bandp407

3 hours ago, Lunastella said:

 

Hi Sgmn,

I also took advantage of the fresh coffee in the Spa cafe- every day right after the gym it was my first stop! I think Eden, followed by Le Yoyage, and then Fine Cut would be my order of preference for the specality restaurants. 

 

 

Thanks Reel Love. Welcome along!

 

 

 

Thanks Lastdance, there will be more...thanks for following along. I hope my commentary and photos are useful. I realise that 2 people may have very different experiences even on the same cruise depending on what you like/don't like, but I really enjoyed Beyond. There were way more positives on this cruise than my previous ones. 

 

 

Jealous! Can I go again!

You are so funny! Amazing review - one of the best! I am sorry , at first I did not realize your cruise was over! Got so excited to read on! Looking forward to the rest! 

Following - we sail on her end of November in a Sunset Veranda , deck 9. Have a fabulous time!!

12 minutes ago, BennyBrun said:

Thank you so much!  Symphony is a great ship and my favorite Oasis Class ship and yes I have been on the Wonder and I still prefer Symphony 😂.

 

The drink package is very costly right now so I go with my Diamond coupons.  It covers any any drink up to $13.00 with no extra gratuity added.  If you go over that then you will pay the difference plus the gratuity on the difference.  It covers the basic wine selection, Kendall Jackson, Chandon, Robert Mondavi, Penfold nothing fancy.  If you go to Vintages that’s where you will find the pricier wine by the glass on my Oasis trip in May they didn’t have anything in stock for the fancier wine by the glass but last week they had pretty much everything on the menu ( the fancier wine).

 

There were two bands that rotates in the Music Hall at the beginning but then one of the band member had a medical emergency so they changed it slightly.  They were fantastic even without the singer.  BTW the captain said he was stable and doing well.

 

Perhaps you will run into Waldo in September as I will be on the Symphony for two weeks!

Thank you soooo very much for your reply & answers to my questions Waldo!  You put a smile on my face hearing back from you AND your Preference for Symphony! Should we book early September, I will let you know. The weekend of the 23rd we go to NJ to visit family. Normally we book our cruises way out but given September is very iffy with hurricanes we are holding off and may wait until close to sailing. In the meantime stay well & enjoy your upcoming European cruise ! 

16 hours ago, Fuzzy55 said:

We got off the Equinox on Saturday. Went to the shows every night. All three production shows were fantastic. Three different solo acts. A super good comedian (go to the 9 pm show if you are okay with some adult jokes).  One female singer who I thought was just okay. And a really good male singer.  Captain Matt could do his own show. Be sure to attend his presentation on the Friday if you are doing the 6 night cruise.  Very funny and informative. Been with Celebrity since he was 19. He is now 42.

 

Appreciate your comments Fuzzy55  & it sounds like you had a terrific cruise!! Yes, we are doing the 6 night sailing as you did. Always  enjoy the Q & A with the Captains , so yes, we will certainly go see Captain Matt. Thank you again! 

Hi Benny~ Thank you so much for taking us along on your Oasis sailing. Great photos & fun comments! Brought back many wonderful memories. DH & I moved from NY 5 years ago & have sailed the Oasis class ships many times. . Symphony was Nov 30, 2019- our last before COVID shut everything down. We remember 6000 balloons dropped at midnight and all the wonderful music & shows! A cruise we will never forget! We are older, but love Dazzles, Boleros, Jazz on 4 & all of the amazing shows!! We sail Celebrity quite a bit also, especially post COVID. Actually sailing Sunday on the Equinox. As you are familiar- driving to the port is just great! 

if I may a few questions. We are thinking about a sailing on Symphony again perhaps in September. We are finally Diamond based on our Celebrity Elite status.  The drink package price is insane & we can’t believe the empty shelves!!! Apart from my husband having a Johnny Walker cocktail pre dinner, we mainly drink wine through the evening. With the 4 coupons (each) if a wine is over $13, can you pay the difference?? Are there decent wines in the $ 13 range ? Does this cover gratuities? 
 

I think Oasis changed Dazzles to the Music Hall? Do they still have the great bands there in the evenings? I believe Dazzles is still on Symphony . 
 

Thanks much Benny! Appreciate whatever else you can share! 
Paula

14 minutes ago, AC Stew said:

Just back from the June 26 sailing. I don't use the App. We enjoyed a full slate of entertainment, always pre-dinner music in the lounges and the atrium. I won't say that all were "fantastic" but there were certainly some standouts. The production cast were all really top rate! Even if you've seen the shows, see them again!

 

As for Covid, the perennially "chatty" Captain Matt made no mention of any cases. (But that doesn't mean that there was no Covid.) All crew were tested about 3 days in and none of our wait staff, cabin steward, butler, bartenders etc, had gone missing. The ship was booked at about 75% and crowds were getting close to pre-Covid levels. We're home now for 2 days and no coughing ... once again, I think that we've managed to escape the virus.

