MSC BELLISSIMA is 171,598 gross tons, and can take a total number of 5,686 guests, with 1,564 crew members, 32 lifts, 4 pools and 19 decks. She has private passenger facilities in the MSC Yacht Club forward, on decks 16, 18 and 19. I had been allocated cabin 13324, an inside single aft port side, and it took a day to work out how to negotiate easily all the alleyways/corridors and turns needed to reach a landing with stairs and lifts. There were several 'dead-ends' on the route, which didn't help. On the way I noticed a large poster picture of the MSC ship I had previously sailed on - MELODY - which evoked a few memories, none of them good, so this new ship should be wonderful.
We had lunch in the Market Place restaurant and enjoyed walking around part of the ship, before preparing for Lifeboat drill and then Sailaway at 5 p.m. That was enjoyable as we sailed out of Genoa, with a big fire boat ahead of us sending spray high into the air before falling onto many of us passengers on deck. It hid the sight of some of the ferries on our port side now and again but as we turned and headed towards the harbour entrance I could see a good array of familiar ferries and take photographs.
To be continued...