We decided on an unusual approach to Thanksgiving this year, we celebrated on a cruise. We got onboard the MSC Seaside for our 6 night cruise from Port Canaveral to Martinique with some fun stops along the way. After lunch, water slides, and signing up for kids club, we decided to check out the sail away party and were seemingly the only ones.
This was our first clue that this huge ship (max passenger capacity is something like 4500) might not be all that full. When we arrived to check in we found out that one of our rooms we'd booked had been changed. Upgraded, in fact, from an inside to a balcony cabin. Yay! But our bags were labeled with our original room number, so I had to go get them from guest services and bring them up myself.
Arthur was pretty excited about his double-decker couch bed and all the kids were excited to do some swimming and visit the arcade.
This ship had a few arcade games, a bowling alley, 4-D theater games, an F1 simulator, and a zipline that were all part of the "fun pass" we got for the family to use. You'd better believe we spent a lot of time on those games!
Our first port day was at MSC Ocean Cay, a small private island in the Bahamas. We came here on our last cruise, so we knew what to expect and had a great time. The weather was perfect: sunny and warm not windy or too hot.
The kids loved playing in the sand and we were able to get up early enough to snag some chairs and bean bags in a shady spot.
After Ocean Cay, we had two full days at sea scheduled. Our cruise itinerary didn't end up going exactly to plan, though, so we really got almost 3 full sea days. The good news is that there is so much to do on a cruise that if you're ever bored, it's probably by choice. If you're ever hungry on a cruise, that's probably your fault. We didn't really experience either of those.
Laszlo did a Junior chef challenge (he was disappointed that he didn't get to eat the muffin he made), we did fitness classes, trivia, games, karaoke, watched theater shows, and played cards with my parents.
They started decorating for Christmas during our sailing. I noticed new decorations popping up in different areas each day. The big, shiny, four story atrium got the treatment first.
One downside to our days at sea were the somewhat choppy water and windy conditions. It kept the zipline and kid friendly water park pool closed those days, which was a bit of a disappointment, but there were still other pools and waterslides available and there were never crowds or lines at any of them.
On our second day at sea we got the announcement that we were diverting towards Nassau because a passenger had experienced a medical emergency. We didn't go all the way to Nassau, but got close enough so we'd be in the range of a U.S. Coastguard helicopter.
Those of us on the covered pool deck got a very up close look at a rescue at sea.
a rescuer dropped down from the helicopter and they managed to lift the passenger and their companions into the helicopter safely. We were informed that the passenger made it to the hospital and was stabilized and recovering. Of course they were apologetic that it would effect our arrival times for our next port, but being at sea requires everyone to do what needs to be done to save lives and keep people safe.
It made me appreciate our amazing Coastguard and the willingness of a big ship to derail all their plans to ensure everyone on board is safe.
Arthur slept through the whole ordeal, by the way. And Paul just kept on swimming while just about everyone else on the pool deck was watching the helicopter through the glass roof.
One fun thing specific to MSC, their kids clubs (the mini and junior clubs anyway) are Lego themed. kids can build with Legos, play video games, and they also do special activities together. The baby club also has babysitting that you don't have to pay extra for (HALLELUJAH!) So Arthur could go play in baby club for a couple hours each day and we got to do some toddler free activities. He loved it, and was apparently the only toddler who did. It was commented on by many employees that he never cried or got upset. He also just liked playing in there when it was open for free play time, so we took turns playing with Arthur at baby club.
Laszlo just wanted to be at kids club all. the. time. He wanted to go as soon as it opened and when we'd come pick him up he'd beg to stay longer. MSC is a very international cruise line and the announcements were usually made in English, French, Spanish, Italian, German, and Portuguese. But this particular trip seemed to be about 40% English speakers and 40% French speakers with a small number of each of the other languages represented. Laszlo has been in the French immersion program in school, so this was a great opportunity to hear and practice his French with the other kids and the staff.
If you are traveling with a group that has a 70 year age range, cruising is probably the best thing you can do to appeal to the whole group. Stay up late or don't, eat when you want, nap when you must, and you can be exactly as busy as you want to be.
We didn't actually buy anything in the shops or restaurants onboard, but the chocolate sculptures were sure fun to look at! Paul was less interested in kids club than Laszlo, though he did have fun there. He spent more time doing arcade games, swimming, and he actually wanted to watch the various theater shows.
