The beautiful Virtuosa cruise ship and MSC’s newest arrival the Euribia, both pack a punch when it comes to fun family-friendly onboard activities. These action packed cruise ships make a perfect choice for family voyages, or a top contender for the grown-ups who simply enjoy having a little extra fun whilst cruising.
Not only do these two mega-cruise ships come with all the usual activities you’d find on a more traditional cruise, like theatres, swimming pools and hot tubs for example. But the MSC Virtuosa and its newer sistership Euribia are kitted out with loads of additional family-friendly onboard entertainment. Some of which are free to do, or included in your cruise fare (depending on whichever way you prefer to look at these things!)
With that said. Here’s my list of fun things to do whilst onboard either of these ships. You’ll soon understand why these sparkly, but family friendly MSC cruise ships make such a great choice for family holidays.
In this article...
Take a ride on the 4D Cinema
The 4D cinema which you’ll find on both of these cruise ships are brilliant fun. It will have you giggling (or screaming) throughout the entire time that you’re buckled into this jolty onboard cinema ride.
They have a choice of 4 films to pick from, one of which is a slightly scarier and not suitable for children under 12 years old. I’m not sure how often the film selection gets switched out? But it was a whole new selection to what we had on the Northern Pearls cruise.
You’ll be handed some 3D glasses to wear (which you give back afterwards), and then you can head into the dimly-lit cinema room, and buckle into one of the 8 vibrant yellow seats.
The seats don’t actually move all that much. But when the movement is combined with the synchronised movie on the screen, you really do feel like you are falling at certain parts. Theres air-jets which blow in your face at all the right moments too, which help to make things extra convincing.
Located beside your seat, you each have a plastic gun which looks a little more like a megaphone or something you would see on The Jetsons. You’ll get a short video clip at the beginning, which gives you a minute or so of target practice before the actual ride will begin.
We did ‘Lost Bandito’s’ and ‘Carnival’, of which the first was our favourite. Carnival was ever-so-slightly creepier, (involving clowns and fairground rides) but I found it was just a little too fast paced and bumpy for my eyes to keep up and process what was happening at times!
Each ride lasts around 5 minutes, but because so much happens during that time, they feel like they last a decent amount of time. At the end of the ride, it will show everyone’s final scores on the screen. If you do really well, you might make it on to the ‘Player of the Day’ or ‘Player of the Week’ leader board. Which is displayed on a TV screen outside the cinema room. James actually made it onto Player of the Day once!
As for pricing, the 4D cinema costs £10 per adult or £7 per child. We had bought the fun pass, so this charge was deducted from that. I’ll explain more about the fun pass later.
We all had so much fun on this ride, and its a great family friendly activity to have one these MSC cruise ships.
On a side note, the best 4D cinema I’ve ever done is Fly Over Iceland in Reykjavik when we did our Iceland ring road trip. So if your cruise is taking you to Iceland, I recommend heading there!
Conquer the Himalayan high ropes course
This is such a fun and unique family-friendly activity to have onboard a cruise ship. I’ve not seen many ships that come with it’s own high-ropes course strung across the top deck!
In order to take on this wobbly high-ropes challenge, you’ll first need to sign your life away on a waiver form. Once signed, they will give you a wrist band to wear which will give you unlimited access to the course.
A member of staff will be on deck ready to get you harnessed up, and then another staff member will clip you onto the high-ropes course. Once you’re all clipped on and secured, you’ll be able to head up the stairs to the first podium.
From each podium there are a choice of two obstacles which run side by side. One of which is generally a little easier than the other, and you can switch and change which side you pick at every podium.
As you’re always clipped in to the metal frame above you, you don’t need to worry about unclipping and re-attaching to change sides. Simply pull your cable along the framework to the side you want to do.
Although the high-ropes course doesn’t look overly high from the deck, it feels higher when you’re up here. Especially in certain places, like when you can see the drop over the edge of the ship all the way down to the sea! The obstacles were a lot of fun, and my youngest was zooming his way around the course.
It was quite breezy up here when I did this course in September. Probably because you’re fully exposed when you’re stood at the very top of the cruise ship! If its not the best weather, I recommend bringing a jumper as we were a bit chilly.
