swjumbo

As I said earlier, each to their own. For a few extra bucks I enjoy the better glasses, unlimited drinks, not having to ask for ‘champagne not Prosecco’! I agree the specialty dining is better value with Princess but….. and if money were no object…. I’d have Celebrity over Princess.

I’m comparing premium drinks package on both.

We have very similar habits to you. Never drunk nor abusive but do enjoy champagne in the morning with breakfast, mid morning and before luncheon. No problem whatsoever getting champagne on the Celebrity drinks package but not so easy with Princess. Again, each to their own!

Erm…. last few weeks….many times!!!

Please re read my post. WE, my partner and I on our first Princess trip, mentioned Celebrity at least 20 times per hour!

We found the Royal class ship layout very confusing despite being 55 & 40 something. Take 5, a Jazz venue is on deck 7! why? Nowhere at the front of the ship to look out apart from The Sanctuary, which was lovely but you have to pay for access. The elevators are confusing and one button only activates one or two elevators. The Vista lounge has no view to talk of. Theatre is small and not as opulent as any Celebrity ships. No natural flow to the ship whatsoever. I think we only mentioned the ‘C’ word (celebrity) around twenty times per hour! lol

We are similar to the OP. Have done many cruises on Celebrity in all classes. Came off our first Princess cruise last week. We always feel deflated leaving a Celebrity ship…. even in port and couldn’t wait to go back onboard. Totally opposite with Princess. We spent as much time as we could in port without getting back on board and were quite happy to get off. PS We have only done speciality dining on board each and never an inside cabin. Perks are better with X! PS We really wanted to like Princess too but we’ve got the Celebrity bug! It just ticks every box for us.

Ship sky Class Royal Deck Marina (15) Cabin # 410 Category Mini Suite Port/Starboard/Bow/Stern Port Middle Connects With Cabin # n/a Accessible no Quiet noise of chairs dragging at all hours upstairs Balcony Size good. One of the larger ones View 180 Privacy Issues no. The skywalk didn't affect us Wind no Soot no Problems no Comments Bed was awful

If you have a drink package with Princess you don't sign for anything but you've got to check your bill daily as the extra few bucks here and these certainly mount up. There aren't as many suite perks with Princess compared to Celebrity but there's a definite difference in price. There appears to be a huge difference between their loyalty schemes and we feel the perks with Celebrity are much better. Staff on both are amazing but it seems that the Princess crew get less time to themselves and therefore are a tad more tired.

Having spoken to a few members of staff on Princess they are worked very had here compared to Celebrity. To get a day off a crew member has to get medical approval. With Celebrity they merely ask their manager. Long chat with a crew member today who’s first contract is here having been with Celebrity before and is finding it tough. An example being in port he was given 30 minutes off. Some people downstairs never see daylight. It appears that in port on Celebrity, if possible, they give as many of the staff time to get off the ship. On Princess they prefer their staff to remain onboard.

Speciality dining is better here than on any Celebrity ship we have been on. We eat nearly every night in specialty dining and prefer them over Luminae. The value for money here is amazing. Third night on board and we have eaten in the steak, seafood and Italian restaurants and thoroughly enjoyed every meal. We have, on a few occasions in Tuscan, had to ask for more spinach or an extra teaspoon of mash potatoes. Not here. In fact, last night in the Italian we had to miss dessert and cheese despite our lovely waiter trying to force feed us. Cover charge is around $30 in each restaurant and well worth it. Sorry Celebrity fans but it’s 1- nil to Princess in this category!

Celebrity are missing a trick here. During Covid we did a round the UK cruise and it was v popular. Pity they didn’t do the same itineraries as Princess and I do wonder why??

Today we washed down our own balcony. A few days at sea meant there was salt everywhere. Thankfully, we had been to The Sanctuary and kept the towels to dry the water off. Now we can see through the balcony glass and our clothes aren’t covered in salt. We miss Celebrity.

Every morning on Celebrity I pop down to the OVC buffet for 2 mimosas for breakfast and take them back to the room. Never served in a plastic glass. I’ve attached a screenshot of my wine glass at rear of the buffet for lunch on Solstice last year. Glass not plastic.

The Sky Lounge isn’t just my favourite place on the ship, it’s seriously my favourite place ever. So many happy memories on all the Solstice ships. It’s the naughty place at the end of the night, the lovely place for Officer’s parties and just a nice place to chill.