Notes about my music charter cruise on the Celebrity Summit, February 25 - March 2

[Honolulu Blue]

This isn't going to be your typical review, but I wanted to talk about some hot button topics here and jot down some things I especially want to remember:

 

1. The dinner buffet was up to pre-2023 standards. The stations were all full of quality food every day. Whether this was because of all our complaints or instructions from the charter company, I'm not certain. But I very much appreciated it.

 

2. I didn't see or smell any pork and beans in the OVC. 👍

 

3. English bacon, mmmm. 😍 I missed it the last two days, though. 😕

 

4. I never dined in the MDR

 

5. I only saw my cabin steward on the first day, when I dropped off my bags and disappeared.

 

6. He did a pretty good job cleaning up, turning the room down, and providing daily chocolates.

 

7. I want to do a special shout out to some people that I met;

 

* The lady from Alabama who had different life and cruise plans but was fun to talk to anyway

* The lady who sometimes danced with me at the KC and the Sunshine Band concert and didn't laugh when I shook my booty

* The lady who was a 10x vet of the Soul Train cruise and knew more about the major music charter players than I did

* The guy who went to the same university I did, but a few years earlier 

 

8. A couple of shout outs to people I didn't meet:

 

* I saw the lead singer of Queen Nation as he hung out with us as we were getting ready to disembark:

 

* This guy was randomly picked out of the stands to sing a Sonny and Cher song. You only get one guess as to which one it was:

 

BTW, the singer was Cara Lee. She was good. I might not mention her again.

 

9. Nothing to do with Celebrity, but rideshares are getting expensive these days

 

10. Sample charter newsletter:

 

11. Sample Celebrity newsletter from the same day:

 

12. I saw 8 concerts on this cruise. I already mentioned KC and the Sunshine Band, Queen Nation and Cara Lee. The others were Taylor Dayne...

 

Al McKay and his Allstars...

 

Ashlie Amber (doing Whitney Houston songs)...

 

Boogie Wonder Band...

 

The Whispers...

 

And Kool and the Gang...

 

13. I could have seen twice as many concerts as I did, had I had the energy and the inclination 

 

14. The KC and the Sunshine Band concert was on land, in Key West. It was more hassle to get to and from this show than the others, but worth it, IMHO.

 

15. I thought all of these concerts were good. I rated Kool and the Gang's show the best of the bunch. Appropriately it came on the last evening.

 

16. The cruise director Jason Venner was a hired gun - not a Celebrity employee and not an employee of the charter.

 

 

17. Jason introduced many of the performers I saw, but he also told a dire story...

 

18. He had a message from the charter company to us: they were disappointed in our financial performance so far and there needed to be changes made in order for the cruise to continue in future years. Few details were given, other than we were to look for an email blast from them. Yes sir.

 

19. Overall I had a wonderful time and would recommend this and similar music charters to fans of the genre and era.

 

20. Did I mention that this was the Ultimate Disco Cruise? I guess I should do so now.

 

I've tired most of you out, but for those of you who hung in there, thank you very much. If you have some questions about this cruise and my experience, go ahead and ask. I'll try to answer when I can. I will be boarding another cruise in a few hours (not Celebrity) and my Internet access will be limited after that.

[hcat]

very nice posts..Thanks.

nice to see something diff on here now and then.

[dlh015]

Wow! Kool and the Gang! Brings back memories...

 

Thanks for sharing!

[Honolulu Blue]

Thanks everyone. One more note for now:

 

21. The good news is we had Starlink onboard. More good news- it was relatively stable and reliable. The bad news is that the basic access I had was heavily throttled. This is the best I could do with it:

[newtocruiseinblue]

Great review! Thank you!

[Mike981]

I appreciate your reviews. I hope to someday take in a music charter, mostly because of your reviews. Thank you~

[Honolulu Blue]

35 minutes ago, Mike981 said:

I appreciate your reviews. I hope to someday take in a music charter, mostly because of your reviews. Thank you~

Thank you for your kind words. Music charters are a lot of fun. I did this one, and I did two last year. I'm actually on another one right now.

 

Be sure to stop by the Theme Cruise board for more from me and people who have a lot more experience than I do.