peak times (like dinner) when you have larger groups travelling together. We ultimately learned that these “smart elevators” require that guests press their desired deck number for each guest in their party; so, if you are a family of four who wants to go to Deck 8, you’d press the number “8” four times.

Strangely, throughout the week, we found some of the elevator waiting areas — as well as individual elevators themselves — extremely, uncomfortably humid. It would change from day to day, so I’m not sure what was going on here, but we would sometimes choose to simply go to a different elevator shaft.

Wristbands, Photo Hub and Wi-Fi

Instead of the classic cruise card, you can get MSC bracelets that will house all of the same information and perform some of the functions of the card, like unlocking your stateroom door, ordering drinks and making retail purchases. They’re priced well, especially as your party gets bigger (the price whittles down to just $5/wristband for a group of four). But it can’t do everything, and that’s really my main beef with it.

I still had to carry around my cruise card a lot of the time, leaving the main benefit of the wristband — easy portability with no purse or lanyard required — in the dust. If MSC can evolve this system, the wristband will be GOLD because it’s waterproof and stays on even during the most rambunctious activities. Here’s where I would have loved to be able to use just our wristbands but still had to have my cruise card handy:

• At the arcade; you must swipe your card to play any games
• At many bars and in the buffet if you do find a server who will fetch drinks; when we didn’t have our cruise cards with us, 75% of the time we were asked to remove the wristband so the server/bartender could take it with them to “tap.” These wristbands are designed to stay on — and stay on well — so getting them on and off isn’t exactly easy. It always felt like a huge win when a server brought over a portable iPad-like device on which I could simply tap my bracelet to order drinks
• To get on and off ship; all of your information (including your photo) is stored in the wristband the same way it’s stored on the cruise card, so it would be great if the system could improve so you can just tap your wristband when exiting and re-entering the ship

Seriously: fantastic concept and where/when it works, it’s amazing and ultra-convenient. Hopefully this is slated for future improvements.

If you truly need Wi-Fi, you’ll be glad to know that the speed is generally quite good. There were times when it was spotty, but unlike our previous cruise internet experience, we had little trouble using our devices as we would at home, even if it doesn’t perform entirely like high-speed home internet, which is certainly understandable. Unlike our previous cruise, I was able to successfully stream shows and podcasts as well as check in for our flights home long before we were docked back in the USA.

You’ll get your wristbands and Wi-Fi in the same area as the Photo Hub on Deck 5. Expect it to be extraordinarily busy on your first and second-last days and plan accordingly. There are photographers set up to snap your family’s dinner outfits every night; you can’t walk anywhere in the evening and miss a pro photo opp. If you don’t want photos, that’s fine, too; we never felt pressured to participate. We only wanted one paid photo in the end — to commemorate our White Night outfits — and it was USD$24.99 for two 8×10″ prints. Not bad price-wise and the lighting and vignette was nice. I also saw some people with HUGE stacks of photos, so there are definitely photo packages available.

MSC cruise ship review: MSC-specific

Now for the things that are more about MSC’s general offerings, beyond the MSC Seashore itself:

Ocean Cay

I have too many stunning photos of Ocean Cay to share, so forgive me breaking up every paragraph here with a new pic.

MSC’s private island, Ocean Cay, is a tiny Bahamian island halfway between Miami and mainland Bahamas. Once an industrial park, MSC has poured hundreds of millions of dollars into its transformation, turning it into a biodiverse marine reserve. With six distinct beaches, a marina, lighthouse and collection of for-rent cabanas, Ocean Cay is surrounded by the most perfect turquoise water The Antilles offer.

Since most of the major cruise lines have private islands now, exclusively for guests, you might be wondering what sets Ocean Cay apart. For me, it’s about settling into a tropical vibe that really feels like The Bahamas. Other ports may feel manufactured, but Ocean Cay feels authentically Bahamian and designed to connect with the sea. There wasn’t even a hint of sargassum during our two-day visit, and that’s a real problem plaguing the Caribbean; the sand is beautiful and mostly stone-free; and there is clear evidence that MSC’s conservation efforts are paying off — we saw plenty of fish species and even a small nurse shark (don’t worry, they’re harmless and want nothing to do with you). And, yes, we saw them with our bare eyes just by looking down at the water; the visibility is that crystal clear.

