WeBcruisingMN

You make some very valid points, thank you for that! We were pretty lucky with this Royal Princess cruise, in that our Black Friday 2022 deal was for the Premier package, which covered drinks up to $30 (Australian pricing). We also noticed that Princess has KEPT some of the ‘good brands’ in their package tiers, while Celebrity has seemed to be REDUCING package offerings, and moving brands to higher and higher tiers (or even above the packages). Sounds like you are a wise consumer, and I think we all need to keep comparing and keeping tabs on the changes that each line makes. i hope you greatly enjoy your upcoming nights on Princess. Happy cruising 🚢

Thanks for mentioning that, I had kind of forgotten about Celebrity’s E class having favorable walking tracks. We have sailed on Edge, Apex, and Beyond….and it definitely was a better walking scenario on each of those ships.

Yes, I would hate the indoor smoking too… I think we got lucky, in that our April 6 Royal Princess cruise sailed from Australia, so they were subject to the rules that someone mentioned in a previous post. So- there wasn’t any smoking in the casino on our sailing.

I have skimmed the six pages of responses, so I apologize if some of this was covered… but thought I would chime in. My husband and I are 60 & 58, and have cruised Celebrity 20x, from 2012-2023. We love Celebrity, but when a good deal with the right itinerary came up on Black Friday 2022 with Princess, we bought in. We just returned from the Princess cruise, Royal Princess, April 6-27, 2024 from Sydney to Tokyo…. And though we tried to just enjoy the cruise for “what it was”, we were constantly comparing to our beloved Celebrity cruise line. For the record, this was our second Princess cruise; the first was to Alaska in 2013. We have cruised Royal Caribbean 5x. Here are some thoughts, and again- it may vary, ship-to-ship. With 21 days of mostly MDR dining (we did specialty dining 4x), we would have to award the trophy to Princess. Variety of food, serving temperature, and taste won out for Princess…especially in re the recent year or two of cutbacks, on Celebrity, but really- all of the lines. Laundry: we loved being able to do our own laundry, though on a 21 night cruise- the laundry room was BUSY! One had to time your loads right. It was $3/load, either washing or drying…and I brought laundry detergent sheets (from our daughter’s house) instead of dealing with a liquid. The last two loads were wash-only, where we hung everything in our room to dry, because there was too much competition for the dryers. Walking/Jogging Track: Royal Princess had a dedicated area on deck 18. We still needed to dodge other walkers, as we prefer speed walking, but on Celebrity- the track weaves through the upper pool deck area, so much more dodging is involved. Nod to Princess for this walking track layout . Free Pizza: Princess wins by a mile. The pizza on deck 16 was delicious and always hot. Celebrity tries, but slices are smaller, and sometimes tastes like it has been sitting around. WiFi: goes to Princess. Fast, didn’t kick you out after a period of non-use… Ship Layout: hands down to Celebrity. Princess seemed to be a maze, at least the Royal. One of the MDR’s (Allegro) is only accessible by the rear staircase coming down to deck 6, Allegro hosts both MDR breakfast and MDR lunch, so seemed we were constantly going up to 7, to then walk to the rear and go down to deck 6. The Horizon buffet seemed really disjointed (the few times we had to eat early breakfast and use the buffet). It seemed like little rooms, and corridors, presenting so many blind corners to run into people. Especially the public bathrooms, both men’s and women’s were very small and laid-out poorly. Like the person would be drying their hands, but blocking the new person from entering. Small spaces to pass by other guests, just poor layouts in the bathrooms for most of them. Speaking of the Princess bathrooms, I could not believe there were No Buttons for accessibility or automatic opening of the doors. Very un-ADA ….and even for a gal like me, I prefer to NOT touch the door handle when exiting the bathroom, but that was impossible. The doors are wooden and very heavy too. On Celebrity, I am constantly using the door open button, and hitting it with my hip. Also on Celebrity, the bathrooms are staffed more regularly with a helpful employee who directs guests to open toilets and cleans between each use (in the evening). The stateroom bathrooms were very small (we had a deluxe balcony). My husband is only 6feet tall and slim build, but he was struggling with the small size. The shower with curtain was a bummer, too…the curtain had some mold on the bottom (no wonder, it ‘hung’ in the water residue most times). Smallest cruise ship bathroom we’ve ever endured. Service: on Celebrity, the crew greets you cheerily EVERY TIME. Plus, there are lots of crew out and about often, cleaning the stairways