SusieV

Oh- the Surf internet was pretty terrible. I could barely check email or send messages on Facebook messenger, and WhatsApp and other services didn't work without a VPN workaround. We upgraded our son's device to the Stream internet so that he could at least chat on Discord with his friends, but he complained about that being very slow. That was as good as it gets though. If you want at least somewhat useful internet, you will likely have to upgrade. Also, if you get bonus minutes for being Elite or higher, you have to use those Stream minutes first before logging into your Surf internet that's good for the whole cruise. Once you create the account and add the Surf internet, you can't get the free Stream minutes anymore, so it's not like you can save them for later in the cruise.

Confirmed from Solstice; masks no longer required as of Oct 1.

Please say hi to Paul and Nikola at World Class from Susan & Steven & Matthew! We miss them already!! Just my $0.02- we'd had four doses plus caught covid in May and we still caught this. My husband is mostly just exhausted but I can't stop coughing and I've lost my sense of smell. There is no way to avoid it onboard in my opinion even if you masked everywhere except eating, and I expect with the crew unmasking that it will spread there like wildfire because of the close quarters. I hope that you stay healthy during your cruise. They have a plain white background some days, but it's not the fun one for the casual pics. It's just like any other background. I would definitely buy more photos if they had the fun and varied options again- I'd even pay more. Photos are memories. The green screen means you see more pictures in your file, but most of them are identical; just swapped background. Not super useful. My husband asked for the originals so he could play with the background himself and they said they'd put them in, but they didn't.

The yellow flag means there is communicable disease onboard. We didn't have it flying during the first cruise. My husband did a snorkeling excursion through Celebrity with his mom in Cabo but I can't recommend it; he said they were baiting the fish and there wasn't very much to see. My son and I just went shopping and asked the locals where to find real Mexican tacos, not tourist stuff. We walked a long ways and found a hole in the wall called La Paisa where you sat on cheap plastic chairs and no one spoke English (definitely not a tourist trap) and he had the best tacos ever, according to him lol. We skipped Ensenada. In Puerta Vallarta we enjoyed watching the local glass artist make trinkets in port (very reasonable price and he'll make anything you want) and went to Walmart just so we could say we went to Walmart in Mexico lol. There is a free shuttle bus to the downtown shopping area, but you have to take a taxi back to the ship.

