GenerationX

Good morning from our sail into San Juan! Today is one of those hybrid half port half sea days as we don’t dock in Puerto Rico until 2pm. I thought the European acrobat show last night might inspire my husband to join me for a workout this morning, but no such luck, so I was solo for my 2 mile run around the jogging track followed by a cool down walking around taking more photos of the ship. As I mentioned, last night after the Caravan show in the club ended we went to the production show, Tree of Life, in the theater. The cast have some really good voices and the show really shows off the new tech in the E class theatre. Once the show wrapped up we headed back to the martini bar for espresso martinis and the presentation of the ship’s officers then did a little slow dancing to live music provided by my favorite Celebrity house band, The Cardinals. Then we headed up to dinner at Fine Cut. Our reservation was for 8:30, but we didn’t get seated till around 8:45. The restaurant was completely packed and between that and the initial wait at the unmanned host stand, I was very worried that we were in for a somewhat painful service experience. Once we were seated that turned out not to be the case at all. Our server Mushi was amazing and gave great ordering recommendations. The sommelier came right over with the rest of our bottle of wine from Eden (I know, I still owe a report). For starters Jeremy had the tuna tartare which he proclaimed “outstanding” and I had the scallops that I remembered being so good in Fine Cut on Edge and I think they were even better this time. Jeremy and I are ribeye people, but Mushi was quite adamant that one of us should try the filet mignon so Jeremy gave it a go. I was shocked when Jeremy left not a crumb on his plate and said it was “one of the best steaks I’ve ever had”. Apparently Mushi is good, Mushi is wise. My ribeye was just as good as Tuscan Grille on S class and spreading the black truffle butter on top made it even better. We also split a decent Caesar salad and for sides we tried the Mac and cheese, tater tots and sautéed spinach. The only disappointment was the spinach. In fact I’ll go so far as to call it flat out bad. The texture was weird, it had almost no seasoning, and it was cold. Like not even room temperature, but cold. I guess though if something’s going to be terrible in a steakhouse meal you’re paying extra for, the spinach would be the best thing to flop. For dessert we split the brownie sundae…sigh…say it with me Celebrity: if you’re going to offer a brownie sundae, serve👏🏾 the 👏🏾 brownie👏🏾warm. It was a really good brownie and ok ice cream, but it needed that temp combo of warm brownie and cold ice cream to really make it. We were completely stuffed after dinner so decided to skip silent disco and make it an early night sipping a last martini on our veranda in our robes. More to come later today!

First scenes from Evening Chic night! We took inspiration from the movie’s 25th anniversary re-release for tonight’s look. We just left the Caravan circus show in the Club. When the acrobat duo act started my husband said “oh NOW I know why you made me come to this show.” We’ve just been escorted to our reserved seats in the theater by our butler for the Tree of Life production show. Cheers to making it count!

Thanks! The prevailing rate issue is what concerns me a little. I got such a good deal on that cruise and prices are much higher right now. We’re still waiting to hear if Jeremy can get the days off and our house sitter can cover, then I’m going to make an appointment to talk to future cruises. I’ll report back on the outcome and pricing!

Quick Update from my Marriage on Apex: After pool time this morning, while I was showering and dressing for lunch in the bathroom, I heard Jeremy leave the room and not return for about 20 minutes. I prepared my best scolding voice thinking he’d snuck out to cheat and have a smoke. Then I went into the closet for something and noticed a new shopping bag sitting next to the safe. What do ya know, at lunch today I was surprised with an extra belated Valentine’s Day gift…this man is lobbying HARD to be invited onto Beyond in April. 🤣 I skipped dessert at lunch so I could have one of the highly addictive warm chocolate chip cookies from Eden cafe while I take care of a few work projects while watching the wake. So far, wifi is a little slower than yesterday, but still cooperating.

This is very true. There was a pillar with a sign for Retreat luggage, but there was a line of cars waiting to pull in there so we kept going down to general luggage drop. Our bags were all still delivered by the time we got done with lunch in Luminae.

Yes she is welcome in all Retreat areas. I’ve seen a handful of kids in Luminae this sailing. I’ve sailed with our 10 year old daughter in suites and she LOVES it. All the crew treated her like a little princess. You’ll be setting your granddaughter up for high cruising expectations!