For health and safety reasons, you’re not allowed to take phones up with you. Just in case you accidentally drop it, and it conks someone on the head in the splash pool below. If you have a phone in your pocket, you’ll have to leave them in an open crate on the deck. We didn’t fancy just putting our phones in a big open box, as anyone could have walked past and grabbed them. So James ended up sitting the high-ropes course out and looked after our phones for us. So, if you all plan on doing this cruise ship high ropes course together as a family. I recommend leaving your phones locked away in your cabin’s safe.
The Himalayan course isn’t open all the time, so you’ll need to check times when you’re onboard. It also depends on the weather as it obviously needs to be safe.
As for charges, this family friendly activity is included in your cruise fare which is brilliant!
Cool down in the splash pool
Splash pools are always a brilliant idea when it comes to entertaining younger children, and the one onboard both of these family-friendly MSC cruise ships makes no exception.
Children can have a fun time splashing about and it gives them the perfect place to cool down on a hot sunny day crossing the sea on route to your next port-of-call.
Both the Savannah (Virtuosa) and the Coral Reef (Euribia) splash pools are really impressive. They have lots of powerful water jets to steer and play with. Plus there’s plenty of different tipping buckets including one huge one that makes an almighty splash! The Coral Reef is far more colourful in comparison to the greens and yellows of the Savannah waterpark, but the activities are very similar.
These onboard splash pools are ideal for a mix of ages, from little tots to older children. My boys (age 9 & 10) were having great fun in here. There were teenagers getting involved too, who seemed to enjoy standing beneath the ginormous tipping bucket ready to get completely drenched.
To play in the splash pool area, you’ll need to sign a wavier form. It’s the same one I mentioned above in order to do the Himalayan high ropes course. So if you’ve already signed, and got your wrist band on, then you’re good to go.
The shallow pool was heated too, which was lovely and warm as the wind was pretty chilly at the end of September.
Sun beds are dotted around this deck too, so you can grab a lounger and have a nice family time playing in the splash pools together.
Make a splash at one of the largest water parks at sea
Both of these family-friendly cruise ships have one of the largest waterparks at sea! Merged with the splash pool, the aquapark’s have three epic water slides for kids and adults to enjoy.
Once again, you’ll need to have signed the waiver form and be wearing your wrist band to go down the slides, and there is an additional height and age limit here too. Children will need to be 7+ years old for all of the waterpark slides, and be at least 107cm tall for the tube slides or 122cm tall for the bowl slide.
The two tube slides run side by side, so you can have a lot of fun racing your family and friends to the bottom. Plus there is the option of going in either single or double inflatable rings, enabling our entire family of 4 to race at the same time! We, found the one on the right hand side to be our favourite. It felt faster in the corners, but the other one was a great laugh too.
As for the bowl slide, there is no need for a rubber ring which means the queue is usually shorter. This slide can hurt your back a little bit and make it go red, but that didn’t stop anyone from going again.
All the waterslides are included in your cruise fare, so we made great use of this water park during our family cruise. The waterslides use salty sea water, but are heated which was greatly appreciated when cruising during the shoulder season. Even when we spent Christmas onboard the Euribia, these waterslides were still running and people were going down them whilst wrapped up in wet suits!
The water park is open at different times of the day, and seemed to close around 5pm. I would check this when you’re onboard your cruise though, as this could differ.
Play games at the Sportplex
If you’re looking for a family-friendly cruise ship that’s got an indoor football pitch, then look no further the the MSC Euribia or Virtuosa!
They both have a Sportplex court which can be used for either football or basketball, and comes with football goals or basketball nets.
Zorb-football was another fun option. However this was organised through kids-club and you needed to be 12 years old to join in. My boys weren’t quite old enough, but they loved playing lots of football in here with other children that were on holiday.
Balls are only put in here at certain times, so if you want to be able to play whenever. Then it might be worth considering bringing your own football on holiday with you. One of the kids had even packed his own goalie gloves.
Controlling the ball is made extra fun when you’re crossing through a rough patch of sea. However we didn’t feel any movement when our children were in here playing football on our way back from Cherbourg to Southampton.
