bbappel

Your best bet may be calling them. Sometimes the website doesn't work well. Sometimes it doesn't work at all.

Generally you can at least look at the excursions by following some of the advice already given, but sometimes even with that, you get into some sort of loop that ends it "under maintenance" so that's why we end up calling.

It is worth the wait even with the recorded message looping.

Beth

We use the laundry service but I am cautious about what I send out. Never my most delicate items, nor the dark colored items that I want to retain their color. It seems that the laundry uses hot water and a hot dryer.

We do send out cotton undies, socks, and older tees that I don't mind getting faded and that are unlikely to shrink.

We do 14 day cruises and usually have a week or two on land. If we are in the US, we have done laundry the day before embarkation day - at a place that has cooler temperature wash and dry.

We tend to pack for 7 days on the cruise and then re-wear clothing that passes the sniff test, and send out or hand wash the stuff that doesn't. We send out clothing 6 days into the cruise for a 14 day cruise - if we were able to board with all clean clothing. If not, we split it and send out laundry on day 2 or 3 and then on day 9 or 10. We pack in 2 each carry-on suitcases and 2 each 24" suitcases.

I hope this helps.

And just a reminder - please, there is no right or wrong about this. Please don't criticize Celebrity because they choose to not have a self-laundry and don't criticize those who use the self-laundry on other ships. Again, there is no right or wrong. I might not choose to use my time to do laundry, but then I don't like doing laundry and put it off at home as long as possible (we have to use a laundromat because we are on a well & septic tank). Others might enjoy the task of transforming funky clothes into nice fresh ones.

Just a little civility - that's all I'm requesting. Please don't chastize others for their feelings about this very personal matter.

Smiles.

It appears that I'm the one that kills roll calls. I joined the roll call for our next cruise two days ago. Mine was the last post. Crickets is all I hear. I'll see if this works on a couple others.

It is a heavy-holiday week. Lots of people are traveling. The January RC has been very inactive and is about to go to the next page. It isn't you - it's the timing. Then again, if no one posts for another week or two, maybe it is you.:D. (please don't be offended - that was a joke).

Sometimes, it isn't personal, it just feels personal.

Beth

Me too.

Why am I avoiding it you ask?

- 3-4 people are dominating the discussion

I hope it isn't one of the roll calls I'm on. Dominating discussions often just means we don't have a life. :D I know I've spent too much time in front of the computer when my post count goes up by too much.

- These people are rabid about knowing your name, cabin number, etc.

I don't think I'm being rabid, just thorough. I remind people that they haven't really introduced themselves.

One issue is that the Connections Party name tag from Celebrity shows only your name (as listed on the manifest - which is an issue because I am H on the Celebrity booking) and not your Cruise Critic ID, so we go to the party and unless someone on the roll call has created nametags, we are clueless as to who people are. For instance, if you are on my roll call, but your booking name is Richard, I'd never find you at the party, even if I knew we had a common interest.

I always wonder why people are so reticent.

But then I'm an Ohio girl and we are entirely too friendly to strangers. Or so I've been told.

- These people are planning multiple events

You do know events aren't mandatory. The NY Times once had an ad "You don't have to read it all, but it's nice to know it's all there." Well you don't have to do it all. I help pull threads of events together, but don't feel committed to do them unless I've told the organizer that I'm going.

I hope you will reconsider and introduce yourself and just pass on the events and things you don't find to your taste.

Beth

We have a similar problem - our balance is much less but shows up when you click on Payment Details in My Celebrity. Probably when working on the website, this was neglected. My husband's guess is that the original programmers did not document the files adequately if at all. This means it is very difficult to fix all the problems when they start changing things. The little bits that used to explain to the Payment Details probably don't exist any more, so it gets confused.

I did call and Celebrity said, as with you, that it didn't show up on their end. My biggest fear was that we would lose our cabin. We booked early just to get this cabin - not that it is so great, but just the one we wanted.

Beth

We had this issue once so in the morning, we told our room steward we needed the MDR menu, then we our room steward delivered the food all at one time. We had the drinks package so on the way back to the cabin we stopped and picked up glasses of white wine (for our first course) and stuck them in the cooler-fridge. Then after placing the order, my husband went to Cellar Masters and got two glasses of red wine (with both cards) while I waited in the cabin. We had our first course on the balcony, then the main course inside since it was getting dark. It was a good solution, particularly since we were tired out from running around all day. No dressing, in fact, I think we ate in our robes.

