A great first cruise on Celebrity: Reflection review. Dailies, menus, food and cabin pics. March 2024.

[Itchy&Scratchy]

4 minutes ago, twins_to_alaska said:

Remember that all the desserts at Cafe al Bacio are free! Don't know if you got any.

we got one or two which were different from the buffet's desserts. However, most of them were the same as in the buffet that day. Plus, there was ALWAYS a line at the cafe, but none in the buffet. 🙂

Edited April 14 by Itchy&Scratchy

[retired dude]

my wife and I were on this cruise..great ship but the food for us was a not-so-great ....We ate  breakfast and lunch in the buffet and dinner in the mdr..After 10 cruises on celebrity we just thought that the good quality has gone downhill on this ship..Service was great and we too thought that the entertainment was excellent. Paulette Ivory was amazing and we gifted her the next day and thanked her...She is an amazing talent.. We loved the band arjam that played alot in the foyer lounge ...Best cover band in our 30 years of cruising. Looking forward to sailing out of tampa in the future as the 15 hours that it took on delta getting home to clearwater  from lauderdale was a bit much.....no fault of celebrity, just poor timing on our part trying to fly during the infamous "yutes" ritual of spring break. Wont make that mistake again. life is good and so was the reflection.

[Itchy&Scratchy]

7 minutes ago, twins_to_alaska said:

Thanks so much for your review, all your photos, and the dailies! Hope you all are feeling much better very soon.

Thank you! Poor hubs is still coughing profusely and non-stop. Keeps himself  and me up all night long, even though he is currently sleeping in the living room. Meds and supplements aren't helping much 😞

I am just tired, though.

Thank goodness we didn't plan a big birthday bash or anything for me, but we had to excuse ourselves from my BFF's birthday bash (she shares a birthday with me).

[Itchy&Scratchy]

7 minutes ago, retired dude said:

Looking forward to sailing out of tampa in the future as the 15 hours that it took on delta getting home to clearwater  from lauderdale was a bit much.....no fault of celebrity, just poor timing on our part trying to fly during the infamous "yutes" ritual of spring break.

wow, it took you this long to get home? It took us less time to fly to Atlanta (5 pm flight). And that's considering that our flight was delayed because the captain was coming off of a different flight which was also late.

 

We always cruise during spring break and our flight was only cancelled once, but it wasn't due to "yutes" lol, but rather owing to horrible weather in Houston. It resulted in the cancelled flight from Houston to FL which left us with no plane to fly from FLL to ATL...

Edited April 14 by Itchy&Scratchy

[cruisetonowhere10]

2 minutes ago, Itchy&Scratchy said:

wow, it took you this long to get home? It took us less time to fly to Atlanta (5 pm flight). And that's considering that our flight was delayed because the captain was coming off of a different flight which was also late.

 

We always cruise during spring break and our flight was only cancelled once, but it wasn't due to "yutes" lol, but rather owing to horrible weather in Houston. It resulted in the cancelled flight from Houston to FL which left us with no plane to fly from FLL to ATL...

We are sailing out of FLL next Aoril for spring break (Easter week) and I’m actually debating flying in 2 days before embarkation just in case…figure wurst case scenario we would be able to drive the 25 hrs.  lol.  Seriously, I have heard a lot of stories this year of canceled flights that I’m trying to think proactively. 

[Itchy&Scratchy]

5 minutes ago, cruisetonowhere10 said:

We are sailing out of FLL next Aoril for spring break (Easter week) and I’m actually debating flying in 2 days before embarkation just in case…figure wurst case scenario we would be able to drive the 25 hrs.  lol.  Seriously, I have heard a lot of stories this year of canceled flights that I’m trying to think proactively. 

yeah, that's twice as long as it would take us to drive if we could or would.

 

Post pandemic we fly in the day before. Pre-pandemic we always flew in on the day of the cruise - it never backfired, but it caused a stress induced migraine EVERY TIME which incapacitated me for the first 2-3 days of the cruise. Now that we fly in the day before, I am finally free to enjoy the entire cruise!

[cruisetonowhere10]

Just now, Itchy&Scratchy said:

yeah, that's twice as long as it would take us to drive if we could or would.

 

Post pandemic we fly in the day before. Pre-pandemic we always flew in on the day of the cruise - it never backfired, but it caused a stress induced migraine EVERY TIME which incapacitated me for the first 2-3 days of the cruise. Now that we fly in the day before, I am finally free to enjoy the entire cruise!

That’s what I’ve done before but figure we have hotel points so staying is “free” so outside of food a beach/pool day before the cruise can’t hurt. 

