So today we were in Rotterdam and came across a bit of weird MSC organisation. We were supposed to dock at 07.00 hrs. but the clearance announcement only came at 09.00 hrs. So why ? It turned out that when the ship is cleared early they only make the arrival announcement in the public area and not in the passenger corridors.  According to the concierge desk this is, so the childeren are not woken up too early. But they do not update the daily program on your App, that just gives the official arrival time.

We docked with the bow inwards, which meant the ship will swing on departure. In the distance we can see “De Hef” a bridge which in the old days used to go up and down. Now they have added a new crossing under it. Just visible behind the tall black tower is “Het Poort Gebouw” or the “Gatehouse” that was the office of the HAL between 1889 and 1901. Then they moved to the Wilhelmina Kade where we are docked now.

So if we had gone to the gangway at 07.00 hrs. we would have to have to wait another 20 minutes while they connected the gangaway etc.  But if you patiently waited for the announcement then you would have gone ashore 2 hours late. So we are slowly finding out that the organisation for the whole setup is not that perfect. According to the website we are asked to vacate the cabin by 08.00 hrs. on disembarkation day, according to the concierge desk it is 07.30. When we pointed out the difference, the concierge desk said: you are reading the general information, “We are the Yacht Club, we do things differently, you have to wait until you get the disembarkation paper work in your cabin during the last day”.  Which now seem to mean we have to get out of the cabin earlier than company policy. So we will see. When we asked why so early, as embarkation for the next cruise only starts around noon time, the initial answer was “we want to have the cabins ready by 10 am. “…….. Ok, if so, then why do we have to wait on the ship to 13.00 hrs, before the Yacht Club cabins are ready. Then they backtracked and started waffling.  The background behind all of this, is that there is simply not enough crew on board, to do the cleaning of the cabins, do the luggage and provide a regular cruise experience on disembarkation day. So they tweak the schedule around it and hope you do not notice.  Does it affect the enjoyment of the cruise, not really. Is it irritating when things do not make sense, yes.

On Deck 16 – 18 and 19 aft are the childrens and sports areas. The ship has a 2 level sports court on the portside for football, basketball and volleyball.

So we had Rotterdam to day, and our main plan was to go to the Migration Museum in Rotterdam, that opened last year in the Fenix building.

This is a sculpture located in the Yacht Club Lounge. In quite a few nooks and corners of the ship, this more of this sort of art tucked away.

The ship has a musical theme as the red thread in the lay-out although it is very subdued. Each deck is named after a composer, our deck 16 is named after the french composer Debussy, and there is a portrait of each composer on his own deck. (There is no female composer selected, only the very big names) Then the decoration in the cabins has a musical theme and here and there in the ship is a bit of art that has a connection to music. Then there is a series of silver sculptures scattered around the ship but here there are  no tags with them to explain what they mean. In the Tropic pool are a number of tropical animals to highlight the tropical character but that is about it. MSC policy is obviously not about enrichment as such, more about actiivities and non stop fun.

Lunch on board with todays specialities. Standard there is always Ceasar Salad, A hamburger or spaghetti.

After a nice and quiet lunch in the Yacht Club restaurant, we walked off the ship, went around the Holland America old head office, now Hotel New York to the Fenix building. There is now a bridge from the Wilhelmina Kade to the south side of the Rijnhaven, which in the old days used to dock the Holland America cargo ships. The Fenix is a complex that in the grey mists of time used to be the cargo sheds of Holland America from when they opened a service to the Gulf of Mexico and Cuba and also to the west coast of North America. Around 1926  they built a new Warehouse called “San Francisco”. At that time the largest shipping /storage warehouse in the world. It went through several transformations when the traditional Liner service of Holland America faded away and has now been re-opened with this museum and next to it a  multi functional meeting place called “Het Plein”. (vilage square as in meeting place or The Common in english) It is only a 10 minute walk from the ship by crossing the pedestrian/walking bridge in front of Hotel New York.

This is an artist impression of the Fenix, witb on the top the silver “Tornedo” which is a look out post for very nice views over the port. (Google photo from the internnt, owner unknown)

It opened in May 2025. I had heard both positive and negative comments about the place, so we decided to have a look. Once we arrived we first went to the top deck. To have a look at  the msc Virtuosa and the port suroundings. Although the museum had more than a half a million visitors in its first year it was very quiet today.