Sharing some pics of our stateroom 9179, an S2 sky suite. I booked this stateroom as a suite guarantee. I’ve never done a guarantee booking before and was a little nervous about what we may be assigned. However when I looked at the suite availability for the cruise, the handful of suite cabins left were all S2’s in a decent location, so I figured odds were good we’d be satisfied. Plus, the guarantee booking price was over $2K cheaper than picking my own stateroom, so the cost savings were well worth the risk to me! Thus far it’s worked out well. No issues with noise from the hall or surrounding areas and it’s a quick walk to the forward elevators to get up and down to Luminae and the Retreat deck. We noticed that our pre-cruise preference sheet requests for welcome bottle, extra hangers and stateroom temperature were also honored. I think my favorite thing about the suites on E Class is the bathrooms. I love the lower but wider tub, toilet having its own enclosure and the mirrors that slide open so you can look out at the sea.

Good morning from our post-Luminae breakfast lazing on the Retreat Sundeck! It’s a beautiful morning at sea! It’s a little after 9:30 and it seems like there’s still a decent supply of at least partially shaded seating. While Jeremy heads down to do battle with a slot machine, a catch up post on our first day on Apex: As mentioned, embarkation was remarkably quick. We arrived at the terminal at 10:45 and when we were directed to the suite boarding area, the port worker by the security check point told us they expected to start suite boarding around 11:30. That seemed pretty late to me but I figured maybe there were technical issues or something. Sure enough, just as Jeremy and I had made ourselves a little plate of suite lounge snacks and were putting sugar in our coffees, they started suite boarding at about 10:55. When we went to our cabin to drop off carry on bags and grab our sea passes, we bumped into our very nice stateroom attendant I Made, who was just coming in to finish cleaning the room. After checking in at our muster station, we headed towards the Retreat lounge for the first cocktails and canapés of the cruise and to see if the concierge could help with modifying a couple of specialty reservations I made online pre-cruise. A couple of Apex Retreat lounge food and beverage hot tips: if you’re a tequila person, Patrick makes a wonderful The Retreat cocktail (which my husband promptly had 2 of). Also, don’t miss the duck prosciutto and mango salsa canapés! One of the down sides to booking last minute is that unless it’s a pretty empty sailing, prime specialty dining times can be hard to come by in the cruise planner. When I booked Fine Cut and Raw on 5 online, the only times available in the cruise planner were an absurdly late dinner of 9:30. Jat our concierge (who greeted us warmly with a smile and offered us another round of cocktails) connected us with the specialty dinning manager who was able to move our Raw on 5 reservations up to 6pm. For Fine Cut, she said the restaurant was almost fully booked for the whole cruise already but she’d see what she could do. By the time we got back to our room after dinner last night, we had a card saying our reservation had been moved up to 8:30! After a little exploring we headed to lunch in Luminae about 12:30. The restaurant was pretty busy but there wasn’t a wait for a table. I was a little worried with how crowded it was that service would be slow, but it turned out not to be the case at all. Start to finish I think we were in and out in less than 45 minutes skipping dessert. For lunch Jeremy had the ceviche and Luminae burger and I had the pea soup and steak frites. Jeremy said his ceviche wasn’t bad, but paled in comparison to the amazing one we had in FLL the day before. The Luminae burger rarely disappoints, but Jeremy said he wished they’d melted the cheese on better. My soup was served hot with lots of flavorful ham strips. The real surprise was how good the strip steak was. It was so tender it almost ate more like a ribeye than a strip and nice and garlicky. My pro tip: skip the potato wedge fries that come with the steak and ask for the truffle fries that come with the burger instead. Our lunch sommelier Arnold remembered me from one of Red and I’s cruises last year and as he refilled my Pinot noir, convinced me to sign up for the blendtique wine event (which I’ve never done before) and the premium wine tasting. I’m going to go for a swim and then maybe take a little sea breezes nap (it was a late night). Soon to come: a report on our Eden dinner and first night of partying on Apex. m

In case anyone is wondering about Jeremy’s initial impressions of his first E-class cruise… Does anyone have experience with taking a cruise booking initially booked as a solo cruise (with full solo supplement) and trying to add a second passenger after final payment with whatever upcharge? For some reason my husband is now much less chill about me sailing Beyond in April without him.

