LIVE from our first Silhouette Transatlantic! Are we the youngest on the ship???

The issue with UK customs today was this was unorthodox. They boarded the ship and completed customs on the ship between 8am and 4:30pm with only two port agents. It took us roughly 1hr and 20 minutes. I didn't like it but it should mean we don't need to go through customs again when we reach Southampton. When I got in line I was pissed. I thought "what a way to end the last sea day" but then I thought, "I can just make the best of it." I had a nice conversation with the couple behind me and had the best time I could while standing for over an hour. I'll explain the entire concept with photos later but I just wanted to give my quick two cents. I refused to let an hour and a half inconvenience ruin my sea day. :)

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I refused to let an hour and a half inconvenience ruin my sea day. :)

That's the right attitude.

Please don't take this as being rude...

But this is what it's like every time we, a non US citizen arrives into the USA. At least yr not finger printed, eye scanned, photographed and spoken to abruptly by the agents.

P&O world cruise last year had to unexpectedly stay over night in San Fransisco as the US immigration took soooooooo long. Passengers were so outraged at being kept on the ship for the day, P&O had to stay another day so they could at least see something....

Further more last year it took me almost 2 hrs standing in the arrivals terminal in port Everglades, due to minimal staff on duty and all the carry-on like I mentioned above.

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Oh I forgot.... To mention th mandatory $14 online ESTA we need before we can even think about checking in for our flight to the USA.

ESTA: it's a pre clearance authority approval, issued after answering many many online questions.

1hr 20 min.....that's sounds a dream...

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Oh I forgot.... To mention th mandatory $14 online ESTA we need before we can even think about checking in for our flight to the USA.

ESTA: it's a pre clearance authority approval, issued after answering many many online questions.

 

1hr 20 min.....that's sounds a dream...

 

 

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Not rude at all. We've heard the horror stories of non US citizens entering the US and we've experienced ourselves as citizens entering back into the US at airports with wait times that well exceeded today's time. Celebrity Staff handled things well today. From an operations perspective, I think there are ways to improve this process but no one on the ship has ever seen this sort of process pop up heading into the UK with customs coming on the ship 1 port prior to our final port. I can't complain. We made the best of it and I'm loving my cruise. Sad tomorrow is our last day. I have tons of photos to share. But here below is the craft beer list from cellar masters! If you have any issues seeing clearly I can upload a higher quality version when I'm home.

Not rude at all. We've heard the horror stories of non US citizens entering the US and we've experienced ourselves as citizens entering back into the US at airports with wait times that well exceeded today's time. Celebrity Staff handled things well today. From an operations perspective, I think there are ways to improve this process but no one on the ship has ever seen this sort of process pop up heading into the UK with customs coming on the ship 1 port prior to our final port. I can't complain. We made the best of it and I'm loving my cruise. Sad tomorrow is our last day. I have tons of photos to share. But here below is the craft beer list from cellar masters! If you have any issues seeing clearly I can upload a higher quality version when I'm home.

 

 

 

You made my day. Thanks a lot for posting.

Have a save trip home!

From an operations perspective, I think there are ways to improve this process but no one on the ship has ever seen this sort of process pop up heading into the UK with customs coming on the ship 1 port prior to our final port. I can't complain. We made the best of it

It happened to us on our 2012 repositioning cruise (Constellation) Amsterdam to Southampton (2 days) That was not well organised, as we were told there would be letters in the cabin telling when we had to turn up. We didn't get a letter, so announcements were made, encouraging us to turn up, if we hadn't already been screened.

However, on our Baltic cruise last summer, we walked off in Southampton without even showing our passports. I could not believe it, considering the number of illegal immigrants who were trying to enter Europe at that time. It was suggested it because we had shown our passports on embarkation in Southampton and we were on a circular cruise- Southampton to Southampton.

So, maybe our immigration officers have 'tightened the procedure,' on repositioning cruises!

All seem to have totally misunderstood. I had no problems with UK Immigration coming on board and needing to que up. My issue is the the that there were only 2 agents. We were given a time, yet were told by staff later that we could have come anytime.

