cgolf1

Some day we may try it. Not sure if staring at the ocean from land would be as relaxing as watching it go bye or watching the wake. Sailing into and out of ports is always cool to watch too.

I don’t know if board is the right word but my mind rarely slows down and I am thinking of the next thing while doing the previous thing or worse talking to someone about something else while thinking ahead. For some reason on a cruise or when I am out fishing my mind slows down which is a very refreshing feeling. When we did Disney and tried to pack in all the activities we could, it was fun but exhausting. Ten nights on the Connie with 600ish people, we mostly hung out on the back deck area with the TV up top and I lost a lot of cribbage games and did a lot of my puzzle book during the day, but that was one of our best cruises ever. We only got off the ship in the Dominican Republic for a short time.

We do a few land vacations and even take our own food on long weekend trips to save cash. We don't need to, but I guess it saves some money for retirement eventually if we are allowed to lol. The issue I have with land vacations is there isn't much in the US that is a must see for me, so that limits our options a lot. If I do a land vaca I need it to be a fishing trip or something with a set activity, just looking at a waterfall or something doesn't do much for me. There are some exceptions like the badlands and some nice hiking trails, but yeh on land I get board easily. Which is odd that while on a cruise my whole goal is to be board and relax. Apparently I am complicated.

I will speak for my wife, who emphatically had it as a bucket list trip for her and we did the half transit in Feb. In fact we travel the great river road along the Mississippi once or twice a year because she loves to visit the locks and dams. So I would vote not a guy thing.

They definitely didn't get a pass for the booze in our survey. That is something with a long shelf life and no reason to run out of those items. Luckily there wasn't a lot of us from WI on there or they would have run out of brandy from all the old fashioned that were ordered during happy hour;) The Montreal to Boston run was an amazing Itinerary. It is a trip that we want to do again a little later in the season sometime.

So for all of those that want X to list all the changes and cutbacks, what do you think that will do to sales? Other lines that are cutting back are also not advertising it, so that would put X at a huge disadvantage, when they may not be cutting back the most. I think the only way this ever happens is if every cruise line were to announce this at the same time. I know of very few businesses, if any, that are publicly advertising that you are getting a lesser product now. Many are just either raising the prices or giving less product for the same price, which they don't tell you about.

I think for the first time I did this on my review. But, it was for very good reason. After the cutbacks this year all bad reviews, even the over the top everything is terrible reviews got lots of praise from people as being an honest opinion, and the good reviews were heavily questioned. So I went with it and tried to do a balanced review. Not sure if I put in the Zaandam report or not. The HAL board overall is handling this type of stuff differently. I could only imagine what would happen on this board if they ran out of certain alcohols like they have on HAL. When we were on HAL they ran out of the cheap amaretto on day 4 or 5.

What do people expect X and other lines to do or say? Say our product now sucks but once we have no more debt we hope to be back to normal or at least better than we are now? Yes we are only 3 cruises in on Celebrity, one pre pandemic and two post. For us they all were great cruises overall. I do have a review on the Edge from this year and I noted the changes which were noticeable. We also recently sailed the Zaandam this year and I did a thread/review on that as well. X was the better line in many ways but we will sail HAL again. All the complaining on here about only one free small lobster, be happy with that. HAL it was an upcharge to get 2 small lobsters or one giant tail, no free lobster at all in the MDR. I do hope someone starts a thread comparing value people are getting. Our mainline cruises run 85$ to 130$ per person per night for inside rooms, usually without all the extras. We still see a ton of value in X and Hal. This includes our 2025 trip on the Eclipse. I might be a lot less forgiving if we were paying 300$ plus per person per night and our expectations would be much higher. The prices we are paying now are inline with what we were paying on Disney back in the day, so honestly cruising is still feeling like a great vacation deal. Sorry you caught me full rant, but I am just trying to figure out what people are expecting Honestly I am just glad we can still cruise and on the home front still can eat whatever we want, just not at the same price point.

This comment really makes me mad, PG version of words I would really say, that tells me you have zero clue about us 3rd class passengers. We sail insides by CHOICE, and for the deals we are getting Celebrity is a great deal even with the cutbacks this year. It does sound like they started to add some back after our cruise in February. I would make the opposite case though that with the rising retreat costs and the cutbacks that the retreat value isn't worth it and its time to potentially switch lines. We saw this on this on Disney way back in the day when they decided to double the suite class prices one year to the next and we were out of those rooms and eventually Disney. Heck be thankful you still get one free lobster on X, when we sailed HAL this year, to get the lobster it was an upcharge. Sailing HAL opened our eyes, it was very nice and would do it again, but X is definitely better line at the inside/oceanview level. For special diets like gluten free, X is unmatched.