I believe that it’s the plan! Hopefully I haven’t hijacked an official roll call meet up. 😂 @KKB hope to see you there! You already know how to find me: map dress, cocktail in hand, look of immense self satisfaction on my face.

O…M…G that is totally the Beyond April sailing that I’m on!!! I also got alerted to the deal through CC and couldn’t resist the pricing. It’s going to be a fun sailing!

Quick update: Full details on embarkation to come, but basically it took me longer to shampoo and condition my hair this morning than it did to get from our Uber pulling up at T25 to drinking kir royals in the Retreat Lounge. Sharing a few first photos from exploring Apex!

I love this so much. Thank you!

Good morning and happy embarkation day to all my fellow cruisers! I’ve just finished swimming a few laps and am taking in some sun and hydration poolside while waiting for Jeremy to emerge from his rum coma from last night. About dinner last night: For dinner I got dressed in a Havana Nights-inspired ensemble and we went to Cuba Libre on Las Olas. I got interested in trying the restaurant after watching their cocktail making videos on TikTok. It was about a 15 minute walk from our hotel. We started with the plantain chips and a trio of dips (housemade hummus, salsa and pineapple guacamole) then did their dinner for two Gaucho platter which came with a little of every meat on the menu (all cooked on the open kitchen woodfire grill) served, of course, with the Cuban staples of rice, beans and plantains. Our shrimp was a little over cooked and lobster was kind of small, but other than that, everything was delicious! For dessert we split the pineapple upside down cake and we each had a Cuban coffee, offered with a shot of rum added for an additional $4. As you can see from the pics, that “shot” of rum is really more like 3 shots. When that coffee kicked in on top of the cocktails we’d had with dinner, my usually reserved husband was ready to be the life of every party in Broward County. Fortunately the restaurant atmosphere is conducive to such behavior. If you’re looking for a quiet, laid back dinner, this is not your spot. There was a DJ and light show going in the dining room starting at 7pm. Our server told us the restaurant turns into a full on night/dance club at 11pm and once the drinks hit we were VERY tempted to stay for the real party. But we made that mistake pre cruise a few years ago (ended up in a club on South Beach at 2am drinking Cristal and doing shots of patron with some Dolphins players, spent embarkation day praying for the sweet kiss of death) and are older and wise enough not to make it again. We had an awesome time at the restaurant though and will definitely go again. Well, I think it’s about time for me to head in and fish out the map dress and start putting on luggage tags. Next time you hear from me we’ll be on Apex!

Pre-starlink it was kind of a coin toss on how good wifi was. Especially on S and M-class ships. Some ships wifi was great, others it would be terrible for chunks of the day. On Beyond this past November and on my silhouette cruise last month (where starlink had been implemented) the premium wifi worked fine for me. I was able to use my vpn and remote into my desktop at the office. I also did a couple of Teams meetings without issues. I’ll be sure to report on how it is on Apex.

Good afternoon from the poolside walkout patio of our cabana room. After lunch Jeremy and I did a little shopping on Las Olas to add to his Hawaiian shirt collection. Then he decided he needed to sleep off some of the lunch with yet another nap, so I threw on my bikini and went out our patio over to the pool bar for a margarita and a dip. The nice thing about these cabana rooms is that when the pool deck is crowded and there’s no shade or louncgers to be found, you have your own private reserved poolside seating and umbrella. An extra perk that I enjoy about this hotel: They seem to have a deal with a spirits distributor to promote certain alcohols at the hotel bars. Last time I stayed here, at checkin, the front desk gave me a voucher for two free Absolut cocktails at the hotel bar. This time, we not only got 2 vouchers for 2 free High Noon canned cocktails at the hotel bar, but also vouchers for 2 free tequila cocktails (made with a craft tequila we’d never hear of, but Jeremy’s philosophy is free tequila is free tequila) at the pool bar. The pool water here is once again a perfect temperature for this low 80’s sunny day. We have dinner reservations at a Cuban spot later tonight so I’m hardcore resisting the urge order the oh so good grilled fish tacos at this hotel for pool bar delivery. The mind reels though that I could even be hungry after our lunch at Casa Sensei. In addition to the ceviche, we also ordered a waygu beef tartare, crab rangoons, tostones and pad kee mow noodles. The noodle dishes at the restaurant can be topped with your choice of protein for additional charge and we decided to go best life and ordered ours with a lobster tail on top. It was a brilliant decision! The crab Rangoon was not your average Chinese takeout and in a very good way. It was made with fresh, sweet blue crab meat and the ratio was about 90% crab to 10% cream cheese mix. The only disappointing dish was the tostones. The plantain chips and shrimp were way under seasoned. I’ve had much better tostones at the Cuban restaurant in the the Hyatt Centric in Miami (don’t sleep on those if anyone is staying there for an upcoming cruise). The restaurant is right next to the launch point for the private gondola tour boats. If you’re looking for a fun and unique lunch/dinner, apparently food from the restaurant can be delivered to the gondolas for you to eat while on your river cruise. While we were eating we saw a family board a boat and pop a bottle of BYOB champagne, then a gorgeous sushi boat was delivered to them to eat while they set sail. Next time Jeremy and I are in FLL pre-cruise I am totally setting that up! I’m going to tackle a few work emails and then maybe doze a little on the patio myself before time to get ready for the evening. Our plan is to spend happy hour checking out a wine bar that we saw on our walk that had a sign saying they’d have live music starting at 6. Then head to our Cubano dinner.

