Celebrity Yes or NO????????

[brwneyez424]

I am a loyal Royal cruiser and thinking of going on a Celebrity cruise to Alaska. I'm trying to get an idea of peoples thoughts on Celebrity but don't see many pages here on the boards like people do on Royal. Have you gone on Celebrity to Alaska???? Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thank you........ :)

[Cruiser Steph]

Hi Sue,

 

I'm loyal to Royal too! We are going on our first X cruise in a few weeks. It was a departure port that we could drive to and was a shorter cruise which would work into our schedule best at the time.

 

I've noticed the difference in the number of pages on threads too. All the info I researched makes me believe that this is going to be a higher class of ship experience and many of the cruisers are veterans that don't have a need for the message boards... just an idea.

 

Anyways, haven't found anything that didn't look promising (unless you consider their regular coffee wasn't too good but they are in the process of changing it over! Not a reason by my standards to not cruise :D ) If the itinerary and price look good. Take a chance and experience it yourself!

 

I'll be checking back in October with a review of my first X cruise. I'm sure we'll LOVE it!

 

Stephanie :cool:

[Susan-M]

The member review section is a good place to get opinions from other CC members on the cruise that you are considering. With a lot of reviews in one place, it makes sorting through the info much easier: http://www.cruisecritic.com/reviews/

 

There have been some reviews posted on this forum recently on Infinity/Alaska as well.

[barbarah33]

I am/was also a loyal Royal cruiser to start - that is until I discovered Celebrity. Now I prefer X. (But don't get me wrong please, I still enjoy Royal Caribbean.) Yes, I think it is a higher class of cruising. IMHO Celebrity is more about service while RCCL prefers to keep you busy at all times. You will find fewer activities on Celebrity - no, you won't get bored but you also won't be climbing any rock walls, surfing, boxing, etc.

It is all a matter of personal preference but if you like Royal then I would think you will love Celebrity.

[cavkc]

I wrote the following comparison of X and RCI which you may find useful

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=392725

 

If you like RCI you will LOVE X

 

Enjoy

[kkid]

I posted a comparison of my one experience on RCL to my seven X cruises.

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=795619

[brwneyez424]

Thank you all so much for your responses. You've really helped me decide that yes I will try Celebrity. I'm platinum on Royal will that help me out on Celebrity???????????????

[fernem]

Hi. I went to Alaska in August '07 on Radiance of the Seas. I went to Alaska in August '08 on the Millennium.

 

I loved the Radiance; beautiful boat. Lots of glass, perfect for Alaska. Great WOW factor with its central atrium. Room was nice too. Food good, service nice.

 

The Millennium was another beautiful ship and turned out to be more to my taste even though I loved the Radiance. Millennium has an older, classier feel ... beautiful fabrics, nice rooms, lots of old wood feel ... Adirondack slatted lounge chairs with wool plaid blankets for comfort and pillow rests. Great outdoor space. Food way better, nicer presentation, even more professional and friendly staff. People were extraordinarily nice to us and helpful to us. I would be happy to get back on a Radiance class ship again ... but I can't wait to go home to a Millennium class ship.

[forensic]

I am a loyal Royal cruiser and thinking of going on a Celebrity cruise to Alaska. I'm trying to get an idea of peoples thoughts on Celebrity but don't see many pages here on the boards like people do on Royal. Have you gone on Celebrity to Alaska???? Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thank you........ :)

 

 

I have not done Celebrity to Alaska ... But have sailed on X 8 times I feel very confident in telling you, you will LOVE Celebrity. If you love Great Service, Great Food, Beautiful Ships, and being treated like royalty than it is Celebrity for you. IT IS THE BEST!!!!

 

HAVE A GREAT CRUISE!:D

[Andy]

Thank you all so much for your responses. You've really helped me decide that yes I will try Celebrity. I'm platinum on Royal will that help me out on Celebrity???????????????

 

Hi Brwneyez !

 

As others have said, if you like Royal, you will love Celebrity. You will probably be very happy.

 

Regarding your Platinum level on Royal.... the good news is, you can be added to Captains Club at a reciprocal level ! You will need to call Captains Club, and have your RCI Crown & Anchor #'s ready. They will issue you a Captains Club # at a similar level.

 

Enjoy your Cruise !

[McGarrett]

I would say that Azamara is much more like Celebrity used to be.

[rubrrick]

It's been since '01 that we cruised to Alaska on Celebrity. It was our first cruise on X........before we even cruised on Royal Caribbean. Our ship, the Mercury was stately, and our cabin became our home.

 

Our last trip on X was again on the Mercury at the end of '06 on a Panama Canal full transit. We had the same cabin that we enjoyed on our first X cruise...........and really nothing had changed. We felt the service was superb, and the ship as nice as ever.

 

When we were on our first X cruise.........docked in Juneau....the Infinity was docked directly behind us. We requested and received permission to board the Infinity and the Chief Purser was kind enough to give us a 2 hour tour of, what was then the newest member of the fleet.