There’s a buffet and food trucks, all included with your visit, and your drink packages work at every bar, too, making this the most cost-effective port you’ll visit. If you love to walk, you’ll be glad to know you could walk the entire island in a day, no problem. For those who have mobility issues or whose legs are on vacation mode, there are shuttle stations at several points around Ocean Cay with shuttles running all day. I think they should add a few more because sometimes you will have to wait because they fill up quickly.

There are, of course, ways to upgrade your Ocean Cay experience. From $18 beach umbrellas to private cabanas for around $400/day, you can definitely spend more money to amp up your visit. Unlike some ports, though, this is one where you don’t have to spend a single extra penny if you don’t want to — and you’ll still have an amazing time. Arrive early and you’ll be able to find some nice areas that have Miami-esque beach furniture fully covered by cantilever umbrellas — no upgrade required.

But if you are looking for a little extra-luxe in your beach life, the cabanas are excellent. You get four loungers reserved just for your group, a fully shaded cabana with a fan, two-seater sofa and two arm chairs, a table, two floating mats and a cooler filled with ice and six bottled waters. While the waters aren’t refilled, if you have a drink package, just wander over to any bar and grab extra waters, storing them in your lovely cooler. Our cabana was on Bimini Beach and it was just the most heavenly spot.

We also did a waverunner tour on our first day at Ocean Cay, which was ah-mazing. Miss Q and I shared a ride for $275 and it was about 1.5 hours from beginning to end. The safety and how-to demonstration was excellent and once we got out of the small bay, the guide really let us rip. It was a choppy day thanks to the (very welcome) wind, so we got some serious air. The guides did a fantastic job of steering a course we could follow and they monitored each driver to ensure that people got moved around who were slower or faster, ensuring those of us with experience and who liked to go full-throttle weren’t held back.

Literally the only downside? We didn’t stay long enough! We got one full day and night plus a second morning. I wish it had been two full days. Actually, we loved our time on Ocean Cay so much that it would be a deciding factor for me to spend my own money to cruise with MSC again just to spend more time at this little island paradise. Stay tuned for a future post I hope to write once Ocean Cay’s dive centre is up and running.

Pro tip: when docking at Ocean Cay, the odd-numbered cabins look out to sea — not the island. It’s the most beautiful port view of the three we visited (which also included Costa Maya and Cozumel), so if you’re on that itinerary, consider choosing an even-numbered cabin if you have a balcony.

MSC for Me app

The MSC for Me app is excellent — but be sure you download it before you leave home. It took one member of our group nearly an hour for the app to download once we were onboard on day one. Besides, if you’re a geek like me, you’ll want to read everything you can in the app ahead of your trip since it’s filled with really helpful information about what to expect, pack and more.

Once we were onboard, we used the app mainly for show reservations, to see what activities were happening each day and to remind ourselves which decks had what.

My only criticism is that the next day’s agenda doesn’t come out on app until too late the night before. My Type A personality would prefer to be able to see the entire week at a glance from day one, even if reservations can’t be made until day-of.

Embarkation and disembarkation process

Embarkation is done in 30-minute time slots starting at 11:30 on day one. The earlier you check in for your cruise, the better the availability of these time slots; for example, I checked in Miss Q and me and had every time slot appear, but when I helped my parents check in several hours later, the first two (11:30 and noon) were gone, leaving them with 12:30 p.m. at the earliest. Don’t worry if you don’t get the slot you want — everyone will get on the ship!

And, if you want to cruise right onto your cruise, embarkation was exceptionally easy at 2 p.m.; we arrived late because of an excursion and had Fast Track entry but didn’t even need it at this time because there was NO ONE ahead of us in line. However, it really compresses the amount of time you have to settle in, do the muster drill, book specialty dining reservations, spa appointments and get bracelets if you decide to purchase them.

We thought the entire embarkation process was easy and well-oiled and had no problem with our reservation, forms or passports. And the woman checking us in was simply delightful.

