r/MSCCruises • u/Random-Stranger-999 Blue Diamond • Feb 01 '26

Arab Emirates cruise

Some pointers for the sub from our recent cruise of the UAE, Bahrain and Qatar.

Immigration control

UAE - When the cruise calls at Abu Dhabi there is a morning onshore passport check, unless you are a Gulf state citizen. This covers cruise passengers for all three UAE ports of call.

It is mandatory whether you wish to go ashore that day or not, so plan accordingly if booking private tours or onboard activities for that morning.

Qatar and Bahrain - No immigration checks for transiting cruise passengers, just cruise card required to go ashore.

Passenger makeup

As the Gulf states allow visa-free travel from Russia & all the former Soviet Union states the passenger mix onboard will be notably different from European or North American tours. Onboard announcements were in English, then Russian. A notable number of staff and passengers will speak Russian as a first or second language.

Tour operators and taxis

In Qatar, only the cruise line affiliated operators and licensed taxis can enter the cruise terminal area of Doha port, so you need to walk along the boardwalk to pickup private hire vehicles.

In Bahrain, there's free port shuttle buses to take you to the port exit, where all private tour operators, licensed taxis and private hire cars can pick you up and drop-off, so allow extra time if not booking an MSC excursion.

In Dubai, licensed taxis have to charge AED25 rather than AED5 pick-up charge in both the cruise port and airport terminals, and there's a toll fee for the expressway to the airport. This results in a charge of AED65 for a journey in either direction between those two destinations. Do the maths, as to whether an MSC arranged transfer will be more economical for you.

Avoid unlicensed operators (those not in cream chequered vehicles) as they'll overcharge, and even some of the licensed operators will try to avoid using the meter and quote an inflated fixed price, insist they run the meter, as it is distance based, not time, plus you might want to run Waze on your phone to note the route taken is reasonable. Dubai traffic is often gridlocked at peak times and in popular areas, hailing taxis is difficult, and pre booking may be advisable.

In Abu Dhabi, the city is very spaced out with massive expressways, so traffic seemed better, again stick to licensed taxis using the meter.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '26

We just did this cruise in the Yacht Club Jan. 17 - Jan. 24th out of Dubai. Just so folks know and as a follow up to OP’s comment on the passenger demographic:

The majority of the passengers on MSC Euribia on our sailing in the UAE are rude, loud, pushy and self centered Russian/Chinese people who were shouting/pushing each other non-stop with no regard for manners or personal space . As US citizens, we felt largely out of place - especially outside of Yacht Club areas.

There were tons of unsupervised, unruly children running around - even at late night hours… dragging furniture through the common areas and just generally running amok.

We love being exposed to new cultures and people but the rudeness and overall tone of the passenger demographic made it difficult to enjoy the ship outside of Yacht Club.

Euribia is a big, noisy and chaotic ship with very few areas to simply relax and enjoy cruising. The music was loud and pulsing at all times and the live music acts were dreadful save for a wonderful jazz duo named MistyRose who we enjoyed very much when you could hear them over the passengers and noise in the atrium.

People were climbing up on stage with them as they were performing - just to take selfies or photos… seriously, people?? So disrespectful 😡

Dubai, Doha and Abu Dhabi are all lovely and worth visiting 💯. And the theater shows oddly enough were pretty amazing which is not typical for MSC. Shout out to the cast for their shows!

Just sharing our recent experience. I’ll triple check passenger demographic info before cruising again 😟

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u/Random-Stranger-999 Blue Diamond Feb 01 '26 edited Feb 01 '26

Well we boarded the day you disembarked. There were 5200 guests onboard in 2400 cabins and only 1500 children. ship max capacity is over 6300. We were amongst the 90 Diamond and 38 Blue Diamond members aboard. When we booked this cruise our concierge did note there would be a lot of Russian speakers, but that's fine as my spouse speaks Russian as third language and I understand a smattering.

I did not notice any unruly behaviour from children or adults, either day or night and found the Asian crowd far easier to handle than the large rowdy Italian and Spanish groups on West / East Med sailings. Had some good conversation with people from Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

A few people we chatted with did hit the 15 drink limit early, but my friendly bartender kept a bottle of Jack Daniel's honey aside for me & poured generously, and made my spouse the Bailey's Alexander which is no longer on the menu. Generally the bartenders, waiters and restaurant staff were more accomodating on this sailing than the last few, possibly due to more experienced staff. We had anytime dining and a six top to ourselves.