 

We are in the process right now of deciding on what ship to take across the pond next spring.........and all indicators are pointing us once again to Celebrity..........and trying an M class ship.

 

We are booked presently on the Navigator of the Seas.....but RCCL changed itineraries on us.........without reason. Also, now there is a discussion about charging for a better cut of meat in the dining room, and other cost cutting measures that I feel maybe it's time to be with X again.

 

I don't......so far, hear of some of the things that Royal is doing......over here at X.

 

So.......if you have any doubts about Alaska..........on X......if you like Royal.........I think you will love X.

 

Rick

[GaryfmCol]

I am a loyal Royal cruiser and thinking of going on a Celebrity cruise to Alaska. I'm trying to get an idea of peoples thoughts on Celebrity but don't see many pages here on the boards like people do on Royal. Have you gone on Celebrity to Alaska???? Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thank you........ :)

 

Bwneyze..

I agree with all on this thread about X to Alaska.

We did the SUMMIT.

 

My only add is that IF you do go to Alaska on

this cruise, please consider taking the Cruisetour.

We spent a week on the northbound SUMMIT to

Seward, then, we were another week, riding the coach

from Anchorage, and, trains to Fairbanks, via Denali.

I even got in some Salmon fishing. I can HONESTLY tell you

we enjoyed the cruisetour as much or more than the ship cruise.

I am very sincere about this.

 

Once up there, go the extra miles and, see some interior.

We are going to do it again someday.

Once you see some bears, elk or moose (like we did).

AND,

The Celebrity cruise train is magnificient...I kid you not!

[Denny01]

To answer the OP's question about the number of posts on the Celebrity thread compared to to the RCL post, the reason I would think is the number of RCL cruisers compared to Celebrity: RCL has 6 classes and 22 ships; Celebrty has 4 classes and 10 ships. More RCL cruises and more cruisers to post.

 

Been on both, enjoyed both, but look to Celebrity as my prime line to find a cruise, and if I can't find a match, then I open up more.

 

Denny

[Sanlj]

I think I'm going to be the "downer" in this thread about Celebrity. A group of 18 of us, avid RCI cruisers, were told of the more upscale experience on Celebrity and decided to cruise the Mexican Riviera on Mercury two years ago. I just re-read the letter I sent to Celebrity about the many problems we encountered and, after receiving no reply, promised myself that word of mouth may be equally successful in correcting problems. Let me add that none of us have ever complained to any cruise company before or since this vacation and we are a pretty easy-going bunch!

 

To begin...the food, waitstaff, room stewards were absolutely first class.

 

We booked concierge class cabins as a treat - and were "treated" to 10 days of unbearable sewage odor in the cabins and hallways in our end of the ship. We were repeatedly told that they were "aware and working on it" but it never stopped. Most of our cabins had no hot water by late afternoon, and several drains were clogged, resulting in mini-floods any time the shower was used, even if only for a short time.

 

There were many other missteps by Celebrity during this vacation (allowing smoking EVERYWHERE, cancelling shore excursions at the last minute, overcharging repeatedly for spa treatments by not applying appropriate discounts, blocking entrances to ports with photographers equipment resulting in ridiculous lines, and missing ports due to vague "medical emergencies") - I just erased a LONG list of them from this message - but it left us feeling rather unhappy and dissatisfied customers.

 

OK - now I can admit that we're giving them another try on Solstice because so many other posters love Celebrity that we feel we may have had an unusual experience.

 

We still think of this cruise with great fondness...but mostly because we are laughing thinking of all the things that went wrong! We are looking forward to a true Celebrity experience in 2009!

[Pupsweet]

We've done Alaska twice on Celebrity (Summit and Infinity) and LOVED it both times. We have also cruised RCCL (Liberty), Costa and Princess.

 

The food, the level of service and casual elegance rule.

 

Celebrity remains our favorite to date. :)

[jjb415]

Hi Brwneyez !

 

As others have said, if you like Royal, you will love Celebrity. You will probably be very happy.

 

Regarding your Platinum level on Royal.... the good news is, you can be added to Captains Club at a reciprocal level ! You will need to call Captains Club, and have your RCI Crown & Anchor #'s ready. They will issue you a Captains Club # at a similar level.

 

Enjoy your Cruise !

 

Good point about the reciprocal benefits. I've attained the Diamond level on RCI, and on my recent Millennium sailing the Elite benefits added some nice touches to the activities onboard. I enjoyed the bridge tour, disembarkation lounge, Officers' gathering, and was sorry to miss the special Tea. The Captain's Club host Ana was very sweet and made us feel right at home.

[hcat]

Some of the Elite benefits are nice but for Royal cruisers they will be disappointed--no cruise discounts to speak of , coupon books not worth very much--most you have to buy something to get someting & no concierge lounge or free goodies at night,, (There is one good coupon on wine for dinner if they still offer it but you do have to buy it)

 

We enjoy both lines but Celeb. is still a more refined experience even with recent erosion. Wish we could afford Azamara or that they'd make Mercury or one M class part of the fleet!

