OysterD

Currently sat at the Mast Bar on Reflection, it's early morning and there's a crew of 6 or 7 maintenance guys sanding down and painting. Yesterday evening part of the front of deck 15 was roped off for a few hours for painting. They're keeping the ship in good condition, it's already better than I expected it to be. If you look very hard you can find a few areas of wear and tear but nothing that detracts from a wonderful ship and cruise experience. I'm sure after 2 weeks in dry dock later this month it'll be almost new again.

Same sailing, our luggage tags are also pending. Just don't take any luggage, problem solved!

Funnily enough a friend just messaged me earlier to say he's boarding a plane shortly for a TA work trip, and he's wishing planes were like they were 20yrs ago with no WiFi and no connectivity to the outside world. He is expected to continue working while on the flight. I'm with him - long flights used to be a time to kick back, relax, have a few drinks and watch an onboard movie and be completely disconnected from the world. Same as, in my mind, a cruise ship should be. We go on a cruise for a holiday, to get away from everything and to switch off for a week or two. Personally I hate being in restaurants or bars or anywhere leisure oriented and seeing everyone glued to their phones. I think it's anti social and its not good for us as a society. We managed perfectly well on cruises or other holidays for decades without constantly being connected. I would love to go on a cruise and never see anyone sat at a bar, in a restaurant or by the pool on their phones! I'm looking forward to 11 days next month of switching off and ignoring work emails and getting away from screens. I don't want super fast Internet and won't be paying to upgrade from the bog standard included package lol. I definitely wouldn't want to give that egotistical guy a penny of mine so I could stream a movie on a cruise. I think there's enough to be doing onboard rather than sat in my cabin watching Netflix! Oh and I'm in my early 40s, in theory I should be loving the idea that cruise ships are getting high speed Internet. Most of my friends think the same way though. We want to go on holiday to get away from it all!

Completely agree that the crew on cruise ships work very hard and should be paid a decent amount for that. Personally though, and whether that's just because I'm British/any nationality other than American, I don't understand why there needs to be a separate line item for 'tips' that is in addition to what the cruise fare is. I don't want or need a breakdown of what I will be paying for the cruise. I just want the total, which includes part of what staff are paid. I don't want to see port fees/taxes, or start seeing fuel surcharges, or egg surcharges, when I book just tell me the total, the rest is totally irrelevant lol. If 'tips' are a mandatory extra you have to pay, without jumping through hoops and feeling like a proper skinflint to get out of paying, then why show it as a separate item. If its costing more to employ the staff onboard, to the value of $1pppd or whatever it is, then add $1pppd to the advertised cost of the cruise. I'm all for keeping things in life as simple as they can be, especially when it comes to holidays!

This might be a dumb/easy question but it's been a while... the xpress pass, do you get an actual plastic card thing when you get onboard or do you have to use either your phone or a flimsy bit of paper that you've printed at home...or do you even need the xpress pass once onboard/what's it used for? Thanks!

Sometimes, only sometimes, it pays to do Celebrity math instead of simple math. I just got off the phone with Celebrity because I wanted to ask how much the upgrade will be from the Classic drinks package I have as part of Always Included booked months ago. I'd already logged into my account and it was showing the full prices/special offer prices (currently 9% off) of Classic and Premium (per person, per day). Classic - £63.84 Premium - £77.71 In my head, I figured the upgrade price would be the difference between the two multiplied by 11 nights (£13.87 x 11 = £152.57). My Captains Club is Classic so I should get 10% off bringing it to £137.31. She told me it would be £111.76. I didn't ask why. I didn't second guess her. I just said ok fine, and paid for it! After I'd paid I asked what it would be for two of my friends. We're all on the same reservation, same room category, same Always Included... but they aren't Captains Club members....£148.72. I cannot for the life of me figure out why mine was £112 and my friends would be £149, but I wasn't going to complain!

It would make sense if you'd rather spend €11/pp on a train rather than $72/pp that Celebrity have quoted for a private transfer. Drive takes about 50 mins depending on traffic. Train will take 1hr 20mins. Not that much in it really.

Train options on the 7th October...

Further to what others have posted, if there is a weight limit imposed on any tender I doubt it's anything to do with the actual boat itself, surely theyd just take one less person. Maybe there's a chance it might be related to the availability of life jackets/buoyancy aids which come in a variety of sizes and should generally be sized to fit the person. Firstly they do need to fit on the person and they are generally sized by the weight of the person they need to keep afloat. I could be completely wrong about why this is the reason there might be a weight limitation, but I know from experience about making sure people you're looking after on water have the correct sized life jackets.

Ooh, check in is open! Top of the app it says ship time is 12:02am, I wonder if that has anything to do with it. Anyway, let's get to it...

You're not alone...same cruise, same August 11th check in date given...same response on app and website saying check in isn't open yet lol It is Celebrity we're talking about though, did we really expect any consistency?!

