Stateroom Tours Series: Let’s Check Out and Rate My Oceanview Stateroom Aboard the MSC Divina

You know you have been curious what the rooms aboard a cruise ship are like or maybe you are thinking about booking an Oceanview on the MSC Divina, let’s see what my stateroom looks like and find out my overall rating for the room.

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SHIP SPECS

• CRUISE LINE – SHIP: MSC Cruises – Divina / Class: Fantasia
• YEARS OF SERVICE INFO: Built/launched: 2012 Last Refurbished: 2017
• SHIP STATS: The MSC Divina is a 1,083 ft long, 139K tons cruise ship with 1,751 cabins and suites (including 45 accessible). Max capacity of 4,345 passengers with a crew of 1,388 people. 17 decks with 14 that are passenger accessible and 9 that have cabins

MSC DIVINA’S OCEANVIEW CABIN TOUR

STATEROOM SIZE / CONFIGURATION

STATEROOM SIZE / CONFIGURATION

What is MSC advertises this to be on their website: Junior Oceanview stateroom has a king bed that can be converted into two single beds with relaxing armchair and a window with sea view

What I really got: MSC was honest about the size of this oceanview cabin being a tiny 128 square feet / 11.9 square meters. There are two single beds that were set up apart and when combined they are closer to a queen then king bed with two nightstands and lamps. There is a porthole window with a sea view* (more on this below in the stateroom location section!)

Probably for the best that there isn’t an armchair as advertised as the cabin is tiny and filled to the max – a common problem with MSC staterooms (or at least the ones I have had) as this makes it feel very cramped. The combo desk/vanity table has a couple of drawers for storage. In the other corner of the room, there is a dresser with an ice bucket, glassed on top underneath the interactive TV.

As typical of many cruise lines, the only outlets are at the desk area. As a nod to their European roots, MSC does have four outlets with two European plugs and two for US plugs.

CLOSET CONFIGURATION

The closet is very small with one shelf at the very top (and with half of the space occupied by the life jackets) and you can use the other shelf if you don’t use the hanging space.

The closet in this room is already reduced in size but a big portion of it is used to house the safe and the refrigerator. Once again, I did not appreciate that MSC has the mini-fridge was pre-filled with snacks + drinks (which were not complimentary) which left very little room for personal items.

What I wish I would have brought: Magnetic hooks: Did you know that cruise cabin walls are metal? I find these to be really useful even if traveling solo – to keep wet jackets out of the closet and there are never enough towel hooks! They are even handier once you start sharing cruise staterooms as tiny as this one with others!

BATHROOM SIZE / CONFIGURATION

The bathroom is a definite improvement over the one in my MSC Poesia room. The glass and metal shelves were just a little bit bigger and there was a third shelf that equated to a lot more usable storage. And while the shower was probably the same size as on the Poesia but without the annoying shower curtain, it didn’t seem quite as cramped and definitely not as gross (I hate when a curtain blows in and touches you in the shower!)

BATHROOM AMENITIES / PRODUCTS

Luckily I learned from my last MSC cruise and came totally prepared for this sailing. There is a combo shampoo/conditioner and body wash in the shower and hand wash at the sink but I cannot stress this enough – they are so low quality. I can normally use whatever a hotel or cruise line provides (with my own conditioner added in) without issue but not for MSC. As always, I carried on for luggage so I had to make a

I still don’t know if you can request a box of tissues on MSC or rather if there is a fee to have one put in your stateroom. But again there were no Kleenex in the bathroom.

STATEROOM LOCATION

The cabin was mid-ship which is a plus if you are worried about seasickness but here it means that this is what you see when you look out of the port window. These are not sold as partially obstructed view rooms but this one definitely is. Directly below the room on Deck 7 is La Cantina di Bacco and staterooms above us Deck 9 but no issues with noise or smells. This is close to a lift/elevator and there was a fair bit of noise.

COMPARISON VS OTHER OCEANVIEWS ON MSC DIVINA

The MSC Divina has three categories of oceanview staterooms with all rooms having a porthole window. The Junior Oceanview is the smallest at 128 square feet / 11.9 square meters and again is what this cabin is. They are all on the 8th Deck and can only accommodate two. The next category is the Deluxe Oceanview and are considerably larger at 183 square feet / 17 square meters and located on decks 8 and 13. Some of these staterooms will have obstructed views. The third category is the Premium Oceanview which are even larger at 215 square feet / 20 square meters and located on decks 5 with unobstructed oceanviews. According to MSC, select staterooms can accommodate up to 6 guests!

OVERALL RATING OF STATEROOM

My overall rating for this MSC Divina oceanview stateroom is a 7.0 in that there are some major drawbacks for this room. The first is the size of the cabin especially if you like to travel with many outfit choices as the stateroom and the closet are tiny especially when you consider that this is room that allows for double occupancy! To put that into perspective, my solo oceanview on the HAL Nieuw Statendam was the same size and had a larger closet! And to further compound things, it’s the way that MSC designs their cabins that they feel even more cramped than rooms of a similar size on other lines.

The second point of contention is that the partial oceanview which may not be a deal breaker for some but for others, they want a true obstructed view if that’s what they paid for.

And the last area that is lacking and drags down the score are the little annoying things about the stateroom from having the mini-bar set up taking up valuable space in the mini-fridge to the poor quality of bathroom products to not having a box of tissues in the room. Having to schlep or buy extra things to bring on a trip makes vacationing on MSC just a little less relaxing, ya know (but that’s also from someone that hates having to check and wait for a bag so I carry on for all of my trips!)

ONCE LAST THING…

Even with this being the fifth post in this series, I am still torn about whether or not I should be including a rating. Would it be better to just do the review and tour? But I continue to hold out that it’s just one more piece of information to give you and to remind you that it’s a subjective thing and that it is coming from someone that spends a lot of time in hotels rooms and in ship cabins so that is both good and bad.

If cruising on MSC is the only way that you will be able to see so many places and it saves you money to do so – then book the cabin! MSC tends to be a lot cheaper and they have more sailings in certain destinations so I don’t think that this review should deter you. Maybe it just means considering a different oceanview room or coming in with managed expectations. Because the fact of the matter was that the cruise and sailing were not ruined in any way for me with this stateroom – you can visit my overview of my trip here!

Lastly, I aim for these reviews and ratings to be balanced and only about the stateroom. But I should admit that I am human and I wonder if there’s a part of me that is still salty about the very weird, a bit suspicious way that my Diamond status was removed from my booking right before sailing. It seems quite strange that not only that I was not upgraded at all (there was plenty of availability!) but that I ended up in this stateroom!