and everywhere on the ship. On Princess, we received a cordial Hello from crew most times, but it just didn’t have the same level of enthusiasm as on Celebrity. On Princess, we hardly noticed crew cleaning the stairways, and a noticeable ‘crumb’ would still be there several days later. No real nightclub atmosphere, at least on the Royal. We enjoy dancing at night, like to 70s and 80s tunes…but every evening the dancing was held in the Piazza, which was 3 stories tall…. With full lighting, and a mostly normal looking setting, the same as during broad daylight- at 11:00pm - beyond. The lights weren’t dimmed at all, and it just seemed too big for evening dancing. It probably didn’t help that the “DJ” (assistant cruise director) was merely playing full songs, without any blending or mash up, and he would often emphasize line-dancing songs (which the assistant CD had made friends with a group of 10-12 ladies who were in to line dancing) or he would even take requests from ballroom dancing people, and would play their music from 11-12midn, even though the DJ was supposed to be ‘playing the hits’ (as per the daily program). Dancing was a big disappointment, and the Assistant CD never seemed to notice the cues of reduced people on the dance floor, once he started playing this specialty music (line dancing or ballroom). Celebrity has great nighttime dancing, both in the Sky Lounge and in the Grand Foyer. Pool layout: very hard to find available shade loungers. A lot of prime pool deck space is devoted to the table & chair seating for the pizza and burger grill restaurants, so not as many loungers. On our particular cruise, it seemed people were NOT the sun worshipping type, rather they were looking for shade. Celebrity has a lot of lounge chairs under the overhangs on decks. Lighting in stateroom: Celebrity is better. In fact, the first night on Royal we awakened each other with nighttime trips to the bathroom. There were automatic lights under each nightstand that were VERY bright, and an automatic light in the room near the bathroom entrance that lit-up by motion, as one approached the bathroom. We did NOT need this additional lighting during the dark of night, and did some ‘hacks’ to disable these features for nights 2 through 21. Not sure if these features are for safety, since we noticed the average age of this Princess cruise was quite old, maybe 75-80? Maybe this older demographic needs additional nighttime lighting? Celebrity wins Theatre by a mile…. Their production shows encompass MANY advanced dance moves and even acrobatics….their theatre stage allows for that extra movement and spatial flexibility. Princess stage, at least the Royal, seemed like our local high school stage, so the dancers seemed to do basic back & forth moves, most of the time…. And the shows were just limited. The Princess theatre seating seemed like a lesser situation: lower ceilings, smaller corridors for accessing the seating, and just a smaller scale experience. We love the theatre shows, so this was a big bummer. Plus, there is no drink service in the theatre, and it is almost like they expect you to NOT be having a drink in the theatre, so there are no cup holders or wine glass holders in the arm rests between the seats. Not typical to have sommeliers in the Princess MDR: on Celebrity, there is a Sommelier dedicated to only drink service in the MDR. The first 3-4 nights in the Princess MDR, the assistant waiter was expected to take our wine order, and we were supposed to know that exactly which wine we wanted to order. We were very dissatisfied with this, and thankfully on Night 5, a sommelier (who was responsible for the entire MDR) approached us and asked how things were going. We were honest, including the feedback of the wine being provided in basic chunky wine glasses, and from nights 6-21, we had a very nice sommelier on Royal Princess, who provided us with good advice on wine and decent semi-fancy glasses, which matched the elegant atmosphere of the dining room itself. 15-Drink Daily Limit on Princess: we never really came close, most we had was 9-10 per day on a couple of days, but it was ALWAYS on our mind and we were constantly having to check our individual accounts to see what our number was. This was due to bar tenders or waiters counting BOTH of our drinks to one of us, not one to each…so one person could get very close to 15, without much warning. Bar Service was also a little spotty on Princess, they wanted you to wait for wait service, but sometimes that took a while…and meanwhile we would watch other guests walk up to the bar and get served immediately. Anyway, we enjoyed ourselves on the Royal, and we had a fine vacation…but we will probably return to Celebrity. I think the clientele suits our style more, and the service aspect is just such a big part of our cruise experience. These are our recent thoughts; it really depends on what is important to you. Happy Cruising, Everyone! 😊🚢⚓️