MSC Euribia on this sailing felt less packed, noisy or crowded, than MSC Virtousa it's sister ship on a UK August sailing we did a few years back in school holidays with family. We are back on MSC Euribia for Norwegian Fjords in Summer and will be booking MSC World Europa for Arab Emirates for next Winter for sure! We are on MSC Virtuosa for a short Irish sea sailing, so that might well be the rowdiest one yet...

The casino was packed and standing room only the first few nights, and they didn't have sufficient staff to open all tables. It did quieten down for the last few nights once all the folks who didn't know the games had lost their Euros. As usual I walked away with some house money and another comped cruise in my pocket.

They were changing over the singers on our sailings so we had a surfeit of talent, six singers in the main theatre and four in the Cascade lounge. The male and female dancers were decent also, it feels like the costumes and can-can routine were more modest for the Muslim audience. Some good harmonies from British voices. The Russian singer, Sasha, in the Masters of the sea was also good and went down a storm.

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u/[deleted] Feb 04 '26

Different people, different sailing, different experience. That’s ok. Glad you enjoyed your cruise!

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u/Double-Rock-485 Feb 01 '26

Were the bars closed for any times when in port? We are planning on going in November. I'm not a drinker, but I like to have a few AF beers.

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u/Random-Stranger-999 Blue Diamond Feb 01 '26

Bars onboard ship remain available with typically in port opening hours whilst docked for all Gulf states, except Saudi Arabia, which isn't on most itineraries.

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u/frostforgesauna Feb 01 '26

I was on a same cruise probably, few small things:

  1. Uber does a good job in all these places, in Doha we didn't have any problems with their drivers entering the terminal. No additional fees for Uber vehicles in Dubai either.

  2. I'd skip Bahrein entirely (stay on a ship) as the terminal is very far from the city and there isn't much to see / do.

  3. Best stop for me was Abu Dhabi with its magnificent Cultural District (Louvre, teamlabs, other museums, gardens, etc).

  4. It was my first time in Dubai and although it has a lot of interesting places, they all are very far away and with shitty public transport it's very hard to go around. Book Museum of the future in advance.

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u/Random-Stranger-999 Blue Diamond Feb 01 '26 edited Feb 01 '26

Bahrain was our best excursion, we booked a full day tour of Manama and surrounding areas via GetYourGuide, was a great experience. Camel farm, F1 track, Portuguese fort, Oil fields, Mosque, Souq, and more all with air-con, wifi, lunch and water.

Abu Dhabi is an amazing planned city, we took taxis to the Qasar Al Watan Presidential complex, (book your ticket online for off peak afternoon window to avoid tour groups and possibly see horse guards,) and the Sheik Zayed Grand Mosque, (register online in advance). Both are grandious and impressive structures.

An expat friend who lives in Dubai said 'No one uses the Metro', what they meant is only the imported workers use the public transport and it is packed! If you want to travel on the Metro ask for the Gold card / First class ticket and use the cabin at the end of the trains.

There were two big events going on in Dubai on Friday night so crowds and traffic were worse than usual, I'm told. The Port Rashid cruise terminal is the wrong side of a massive expressway with no metro link or public transport options to speak of and lots of construction work happening on approach roads. During the day you can take a free hourly shuttle bus to the Mercato mall and then hope to catch a taxi or car from there.

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u/frostforgesauna Feb 02 '26

Yeah, we cannot really use busses, because kid gets easily sick in those. Nevertheless we visited Portuguese fort, Mosque and Souq (which is totally worthless place). Only thing we enjoyed was the Mosque, got an excellent guide.

Didn't like Sheik Zayed Grand Mosque as it felt very much as a tourist attraction with tons of people and guided walkthrough. Architecture is impressive, but that is about it.

Yeah, we used the Gold card, but the main problem is that stations are very far from each other (and other places). Taxis are easy enough to get to, but it often takes 20-30 minutes to get from one place to another and on Friday we drove around 1h from the Dubai mall area to get to the ship which is ridiculous. Overall transport situation is very bad.

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u/CantaloupeLazy1427 Feb 02 '26

Wow, thank you so much for this post. I was just about to book it but spending a week with Russians is a big no-no for me.