The Room Service menu doesn't mention that you can get the MDR food as long as the MDR is still serving.

Other times we have booked the Specialty restaurant on days like this, but the time mentioned above, we would have been too tired to enjoy the Specialty restaurant.

Beth

Venice: The World Before Her, Deborah Weisgall and A Stopover in Venice, Kathryn Walker; Venice. Pure City, Peter Akroyd. Donna Leon's Guido Brunetti mysteries.

Malta: Empires of the Sea: The Siege of Malta, the Battle of Lepanto, and the Contest for the Center of the World. Roger Crowley. History

Rome: City of the Soul: A Walk in Rome, William Murray

Mediterranean: Traveling with Pomegranates, Sue Monk Kidd and Ann Kidd Taylor. Memoir (particularly for mother-daughter trips)

Panama: Path Between the Seas, David McCullough

Quebec: Louise Penny's Armand Gamache novels

I think Travel Agents are not permitted to list their location. I'm not one, so I could be wrong, but in my experience it has been the TAs who didn't list where they lived.

Beth

I'm probably one of the people that others say interrupts too much :)

 

Tom

Me too - I grew up in a family where if you didn't interrupt, you never got a word in. It has not served me well, so I'm trying to learn not to but at my age (nearing 3 score and ten) I probably won't learn.

Beth

Don't believe I've cruised with you, but thank you for your efforts to provide a better cruise experience for all.

I don't think so either, but I've left on my signature this time. You may have cruised with friends of ours. Seems like I may have seen your name on their roll call (yeah, I checked in once and a while to see how it was going).

Beth

Orator: The function of a Roll Call to me is to help people to enhance their cruising experience by introducing fellow cruisers and providing useful information. A roll call is good to the extent that it does that, bad to the extent it doesn't. ...

Orator: Thanks for starting this; I almost didn’t read it because it seemed it would be negative. To answer one question, though, most people don’t share full names on the Roll Call – I don’t – so it is unlikely someone would be able to find me if I didn’t give them my cabin number. Most of us have shared our cabin numbers off line so that we can get together onboard ship if we wish.

I’m probably being sensitive because I am a roll call “organizer” of private roll call information – not instead of the open roll call, but to augment it. I do this to share the information I am gathering for the trip, but don’t want out in the world of google, but still want to share (you do know that every post can be found by google, right?).

My introduction to this concept was on the Equinox when we were traveling without friends. It turned out to be quite helpful. Stacy had requested photos, cabin numbers, and kept track of everyone’s tours. Although we had booked ship excursions exclusively, it was quite interesting to see what others planned; the photos helped me recognize people so we felt like we “knew” them ahead of time; and they organized a pre-trip get-together. For our next cruise, Silhouette Adriatic, I decided to try my hand at it since it uses expertise I already had. That Roll Call was very supportive, and along with the roll call itself on Cruise Critic and all the commentary, there were also e-mail conversations going on. Because of the Roll Call, I have remained friends with several people on the trip.

Our next cruise, this time to the Caribbean, I did the same, and the roll call was still busy and allowed people to organize private tours and share information - not the level of the Adriatic cruise, but still good.

We organize shipboard activities that are totally voluntary and optional, but are nice for those who aren’t traveling with friends. Or for those of us who are particularly group-centric.

Currently, I’m doing another private roll call on the Summit (none of the critical posters here have introduced themselves on the Roll Call – that doesn’t mean they aren’t there; I was glad that Maxsales wasn’t negative). I hope no one on our roll call feels pressured.

Jade13: Or, those who want their personal lists to include others private excursions (including full names of the participants and tour company and contact person) that do not even involve them....

I organize this information in private roll call files as a tool for others to use. Not because I want the info - and I stress that it is confidential, not to be shared outside the roll call. As I mentioned before, I don't share my name in a public forum (though most can guess - I wasn't thinking ahead). I’d rather organize the private tours off line in the Private Roll Call because I’ve noticed people posting that they want to participate in one, only to find it has been filled for weeks.

This is something I do simply because I have always liked to make it easier for people to socialize and I don’t need (nor do I want) to be in the middle, just facilitate it.

tserface: I'm not bothered by any of this stuff. I figure a roll call is a great place to get to know people before the cruise and if there is someone who knows someone and wants to reconnect I don't see a problem with that. ... OK, I do know one thing that bugs me a little. Roll call police. The ones who say "roll calls are not for [insert here]" and try to restrict what happens. If you don't like what's happening you can ignore it.