Disembarkation was equally well-organized, both at ports and on our final day. Although you’re assigned a time for breakfast and a departure time, if you have an early flight like we did, just keep all your bags in your room and proceed to Deck 8 around 7:30 a.m. and you can do a “walk off.” We saw many, many people doing this and we did it, too. Easy peasy and we made our 11:55 a.m. flight with loads of time to spare.

One quick note about your check-out procedure: if you need to go to guest services and/or the Photo Hub, be sure you do so either VERY early or around 5 p.m. on your final sea day; otherwise you’ll find the lineups quite long. If, however, you check the final charges on your MSC for Me app and everything looks good, you don’t need to bother with this at all since you’ll be automatically checked out and billed for any extras.

MSC cruise excursions

We’re big fans of booking excursions through your cruise ship to guarantee that you won’t get left behind if there are any unexpected delays, breakdowns, etc. The only excursions that are fully owned and operated by MSC are at Ocean Cay; for everything else, they’re really just a third party. And, to that end, you should do some independent internet sleuthing before committing to an excursion to be sure (1) the experience is what you’re looking for and (2) will be delivered as described.

You’ll find MSC staff at the end of the piers at most ports, and at Ocean Cay there’s a dedicated excursions hut located just to the right of the Ocean Cay welcome centre (the blue makeshift “lighthouse”).

We did four excursions, all of which you can see in action in my Instagram Stories in the MSC highlight in my profile:

1. Kennedy Space Center (Cape Canaveral, Florida) — you can do this excursion on the way to your cruise at the beginning of your trip or at the end on the way to the Orlando airport, provided your ship docks out of Port Canaveral. This is such a great way to hitch a ride to or from your cruise ship! A private driver will pick your family up at your Orlando-area hotel at 9 a.m. and deliver you to the Kennedy Space Center, where you can stay until 1-2 p.m., after which time your driver will take you directly to the cruise terminal and drop you and your bags off at your ship. Although it won’t give you the full taste of this outstanding attraction, you’ll have enough time to do some key highlights.

2. Waverunner Tour (Ocean Cay, Bahamas) — such an amazing way to experience Ocean Cay a little differently than just swimming and beaching. Organized well and decent value if you have two riders; I wrote about this a bit more above in the Ocean Cay section. Please note this tour is not for small or nervous children.

3. River Tubing on the Bacalar Lagoon (Costa Maya, Mexico) — we LOVED this excursion, but had no idea until we got on the shuttle bus that it would be a 90-minute transfer each way. It took us within 40 minutes of the Belize border to the beautiful Bacalar Lagoon, which is supposed to have seven different colours of water — but that’s very dependent on natural light from day to day. We encountered a lot of rain (this is basically the jungle, after all) and cloudy skies, so missed out on all those colours. But it didn’t matter, because the experience itself was super-cool! Everyone gets a pink innertube and they’re all connected to each other and a small motorboat, which takes you to the beginning of the lagoon’s most narrow section; then it’s time to hop out of your tube and float in your life vest down the lagoon, which is a natural lazy river with a white, sandy bottom and a series of three-billion-year-old stromatolites — home to some of the oldest life on planet Earth. Stromatolites are a living fossil that have been here before humans, before the dinosaurs and even before plant life, so it’s quite a privilege to have been so close to them. (Please remember to respect the delicacy of the ecosystem and do not touch or walk on them.) You’re then transported by tube to a lunch spot on the water, and Miss Q said it was one of her favourite lunches throughout the whole trip!

4. Beach Buggy & Snorkelling (Cozumel, Mexico) — this isn’t MSC’s fault, because they’re merely the vendor, but we didn’t really enjoy this tour at all. We wanted to go on a snorkelling excursion in dune buggies but it was either sold out or unavailable, so this was presented as an alternative. The beach buggies were difficult for my parents to get in and out of and just terrible to drive because the pedals were so high that I could never rest my right leg along the floor. The drive around Cozumel is mostly unimpressive, until you have some ocean views which are obviously gorgeous — but most of the drive isn’t coastal. The snorkelling is too short (25 minutes) and so contained that you have more views of dangling legs from other snorkellers than of sea life; and because there are so many people, sea life is limited. Then it’s time for lunch, which was good but essentially a carbon copy of the lunch we had on the Costa Maya excursion, and a very short amount of time to swim in the ocean. Finally, there’s a visit to a pretend Mayan village with staff who are dressed up in traditional costumes and the whole thing was just so manufactured that I didn’t even stay for the whole experience. The best part was trying some freshly made chocolate, but I typically avoid places like this when I travel.

