voyager1964

For those who stayed in this suite - how accessible is the "hot tub" on the balcony?

I mean it seems to be ~ 1/2 hip in height and no stairs, so do you just take a seat on the edge and then rotate all the way? Is there any seat or bench inside the tub? Trying to figure out if a person with bad back can use it.

Thanks in advance

Any news about the music level, e.g., in the pool area on E-class?

11 hours ago, Oxo said:

Please- Not be be funny or negative. 

What is so special with the quality of service in Reserve?

We cruise a lot and have found service to be excellent normally regardless if it is MDR or Specialty Restaurants. 

I'm very interested in what the Reserve offers.

TIA

Physically, it is a small isolated section with a few tables. And you get this wonderful feeling of being special.

There might be an additional aspect not considered so far. In D726 on the Enchanted, 10-days Caribbean cruise, we experienced unusually strong vibrations, especially the first and last two nights. See my cabin review in the sticky post (also posted a cruise review here with some valuable updates from fellow cruisers)

Thanks for all that replied. I will admit that the reason for my inquiry was @Papa Yoda 's review here:

Has the situation on the Grand's Sun deck changed since then? That was a Hawaiian cruise, and I am looking at a Caribbean from San Juan, perhaps not as many joggers...

I am trying to decide if there is a significant difference between Port (cabins #302-308) and Starboard (cabins #301-307) cabins on the Lido deck of the Grand. Older reviews (~2008) suggest there was jogging on deck 15 right above the starboard that would start early in the morning, but did not see anything about the port side. 

Are there still people jogging on deck 15? If so, do they jog on both sides or only on one side?

TIA

OK, just to clarify here is an image of a gangway (different company but still):

This gangway is divided. On the right, there is a portion with stairs. On the left, no stairs. So, which one would have Virtuosa in Caribbean ports of call?

Very informative post - thank you very much for that!

Could you please relay your experience for navigating the gangway in the ports of call? I saw some photos suggesting the gangway is not smooth but with small stairs, which would make impossible for a wheelchair to roll... Did the crew push the wheelchair over the gangway in the ports of call?

Please advise as we are considering a sailing on Virtuosa in YC in Spring 2026.

Thanks

6 hours ago, IDL said:

Similar to the Jerry Seinfeld’s rental car stand up comedy routine; she may be willing to accept all questions but answering them not so much.  I submitted a question July 4th concerning the price of the meal at Eden and not even the courtesy of a response. 

You can thank your fellow CC members for the overwhelming animosity toward Laura. I would not bother to answer the questions from disrespectful audience

12 hours ago, TeeRick said:

I doubt very much that LHB cares about a poster here characterizing her answers as an insult.  Maybe got a chuckle out of it.

If you have a better idea why she stopped her responses at the same time this threat started along with numerous insulting posts elsewhere, please share. You probably remember the previous series of Q&A with the previous X official (was it in 2019 or 2018?) - at that time the similarly crafted answers did not get that much animosity

This topic was posted yesterday morning (Wednesday). Laura has not posted answers yesterday. Nor today. Given the intriguing topic title (honestly, it is insulting), I am afraid we may not be given answers tomorrow either. 

In the previous round, the answers appeared two days after the expected date:

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forum/827-celebrity-cruises-president-and-ceo-lisa-lutoff-perlo-invites-you-to-crewupwithwomen-read-only-2019/

Those of us that require stateroom accessibility and yet desire to sail in a suite, are getting less and less opportunity with Celebrity's new ships.

For the M-class ships, among 50 suites, there are 6 accessible cabins (12%), all sky suites, i.e., the lowest suite category.

For the next generation S-class ships, we have 66 suites of which 4 are accessible (6%), again only sky suites are accessible. Reflection, being an exception has 111 suites of which again only 4 are accessible (3.6%)

The newest E-class ships, Ascent, Beyond and apparently Xcel have a whopping number of suites - 198 of which only two are accessible (1%), again of the lowest sky suite category.

