onespots

Hello Everyone,

I found most of your resposes very interesting & informative. I can appreciate everyone's opinion. Since I posted this about Jumping Ship, it seems some of you have done the same. Therefore we have just completed 2 bookings. We are going with Viking riverboat from Bordeaux for 7 days & returning to Bordeaux. One day later we board Azamara in Bordeaux for a 12 night cruise with one sea day & ends in Amsterdam. Since we are already in Bordeaux, this seemed like good fit. Upon our return, I will share our experiences on both lines. This a good itinerary for us because it is all France, with one day in Belgium & an overnight in Amsterdam. From there we will fly home to Arizona.

Happy Travels,  John

We having been sailing with Celebrity since 2005. Usually in a verandah/balcony stateroom or higher. We have noticed many small changes over the years. However since Covid our observations have been about the quality of the food in both the buffet & main dinning room. Also the changes with Captain's Club & general entertainment. It appears to us that management has no interests on our loyality to their line & service levels are at an all time low. Although we have enjoyed many good/nice sailing over the years, our lastest experiences see too large of a decline from the past. Prices have increased significantly, service levels are down, & food quality not even average. Although we are nearing the end of our cruising experiences, mostly to Europe, we our now considering using Viking or Azamara for our future. The new ships to do not appeal to us & it seems if you are not in a suite, Celebrity has very little interest in your business.

Our last cruise was in September on the Summit sailing from Boston to Boston for 11 nights. The changes in the observation lounge for Captains's Club happy hour, were just flat terrible. Did not allow for any oppertunity to meet fellow travels & enjoy a beverage before dinner or the theater. I understand that is changing. Still we will taking future cruises on a different cruise line.

Happy Travels to All,  John

After 15 cruises with Celebrity, I have never witnessed  a maitre d  enforce a dress code in the main dinning room. The Formal night or Gala or whatever it is called encourages guests to dress a little better for that evening. Yet I have never seen anyone turned away. Guests have other options to dine, & should use them if they wish not to be properly attired. The most casual dinning I have experienced is on the Alaska cruises. I completely understand why many people would dine in the same outfits they wore on their excursion. However, I don't think shorts should be allowed at dinner on any occasion.

This is totally my opinion & likely upset others.

Happy Travels,  John

To Billybob 79

We are leaving Monday October 17 2022 on this trip. Doing the regular trip with Vantage that includes 7 days on the Nebu. We will do the post excursion to Jordan for 5 days. Will give you a full report upon our return. Perhaps you could me your email address.

Happy Travels, John (onespots )

sfaigle@aol.com

We will be early to the port around 12 - 1:30pm for a 2:00 pm check in time. Happy to wait until we are called. Do not want to wait the entire time at FCO, as we will arrive by 9:00 am at the airport. Should we spend some time in town until our check -  in time or go directly to the ship on July 28th. Appreciate your responses.

Thank You, John 

Hello, Everyone

Would one of you please explain to me, how to add a photo to a post ?

I would very much like to be able to do this on my sailing in late July on the Ooosterdam, Greek Odyssey & Mediterranean Empires.

Appreciate you help, John

Hello Italy 52

Seems time of day for  whale watching is subjective. Whales generally are feeding 23 hours of the day. Morning or afternoon seems to have little bearing on the amount of activity. The boat captain is constantly in search of finding whales for you. I like morning because I find the early morning light better for the type of photos I like to take. However there is no guarantee & perhaps you will have greater activity on your afternoon tour. Best of luck, you will enjoy Jayleen.

Happy Travels, onespots

Hello Kuddles 14

Just finished a whale watching tour with Jayleen's on Thursday 6-10-2021. She was fantastic & the boat was super clean. 5 people total on her boat. She is very knowledgeable & safety minded for your trip. She has binoculars on board, so just bring your camera. We had several Humpback sightings & calm water. The day was cool & overcast, so I advise layers when outside on the deck. It was raining hard in Juneau when we left, however we encountered no rain in Auke Bay. This trip was the ending of our 14 day land trip in Alaska. Jayleen is a wonderful person & wants all of her customers to have a great experience.

Safe Travels,  onespots

Hello Everyone

Our sailing for May 29th 2020 on the Millennium has been canceled. We called Celebrity directly & booked a new trip for June 4th 2021. They explained to us how their credits work. We were given 125% credit on this current sailing & shore excursions. Our out of pocket expense to re-create this trip is about $400. ( mostly due to the increased rates for next year's sailing )

We were given a credit on our account for the shore excursions to be decided at a later date. We paid a $500 deposit to confirm this reservation & received a reservation number shortly after the phone call.

