I chose this cruise for the itinerary, because several ports had an overnight giving 2 days in those ports. I saw Divina launched in Marseille in 2011 and sailed on her as a solo traveller the following year, and loved it, so was looking forward to sailing on her again.

I have a friend I travel with now but we choose to have our own cabins. Paying a single supplement is huge so we always book interior cabins. I booked this cruise roughly 18 months prior to departure and choose cabins on deck 9 close together. On getting our final payment papers I discovered we had been allocated different cabins 4 decks apart, not the cabins I had chosen. I contacted MSC Sydney and they said MSC had the right to change cabins even though I was under the assumption we had in fact paid more for cabins midships on a specific deck. Eventually we were allocated cabins on the same deck but deck 13 forward - not an ideal position as far as I was concerned. My friend and I were very disappointed and in fact I didn't want to take the cruise. We are both Black Card members with MSC but that did not change the situation. Our early preference dinner seating had also been changed to late seating.

Once on board in Miami we went directly to the Black Crab restaurant to ensure we could get first seating for dinner as we both require to eat early for health reasons. We were told there were no seats left and that early seating was reserved for American guests - that did not impress us. Thankfully we recognised a head waiter we had met on an MSC cruise from South Africa last year (and he remembered us) and he organised seating for us at the early sitting. Read more