MSC Musica heads home after triumphant South African cruise season

MSC Musica has ended her 2018/19 South African cruise season on a high note, departing for Europe on Saturday after spending five months sailing from Durban and Cape Town on roundtrip itineraries catering to the SA cruising public.

MSC Musica carried more than 117,000 passengers on 46 cruises from Durban and Cape Town to Portuguese Island, Pomene Bay, Maputo, Walvis Bay, and (on her New Year cruise) La Possession, Reunion and Port Louis, Mauritius. It was her first ever visit to the country.

RELATED: MSC Cruises adds new cruise destination for Musica’s Durban season

RELATED: MSC Cruises confident Musica class will be South Africa’s “new darling”

MSC Musica replaced MSC Sinfonia, and will herself be replaced for the coming cruise season between November, 2019 and March, 2020, with sister ship MSC Orchestra. Her season got off to a good start, with passengers reporting a vastly improved embarkation process in Durban.

Others marveled at her sheer size and the vast number of features and attractions on-board.

“She brought more to our South African passengers than the Sinfonia; more space, more balcony cabins, more swimming pools, more restaurants (there’s even a sushi restaurant), more bars and designer venues,” said MSC Cruises South Africa in a statement.

And on social media South African cruise passengers trolled everyone on shore with all the fun they were having.

RELATED: Durban-bound MSC Orchestra collides with MSC Poesia in Buenos Aires

RELATED: SA has potential for more than 1-million cruise tourists by 2025 says new report

Even when MSC Musica got stuck outside Cape Town harbor for two nights in January due to high winds, spirits on-board remained upbeat, with passengers on-board ‘complaining’ about the extra two days they’d head at sea free of charge.

Now she’s heading home for the Mediterranean to begin a summer season of 7-night roundtrip cruises from Venice and Athens.

MSC Musica will call at seven ports on her 24-night northbound voyage to Venice, starting with the island of Reunion after four days at sea on the run from Durban. She’ll then visit Mauritius, and will spend a night in port in the Seychelles before spending a full nine nights at sea en-route for Aqaba and the ruins of Petra.

It’s then a quick day transit of the Suez Canal before arriving in Katakolon, Greece (the birthplace of the Olympic Games) and visits to Montenegro and Croatia before disembarkation in Venice.