Bobbie

Have fun. I want to take a TA next year. Trying to look for a bargain solo rate. I might have to take the plunge and pay the 200% and enjoy myself. It will be a bucket list trip. I guess age wise I'll be in the middle in my 40's.

I always sail solo and my cruises include 1 to 3 TA's per year...love the sea days. But have never found a bargain for solo...always have paid 200%. A drag, but at least get double Captains Club points.

If you find a reduction in the single supplement on an X TA, please let me know!!

rs at pobox dot com

THANKS!!

Randy :D

I always sail solo and my cruises include 1 to 3 TA's per year...love the sea days. But have never found a bargain for solo...always have paid 200%. A drag, but at least get double Captains Club points.

 

If you find a reduction in the single supplement on an X TA, please let me know!!

 

rs at pobox dot com

 

THANKS!!

 

Randy :D

Hi Randy, I go solo most times too. Would love to find a way to avoid 200%. I really like having a balcony so the newer ships with studio cabins doesn't help much.

I'm doin 1st X cruise & 1st TA on Relfection in October. Can't wait! This thread has been a blast to follow. Good to know the crowd is usually friendly since I will be on my own.

I now know for sure I am getting the drink package because I see a lot of those bulliet infusions in my future!:D

- John

Hi Everyone! Well, we are now back in Chicago and back to work :( I'm working from home this morning so I thought I'd take the time to start my final / total review for the cruise. I'll post a few times over the next day or two and I will also post all the daily papers as well and upload all the food photos in coming posts. I will start with where I left off (final day of the cruise) and then will start recapping various aspects of the cruise, the ship and the crew.

The Final Days

Ugh, the feeling of dread when you receive luggage tags at your door. It means it is time to start packing and to start saying your goodbyes to everyone you've met on board. For me, that is always the most depressing. It's not the fact that my drink package won't work at the bars at home or the fact that we have to make our own bed (I've tried to train Edward to do it, but he hasn't learned yet) or cook for ourselves; it's saying goodbye to all the wonderful people we've become friends with. However, the wonders of social media make it easy to keep in touch.

Our final day on the ship was at the port of Le Havre. We arrived at 7am and the ship was to depart at 9pm. Our initial thought, prior to getting on the Silhouette was to purchase the "Explore Paris on Your Own" package with Celebrity. However, after talking to people on the ship and thinking about the time it takes to get to Paris (2.5hrs each way or longer) we decided to skip this. When we woke up on Friday and saw the gloomy skies and the rain we were glad we made this decision. By the time we would have gotten to Paris we'd have time to grab a nice lunch and probably quickly see a few sites but that would be it. That is not how I'd want to explore Paris and I'd be afraid it would put a bad taste of Paris in my mouth and I definitely didn't want that. Some people were surprised we chose not to go, but 5 hours in Paris isn't enough. You could spend 5 hours in the Grand Gallery at the Louvre!

We rested on the board the final day. We were the only people at the pool bar in the morning with the exception of a couple that were sitting in a hot tub. It was quite cold but they definitely were enjoying their time and the bartender kept bringing them drinks in the hot tub. I'm slightly regretful we didn't do the same.

Final Night

We packed everything we needed to pack and had our bags in our room ready to go out after dinner. We started with drinks at the Martini Bar and watched people come back onto the ship (They used deck 5, Cellar Masters for security). Everyone looked exhausted! We're glad we stayed on board.

We had dinner in Murano on our final night with our friend Johan (who we've met on a previous cruise) and new friends we met on this cruise (Magnus from Sweden, Mario and his friends from Switzerland and Peter & Richard from London). Murano was able to get us a table in their "wine cellar" room which was very nice. It was fun watching the wait staff serve 9 people at once. I think the table had 4 lobsters and 3 dover sole's. The staff did a great job doing table side prep for everyone. For desert we finally tried the crepe which was very good and fun to watch prepare.

