Life Aboard the MSC Magnifica: Chapter 4
Our Captian Massa is a friendly fellow, and we see him around the ship occasionally. We hear him speaking to us from the bridge every day. He gives us the run down when we’re leaving each harbor and what we’ll see on the port and starboard sides of the ship. We’ve decided his favorite English word is “beautiful.” A typical sendoff sounds like this, “Good evening ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking from the bridge. Please enjoy this beautiful sunset as we pull away from this beautiful island of Puerto Rico. On the starboard side of the ship you will notice the beautiful San Cristobal Fortress. Please sit back and relax and enjoy this beautiful departure.” We like his attitude, and we’ve certainly been enjoying some beautiful sunsets at the direction of Captain Massa.
We’ve had an interior room, and it has met all of our needs. It’s got a closet and drawers for our clothes, a TV, mini fridge, 2 side tables, and we have a full bathroom with shelves, cupboards, shower, toilet, sink. It’s compact but it has not bothered us. We decided that if we had a balcony room we’d never leave the room. The channels we get in English are Food Network, HGTV, MSNBC, and a movie channel. After the amount of HGTV we’ve watched during our days at sea we’ve convinced ourselves that our next profession is flipping and selling houses.
The same woman cleans our room each day, Marta, she’s a little dear heart from Bali. They really work her to the bone! We wonder if she’s ever had a day off, and she works from 7am to 10pm! I’d like to tell her that she really need not vacuum the hall outside our room at 9pm, but Marta just won’t stand for crumbs. About a week into our trip I went to throw something away and the trash can was not where it was the day before. I gave Ashley a serious look and asked, “have you been moving the trash can?” She looked at me and chuckled, “I thought you were moving it!” Marta seems to enjoy finding new places for it every day. This has become one of our favorite games we play as we come back to our room: where is the trash can today? There aren’t a lot of places in our room to put a trash can, there are exactly four locations where it fits. Call me old fashioned, but I like the garbage can to stay in the same place day after day. I like to toss something in its direction and know that there is a receptacle that will catch it. She also comes in at night and turns down our bed, and she has been laying out our pajamas for us on the bed, bless her heart. Sometimes she also will fold up my beach sarong and put that with my pajamas. I’m not sure what she imagines I’m wearing to bed. But my favorite was when I couldn’t find my pajamas, and then the next morning I felt them underneath my pillow. Marta, are you messing with me?
There’s a “rainbow group” that meets every three weeks for the LGBT passengers. We’ve made a couple friends, there are about a dozen LGBT couples on board. We only made it to one of these get togethers. A few MSC employees joined us and brought us drinks while we socialized. It was nice that MSC carved out a space where we can all meet and feel welcome.
It really does feel like we’re on a floating UN some days. There are 43 nationalities on the ship, and with the all of the announcements in multiple languages, we should be able to count to ten and say hello, goodbye, please, and thank you in Spanish, French, German, Italian.
A while back, we learned that an MSC employee “jumped ship” in San Diego. At first Ashley and I thought that meant she jumped overboard, but we realized that’s the term for leaving the ship and not coming back. She was Honduran, and she left behind all of her belongings including her passport in order to get into the U.S.. While it may have been a creative way to get past the U.S. border, it left all of her former co-workers quite upset. After learning of this deserter, U.S. Border Control made the call that no other MSC employees could get off the ship in any U.S. state. We would be in the U.S. or at sea for the next 21 days. All the MSC guys who we chat with were very excited about going to Los Angeles and San Francisco, and they were heart broken when they couldn’t get off the ship. They had some very choice words about the lady who jumped ship and caused them all to be sequestered on the ship for 3 weeks. Tensions began to run high at sea when the crew could only go to their cabins or go to their work stations. There was an actual fist fight between the Italian pizza chef and the Indian head chef. We found out later that the fight was about a t-shirt. I suppose I’d get testy if I couldn’t get off the ship for 3 weeks too! Sadly, the pizza chef was asked to leave, and we were pretty fond of him and the pizza he made. Now there is a Chinese man who makes the pizza, we’re not fond of the pizza he makes or the fact that he never even winks at us like our former Italian pal.
We were invited to an informational session about navigation, weather, and communication of the ship. It was a fascinating look behind the scenes. We could have sat and asked questions about the ship for an hour and still had more! We learned that in the span of one day the ship consumes around 130-140 tons of fuel. The ship has stabilizers on each side that extend like wings and counter act the rocking motion from high swells. They explained the ballast system below deck how large areas are full of fuel, oil, drinking water, gray water, and black water. They have to strategically fill and empty out ballasts of salt water for balancing out the ship, that was Ashley’s favorite part to know about. We learned about all the leg work that went into selecting the ports and planning for the arrival of the ship. My favorite part was to learn that they navigate with modern software, but they also use paper charts as a backup. I was most interested see how a sextant is used to pin down the location of the ship without modern GPS. It’s an ancient tool that is still useful today. We were hoping to be able to meet the captain and go into the bridge, but because we were nearing the high risk area of the Indian Ocean where pirates are a potential threat, the security was upped a few notches. They actually had specialty security officers on board trained to spot pirate boats who look like they have the intent to board our ship. The danger zone was highest entering the Red Sea navigating between Yemen and Somalia. We crossed our fingers for no midnight pirate drills! We ended up doing an overland in Turkey during that sea crossing, but we were informed that although they did spot some pirates, there was no threat to the ship.
On our second to last day on the ship we did get invited to visit the bridge where the captain and crew command the ship. It was fascinating to see how they steer this enormous ship with a tiny joystick, it’s not the enormous ship wheel you might be envisioning. He showed us their weather tracking system, the radar, and explained how they can maneuver the ship with the 2 engines thrusters that allow the ship to move sideways, and how they balance the weight of the ship with ballast tanks below deck. Visiting the bridge was something we had been hoping to do the entire trip, and we were very glad we made it on the list!
We feel so lucky to have gone on this adventure. We’ve seen an eyeful of amazing landscapes, people, cultures, and foods. We’ve milked all we could have out of this world trip, and it’s been exhausting at times, but it’s all been worth it in the end. There are days we go to bed at midnight and wakeup at 6am the next morning to get out there again. There are days our feet are swollen and sore, and our glutes are on fire from the hike we did the day before, but it’s no excuse to not get back out there and see what the next destination has to offer. Through all the sore feet and hip aches and knee pain we seriously wonder what this trip would be like if we had waited until our retirement. It has reaffirmed why we took breaks from work to experience the world while we’re able. We’re sad to see it end, and we’re grateful for the experiences we’ve had. Our goal was to share our adventures in real time with you all, but the lack of internet and fast pace of our trip made that more difficult than anticipated. We have many backlogged stories and photos to share, so stay tuned for more over the coming weeks! Thanks for following along.