Any football or sport enthusiasts will be excited to have an all weather-indoor pitch to play on. Making both these ships top contenders when shortlisting a family-friendly cruise ship.
Have a game of bowling whilst cruising at sea!
Another firm family-favourite activity is to have a game of bowling at the full length bowling alley onboard!
We all know it’s cheating if you have the guards up when bowling, but is that still the case if bowling whilst cruising?! Especially if the ship is gently swaying.
As there are only two lanes, you’ll need to book a time-slot to play a game. I recommend arranging this early on as it soon gets fully booked.
Bowling is chargeable (or can be deducted from your fun pass credit) and when we were onboard it cost €25 for 30 minutes or €45 for one hour.
If you’re wearing trainers you’ll be able to keep them on. But if you’re in open toes or heels, you’ll need to strut your stuff is some of their traditional looking bowling shoes instead.
Drive the formula one simulator
Now this is something new that you won’t get to experience on other cruise lines, and that is getting behind the wheel and driving an F1 race car!
This formula one race car simulator, is supposed to feel very realistic with a stiff ride and hard steering. Which could make it a little too tricky for younger children.
Because of that, there is an age limit to go on this ride, and even then you do still see some parents trying to help from the side-lines. But teens and pre-teens will love the thrill of feeling like a race-car driver.
A go on this simulator will set you back €12, or this charge can be deducted from your fun pass credit.
Enter a different world at the VR experience
The VR experience on the MSC cruise ship was a holiday highlight for our two boys.
This game has the option to do single or double play and there’s a big selection of games to pick from. Meaning you could have go on this virtual reality game many times without it getting boring.
The boys chose to do the ghostbusters game and they said it was brilliant. On-viewers can see what the VR gamers are seeing, as it’s displayed on the tv screens above them. It’s also pretty funny to be a spectator for this one. Especially when they really get into it!
Get more for your money with an MSC fun pass
If you’re cruising with children then I highly recommend you prebook a MSC fun pass before you cruise. If you buy a fun pass before you set sail, you can get almost double your moneys worth!
We paid £70 for one fun pass prior to boarding, which got converted into €140 worth of credit. Meaning you and your children will get to enjoy way more rides and arcade games when you’re onboard.
Depending on how much money you want to spend. You can either buy everyone a fun pass, or just buy one and then select which cruise card you would like the credit to be linked to.
We linked the fun pass to James’s card, and they stuck a ‘fun pass’ sticker on it for us to save any confusion. Then we just had to make sure we showed his card whenever booking or paying for any games.
If you use the wrong cruise card, that charge will be added to your account and need to be settled once your holiday is over. So to avoid any nasty surprises, make sure you use the card that’s linked to the fun pass!
Conclusion
As you can see, the MSC Virtuosa and MSC Euribia are both family-friendly cruise ships, with a great selection of onboard entertainment to keep you busy whilst at sea.
They have loads more onboard too, like arcade games, swimming pools, shows and kids clubs. Plus on Virtuosa you’ll find the robot bartender too!
These MSC cruise ships are well equipped for families, and understand how all these extra onboard activities are perfect to keep children happy whilst sailing. Some of their other ships having additional things like zip lines and dry slides. You’ll find the viper slide on MSC World Europa which I would love to go on one day, and the new MSC World America looks fantastic too.
If you’re interested in seeing more about each of these cruise ships, and discovering the slight differences between these two sisterships, I have full reviews on both. Head over to this article to learn more about the MSC Euribia, or head to this post to explore the MSC Virtuosa.
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2 comments
The included activities like the waterpark and Himalayan high ropes look like great fun, and the deal for the Fun Pass definitely seems worth it in order to experience the arcade, VR, 4D cinema, bowling and race simulator. Do you have any recommendations as to what the best activity was with the Fun Pass? Also was you easily able to make full use of it and use the entire 140 credit?
These ships aren’t short of fun, thats for sure! I would say the 4D cinema was a favourite for all of us, and the credit worked out great for this 3 day cruise. The last €10 or so was used up on the cheaper arcade games, so none got wasted. 1 fun pass shared between the 4 of us was more than enough for this trip and worked out great value for money.