We went on a 7 night cruise round the West. Med. on the Preziosa with a couple of friends (Sept.19th to 26th 2015.) This was the third time we went on a MSC cruise, the first time about nine years ago. On all three cruises, the ships were beautiful and all fairly new. The cabins were always nice and kept reasonably clean. We got a complimentary upgrade from ocean view to two balcony cabins and that was the best part of the cruise, but then it seemed to go downhill from that point onward.

The food in the dining room in the evenings were really substandard. This was the case with our first two MSC cruises, and nine years on, we expected some improvement but were sorely disappointed. For my first meal I had a piece of fish that was half cooked and that upset my stomach for 3 days, with lost appetite and vomitting after each meal. My husband also suffered a bout of stomach upset after having a cup of hot chocolate. We thought the milk might have gone off. However, the quality of the meals seemed to improve somewhat after the fourth night, which we found perplexing. Even then, the quality of the food paled in comparisons to other cruse liners.

We were also shocked to learn that tea and coffee in the dining room were not part of the meal and we had to pay for them. We have been on a dozen cruises with other cruise lines and tea and coffee have always been part of the meal. There was this drive to pressure you to buy drink packages, and as we do not drink much alcohol, we found it a real rip-off. The buffet for breakfast and lunch was also of poor quality, with the cheapest foods on offer, like pizzas with hardly any toppings on them, unappetising looking hotdogs and burgers. Even the salad was of very poor quality and variety. The so called ethnic corner was tucked away in a remote spot which people had difficulty in finding and whatever was on offer there was soon gone. As there was only one place where all 4000 passengers seem to go for breakfast and lunch, it was a struggle to find a seat let alone having the chance of sitting together with our group. Read more