Due to all of the negative reviews that I’ve consistently read since booking the MSC Seaside back in January 2018, my expectations were very low coming into this Memorial Day week 2018 cruise… But I figured, “how bad could it be?” I’ve taken 15!cruises over the past 6 years. And no cruise out of those now 16 had been more critically slammed than the MSC Seaside. So naturally, like others, I was tremendously apprehensive.
Never have my expectations been so low heading into a cruise, only to be so surprisingly surprised with the vacation that I had the privilege to take on this ship!
I was sailing with my 75-year-old father who has some health issues and although he can still walk, mostly uses a power chair to get around. The staff aboard the ship couldn’t have been nicer, nor more willing to help whenever he needed it.
I first sailed on MSC in 2009 on the Poesia, and again in 2016 on the Divinia.
I said it in 2016 when I sailed the Divinia, that I thought the cruise line had come a long way since 2009 in catering to American audiences, and I’ll say that the line has come EVEN FURTHER with this incredible ship that they created late last year.
***Honestly, I spent numerous times throughout the course of the cruise racking my brain as to why this ship has been so negatively reviewed by so many people when I couldn’t have had a better experience!!!
Below is a long detailed review of my entire cruise... Enjoy!:
OVERVIEW:
The ship itself:
First of all, i didn’t realize that the ship was as big as it was until we actually arrived on the day of embarkation.
The ship can hold slightly under 4500 passengers.
As mentioned before, I’ve been on 15 previous cruises prior to this....And although I give Celebrity and Norwegian incredibly high marks for their newer ships, and how beautiful and modern that both of those cruise lines’ new ships are, The MSC Seaside is incredible(in terms of aesthetics and pure beauty). I’m young, and like glitzy/glammy modern ships. And this ship has beautiful indoor and outdoor spaces throughout the entire ship. Particularly, the main promenade, or “rotunda” as I called it, to where most of the interior action and meeting points take place on the ship is nothing short of stunning. —It’s essentially 4 floors of mirrored bars/hangout spaces/ information desks(such as guest relations, photo areas, and the excursions desk). Lots of live music, and beautiful HD digital screens of designs, artwork, etc... Very Miami Art Deco looking. — obviously that’s the theme that they were going for.
You can see what’s happening on all 4 floors no matter which floor you are on. Think of it, like the main “connecting point” of the interior part of the ship.
I’ve never seen a ship that had so much available outdoor spaces on various levels all throughout the ship. Unlike many newer modern cruise ships that only have significant outdoor spaces on the top several decks, Seaside’s design is very different and unique. You can be on decks 7 and 8, and have just as much outdoor space as you can on decks 16 through 19.
It seems like a goal of this ship’s design was to maintain outdoor spaces no matter where you are on the ship. —I know that this may not seem like a big deal, but it really makes the ship not seem quite as crammed or crowded as some of the other ships that only have outdoor spaces near the top.
The outdoor spaces are numerous, and abundant. Not only do you have the main pool deck on floor 16, but you have available sunning areas on decks 17 & 18....If you are looking for a little bit of a quieter(more adult) area to relax with a pool, the Miami Beach Bar totally at the back of the ship on deck 7 is the place to be. Smaller pool with tons of space for lounge chairs.
I am a member of MSC’s “yacht club” due to their “status matching” with my Celebrity status... So I was also able to go to the yacht club pool area as well. And although this was pretty, and small, and relaxing, I actually enjoyed the main pool on deck 16 the most. BUTTT, no matter which pool you choose, there are at least 4 or 5 pool areas for you to choose from to enjoy.
—So my suggestion would be to go try them all, and decide which one you like the best.
One very small criticism of Seaside’s design is a problem that MSC seems to have on all of their ships(although it’s not quite as bad or prevalent on Seaside as it was on the Divinia, or certainly the Poesia...) When you are heading somewhere on the ship, there might be certain times that you cannot walk completely through that floor to get to a particular location elsewhere on that floor (such as a specialty restaurant, or shop, or things like that.) And what I mean by that, is that you might have to go up/down a floor to go around a service area or something like that, and then go back up/down to the floor that you were just on to arrive at your destination. —This Is not that big of a deal to me, as I’m a pretty quick learner and usually have the vast majority of the ship learned by the second or certainly third day of the cruise... But I can see that it would be a little frustrating or confusing for an elderly person or kid.
Once again, this is a very minor criticism that really didn’t bother me all that much. But I heard a few others on the ship complain about this.
Bottom line to wrap up the review of the design of this ship, I would love to have a debate with someone on any of the newer megaships on whether or not it could beat the Seaside. Because I’m pretty critical when it comes to cruising, and I simply cannot think of a ship in terms of pure aesthetics and beauty that can beat this ship from that standpoint.