So, we have two problems

- There are disproportionally fewer accessible suites on the newer Celebrity ships.

- There are no accessible upper suites on Celebrity. At all. For a comparison, the sister company RCCL always offers at least one upper suite as an accessible cabin. Typically, the most exciting two-story suite on RCCL would be accessible (Crown Loft suite on Oasis class or Icon Loft suite on Icon class).

So I wonder if there are any plans to convert regular suites into accessible suites?

How about making some upper suites accessible, e.g., the Edge Villa? The RCCL installs an elevator in their loft suites to make them accessible - why Celebrity cannot?

At the very least, can Celebrity offer an ~upper-level suite package for their accessible suites so that their guests could enjoy the benefits of the upper suites that are not attainable to them in principle (not because they cannot afford an upper suite but because the upper suites are not accessible)? I mean a nominal fee package offering them higher-class balcony furniture, unlimited specialty dining, laundry, etc? 

For the folks that continue posting on this exciting topic. Given that the new Celebrity's President might directly answer our questions, it is interesting to see how the previous President answered a similar question (Yes, this problem is not exactly new):

Scroll to the last page to find the answer. Those that are sailing soon, may want to print the answer and take on board...

3 hours ago, 2011mom said:

I love snorkeling, hiking, outdoor activities

In this case, I would say Summit as it goes to Dominica and St. Lucia.

I would add a few of aspects for Princess as compared to Haven/Retreat

1) Princess seems to employ European chefs, e.g., on our recent cruise on Enchanted, the main Chef was from Bulgaria. This can make a significant difference - practically all the meals we experienced be them in the Reserve collection or in the special restaurants, were tasty (to us).

As a counter example, we experienced chefs from e.g., Indonesia or New Orleans (think Creole cuisine) on Celebrity - the presentation was beautiful, but sorry not the taste.

2) Medallion technology on Princess: it seems like light years ahead of the traditional card-based system. You can track the location of your cabin mate in real time, the waiters will know you are coming, the screen near the elevators will greet you, the cabin door will blink in green light and unlock for you..

3) You have real pools on Princess, and the Retreat pool is adults only, it was practically empty whenever we visited.

4) If you want a butler, you can book a Sky suite. It costs ~ a bit higher than the Celebrity suite on X, certainly less expensive than either Royal suite on X or H2 on Haven, but they will take care of you similar to the RCCL's Genie for their upper suites. 

5) Princess Thermal Suite and Enclave blows Celebrity's Thermal Suite out of the water. Physically, it is ~ similar to NCL's Spa (you get co-ed only saunas on Princess though), but do not forget that Princess does not have spa-related cabins. You can only gain access to the Enclave by purchasing a pass, with all the consequences.

6) The special restaurants on Princess charge reasonable fees, like $35-$40 pp (except for the 360°).

7) Unlike S- or E-class on X and Getaway+ class on NCL, Princess has three banks of elevators.  

2 hours ago, canderson said:

there will be an experiment

Our RCCL ancestors called this procedure "midnight requisition" 🙂

4 hours ago, phoenix_dream said:

The insurance explanation makes some sense until one considers the chairs are made of the same material,  as were the footstools.  Plus I would be willing to bet a cruise that Royal uses the same carrier but they have loungers. Still doesn't make any sense

There is no need to reinvent the wheel, really. Happy reading 🙂

and

11 minutes ago, new2cruise said:

We have removed footstools and lounge chairs from all balconies

Interesting. The cruisedeckplans site only mentions the loungers:

2 minutes ago, ggo85 said:

but how does that explain the footstool policy

Was it in the official Celebrity's correspondence, or it was "over-volunteering" crew that removed the stools?

On 6/4/2024 at 3:34 PM, ggo85 said:

X should explain what they mean by “safety” I. The context of loungers.  Something that apparently affects only X and not any other line. The fact they won’t tell anyone speaks volumes.  

