Celebrity Silhouette March 28 - April 8

[groryjm]

@DaKahuna who is is seving at tha WCB at the moment?

 

I highly recomend the Spiked IPA at the Retreat sun deck😎

[DaKahuna]

6 minutes ago, groryjm said:

@DaKahuna who is is seving at tha WCB at the moment?

 

 

 Yolanda was the young lady who served us our drinks last night.  There was another gentleman there but he was at the opposite end of the bar.  

6 minutes ago, groryjm said:

I highly recomend the Spiked IPA at the Retreat sun deck😎

 

 My appologies but there are two terms that should never be used together.   "recommend" and "IPA".  Sorry, I have tried to like IPA but unfortunately I have failed.   When I do drink beer, it is a porter/stout or a nice Belgian ale. 

 

[Pinboy]

9 hours ago, DaKahuna said:

On a real Rolex the second hand is a smooth flow versus a second by second tick.  

Off topic--

I believe Rolex did make " second by second "  ( quartz ) watches at one time.

The ones they sell on the islands -- who knows ??----- ( I do ).

LOL-- When you see 43 people wearing 'em on the way back to the ship, checking the time every few minutes, --- that's a pretty good indication they all bought a " real " Rolix.

[groryjm]

1 hour ago, DaKahuna said:

..... My appologies but there are two terms that should never be used together.   "recommend" and "IPA".  Sorry, I have tried to like IPA but unfortunately I have failed.   When I do drink beer, it is a porter/stout or a nice Belgian ale. 

 

Its not actually a beer as such but a cocktail. I would normally steer clear of beer on general principles but last summer this became a firm favourite of mine along the Coperhead. My Gastrognome was rather partial to the Retreat. Recipes below... 

 

Retreat
80m don julio blanco
40m dry rose
30m lemon
20ml early grey syrup
10ml sloe gin
40ml tonic
   

Copperhead 
80ml bourbon
10ml Drambuie 
20ml amontillado
3dsh orange  bitters

 

Spiked IPA
60ml vodka
30ml lemon
3drps Bittetmans hopped grapefruit
60ml IPA

Edited March 30, 2022 by groryjm

[DaKahuna]

17 minutes ago, groryjm said:

Its not actually a beer as such but a cocktail. I would normally steer clear of beer on general principles but last summer this became a firm favourite of mine along the Coperhead. My Gastrognome was rather partial to the Retreat. Recipes below... 

 

Retreat
80m don julio blanco
40m dry rose
30m lemon
20ml early grey syrup
10ml sloe gin
40ml tonic
   

Copperhead 
80ml bourbon
10ml Drambuie 
20ml amontillado
3dsh orange  bitters

 

Spiked IPA
60ml vodka
30ml lemon
3drps Bittetmans hopped grapefruit
60ml IPA

 

 Ah - thank you.  Shows you how little I know.   I am signed up for the Mixology class later in the cruise. 

 

[DaKahuna]

Just wanted to provide an update on the staffing issue I mentioned. 

 

They are indeed short staffed and some staff have been shifted to the MDR to fill gaps as best the can.  The good news is that they are expecting to add additional staff at the end of this sailing, April 8, before heading on the TA.  

 

We have been experiencing winds of 30+ MPH since leaving Ft. Lauderdale so I have not ventured outside since leaving port, except to walk along side the pool to the solarium.  Captain's announcement this morning mentioned that we are expecting winds of about that speed in Aruba tomorrow.   The winds and waves have put a little motion to the ship and I have been sleeping like a baby being gently rocked to sleep each night/morning. 

 

 

Edited March 30, 2022 by DaKahuna

[DaKahuna]

Sopmething else I neglect to mention in my comparison of the Retreat Lounge to Michael's Club.  There is a continental breakfast put out each morning in the Retreat Lounge and pupu's / snacks put out at various times during the day.  Instead of having our Retreat Host delivery or having to go to Cafe al Bacio for our morning Bailey's and coffee and almond croissant, they are both available in the Retreat lounge.  This was something I did not remember experiencing on Reflection.   Unfortunately, I did not have a camera with me this morning but I will make a point of taking a picture of tomorrow or the next day. 

