mahdnc

Here are my notes from taking the Trans-Alpine Railway excursion when we sailed on Solstice to New Zealand in late Dec - early Jan: 7:30 am We arrived at the Celebrity Theater as instructed on our ticket. 7:45 am We line up to board the first tender. 8:20 am We board our motorcoach. There are 28 passengers on our bus and a total of 3 buses. The bus ride is nicely narrated by the driver. 9:05 am We have a scheduled restroom stop It is very brief. 10:00 am The bus arrives at the location in Christchurch to board our train. The train is empty and appears to be dedicated for the cruise ship. It only has around 4 passenger cars with an observation car. There are 84 passengers that board. The train ride is headphone narrated and is very comfortable. 11:00 am A nice box lunch is served on the train You can buy additional snacks or meals. The train climbs the mountains through 12+ tunnels along a beautiful river. The river is a pretty silty turquoise color which indicates that it is being fed from a glacier. 12:30 pm We arrive at our destination, Arthur's Pass. Under gorgeous sunny skies, we get off the train and board the same 3 buses from earlier in the day. We make 3 quick stops for photos of the mountain scenery. The view on the bus ride down the mountains is as spectacular as it was from the train on the way up. 2:20 pm. Two buses arrive at a sheep farm where free water, coffee, and tea are served along with snacks. There is a demonstration of the dogs herding the sheep followed by a sheep shearing demonstration. 3:30 pm. We get back on the bus for the 2 hour bus ride back to the tender dock. I am currently on the bus.

No wonder you were working so hard to Elite+

I remember it being published around mid-October because there is Halloween information in it.

Last year, Celebrity actually published a brochure which had the holiday decorating schedule for each ship: link Note that not all ships were sailing then (Solstice, Eclipse). The brochure has more holiday information in it that you may find of interest.

I am sorry to hear that you have Covid and it must be so disappointing to cancel your cruise vacation. It is good to know that you had a great customer service experience. Get well.

It depends on what you like. During our last cruise in 2019, we did the train excursion and very much liked it

Basically Book Later allows you to delay your decision for up to 90 days. If you don't make a decision, it expires and your deposit is returned. When you do book, you then make a decision on whether the booking has refundable or non-refundable deposit. Here is a link to to the form itself with screenshots of it pasted below:

We have booked the family cabins at least 15 times. As many have mentioned, they are not eligible for the one category Captains Club upgrade. During the late 90's we did get CC upgrades into the larger family cabins but they were outside cabins (Century class) and were designated as Cat 3 cabins. The upgrade was worth about $200 pp for 1st/2nd.

We are flying to Rome in October. It is my wife's dream for our bags to be lost so she has an excuse to buy a new wardrobe in Rome in which case I will need the Euro to go down more....

There is a world wide chip shortage going on right now.

Also no need to sleep on the couch in the case of a late night heated disagreement.

So the 20,000 PUP super quiz would be attractive to you.

While ships don't have to sail full to break even, they cruise lines try mighty hard to fully load them. Again, couples can financially benefit by booking a higher cat cabin (such as an FV) and an inside cabin separately as solos versus paying for the FV cabin as double occupants. There is a large cost difference between the two.

It was recently changed to 2 bottles per person

If solos had to pay double the price (solo supplement) then there would be no difference (ignoring onboard spending differences of course). That is what the solo supplement is designed to do. But if solos do not pay double, but rather only for themselves (no solo supplement which is the current promotion), then couples that otherwise would double occupy a cabin, could elect to book two cabins of the same category--and occupy each cabin as a solo for the same cost. Or some couples may elect to book a suite as a solo for one of them and an inside cabin as a solo for the other and pay less than if they had booked a double occupied a suite. Either way, in the most extreme scenario, Celebrity's ships would sail half full (passenger point of view: woo hoo!) or half empty (Celebrity financial accounting point of view: boo hoo!).

I think of the supplement as a multiplier. If it's 200%, then the solo passenger has to pay double the rate for 1st passenger.

Good point. However Celebrity is very good at marketing an equivalent offer disguised as something different. Case in point: yesterday's 60%-off-the-second-passenger offer has been replaced with a 30%-off-every-passenger offer which is the same thing for a double occupied cabin. But the two-solos-in-two-cabins plan gets the discount! Woo hoo (x2)!!

June

I got the point.

Yesterday I noticed that the registration on Celebrity's website has been removed: https://www.celebritycruises.com/cruise-critic-connections

Thanks for the information, Anne. I hope they are resumed soon.

Yes--either answer.

I am glad to read that you had a fabulous time aboard Solstice. Our last cruise before the pandemic shutdown was aboard Solstice and we hope to sail her again at the end of next year.

I agree. I just finished the quiz. It is very difficult to develop a marketing oriented True/False question where "False" is a correct and useful answer.

From our experience aboard Solstice back in Dec 2019, you cannot get the ship to ship your glass works. They really don't have a standard set of packing materials or boxes to give you either. You are pretty much on your own.