After dinner we quickly went back to the room to put our luggage out (ugh I'm reliving that depressing feeling right now :() and we then went to World Class bar to try a scotch they just received and to say goodbye to our bartender there. Both Ivan and Vasil at World Class bar were great, but Vasil was incredible. He knew our card number after the first day. We enjoyed a drink there and then we headed down to Quasar to say goodbye to everyone and our bartender Hans. I made one quick trip to the Martini bar to grab a final martini and say goodbye and then we headed back to the room. I didn't want to leave the ship but we were spending one night in London and were looking forward to having dinner and drinks in London with friends we hadn't seen in a while.

Debarkation

We had number 43, which was 8:15am off the ship. We had a group of guys we'd always meet at the pool bar everyone morning and they weren't leaving until around 8:45am so we decided to try to find them in Ensemble Lounge (they had access to Michael's and they told us to meet them by Michael's in morning). Sure enough we saw them in Ensemble in the morning. It was great to chat with them one last time before leaving the ship. We exchanged contact information and have actually been texting every day since we left the ship.

Leaving the ship was a breeze. Remember how everyone was complaining about waiting 1 1/2hrs on the ship for UK customs? Well, we didn't have to wait a single second during debarkation. We didn't have to clear customs. We exited the ship and went to baggage claim. No conveyor belts! Bags were set up by numbered stations and ours were all stacked together. Very easy! We walked right outside into the UK...how wonderful! We had booked a car service to take us to London at 9:30am. We easily could have had them come at 9am but we were worried there might be delays. Right at 9:30am our driver showed up. We had a private car into London which is roughly a 2 hour drive depending on traffic. Our drive took around 1 hour and 50 minutes. Price was 110 pounds which with the exchange rate came out to $161USD I believe. Some advice I've read has been to book a Southampton car service as they can be cheaper. We opted to go with a London based car service. He knew his way around London and could definitely drive in the traffic.

More of a final review to come!

Here will start the final review. It will take a couple days for me to complete in total. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to ask!

Cabin

We were in a Veranda Cabin #6281 This was the first time we were on a lower deck. We've always been higher on the ship. 6281 did have an obstructed view which you could see in the first video I posted of the cabin. The obstructed view did not bother me as much as I thought it would. The only thing that may bother some people are the lights off of deck 5 that will slightly shine into the room at night if you have the curtains open. We always had the curtains open so the sunlight would wake us up in the morning. We found the lights to act as a night light and actually liked them.

I'm not sure what was directly beneath us, but we did hear some noise from either carts or some sort of supplies being moved around. We never heard this at night but would hear it during the day and sometimes in the morning, though not too early.

We did hear a lot of creaking in the cabin which I never heard before in any of our cabins on a S class ship. The creaking was not constant but it was noticeable. Sometime it would sound as if someone was knocking on the door. The seas were pretty calm the entire way. Maybe this cabin or the 6th floor specifically is just in an area of the ship that is meant to give a little hence the noise.

We received this cabin a Balcony Guarantee last minute booking. For the price, we LOVED the cabin. The noise I would say was the biggest negative of the cabin (noise from the deck below) and the creaking. However, for the price we paid I was thrilled with 6281. It was great at night because we were a short walk to the Martini Bar, Casino and the specialty restaurants.

Cabin Steward

Our cabin steward was Jack. He was great. We never required much but our room was always very clean and he always gave us 2 dailys! No one has ever done that we always just received one. It was nice to receive 2 as I could carry one around during the day and then have another one for safe keeping so I can take photos of them for all of you! Jack and his assistant never intruded on us when we slept in. Everything was always cleaned well. On day 1 he did his usual introduction but made it clear that if we ever needed anything, even unrelated to the room, to phone him and he could help us. His English was perfect and he always said hi to us in the halls.

Laundry

We sent laundry out twice using our Elite coupons. Laundry always came back quickly. The first time we sent it out in the afternoon and had it back the following morning. The second time it took a day and a half. We also had a couple items dry cleaned. These items took a day and a half as well.

Cleanliness of the ship overall

As usual, we found Celebrity very clean in all common areas. Some of the chairs in the Martini bar are slowly starting to get a little worn (they probably get a lot of use!) but it's not something that requires immediate attention. We spent some time in the Casino and we found that to be quite clean. A couple times in the evening I noticed staff going around and wiping down the machines.

