GenerationX

WOW! That AQ price is ridiculous. That’s even more than I paid for a sky suite on Edge. Almost twice what I paid for it in fact. The Blu menus for my sailing look like pretty much the same ones I ate on Summit in July, so I’m not planning to go there much for dinner. But I love having breakfast there and will be sure to report on that. I hope you have a great cruise too!

It’s packing time! I know my packing tradition is to watch Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, but this cruise I feel like another movie is in order. The big question is: do I go with Robert Redford or Leo? 🤔

Will do! I can’t wait to see everyone’s Gatsby outfits!

Looking forward to meeting you too! I’ll see you in Eden Bar on night 2!

BTW, I spent yesterday evening folding the last of my pre-cruise laundry, watching the rest of my shows from the week sitting on the DVR (lest Jeremy delete them while I’m gone) and completely fangirling out. My favorite shows and my favorite cruise line came together in such an awesome way! I remain incredibly jealous of the people who got to be onboard with Captain Lee and Captain Jason. I’m counting the hours till I’m sitting at those beautiful bars martini in hand. I’m quite put out that daylight savings had the nerve to put me an extra hour back from my embarkation time on Tuesday. I’m BEYOND ready to be on Beyond!

So…what’s a girl to do to entertain herself for 6 days on the newest ship in the fleet? Well, let’s start with the most important thing: food. I decided to spend a good chunk of my OBC spoiling myself with specialty dining, so I’ll be eating at every specialty on the ship except Le Petit Chef (which looks like it has the same menu for our sailing that I already did on Summit in July). Red and I are very excited to try the new Le Voyage. I’m also looking forward to two nights checking out what appears to be a much expanded/improved menu for Raw on 5. I’ll be doing 1 night there solo checking out some of the Sushi and hot Japanese fare, then Red and I plan to go again together on the last night and drown our sorrows at being kicked off yet another cruise in champagne and a seafood tower. I think our ports for this cruise are Costa Maya and Cozumel, but honestly I haven’t paid much attention, because I don’t think I’ll really spend much time off the ship. I know both ports like the back of my hand and Beyond is the important destination for me this cruise. For onboard diversion, Red and I have booked a sea day poolside cabana and a few spa services. I also got lucky that even though this is a shorter sailing, we’ve had a very active, social roll call and FB group, so we have some meetups and a slot pull planned. Speaking of said meet ups, about the onboard activity I’m most looking forward to…ok so remember a couple of reviews ago how I said I’ve always wanted to throw a Gatsby party at sea? Well guess what I’m doing on evening chic night on Beyond…. Yep, with the help of the wonderful hcat, we’re having a Gatsby themed pre-dinner cocktail party meet up in Eden bar on night 2!!!! It may not surprise you to learn that I already owned a 1920’s style dress, however I deemed this occasion as meriting shopping for a new ensemble. I think I found the perfect fit and can’t wait to show it off! I’ve just checked in for my red eye flight to Miami tomorrow morning. Beyond of course sails from Port Everglades, but AA doesn’t have a direct flight STL to FLL and especially when it comes to getting to a cruise ship on time, I try to avoid connections whenever possible. The extra $30 in Uber cost getting from Miami to Fort Lauderdale is worth my extra peace of mind. I’m not sure which member of my household, my husband or my child, is the most salty at not being brought along on this cruise. However I must say, Gen Z gets the win by a mile for style of expression of displeasure. 😂 Today will be spent running a few last minute pre-cruise errands and of course packing far more luggage than any reasonable person needs to take on a 6 night trip. Then it’s off to bed early so that I can drag myself out of bed at 2am to head to the airport. It’s final countdown time!

I am so looking forward to finally meeting you in person! I hope all is well at your FL home and there hasn’t been too much clean up/repair work needed.