@mahdnc May God bring peace to you and your family, as you grieve your mother-in-law’s passing. Sympathy and compassion to you 💟 Thanks for the additional Galapagos info you continue to provide ✅

Hello @mahdnc David! Just caught up on your trip report and (as always) very specific and helpful info. So glad to see & hear that you and Marcia had a stupendous cruise in the Galapagos Islands. We are on the FLORA in October 2024. Seemed so far-off when we booked it, but now only 11 months away and starting to get excited. We just returned from Hawaii, where our youngest daughter Theresa married her long time Australian love, Chris. Remember they met on the dance floor of the Celebrity Solstice while sailing in Australia (April 2018) and got engaged while sailing on the Solstice in Alaska (August 2022)? It was a joyous wedding, and a fun time- uniting Theresa and Chris, and also uniting two countries & cultures. The Americans and Australians had a great time together celebrating. All the best to you and your family, as you continue to enjoy cruising and enjoy life 😀🚢 Sharon A quick pic of the happy couple at their beautiful venue on Oahu

Great trip report, @prmssk‼️ Such wonders you saw, and excellent photography of those wonders. We are on the Flora in October next year. I am sorry if I missed this in the report, but could you list the footwear that you brought and if there was anything you wish you had brought along? Wondered if actual hiking boots were necessary? We are 58 & 60 and will aim for doing the most active excursions possible… Also, were you happy with the SeaLife Sports Diver underwater phone casing you used? Thanks ⚓️Sharon

Yes, we did cruise on the same ship as the Abraham Hicks group in early April 2019 on a 7-night Caribbean cruise on the almost brand new (at that time) Celebrity Edge. They numbered about 1000 people, so about 1/3 of the ship. While we did have a fun cruise and enjoyed ourselves, there were a few observations that I will share about the dynamic and flow of the ship: 1) Apparently it is important for them to try to get a really good seat for their meeting or even to make it into some kind of ‘hot seat’, so before their meetings there would be long lines of people in front of the theatre and down the hallway for a long ways. This bogged down the hallway areas for a bit each of their meeting days, just had to walk around a bunch of people. Because they were using the theatre a lot, I also think there were less ‘regular guest’ events in the theatre. 2) We learned the first day that their meeting would end at 5:00, and at 5:01 pm - the martini bar would be JAMMED with all of them arriving, needing seating, drinks, etc….they filled the area and stayed for a long time, so if we wanted a seat at the martini bar or good service, we had to change our cruise evening ‘plan’ to arrive at the Martini Bar by 4:55pm. Cafe al Bacio would also be JAMMED in the time period before their meetings starting. 3) They seemed to wear their name tags on lanyards most of the time, so you’ll notice them, and it seemed they often hung out with other AH people. We overheard some conversations about ‘how am I going to bring all this wonderful enlightenment back to my life at home?’ and such, but nothing inappropriate. One of the days, we ended up on a Celebrity snorkeling excursion with a big group of AH people and they were respectful and nice, though we seemed to be some of the only ones not in their group on that excursion. I will say there was a slight advantage to them being there, because areas of the ship (like the pool) would seem less crowded when they were in their meetings. I assume most of them attended all the meetings; I think they pay a lot of money to attend these meetings. I personally would not be too interested in cruising with them (or any large group) again, just because of the flow and ‘clustering’ that occurs (another comment stated it that way). You can search on “Abraham Hicks cruise dates” and find out what dates they will be cruising. They seem to choose Celebrity. Looks like they will be on the Reflection 10-night Greek Islands and Malta cruise from July 17-27, 2023 ….the Solstice 9-night Hawaii cruise from Sept 22-Oct 1, 2023 for the rest of this year.