Common area bathrooms were all impeccable though the Men's bathroom by the pool bar was occasionally a little off. I was surprised by this as it wasn't getting that much use since pool area was never very crowded during the day (though the Solarium was). They also only had paper towels in this bathroom, not the nice cloth ones. Cleanest bathroom award goes to the bathroom in Ensemble lounge. The attendant is always there, always in a great mood and always folding towels, etc.

During Holidays and in the Summer months we see all age groups sailing. People are still working or in school this time of year. I would guess you have more retirees and self-employed people sailing now. One trip we met 74 year old "Hal". He was a hoot, and the highlight of any trip we had so far. Drink a Stoli Elite martini for me:)

Paul and Edward it was a pleasure meeting you both, and have enjoyed your review. I had a great time. Hope to see you on a future cruise.

Norma

Paul and Edward it was a pleasure meeting you both, and have enjoyed your review. I had a great time. Hope to see you on a future cruise.

Norma

Hi Norma! It was a pleasure meeting you as well! Thanks for reading my blog and I definitely hope we see you on a future cruise! I gave you my contact info correct? If not send me a private message on here. Would like to keep in touch!

Well, it is just after 9pm here in Chicago. If we were on the ship at 9pm we'd be halfway through dinner right now. Maybe awaiting our entree? Right now I'm waiting for a movie to come on Showtime while I'm finishing some wine. Since I just finished dinner why don't I devote this post to the specialty restaurants and the bar service on our cruise.

Specialty Dining

We purchased the ultimate dining package on the ship. We made sure we were one of the first to get on so we could get this deal as I am told they only sell a limited amount. We purchased it before on a 7 night sailing and we were very excited to purchase it for this 13 nighter. As soon as we came on board the ship (ah, to have that feeling right now!) we were greeted by someone selling the specialty restaurants. We immediately told we wanted the ultimate dining and he was very happy to take care of us right away. At first he tried to only charge us for 7 nights, but we reminded him this was the transatlantic and it was 13 nights. Of course we're going to be honest :)

Here are my reviews of the specialty dining.

Qsine

We only ate here once. While we always enjoy the food here, we never feel like we are enjoying a relaxed meal here, instead we feel like its a bit of a show??? While the food is great, the overall atmosphere has never been our particular style. However, we always need to try it at least once, especially with the ultimate dining package.

The food was great as usual. The lava crab is one of our favorites, but the spring rolls are at the top of our list. There is a vegetable spring roll and a pork spring roll. We asked for two orders. There was also a build your own sliders entree that was quite fun. The "special sauce" was very tasty. We had the tacos as well. The best part was being able to make your own guacamole. The tacos were filling but definitely on the salty side. I don't think I'd order them again for this reason.

The service was very good. We had nice conversations with our wait staff and had a beautiful table by the window. We had 8:30 reservations but due to the time changes on the transatlantic it was still light outside so we were able to enjoy the ocean view. The restaurant was surprisingly dead that night. There were only a couple tables occupied.

Lawn Club Grill

We ate here twice on the cruise. We made sure to eat here the first night as we knew the weather would get colder as the cruise went on. The first night was beautiful out. The weather was absolute perfection, albeit slightly windy. The feeling you have at dinner on the first night of a cruise is such a wonderful feeling. You've completed your travel. You finished the muster drill. Everything is unpacked and in its place. Your mind is shut off from work and filled with wonder of the relaxation and fun that is in your future. You look around at people in the restaurant wondering who may become your friends...and who you may learn to avoid! Haha....anyway I digress. Back to the food!

We typically order the filet at Lawn Club, but always with a few extras. The Tandoori chicken is wonderful. We also had shrimp and scallops. We shared a flatbread as well which was half sausage and peppers and half margarita. For dessert we had the warm chocolate chip cookie which we always adore and the carrot cake.

The second night I know I had the veal which was good, but not amazing. Though I did enjoy it. The second night was definitely cooler. I was wearing a sweater and a blazer which kept me comfortable...I think Edward was a little cool. I remember we were sitting by the glass / plastic covering and there was a gap in the partition. We had to move the table a little so Edward was not near the gap and therefore not getting hit with the cool winds.

