WHY I CRUISING
The Coronation Street star and I’m A Celebrity... runner-up on his love of cruise holidays
MY WIFE Nichola and I went on our first cruise in 2016, from Barcelona around the Med, and we absolutely loved it. Waking up somewhere different most mornings, and not knowing what our view was going to be was amazing.
Since then, we’ve been on four more cruises – around the Caribbean and around the UAE from Dubai – all with MSC Cruises. We had another two booked for this year, which we haven’t been able to go on because of Covid-19, so we’ve transferred them to next year, and are really looking forward to them.
Before our first trip, we thought cruising was just for older people, and that you’d have to get suited and booted every night. But that’s not the case at all – you can wear black tie if you want to, but it’s not compulsory. Sometimes it’s fun to dress up and sometimes we keep it more casual, but we like that there’s a choice.
You get the best of both worlds on a cruise. You’re effectively on a floating hotel, with a different view daily, and new places to explore – so much better than staying in the same place for a week or two.
A typical day at sea would be to get up at 8am, grab some breakfast then relax on sunloungers or watch the kids – son Tom and daughter Hollie – in the pool until midday, when I make my way to the bar for a beer. Then we’d get some lunch from the outdoor buffet together – I absolutely love my food, so being able to choose from all the different options is great.
In the afternoon the kids go off to the water slides, and we relax by the pool enjoying the gorgeous weather.
We get back to the room at about 5.30pm, and then get ready for the evening. For our meal, we visit the main dining room, which has a different menu every night – if I can’t decide, I order more than one meal!
We tend to save the speciality restaurants for big occasions, such as birthdays. Our favourite is the Kaito Teppanyaki restaurant – the food is great, and it’s real experience watching them prepare the food in front of you.
It’s hard to pick my favourite cruise, but the New Year cruise on MSC Bellissima was pretty amazing. And my favourite destination was Cozumel in Mexico, because we found a really nice beach club there.
And in terms of my favourite ship, I would say that MSC Seaside and MSC Bellissima are both my favourites – the former has so much outdoor space when it comes to dining, but the latter has the Masters of the Sea pub, which does amazing fish and chips. It also has a high ropes course, which the kids loved.
A bit of advice I would give before someone goes on their first cruise would be to decide which is more important: the itinerary or what the ship has to offer.
The larger ships tend to have more entertainment on them, such as water slides and splash parks, which is good if you have children. But the smaller ships have some amazing itineraries. We were booked on
MSC Opera visiting places like Santorini and Mykonos, which the smaller ships can access.
Room choice is also key, so it’s important to look into the different options available. We like to get a balcony cabin, as we like to sit out of an evening for a cocktail. It’s so relaxing.
My favourite part of the ship has got to be the Yacht Club on MSC Seaside – it’s like a ship within a ship. The service is excellent: as I finished my drink and put it down, a waiter put a fresh one down for me! The breakfast menu was unreal, the Farmer Breakfast, which I had nearly every morning, included steak. The pool area in Yacht Club is much quieter too – we loved it.
Looking to the future, we would love to cruise around Asia, and my wife is desperate to go to French Polynesia – Bora Bora is on her bucket list. There are so many places we’d love to see!