 

The ship looks great, you'll enjoy a wonderful sailing!

 

Thanks much AC Stew ! Appreciate your feedback - sounds like what we have grown accustomed to with Celebrity. As to the shows, we have noticed they have greatly improved . 
 

Glad to hear you are home for 2 days with no Covid symptoms! Hope that continues! We have been Covid free for 2 1/2 years , vaccinated & boosted , but you just don’t know these days. It’s a risk we take to cruise. Like you, we are fortunate that we drive to the port & don’t have the added stress and exposure with flying . Stay well! 

10 hours ago, phoenix_dream said:

A version of this has been the case on our last several cruises recently. The app was missing much of the entertainment, some was added mid-cruise, and some changed during the sailing 

I won’t be paying much attention to the app going forward,  other than for check-in!  I’ve always been spot on knowing the Chic nights & Lobster nights in the dining room without the app. Should have done the same for this cruise & would still have Murano ! Not a big deal in the scheme of it all! 

11 hours ago, Ella2 said:

PLEASE don't worry!  The same thing happened with my June 18 Equinox sailing.  EVERYTHING changed multiple times and then NOTHING showed up right before the cruise.

 

The REAL cruise entertainment experience...was AMAZING!  

 

You will have an AWESOME time!  Enjoy!

Ella2 - thank you so much for putting us at ease & all of your good wishes! Looking forward to another memorable cruise! 

2 minutes ago, jelayne said:

The entertainment isn’t particularly accurate until on board and then last minute changes don’t always show.

Thank you for clarifying!

22 minutes ago, Jim_Iain said:

To check a different ship -  Click on the icon of a head  and select the Teal Words Select a different Sailing -

 

At the bottom under your reservation -  choose Get more details on ships we support -  Select a ship and choose a sailing.

You are the best ! Thanks so much Jim!

1 hour ago, zitsky said:

The app stole my wallet once.  I’d agree not good to rely on only the app.  Lots of posts here about how unreliable it is.  Good to use it as a general guide.

Thank you - good advice. What I am seeing really does not make sense. 

1 hour ago, Jim_Iain said:

Why not look at the current cruise.   Often a week to two before the cruise they delete the place holders and populate with the "REAL" activities.  

 

It is not uncommon that things are messed up during a weekend escpecially a holiday weekend. 

 

 

Thank you Jim! I don’t often look at the app pre cruise, but did for this one & oh boy ! A lesson to be learned. I relied on it & lost a dinner reservation in Murano. Will see what we can do once onboard.

I don’t know how to check the shows & live music happenings for a cruise other than ours. I should just let this rest , finish packing & keep the excitement going! 
 

wish you & Iain a fabulous  & Covid free sailing on the Summit! 

On 7/2/2022 at 7:15 AM, terrydtx said:

I am following, we board the Reflection August 5th in a Sky Suite. We follow this cruise with 6 days in Florence and Venice before we board a14 day HAL Oosterdam cruise of Greece. This will be our last cruise with HAL, only booked it to use up FCC from canceled 2020 and 2021 cruises. We had 6 cruises canceled thanks to Covid on Viking, Celebrity, HAL and Oceania. Our Reflection cruise is the result of canceling an Oceania Baltic cruise when it looked like Russia was going to invade Ukraine in January. After our first-rate experience last year in a suite on the Equinox, we decide to book all future Ocean cruises with Celebrity.  We are traveling with my sister and her DH for this whole trip, they have never been to Italy, and this is our 4th trip there, so for Italy we get to be their tour guides.

 

Looking forward to reading about your Retreat experience on the Reflection.

Are you referring to the Retreat Sundeck? They have not made that exclusive to Suite Guests yet. We were on Reflection end of March & it was not Revolutionized. She goes into dry dock for 2 weeks in October. Perhaps then. 

23 minutes ago, cruisestitch said:

The app is not very trustworthy.

I truly hope you are right! 

DH & I sail next Sunday. I just went back into the App to check the latest on menus & entertainment. Well to our surprise it was TOTALLY different than 3 days ago!!!

There is no pre dinner live music - generally around 7:45, no combo late afternoon at the sunset bar, no bands at 10:00 in the Grand Foyer & other than late night comedy, NO SHOWS in the theatre ! Gen Maldonado is in the theatre 1 night & the activities team does the ABBA Mania on night 2. Silent Disco is taking over 3nights & Full Moon Pride Party is 2 nights. This sounds like a VERY different Celebrity Cruise experience than we are used to. Sailed on the Reflection in Nov & March and the music and shows were excellent. Previously sailed on the Equinox and she was amazing!  Should I not put faith in the Celebrity App? The Menus greatly changed from 3 days ago as well. We have gone from pre-cruise excitement to oh no! 
 