A Little About How This Cruise Came to Be… A suggestion for others like me who are trying to cruise as much as possible within a fixed budget: find yourself a cruise deal hunting buddy. Future vacay searching/planning is one way I de-stress after work and Red’s Blue Chip status often sends good offers her way. Granted, my lowly $100 max per cruise in slots play doesn’t get me the sweet Blue Chip deals that a serious gambler like Red does, but we’ve found that the sailings that she gets good Blue Chip offers for usually also tend to have good market prices for a lowly Pearl like me. We always send each other a text when one of us comes across a well priced sailing. This Beyond sailing came to me courtesy of such a text from Red back in March. During the promo that was running, Celebrity was charging a full solo supplement. However the solo infinite veranda class staterooms (1 passenger max occupancy) were priced under $2K with premium beverage and wifi, tips and $300 OBC included. A couple of months after I booked, I noticed that Celebrity had waived solo supplements for a number of cruises, including this one, and I priced out straight upgrading to aqua class before final payment. But when I looked into it, if I made the change, in addition to paying several hundred dollars more, I would have lost most of my perks (the upgraded beverage package, better wifi and OBC). Instead, I decided to take my chances and put in a just above minimum Move Up bid of $400 for AQ class (since when you win a move up, you keep the perks of your original booking). Lucky enough, 2 weeks ago I got the emails saying that my move up was accepted and sending my new cruise docs and luggage tags! While I won’t get the extra captains club points and didn’t get to pick my cabin location, it’s worth the sacrifice to me for the amount of money and perks that I saved. Soon to come: a preview of the fun agenda for our 6 days on the Beyond!

QUICK UPDATE: I was just sitting in the spa after work getting my pre-cruise pedicure and scanning my email when I saw an email that briefly stopped my heart. It was an auto email from Celebrity telling me that health and safety requirements may have changed for my cruise. As most I’m sure are aware, a little while ago Celebrity had dropped COVID testing requirements for shorter cruises (like mine which is 5 nights), for vaccinated travelers. When I saw the email I was terrified that testing had suddenly been reinstated and I was going to have to rush and find a way to get proctored COVID tested on Sunday. (I planned to self test with a home kit Monday morning just to be safe.) Based at on my read of the updated website though, it appears that instead, things have swung the other way and Celebrity has now removed pre-cruise testing requirements for all cruises, regardless of length and passenger vaccination status, with the exception of cruises in some jurisdictions (exceptions screen shot below). Someone please correct me if I’m misreading though. The website says that the change was effective as of 11/2, so it’s odd that I just got an email about it 2 days later, but hey, I’m just glad it wasn’t adding a hoop for me to jump through to sail.

Hello and happy Friday CC Friends! Man, it feels like forever since I’ve been on a cruise ship… Fortunately, three long, hard months after DH and I stepped off my Bermuda birthday cruise on Summit, on Monday I will fly to Florida to sail on the Beyond! Would anyone like to come along? I think most may know me from previous reviews, but a quick about me: Married 40 year old lawyer from outside of St. Louis, MO. Celebrity is our preferred cruise line and I’m Elite status level. Due to differing vacation allowances and abilities to work remotely, I sail about 70% of the time either solo or semi-solo with a friend in a separate cabin (what can I say? I need my personal space). I’ve also done one cruise with our 10 year old daughter who I’m delighted to say quickly became a fellow Celebrity Cruises addict and will be making her return to the seas with me on Solstice in spring of next year, but future cruise plans are for the wrap up post so moving on… I’ve sailed on all the S and M class ships in the current fleet, but this will be only my second time sailing E class. I sailed on Edge in a sky suite in February of last year and had a great cruise. If my husband and I are ever blessed with another daughter I think I would push to name her after my butler on that cruise, Anastasia. She was really something! This cruise I will be sailing semi-solo. My good girlfriend Red (dedicated spa and casino enthusiast who has appeared in previous reviews) is also sailing in a separate aqua class cabin. I originally booked this cruise in one of the solo infinite verandas at a bargain price. Then a couple of weeks ago won a move up bid to aqua class. I’m very much looking forward to seeing the improvements that have been made on E class from Edge to Beyond but, in full candor, I’m a bit nervous about this whole infinite veranda thing which just on its face has never sounded very appealing to me. Alas, suites were well above my budget for this cruise, and I figured a cruise in a glorified oceanview is better than no cruise at all. I also assume I won’t spend a ton of time in the room anyway with a brand new ship to explore. Plus I feel like it’s unfair of me to knock the IV too hard until I’ve tried it, so off I go! Before my review really gets underway, I would like to say massive thank you’s to @PinkSandGirl and @DragonOfTheSeas, whose fantastic reviews of their sailings on Beyond’s repo to FLL have been giving me life during my final countdown to this cruise. Thanks to you guys, I feel like I’ll be stepping onboard fully prepared. In the next day or 2 I’ll be doing a couple of posts (between pre cruise errands) about details on my booking and move up experience and plans while onboard. As always feel free to jump in any time with questions/thoughts/suggestions. Can’t wait to start another cruise with everyone!

