Live from the Equinox in a Sunset SS 10/22 to 11/5 (b2b) hope to be able to answer questions

[Joker54]

We will do our best to get online and answer any questions that are posted.

 

 For those interested in the new Sky Suite Butler/no Butler situation here is how yesterday went.

 

Room was ready for us at 11:15 which was nice, however there are somethings that are missing from the bathroom, even still this morning so we will ask him about that next time we see him.

 

We met our room steward around 3, have yet to see the head butler. Met the suite Manager in the Retreat and she is hilarious and very friendly.

 

Room steward has picked up on a few things from previous cruisers in that the fridge was already empty. We thanked him for having that already cleared out.

We asked him for a few items, some appeared in the room, others did not like menu's for breakfast. So we called room service around 10pm and they delivered a few menu's with in 15 minutes.

 

Lunch in Luminae was so so, menu seemed to be the same. Staff were slow to pick up plates when we were finished, the DW ordered an ice tea which never came. 15 minutes after they picked up the plates from the main we got up and left as we couldn't wait any longer for desert to arrive due to Spa appointments.

 

Had dinner in Murano, food was great. They did not have enough waiters. Not sure if they are missing someone or if it is a cutback. Our waiter had tables all over the restaurant. He worked hard and the lack of staff didnt have a huge impact on us.

 

Our room attendant has 1 Penthouse, 2 RS's, 5 Aqua class rooms and our SS. Its a long way from the Penthouse to the stern to get to our Sunset SS. Feel bad for him. We asked him how the new process was working and he replied with the corporate line that SS passengers never use their butlers........

 

Cheers

 

[Barwick Cruiser]

Thanks for posting, what is your itinerary? Hope you enjoy a wonderful sailing and I look forward to more posts! 

[DaKahuna]

2 hours ago, Joker54 said:

 

Room was ready for us at 11:15 which was nice, however there are somethings that are missing from the bathroom, even still this morning so we will ask him about that next time we see him.

 

 Make sure you let the Suite Manager know if this continues to be an issue.  We normally give them one day to make corrections before escalating the issue. 

 

2 hours ago, Joker54 said:

Lunch in Luminae was so so, menu seemed to be the same. Staff were slow to pick up plates when we were finished, the DW ordered an ice tea which never came. 15 minutes after they picked up the plates from the main we got up and left as we couldn't wait any longer for desert to arrive due to Spa appointments.

 

 Definitely make sure you point this out to the Luminae Matire'd.  There is no way this is acceptable.  While it sounds like a staffing issue, it is still unacceptable and should be addressed immediately. 

 

 

[DelawareTom]

DW and I are doing a b2b in Jan./Feb. after not cruising since the pandemic started.

 

Embarkation questions:

-        What was the process at the pier?

-        Do you have to worry about vaccination?  Show your vaccination card?

-        Did you have an assigned time to check in?  Did it matter? 

-        Is there a special place for suite guests to check in?

 

Who is the suite manager?

Thanks very much.

[39august]

No vaccination cards. You can choose an assigned check in time when you check in on line for your Express Pass, however this does not matter as suites can check in at any time after check in has begun. Yes, suites check in is marked. The furthest door to your left as you face the building, then up an elevator to a very nice lounge 

[Joker54]

21 hours ago, Barwick Cruiser said:

Thanks for posting, what is your itinerary? Hope you enjoy a wonderful sailing and I look forward to more posts! 

George Town, Grand Caman

Cozumel, Mexico

Bimini, Bahamas

Then on the follow-on 8 night cruise

San Juan, Puerto Rico

Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas

Philipsburg, St. Maarten

Tortola, BVI

Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic

[Joker54]

Day 2

Breakfast in the suite, room service arrived at the time requested from the card we left out the night before. He set everything up on the coffee table.

 

Had the Filet in Luminae at lunch, DW had the cobb salad. The filet was a nice cut of meat and prepared well.The Cobb salad was as good as always.

 

The Luminae staff were much more attentive on day 2. Not sure if that is normal or if that is related to one waiter who recognized us as having sent a letter to the presidents office commending the team last November. That trip we were in the PH and treated like royalty in Luminae.

 

Dinner at Sushi on 5 - always great

 

Last night we added Latte's to the breakfast order - written off to the side as its not a listed item. We will see if it comes this morning and whether we get charged or not.

 

The suite attendant replenished the water when he did the evening room make up. This is something he did on his own as we have not asked him to do that for us.

 

We have not received the usual bag for hauling things around the yacht. Am going to ask about that today.

 

Laundry now takes 48 hours vs the old 24 hours?? Wonder if they reduced the laundry staff?

 

Others have posted how busy the Retreat Lounge concierge's have been, so far on this cruise they have not been busy at all.