We made it to Miami! For the first time in forever our flight left right on time. It was a nice smooth flight with two very friendly flight attendants servicing first class. I have no idea how those ladies manage to be so energetic and pleasant that early in the morning. Jeremy had the always a solid choice smoked salmon bagel for in flight breakfast. I decided to give the mushroom and asparagus frittata a try. Definitely not the best breakfast I’ll have this week (at least I really hope not), but it was better than the omelette on my flight last month. A $50 Uber ride delivered us to downtown Fort Lauderdale to our hotel, the Hyatt Centric Las Olas. After a much needed nap, we decided to get the circulation in our legs going and took a 20 minute walk down Las Olas Boulevard to have lunch at Casa Sensei. The Las Olas area has tons of great restaurant options all in easy walking distance. I’ve passed this Asian-Latin Fusion restaurant on my morning runs a few times and always wanted to try eating on its nice looking riverfront patio. Btw for anyone following who uses the Riverside Hotel for their pre cruise hotel, right now it looks like there is major, loud jackhammering, street construction going on right outside. Not sure how long it’s expected to last. We’ve just about to get down on some beautiful cocktails and ceviche and it’s really starting to feel like vacation!

It’s 4:30am in STL and we’re boarded and ready to go. Next stop Miami!

REAL CONVERSATIONS FROM MY MARRIAGE TONIGHT… Me: All I’m asking is if there’s 3 or 4 things you could conceivably leave behind so that I can use like ONE LITTLE POUND of your checked bag weight allowance. Jeremy (puts on Billy Zane British accent): You can be blasé about some things, Charla, but NOT about you overpacking for Apex! 2 hour later… Me: I just realized that there is NO first class meal service on this late flight back to STL at the end of the cruise. I mean not that I was planning to eat that late, but it’s the principle! Jeremy (again puts on Billy Zane British accent): Charla is displeased…what to do…🤔

My yoga instructor is always telling me that I should be striving for “balance” in all things in my life. So, for my post-last half day at work, pre-vacation spa treatments lunch, I’m having a fresh, nutritious grilled shrimp and avacado salad…with a side of duck fat fries with garlic chipotle aioli and 2 glasses of Pinot noir. Balance achieved, right? When I checked in for our red eye flight tomorrow morning, my AA app went a little nuts, froze and crashed (NEVER a good sign). When I rebooted, we were all checked in (phew) but I saw that our 3:30 flight home out of Miami at the end of the cruise had been changed to a flight that doesn’t take off till 9pm!!!! Not one to allow such things to even break the top 5 on my list of things to stress about pre-vacay, I decided to do something I’ve seen recommended on cruise forums many times over the years and while I’m eating lunch I booked us a day room at a hotel in Miami for disembark day. I made my booking through Hotels by Day, which a girlfriend recommended over others because they allow you to pay in full in advance (refundable up to 48 hours before check in) for a guaranteed room booking. Apparently many other third party sites let you “reserve” a day room but since they don’t take a deposit or card guarantee, you aren’t actually guaranteed to get a room and it’s essentially no different than just randomly showing up at the hotel the day of and asking if they’ll give you a day room. If the hotel gets slammed with true overnight reservations for that day, apparently you may still be out of luck. I booked our room at the Good Time Hotel on South Beach (co-owned by no other than Pharrell!). I’ve never stayed at this hotel but it passed my “3 check rule”. When researching new hotels/resorts: 1) I won’t even bother with anything that doesn’t have at least a four point/stars/dots total average score; 2) I read over all the reviews written in the past months; and 3) I read the reviews on at least 3 different review platforms. I find it super helpful not only in sniffing out fake or biased reviews, but also I’m getting a sense of the common themes of pros and cons related to a property. I paid a little under $160 to have a room from 10am till 6pm. This way after the cruise we can check in and have a little nap then spend our day by the pool and maybe have an early dinner in South Beach before heading to the airport. I’ll be sure to report on how the experience goes. After lunch I’ll head down to the spa for my pre-cruise massage, facial and pedicure. Then I’m meeting my dad for a quick goodbye dinner and then it’s home to finish packing and get to bed early for a 2am trip to the airport!