WAIT WHAT???? Just when I thought I couldn’t get more jealous of everyone onboard for this sailing. I’m a little afraid of how many of my morals I would consider compromising to get a selfie huddled up between Captain Lee and Captain Jason. 😂

I’m just catching up and wanted to say thank you in advance for doing this review! It’s going to carry me through so perfectly until I board Beyond on Nov. 8th! I’ll be following and taking notes (like you I’m a hardcore documents/lists cruise person). Bon Voyage!!!

Welcome back to cruising! Im so sorry to have caused wardrobe stress (a stress I’m very familiar with 😁). My understanding is that Blu is still smart casual other than on evening chic night. I think there’s usually only 2 chic nights on 7-9 night sailings and 1 on shorter itineraries. I just really like dressing up for dinner on cruises and Jeremy follows suit to preserve marital harmony. It it makes me feel like I’m on the Queen Mary making a crossing to shop the boutiques in Europe or something (I may have read a bit too much nautical historical fiction over the years 😂). I’d say on our cruise it was about 60-70% who dressed more towards the casual end of the dress code for dinner so you certainly won’t look out of place! I hope you have a wonderful cruise this month!

Hello CC, sorry it’s another better late than never return to finally finish my review of our Summit cruise. Looking back I don’t think I ever reported on our last sea day! It was one of those perfectly scheduled sea days for me, that consisted of nothing but eating, drinking, gambling, shopping and hanging out with fun fellow cruisers. We started the afternoon with the Captains Club wine tasting event. The wines we tasted weren’t super exciting but I wasn’t expecting anything impressive from a free tasting and we had great tablemates. I was really there as much for the sommelier as the free wine. The tasting was led by our good friend Michael who, I knew from my fall Equinox cruise, runs a fantastic tasting event. In my opinion his promotion to head sommelier on Summit is very well deserved. If you’re interested in wine and will be on the Summit in the near future (I know he’ll be on at least through November because I asked if I’d be lucky enough to see him on Beyond then and he said he’ll still be on Summit 😭) his presentations alone are worth checking out a tasting. Unless you’re one of those super hardcore wine people (whom I envy) whose annual wine budget is comparable to my annual cruise budget, you will probably leave with at least a little interesting info on wine that you didn’t know before. He also throws in personal anecdotes that make the events entertaining (ah laughter and wine, 2 of my favorite things). After the captains club tasting, we headed up to the sky lounge for the captains club senior officer meet and greet party where we bumped into a Norwegian couple we befriended in the martini bar a few days earlier and after the party the 4 of us decided to check out the MDR lunch together. We got to lunch a little late so Jeremy and I decided to skip the appetizer course and just have entrees and split a dessert so as not to spoil our dinner appetite. I think Jeremy had buyers remorse on his burger (he said the mast grill ones are better), but my beef and shrimp udon was very good, as was the brownie sundae (FINALLY, after I’ve lost track of how many cruises I finally found a brownie sundae that’s made with a decent brownie!) As we were casually strolling back to the front of the restaurant, I saw Michael heading through with his arms full of wine bottles. He looked me dead in the eye, smiled and tapped his watch. That was when I remembered that I’d also signed up for the Oregon wine tasting that was starting in 10 minutes! After another hour of wine, I stumbled over to the casino to collect Jeremy from his ongoing (losing) pride battle with a Zeus penny slot machine and we went up to the pool deck, which had earlier been thinned out by a rain storm, to listen to the house band and have a couple of last tropical drinks in the ocean breeze. After watching sunset, we headed back to the room to dress and have dinner at La Petit Chef. I was planning to skip LPC this cruise because I’d done it on so many this past year. But then I saw that the show/menu was one I hadn’t done before and remembered thar my poor husband had only done it once, over 2 years ago, when the presentation/graphics were at version 1.0. I think this show was the coolest one I’ve seen. The visuals were really eye catching. As far as the food, I don’t think it beat the LPC and Friends show menu for me, but it’s a close second. The tomatoes in the tarte course were delicious and the short rib course was outstanding. You barely needed a knife, it just collapsed onto your fork after you poked through the crispy, flavorful outer crust. Dessert was underwhelming, but I’ve kind of come to expect that from LPC. The puff pastry in the shortcake was so hard I had to saw at it with my knife and finally gave up and just enjoyed the strawberries and cream. After dinner we made our trips to the martini bar and sky lounge to say goodbye to new late night party friends made over the week and pass out thank you envelopes to all the hardworking bartenders who took care of us all week. Coming soon (really, I promise) one last post with final thoughts on our Summit cruise.