 

Still have not seen the head butler, we may see him today as we asked the Retreat Concierge if we could get a second lounger on our Veranda - had to laugh when he said he would talk to our butler.....i really wanted to say we only had a room attendant but we want the furniture so no need to make a scene lol. He let us know later that the head butler was going to look into that today..... we will see

 

Cheers

[thebutlerdidit]

We found our bag underneath the laundry bag in our SS suite earlier this month. It was on my list of things to ask about. 
 

We never met the head butler, and had a so-so room steward. It was the first time I haven’t felt that an extra gratuity was earned. 

[Joker54]

Ship was in George Town, we stayed on board to enjoy the ship. Room service delivered breakfast at the appointed time and brought the requested Latte's from Cafe Al Bacio - checked our account this morning and pleasantly surprised that we were not charged for the coffee's

 

Still waiting to see the mysterious head butler. Wandered through the OVC and all stations seemed to be in use for breakfast. Everything looked very good. We will try to wander through this evening.

 

Dinner in Luminae - the waiter told us he remembered us as being the couple that wrote the letter to the president on their behalf - guessing that is why we are receiving a lot of attention. They did a great job last year and deserved that letter. Its nice that they remembered as its been a year and they see a lot of guests.

 

The DW had black bass and said it was very good. I enjoyed French Onion soup and the Seafood Meadly Orzo from the main dining room and it was excellent.

 

I am still looking to catch the name of the suite manager and hope to post that tomorrow.

 

Veranda has yet to be cleaned the entire trip. Will have that resolved today. Retreat host said the Staff Captain denied our request for a second lounger due to safety reasons - I guess our request to remove the existing chairs was also a safety issue..........................

 

Future Cruise desk has been busy. They have a 40% off each person and the sale shows ending but magically reappears. We went an priced an Aqua class room for an 8 night cruise in Dec and it came out to 6500 for the 2 of us. We declined and told them they wanted to much money, then the associate tried to talk us into purchasing a future cruise certificate - we politely declined again.

 

We are enjoying the cruise and the suite but going forward we will book a concierge room and save some money as it is way overpriced

 

Cheers

[Joker54]

Sorry for being mia for a few days.

 

We noticed one very important issue with the new Butler situation. Not only have they removed Butlers from the Sky Suites, they have also reduced the number of dedicated butlers on this ship to 2. So 2 butlers are responsible for the PH's, RS's and CS's. That is an impossible work load. We spoke with a guest who was in a Royal Suite and he mentioned that he never saw his Butler and that his requests were rarely completed. He was very frustrated.

 

Noticed that the menu's in Luminae are dated Feb 2023. So far they seem to be the same as on previous cruises. I had the "Beef Ribeye" the other night, it looked more like a roast and had been tied together for cooking. It was not like any Ribeye steak I have ever seen. It was prepared well and had a pleasant taste but was definitely a choice cut.

 

Our room attendant continues to impress us with the level of service he provides. We feel bad for him since he has so many rooms to take care of.

 

We went to guest relations - to see if we could find out exactly who in the crew participate in the prepaid tips and how that money is divided up and was told that information was not available.

 

Cheers

[Joker54]

On 10/23/2023 at 5:57 PM, DelawareTom said:

Who is the suite manager?

Denisa Mordunescu - we have not asked her for anything but can say that she is very friendly and easy to talk too. Wish we could say the same for the Hotel Director.

 

Cheers

[39august]

Are Ian and Gazelle still the Retreat concierges? If so, have you asked them for anything? We found Ian worthless, as he bungled the only two requests we had of him. One simply wasn't done, the other a reservation, made for the wrong time, then day. On the other hand, our sky suite cabin steward was outstanding. I had no idea there were only two butlers for all the other suites. That's so nuts!

[bjahil47]

We were on Equinox end of September to October 8th.  We were in the RS and our butler was outstanding!  The best we ever had!  But we have been in RS before with no visible butler so I understand how the other guest is frustrated.  Enjoy your cruise!

[mac_tlc]

Thanks for sharing your observations. The SS experience doesn’t sound anything like it used to be. Too bad. We thought that had a great product. But now it seems watered down and really no different than any other cabin—- but for so much more $$$.

 

Enjoy your b2b!

 

 

mac_tlc

[mac_tlc]

I find it interesting that the room steward’s line was “SS guests never used their butler “ vs. Laura’s explanation being too many were asking for something at the same time. 
 

oh, what a tangled web we weave……..

 

 

mac_tlc

[Joker54]

On 10/30/2023 at 3:15 PM, 39august said:

Are Ian and Gazelle still the Retreat concierges? If so, have you asked them for anything? We found Ian worthless, as he bungled the only two requests we had of him. One simply wasn't done, the other a reservation, made for the wrong time, then day. On the other hand, our sky suite cabin steward was outstanding. I had no idea there were only two butlers for all the other suites. That's so nuts!