First, a little about us. These were my 14th & 15th Celebrity cruises- this is my favourite cruiseline! My husband and I are in our late 30s, and we were sailing with our 12 year old son, my parents, and my husband's mother. Our last Celebrity cruise was in 2017 since our 2020 was canceled because of covid-19, so it's been a few years, and we were interested to see what is new and what had changed. Precruise: We flew to Vancouver a day early and stayed at the Days Inn by Wyndham Vancouver Airport. They have a free shuttle pickup from the airport, and included continental breakfast. Also a plus, it's only a short walk from Costco (love those $1.50 hot dogs!). The hotel was adequate, nothing special. It's also quite far from the pier, but was very reasonably priced on Priceline. They offered a shuttle for $26pp but since we had a large party it wasn't economical for us. We took a taxi van to the pier and it cost about $60 plus $2/suitcase. Embarkation: This went pretty smoothly, although they definitely don't check what times you get for boarding. I guess they just hope people will stagger themselves as a result? There was a lot of walking between the different stations which wasn't too difficult for our party but I imagine that some people had trouble with it. Stateroom: We did have to change rooms between sailings. On the first leg we had cabin 6153, a standard 2B balcony, and on the second leg we had cabin 1200, a C1 aft balcony. The first week we had the layout of bed by the balcony, and the second leg we had the sitting area by the balcony. I never really thought it mattered, but going from one to the other- the room definitely looks more spacious with the bed by the balcony. I remember when I opened the door to cabin 1200 being surprised by how small it looked. That being said, the S class cabins are great for storage and we had no issues storing all our things even with being B2B cruisers and overpacking! Our stateroom attendant on the first leg, Wayan, was excellent. Everything we asked for was taken care of in a timely fashion. We ask for egg crate mattress pads on the bed, and this time an extra blanket since it was cold in Vancouver! We also asked for the minibar to emptied for our own use, and we sent laundry and dry cleaning out a few days with the Elite perks. The balcony furniture in 6153 was most definitely the worse for wear- the varnish was all rubbed off the wood and they looked pretty run down. That being said, they were perfectly fine to use and we spent quite a few mornings out there with room service breakfast. We hardly saw our stateroom attendant, Sinclair, on the second leg. Wayan had always seemed to be around when we came by, and he always had a smile for us. Sinclair introduced himself on the first day and after that he seemed invisible. However, our cabin was always clean and we had no issues with his service. We enjoyed the footstools on the CC balcony, but it was so hot and humid this week in Mexico that it was really unpleasant to sit outside even into the evening, so we didn't use our balcony as often as we would have liked to. Also my own fault- I thought that all the aft balconies were larger, so I was surprised to see that 1200 was only a standard size. We did enjoy the view of the wake nonetheless though. I will note that we did get black ash on our veranda on several days though, so I'd suggest having a look at the chairs before sitting down. We had some minor plumbing issues in both staterooms, but they weren't enough of a problem to mention to Guest Relations. In 6153, the water temperature didn't stay consistent; it would shift back and forth between cool and warm. When you set the temperature, you were picking the "warm" temp but that didn't stop it from occasionally flicking back to cool, and if you tried increasing it you'd get roasted when it went back to warm. We just made do. In 1200, the shower always started icy cold and then became hot. No adjustments really changed anything which was a disappointment for my husband who likes cool showers. Dining Room: I am happy to say that both the food and the service in the main dining room was excellent; much better than I remember it being on many of my previous cruises. We chose main dining at a table for six, since 4/6 of our travel party have severe allergies. We were given table 145 by the window which was great, and we requested to keep both the table and the waitstaff for both cruises. Our assistant maitre d', Gorica, was amazing. She visited us every night with the following night's menus so that the guests with allergies could pre order safely and have menu items modified to remove allergens if possible. She also made some special requests appear, and spent time entertaining our 12 year old. We would also see her working lunch in the Oceanview Cafe and if there were any questions about the food there, she was able to assist. Despite the varied allergies, we had no issues at all in the dining room with allergies. Our waitress, Dewi, made sure that we were happy with our meals. She didn't bat an eye when my bottomless pit son ordered 8 shrimp cocktails or 6 beef carpaccios, and on the nights where he didn't feel like coming to the dining room, she always offered to send him a meal. Most nights she sent more than I ordered him, which he was happy with! Our meals were generally served at appropriate temperatures (only a couple were cold, which is a great batting average), and generally were of good quality. While in the past we often did a lot of specialty dining, with the recent price increases, and the fact that we were really enjoying our MDR meals, we ate most nights in the dining room. Our assistant waiter, Jebbel, always had a smile for us and made sure our water glasses stayed full and that we had everything else we needed. Our sommelier, Madelyn, was wonderful. After the first night when we explained how we like to pair wine with our courses, we never saw the bottom of a wineglass unless we said we were finished. We had the premium package, and she always found us a good selection to pair with what we were eating. She also gave us recommendations to pick when we did go to specialty dining, since at that point she knew our tastes. Our bar waiter was Hero, who was in fact a hero when our sommelier was absent from the dining room the last two nights. He not only served drinks from the bar but tried to keep our section with wine, too. Obviously we couldn't get the sterling service Madelyn had been providing since he had much more work to do, but he definitely