Stateroom:
This will be short and sweet… Like pretty much all cruise ship cabins, it was small and served it’s purpose. I am a 31 year old bachelor... and although I always get a balcony room on any ship that I sail on, I can’t tell you that I ever spend much time in my state room other than to sleep and get dressed. But, for what it’s worth, the state room was very nice, and modern. The balcony was a very decent size and I enjoyed having a bloody mary or coffee on it in the mornings. You are on a cruise ship to have a good time, and be around other people, and get some sun. —You can’t do any of those things by staying in your room. I was on deck 14(mid ship)Good location and easy to everywhere. My room stewardess was Leddy from Columbia... She was awesome. Always was there when I needed something.
The Bars:
Bars on Bars on Bars on Bars
If you don’t take anything else away from my review, take this: You will not have any trouble whatsoever finding a drink. Rather than to take it bar by bar... I will say that my favorite bar was the “Haven Lounge”...which had good live music, karaoke, and a great atmosphere.
Honorable mention goes to the “Miami Beach” bar(this is right by the lower pool deck on deck 7). Good atmosphere, and is one of the few night time outdoor bars that you’ll find on a cruise ship… It is lit up in neon lights like South Beach.
All of the bartenders and cocktail waitresses are great! The best cocktail waitress on the ship is from Brazil, and her name is Cláudia Spicciati. She typically works in the promenade/main interior decks at the “Shine Bar”. She is incredibly sweet, and would always remember what I wanted, and would mostly bring it to me without me ever having to ask for it after day 1....As a matter of fact, I made it a point to write her name down so that I could include her in this review.(That’s how much I thought of her).
Specialty Restaurants/Main Dinning Room/Buffet
My father and I ate at 3 of the 4 specialty restaurants on board.
By far, the best specialty restaurant on Seaside is “Butchers Cut”. I know that a lot of people may roll their eyes at fancy steakhouses now a days considering that they seem to be on every corner in our country. BUT Trust me, you want to go and try this restaurant… My father who has been on 10+ cruises as well, and I both agreed that this was one of the best meals that we’ve ever had at sea.
Ask for “Rowena Sebastian” to be your waitress… I thought so much of her, that I also made it a point to write down her name.
—Our second favorite specialty restaurant was “Asian fusion by Roy Yamaguchi”... Very very good… If you've ever had “Silk Harvest” on the Celebrity Equinox, it is very similar to this. Lots of great appetizers, and spring rolls, and dumplings, noodle bowls, etc...
—The third specialty restaurant that we ate at was “Ocean Cay”. And Although the seafood was pretty good, and the atmosphere is very nice like all of their specialty restaurants, i’m from Louisiana… So it’s hard for me to get any better seafood than what I eat at home. I would probably not choose this restaurant again if I ever go back on Seaside, but it wasn’t bad. Like I said, I’m pretty critical of seafood given where I’m from.
Dining room
Given that we were in the MSC yacht club, and had the aurea package, we had “any time” dining in the nights that we ate in the main dining room which was the “seashore dinning room”. The food was much improved from our previous MSC experiences… Particularly, Italian night was very delicious. They have a team waiting staff, so you get three or four waiters with various functions… And all of them performed very well and catered to our wants and needs.
Buffet:
The buffets on Seaside are pretty standard for what you’d expect for a buffet for all cruise ships. There is 1 unique difference on this ship with the fact that there are 2 buffets. The buffet on the 8th deck is much larger, and is your standard size buffet for a mega ship. We ate breakfast every day in this buffet.
—Contrary to what some people have written about the buffet, I found the variety to be pretty good. They had all of the American favorites such as burgers, hotdogs, and pizza. Plus, they had salad bars, pasta bars with assorted pastas and lasagna and ravioli etc... Plus they had a grilled section to where they would change it up from day to day with meatloaf one day, pot roast, roasted chicken on other days ETC... There is a smaller buffet about half of the size on Deck 16 right near the main pool area. This buffet seemed to be more of a “quick grab buffet” with things such as salad’s, pizza, and burgers and sandwiches. We used this buffet more for two or three lunches on the ship.
Overall score for food when you add everything together would be a solid A- or B+ (I’m from Louisiana... Trust me, if it was bad or unseasoned, I would tell you)
THE SERVICE IN GENERAL:
I’ve read hundreds of reviews of this ship coming into this cruise of people criticizing the staff over troubles with service. Ladies and gentlemen, I’m here to tell you that I didn’t experience this. —If I’m at my most critical, I would give the service a B+ or A-. If we ever needed something, it was taken care of in a timely fashion. The Rare time that something was wrong, it was fixed in a timely fashion.