About our last afternoon in Bermuda: When Jeremy got back from shopping in port, we went to Sushi on 5 and split some shrimp tempura udon and a couple of sushi rolls. We had a few pieces of sushi left that the staff offered to box up for use to take back to the room for later. We ended up eating them along with our afternoon AQ canapés on our veranda as we watched sail away from Bermuda. That sail out from Bermuda really is fascinating to watch. There are so many shallow reefs that the ship has to navigate through and you get some great views of different parts of the island as the ship loops around. After a short post-sail away nap, we dressed for evening chic night dinner in Blu. I’m not sure which was a better view: the sunset that night or my chic dressed husband. I think the chic night dinner was our best Blu meal of the trip. We had the Blu Caesar salad and tomato fennel bisque to start and also split a crab cake. Then we each ordered a lobster tail and split the beef stuffed shells. We enjoyed everything we ate, but we did see a couple of other tables send their lobsters back for fresh ones. The stuffed shells weren’t as amazing as I remember them being in Blu on Solstice a few years ago, but still good. After dinner we decided that we needed a break from late night partying, so we just had one quick martini and headed to bed. Coming up: a report on our last sea day and final thoughts on the cruise.

We’re settled into the Admirals Club at LGA after an $80 pre-tip Uber ride from the port. The agent checking us in said that the lounge expansion just opened on Tuesday and it’s spacious, clean and not at all crowded. When Summit disembarkation finally started, with walk off luggage guests called at about 8:45, it moved pretty slowly. It was about 9:30 when they called the first batch of 3 luggage tag numbers (presumably suites and zenith had already been called by then). Then it was about 20-30 minutes before the next set were called. We were in tag group 23 and were called to get off the ship a little after 10am. Lines for customs were long and slow moving as well because the port wasn’t using facial recognition. We asked for porter service (no charge but tip generously) due to my plethora of baggage and those using porters were escorted to the front of the line. At the rate things were moving I don’t know how they were going to clear the ship in time for new passengers to start boarding at 11am. As we were walking down the gangway we saw a group of people down at the pier level coming off the ship and being loaded into a black SUV. So presumably we had at least a few COVID cases onboard but I never heard any numbers announced. Jeremy and I both tested negative this morning and have no symptoms so hopefully we stay that way! Coming soon: a back in time report on our last afternoon in Bermuda.

I did, the service situation in the buffet turned out to be very odd by the end of the cruise. Some days/meals we would go in and crew was serving and others it was self serve. The last day or 2 it was kind of a confusing hybrid where some stations were self serve and others had crew serving. There didn’t seem to be any consistency to it.

Good morning from Cape Liberty 😭 If you’re one of the lucky people boarding the Summit today, it looks like you’re going to have e a beautiful day to cruise. As you can see, the crew is already hard at work dressing the ship in celebration of your arrival! It’s about 8:30am and the ship hasn’t been cleared to start disembarkation yet. Our room steward told us that it isn’t unusual for disembarkation at Cape Liberty not to start till as late as 9/9:30 so it’s something to take into account when making flight plans. Our flight out isn’t until 4pm so we should still have plenty of time. As we're rehydrating on the pool deck from our last night onboard, I’ll start doing a few catch up posts and putting together my final thoughts on our week on the Summit and future cruise plans.

Thank you again so much for the book offer! We are doing dinner at LPC at 8:30. Would it work if we met in Martini Bar beforehand about 8pm ship time? Or afterwards around 10:30?

Scenes from my marriage this morning on Summit. After breakfast my husband and I took a walk around the shops to get some gifts for Gen Z then I was planning to have some tea and read solo in al Bacio while he spent some time in the casino. After I discovered the new luxury handbag shop though, Jeremy decided that he’d better join me and have a caramel macchiato and talk some sense into me.