Tuscan Grill

Alexandra. If you eat at Tuscan on the Silhouette it is an absolute must you request Alexandra's section. Alexandra from Romania. She was incredible. We met her on the first day in Bistro on 5 and then had her the following night as our waitress in Tuscan. She was so friendly and talkative and truly loved her job though she wasn't afraid to tell us how she really felt if she was having a problem with someone! Ask for her, you won't be disappointed.

OK, onto the food. We've eaten at Tuscan many times before. It is Edward's favorite. I won't bore you with every single item we had, but if you have questions feel free to ask. My favorites on the menu for entree's are the filet, the veal and the pappardelle with lobster and cream sauce. I love the caesar salad made table side and the short rib ravioli. Yum!

One interesting fact to note - after our cruise they are no longer serving caesar salad table side. We are told it is due to US food regulatory issues that are no longer accepting it. I know what you're saying - the ship is in Europe! However, this is due to their insurer and their insurance carrier deflects to US standards for them to meet.

We always sat in the back left in Tuscan at the window. Always an incredible table. Alexandra was terrific but every other person including our sommelier were excellent.

A couple items of note that slightly disappointed us. Again, due to food regulations the slicer that was used to slice the prosciutto so wonderfully thin is no longer used. Therefore the prosciutto is thicker. I prefer it thinner. The Parmesan given at the beginning didn't taste as fresh as it used to. Perhaps they break it up early in the evening and since we were eating at 8:30pm it tasted a little dry? These are my biggest complaints, but overall we were very happy with our dinners in Tuscan.

Murano

Ah Murano! Edward always says it is a little too much for him so he can only go there a couple times in one cruise. I could eat there every day. Roxanna is who you want to see here. She is fabulous and the best tableside cook I've ever had. In addition to this, my favorite table was #17. When you walk into Murano in the Silhouette it will be the table to the left which is a 4 person table, but only has 2 seats set up next to each other. It gives you a full view of the restaurant but also gives you privacy and it is easy to talk to your partner. So to recap, ask for table 17 with Roxanna. Got it? Good!

We've tried literally the entire menu so again we will tell you our favorites: Dover sole, chateaubriand, and lobster. For starters I LOVE the crab and salmon parfait and lobster bisque. The cheese cart is excellent and we've gotten into the habit of having them bring it around as an appetizer as opposed to after dinner. At home we always enjoy having some cheese and wine or cocktail before dinner when we cook so it's always such a treat to have so many cheeses in Murano to start our dinner.

I'm always thrilled with the service in Murano. I've never once had to open the door when leaving the restaurant to use to the restroom and I've always had a new napkin on my table when I've returned. I've always been served from the left with food being removed from the right. I know these may seem like small items, but for me it completes the overall experience.

My favorite night in Murano: I was watching Roxanna cook lobster. I was listening to her explain all the ingredients in the lobster and I was taking note. When she came by our table I made a comment about the ingredients and told her I was trying to remember them all so I could trying cooking it at home. Roxanna asked us if we liked to cook and we told her that we definitely do and try to cook at home at least 4 nights a week. She brought to our attention that Celebrity has a cookbook we could buy that has almost all the recipes of the restaurants. She said it was only $30 but most people didn't buy it because it was so large and heavy it weighed down their luggage. She told me she would bring it out for us to see. She was right, it definitely was huge! But I thought it would make a wonderful coffee table book so we would buy it. She said we didn't have to worry about bringing it back to our room that she would have it delivered to our stateroom. How nice! Additionally she said the lobster recipe was not in the cookbook but she was bring us a full copy of the recipe from the kitchen. Again, how wonderful! One of my ideas is to try and cook one meal per week from the cookbook and post photos and maybe a short video on Cruise Critic. I think it might be a fun way to share Celebrity at home and get people excited about upcoming dinners on their cruise. Thoughts??

Bistro on 5

Bistro is about to go away. We were told that it would change over to Sushi on 5 starting the day we got off the ship. However, toward the end we were told it may not happen until June. Anyone on the ship feel free to report back! I was able to get a copy of the food menu and drink menu for Sushi on 5 which I will post later on.