The Silver Helix, or Tornedo, runs up through the building from the entrance to the top floor. You can walk or take the lift.

From here we had indeed a wonderful view  and it also gave an impression of how big the MSC Virtuosa is. During the heydays of HAL, 3 passengers ship would dock where there is now only space for one mega liner.

The Wilhelminakade. You can see the stern of the msc Virtuosa, the tall tower of the Harbour masters office; then the old Holland America head office, now Hotel New York and then to the right, the new Holland America Office which houses HR, Europe Sales and Purchasing. The yellow boats are the Water Taxi’s that run a regular service through the city part of the port of Rotterdam. Behind there is now a pedestrian and bikers bridge, where once was open water for the cargo ships to sail through to go to their docks.

That kept us busy for about 2 hours. It is not an emigration / immigration museum as such, like a museum that tells the whole routine from Rotterdam to the New York. For that you are better off in the” Emigranten Museum” in Bremerhaven which gives a much better intrepretation.

The photo section of the museum with photos of refugees, migrants and immigrants from all over the world. It is all about leaving people behind and saying good bye. There are only a few photos from the Emigration Days from Rotterdam. And to my amazement also nothing about the period 1945 – 1952 when The Netherlands and Indonesia split up and a lot of Dutch and Indo Dutch had to leave their roots behind.

It shows more of a worldwide issue of humans having to leave their place of birth, due to displacement by war, famine , genocide etc.etc.  Then the other 3 sections are giving over to artists interpretation of how travel took place and the stories of individual migrants with their experiences.

This is the Art part of the museum. The bus on the left is an artist interpretation of a bus in New York used by migrants when going to work etc. Inside there are life size pupets symbolzing the various cultures and races that form the melting pot. Please note the very strong concrete ceiling from the days that tons of cargo were stored here, before being loaded onto the ships.

It was quite interesting but I missed the connecting story with it all, there are flyers, there are little pedestals with text, you can buy a photo book but I did not get a holistic feeling of full absorbtion when taking it all in. For 18 euros a head the price is not that bad but I did not get a kick out of it, and found even some photos wrongly labelled. At least those that I recognized and had to do with emigration of the old Ocean Liner Days.

So it was back to the shp, for cocktails and dinner, followed by the show. Which was a very “high octaine” dance show. There was a lot of modern music in there, not my interest as such, but I can give only compliments to the dance team. They were VERY VERY good.

Tonights show. with light and sound effects, including fake fireworks.

Tonight was also White Night. We had heard about it on the grape vine but the website did not give any indication if it was going or not. So Lesley did a chat on the MSC website and the answer was yes. Hence we made sure we had an all-white outfit with us, including shoes etc. When the cruise started, the announcement popped up for the first evening on the App, then disappeared again, and then re-surfaced for Rotterdam day.

We tried to find out from The concierge desk how it worked with these special nights as the first night was switched to 60’s, 70s’ and 80’s. and we did not know about that either. I overheard a lady in the ship complaining about that as otherwise she would have brought her “Abba Dress”. Also MSC seems to do formals on the longer cruises. According to the Concierge team, it is not policy to announce these nights pre cruise, because it is decided on board. So you have to take your formals with you and then hope for the best. But if you fly in, then it would help to know, for packing and staying under the suitcase weight.  The mind boggles.

The Cruise staff lining up to start the party. They kept going for a good 30 minutes and then invited everybody to join them downstairs. But with 6000 party goers downstairs already, none of us followed.

But we were prepared for White Night which was late evening in the ship with a “warming up” party in the MSC Yachtclub Sun Deck and Bar, what is normally the day sunning area.  So after dinner we went up and there was a group of the cruise staff giving a little show and then got everybody going with a sort of line dancing.   It was nothing compared to the Azamara White Night but it was still very enjoyable, and I think the best they can do on such a large ship.

They did get the party going and many of the Yacht Club guests joined in. Even some of the butlers hopped into the fray while the rest of them kept the glasses full.

Then it was time to turn in as tomorrow we have a full sea day, with lots of things to see and to try and figure out how disembarkation will work. As so far there has been nothing on the App. and nothing on the TV.

So tomorrow we are all day at sea. And we will be going at a very slow speed. Weather, mainly overcast and hazy, but with a nice temperature fo 24oC / low seventies.