I have a working hypothesis that seems to explain many facts and observations reported in this thread. Let's see:

1) About 12 years ago, there was a similar problem, reported not only on Celebrity's but also on RCCL's and Princess's boards (https://www.foxboroughma.gov/cms/DocContainerLinks.aspx?key=15207780-15207864-15413013-390604-15416693-1)

2) At that time, there was an official explanation that was transparent - the problem was the fire hazard presented by the highly-flammable material of the lounger cover.

3) Thereafter, other cruise lines have installed fire sprinklers on their balconies (see, e.g., #8 here for Princess: https://www.princess.com/en-us/why-princess/top-ten-faq)

Celebrity, apparently, has NOT. At least I have not seen such sprinklers an Celebrity's balconies.

4) Insurance companies are proactive nowadays, e.g., they are using satellite imagery to check whether you have a tree that can fall on your home and correspondingly demand you to either cut the tree or cancel your policy. Thus, it is plausible that Celebrity's insurer has recognized the fire hazard and demanded Celebrity to address it.

5) By (almost) publicly claiming that all the loungers are being removed from the balconies, Celebrity is addressing the insurer's concern. Understandably, Celebrity is interested to conceal the actual reason behind that from the public.

6) On the pool, there are fire sprinklers available. On Celebrity's balconies, to the best of my knowledge, there are none. You can say that Celebrity prohibits smoking on the balconies, so there is no fire hazard. But this is not true. Smoking is allowed, e.g., in the Sunset bar area on E-ships. A cigarette butt, accidentally thrown away could easily land on an aft balcony downstairs, and we will have the Star Princess fire repeated. 

7) So what can we actually expect and/or do? I believe that the ship crew realize that the likelihood of a balcony fire, especially on the side balconies (=Magic Carpet) is negligibly small, so they are happy to quietly provide you the loungers thus avoiding a big fuss. In 1-2 months, Celebrity would report to the insurer that their demand were fulfilled and after another several months the loungers would quietly return back. Or maybe not.

Actually, it is not the first time Celebrity decided to remove the loungers from balconies. Look here: 

Back in 2012, the CC members were able to get a more comprehensive answer from Celebrity - apparently it was the lounger cover that constituted a fire hazard on the balconies not equipped with the sprinklers. Someone made an educated guess that this could occur during a regular insurance inspection so that Celebrity issued the call to remove the loungers fleetwide, while quietly keeping the possibility to request and get the lounger for the guests. A similar problem appeared at approximately same time on both RCCL and Princess. Look at that thread - very educational.

Bottom line - a storm of the phone calls and Facebook messages ensued and the cruise companies backed up in 2011-2012.

BTW, the well-know site with the deckplans now openly states for all Celebrity ships "All loungers are being removed from ALL staterooms balconies for "safety" reasons" 

How about guessing what that mysterious "safety" issue could be? For example, somebody decided to sleep on the balcony overnight and, while going at night to the bathroom, got injured in the darkness? Or, could not recall (again overnight) how to open the balcony door from the outside and then had to use an impromptu "bathroom"?

5 hours ago, cttraveller said:

Many unhappy folks.  Please leave Celebrity if you not happy with the experience.  There no need to announce your exit. 

Several years ago, Celebrity had a representative here ("Celebrity Cruises") that apparently monitored the board and sometimes could even relay those things the "folks" were "unhappy" with back to Celebrity HQ. Unfortunately you cannot go back that far in search any longer after the Forum was revamped like ~three years ago, so I cannot cite any specifics post.

I guess the hope that Celebrity is listening is still alive 🙂

10 hours ago, DaKahuna said:

I personally believe those working in Luminae need a bit of time here and there to relax and get ready for the next meal. 

I feel a slightest hint of bias towards Celebrity employees 🙂. Like looking for an excuse rather than finding a solution.

More seriously though, other lines allow for extended open hours of their Suite restaurant, e.g., NCL Haven. Or Princess's suite breakfast in Sabatini's. Also, the buffet (aka OVC) somehow finds the resources to stay open for extended hours..