Yes they are still the Retreat concierges. We didnt make any real requests from them. We needed to change a dinner booking and tried calling them, never answered so we called Specialty Reservations ourselves and made the change in only a couple of minutes with no price changes

 

Ian english was better than Gazelle's. She spoke great english but sometimes looked very confused when we were trying to explain an issue.

 

They never appeared to be busy as others have posted.

[Joker54]

On 10/30/2023 at 5:27 PM, mac_tlc said:

Thanks for sharing your observations. The SS experience doesn’t sound anything like it used to be. Too bad. We thought that had a great product. But now it seems watered down and really no different than any other cabin—- but for so much more $$$.

 

Enjoy your b2b!

 

 

mac_tlc

It's not worth the $$ anymore. We have 1 more cruise in an SS and will keep it. Any future bookings will be in a Veranda room.

[Joker54]

Our final observations from the B2B's

 

The OVC was crowded at all meal times. The carving station was MIA at dinner.

 

We ordered the Luminae hamburger one evening and it was raw in the middle. Guess the chef wasn't using a thermometer that day. Sent it back and ordered a different meal. Our waiter did offer to get another burger but I wasn't interested after that.

 

Ordered the NY Strip from the MDR, it was prepared like a roast similar to the Ribeye that I had earlier in the week. It was barely cooked to medium rare when it arrived but at least it wasn't raw:) There was one small scoop of mashed potatoes - I guess they were rationing those portions. They were lumpy so I am assuming that meant that they were not out of a box.

 

While room service for breakfast was on time and the food warm, we ended up eating breakfast in Luminae. We would ask for 2 sausage links and 1 hash brown each and the meal always came with 4 links and 2 hash browns each. Maybe the meals are prepped that way for speed. In Luminae we received what we asked for.

 

They had back to back comedians during the cruise which was a huge mistake. The first comedian was outstanding - we had seem him on previous cruises. The comedian that followed him the next night might have been funny had we not seen the best the day before. We left that show after about 15 minutes, many others left as well. Bad planning on Celebrities part.

 

Just as a test of the new no-butler-system we called room service and ordered a cheese and cracker plate which arrived in 25 minutes. It was horrible, if I had been in a regular room and been charged for it along with the 20% tip I would have been livid and at customer relations. I took a photo and spoke with the suite manager and she took a photo of my photo. We expected a new cheese and cracker plate to show up but nothing - we didn't ask for a replacement - just was expecting it. We did receive compensation which we didn't want, we just wanted the issues resolved. I guess it's easier to throw some money at problems rather than fix them. It was nothing like what our butlers have brought in our many previous cruises.

 

After 14 days the mysterious head butler was never seen. Only his photograph at the entrance to the Retreat Lounge.

 

Cheers

[cruisebeachgirl703]

Thanks for your review. Can you post a pic of the sad cheese plate?

[Joker54]

29 minutes ago, cruisebeachgirl703 said:

Thanks for your review. Can you post a pic of the sad cheese plate?

Sure

 

[Joker54]

Vaping - forgot to mention that there was a fair amount of vaping on deck 14 - all over deck 14. Actually saw a person walking through deck 5 vaping. This is probably just the way life is these days.

[hcat]

38 minutes ago, Joker54 said:

Sure

 

Was that it..no nibbles taken?

Old grapes & berries,  hardly any cheese  or nuts at all...sad!

 

Who would have the nerve to serve something like this?

 

Vaping also?

 

Sounds  like the overall management  of Equinox in several areas is poor!

 

We used to love this ship but  would  be reluctant to book it now.

 

Hope you will continue to report & are still able to have a good time!

 

[Joker54]

1 minute ago, hcat said:

Was that it..no nibbles taken?

Old grapes & berries,  hardly any cheese  or nuts at all...sad!

 

Who would have the nerve to serve something like this?

 

Vaping also?

 

Sounds  like the overall management  of Equinox in several areas is poor!

 

We used to love this ship but  would  be reluctant to book it now.

 

Hope you will continue to report & are still able to have a good time!

 

That picture was taken before we touched it. That is how it arrived

 

We really enjoyed the cruise and had a great time. Of course the issues here and there can be somewhat of a challenge - we try to never let those affect our holiday. Outside of room service the rest of the crew were as amazing as they have always been. It's not the crews fault that they have been handicapped by corp. There has also been departmental staff reductions so some of those crew members are doing more now than before and they were very busy before the changes.

 

We will book X again but only in a Veranda room.

[hcat]

great attitude!  why pay extra when value is not there.  We are booked in AQ, SV and Concierge for our future X cruises.. 

 Quite ambivalent abt the new ship

Xcel

[cruisebeachgirl703]

8 hours ago, Joker54 said:

Sure

 

WOW. AS IN WOW BAD!!!!!