cgolf1

If you don't like Celebrity prices, don't look at Disney, they are really high right now and have been since we quit sailing with them.

Having sailed Disney a lot, we saw a lot of parents with the I paid $$$$ for this cruise, I can do what I want and the rules don't apply. Really no different than the chair hog or shorts to supper mindset.

I want to believe that because the In-laws also had a tremendous cruise on the Constellation as well and booked another Celebrity cruise, but many reviews and comments I see here and elsewhere aren't all that positive. Other locations are to the point that I posted the food stuff there, I was middle of the road on, but I didn't even bother posting about the great time we had on our Panama Canal cruise.

Wow you guys can't catch a break on this trip. Our Edge trip last month, all of the staff was amazing, perhaps we just got lucky.

I honestly don't remember but just looked it up and kids needed to be toilet trained to enter the pools and hot tubs. Swim diapers only allowed in splash areas. Was it enforced well, I don't remember as our last Disney cruise was 2016. That said we did see their kids pool close a few times for a cleaning so I would guess some parents didn't follow the rules lol.

Rude people aside, I guess we have sailed Disney so much we are pretty much used to it. I will say though that the the times that they chose were at least at a non peak time where many would be getting ready for dinner or a show. It could be worse and they could have allowed it during peak times during the middle of the day. I do agree with everyone though that it should be adult only, but unfortunately like Disney, all cruise lines are hesitant to enforce their own policies, so the guests get away with it. Also the entitlement on cruises can be at an all time high which also leads to altercations and guests constantly ignoring the rules.

Actually I think it does. I have seen a cruise we have been looking at for a while jump up in down in price for an inside room by as much as 200 bucks total end price depending on the day while the same sale is going on. The good news for us that we sail insides we don't have to false book to see the price as they already show the lowest price for us when investigating the cruises during the date range we choose.

This was one thing the third person we talked to said, that they provide this, emergency service he called it, if anything happens with the flights that the airlines as a general rule don't do for you. We have never used a travel agent for flights, so maybe this was services that they provided in the past. Our cruise travel agent is mostly just for the extra OBC as they really don't do a lot for us anymore. When we sailed Disney though, I will say our agent did a lot for us when booking in an early window when new cruises were released. Celebrity we book our own and just have them transferred.

The only reason we are using them is due to the 1500 airline credit we were given for the trip by Celebrity, but needed to use FBC. My wife priced out the exact flight before we called FBC and they said that us looking at the flight drove the price they were seeing up because we looked at a flight. So after we had called a second time, each of us once, she found the same cheaper price as before that they couldn't see. The second person also said us looking drove the price up and there view is real time, similar to the first person. The third time I called and asked why did they say us looking changed the price, but after they quoted higher we still found the same lower price. That was when they stated that they are 3rd party and we can't use the airlines site for price information. So we really got 3 answers and I am guessing the last is closer to the truth but who knows. The last person also said that the FBC website might not be accurate either as it doesn't update real time. So they didn't have an answer to how do we figure out when to call to get the lower price. That said thanks to the credit our flights are only costing us 388 bucks, so it could be worse.

So we are booking our fights using flights by Celebrity for a Galapagos trip and getting an education today. So we found the flights on the airline website to be a total of 100 dollars per person cheaper. When we call flights by Celebrity the price is either more expensive or that they can't find the same set of flights. The gave us an option to save 43 dollars per person but only gives us a 40 minute layover which could be shrunk for many reasons during the winter and having flown thru Phoenix many years ago, we know some airports have long paths to get to a connecting flight. The airport with the short layover is new to us. What they told me was basically the charge extra to service the flight and guarantee getting us there if there are any flight issues and the fact that they defer payment. If we look at the airlines site that isn't the price we get from them. I will say if we didn't have the large flight credit this isn't the way we would go. Is this what others have encountered? Hopefully it all makes sense as I am a bit baffled.

I hope you do realize that materials to make batteries need to be mined, etc. There is a real problem without a lot of sustainable answers. If you are curious look up how they discard wind turbine blades. On the ship recently the captain talked of a few different options for much cleaner burning fuels. There would never be a nuclear powered cruise ship, but that would be very clean.

For us Celebrity is the first choice and we will look at certain Royal ships. Inside room prices on Celebrity are still really good deals so price isn't an issue for us. For a potential birthday cruise this year though, I did also price out MSC, Carnival's new ships, Princess, and Holland. If we don't do Royal or Celebrity we might try MSC for their crazy low price point. Cost matters a little this year since 2024 is a Galapagos cruise which isn't cheap.

I don't understand the fascination with cruise ship lobster. Its always just ok at best. Across three lines I think of it as being similar to the quality of grocery store sushi roles. Its not horrible, but I am glad I am not paying for the lobster and its my second main dish.

So other than the first night just ask for the next nights menu when you are being seated. Then do the preorder and have them link it to your room number. The theory is that regardless of the dining room you are in the next night they should be able to get your preorder based on your room number. I never ended up testing that though. It is important though to ask for the next nights menu when arriving. The servers are busy and relying on them to get the menu caused a delay to leave the dining room. Having the menu right away I did my preorder when my wife ordered her dish for that night. Ordering the night of can be done, but one or more nights on the section of the menu that changes every night none of those were gluten free, and needed to be modified. Not sure if they can handle the on a real time order. The E class gluten free food is wonderful, but the 4 dining rooms do make it more of a challenge than the more traditional ships. This is one case preordering in the app would be useful.