[Casino Player]

I am a loyal Royal cruiser and thinking of going on a Celebrity cruise to Alaska. I'm trying to get an idea of peoples thoughts on Celebrity but don't see many pages here on the boards like people do on Royal. Have you gone on Celebrity to Alaska???? Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thank you........ :)

 

 

I've been on one RCCL cruise and in a couple of weeks will be on my third Celebrity cruise. That should show you what I think of the diffference of the two cruise lines. Celebrity Cruise Line has better food than RCCL and better service although the same management company owns both lines. The staterooms are smaller than the ones you could get on Carnival for each category. On Celebrity Cruise Line when I order something to have in the room it is there in minutes. On RCCL it took hours to get there, long past the time they promised it would be there. RCCL seems to operate on their own time instead of that of their clients.

If you have problems on the cruise customer service is handled by RCCL which is bad. Carnival is better able to handle problems that pop up during a cruise. However, on Celebrity I haven't had any major problems once the cruise started. I have found the food to be better on Celebrity as opposed to RCCL. However, everyone's taste in food is different.

Overall, you should enjoy sailing on Celebrity Cruise Line better than you have your cruises on RCCL. At least I have.

[xamsx]

We have cruised Princess, RCCL and Celebrity, most recently the Infinity inland passage to Alaska via Seattle. For some background my favorite ship is the Radiance of the Seas. It "feels" like a cruise ship is supposed to "feel" to me, as well as never appearing crowded regardless of how many people are onboard.

 

I did not like several things about the Infinity including the teeny-tiny stateroom. We had an aft cabin and I swear that balcony was bigger than the room! The aft cabin balcony is enormous, the room is small. We had to put one suitcase into a bigger suitcase and stored them out on the balcony because there was no room inside the cabin and we had filled up the space under the bed. The closet is very small and the bathroom is tiny.

 

I also was not impressed with the ship's decor. It seemed cheap to me and worn in many spots. The smoking ends October 1st, but smoke seemed to be everywhere on the ship. Smoking was supposed to be limited but I don't think that was enforced. While we never complained, we spoke to many people that did not like that at all.

 

There were a number of very good things about the Infinity though.... service was very good for the most part. Overall I'd say the general service was the best of the three lines we have sailed.

 

The food on the Infinity was quite good. Breakfast was better than RCCL (ok, breakfast at McDonald's is better than RCCL breakfast, so not a high bar, but it was quite good on the Infinity). We dined in the dining room all seven nights and there was only two stinker nights (poor choices for us).

 

Honestly? The cruise was great and we really, really enjoyed Alaska. However after reading the rave reviews here about X vs other lines, I came away a bit disappointed. I'm not sure anything could have lived up to some of the reviews I read here. If you go into the cruise expecting the same cruise experience as RCCL but without the glitz, you will enjoy Celebrity. If you go on Celebrity expecting an exponentially better experience than RCCL as well as the glitz, you will be disappointed.

[jackdiamond]

We are diamond on Royal and elite on Celebrity. As far as we are concerned, cruising CC or higher on the M class ships is as close to luxury as you can attain without the additional costs of luxury. Berlitz agrees; and, they assess this category as 1697, which is only three points shy of their luxury threshold. I would imagine that aqua class on the Solstice class would also be in this category.

Since, we have never cruised Azmara, I cannot provide an enlightened opinion vis-a-vis this class.

[Napi's Mom]

We are diamond on Royal and elite on Celebrity. As far as we are concerned, cruising CC or higher on the M class ships is as close to luxury as you can attain without the additional costs of luxury. Berlitz agrees; and, they assess this category as 1697, which is only three points shy of their luxury threshold. I would imagine that aqua class on the Solstice class would also be in this category.

Since, we have never cruised Azmara, I cannot provide an enlightened opinion vis-a-vis this class.

To give an opinion on Azamara: It is a step above Celebrity, we've never cruised Celebrity, since the Meridian in 1992, but reading about the Celebrity lines on this forum, I realize that Our time on the Quest had to be taken in context...the first long cruise (14 days) she'd had in the short time it had been in Azamara's service, so it had some service glitches...but the main premise of the line is to treat ALL their passengers to the Concierge level of service, then the suites get "just a little more". We all got flowers, fresh fruit, Elemis toiletries (except suites also got the shower gel I wanted!) Canapes if wanted in the afternoon, and Tea delivered by the" almost a butler". Actually some wore Tails and were more like a butler than ours was...and they were serving the INSIDE cabins and the porthole ones! Very little class distinction on Azamara...if you like to feel better than the rest...not the ship for you! Just a family atmosphere, regardless of your income level. We loved it..the open seating and the Casual dress code (NO nobody wore flip flops in the dining room, and Jeans were forbidden in the specialty Restaurants.) An old hand at cruising "Jan Cruz" who posts here also has stated she doesn't think she'd ever want to go back to the set seating & formal wear!:D