Yacht Club

The MSC Yacht Club is a higher-end, all-inclusive cruise experience that features private spaces and 24-hour butler service. There are 12 butlers for about 130 rooms, so the ratio is good. Yacht Club guests have cabins on the highest decks with the best views, a private pool and bar, private dining room, luxe pool deck furniture and towels, and nicer room amenities — and guests can still enjoy all of the recreation and entertainment services on the rest of the ship. Think of it as a ship-within-a-ship.

Guests have an accelerated embarkation and disembarkation process, don’t have to make any of their own reservations, enjoy more personalized service from dedicated staff and are even escorted to the Madison Theater for shows so they don’t have to line up and rush to find good seats like the rest of us. At Ocean Cay, Yacht Club guests also have their own shuttles.

I toured one of the Yacht Club suites and most of its common areas and — on the surface, anyway, in the hour I spent wandering around — it definitely has a quieter, more exclusive vibe. And when you compare the price to other cruise ships’ ship-within-a-ship concepts, it provides more value for your dollar, IMHO. Hopefully I’ll be able to review the Yacht Club experience for you down the road, at which time I will share photos from a personal experience with it.

Is cruising multigenerational-friendly?

Heck, YES. Even though our first cruise wasn’t a success in every way, it did prove that the idea of a cruise is one that multigenerational groups should consider. You just want to make sure the boat is a good fit for you in terms of size, food, amenities and itinerary. Cruising a second time showed us that, once you get the ship part right, it makes a whole lot of sense for families travelling with both kids and grandparents — because there’s something for everyone.

Unlike most beach resorts, cruise ships have elevators to get both the youngest and oldest family members up and down to all the action. There are more food stations, flavours and varieties than your group could possibly get to in just a week; there are activities galore for every interest and age group, from BINGO to waterslides; there’s entertainment and spaces suitable for anyone; and for those who have a sense of adventure and want to get out at every port to explore, go for it! Don’t need to get out and see what all the fuss is about? No problem, stay onboard and enjoy the quietest moments all week when most guests have left.

Cruising allows families to safely split up and do their own thing for the day — kids included — but come back together at night to enjoy dinnertime together. Different seating times and two evening showtimes mean even early-birds and toddlers can enjoy the festivities. There’s no question that we would do this again with our kids and parents!

When you’re travelling with a larger group — whether it’s a multigenerational family or a big friend group — the other benefit of a cruise is that it can cater to different budgets. For example, those luxury lovers can spend more to be in Yacht Club while those on the strictest budget can opt for inside cabins, and then there’s room in between for everyone else. I’ve been tracking MSC’s prices for a while now and, although you still have to factor in your flights, there are some killer deals to be had. As just one example (because there are hundreds), the same itinerary we did on the MSC Seashore leaving from and returning to Port Canaveral near Orlando, Florida, with seven nights in the Caribbean & Antilles, starts at a mere CAD$476.17 per person — and that includes taxes! It’s obviously for an inside cabin, but with return flights from Toronto to Orlando often hovering in the $500 range these days, that means you could have a one-week holiday for less than a thousand bucks. Here’s a screenshot I took at 8:15 a.m. on August 8, 2024:

One final thought in this MSC cruise ship review… Longtime readers will know that I don’t sugarcoat reviews and I judge every travel experience with a critical eye. We all work so, so hard for our money and, like everything else, the cost of travel has increased dramatically in the last few years, so I never want to make recommendations that I wouldn’t give to my closest friends and family. It’s important for me to point out areas of consideration since we’re all different; and, what annoys one person won’t be a big deal to the next. At the end of the day, nothing is perfect and reviews are subjective, but I have tried to be as objective as possible, putting myself in your shoes as a paying customer. Would I spend my own money to take another MSC cruise? Abso-freaking-lutely.