Good morning from a rocking (literally) sea day on the Summit. I have pretty good sea legs so I’ve only had to tap into the Dramamine in my travel medical kit a handful of times in all my cruises. The way my chair is rocking in Blu this morning, I’m thinking today may be one of those days. First post of the day: A Back in Time Report on Night 2 in Bermuda… After our dinner in Blu we headed down to the pier for the the evening White Night Catamaran Sail excursion that we booked through Celebrity. Once again the catamaran picked us up right by the ship so no transfer buses, etc. If you’re planning to do the excursion, fyi it looks like people take the white night theme pretty seriously. I only saw 1 or 2 people who weren’t dressed in white. Because I knew I’d be on a boat in evening ocean breezes, I went for a white dress that had built in white boy shorts underneath to avoid a stiff wind accidentally showing my full GenX to all of Bermuda. On the sail out the crew gave us a little house tour of the mansions on the shores of the island and told us stories of some of the people who own them. Then we turned back towards the dockyards to watch the sun set next to the ship. After dark, they put on party music and turned on club lighting on the boat so that we could dance. Throughout the sail the onboard bar was open. Unlimited soft drinks, water, Rum swizzles and Prosecco were included in the excursion price. They did also have a full bar with other mixed drinks available for purchase in cash. We sailed for about 3 hours total and got back to the ship just as the 10pm Motown show was starting in the sky lounge. Unfortunately, most people had gotten to the lounge early to stake their claim to seats so by the time we got there there was nowhere left to sit. We decided to head back down and take advantage of their actually being seats open at the martini bar, then rejoin the party in the sky lounge after the show ended. I had one of my go to’s the French 75 martini and Jeremy tried the Lycheetini which he said was very good. Once the Motown show wrapped up, our house band Hey Mama played an awesome set. If you’re sailing with them on Summit, this band is not to be missed! They’re an all-women band from Brazil and the sets they’ve done onboard this week have had a diverse range of really good songs. Everything from James Brown to Shakira. I had the pleasure of chatting briefly with a couple of the ladies and addition to being very talented musicians, it seems like they’re very gracious and just gorgeous young women both inside and out. After the band finished in the sky lounge, we grabbed some late night pizza from the buffet to eat on our veranda before bedtime.

Yesterday during the day, we were supposed to go on a half day ocean kayaking eco tour, but the weather for the afternoon was looking like a decent amount of wind and drizzle out on the sea and Jeremy wasn’t feeling it. So we decided to stay onboard and relax and take advantage of a quieter ship. For lunch, we took Jim’s fabulous recommendation and got some small plates from the Aqua Spa Cafe that were delicious but also light and refreshing. The salmon salad and chicken salad were our favorites but the chilled soba noodles and spinach salad were also good. Portions are small but we knew we were having an early dinner before our evening excursion so didn’t want to fill up too much. For dinner we went to Blu right at 5:30 opening so that we could finish in time for our 7:15 pier excursion meet up. I think last night’s Blu menu was the weakest of the cruise but we had a wonderful waiter who helped us navigate and gave great recommendations on what was good and what to avoid. He also reminded us that we could also order Everyday items from the MDR menu. For starters, I had my favorite escargot from the MDR menu and Jeremy had the smoked trout mousse from the Aqua menu. My escargot was as delicious as always. Our server warned Jeremy about that smoked trout, but Poseidon forbid my husband ever listen to anybody once he’s made is mind up. Turned out, of course, that our server was right. That trout was big time disappointing. You couldn’t actually taste any trout or any smoke for that matter in the mousse. And the sweet potato cakes it was served on top of were over salted and extremely greasy. All such a shame because if done right it has the potential to be something really tasty. For mains Jeremy had the Blu roast chicken entree and I had the Blu bronzino clean eating special that our server recommended. Then we also took his recommendation to split the duck confit ravioli Blu entree. All of the mains were really good. I think that bronzino was even better than the one in Tuscan Grille. Perhaps in part due to the feta and pesto it was served with that really complimented the fish. We didn’t want to be over full for our excursion so we decided to skip dessert and just have a couple of espressos instead. I’ve got to wrap up writing and finish my poolside Gosling’s rum and Diet Coke cocktail (btw a very good rum from Bermuda, included in the premium beverage package) by the pool then I’m going to take a quick shower and meet Jeremy, who decided to stay in port a little longer looking for gifts, for a late last sushi lunch. Soon to come: a report on our sunset catamaran sail and last night’s late night fun!

Oh yes! Nothing kills a buzz like being greeted by those tags on the bed. They should put a little box of those fancy chic night chocolates on top of the tags for every stateroom to help soften the blow!

Good morning from the Summit pool deck which, as our visit in Bermuda is coming to a close in a few hours, is starting to creep its way back up to sea day level of crowds. Our weather today has turned cloudy with spotty showers (to match my mood about the cruise entering its final days). I know I have an entire day yesterday to report on, so stay tuned for a string of catch up posts. Today we don’t have any plans other than running into port for maybe an hour or 2 to do some quick souvenir and rum shopping that we couldn’t do yesterday because the shops were closed for the Emancipation Day holiday. Then tonight will be our second evening chic night as we leave Bermuda.

Thank you Jim! Yes I can confirm the chef did come out and ask about allergies at the beginning. I agree it is probably a good idea to let the restaurant manager know in advance as well. That would give the chef more time to come up with good/creative options to accommodate.