@mahdncHow fun to see your wonderful thread ‘resurrected’! Hope you and your family are doing very well 👍🏻 We recently returned from a fantastic 35-nights of vacation to NZ & Australia, including the 11-night NZ cruise on the Eclipse (out of Sydney) March 26-April 6. April 12-20 We did something new and amazing with our daughter Theresa and her fiancé Chris, along with his family. We flew from Melbourne (where they live) to Airlie Beach (airport= Proserpine) and rented a sail-yourself 50-foot catamaran for the week to sail in the Whitsunday Islands. It was an incredible sailing, which included snorkeling whenever we wanted, hiking on the many different national parklands of the different islands, and the most amazing starry skies we’ve ever seen- while moored in dark bays/ inlets. We even anchored near the famous Whitehaven Beach late one afternoon, and essentially had it all to ourselves to enjoy- after the numerous helicopter tours had finished for the day. It was different than our usual cruise (we had ‘work’ to do), but all the work (sailing, anchoring/mooring process, cooking, etc) was shared among the nine of us, and the benefits of the serenity and adventure were worth it. If anyone ever has any questions about such an adventure, let me know sharonbaranick at yahoo dot com I’ll attach a few pics:

We just disembarked Eclipse today after the March 26-April 6 cruise to New Zealand. Our comments are that she is a little worn in places, but it didn’t affect our enjoyment of the cruise at all. Some of the things we noticed that cause me to give her the ‘a little worn’ designation include: Occasional scrapes on the upholstery of chairs (leather or fake leather) Very worn wooden drainage grates (in some cases broken slats) around the pool areas Carpet in stairwells was a bit dull and had an occasional stain In ladies bathrooms there were often one or more sinks that were ‘Just resting’ (out of order), but there were others working normally The awnings over the lawn area are discolored/ grimy looking, but obviously still functional In our veranda stateroom 7276, the carpet seemed somewhat worn, all drawers worked fine but there was a loose closet handle, and the veranda furniture was quite worn (but still functional). Some of the curtain clips were off track a little or missing, but it still closed mostly well. We didn’t have a sheer in our stateroom, just the blackout. They ARE fixing up the Eclipse at least in small ways. Things we noticed on our eleven days onboard include: - scraping off the old worn varnish on our veranda railing (and other adjacent railings) and re-varnishing them. My husband said they did a really good job! - on different days, they drained each of the two pools (one at a time) and repainted the insides of them and refilled them. We observed the crew doing this painting one night after 10pm when we went up to walk around the pool area. This rendered each pool and adjoining hot tubs as unusable for about 24 hours each, but we were on a mostly cooler weather cruise (New Zealand Autumn timeframe), so it didn’t seem to be a hardship. Hope these descriptions help. If you have any other specific questions, let me know and I can recall our recent experiences. 😊🚢

We just disembarked the Eclipse today from the March 26 sailing. We had read (on cruise critic) of agents who looked closely at photos of the tests or the actual tests and other tales of agents who barely glanced. To report on our experience: We arrived in Sydney from the USA on March 24. At about 10am (Sydney time) on March 25 we did our antigen tests in our Sydney hotel room, testing negative and taking pictures of each of our tests. We boarded the Eclipse about 11:30am on March 26, and the agent carefully looked at our pictures, noting the negative result, and enlarging our screens to look specifically at the date/time stamp of our pics. Not sure if this was everyone’s experience while boarding recently, but that is what our situation was like. Side note: my husband and I felt like this ship had the LEAST amount of coughing, sneezing etc on the entirety of our 11 day cruise… than the previous seven cruises we have taken since Restart. Seemed like most were healthy! Good luck to you, @KenTheCruiser 😊 🚢