The  agent at Celebrity was very nice.

Our new booking is for June 4th 2021. 

We had to cancel with all the hotels & vendors in Alaska for our pre-trip ( DIY ) adventure that was planned. All of these people were very understanding & pleasant. They refunded our deposits or total payments within a few days after the phone call. The Alaska Railroad also refunded our entire payment for the trip from Anchorage to Seward.

Our next next challenge is with Alaska Airlines. We have non-refundable multi-city tickets. The airlines has stated they will work with us. However nothing can be decided until later this year. Airlines generally do not book flights out any further than 330 days. So we our on hold until this July. Should be interesting to see how they respond to this situation. 

Happy Travels,  John

Any private tour operator in St. Petersburg will be better than the ship's excursion. We have been to St. Petersburg 2 times & much prefer the private tours.

Happy Travels,  John

You did not say where you are sailing & for how long ? We have sailed on both & the major difference for us is as follows:

Infinity     is a smaller older ship. For ports that require a tender, Infinity has the advantage with less passengers

Rendezvous lounge on Infinity is larger with more seating. Usually has live music during Happy Hour

This location is much closer to the MDR  & on the same level as the Celebrity Theater

Our last trip on the Inifinity  we had a veranda cabin. Seems the shower still had a curtain. Cabins seem to be a similar size with the Infinity a little dated in comparison to the Equinox. 

Less speciality restaurants

Seems passengers engaged with each other better on the smaller ships

Exquinox     large newer ship with a few more amenities. Better equipment in the workout areas

Mores bars but smaller with Martini Bar being always crowded

Little more updated cabin with sliding doors in the enclosed shower

Buffets very similar, however solstice ships seem to have more variety & offerings of food

Both have designated smoking areas 

We would prefer a solstice ship in the Caribbean, however the Summit is a wonderful ship as well. Either one is a good choice. For only $20 I would choose the Equinox

Happy Travels,   John

First I would like to thank all the people who responded to me many months ago about planning for this trip.

The Port Douglas advise was extremely valuable & I'm glad we lodged there instead of Cairns. It was quite warm in Port Douglas for November & we enjoyed all the activities the town has to offer & a smooth ride out to the reef for some snorkeling.

Our accommodations in Sydney were very nice as we stayed in the Meriton serviced apartments about 5 kilometers from the Harbor Bridge & Opera House. Then on Saturday embarked on the Solstice to begin our next journey. The port area was under a lot of construction making it difficult to get to the proper area to receive our luggage. The process time with Celebrity was about 1 hour.

Our cruise was just great & the weather was quite good, except for a bit of our time in Doubtful Sound. We found the service levels to be good throughout the entire ship. Only exception would be the Martini Bar. Our dinning staff was terrific & sommelier exceptional. People aboard were very friendly & engaging. Food was okay to good as you would find on most mass market companies. Second show in the theatre was generally filled & the entertainment about what you would expect on a cruise ship. I know we just scratched the surface of these two beautiful countries & would hope to return again someday.

Once again Cruise Critic proved to be a valuable tool in planning our holiday.

Happy Travels, John

Thank you all for the information provided to us. If Sprint Plan for international is too high, we will go & purchase sims cards for the phone. Appreciate the nice & timely answers. Happy Travels, John

Thank you all for the nice replies & suggestions.

Appreciate the quick responses. John

Hello

We are traveling to these locations at the end of November. We are from Arizona (USA). We are taking the Galaxy 8 phone which is android & our carrier is Sprint at home. We will use the phone only while land, to confirm our excursions. We are doing a 6 day DIY trip in the Port Douglas Area & then arriving for 2 days in Sydney prior to boarding a Celebrity Vessel for a cruise from Sydney to Auckland. Would appreciate any advise, thanking you in advance, John

Hello

We are leaving for this trip at the end of November. We are from Arizona (USA) . We are doing a DIY trip for 6 days in Australia in the Port Douglas area & ending in Sydney, 2 days prior to sailing on Celebrity a 14 night cruise from Sydney to Auckland. We need advise about phone service to communicate while on land. We are taking an android Galaxy 8 phone & need to confirm our land excursions throughout this trip. Will not use the phone to call from the ship. Our USA carrier is Sprint. Any advise is welcomed. Thank you in advance, John

If everything is equal, fares, & destinations I would choose Alaska. Alaska service much better. We have used Delta on long flights & have never been happy with their lack of service. Just my opinion... John

We always keep our passports in the safe on the ship unless required at a port for immigration. We do have a photo-copy of the passport we carry with us at all times & keep one in the safe. Hopefully this copy would help us if this document was lost or stolen. Fortunately we have not encountered any problems in over 25 years of foreign travel.