We have sailed the Edge February this year and the Zaandam May of this year, and I found the MDR food to be much better tasting on HAL. The service in the MDR though was much better on X. As far as lunch buffet goes, X crushed HAL especially for someone on a gluten free diet. Apparently I am this poster now, there Beyond experience can't be compared because that trip was before the 2023 changes were implemented. Even though I was overall happy with the food on the Edge, I definitely noticed the changes.

All of the people peeing in the pools;) Seriously though, having sailed X and HAL this year, I know I saw cutbacks on X, and it sounds like similar may be happening on HAL. Both to me were still a product I would easily sail again and we currently have 1.5 X cruises booked (Galapagos counts as a half since it is X but super different. We are pretty chill though so the changes on X specifically really didn't impact us too much. Also was surprised on HAL that in the MDR that free Lobster is not offered on any night.

That was why in my post trip survey, I offered suggestions to fix some of the issues that we encountered. Sometimes a complaint can be useless information unless everyone is complaining about it. Adding a potential solution along with the issue can be a big help and will likely add weight to any complaint.

We just had our passports and the customs part was computerized and printed a slip that you showed to a customs officer and they asked us why we were in Canada which was an easy we are going on a cruise and they waived us through. Then we grabbed our bags and on the way out of the terminal you simply hand the slip to a customs agent on the way out and you are done. Only issue might be if you are carrying large sums of cash, I believe the number was 10k. we read the Canada government sites and they made entry sound a lot more problematic than it was and added a lot of stress pre cruise.

The Edge in February was awful, thankfully I grabbed a hot dog too which wasn't bad. It did remind me of lean ground beef we have used at home, but usually those fall apart so no idea what it was. It seems like with both burgers and hot dogs, the more fat or junk meat in the case of hot dogs in them the better they taste.

Yes but in this day and age, I look at the roll calls, but never sign my name to them because I don't want to publicly state that I will be on vacation during a certain time. It also made it difficult for me when inquiring about cruise info for the Canada/New England we booked 1 month before we left because I didn't want to say we are leaving April 30th, help lol. I am probably being overly cautious, but who knows. Some day I may lurk on the roll call and show up at the meet if I know some of the names, but only spending a short time on this board to prep I didn't recognize anyone. The X board there are some people for sure I would want to meet, especially a few that drive me crazy and some of them are on this board too.

I am surprised this thread was still going, as I would think that the X burgers are just so bad that nobody could defend them much less eat them. If X wants to save some money or make people happy, get rid of those burgers and add something back to the buffet;)

We did this all the time with lean ground beef. It not only tastes incredible, but the burgers are easy to cook because they tended to not burn because the grease would just burn off and you always ended up with a really hot fire if your were cooking on a charcoal grill.

I also only do reviews on these forums. Two for Celebrity and one for Holland. Not sure if I did one for RCCL for CC or another board more related to Disney. I stay away from the actual review area on CC. I read the boards to learn about the lines and learn who to trust over time. It is weird in that you get to know people without ever meeting them. Starting to get an idea of some people on this board in a good way in my short HAL time.

Off topic, but thanks for your Connie review, it helped our inlaws out for their sailing, first main X sailing (had done Flora as only X), I believe right after yours. I thought I recognized your screen name.

The wives joined us in our WI tradition of Brandy Old Fashioneds:)

It is a beautiful ship, but I do like the Fincantieri builds from that timeframe and this ship didn't disappoint. The MDR was a challenge, as I covered here and my post cruise report on here. It was a great trip overall. Every cruise has its share of challenges, and we just need to roll with them. We have seen many on other boards that would scrap a ship for slightly worn carpet, tile issues in a bathroom, marks on the paint etc, we refuse to roll that way. These ships turnover a lot of people each year, there is bound to be wear and tear, these aren't super yachts.

I agree with all you said having sailed the Zaandam recently as well, except they ran out of Amaretto in the crows nest. Despite some of the hiccups we will be back for a second HAL cruise in the future.

The lady that played at the piano bar had an amazing voice, so I wasn’t surprised it was packed. She was a gem. After are last Celebrity cruise, it was nice to hear great live vocals.

The Canada/New England cruise on the Zaandam had zero issues with chair hogs. That said it was cold and the top was always closed, and we only had one sea/river day. Being our first HAL cruise, I just thought HAL had it controlled:) All joking aside, we appeared to have a full ship based on rooms booked and no upgrades available and other then the piano bar by the casino being packed at night, I really never saw many people congregating in one area during the trip. Other than the lines for the MDR at 5:30 that is to tie it all together;)

Yup and we chose to cruise on lines with the least first world problems:)