Highly recommend hiking Deer Mountain, if the weather is good. We have hiked it three times while on a cruise stop, 2016 & 2022 in great weather, 2019 in rain (would not recommend). You can easily walk to the trail head, I think it is about a mile…but we had gotten a tip to hire a taxi to the trailhead (easy to find, just hail one from the street or google taxi companies and call them direct to arrange, I believe our company in 2022 was Sourdough Cab Co.). The one mile walk to the trailhead is almost fully uphill, so if you take a taxi there- you can save your legs for the hike, which is easily marked, by the way. I will attach a couple of pics from our most recent time in August 2022. Be sure you have bug spray along, there was a point in a sunny meadow where we were swarmed by something that was feasting on our blood. Let me know if you have any questions. I love to promote hiking in Alaska; we have done wonderful hikes in Juneau and Skagway too, right from the ships. Sharon 😊

@larstickWe dined at 6 the first night (in Eden), so we went to the 9:30 show that night, the other six nights we dined AFTER the 7:30 show, so dining time was about 8:30pm.

Yes, Beyond show times are now 7:30 & 9:30 (we were just on the Dec 4-11 sailing). I believe they did recently change, as I had been following other ‘live’ reports from the Beyond or post-cruise reviews….and it seemed like they had been 7 & 9 right up until about one or two cruises before ours We usually attended the 7:30 shows, and they were well-attended, especially the 3 production shows. You should plan to get there earlier than usual to get settled in a good seat… and I’m sure you won’t be one of those who comes in 5-20 minutes LATE. We observed this scenario for each of the three productions and one group even paraded past the very front of the stage to get to a seat up front, off to the side (the same group actually did this for all three shows). There were others who came in late, and they made already-seated guests stand up so they could get to the middle of a row while the show was already playing. You may also want to consider the Wonder of Eden production shows. We attended all three of those and they were excellent, plus you are seated really close to the action. Plan on arriving about a 1/2 hour before show time to get a good seat. For reference, our sailing had 2,340 guests (about 70% full).

What sort of cabin are you wondering about, what deck and how close to the Bridge? I just disembarked from The Beyond today and we had a deluxe porthole veranda, stateroom 8118, starboard forward. If this is the area of the ship you are interested in, I can tell you some details or load some pics I took of the room and the veranda view.

Hello fellow Minnesotan! 😊 Yes, Celebrity DOES usually have diet tonic, we often drink Gin & Diet Tonics so we have had this on a variety of ships. You need to ask for it specifically, and sometimes the bartender will ‘sigh’ as you ask for it, because they serve it out of bottles and sometimes they need to go to the refrigerator for it or even in the backroom (takes a little more time to access it), but we have usually gotten diet tonic without too much trouble. The brands we remember are Canadian Club, Seagrams, …

@mahdncDavid, Your photo is really nice, too! Was it from your veranda? You’re correct that my photos were taken from a higher perspective. Both were taken on the rail near the Sunset Bar, so deck 15 (or is it 14?). The one with the pinkish sky was from January 25 @ 5:33pm, so likely the ‘golden hour’ before sunset. The other was November 7 @4:53pm, so 40 minutes earlier in the day, but a different sun angle since it was November. I hope to take another photo of the Nassau sailaway and lighthouse on our coming Beyond cruise in early December. Maybe I will add it onto this thread for yet another comparison. 🤷🏻‍♀️ Hope your settling-in at home has gone well. 😊

Excellent review, David, and a nice sailaway pic from Nassau! That is one of our fav sailaways. I’ll attach my two recent pics from November (Reflection) and January (Silhouette). So glad that you’ve had a successful return to cruising and a wonderful crossing of the Atlantic. All the best to you and your wife, Marcia 😊 Sharon (& John)

I LOVE the President butter 🧈, in fact I buy it at home (at a premium price) for a special ‘treat’ every now and then. I had also observed that Celebrity has President butter on European sailings and a different brand on other sailings. Thanks for making me smile 😀 by mentioning President butter! 💛

