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All in MSC Cruises
Cruise is Back in the UK!
May 29
MSC Cruises, UK Cruising, Wellness on board, New to Cruise, Cruise Basics, Covid 19
We were welcomed aboard by this Union Flag blowing in the breeze!
I’ve just come back from the first UK Cruise to sail in 15 months!
I sailed from Southampton aboard MSC Virtuosa on a short 4 night itinerary and had a fantastic time!
I knew that things would be different but there were six things that particularly surprised me that I wanted to share with you…
After eight weeks of uneventful cruising on their Italy/ Malta route for Schengen Zone passenger only, the crew aboard MSC Grandiosa had their first real test of their responses to a positive COVID test today.
As MSC Grandiosa leaves Genoa, on the fourth of its ‘post COVID 19’ itineraries, it really does begin to feel as if MSC may be providing a blueprint that the rest of Cruising can follow. Their enhanced Health and Safety precautions seem to be working and it almost feels normal to see pictures of the ship leaving port and heading off on its Genoa, Civitavecchia, Naples, Palermo, Malta circuit.
Could this be the start of a ‘Slow Cruise’ movement…
In the same way that the extremes of Nouvelle Cuisine led to the founding of the Slow Food movement and restaurants service food celebrating ‘regional traditions, good food, gastronomic pleasure and a slow pace of life’ I think we may see the beginning of a “slow Cruise’ movement. As the actual process of disembarking a ship and spending a day ashore becomes more difficult, that we will become much more discerning about what we do and where we decide to visit. Maybe we will even learn to wind down, relax, stop rushing around and appreciate our time onboard a little more.
Its reassuring to see that MSC Cruises are definitely taking a zero tolerance approach to rule breaking their first post-Covid Cruise which left Genoa two days ago. Following its first port call to Naples, MSC have denied boarding to a family who left the ‘bubble’ of
So after a disappointing summer, where Cruising seems to have been made the scapegoat for the COVID 19 woes of the entire travel industry, the hopes of Cruising in Europe are now resting on the large independent Italian company MSC Cruises.
lissima - the literal translation from the Italian means Beautiful; so a very confident name for an enormous, great big new ship. We wanted to find out if she deserved such a compliment so were thrilled be able to join Bellissima for a short section of her Inaugural cruise from Southampton to Genoa - embarking in Barcelona for just two nights aboard.
Although we had a plan for each port, it wasn’t as detailed as we would normally expect to have! So on this particular morning our plan was simple… leave ship, get taxi to the fictional Honoré, in reality a pretty village called Deshaies on the north coast of Basse-Terre, a forty kilometre, one hour drive to the north coast of the island. Sorted!