[mac_tlc]

Thank you for your review and all the food pics , but.........  eight days and no french onion soup 🤣🤣🤣. My wife and I get it almost every night......

 

mac_tlc

 

[Itchy&Scratchy]

52 minutes ago, mac_tlc said:

Thank you for your review and all the food pics , but.........  eight days and no french onion soup 🤣🤣🤣. My wife and I get it almost every night......

I know, right? Probably has to do with the fact that I hate onions. 

And, while my DH loves onions, to this day he refuses to try the french onion soup. I don't know why. Probably, the texture issues I mentioned in one of my previous posts. It does look a bit slimy, if you know what I mean. 🙂

[mac_tlc]

But…..😂😂😂

[hcat]

10 minutes ago, mac_tlc said:

But…..😂😂😂

not slimy to us!

[Harrisonkid]

I do love the Onion soup...I get it most every evening. Since Food on a cruise is 'eat as much as you like'.. your husband should get it and if it's to 'slimy'  then just put it off to the side  and enjoy a double Shrimp Cocktail 😁

[serene56]

On 4/10/2024 at 7:16 PM, Itchy&Scratchy said:

there were no sugar added desserts. I do not recall any sugar FREE ones.

 

On our cruise they were mixed in with the others--  but labeled sugar free 

[kluv2cruz]

8 hours ago, Itchy&Scratchy said:

Poor hubs is still coughing profusely and non-stop. Keeps himself  and me up all night long, even though he is currently sleeping in the living room. Meds and supplements aren't helping much 😞

I am just tired, though.

If he’s able to have it, I found NyQuil to be amazing at helping me stop coughing long enough to sleep. Sleep almost sitting up with LOTS of pillows. And DayQuil and neocitron, and fisherman’s friend - use a knife or pill splitter to cut into 1/4’s so they’re not so spicy for so long, but long enough to help. Lots of water or tea. Hydrate. As others have said, vit c, since, echinacea. Ugh. Get well. Use a new toothbrush or put old one in boiling water or dishwasher.

Edited April 14 by kluv2cruz

[Itchy&Scratchy]

a few more random thoughts about the ship.... I will cover the ports of call in my next posts.

 

The Solarium was always freezing. The only space we could find to sit on were the "sofa" next to entrance. They were NOT comfy at all. Our DS spent some time with us in the Solarium, sitting quietly and playing on his Switch. Security passed by many times but nobody booted us out. Nobody gave us any dirty looks either.

 

We would have loved to sit in a lounge next to it instead, but I swear - every time we showed up, it closed for a private event.

 

It was hard to find a quiet spot to read inside - there was almost always a performance of some kind in the Grand Foyer. On the last day we found a very nice spot here, in front of the Studio:

 

We moved the chairs into the shade, and then moved them back when we were done.

 

The chairs on deck 5 outside promenade were very nice, but it was rather windy.

 

DS and DH played a lot of ping pong, but Reflection staff really needs to rethink the placement of the tables: the elevator bank was not well air conditioned or well sized.

 

Some unruly kids stole the ping pong balls.... Sigh.

 

I was surprised to find a smoking section in the forward area of the ship, which allowed the cigarette smoke to waft backwards. We couldn't use the Sunset bar because it was always full of smokers.

 

Somebody smoked marijuana in our inside cabin section for the first 2 days. The hallway stunk like skunks every morning.

 

My DH kept missing the turn to our inside cabin, so I put a pretty magnet on the wall so he wouldn't miss it. It was stolen within an hour. 😞 At least nobody stole my door magnets. I changed them up every couple of days. 🙂

 

The availability and taste of the soft serve really made our cruise. After having just sailed on MSC Seascape where they charged $5 per soft serve cone, this was a wonderful highlight.

 

The crew was superb - so polite and friendly, always cheerful, always smiling and greeting everyone.  I was not used to being addressed by EVERY crew member at the buffet, saying "good morning!" and 'enjoy your breakfast/lunch/dinner!" just out of the blue. On other cruise lines the crew will smile and greet you IF you look at them, but on Reflection they literally spoke to me when I wasn't even looking their way, just wandering about getting some food or looking for a place to sit. 🙂

 

Embarkation/disembarkation and getting on and off the ship in the ports of call was a breeze, unlike MSC Seascape.

 

We didn't buy the internet package, but my DH decided that he couldn't live without it for one day and bought a one-day package. It cost $37 and change.   Yikes. I don't know what he bought. Maybe, some super premium wifi? In any case, it was fast and switching between devices was very simple and easy.

 

The app worked pretty well, except for the last day, when the messaging part of it randomly quit working. And, of course, Murphy's law dictates that it was at that moment that I misplaced my DH somewhere on the ship. After about an hour of running around, I finally found him back in the Solarium where he knew I was going to look for him eventually.