We would love to sail with you and Iain! We can totally surprise him with our plan. You guys could just walk into the retreat lounge on embarkation day and Jeremy and I will be sitting there and I will raise my bourbon and peaches and say “cheers Iain! Welcome aboard Intervention of the Seas! Please sit and let’s have a chat.”

I am so sorry to hear this. With what celebrity charges for royal suites these days I would be furious at receiving anything less than excellent service. If you feel comfortable sharing may I ask which ship you were on? Please also keep us posted on what you get as far as response from corporate about your treatment.

This is also a bit dated, but this the Camp at Sea hours, meals and schedule sheet from March of last year on a 4 night cruise. You may need to zoom in to see it well. Im not sure when your cruise is but my 10 year old and I will be on Solstice next month and I’m happy to share more updated info from that sailing if it would be helpful.

Yesterday I received two emails from the shoreside Retreat Concierge team. The first was regarding my (spoiler alert) recently booked bargain April solo sky suite cruise on Beyond, for which I’ve been emailing back and forth with the general customer service email address about similar booking issues (missing perks, random balance due email when the cruise was paid in full at booking, etc.). The email yesterday from the concierge apologized for all of the errors and had attached an updated, correct invoice showing no balance due and all perks included. The second email was regarding this Apex cruise and the concierge included a link to a form that she requested I fill out regarding preferences for our sky suite on our (very soon!) upcoming cruise, including options for the type of wine we’d like in our suite for embarkation. She also invited me to call or email her if there was anything else that we need last-minute assistance with before we sail. I thought about emailing her regarding my ongoing quest and to get perks resolved and properly documented for this cruise. But just out of curiosity, I checked and our beverage packages are now showing on our express passes and our paid gratuities and premium Internet seem to be reflected in the cruise planner! I’ve had outreach and assistance from the Retreat shoreside concierge when sailing in a Celebrity Suite or higher, but never before in a sky suite. Does anyone know if this is now officially a standard thing for sky suites? If so, having dedicated shoreside assistance, even at the lowest suite level, to step in and get issues like this resolved when they pop up is a nice additional perk. Sharing pics of the preference form below. I’ve seen that there’s sometimes a disconnect between the shoreside and onboard teams, so it will be very interesting to see if our preferences/requests actually come through.

Aloha! Great to have you along again! We have ventured into Alaska cruising and Bermuda, but venturing much further than that has been a bit of a challenge due to Jeremy’s vacation time allowance. Up until this year he only got 2 weeks of paid vacation for the entire year, so with other family travel commitments around the holidays, etc. it was difficult for us to make a longer cruise or a 7 day that required a few days of travel time added on happen. As of 2023 though, he’s been bumped up to 3 weeks paid so we are looking at doing a more adventurous trip this November/December to celebrate Jeremy’s 40th birthday. We’re considering Hawaii or South America with maybe a Panama Canal crossing. I’m also trying to lobby him to spend a bit bigger and do Galapagos on Flora, but he insists on adulting and going on about the need for funds for appliance upgrades at our house. 🙄 I on the other hand would cheerfully spend a year scrubbing our laundry using a metal tub and a washboard like a medieval peasant if it means I get to go to Galapagos!