 

 

[GREG781]

1 hour ago, groryjm said:

Its not actually a beer as such but a cocktail. I would normally steer clear of beer on general principles but last summer this became a firm favourite of mine along the Coperhead. My Gastrognome was rather partial to the Retreat. Recipes below... 

 

Retreat
80m don julio blanco
40m dry rose
30m lemon
20ml early grey syrup
10ml sloe gin
40ml tonic
   

Copperhead 
80ml bourbon
10ml Drambuie 
20ml amontillado
3dsh orange  bitters

 

Spiked IPA
60ml vodka
30ml lemon
3drps Bittetmans hopped grapefruit
60ml IPA

Boy do I miss my numerous daily Copperheads from the Apex last week!

[Jim_Iain]

Really enjoying reading along.    Do you happen to know who the Hotel Director is.   We were hoping that Nina was back.

[DaKahuna]

5 hours ago, Jim_Iain said:

Really enjoying reading along.    Do you happen to know who the Hotel Director is.   We were hoping that Nina was back.

 

 No, I do not know but will endeavor to find out.  

 

 There has been a noticeable absence of senior officers seen around the ship.  On our last cruise we ran into the Captain and most of his senior staff almost daily.  

 

[DaKahuna]

To those who may have been expecting me to be more verbose I apologize.  This being the third day and we have not made a port of call yet, our first is tomorrow in Aruba, I really have not been up to very much.   But here is a summary of today's activities. 

 

Foregoing room service we decided to have breakfast in Luminae.  Nothing good, bad, or indifferent.  It was french toast, bacon, apple juice, coffee with Baily's and almond croissant for my wife, two eggs over easy, English back bacon, corn beef hash, coffee with Bailey's and an almond croissant for myself.  

After breakfast we proceeded to the casino to make the first of multiple daily donations to the gambling gods.  They were as unforgiving as always and kept more than they gave back.  Thank goodness for lots of OBC. 

 

A quick trip to the Retreat Lounge for some Vitamin Zero water and to relax for a bit and then up to the room we went.   We relaxed in our room until noon and then went to Sushi on Five for lunch.  It was enjoyable.  My wife had the Eel Dragon roll and gyoza.  I had the lobster and shrimp wonton, sashimi omakase and sushi omakase. Some sake (hot  filtered for her, cold unfiltered for me) to go with it and we were all set. 

 

Unfortunately after lunch work got in the way so back to the room for an hour plus conference call.  I have noticed that I have had pretty good luck with the Premium (Streaming) WiFi and WebEx calls.  Even an hour Microsoft Teams call yesterday only dropped once on me.  But curiously, there are some activities I did not have an issue with on Reflection in December but cannot get to work this cruise (Citrix).  HOpefully I will find a nice wifi source tomorrow in Aruba and can connect to my work email. 

 

Dinner in Luminae was good.  My wife loves french onion soup so she orders that almost every night.  Everthing else tonight was off the Luminae menu.  She had the chicken and I had the cod.  We both had the scallop carpaccio.  The Braised short rib was wonderful, as always.  

 

You may want to fire me now because I have neglected to take a lot of food pictures this go around.  I'm not a big fan of posting pictures that have been posted numerous times before but again, if there is something you want me to try and post a picture of, please let me know.  I will say that we have been showing up at Luminae around 6:15 - 6:30 pm for dinner and have not had to wait and have been seated promptly.  Lunch on Tuesday was the only time we've had people in front of us and seen the restaurant more than 50% full. 

 

After dinner it was a stop by the martini bar for the 8:30 pm performance.  I tried to post a video I took but it failed to upload.  There are any number of them on YouTube already anyway.  It was a good show. 