@mahdncThanks for the info, I am thinking it bodes well for the Beyond to be decorated by the time we board on Sunday, December 4th. I would think with it being a new ship, that they would want to have it decorated well too…I will report back and post some pics in a few months ✅ Looks like you have a nice TA cruise coming in October; hope you all have a lot of fun and smooth seas 🚢 We kind of assumed an engagement would take place sometime during our week on the Solstice (8/19 to 8/26), especially since it was Theresa and Chris’ first time back on the ship since they met there and fell in love in April 2018. We just didn’t know when….We did an incredible hike on Deer Mountain in Ketchikan, but it didn’t happen there. The next day in Juneau, Theresa and Chris had booked the Helicopter/ Glacier / Dog sledding excursion, while John and I did the (more affordable) Bike and Brew. Chris asked her to marry him atop the glacier and the pics were beautiful! So we weren’t present, but found out quickly thereafter when we met-up in the theatre for the evening show and the two of them were beaming with smiles. 😁 They have been a great example of a faithful International couple, and I think- a good promo for a Celebrity love story. ❤️❤️

@mahdnc Hi David, hope you and the family are well! Thanks for all of the fun and festive Christmas-NYE pics. So much fun has been had and will be had 🎄 Question: I was thinking in a past post you had access to the decorating schedule for the ships? If I am remembering correctly, could you please post the link to that? While we won’t be on a ship over the actual holidays, we recently booked the December 4 Beyond cruise, so I am hoping the decorations will be complete before we begin our sailing. Thanks, if you have any info on that. By the way, Theresa and Chris recently got engaged (on a Juneau glacier excursion while the four of us sailed the Solstice in Alaska, the ship where they met in 2018), and Theresa has moved to Australia to live with him. We are so happy for them, but already miss her (them) greatly. Wedding in Hawaii in late 2023. 🇦🇺🇺🇸A wonderful Celebrity love story, for sure ❤️ Take care and happy sailings, Sharon

Bon voyage (soon) 🚢⚓️ Hope you have a wondrous B3B, many spectacular ports await you….let me just say that I am looking forward to your P I C T U R E S! You have an eye for photography, and I haven’t found anyone else on CC who better tells the story of their cruise through BOTH words and pictures….happy sailing to you and Iain 😊

I hear ya….we dislike tendering ports too. On our recent Silhouette cruise (mid-June 2022) we had two of them. 1-St. Peter Port (Guernsey) was fine on the outbound, but the line for the tender back (mid day 1:00) was super long, with much of the waiting done in full sun (thankfully it was only about 70°, but it was still quite warm). We waited 55 minutes before we could board a tender for the return. We are young middle-agers, but it was a difficult wait for the older folks for sure! 2-Waterford, Ireland we were booked on a Celebrity excursion, so we walked from the theatre with our tour group to board. Went alright and we departed fairly quickly after boarding. Return tender was on our own timing (some people stayed in town), and of course it was warmer and the tender boat was so stuffy inside. They loaded people into every possible nook and seating area, just jammed us in (and we were all supposed to be wearing masks in the sweltering, stale air conditions). One lady in the very front corner opened a window to get some air … which seemed like a good idea, but then when the tender boat moved beyond the ‘No Wake zone’, a wave of water came through the window and drenched a few people 😵 Of course we survived, but we have similar thoughts about tendering. I understand why they have to do tendering, and we would rather Cruise than Not Cruise… One other note is that I asked the Silhouette Captain’s Club concierge on the first day of the cruise about priority tendering for Elite and above. She said they are not doing that at the present time, “because of Covid”. 🤷🏻‍♀️ ….so that was a bummer to us to ‘lose’ that benefit. Maybe that was just the policy on that ship?

@cachouonacruisethanks for your stupendous pics too! I especially love your representation of our wonderful weather day in Iceland on June 20- looks like you had a great tour and saw some wondrous beauty of the land. Even if we have a rainy dreary sailaway from Reykjavik, what a great cruise it has been, right? Onward to Belfast! Not sure if you already mentioned this, but Guest Relations told me we are sailing with 2,091 guests. I also heard from a crew member that we have approximately 960+ Americans and 760+ Brits… plus other nationalities. I was kind of interested to hear the top national representations, so I asked…. And I know some have asked or wondered about the passenger count on cruises.

We are on the Silhouette and just booked the Porch for lunch on one of the sea days. Didn’t notice if it was available on port days.