 

Tom

Let’s Get Wet: I believe that the only option an individual has with their signature is to turn it on or off globally. There's no way I'm aware of to decide on a post-by-post basis whether to have it included or not.

Yes, you can turn off the signature for individual posts. It is down in Additional Options. I've turned it off for this posting but I do list all my cruises because if I'm on a cruise, I always look to see if someone posting has shared a cruise with me. And I have some signature quotes that are meaningful to me and help to introduce me to others.

Beth - upcoming cruise, Summit to Canada & New England

US Resident, so if you aren't this might not apply (I forgot to look if your location was listed)

We just made our final payment for a cruise (it is due in 4 days). The first page of Our Celebrity was accurate, it showed a zero balance, but when you clicked on Show Details of our payment to see what the charges were, it showed we owed ~$180 more. I had gotten a day credit just for me (illness on last cruise), and it didn't show up. So I called - I really don't want to lose our cabin on a nearly sold-out cruise - and was told by the agent that they wouldn't cancel me for this, but would call us to inform us that we hadn't paid.

So that good news is it is entirely possible that Celebrity would make sure you knew you had missed your payment.

Then again, since you used a TA, maybe they would call the TA. I didn't use one.

The only caveat here is that I never know if what I'm being told is accurate, nor if not paying at all would have the same results, but I felt a little better. We will keep checking since as I said, I really don't want to lose this cabin.

Beth

How long was the aerial tram portion of this tour?

Sorry to take so long to answer - but I don't have an answer. I'm not good with details - it was just the right length for me. Not long enough to get concerned about being way up there, and not so short that I thought it ended too soon. One person in our party is a little acrophobic (heights) and it didn't bother said person.

Beth

We did the Rainforest Extravaganza in Dec 2012. It was one of my favorite shore excursions. I can't find how much it cost for us. The park where we took the aerial tram was really interesting and the walkways were beautiful. And we saw sloths. Sloths in the wild were on my "must see" list.

Beth

Ummm - and sometimes folks look on the Celebrity website and it is acting up and you can't find anything because the search feature does not work well at all, and here is a helpful group of people who will answer any question - except for those who are not so helpful, c'mon, you know who you are.

5onadime, you did come to the right place. As mentioned by drarill, the soda package, it's not for coffee coffee, in fact none of the packages covers better brewed coffee (like on Princess) because the only coffee (not espresso) is the ship coffee. I am not an expert on Celebrity coffee because we quit drinking it when the drink packages started. Now we have lattes in the morning and espressos after dinner.

Our perspective, we get the premium - and it is because we like the better water and not having to think about it. It also covers fun pool drinks (non-alcoholic) and I'm not certain whether the classic covers them.

In the classic package, regular espresso drinks are covered; fancy ones are not. With either non-alcoholic package you can get water to take off the ship on tours. That is a major plus. With the premium, it is Evian or Pellegrino; with the classic, it is some other brand. You can have your in-room cooler emptied by the room steward and when you go by a bar (or Bacio), you can pick up a water to take to the room to save up. We do this, so we can carry off 2 waters each into port. For us, it is a good deal. We don't drink soda, so I'm not so up on the soda package.

I hope this helps. Oh, there is also a water package (just water).

Beth

I look for them but what do you do if you find them? By that time you've already brought your bag into the room. I'm feeling crawly just reading this.

If you aren't from the US, it may pay to watch the currency fluctuations and buy it as soon as the rates are in your favor. Celebrity charges you at booking time, not when you board. If it saves you only a little, it may not be worth your time - but if the dollar is fluctuating dramatically against your currency, and if it is fun for you to watch it, then it is worth it. You probably can tell I haven't been checking recently since we don't have an abroad trip planned soon. When we were going to Italy & England, I was watching the pounds and euros.

Beth

Because I really enjoy the Hot Glass Show, we went to the Corning Museum on a recent road trip. The glass shows there are significantly shorter, though the museum has lots of stuff to see. If you are ever near Corning, NY, it is worth the trip. You can even sign up to create your own piece, but you do need to sign up in advance if you are visiting during a busy time.

A friend once won one of the pieces - and he gave it to us as a thank you. A treasure - and it made it home.

Beth

When I go online to upgrade my classic package I'm told I must cancel and then order premium package. When I remove the classic package I get there is no refund since I didn't pay for it. I cancel the request. but when I try to just add the premium package there is a charge for the full amount not the difference between the two packages. Afraid to go further as I only want to pay the difference.

