CAPinBoynton

Bluwes, if you get to Abu Dhabi please be sure to go see the mosque.  It was so beautiful!  If you can arrange it, go at night.

For Kearney — speaking about using scooters.  While on the Edge I had no problems using my scooter.  I thought that there was no way to go to the different levels of Eden, but I found out later that there is an elevator.  With the limited time on board, we only got to go to a couple of the restaurants.  We had lunch at the Oceanview, which of course was no problem.  We also had lunch at Luminae and had plenty of room to park my scooter next to the table where I was sitting.  For dinner at the Normandie, I was able to pull the scooter in close to the table and everything was fine.  The second night we went to Tuscan and the tables were too close together so the waiter took my scooter back into the closed off area.  It was returned to me promptly when I was ready to leave.  Seating in the cabin might present a problem and you may have to improvise with an extra couch cushion.  Overall, I doubt you’ll have any real problems.

Good for you, Ed!  Y’all have fun!

If you look at Mike’s signature, our website address is at the end of his post.  It is written in red and says For cruise reviews and pictures or you can expand our signature and it will show it.

On behalf of my husband, thank you all for your kind words.

I had no idea you could take a cruise with this itinerary! I'm actually going to London and Iceland in October, but not cruising. My trip started as a week in London to celebrate a milestone birthday, but it was so pricy to fly direct from the NY/NJ area at the time, I looked into other options, and discovered I could fly through Iceland for much less.

 

And since Iceland is on my bucket list of places to visit, it made sense to spend a few days on my way back. It's funny; I think I'm more excited about my 2+ days in Iceland than my almost week in London! I'm at work so can't really look at it all, but wow, your photos are amazing! Looking forward to taking the time to go through all of your Iceland shots.

That's funny. I don't know how Iceland will be in October, but it should be interesting!

Thanks for the review. We are booked for Iceland 2017. My wife has limited distance walking ability. We use a transport chair and looking at your wonderful pictures, I was wondering about our ability to do the Iceland excursions. On some previous cruises, she has stayed with the van when the terrain was difficult, as I went exploring. What was your experience in Iceland.

 

Don

Hi Don,

As you can see from the pictures, I am the one with mobility issues. I can walk, but only for short distances, so I use a scooter. Within the towns, the scooter was not a problem. However, most of Iceland involves waterfalls and terrain that is not conducive to scooters. Most of the time I could wait at the bottom of the falls while Mike climbed up. I would suggest that you hire tour guides that can taylor tours to meet your needs. Still, it was worth going!

I enjoyed another great trip report from MVP.

I especially enjoyed the photo of Roger Cartwright. He is a great lecturer and a very dear man. We enjoyed several dinners with him and his lovely wife June.

I'm jealous. I would imagine that dinner with him would be most interesting!

Thank you very helpful. I think I might have a job to persuade DH to do this trip.

As Mike said, this was a bucket list trip for him. I was not really interested and he had to do a lot of talking to convince me to go. Thank goodness he did! Except for the horrible pollution, it rates as one of my favorite cruises. Thanks Sweetie, for convincing me to go!

Hi, Just found your HAL review from last March! WOW ! Thank you so much - will read your other reviews with great px!

Glad you enjoyed it. We have just returned from China, S. Korea, and Japan. You can look for that review in about three weeks. It was a fabulous, once in a lifetime trip. :)

I also thank you for the kind words about our website. May I add one comment to the conversation. To me, one of the best things about Oceania is the people I have met. No matter the age, I have found the people to be interesting conversationalist, well educated, and widely traveled. The crew is very friendly and the service outstanding. :)

Thank you so much for sharing! We are doing a Transatlantic Cruise on the Celebrity Equinox end April and will now look into booking Alex from Top Ten Tours for our day in Portugal.z

You will certainly enjoy yourself. We had so much fun with Alex. He was so accommodating. He was comfortable with suggesting things to us, but he wasn't in the least bit pushy. I can't wait to go back to Lisbon again.

Interesting title of this thread, given that you were on the Eclipse :D:D:D

What can I say, I've tried to teach him that haste makes waste!:D:D:D

Hey Mike, you forgot to mention that we also included our 3 day pre-cruise in London. :)

Thanks so much. I am glad it helped in your cruise planning.

First off, let me say that for formal nights I prefer a tux for my husband and a long gown for myself. However, with weight restrictions on airlines it is not practical to bring beaded or sequined tops, and even plain long gowns can be very heavy. For a cruise with three formal nights, three heavy gowns does become a consideration. Lately, I have been taking one floor length black skirt and three light weight fancy tops. I think that Mike has used this as an excuse to rebel against his tux, which he hates.

As for men, a suit is perfectly acceptable for formal night. For other nights men usually wear slacks and a button shirt without tie.

We have been on 36 cruises, and I must say that over the years dress for both men and women has become less and less formal. I think that short "Sunday" dresses and sport coats are becoming the new norm. I don't want to see that trend, but I'm afraid it's happening.

