Seriously now-how many of you are REALLY looking at other cruise lines because of the CEO's changes going on?

[xamsx]

3 hours ago, Keys Kathy said:

OK, let's do a quick survey. Just your CC status, please, and if you are staying with X or looking elsewhere. 

 

Elite-plus, booking elsewhere.

Elite. Booking elsewhere.

[MustBCruzn]

3 hours ago, Keys Kathy said:

OK, let's do a quick survey. Just your CC status, please, and if you are staying with X or looking elsewhere. 

 

Elite-plus, booking elsewhere.

 

Elite-plus, booked 3 HAL in 2024, 2 HAL and 1 Viking Ocean in 2025. First time in 15 years we've booked a line other than X.

[Cruise till you drop]

11 minutes ago, doghog said:

I'm not impressed with any of MSC intinaries for the Caribbean. 7 or 11 night cruises. Limited ports and their longer cruises are like B2B cruises with a TAD.  Leaving from Miami, New York or Port Canaveral. I like their 10 and 11 night US/Canada cruise intinaries. 

 

I agree.  I want to try it as I’ve heard the ship experience is good but I hate almost all their itineraries as it’s almost all Western Caribbean 

[Cruise till you drop]

3 hours ago, Keys Kathy said:

OK, let's do a quick survey. Just your CC status, please, and if you are staying with X or looking elsewhere. 

 

Elite-plus, booking elsewhere.

Classic with 2 completed on the Edge and 2 booked on Equinox and Beyond and definitely doing more although open to Princess for Alaska and Europe in future if there is a way I can secure a specific cabin (which they’ve not been able to do)

 

 

Edited September 10, 2023 by Cruise till you drop

[Hawaiiatheart]

Elite plus, have a cruise booked on Celebrity for April.  Then looking elsewhere!

[bigbenboys]

Elite Plus, were 800 to Zenith, 36 cruises with X. I want my Premium drink package for being Zenith. Wait, dont I already get that with suites. Booked a Princess Penthouse Suite for Feb. 1st time in 12 years. 

Edited September 10, 2023 by bigbenboys
added info

[terrydtx]

26 minutes ago, doghog said:

I'm not impressed with any of MSC intinaries for the Caribbean. 7 or 11 night cruises. Limited ports and their longer cruises are like B2B cruises with a TAD.  Leaving from Miami, New York or Port Canaveral. I like their 10 and 11 night US/Canada cruise intinaries. 

I looked at MSC for non-Caribbean cruises and couldn't find any YC itinerary that was longer than 7 nights that we liked. And the few I found did not have the YC on that ship, so no MSC for us for now.

Edited September 10, 2023 by terrydtx

[drakes2]

23 hours ago, the penguins said:

Just like Ian or phonetically ean

I met them both during a slot pull on our recent Apex TA.  Very nice men

[bigbenboys]

29 minutes ago, doghog said:

I'm not impressed with any of MSC intinaries for the Caribbean. 7 or 11 night cruises. Limited ports and their longer cruises are like B2B cruises with a TAD.  Leaving from Miami, New York or Port Canaveral. I like their 10 and 11 night US/Canada cruise intinaries. 

Where can you smoke on MSC?

Smoking is permitted in several bars on each ship, and on one side (indicated by signage) of the principal outdoor pool deck areas, where ashtrays are provided.

Is smoking permitted inside on MSC. This is a no go for us. Even if YC is very nice.

[mac_tlc]

Diamond + on Royal, Elite + on Celebrity.

 

No future Royal cruises booked, 3 future X booked (when pricing was sane).

 

Booked Oceania Vista for November 2024 last week, booked HAL Koningsdam for January 2025 today. 

 

 

mac_tlc

[MamaFej]

I kind of feel like the Level and where looking/booking would be a good separate thread, maybe as a poll?

Zenith and staying with X

Zenith and looking elsewhere

Elite Plus and staying with X

Elite Plus and looking elsewhere

Etc.

 

But since it isn't, I'll play, too,

 

We are E+ on Celebrity and Discoverer Plus on Azamara (mostly with X points) and Platinum on Princess. We are very much looking and booking elsewhere, with 6 booked long ago on X, 2 on Princess, 2 on Ama Waterways, 1 on Viking Ocean, 1 on Azamara (which will likely become a B3B in 2025).

[doghog]

6 minutes ago, bigbenboys said:

Where can you smoke on MSC?

Smoking is permitted in several bars on each ship, and on one side (indicated by signage) of the principal outdoor pool deck areas, where ashtrays are provided.

Is smoking permitted inside on MSC. This is a no go for us. Even if YC is very nice.

Why are you asking me that? Where in my post you quoted did I even remotely say anything about smoking? 

[Rustyman]

Celebrity don’t seem to care too much about customers, evidenced by the way they are changing the product in a negative way after we have booked. Now this can work both ways if those who are considering cancelling wait until the last moment or just allow their final payment date to pass then Celebrity will struggle to fill their ships. This would give them a wake up call that they can’t treat their customers with such disdain and hopefully lead to a return to what only a year ago was a premium product. Or of course they could allay all concerns by cancelling all of the ridiculous cost saving initiatives recently implemented.

We have never based our Celebrity cruises on price alone, our priority has always been quality, you just can’t remove the quality and expect everyone to return, loyalty is hard earned but easily lost.