Since we had a late flight we did the airboat ride. This was done at the home of the gator boys, a show that we used to watch. The airboat ride was a lot of fun, but very loud, and we saw at least 5 gators. We had done a different one in the past and only saw 1 gator. The show though was a bit disappointing. One of the gator boys did the show I will be kind didn't impress us. I would be curious if anyone else had a similar opinion. Overall though it was a fun way to pass the time before our flight. Thanks for following along:)

So this cruise, I think the review says most of it. Yes there are some changes, but Celebrity is still our goto line as it fits the way we cruise and like to spend time on a ship. The food and service are top notch and in my opinion it isn't close. Also how they handle gluten free, especially in the buffet, is a huge win for me. We still really like the edge, but we did move our 2025 cruise to try an S class ship instead of the Beyond. In 2024 we are on the expedition to cross the Galapagos off our bucket list. That said our birthday cruise if it happens is either on the Reflection or the Adventure of the Seas which is a Royal ship that we just loved the design of, especially the 2 deck mini golf course. Time will tell if that happens. One note for all. For the excursions, we showed up in the theatre for the Bonaire excursion at the proper time and they gave my wife the stickers. 10 minutes in they said they had already called our number plus a new one. Thankfully they had waited for us, but they didn't tell my wife they had already called our number when she go the stickers. Moral of the story is get there early because the next days excursion was called before the meeting time, but we got there plenty early this time.

The theatre show was feel the funk and now we really felt like we were on the Edge of old. All 4 of the singers sang incredibly. The harmonies were spot on, and nobody tried to sing over anyone, it was amazing!!!! Great show and great job by the cast. We swam earlier in the day so we went back to Eden to listen to Johnny again and play some cads, two nights in a row. It was a perfect way to end the last night with awesome music the full night!

Supper I had the escargot/bread dip again and the Cypriot short ribs. Both were excellent and we are so glad that we settled on Cyprus with our serving team and hostess:) My wife had the Hot melted cheese Saganaki, she just really enjoyed this, and the vegtable wellington, which she also enjoyed.

Day 11 at sea Happy sad day in that you have to start to pack and start to think about home, well for a small amount of time that is. We did go to the life on a cruise presentation with Giuseppe and it was really good. We also wen to see 10 simple ways to find happiness with Giuseppe. I do want to say that before the happiness presentation he rocketed to the top of my favorite cruise directors, very short list because I generally only remember the bad ones. He is very funny and always seemed very happy. With the 10 simple ways presentation, we learned a lot about him and he is a very well rounded and just seems to be a genuinely good guy. The 10 simple ways presentation made me think a little because I definitely have a few rough spots I have needed to iron out for like forever now.

After supper Uptown put on another excellent performance. We swam a bit and then we went to Eden to play cards and Johnny was playing again, so we were excited about that. He didn't disappoint and my notes say he was awesome again:)

Supper I had the creamy smoked tomato bisque, this was insanely good with the smoky aroma, and the slow roasted leg of lamb, also excellent, and the broiled lobster tail. The lobster tail was as predicted but good as a second to the lamb. My wife had the double baked blue cheese soufflé, really liked it, and the grilled chicken breast. Unfortunately this was very dry and overcooked, but 1 not so great dish is ok.

Day 10 At Sea Today was a big day as we did our rescheduled behind the scenes tour. First we did the beyond the podium on americats that was really good. A little before noon, the captain came over the loudspeakers to announce that Covid was around the ship and KN95 masks were available at guest relations. This didn't surprise us at all. At times we did where a mask, depending on the situation and the proximity of people that were coughing. The behind the scenes tour was amazing, especially the engineering section. They didn't show us the bridge wing, or the ER, expected with the Covid numbers. I would highly recommend this and the food storage and the crew spaces were really interesting.

Supper I did the Steak Tartare and traditional Moroccan Spiced Ahi Tuna Steak and my wife had the Hot melted cheese Saganaki and the roasted chicken breast. Definitely a good meal tonight. After the dinner we went to the show. The main act was replaced due to a family emergency by someone that mimics singers voices. She started out singing a song and it was amazing and then for us it went sideways and she started talking during the song, and then jumping around to different voices. If she would have done 1 song in one voice and then the next in another we would have stuck around. Perhaps she did that eventually, but it was such an odd start that we along with a few others didn't stay. We ended up swimming in the outdoor pool which was really warm and playing cards in Eden. It is so awesome to be able to use Eden this trip.

Now there have been more and more people that have been coughing and as best we can we try to avoid sitting near these people knowing that we soon had to go back to work soon. Well my wife went to sit in the solarium and someone had a really nasty cough and the person sitting next to them commented about their cough to them. The person said that their spouse had tested positive, and they tested negative at the same time. They followed up if they had tested again and they said no because they only brought two tests and that their significant other was up sitting out on an open deck. The person told them they should get tested and everyone in the area that overheard this vacated the area very quickly. Overall I wasn't surprised and it is too bad that this happened. hopefully the husband and wife are doing fine now and hopefully nobody got sick from it. This will tie into tomorrows post though. I don't know what the right answer is to this but you don't want to see a lot of people get sick on a cruise.

Day 9 Colombia This was a surprise port for us. While we never left the port area, the wildlife display they have is worth getting off the ship for. The parrots especially are really cool The do a little show and when it finished the walk back a group of flamingos to the area they stay. Well they almost ran me over. The picture was a little late because my wife had to prod me to take the picture. I was too shocked initially to get a picture. The gift shop also had good prices as well on some stuff. I got a nice hat for under 10 bucks.