We only ate in Bistro was pretty good but we only ate there a few times. our favorite crepe is always the Cowboy. This time we tried the short rib special on Friday which was pretty good and so was the soup that day. I forget the name of the soup but it also had short rib in it plus potatoes in a minestrone style broth. Excellent!

We've always seen Bistro pretty empty and it was fairly empty this cruise but I think we've seen more people here than in the past.

Ocean View Cafe

We ate here a couple times. As usual the Indian food and the roasted chicken is always my favorite. The Indian food options were usually the same but changed every so slightly. We had late night pizza a couple times in the cafe. Edward as usual loved the Mexican station. The buffet always seemed crowded. I think given the amount of sea days we had people just hung out and ate in there all day.

Each time we ate in Ocean View were were asked if we wanted a drink. Usually the bar servers are few and far between here so while we typically didn't drink in Ocean view I did appreciate the offer

Mast Grill

It was never crowded since it was cool out most days. This was a nice change of pace to not have to wait in a long line! The burgers were good as were the hot dogs. Service was always pretty quick and friendly and again, given that it was cooler outside we never had a problem finding a table near the mast grill to eat.

I will take a short break right now! I will still update on Bar Service and plenty of other things about the cruise! In addition, I will post plenty of photos that are on my phone. Everyone have a wonderful evening!

Hello Paul,

Your detailed review is fabulous! Many thanks!

I'm looking forward to the pics.

Oh, and your idea of cooking with the Celebrity cookbook and posting pics sounds wonderful!

I had never heard of such a cookbook, I'll definitely ask about it, when I'm on the Silhouette next month!

Regards,

Stephanie

Check Amazon & eBay for the cookbook.

Bobbie

What is the price for the ultimate dining package and did it include unlimited access for the full 13 nights? Thanks for the excellent reviews, it sure helps as we are on the Baltic cruise May 14. Once again, I thoroughly enjoyed reading your posts, thanks!

Thanks Paul for the great review, really enjoyed it.

Artie

Cheers everyone! Edward and I have just boarded the beautiful Silhouette. This is our first transatlantic but our 9th cruise on Celebrity. We are definitely on the younger end of pax at 29 and 33. We just purchased the ultimate dining and premium drink package. The weather in FLL is absolute perfection at 78, sunny and a light breeze.

 

We will get the unlimited internet package so I will update as much as I can and post photos too. With 8 sea days coming up I will have plenty of time to answer any questions about the ship or find out anything you need to know. I'll post menus from all restaurants as well as the bars now that we have unlimited internet. I will also post some videos as well.

 

We've already met some wonderful people on this cruise. I think it will be a great one!

 

 

Cheers!

I had to laugh at your title. My husband and I are mid 50's and we felt the youngest on ship from a recent TA on Reflection. We are switching to Royal. Need a bit more energy than our fellow cruisers who wrapped up the evening at 11pm.

Good Morning everyone! Thank you for continuing to read along and for the nice comments. My goal is to have all the photos up by the end of the weekend. I'll continue my review now. Last time I covered the food, I suppose now I should cover the most important part of any cruise...the bar service!

Pool Bar

If you've followed along from the start or watched my instagram, you'd know that every morning I would start with my "breakfast" at the pool bar. At the pool bar I met 4 other people that were there every morning (Wayne, Sal, Jim & Francis). We became known as the "breakfast club" to some cruisers. We'd each have 3 drinks and then off to lunch! The pool bar was never that crowded, mainly due to the weather. The first 4 days the weather was quite nice. Just a light sweater would suffice early on and then a t-shirt was fine in the afternoon. On day 5 the weather started to get cooler and we'd need a jacket to be at the pool bar some days. We had a little rain as well, but the bartenders were always there and they knew our orders.

On the last day it was rainy and relatively cold out. The bartenders were still there and we were the only ones sitting at the bar, but there was a couple enjoying the hot tub. The bartenders were great at keeping an eye on them and bringing drinks out to them in the hot tub.

Ensemble Lounge

We didn't spend too much time in Ensemble, but we would stop occasionally for a drink before dinner or a glass of champagne after dinner. All the bar staff here were very friendly and professional. Even when the bar was crowded they were very quick and attentive. Andrei and Arif, specifically, were great.