Thank you for posting your review! DH and I are on the Island in August for the same trip - this will be very helpful.

One other thing, you might want to take a look at our 2005 Alaska trip, too, as it was in August. It will give you an idea as to the difference in the things Mike and I saw. :)

Eve, I reserved my manicure online before the cruise. It doesn't specify different types, it just says manicure $41. My nails are shellac. They charged $45 instead of the advertised $41, and an extra $20 to remove my old polish. Then they included an automatic tip of $9.75 for a grand total of $74.75. There was no mention anywhere of additional charges.

I had been expecting to pay the $41 plus I would have given a $8.25 tip to equal $49.25. I have never paid extra to have polish removed, on land or at sea!

Thank you so much for your post. We are sailing to Alaska on the Star in Sept. Did you book your seaplane trip with the cruise line or from an outside source>

The sea plane was booked directly with Island Wings through the link given in the review.

I was just reading this on Facebook. Your pictures are amazing. I'm appalled at the manicure though, that's crazy

As I said in the review, I really felt "taken". Even the basic manicure price was different. I have a paper from Princess stating $41. On the receipt I have, it shows $45 before all the add on charges. I should have pitched a fit and questioned it on the spot, but that's just not me. I always have a tendency to think I must have made the mistake. However, after getting home and looking up my "order", I did find that it said $41 and it did not mention any additional charges. So, I sent a nice email to Princess on 7/5/14 with my complaint, but so far not a word, not even an acknowledgment that they received my email. I must admit that it does leave a very sour taste in my mouth from an otherwise great trip. :mad:

LOL, I'm just naturally clumsy, always have been. One time I tripped on the little 1" lip coming out of the garage. Skidded on my face, broke the tip of my nose, etc., etc. That's just me! :D:D

Yes Mike certainly more than one afternoon, now reading your reviews at night after I come home from work.

I'm also glad that you're enjoying our reviews. :) If you read the 2013 Baltic cruise, be sure to also read the land tour pre-cruise that we did. We had quite the adventure with Mike driving on the wrong side of the road! Added to that were 1 accident, 1 entrapment, and 1 fall. :eek:

Okay, let me try to clarify this whole lido business. When I said that the Reflection is set up in islands, that is what it is called. It is only found on the Celebrity Solstice class ships. There is no traditional line with trays. There is an island for salads. Yes, there is a person there to make that delicious Caesar for you, but you can make your own salad from a big selection of ingredients. Another island is the Cuttery, where among other things, you can get the slice of ham or beef or whatever they feature that day. Another island might feature sandwich makings. It just lets you go straight to what appeals to you rather than having to wait in line behind grandma while she makes her salad. I'll put a couple of pictures below, but it's easier to understand if you look at any of our reviews of the Solstice class ships: Solstice, Silhouette, Eclipse, or Reflection. I left out the Equinox because we haven't sailed her yet.

So, are you going to tell us the "suggestion" you made that was implemented throughout the dining rooms? Please? :)

Yes, believe it or not. I spoke to the Dining Room Manager, Himanshu Dogra about there being no spoons on the table to stir the iced tea. As he explained, quite awhile back they stopped setting out the multiple forks, spoons, and knives on the tables because it is a waste. Now they only put out one knife and one fork unless something else is needed or requested. I told him that I understood that and agreed with him.

I suggested since most people either drink wine or ice water with their meal, why not instruct the waiters that anytime someone orders ice tea, to serve it with a spoon. They already do that with coffee. A simple solution to improve the service.

It was no big deal. The only reason I even mentioned it in the review was to serve as an example of the great service we received on board.

That is good to hear. As we never eat in the dining room that will be nice. We may do a couple of the specialty restaurant as they are smart casual every night

I haven't finished reading this entire thread yet, but I just have to jump in. We have just experienced the reverse of your situation. We have sailed Celebrity 13 times, and just did our first HAL on the Westerdam on March 1. In many ways they are comparable. In the Solstice class we have sailed the Solstice twice, the Silhouette, the Eclipse, and the Reflection.

Since you have "food" in your handle, I assume that you are a foodie like I am. The buffet on the Reflection is great. It will be a different experience for you, as they don't use trays and have islands instead of a line. At first it will seem weird, but once you are used to it, it's sooooo much better. All of the specialty restaurants are amazing. Get a group of at least 4 or 6 people together and go to Qzine. WOW!

On another note, and the reason I wrote before I had finished reading the thread, is please, please do not deny yourself the experience of the main dining room for a couple of nights. It won't kill your husband to wear long pants. He can change after dinner. In fact, if it's not a formal night, he could get away with nice jeans (no holes). I always just wear slacks and a blouse. It's not dressy except on formal night. The food in the MDR is extraordinary and the service is to be experienced.

And last, but not least, take a peek at our website and you'll find our reviews of all of the Solstice class ships with lots and lots of pictures of the ships, the menus, and the food, as well as the ports, etc. You'll find them at http://www.thepreismans.com. Enjoy!