did his best and we appreciated it. After the first day he always had a Sprite waiting for my son and he made sure to check if he needed a second one partway through the meal. Specialty Dining: Over the two cruises, my husband and son ate at Sushi on Five twice for lunch, we did Tuscan Grille as a family, and Murano once for date night and once with our son. At Sushi on Five, the food was great, but the service was very slow. My husband had asked if they could order more food as they received it, kind of like an all you can eat place, and they didn't seem to understand that as they didn't check back for half an hour. The food was wonderful, much better than at local sushi places, but they would have appreciated being able to eat in a more timely fashion. The food and service at Tuscan Grille was excellent. I didn't realize that you now have to order the charcuterie, they don't just bring it for the table, but it's still available! Our family enjoyed everything there. The waiter made a point of telling us all to order as much as we liked, it was all included in the service charge. And of course, the steal of a deal is that Celebrity charges children 12 and under only $10 to dine in the specialty restaurants, so my son really got value for his money! The food at Murano was likewise as excellent as usual. My son had been anticipating his visit for several years since our 2020 cruise had been canceled, and he considers himself to be a foodie. He said it was the best meal he had ever eaten. They no longer bring out the cheese cart due to covid, but they do still serve a cheese course; you just tell them what kind of cheeses you would like. We had a service hiccup involving a celebratory bottle of champagne on our date night at Murano, but they did resolve the issue to our satisfaction. On both cruises, the specialty restaurants were completely booked up. The only night it was possible to get a discount was the first night 30% off. After that, it was difficult to get a reservation at all, let alone a discounted one. I would advise if you are looking to dine in the restaurants to either book in advance of the sailing or else see the specialty restaurant maitre d' on embarkation day to ensure you get the dates and times you are hoping for. Oceanview Café/Poolside Grill: The Oceanview Cafe has definitely gone downhill since our last cruise, which was disappointing. First off, the offerings available have been reduced, and since we like to snack at odd hours, we found this noticeable. In the past, the buffet was open until 1am and would have an assortment of snacks including various breads, meats, cheeses, fillings like egg and chicken salad etc. Now, after 9:15pm the only things available were pizza, basic salad bar, and the pasta station. If you're looking for a snack and don't want pizza, you're pretty much out of luck. Similarly after 3:30pm and before dinner opened at 6pm, there was very little. No more afternoon tea type offerings like sandwiches and scones and whatnot- just the late night items. Also, there didn't seem to be any dinner specials in the buffet. On previous cruises there had been a special station every night with a themed cuisine like Asian, Mediterranean, etc, but there was nothing like that this time. My son did enjoy that there was a nacho section on the buffet every day and he loved the cheese sauce and fresh toppings. For people who prefer to eat vegetarian/vegan, we did notice a much larger selection than on previous sailings. An entire part of a hot area was devoted to vegan food. Breakfast was pretty much the same every day, but there was a lot to choose from and we generally preferred to have breakfast at the buffet or from room service rather than from the dining room. There was a station that changed daily, and my son loved that on both disembarkation days, there were frosted donuts. At lunchtime we noticed that the cold meat/cheese station was reduced from previous sailings as well. There were the same sliced cheeses every day (provolone, Edam, Swiss, Monterey Jack) and generally only 1-2 deli meats to go with them. Nothing fancy like Brie anymore. Also, there is no more make your own sandwich area; instead they have premade sandwiches, 3 types per day, that they offer to grill for you but can't be customized. I know we don't go hungry on cruises, but I have to admit when I take a ham and cheese croissant, that I feel it to be a bit lacking when I open it and there is only one small slice of deli ham inside. I don't see why they'd get rid of the make-your-own stand to change to this when there must be more food wastage this way but I guess they have their reasons. I miss it though. The Poolside Grill was great as usual- they had turkey burgers and veggie burgers as well as their standard beef burgers and hot dogs. Room Service: The room service menu seems to get smaller every time we sail! That being said, we still enjoy it. We switched to room service for our evening snack since the buffet didn't have much. As long as you order before 11pm it is free; after 11pm there is a $4.95 service charge. They still seem to be honouring write-ins on the breakfast menu, which is nice. The breakfast menu in a standard cabin only has a few items on it. The Concierge breakfast menu the following week has many more options on it. Room service generally came hot and fresh, which was great. Bars: We love the World Class Bar on the S class, and this trip was no exception. Paul and Nikola are amazing bartenders, and we really enjoyed spending most evenings at the bar with them. They got to know our likes and dislikes, and made us wonderful drinks. Definitely a highlight of the cruise. Entertainment: My husband and I didn't go to the evening shows, although our parents did generally go. They said they enjoyed most of them. We played Deal or No Deal on the sea days since my son loves the show. All I can say is Celebrity must be making a fortune off this compared to Bingo, since there are only two contestants per game (plus one person who spins for a free 7 night Caribbean cruise) and most of the time the contestants didn't win much. Additionally, I hate that they pay out the smaller audience prizes (you get $5 for matching two cases, $10 for 3, $50 for 4 etc) in not only casino credit, but specifically casino SLOT credit. I'm not a slots player and I asked for promo chips but they said they only give those as a payout for $50 or more. Forcing you to play your "winnings" through a slot machine really nullified those winnings and I think that change really