robmab

10 hours ago, Miaminice said:

As mentioned above, the FCC notification is sent by email.

 

When you have FCC applied to another cruise, you will receive a new confirmation for that cruise. It will just mention a new fare (reduced by the FCC). 
 

For example:

Previous fare was $2000 and a $800 FCC is then applied. Your new confirmation will simply state a new cruise fare of $1200. 
Celebrity can see in their system that an FCC was applied. You can’t.

I rebooked using FCC last night, and I'm pretty disturbed that nowhere on my invoice does it show the full value of the cruise. It's like the $7,000+ I paid for the cruise that Celebrity cancelled has just vanished. Now my new invoice shows a cruise fare of $40 per person, but that does me no good for proving how much we have paid Celebrity for travel insurance purposes. Also, what if they cancel this new cruise, too? Do I only get back $40 per person since that's the fare I have supposedly paid on my invoice? I will be calling them today to ask these questions, but it's adding to my stress level right now.

Download GroupMe or WhatsApp to your phones and you can message each other from anywhere, as long as you're connected to WiFi. We used GroupMe on our last cruise to communicate with our teen daughters about dinner times, meeting places, etc. or just to find out where they were on the ship. The internet package was worth it for us to be able to send/receive messages from them.

We'll be in our first Celebrity SV in March on Equinox, but we have sailed in these types of cabins on RCCL for years. They're our favorite. The 180-degree view over the ship's wake is incredible and the balconies are usually a bit more spacious. We've never had issues with movement because we've always been on very large ships.

There is some noise when coming into port (and sometimes that's early in the morning), but like another poster said, we just roll over and go back to sleep. It's MUCH quieter than having a mid-ship cabin where everyone getting off the elevator and stumbling to their cabin at 2 am passes your door with voices at full volume.

I will always choose the SV over any other category (except maybe a suite...if I could ever afford one). 😊

We spend more time on the balcony than we do in the stateroom itself. It's nice to have your own private outdoor space to enjoy coffee in the morning, read a book, watch the sunset (if you're facing the right way). I can't think of any reason we'd ever skip a balcony -- even on a cooler itinerary or during winter months, I'd just take a blanket out there.

To me, it's definitely worth it because it's one of the truly unique parts of the cruise vacation: opening your drapes each morning to a completely different view and being able to experience the sounds and sights of each port from your stateroom before you venture out and again as the ship is pulling away. A window just isn't the same. (In fact, I'd save the money and go with an inside stateroom before I'd pay for just a window.)

We just came off the Allure with the same itinerary that will be on the Harmony.

My advice:

Florence is WAY too far from the La Spezia port. If you want to see Pisa or Lucca, that is doable from La Spezia, but if you have your heart set on spending time in Florence, you will not get enough time during that port stop to actually experience the city. I agree with the poster who said it's better as a land stop.

Marseilles is not the most exciting port city either, but I believe it's very similar to Toulon. We took a wine tour of Provence that day, which you could also do from Toulon.

With such a port-intensive cruise, you will barely even see the ship. We loved the Allure, but wished we'd done it on an itinerary with more sea days and fewer long days of sightseeing. We were simply too tired to stay up late and go to the shows and parties because we'd worn ourselves out in port every day.

I'd probably choose the Jewel because I love the size of that ship (and the thermal suite in the spa is my favorite of any spa on any ship).

14 days to Allure!

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We're on the Sept. 17 sailing (embarking at Citavecchia) and I have read every single post in this thread in the last two hours. I'm sure I will read it through at least one more time before we depart.

I love your writing. You're sarcastic like me. You also seem pretty laid back compared to other "Cruise Critics" and you take great photos, which I aspire to do.

Thanks for your time and effort in sharing all these details. I'm so glad you had a wonderful trip, and I wish you many more. Cheers!

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I would echo the recommendations for Trunk Bay, St. John. We've done Magen's Bay and loved it, but Trunk Bay puts it to shame. Much less crowded and the trip to get there is really not as long as everyone makes it out to be. From now on, we will always go straight to Trunk Bay ANYTIME our ship docks in St. Thomas.

If you decide to do Trunk Bay, here are a few tips to maximize your experience:

Get off the ship as soon as you possibly can and grab a taxi to Red Hook. Ferries from Red Hook leave every hour, on the hour, so if your ship docks at 8:30am, you have a chance of catching the 9:00am ferry from Red Hook, but it's cutting it close.

Take water and snacks with you. There's a dive shop at Trunk Bay, but no restaurant. And yes, there are lockers to leave things in.

Grab some extra towels to take with you. There are no chairs on this beach, unless you bring them yourself. We just sat on towels (the sand is super soft), but wished we'd had extra towels for drying off/showering, etc.

There are always taxis at Trunk Bay waiting to take you back to Cruz Bay. You don't have to worry about not having a ride back. They know the ferry schedule and will make sure that you don't miss it. However, they will usually make you wait until they have a full "load" of people.

Same for Red Hook -- we had NO trouble getting a taxi back to the ship. Just leave yourself a good long window (meaning 1-2 hours before the ship sails) to account for any traffic issues.