Now, I have no idea of whether or not this is true, as I’m going off of complete secondhand information… But, I befriended a woman on the pool deck one day during the cruise. And she said that she was a travel agent. I asked her how her experience was with the staff. She proceeded to tell me that it was great, in fact was some of the best service that she had ever had on close to 10 cruises. So I then asked her why she thought the service was so negatively reviewed. She told me that one of the waitresses told her that about a month ago due to all of the negative reviews on service, MSC pulled about 300-400 experienced crew members from other ships in their fleet and sent them over to Seaside.
And in turn, removed 300-400 less experienced staff off, and disbursed them into other parts of their fleet. Like I said, I have no idea whether or not this was true, but it would make sense as the service reviews seemed to have gotten better within the last month. Like I said, the service was impeccable in my opinion… There is a little bit of a language barrier. But the vast majority of the staff at least knows a little bit of English. If you find yourself in a rare situation to where someone cannot answer a question, simply ask one of the numerous abundant crew staff members who will be near to the person that can answer your question.
ENTERTAINMENT ON BOARD
As usual, this in my opinion is MSC’s strongest area. Even going back to a very lackluster cruise on the MSC Poesia in 2009, the entertainment back then was good. Those Italians can put on a show! The entertainment on this cruise was excellent. The shows from night-to-night are nothing short of sensational. Even the few people who seemed to not enjoy this cruise remarked how good the entertainment was. Rather than to take it show by show, I can tell you that you will see a lot of Broadway variety type of dancing, singing, and incredible acrobatics. The best show by far was the Michael Jackson show... I forgot the exact name of it, but it was probably the best show that I’ve ever seen at sea. The only thing negative that I have to take away from the entertainment is the theater on the ship. It fills up incredibly quickly, so make sure to get to your designated show early. If I have one knock on the entire ship on aesthetics, it’s like they skimped on the theatre. Too small for a 4500 passenger ship. There’s three shows a night, and I would recommend that you book your time for the shows very early in the cruise… Maybe even right when you get on board. I overheard several people complaining that they did not get the designated time for the show that they wanted each evening because they didn’t reserve on the first day. —I was prepared for this from reading other reviews, and went ahead and reserved the 9:15 PM show for every single night of the cruise. I did this on the day of embarkation.
The other highlights from the entertainment are the cruise entertainment staff...These are about 10 young people that sortve act as assistant cruise director’s and handle the smaller entertainment in the lounges and pool decks. They are all very very nice, and all speak perfect English. You’ll see them constantly throughout the cruise, and they will always ask if they can help you with anything, and make sure that you are having a good time.
The Casino:
The casino was very nice, and had some cool features to it. But I’m not going to be the best person to review this area as I’m not much of a gambler, and I’m allergic to cigarette smoke, and this was one of the few areas on the interior part of the ship that people are allowed to smoke. That being said, it looked really cool, and people seemed to be having a good time there.
THE PEOPLE:
My father and I estimated that there were about 50 to 55% Americans on the ship. The vast majority of the rest were western European, such as German, Italian, British and then Latin American...There were a small number of Asian and other. Many of the Western Europeans and Latin American passengers spoke English. And although it was a diverse crowd, I thought it was the perfect balance between American people and people from other parts of the world.
As I’ve mentioned several times, I’m young, and I am a bachelor. I found that there was a good number of millennial singles on the ship, as well as married couples, and others. I also though that it was pretty diverse with different ages on the ship as well… Supposedly there were around 300 kids on the ship. —Credit to MSC for having kids/teens clubs... Because, if there were that many on the ship, I didn’t notice it....
IN CLOSING:
As mentioned in my opening, MSC has come a hell of a long way since I first sailed them in 2009. And this cruise was legitimately consistently good across the board. The food was very good, the service was very good, the drinks were very good, and the ship was spectacular. I will say it again that I DO NOT understand why so many people have had issues with this cruise. If you are looking for a Carnival Walmart cruise, to where everyone weighs 400 lbs, and has 13 kids, then book Carnival. This cruise line does not try to be that.
Bottom line, if you are thinking about booking this cruise, or have already booked it, and are apprehensive like I was because of some of the negative reviews, DONT BE! Keep an open mind! A cruise is WHAT YOU MAKE IT. I have yet to find the perfect cruise, and the MSC Seaside is no exception. But I can tell you, that I had (C-)expectations, and had an (A+) time.
MSC has clearly gotten the message of some of the earlier negative reviews from this ship's first several months of existence from November into the early spring of this year. Whatever was wrong in the past has mostly been fixed by the time I took this cruise on memorial day week of 2018.
-Matthew Dunn
New Orleans, LA. USA
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