is unfair for players. That being said, I like the idea of the game and it was a fun change from bingo- I just don't like the payout rules. If you spend $40 on cards and win a whopping $5, it would be nice to at least choose how to withdraw that $5. My husband really enjoyed the Hot Glass Classes, and made two different things there; a turtle and a pen holder. I would definitely recommend this experience as being well worth the money if you're interested at all. You can also sit in the gallery and watch people making their things if you don't want to pay for a class yourself. The enrichment lectures were about whales, which was fitting since we had gone whale watching in Victoria (I highly recommend Prince of Whales for an excursion, by the way!). It was really neat to learn more about the whales we had just seen. My mother in law did the behind the scenes tour since it was her first cruise. She enjoyed the look at what goes on in the kitchens and backstage. There was lots of live music in various places every day. It felt like there was more than on previous cruises, and we enjoyed this very much. Fun Factory/Club X: There were very few kids on either cruise, so they combined the teen club and kids club together. My son enjoyed the Fun Factory on the first cruise, when kids his age were there. He liked winning the kids club money during activities so he could buy prizes at the end of the week. The second week, no kids around his age showed up so he didn't go to any of the activities. He generally liked the activities available and thought the staff were very nice and friendly. Photography: There have been a lot of changes here as well! I remember when they used to have the walls of photos posted but now everything is on a little kiosk. I will say- do NOT buy the unlimited digital photo package in advance if you are an Elite member. I bought it at $89 and on board it was $99 minus the 40% Elite discount. It took some doing to get that straightened out onboard and get the value of the discount refunded. Also they were throwing other little things in like some prints or folios if you signed up onboard. There were fewer photo opportunities as well. There used to be a photographer at every port to take pictures, and then a variety of different styles of photography in the evenings. I remember the casual pics where they unrolled white paper all over the floor so you could sit or lie down and use silly props, but there was nothing like that. There was generally only a basic white or back background to stand against, or the green screen where they'd put your picture against a number of stock photos from the ship. The green screen pics were pretty cool though. We did get some very nice photos, but I miss the variety and some of the creativity I've seen in the past. That being said, photos are much cheaper now than they have been in the past. I remember paying $29.95 for formal night photos and now you can pay $100 for ten 8x10 prints or get unlimited digitals. This was a great deal and since we don't cruise more often than once every couple of years, I could see myself buying the package every time. Do make sure to check using Photo Finder on the kiosk for pictures that didn't automatically get credited to your stateroom, even if you told the photographer your room. I would say it was about 50/50 if pictures showed up in our file or if they had to be looked for and individually added. Disembarkation: On the first leg, the back to back guests went to the Sky Lounge to get their new Seapasses and wait for the ship to get a zero count and be cleared. It actually took a surprisingly long time, so we didn't have the empty ship for long before new guests were boarding for the second sailing! However they did prioritize cleaning the B2B guests' rooms, so once they cleared us around 10:30am from the Sky Lounge, we went straight to our new room to unpack. Quick and easy on the second leg. We had our bags put out by 10pm, and we left our cabin by 7:30am to go to the Oceanview for breakfast before they called our number. Our bags were waiting, and we walked through the passport check and got a taxi to LAX (~$65) for our flight home. COVID-19: I know my comments will be unpopular, but I wanted to say that we saw a pronounced difference between our first cruise which departed from Vancouver and required a proctored test, and the second cruise which departed from LA and did not. Other than the crew being masked, the first cruise felt like a normal cruise. No hallways blocked off, no one seemed ill, everything was normal. On the second cruise, we noticed precautions being stepped up by day 4. We were flying the yellow flag going into ports. Extra people everywhere with sanitizer, more so than the first week. Extra cleaners. And staff members started to be off sick. The emergency crew drill was canceled at the last moment, which we speculated was covid related. We heard people coughing all over the place. We came home and tested positive, unfortunately, despite being vaxxed and double boosted. We were told that as of the next sailing, masking would no longer be required for crew members. Combine that with dropping the required test coming onboard, and I think it's going to be a rough winter for cruising. I would be much more comfortable if they dropped the vaccination requirement but kept up the 48 hour testing requirement. Seems to me from this very short sample that the honour system with regard to testing isn't working very well. The timing was clear because of the sea days after embarkation that covid was brought on by the embarking passengers and it spread very rapidly. General Comments: Overall, we had a great cruise. My husband was frustrated that one of his favourite shirts got lost in the laundry on the first week and it never did turn up. I would recommend not only keeping your copy of the laundry slip until the clothes come back but also snapping a quick picture of what you're sending out. While Solstice is showing her age in a few places, they didn't affect our cruise much at all, and I would definitely cruise her again without second thoughts. We found the Celebrity app to be very useful. It was nice to be able to check out the restaurant menus in advance and see which nights we'd prefer to do specialty dining, and having the daily planner loaded made it easy to see what was going on at any given time. It was also a convenient way to check your shipboard account. This was definitely a positive change. If anyone has any questions, I'd be happy to try and answer them.