I think people are never going to agree on this lol The issue is nothing at all to do with spending £30 or whatever it is for a test. The issue is all of us finally managing to organise 2 weeks off work at the same time for an expensive holiday to be told at the very last minute no, you can't go on your holiday because, well not because you're at deaths door but because even tho you have no symptoms whatsoever, you have covid which may or may not be passed to someone else who may or may get a runny nose for a couple of days. And why can't we go on our holiday...because a country you'll be setting foot in for a few hours in 6 days says so. Oh, but if you want to get on a plane and go visit that country right now without testing and stay for a few weeks, thats just fine. If you can't see that that's utter nonsense then I don't even know anymore lol. If Greece was that concerned about covid "being brought into the country" (its already there btw) why not test the hundreds of thousands of tourists who are flying into the country this summer and spending a week or more there? Why just pick on those who will be on a Greek island for 6 hours after stepping off a cruise ship? Not everyone who cruises is retired. Its very difficult for those in our travelling party (and I'm sure the same for most people who work) to organise 2 weeks off at the same time. If one of us tests positive before the cruise we can't just shrug it off and say oh well, we'll rebook it in a month or so. It'll be at least another year before we would be able to all get the same time off again.

Yes, obstinate. Can you give me any scientific or logical reason for Greece requiring all passengers to have a supervised covid test before boarding a ship in Italy, even though they won't be stepping foot on Greek soil for another 6 days? While at the same time not requiring anyone flying into the country to test at all. Also yes, customers DO want to sail again, but many can't be bothered with all the constantly changing hassle involved or fear of being locked in a room for 10 days because they had a slightly runny nose for 24 hours.

Quite the opposite actually. The cruise industry will get back on their feet properly once vaccination mandates, testing and masks have completely disappeared. Covid is never going away. Like the common cold and flu. The rules haven't been relaxed enough, unfortunately because a handful of countries are being obstinate. I welcome the day when you can get on a cruise ship with the same covid related rules as going to the shops, cinema, staying in a hotel or getting on a plane...ie no rules whatsoever.

It's a new rule. No barking allowed. 🚫🐕

Hahaha thanks for that, gave me a laugh too. If visiting Southampton pop down Greggs and get yourself a sausage roll cos you may struggle finding a Cornish Pastry...or at the very least you'll get some funny looks! PS to anyone visiting England for the first time, rest assured, food and restaurants have come on a long way since the 1970s!

Just saw this bit. Which is so dumb. We visit Greece on days 4, 5 and 9. There is zero point in forcing people to have a supervised covid test 2 days before boarding when we won't then be stepping foot into Greece until 6, 7 and 11 days later. It makes absolutely no sense. You dont have to test at all if you are flying into the country. I hate with a passion rules that are completely illogical, and this has to be right up there lol. C'mon Greece, get your act together!

When I just looked and followed the links to "sailings departing Italy after September 5th" it just takes me to a "this page no longer exists". So I have no idea what rules will be in place.

Guessing you meant 2022 😛 I'm all for getting rid of plastic water bottles, I can't stand the things altho admittedly the water out of my tap at home tastes better than any bottled water I've had before. However, do celebrity provide specific recycling bins for them or do they end up in the general waste bins?

On our Reflection cruise next month specialty restaurant prices are as follows (currently a special offer on if you book them now, prices quoted include the current roughly 8% discount): Murano £54.02 pp Le Petit Chef £54.02 pp Tuscan Grille £48.98 pp Lawn Club Grill £44.03 pp Or, if you want to eat at multiple specialty restaurants they sell packages ranging from a 3 night package for £141 up to 10 nights for £357. These are also currently on offer and those prices reflect the approx 8% discount being offered. There are a few other benefits of AQ class, which may or may not be of any value to you. Taken as a whole, we thought it worth the slight upgrade price from a regular balcony cabin to AQ for our cruise. Hope that helps! Oh one more thing to add, the menus in the specialty restaurants are the same every night but the menu in Blu does change every day, so it's not like you'll be sat in Blu ordering the same food every night.

Loved your review, we're doing the same itinerary next month...cant wait! Quick question for anyone who's been to Santorini with celebrity recently - which port are they using? We're just booking a shore excursion and have been asked which port the ship will be dropping us off at, the new one or the old one with the cable car? Thanks!

I just checked the current 11 night Reflection sailing, same itinerary as what we'll be on later in Sept and it looks like they have 3 chic nights on days 3, 7 and 10. I'd thought it was only 2 chic nights on sailings over 7 days? Funnily enough I'd just got done reading the thread on whether it's feasible to get away with only carryon luggage and was wondering to myself if I could manage by sacrificing a smart jacket/shoes. Nope. If we have 3 nights to dress up for I think the smart jacket and shoes are gonna have to come along for the journey!

Feel free, but as others have pointed out, knowledge and science changed in the last 2 and a half years....if you're still concerned about catching covid on a ship, picking up a spoon at the buffet that someone else has touched should be the the very least of your worries.

Absolutely impossible to know but I don't know why it would make a difference, you don't catch covid through touch.

Ultimately, you've only got a chance of testing positive if you, well, test. Soo if you don't test....no quarantine 🙂