 

[Ken the cruiser]

20 minutes ago, Cruise till you drop said:

Classic with 2 completed on the Edge and 2 booked on Equinox and Beyond and definitely doing more although open to Princess for Alaska and Europe in future if there is a way I can secure a specific cabin (which they’ve not been able to do)

I think I figured out what the issue is with you not being able to find a PCL Premium Deluxe Balcony for 2 on the Enchanted. However, I can't seem to find the PCL Forum thread you originally identified the problem on to post what I discovered. Has it been removed or was it started by someone else and you just started posting to it?

[terrydtx]

1 minute ago, mac_tlc said:

Diamond + on Royal, Elite + on Celebrity.

 

No future Royal cruises booked, 3 future X booked (when pricing was sane).

 

Booked Oceania Vista for November 2024 last week, booked HAL Koningsdam for January 2025 today. 

 

 

mac_tlc

My TA was telling me last week, as bad as Celebrity has raised prices Royal has raised theirs even worse. We are also booked on the Koingsdam in November from San Diego.

[hcat]

Elite +...

already booked on ASCENT and APEX

looking into CUNARD

 

Plan to Book Silhouette after the Oct 4th changes... cruise only..probably add daily grats and Classic Alc..do not need wifi

[grandgeezer]

Elite + about 1200 points.

 

Probably done cruising. The only real positive, as we see it, is only having to unpack and pack once, although we visited several different ports. About 12-15 years ago we new at least a dozen, or so couples that cruised several times a year. We know no one who has cruised, even before the shutdown. Everyone said the exact same thing, “we don’t think the product currently offered is worth the price being asked”. 

Us, at one time we were die hard Celebrity/RCL cheerleaders. Between the start of 2022 through 2016 , we five cruises on RCL and thirteen on Celebrity, and one on HAL. The one on HAL was a fourteen day cruise to Alaska, the middle of August. It went to places like Anchorage, Homer, and others. There was no ports that were repeated. To be quite honest, except for the weather. it was quite nice.

Like everybody, we had choices, either lower our expectations and cruise or move on. Took all of two seconds.

 

[bigbenboys]

6 minutes ago, doghog said:

Why are you asking me that? Where in my post you quoted did I even remotely say anything about smoking? 

My comment was more about MCS in general. Sorry

[doghog]

5 minutes ago, bigbenboys said:

My comment was more about MCS in general. Sorry

We've never cruised with MSC. Best to cruise on over to the MSC forum and ask that specific question. 

Edited September 10, 2023 by doghog

[mahdnc]

4 hours ago, Keys Kathy said:

OK, let's do a quick survey. Just your CC status, please, and if you are staying with X or looking elsewhere. 

 

Elite-plus, booking elsewhere.

Elite, have four Celebrity cruises booked that we will take because of the attractive itineraries. We expect our November Galapagos to be fine which will make us E+. We will see how our December Far East sailing on Solstice goes to decide whether we will book again. We have a couple of long expensive land vacations (skiing, Fiji diving, and exploring all the national parks in the Alaskan interior) in mind that we keep putting off in favor of doing cruises on Celebrity. We will see. 

[mac_tlc]

9 minutes ago, terrydtx said:

My TA was telling me last week, as bad as Celebrity has raised prices Royal has raised theirs even worse. We are also booked on the Koingsdam in November from San Diego.

Especially their suites and especially the new ships.

 

Here are a couple of sample prices I was following. For two people.

 

Beyond, 6N, 5/26/24, Sky Suite, $629 pppd

MSC Seashore, 7N, 5/26/2024, YC Grand Deluxe, $452 pppd

Symphony of the Seas, 7N, 5/24/2024, Grand Suite, $533 pppd

Wonder of the Seas, 7N, 5/26/2024, Grand Suite, $1,006 pppd.

 

Icon is even higher.

 

mac_tlc

[zanderblue]

Elite

Already cancelled one future Celebrity, so now looking elsewhere

[paulh84]

We'll continue to look at options. Elite. Not canceling anything except potentially one Celebrity cruise based on itinerary. Nothing to do with the cruise line. I don't think Mediterranean cruises are for us. Far too crowded and not enough time in port.

 

Princess - one and probably done. Very mediocre all around. Their longer than 7 but shorter than 14 night options for the Caribbean are extremely limited. 

NCL/Royal Caribbean/Carnival - not even on the radar unless Haven wasn't even more expensive than Retreat.

Virgin Voyages - on the to do list maybe when 2025 itineraries come out this week.

MSC - only would consider YC but the cabins are so dark and dreary. itineraries are not great and the ships generally gaudy. I think we would feel stuck in YC. 

 

Right now on Celebrity:

January 2024 - Ascent in Retreat 

September 2024 - France/Spain/Italy on Equinox - may cancel due to itinerary 

 

For the Jan/Feb 2025 cruises I've looked at Celebrity, Princess and NCL are all very similar in price. I will probably book something later this fall for that timeframe and I would say there's an 80% chance it is going to be on Celebrity.

 

 

 

Edited September 10, 2023 by paulh84

[islabahia]

Elite.  One last cruise on X to use $$$ of FCC’s and then moving on.  Regent and Oceania are interesting to us.

[Cruise till you drop]

45 minutes ago, Ken the cruiser said:

I think I figured out what the issue is with you not being able to find a PCL Premium Deluxe Balcony for 2 on the Enchanted. However, I can't seem to find the PCL Forum thread you originally identified the problem on to post what I discovered. Has it been removed or was it started by someone else and you just started posting to it?

I can’t remember myself. Sorry