 

Before that we were able to text each other through it which was great. The MSC app allowed us to message my parents and our friends who were in a different cabin, but did not allow me to text my DH and vice versa, oddly enough.

[Itchy&Scratchy]

27 minutes ago, kluv2cruz said:

If he’s able to have it, I found NyQuil to be amazing at helping me stop coughing long enough to sleep. Sleep almost sitting up with LOTS of pillows. And DayQuil and neocitron, and fisherman’s friend - use a knife or pill splitter to cut into 1/4’s so they’re not so spicy for so long, but long enough to help. Lots of water or tea. Hydrate. As others have said, vit c, since, echinacea. Ugh. Get well. Use a new toothbrush or put old one in boiling water or dishwasher.

thank you, he is doing all of that (except neocitron?), and he usually sleeps sitting up anyway (breathing problems), but none of it appeared to be helping. It's just like our 2022 variant when we couldn't get a momentary break from coughing. I thought my ribs were going to break. My 2023 variant was like a cold - so much milder.

 

I think he is getting a smidge better now, though, even though he doesn't think so. To me, he is not coughing nearly as much today as he was yesterday. Yay!

[HopefulCruiser123]

7 hours ago, Itchy&Scratchy said:

I know, right? Probably has to do with the fact that I hate onions. 

And, while my DH loves onions, to this day he refuses to try the french onion soup. I don't know why. Probably, the texture issues I mentioned in one of my previous posts. It does look a bit slimy, if you know what I mean. 🙂

I love French onion soup, but I too do not care for big, long stringy, slippery onions.  So my method is to eat all the bread, broth and cheese (sometimes a little onion creeps in) and then leave a pile of onions filling the half bottom of the bowl.  It's worked like a charm for some 50 years now.   

[doghog]

1 hour ago, Itchy&Scratchy said:

My DH kept missing the turn to our inside cabin, so I put a pretty magnet on the wall so he wouldn't miss it. It was stolen within an hour. 😞 At least nobody stole my door magnets. I changed them up every couple of days. 🙂

I'd bet no one swiped your magnet. A crew member probably removed it. Door magnets are one thing but not in the other public areas of the ship. Can you imagine if others did the same? 😵

[doghog]

23 minutes ago, HopefulCruiser123 said:

I love French onion soup, but I too do not care for big, long stringy, slippery onions.  So my method is to eat all the bread, broth and cheese (sometimes a little onion creeps in) and then leave a pile of onions filling the half bottom of the bowl.  It's worked like a charm for some 50 years now.   

Yum. Lots of onions and lots of hot cheese for me. I can do without the bread but I eat it as it's soaked with the flavorful broth. 

[DaKahuna]

9 hours ago, Itchy&Scratchy said:

And, while my DH loves onions, to this day he refuses to try the french onion soup.

 

And don't forget to ask for horseradish on the side.  There is usually almost no flavor/bite to the cocktail sauce they normally serve.

 

 

 My DW loves it and orders it at most meals

7 hours ago, Harrisonkid said:

and enjoy a double Shrimp Cocktail 

.  She normally does not eat more than a bite or two of the cheese, bread, and onions but drinks the soup/broth almost dry.  

 

 

[Itchy&Scratchy]

Now on to the ports of call. ABC islands is our favorite itinerary. We were introduced to it by accident in 2016. We were going to cruise with our friends on Regal Princess, however, that ship has already filled its quota on children of our son's age (who knew Princess has quotas????), so we had to chose another cruise. The only other Princess ship available during that school break week was Caribbean Princess (never again) which was sailing to ABC islands. We loved the islands! And we are now happy to come back any time.

 

Aruba. 🙂 What a beautiful and windy place.

 

Last time we went to Eagle beach, nowhere specific. The taxi driver dropped us off by the Coco Loco bar. We were happy with the beach, but not that particular spot. It was extremely windy, the bar had no wifi at the time, and there was a construction site nearby with a lot of construction noise. We remembered how much we liked the beach at the Divi Phoenix hotel the first time we went to Aruba, so that's exactly where we headed to this time.

 

The taxi was $15. We were dropped off right at the entrance to the hotel and walked to the beach through its lobby. At first we were going to walk a little to the left, away from the main hotel beach entrance, but while the palapas and beaches are free, the chairs are not, so we had to rent the chairs from the guy right at the entrance. We didn't want him to drag the chaises to a location we hadn't even chosen yet (many palapas were already taken, but not all), so we looked around and ta-da, there was an available palapa right there, near the water and the rental place. Each chaise was $20.