 

From the Martini Bar we proceeded to the theater where we saw Tim the cruise director for the first time.  He said that he had just completed a 10-day quarantine for COVID.   He also informed us that the passenger count for our sailing is 1456.  More than I thought as the ship seems very uncrowded but that number represents just over 50 percent capacity.  

 

Tonight's entertainment was a quartet called December '63.  They did Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons top hits. We both enjoyed their performance.  They will be back once more toward the end of the cruise so we plan to catch them again. 

 

From the theater we went to the Ensemble Lounge for a night cap and to listen to a solo guitarist / singer named Bryony Drake.  She did performed songs by folk artist like Joni Mitchell and James Taylor.  I have heard better but she was not horrible.   Given the opportunity, we would listen to her again. 

 

That is pretty much our leisurely day in a nutshell.  See, I warned folks back in December I was boring. Now you have more proof. 

 

 

Edited March 31, 2022 by DaKahuna

[raudacruise]

No John, you are not at all boring. I’m enjoying reading your posts.

 

My waiter was actually quite chatty during my March 7 and March 18 Silhouette cruises. Glad he didn’t catch Covid from me. (Of course he was always wearing a mask.)

[DaKahuna]

14 hours ago, Jim_Iain said:

Really enjoying reading along.    Do you happen to know who the Hotel Director is.   We were hoping that Nina was back.

Jim, it is not Nina.  The HD is a gentleman from Croatia who used to be the Maitre’d.  I caught that his name starts with a V but did not quite grasp the name.  They did not publish a senior officer’s list and I have not seen many of the senior officer’s out and about.  

[DaKahuna]

5 hours ago, raudacruise said:

No John, you are not at all boring. I’m enjoying reading your posts.

 

Thank you for your kind words.

 

5 hours ago, raudacruise said:

My waiter was actually quite chatty during my March 7 and March 18 Silhouette cruises. Glad he didn’t catch Covid from me. (Of course he was always wearing a mask.)

Ours can be given time.  It seems when Luminae is less busy he does take time to talk with us but as I said earlier Luminae is short staffed and it is not always possible for him to take a lot of time with any of his guest. 

[Cathy in Boston]

We are on this same trip so I feel compelled to comment.  I agree with nearly all of your observations with a couple of things that are exactly opposite.  First, the two USB ports in our lamp work, so I guess we got lucky.  Second, our sommelier in Luminae is great, and made many suggestions.  They were out of our fave Decoy as well unfortunately, but he always stops by with suggestions.  The other weird opposite is we asked our butler to remove the liquor as well and replace it with just Evian and he was very reluctant to.  He said he would just check to make sure we had water.

 

All that being said, so far we are having a great time.  My husband won the Beatles trivia contest and now we are at the RIU as we bought a resort for the day.  Tuscan Grill tonight.

[DaKahuna]

6 minutes ago, Cathy in Boston said:

We are on this same trip so I feel compelled to comment.  I agree with nearly all of your observations with a couple of things that are exactly opposite.  First, the two USB ports in our lamp work, so I guess we got lucky.  Second, our sommelier in Luminae is great, and made many suggestions.  They were out of our fave Decoy as well unfortunately, but he always stops by with suggestions.  The other weird opposite is we asked our butler to remove the liquor as well and replace it with just Evian and he was very reluctant to.  He said he would just check to make sure we had water.

 

All that being said, so far we are having a great time.  My husband won the Beatles trivia contest and now we are at the RIU as we bought a resort for the day.  Tuscan Grill tonight.

 Glad your bedside USB ports are working.  My work around is to charge my tablet all day and only use it at night.  It’s primary purpose is as our alarm clock. 
 

There is only one sommelier in Luminae and we have seen him with a number of the guest, just not so much with us.  He has been so busy that our waiter has been taking our wine order.  Not a ‘complaint’ that I would take to management but more of an observation.  I also tried to order Decoy the first day and found out they were out. 
 

We chose not to do any excursion here in Aruba. We are not beach people nor do we spend a lot of time in the sun. Our plan is to just walk around and see what we see. 
 

I am sure you will have a great time at RiU.