They sold out on both our b2b weeks on Solstice. No discounts except on the first night.

TA OBC won't show up precruise in the planner, if that's what you're asking. Only OBC from Celebrity.

We're boarding Solstice on Friday and I hope there is karaoke!

You didn't include a screenshot of the rate???

You'd think that would be easy proof.

Do you not have a copy of your submission in your sent email?

Thank you!

Keep her ready for us!!! SO excited to board soon!

would you mind showing a screenshot of this? I'm not seeing it in my cruise planner.

I'm not a slots player though and if I get stuck trying to play $500 I'll be a very unhappy person.

Can anyone clarify- is there a difference between buying promo chips in advance via Cruise Planner and getting the 10% bonus, or buying chips onboard using NR onboard credit? Will both situations yield promo chips only? Can you sell promo chips back to the cage and get your nonrefundable OBC back if you're done playing?

OK so I can't buy a 4 card package and use them on 4 different days. Just wanted to check.

If you buy the cards in advance is each purchase 1 game, or do you have to use them all at once? Just wondering if I can buy a 4 card pack and play 4 times or if I'd need to buy 4 single cards.

WOW- they gave you $25 instead of a cruise. Unreal.

You can download them right on the ship though right?

That is literally how strikes work. It sucks to be caught up in one, but simply protesting doesn't tend to make much impact. Causing disruption is how things change. I have sympathy for the passengers but I respect the rights of workers to effectively bargain for their contracts.

FV is much, much better than Concierge. I'm not sure why you think it's lower just because it doesn't have the fancy perks that aren't worth much.

Does this help? 15047719_CEL_Children_Specialty_Dining_Flyer.pdf

Did you mean Pacific Coastal? Or a different sailing? I'm on the 9/16 PC sailing and still getting the not ready message.

So the Pacific Coastal cruise starting in Vancouver and going to the US still requires a monitored test, right? Even for Canadians? I was a little confused when I read through the directions.