Azmara VS Celebrity

We have one booked on AZ for SE Asia for 2019. They do more days in ports and port much closer to cities. For some itineraries, it can be a difference in hours (not just minutes). I admit that I am concerned about what to do when we have nights on the ship. Could be boring. Royal Caribbean has great entertainment. Celebrity has very good entertainment. Azamara, probably not so much. We'll have a great time. Our price for 15 nights in balcony cabin is $5,155 per person but a give back of $1,700 OBC, so effective price is $4,300 per person for 15 nights. $287 per night is not horrific when you consider gratuities and drinks are included.

I really disliked the cabins. Harpenden commented they were fine for him, DH is someone who played college football with a stature to match. Sharing with him, the cabin is tight. In the loo there is barely room to turn around for me (and I am no former football player). But your concern about entertainment is different. I did enjoy what we had but you need to expect something different. One thing they did was folkloric shows. In Dublin we had the dancers from the Gayety theatre which does the 'Riverdance' shows. Excellent performances and not something you get on the main cruise lines.

There was dancing nightly and lots of folks enjoyed that. The cruise director had Broadway credits and did a lovely one man show. The Azamazing evenings were very fun and quite special. I have travelled Azamara twice and neither cruise did the White nights event get to be on deck which is the most special that people talk about but the singing and music for that was great.

So you will enjoy but don't expect big production shows or comics from the Las Vegas circuit. Different but fun.

I was looking at perhaps doing a shorter cruise to see if I'd like Az.

 

I saw a couple of 4 dayers next year that go to Cuba or Key West/Cuba. They have a promotion where their insides are priced the same as balconies (balconies lower priced than outsides).

 

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Just remember to research the latest rules for US citizens travel to Cuba. Some rules are still in place. :confused:

I've looked at sailing Azamara but am yet to take the plunge. What I would say is that's it's almost pointless to compare an AZ balcony room to an X balcony because price wise the cost of an AZ balcony is closer to an X sky suite.

 

Open two browsers for your favourite TA, find similar itineraries and times and compare the overall packages and you'll see what I mean. Just remember to factor in all four perks with a sky suite and work out a dollar per night cost and you'll see what I mean.

 

A 300 sq ft sky suite is a lot more appealing than a 175 sq ft balcony room to me personally. The X premium drinks package is as I understand quite a bit better than the included AZ offering for those that this is important too.

 

Does anyone have any thoughts how Luminae compares to the AZ restaurants and how suite class service stacks up against AZ?

 

I completely appreciate that itinerary will be a massive factor though, but if you look hard enough you will find some that are comparable and with those it's difficult to switch to an AZ balcony when it's of a comparable cost to an S class ships sky suite.

I was able to compare an AZ veranda to an M-class Celebrity Suite last year. Luminae is comparable to AZ MDR. Can't compare specialty restaurants because we were so happy with the regular options that we never tried them. Celebrity Suite is larger than any cabin we have ever had and really well laid out -- but the furnishings are well past their sell-by date. I see that Celebrity is going to fix that, but not for several more years -- whereas AZ has completely upgraded all the cabins and suites. The rest of the public areas: AZ is refined, quiet, and comfortable; X is increasingly noisy and crowded.

I'm not a good source re the included drinks packages because DW doesn't drink and I only drink wine with dinner -- the included wines on both were satisfactory and the waiters were able and willing to get me a different included wine from the day's official pouring. Both include bottle water and don't fuss when you bring water back onto the ship [i'm looking at you, NCL -- which prohibits you from bringing even the water you bought from them back on!]

Entertainment on AZ has very good guest artists, but the production shows are way below the standard of the big cruise lines. Outside of the main theater, Celebrity has had so many cutbacks that it's hard to say they are better than AZ [Princess wins on this one based on our most recent cruise].

But the two areas where AZ is strongly superior to Celebrity and Princess and HAL are: itineraries and service. Except for TAs, most AZ cruises have more port stops, stay longer in the ports, visit more unusual ports -- and don't repeat the same itinerary over and over, so you can put together a b2b2b and keep going into different areas. Onboard service is the difference between luxury and faceless. On AZ you will be called by name, your preferences will be remembered -- and even the top stripes will be visible, eager to interact with you, and will jump into action to fix any complaint. Our Butler in the Celebrity Suite was many of those things, but without stripes he couldn't fix stuff above his pay grade and we had no access to the people who could.

So the bottom line for me is that at similar prices [which is often the case], I would take a Celebrity Suite in the Caribbean where I really don't care what island we have allegedly called at or those places that AZ doesn't sail to [e.g. New Zealand] -- but I would take a Club Continent suite on AZ for most other parts of the world.

Thanks for the reply. It's nice to see some objective comparisons.

As for AZ I've noticed some pretty big price increases recently but I guess if you've just modernised a lot of cabins and are about to purchase a third ship you'll need to raise revenues as you'll have some very big bills to pay! When I book an AZ cruise it will because of the itinerary, other factors are not selling it to me. O looks more appealing.

P.S I had to laugh at your Caribbean comment. I think we see the world through very similar eyes.

Just remember to research the latest rules for US citizens travel to Cuba. Some rules are still in place. :confused:

Also, saw on the news that some tourists have reported the same problem that hit the embassy staff with this noise thing that's going on.

State department has issued a travel warning.

https://travel.state.gov/content/passports/en/alertswarnings/cuba-travel-warning.html

Also, saw on the news that some tourists have reported the same problem that hit the embassy staff with this noise thing that's going on.

 

State department has issued a travel warning.

 

https://travel.state.gov/content/passports/en/alertswarnings/cuba-travel-warning.html

That's interesting. Where did this take place? Hotels?

Thanks for the reply. It's nice to see some objective comparisons.

 

As for AZ I've noticed some pretty big price increases recently but I guess if you've just modernised a lot of cabins and are about to purchase a third ship you'll need to raise revenues as you'll have some very big bills to pay! When I book an AZ cruise it will because of the itinerary, other factors are not selling it to me. O looks more appealing.

 

P.S I had to laugh at your Caribbean comment. I think we see the world through very similar eyes.

Thanks. I think any linkage between the renovations and the higher fares works opposite to your guess: they were able to get approval for the expenses [from RCCL] because they could point to the revenue. In the Cruise Critic interview with Larry Pimentel

Azamara's Larry Pimentel Talks New Ship and Future Plans

https://www.cruisecritic.com/news/news.cfm?ID=8155

he says: "We had one unsold stateroom in the first six months of 2017." That's pretty solid proof that the higher fares aren't driving customers away.

Thanks. I think any linkage between the renovations and the higher fares works opposite to your guess: they were able to get approval for the expenses [from RCCL] because they could point to the revenue. In the Cruise Critic interview with Larry Pimentel

Azamara's Larry Pimentel Talks New Ship and Future Plans

https://www.cruisecritic.com/news/news.cfm?ID=8155

he says: "We had one unsold stateroom in the first six months of 2017." That's pretty solid proof that the higher fares aren't driving customers away.

An interesting read, thanks for posting and yep, it all makes sense.

It will definitely be worth looking at the new itineraries in a few days. :)