Martini Bar

We would go to Martini Bar every day before dinner. At first it was not crowded but after a few days it would start to get completely full around 5:30 and would stay busy until 7pm (first show time) and which point the crowd would fizzle out. We never had to wait long for a drink, though it was never as crowded as it has been on some Caribbean cruises.

On this cruise lots of people seemed to sit in the alcoves around the martini bar, including us on some nights when we'd meet up with a large group. Service was always pretty good and we noticed the bartenders looking around to check in on the groups sitting away from the bar.

I Made was my favorite bartender at the Martini Bar. He got to know my order quickly including the fact I like a Pellegrino or Perrier on the side of my martini.

World Class Bar

This was our first time trying to World Class bar and we were excited! We knew Chairul from the Reflection and have kept in touch with him. He explained all the drinks to us via facebook, so we really wanted to try every single one and I think we accomplished our goal!

There were two bartenders at World Class, Ivan and Vasil. Vasil was the main bartender for World Class Bar. We always enjoyed talking with him and he liked explaining the drinks and the different whiskeys behind the bar.

My favorite drink at World Class Bar was the Bulleit Infusion. The Bulleit Infusion is Bulleit Rye whiskey that sits in a container (it looks like a small wheel) with all different kinds of fruit from oranges to blackberries. It was extremely refreshing and easy to drink and not overly sweet at all.

World Class was never too busy so if you're on the ship I definitely encourage you to stop by and try a drink. All the drinks in the menu are included in the Premium Beverage package (they're all $12).

Passport Bar

There was one day that the pool bar was closed due to the weather so we ended up at Passport bar in the morning. Staff here was always very nice. I was never here in the evening but from Deck 4 I would always see the Passport bar packed before dinner. I think people were there using their Elite coupons!!

Cellar Masters

I only went in here to take pictures of the menu. When I did step in there I noticed a few tables with people sitting and enjoying wine & beer. The sommelier in Cellar Masters seemed to be very attentive at the time I was in there, but I can't speak to the overall service.

Sunset Bar

I think because of the weather (it was always a little windy up on deck 15) we never used the sunset bar on this cruise. Personally, I prefer the Sunset set up on the Silhouette versus the set up of the sunset on the Reflection. For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, the sunset bar on the Reflection is sunken and is circular off to the side on Deck 15. On the Silhouette (and other S Class ships) the Sunset bar is directly in the center of the aft of the ship. The sunset bar used to have a wonderful selection of high end whiskeys (scotches, bourbons, Irish whiskeys) but they removed most of the high end ones!

Sommelier's in the Restaurants

We almost always ate in Tuscan and Murano. The sommelier in Tuscan was great. We typically stuck to a couple different wines that we liked. In Murano, Roxanna, our waitress was very well versed with the wine and took care of pairing different wines with our courses. We'd usually exceed the package limit in Murano and need to pay the difference, as there are only a few wines within the premium package in Murano. You can always ask for a different wine off the list and they can get it for you. However, we enjoyed using wines from the list to be paired. It wouldn't cost too much more.

What is the price for the ultimate dining package and did it include unlimited access for the full 13 nights? Thanks for the excellent reviews, it sure helps as we are on the Baltic cruise May 14. Once again, I thoroughly enjoyed reading your posts, thanks!

The cost is $29/pp per day plus 18% gratuity. You must pay for all days, you cannot buy mid cruise. It must be purchased as soon as you get on the ship. If any specialties are open for lunch, it does include that as well including Bistro on 5. We were told it only includes 1 visit to the porch. We never went to the Porch on this cruise so we can't comment on the accuracy of that rumor.

Hi Norma! It was a pleasure meeting you as well! Thanks for reading my blog and I definitely hope we see you on a future cruise! I gave you my contact info correct? If not send me a private message on here. Would like to keep in touch!

Paul I am on FB UNDER Norma Kennedy and my email address is normajkennedy@aol.com

I've been following your review thread since the beginning, and just wanted to say Thank You, as I really enjoyed your posts and comments. I've sailed on the Silhouette many times and have really enjoyed all my sailings on her.