We did a 7 day DIY tour of Alaska before getting on the ship on the 4th of September. We encountered rain during the 2 days prior to boarding the ship in Seward.. We had no rough seas or rain during our southern cruise back to Vancouver B.C.

Dress in layers & be ready for every type of wind & weather during September. We took warm hats & gloves & were very happy we did so. We lucked out on the weather which made for a great trip...

Happy Travels, John

Another vote the balcony. For a balcony provides an opportunity not to fight the crowds on the upper decks for viewing purposes. While in Alaska we used the balcony everyday. Did not matter to us about the weather, because we could just duck back into room to get warm. We were always on the balcony entering or leaving port. When our ship visited the Hubbard Glacier, the captain made to large circles so everyone could enjoy the view. We were close & able take some very nice photos from our balcony. Further as we left Ketchikan the captain announced the possibility of seeing some Northern Lights between 1:30-3:30am. I set the alarm, about 2:15 am the clouds cleared & we enjoyed the show for about 20 minutes without having to leave our room. I took some photos to remind me of this memory. Finally we can always enjoy an adult beverage during our sail-a-way from the balcony before heading out for dinner. I guess during our voyages I must see, hear, & feel the ocean to totally appreciate the cruise.

Try getting this picture from way up high on the observation decks...

I will probably get flamed for this, however these are my opinions.

First of all you have picked a good itinerary which is port intensive. Therefore go into Venice early & explore the city & get rid of any jet-lag. Cruises in the near future will soon be unable to use the Grand Canal. A great experience for a sail-a-way not to be missed.

Pick an all English speaking vessel like RCI or Celebrity. Your ship is not the destination, the ports are your areas of interest.

Do the research on your areas of interest for each port. You can get ideas from the cruise line's excursions offered, Trip Advisor, & be sure to join your roll call for ideas from fellow passengers & maybe join them on a private excursion. Use the ports of call feature on cruise critic for the places you will be visiting. We found it much more pleasant to travel in a small group excursion with a good bi-lingual guide to explain the history & sites to us. You will be doing a lot of walking, so choose your footwear accordingly.

In Venice pick a hotel in your price range & inquire about transferring your luggage to the ship. Costs vary depending on location. Also be aware of the costs of going from the airport to your hotel. Most travelers tend to over-pack & dragging luggage around in Venice is difficult. Remember there are no cars, so water taxis are used everywhere or private boats.

Good planning will avoid most issues. Most everyone in Italy speaks English. Just learn a few simple phrases in Italian. Hello, good morning, thank you, farewell, or good bye. It is always good to take some Euros with you prior to arriving in Venice. This helps with small expenses, tips, & with a few vendors who do not take credit cards. Visa & Mastercard mostly accepted everywhere you are traveling. Beware of international fees charged on your credit card. To avoid this, many USA credit card companies offer cards with no Intl transaction fee.

Really traveling from a foreign port is not that difficult in Europe. There is a lot of good specific information on cruise critic for suggestions on hotels & transfers, check out the boards.

Venice seems more prone to rain than the other ports of call. Be prepared with a light windbreaker or jacket. Also nice to have on aboard the ship during sea days. Remember for most men in Europe, they wear long pants. Only the tourists wear shorts. Shorts & sleeveless shirts will likely prevent you from entering Cathedrals. For women they must cover their shoulders & nice shawl is recommended. Casual attire is preferred in Europe. Personally I like... light weight slacks & a golf shirt, my wife is usually in capris pants with a nice top, or a light dress. Always she has a shawl or some type of wrap with her. We have never been denied access to any site, historical building, or church. Europe is much more of an urban experience with a history much older than USA. It is always very interesting to us. Thus we have been back several times on cruises & land trips. Do take this trip...

I am certain you will find this adventure most exhilarating. Happy Travels, John

Hello Banana15

First of all... You cannot go wrong choosing a S-Class Ship with Celebrity. You will find the Exquinox an excellent choice.

Given your age, interests, & energy the Equinox should be more to your liking. HAL is a fine cruise line, however much of their appeal is to an older demographic. If you enjoy night life on the ship, likely there will more to do on Celebrity.

Happy Travels

To Glaciers

Yes I do still have the Nikon D40. My reference was to what I am currently shooting today. I had forgotten about this trip & took all my pictures with the D40. Did not get the Nikon D7100 until 2013 just prior to a trip to South Africa. Still a decent photo for a 6mp camera. Thanks for correcting me... John

Thanks everyone for your help. I will give this a try in the near future. Just another casualty & victim of photobucket who will not pay their high fees.... John