Any information is appreciated.:confused:

That's one that might work better with a phone call. We've always seemed to do it in a call and it worked fine. I do think it has to be more than 4 days (and may be more than that) before your sail date to do it through Celebrity and not on the ship. I usually call the Captain's Club number, if that's any help.

Beth

Only slightly tongue-in-cheek:

Flip a coin.

Heads you go on the cruise

Tails you don't.

If your reaction to your results is "darn, let's go for two out of three," you will have your true answer.

Sometimes that works.

Personally, we took this cruise, stayed a few days in Venice and took side trips to Verona and Burano and managed to be there the day of the Vogalonga (a gondola race/parade). We met great people on our roll call, some who have remained friends, and traveled with family. This was one of our top cruises. We did shore excursions in Ravenna (ShipEx-to Bologna); Koper (Private to Lubljana & Postojna Caves), Bari (to Alberobello for Trulli houses-ShipEx), Malta (ShipEx-overview) and Messina (Private to Taormina and Castelmola). In Split, Dubrovnik, Kotor, Corfu and Naples we just got out and walked or took public transport (Naples) around the city.

We are modest income folks - my husband is a retired teacher and I was then still working as a secretary - so vacations are a big deal. This was worth the cost. If you decide to go, I'll tell you the things I would have done differently but I would do this cruise again. I want to do it again.

Silhouette is a beautiful ship, and though we didn't do it, friends love the Lawn Club - in fact they booked a cruise on Silhouette because of the Lawn Club.

Hope this helps.

Beth

Thanks for all the information. I admit I haven't read every day, so if you covered this, I apologize. I read occasionally. I guess now that I've posted I'll get the updates so I won't forget.

A group of us from our roll call are organizing a sailaway get-together. On S-Class ships we usually meet at the Sunset Bar which allows us to expand onto the Lawn. I have seen conflicting deck plans (the buffet is called Waterfall Cafe on some, Oceanview on others). Is there a Sunset Bar on the Summit? Is it a good place for about 30 people to meet up and get a good view? We are sailing out of Bayonne and it would be neat to see NYC in the background as we leave. I don't know if that is even possible as I haven't looked at a good map.

Recommendations? If there is somewhere with better views, we'd love to learn about it.

Thanks, and I hope the rest of your trip is wonderful, or if you are home already, that you got home safely and well-rested.

Beth

There always seem to be several camps to anything.

There are the THESE ARE THE RULES people - and they seem to believe that every rule should be a hard and fast line drawn in the sand no exceptions kind of rule. Rules like that are easier to enforce and insecure people in positions of power like hard no-exceptions rules, likely because they don't have to make decisions.

There are the Rules, schmules folks. An enforcer's nightmare because they don't believe the rules apply to them. We aren't talking about the occasional kind exception, they simply don't follow rules anyway and it is impossible to create a framework that will work for them.

There is a middle ground. The majority of people generally follow the rules, but on occasion, would like the rules to be bent a little.

Kind self-confident enforcers can do this.

Personally, I wouldn't mind quiet children at an Elite event, and would probably enjoy their presence. It wouldn't irk me that rules weren't being enforced as long as the young person was behaving responsibly.

I would mind more active children in these venues, just as I notice and am bothered by rowdy adults (unlimited alcohol, what could go wrong?) and I would wish there were rules to keep them from such behavior. With the children, I would wonder what were the parents thinking?

Some children are calm and quiet by nature, some are more active bordering on rowdy. Not a judgment, just an observation. Parents and grandparents, you know which your children are. If you are bringing them to an event where they need to be calm and quiet, and they aren't capable of such behavior, or you aren't willing to give them your undivided attention, you are doing everyone a disservice. If you observe someone at an adult venue whose child is behaving properly and you demand equal treatment for your hyperactive child, you are being unfair to everyone, your child most of all. Children thrive with positive interaction with adults, and they won't get it if they are disrupting an adult event.

Can't we all just get along?

I agree about the robo calls. On our last cruise (January Eclipse), the CCH (Graeme) used a system that put them on your TV. I thought that was being done system-wide and think it a major improvement over the calls.

The only downside is we often didn't see them (it took me until 10 days into a 14 day cruise to realize they were there), but most weren't anything that interested me and the events that do interest me, I usually seek out.

Beth

You might bring plastic hangers for this purpose to hang on the hooks or from the shower head. It isn't easy, but it can be done.