The kids were totally worn out by the end of the day. Arthur actually took naps. Guys. Arthur stopped napping when he was 18 months old. But here he is, unable to stay awake for dinner. He literally fell asleep while he was eating.
Given that probably 50% of the passengers and 99% of the crew are from somewhere other than the United States, you might be wondering did they do anything for Thanksgiving? They did, in fact! The main dining room offered a turkey dinner and festive pies and there were Thanksgiving crafts...the essential food items were present and delicious.
On Thanksgiving day we were scheduled to have a port day in Philipsburg, St. Maarten. Due to the extraordinary Coastguard rescue of the previous day, that wasn't going to happen as planned. But new crew members were being picked up in Philipsburg, so stopping there was still essential. Instead of spending the whole day there, we arrived in the evening around 6 PM and then departed at 2 AM, giving the new crew time to board, and giving us a couple hours on the island.
Sint Maarten/Saint Martin is an island of two different nations: Sint Maarten is Dutch, Saint Martin is French, and the island is split divided between them. We didn't really get to see or do much, we just hopped in a taxi to go down to the boardwalk in downtown Philipsburg.
the shops and restaurants were closed, the beach was empty, but it was a nice evening and they too were just starting to decorate for Christmas. Grandma Jamie and Pa Duane took a taxi back to the ship, and we walked back. That was a lovely time, until we had multiple kids need to go to the bathroom at the same time and, uh, not a single one was open. We just had to get back to the ship for them to go potty.
What I really used our balcony for (besides drying towels and swimsuits) was rolling out of bed and photographing our sail ins to our ports. Our third port was St. John Antigua.
We had booked an excursion for this port, so I am very glad we didn't end up missing this one or arriving late. Arthur was too young to go, so Pa volunteered to stay on the ship with him. There were some ladders and climbing in and out of boats that would have been tough on his knees, so he was probably better off with Arthur. Apparently, with so few passengers on board during the day, Arthur got a lot of attention at lunch time. Being so cute helped too, I'm sure.
To being our excursion, we drove to the other side of Antigua and our driver offered up lots of information and answered our questions about the island. I'm reliably informed that Antigua and Barbuda is pronounced An-tee-gah and Bar-bew-duh. I've been saying those both wrong my whole life. Oops.
Our destination? Stingray City! After the drive and a short safety presentation, we hopped on speed boats and headed to a shallow sandbar and reef.
Our boat was the first to arrive and we were among the first in the water. Paul and Laszlo weren't quite sure they wanted to touch or hold a stingray, but they quickly got over their nervousness.
The stingrays were bigger than I expected and surprisingly docile. They didn't seem to mind being touched and held, they were more than happy to be fed, and they weren't the least bit concerned about all the humans hanging around.
There were quite a few fish around and a small reef. The snorkeling was pretty fun, but holding and petting stingrays were the main event.
We got back to the ship in time for a late lunch, which we enjoyed out on the shady side of the deck. There were so many other cool things to see in Antigua that I'd have loved to get to, but there just wasn't time. We'll have to go back someday.
Lee and I did do a short walk into St. John to see the cathedral up close. The kids weren't interested, so they stayed with grandparents. When we got back to the ship we realized that the calm weather meant the zipline was finally open! We made sure to do a couple runs to make up for lost time. The views were terrific, unfortunately we couldn't bring phones or cameras on it with us. I tried to convince Paul to do the zipline, but he insisted he wouldn't like it.
We tried to squeeze everything we hadn't gotten to into our last evening. There were many arcade games played, desserts devoured, and I think Paul's favorite theater show of the whole cruise. One of the crew suggested I should make sure to come to an activity where you could sing with the band. It's like karaoke, but a little more exciting. I didn't know a lot of the songs on their list super well, so I went with the one I did know.
That was our cruise! The next morning we arrived in Fort de France, Martinique! We waited for our turn to disembark and enjoyed one last game of ping pong and a tasty breakfast, and then we were on our way for the last stage of this big adventure.
From the ship we had a good view of the Fort St. Louis, as well as the cathedral designed by one of Gustav Eiffel's students. I think the Eiffel inspiration really shows in the design of the spire.
And so we say good-bye to the MSC Seaside! There were so many things that we didn't have time to do. That seems to be a recurring theme on this trip, we always have more to do than hours in the day. That will certainly continue to be true on this next leg of the journey.
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