If anyone on board this week’s sailing can clarify any of this , it would be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance.

As stressful as this whole testing issue is, it is an even greater stress for those flying to the port. What a mess with all of the cancellations. Good Luck to everyone needing to fly !! 

I decided to put a call into the Captains Club . I waited on hold for 1 1/2 hours but wanted to vent & let Celebrity know what we are now faced with. The cost combined with the appointments only available 3 days out. Once the masks on planes & testing to enter the US ended, IMO, this testing should end as well. A few weeks ago a family sailing on the Equinox had a negative Covid test 2 days before & then started having symptoms the 1st night of the cruise. By Sunday morning , they all tested positive. 

I did learn something on the call to the Captains Club that I was not aware of. There is testing at the pier for a cost of $55 pp. If all else fails, we have another option. 
 

In health , Bon Voyage to us all!

18 hours ago, RobertoF said:

Quick clarification and update: when we made our Walgreens appointments it did not ask all of the questions about exposure, etc.  So we said the purpose of the test was for travel.  Perhaps if we had said we had exposure when we got there they would have done the test for free.  I don't know.  I just know they said we would have to pay for our tests when we showed up at 11:30am today.

 

The update part is we were able to get an afternoon appointment with CVS.  CVS also asked about exposure, symptoms, etc.  We truthfully said that we had been exposed recently to a family friend who tested positive yesterday, and also that we had recently been in a situation where social distancing was difficult (we just got off a different cruise on Monday).  So I guess with those answers we qualified for the free test.  We did the tests this afternoon.  CVS was very efficient and we just got back our negative results!  So off to Celebrity Equinox on Saturday.  Good luck to everyone getting tested.  I would suggest using CVS because Walgreens seems a bit disorganized right now.

Thanks for sharing Roberto. I learned about the Walgreens change this morning. We sail on the Equinox next Sunday. The 10th. CVS shows 2 different antigen tests, the immediate in store & the one within 2 hours. Which one did you do? Have a great cruise on the beautiful Equinox! 

2 hours ago, Silkroad said:

As Jim said, the Elite benefit is one bag per person. Though they’ll give you a second bag, we’ve simply used the same bag twice (unless it’s paper lol). Since our cruise vacations include land segments, our strategy is to stagger our laundry. For example, we may stuff our laundry in the bag on day 3 (using my name) and send off the bag again on day 9 (using DH’s name).

Thank you Silkroad. Appreciate you sharing. Typically we take 7 night cruises, but in 2023 we will take the big step ( for us) and do a B2B 19 day Reflection sailing in the Med. Then it will certainly be useful, aside from our delicate items. 

12 hours ago, Jim_Iain said:

 

The bag is per CC member.   So if both you and your spouse are Elie you get 1 bag each.     Prior to hitting Zenith we were never able to use all 4 bags.    All you have to do is ask for another bag.   Now we are Zenith and get Free Laundry they bring us a bag daily.

Thanks very much for clarifying Jim! 

20 minutes ago, Jim_Iain said:

Thanks for taking the time to LIve Post.   Really enjoying the post.

 

RE: Laundry -     If you are Elite (1 Bag PP)  or Elite Plus (2 Bags PP)  you will get one or two free bags per person.    If not usually around mid cruise they will have a special at about 49.95 for a bag of up to 30 items (most report they never count and as long as you get it in the bag they will do it. 

 

 

Hi Jim- i thought the laundry for Elite was 1 Bag per cabin. Is it really 1bag PP ? I looked at the Captains Club benefits and it states the 1 bag - doesn’t clarify if it is pp or per cabin. We recently became Elite & only used the service 1 time. They only leave 1 bag in the cabin.

Many thanks! 

Following- have a great cruise Serge102!

1 minute ago, CHEZMARYLOU said:

Keep the existing reservation and go to the Maitre D once on board to change the date/time.

 

I would have , but there is nothing available until 930. I got the last 830 slot. Thank you for the suggestion anyway. 

38 minutes ago, jelayne said:

Depending upon the ship either the cost in the cruise planner is 18% higher or if the previous cost ($50 for Murano) then at checkout 18% is added.

There is another active thread regarding this change.

Sorry - had not seen the active thread on this. 

I went to change a Morano reservation for a upcoming Equinox sailing in July. There is now an 18% gratuity being added. The new total is $118.00 for 2. I did speak with someone in the service department & she said this went into affect April 27th. 

JetBlue - you have done an amazing job through this ‘’ major interruption “ to what you  & David expected for your Crossing & your trip. We agree with many - you should have had a balcony cabin . Celebrity has always done the best in so many ways - what really happened here? . All of us on cruise critic obviously love our cruises & all of the planning that goes into them. We come home and count the days till the next one! Hopefully you have another cruise in the very near future. 

May you both be well soon! Sail on in good health!