 

[az4ship]

I enjoy your posts and don’t find them boring.  I board on April 8 so I am interested in everything going on the ship.  Enjoy your cruise 

[MamaChach]

17 hours ago, Jim_Iain said:

Really enjoying reading along.    Do you happen to know who the Hotel Director is.   We were hoping that Nina was back.

We just got off the Silhouette Monday.  The hotel director is John Flynn.  He is always out and about chatting with guests!  We loved him!

[Jim_Iain]

4 hours ago, DaKahuna said:

Jim, it is not Nina.  The HD is a gentleman from Croatia who used to be the Maitre’d.  I caught that his name starts with a V but did not quite grasp the name.  They did not publish a senior officer’s list and I have not seen many of the senior officer’s out and about.  

Thanks John.    Not to worry.    BTW -  on the TV buried very deep they have the officers listed and a short biography of each.

[DaKahuna]

7 hours ago, Jim_Iain said:

Thanks John.    Not to worry.    BTW -  on the TV buried very deep they have the officers listed and a short biography of each.

I will check that out tonight or tomorrow. When we have turned the TV on we’ve pretty much only looked at Channel 1. 
 

i have been to the iLounge twice and the one person there has been busy dealing with customers having issues and there has been a waiting line.  I’ll keep trying to find out about stock but looking at the display, I am not seeing any iPads, only MacBook Pro’s. 
 

[DaKahuna]

We are currently enjoying post dinner drinks in the Ensemble Lounge listening to the Vivace Sting Duet.  Two wonderful violinist playing some soothing music.  
 

We have tried to make most of their evening appearances.  They have also played in Cafe al Bacia a couple of times but we’ve not made those yet.

 

[Jim_Iain]

15 minutes ago, DaKahuna said:

I will check that out tonight or tomorrow. When we have turned the TV on we’ve pretty much only looked at Channel 1. 
 

i have been to the iLounge twice and the one person there has been busy dealing with customers having issues and there has been a waiting line.  I’ll keep trying to find out about stock but looking at the display, I am not seeing any iPads, only MacBook Pro’s. 
 

Thanks John but don't go out of your way.    Being a teckno nerd I was just going through all the menus one day and found it -  I Think it was under the information area. 

 

I'm not expecting much in the iLounge but sure seems logical with as much OBC credit that most have would be a good chance for Celebrity and the Vendor to cash in. 

[DaKahuna]

14 minutes ago, Jim_Iain said:

Thanks John but don't go out of your way.    Being a teckno nerd I was just going through all the menus one day and found it -  I Think it was under the information area. 

 

I'm not expecting much in the iLounge but sure seems logical with as much OBC credit that most have would be a good chance for Celebrity and the Vendor to cash in. 

Jim,  it is no trouble at all. 
 

My wife has discovered that she can do a room charge to the slot machines in the casino so spending OBC has become a non-issue.  She has won a couple of times but since it is ‘free money’ and non- refundable, we come out ahead anyway. 
 

[dateacher]

There is no Ron Zacapa anywhere on board.  There is not a lot of other 'quality' rums onboard from what I have gathered.  In the World Class bar, the Zacapa Old Fashioned is being made with Brucal Anejo (see photo) .. Not the same at all.

 

We were on the Silhouette the week before you and went to the World Class bar for the first time and went back every night. I didn't know that the Brugal Rum was not the original recipe.  We loved this old fashioned but ignorance is bliss. 

[dateacher]

On 3/30/2022 at 8:10 AM, DaKahuna said:

 

 Yolanda was the young lady who served us our drinks last night.  There was another gentleman there but he was at the opposite end of the bar.  

 

 My appologies but there are two terms that should never be used together.   "recommend" and "IPA".  Sorry, I have tried to like IPA but unfortunately I have failed.   When I do drink beer, it is a porter/stout or a nice Belgian ale. 

 

On the March 18 sailing, the bartenders at WCB were Shawn and Mikahala (both wonderful) with occasional help from a woman whose name I didn't get.