 

We settled down, and my DH walked over to the hotel bar to inquire about the password. A very kind bartender simply gave it to him, not requiring a purchase of any kind. The wifi was fast enough for me to email some photos to my parents and check FB.  DH checked in with his work again.... Sigh. He is a manager.

 

Water was nice, wind was very strong as usual, the location was nice. Would definitely return.

 

We swam, chilled, I read, the boys surfed the net, till late afternoon. We then took a nice leisurely walk to the left and took some photos.

 

To the right of the hotel beach entrance:

 

 

 

 

Now right in front of the hotel beach entrance: there is the rental "hut", and we were under one of these palapas close to the water. The beach and the entrance to the water is nice, soft sand. Not the rocks you see to your right.

 

 

a little farther left - a nice dining place at the hotel.

 

and a little farther to the left is a public beach. The wind was a lot more quiet here.

 

 

 

at the hotel pool:

 

 

 

Edited April 15 by Itchy&Scratchy

[Itchy&Scratchy]

Bonaire

 

We love going to the Sorobon beach in Bonaire. However, this time was it very crowded with beach goers AND windsurfers. Extremely crowded. Like never before. The photos below where taken right before we left, and at least half the people had already left, so it looks a lot emptier than it was when we got there. At some point, a cruise tour also arrived with quite a few people, and I was surprised that no space was set aside for them like last time. They literally arrived in the middle of the day to a very crowded beach and there were no chaises available to them.

 

 

 

 

No umbrellas for rent. If you are lucky, you will be the first to arrive and get this 4-person spot in the shade: 

 

If not, you will be baking in direct sun. Those wooden "umbrellas" you see in the back don't provide any shade. There is a tiny bit of shade along the fence in the back, but it was ALL taken by the time we got there by 10 am.

 

The sun in Bonaire (and in Aruba) is brutal. I think it's more brutal in Bonaire. We burn every time we are there, despite all the SPF, hats, rash guards and water shoes. The blond Dutch girls who work there as waitresses? Some of them looked like lobsters. And they wouldn't even put a hat on until way after 11 am when the sun is already evil.

 

Taxi was $5 a person. We got to share it with a lovely couple from our cruise. On the way there I talked their ears off and mentioned how much my DH loved donkeys, and how one day (when we have more time in port) we'll definitely go to the donkey sanctuary. Lo and behold, a couple of minutes later there was an unattended donkey standing by the road. The taxi driver was so nice - he stopped and let my DH pet the donkey through the window, and we even gave him a snack. Yay! Happy moments. 🙂

 

When you have had enough frolicking in the water or sitting at the bar, you should walk over to the left to see more of a wildlife scenery. It's beautiful.  Last time we were there it was even more spectacular.

 

This time:

 

just walk that way ->

 

 

 

 

 

I snapped a couple of photos right before we left:

 

Much emptier at the end of the day. Doesn't look like human-surfer soup....

 

We had to wait till the taxi fills up a bit - took about 15 minutes for more people from Reflection to show up. The all aboard time was 3:30, so we went back around 2:15-2:30. Plenty of time.

 

P.S. We may try something different next time. It was just too crowded and lacked any shade this time...

Edited April 15 by Itchy&Scratchy

[Northern Aurora]

We have been on over 70 Celebrity cruises, so it was very interesting to read your perspective as a first timer on X.

 

And I also suspect that your magnet was not stolen by a passenger but was removed by a housekeeping staff person.  While some folks feel the need to decorate their doors I have never seen a magnet in a hallway.  If you had dropped by Guest Relations (lost and found) they probably had it.

[Itchy&Scratchy]

7 hours ago, Northern Aurora said:

 If you had dropped by Guest Relations (lost and found) they probably had it.

it was a small magnet, and not of sentimental value. My hubs said to make sure not to put ones I was really attached to on that wall. 🙂 He was right. It's no big deal. It would have been a much bigger deal if somebody stole a magnet off our door, especially the ones I like a lot more (hint: gnomes).

 

I do hope that whoever lost her earing in front of the Opus MDR stopped by the Guest Services, because that's where I took it. 🙂

[Northern Aurora]

32 minutes ago, Itchy&Scratchy said:

it was a small magnet, and not of sentimental value. My hubs said to make sure not to put ones I was really attached to on that wall. 🙂 He was right. It's no big deal. It would have been a much bigger deal if somebody stole a magnet off our door, especially the ones I like a lot more (hint: gnomes).

 

I do hope that whoever lost her earing in front of the Opus MDR stopped by the Guest Services, because that's where I took it. 🙂

I am glad that there was no sentimental value. But I suspect that  a housekeeping staff member had no idea that it was some sort of marker for a kiddo.