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Geez, that $600 bar tab offer will go pretty quickly with those drink prices. I wish VV had a beverage package.

Really enjoyed your take on Celebrity. My DD, aged 27, and I did Summit the end of last year. This was our first Celebrity sailing. My daughter has a gluten allergy and Celebrity was very accommodating. In the MDR, during dinner, they went over the next night’s menu with her so they could make substitutions for items she wanted to order that contained gluten. She was also given gluten free bread each night. This Easter, my daughter and her boyfriend sailed on Carnival Paradise and she indicated they were not nearly as accommodating. Her boyfriend is allergic to garlic, which is used in so many dishes, but Carnival would not substitute side dishes cooked with garlic for other sides without garlic. My DD grew up on Carnival cruises, but said after the last experience, she is done. She had a girls cruise booked with friends on Carnival, but after her last experience, they changed to a land trip. I have not been on Carnival since 2013. Once the kids graduated high school, we did other types of vacations and never got back on Carnival. We turned platinum and then stopped sailing them. For me, the big draw to Celebrity, MSC, and NCL is the included beverage package. We would love to try Virgin, but my DH likes the good scotches and I like the real champagne, so we are not sure how far a $600 bar tab will go. We were looking at the Virgin TA in 4/24, but for a 2 week sailing, we figured $600 might get us 2 drinks each per day. I’m pretty sure we had your same cruise director. We really enjoyed her. I loved the Zumba classes!! Our sailing also had the Abba singalong which we loved. For us, the food was ok. We did the steakhouse one night and enjoyed it. There were always gluten free desserts in the buffet, which my DD appreciated. I did find the buffet pizza really lacking in toppings. And the late night buffet offerings were very scarce! We had an aft balcony and being concierge class, we could order a full breakfast to be delivered, which was lovely to enjoy on the balcony. Would love to try the retreat, but not sure the extra cost is worth it for us. Concierge class was just right and we loved the helipad sail away from Miami. I guess it’s a crap shoot as to who gets invited, but Celebrity is smart to invite first time cruisers with their line, because it made a great first impression for me! I’m off to read your VV review now. Am following Sid’s review too. I hope to try them someday, just for the hammock. We live in Orlando so with the Brightline train starting service, we hope to do more sailings from Miami. Maybe a short VV cruise is in order to see if it’s our thing. Thanks again for a great review!

We were invited to this on our Summit sailing and loved it. Do you know how they choose whom to invite? We were in a concierge class cabin, so figured that’s how we received an invitation. Maybe they know you are doing a review?

Can I just say how impressed I am with your work ethic! Thinking I need to use you as my travel agent!! I have not had the best luck with others I’ve used! Loving the review. We did our first Celebrity cruise on Summit last year and fell in love with the M class ship!!

Thank you. I just have an air fryer without the pressure cooker feature.

Such a pretty view from your apartment. Those chicken wings looked delicious. I’m still trying to make friends with my air fryer. How long do you cook them for and at what temperature?

I wish I knew the answer to this. Our PPC calls me with cruise offers (the last call was 11 pm--that went straight to voicemail), but when we have a cruise booked and e-mail or call with a question, he is no where to be found. I went the TA route twice with two different TAs who were recommended to me by people I met on a cruise, but did not have any better luck. What do you do when a TA travels all the time and cannot be reached? Shouldn't they have backup? I'd love to find a TA who really advocates for the clients, but sadly, I have not had that experience. Often I know more than the TA just by reading Cruise Critic. Would love to know where the good ones are!!

Thanks so much for the review. There are not many non-Yacht Club reviews of MSC out there. For your pizza lunch, did you order from room service? The photos of Ocean Cay are so pretty. Glad the weather cleared up for you.

Thank you!

Please share information regarding the Air B and B in Miami. Hotel prices in Miami have gone up so much! Looking forward to your review.

I believe that Frontier has recently discontinued their call center, so there is no option to speak to an agent in case of issues. I flew them once in 2019 roundtrip from MCO to LAS and had no issues. Booked again for a flight in 2020 and had an absolute nightmare using the flight credit when the flight was cancelled. At that time, they had a telephone call center, but I literally spent 4 hours on the telephone. They would intentionally cut me off at a certain point. I still have a small credit with them, but do not have any intention of using it, which is what they bank on. They make using any type of credit an absolute nightmare. My recommendation is to use them only if you are 100% certain your plans won't change (or that there is not another pandemic that shuts the world down). If you have to try to access their customer service for any reason, it's a nightmare.

Neither my husband or I are beer drinkers. As long as they have a decent cab for my husband and a decent champagne for me (last cruise on Divina it was Nicholas Feuillatte), we will be set! Thanks for your review. We are doing Seaside in Sept. Seaside reviews seem very scarce!

Another plug for the Celebrity Summit. We sailed this ship from Miami last December and loved it. Wonderful crew and service.

As others have indicted, there are kiosks set up on the ship to take care of entering your credit card information. We did it shortly after embarkation just to get it out of the way. There were staff around to assist and no line at the kiosk.

@PistolPete13Loved the review and your unique perspective. Your photos are gorgeous!! Besides the stunning photos of the ship, your photos of the NYC skyline are amazing. I have a love for NYC, having attended grad school there in the mid-1980s and then visiting my son during his college years in NYC from 2013-2016. NYC will always have a piece of my heart! I hope to sail Prima and am sad that she is leaving my home port of Port Canaveral so soon. @BirdTravelsWe love the Epic; I know that people seem to have strong feelings about this ship, but after spending 15 nights on a TA on the Epic in 2019, we loved it!! I'd sail Epic again anytime!

I’m jealous you have them. Now, the only one in Orlando is at the airport. We had one by the Millenia Mall, but it’s gone now. I believe they tore the building down and put in a Chick Fil A. Like we needed another fast food chicken place; and one that closes on Sunday at that! I miss the cappuccino from La Madeleine.

La Madeleine is my fav. Great French pastries and cappuccino.

From what I understand, you can make a reservation online for security. I believe you have 20 minutes past your reservation time to make it through. You enter in the date of your flight, flight no. and destination city. I have not personally used the service.

You will love the balcony. We’ve done all types of cabins, from inside to ocean view to balcony to aft balcony. We did those 4J rooms on Carnival too and they were pretty nice. The aft balcony is my favorite. So relaxing to sit outside and watch the wake, but I’ll take any balcony. The older I get, it’s hard to do anything else. I’m not sure I could do a dark inside room again though.

The new Terminal C is also home to the Brightline train station. By June, we are supposed to be able to travel to Miami via train in 3 hours. I’m very excited for this, as Miami traffic is horrible and we tend to park our car at the hotel and Uber everywhere when we visit. It will be so nice to sit on the train and enjoy a cocktail or two and free Wi-Fi on the trip!

This is my home airport. It is a beautiful airport, but without TSA Pre-Check, the security lines can be very long.

I like a beurre blanc sauce. You can also serve it with a dill sauce or glaze it with miso or maple syrup.

Needs some sauce, lol.

Lol. My 28 year old daughter and I did a Celebrity cruise in December. I joked with her that we would not be seeing how “low” the waiters could go during the dinner service. She was genuinely disappointed that the waiters would not be dancing to “Low, Low, Low” or any other song during our cruise. She has 2 Carnival cruises booked this year, so the dancing does appeal to some! 😊

Why is the alcohol always only served on the return trip? I can understand if you are snorkeling or doing another activity, that they want to wait until the activity is over, but why can’t one enjoy a cocktail while sitting passively in a boat observing whales??