chemmo

Totally agree! Our favourite time to visit the Mediterranean too. As you say the long evenings lend themselves to outside dining. Also agree the water will be cool. The summer season is in swing but not at its maximum so whilst busy most tourist sights are not heaving… Definitely take a cardigan for evenings…

Totally agree. There are journeys that are easy to do independently and others that simply are best done through the ship.

Thanks Norris, very reasonable! I don’t mind paying for a coffee with a view, I do mind if I feel I should be walking away with the chair and table! Hope your health continues to improve, don’t overdo it!

Amsterdam has never been on my bucket list of European cities to visit, I am beginning to think it should be…I guess being so relatively easy to get to for us it has always been somewhere on the back burner… re the cost of coffee, snacks etc overlooking the canals, expensive or reasonable?

They are doing a private tour not a Celebrity private journey… You are correct, if you book a through Celebrity it will indicate if food is included. It will also indicate where there are restaurants and you will have time to purchase a snack if you choose to do so.

Thanks for that!

You know we barely noticed it….Too busy watching that wake view…mesmerising…

Perhaps we should start a club for the unsophisticated wine drinkers! A good excuse for drinking more, we are trying to educate our palates!

That sounds like a great idea. I am cruising next year with my son and his fiancée. Both far more active than me…It would be great to personally design a trip so we can share perhaps a morning’s sight seeing but perhaps me then being left in a nice town square by lunchtime to enjoy a drink, shop and view whilst they do something more energetic and return to collect me later. Is it priced per guest or per vehicle?

Yes, this is always a concern. We do tend to lean more towards X tours if the time back to the ship is tight. Also more risks in ports the ship visits less frequently as the tour guides are more likely to be less experienced.

Sincere best wishes for a wonderful cruise…As a none gambler I can’t see me ever getting a free cruise!

Ask your tour guide to arrange packed lunches for you. They should be able to contact a local bakery/restaurant and put together a something…One of the reasons for booking a private tour is that things like this are the responsibility of the tour guide to ‘make happen’. I’ll bet she thought you bringing your own packed lunch was a good idea, less for her to organise. Obviously this will be at an additional cost. Just as a second note, I do understand the desire to squash as much as possible into a day trip but a full day with no lunch stop is a long day…We have organised a couple of private tours. We have been very specific about a lunch stop. We have requested a lunch lasting no more than 30 minutes offering a simple taste of the country we are visiting with a view if possible and decent rest rooms…We usually stipulate a restaurant not attached to a shop…The reason for this is often the shops will offer incentives for guides to stop. Not conducive to the guide choosing the best food or location…

Speaking as someone who buys most of their wine from the UK equivalent of Walmart I obviously wouldn’t be buying the bottle on board… I do remember some years ago going to a business meal where the host had provided 2 bottles from his vintage selection to be served with the entree. We heard all about the price, the laying down, the bouquet, the vanilla background…I could hear the drums rolling as the first bottle was opened…What a disappointment…It was nice but in my (very limited) experience was no better than a £10 - £20 bottle I could have bought from the supermarket…Obviously we all politely enthused but in private conversations after couldn’t help but feel it was ‘much ado about nothing’…

Be aware that there are ongoing rail strikes in the UK at the moment. Also traffic can make a big difference to road travel time. We live in the UK (about a four hour drive from Southampton) but would never drive up on the day. Just so much more relaxing to be in the port the day before your cruise. Enjoy a nice meal, get up at leisure….

The focus on RC is action and adventure whereas on Celebrity it is more on rest and relaxation. If you don’t like the smaller RC ships which have less entertainment venues you may also find the Celebrity M class limited. In our opinion all Celebrity ships ‘win’ on food, relaxing bars, a quieter atmosphere and excellent service. Also generally less children on board and those that are on board are well supervised and well behaved. Also in our opinion RC ‘win’ on entertainment and activities. With a free cruise up for grabs why not just give Celebrity a go? If you board expecting a new experience you may find you really enjoy the differences. if you board and compare negatively with the RC big ships then you will be disappointed.

Welcome to cruise critic! Not only do we always spend a night pre cruise in the port we are sailing from we pick a room with a port view whenever possible. For Southampton, the Holiday Inn. If we are awake early (4am ish), which we usually are as we are excited, we will use ship tracker to see our ship approach the port…Lovely to open your curtains and see your ship arriving! Even when we have a free breakfast we keep it light so we can enjoy a lunch on board. Our once on board routine is similar to many others. A mix of getting organised for the cruise and beginning to unwind. We invariably on S class ships dine in Tuscan first night. It really is magical to watch the ship slowly move out of the port and see day turn to night through those amazing aft windows with the wonderful wake views…

Sincere thanks for such a lovely review! I must confess that I preferred some of the lunch menus to the evening ones…We have never bothered with the MDR lunch menu…perhaps we should…

We have tried a few times re suites. As sailing date has got near the odd suite has come up as available, invariably more than the price we have paid…

Agree.. the decks are wonderful.

We have booked Infinity for next September. We are expecting what we have paid for…An older ship so a few age wrinkles, not upgraded so not upgraded! What we do still expect is Celebrity service levels, decent food and the usual ambiance we expect from a Celebrity Ship…A focus on rest and relaxation… Re your quote below, I don’t quite know what a fruit pair is but in our experience staff will usually do their best to meet your expectations. We generally have a rule that if we want something not on the general menu we will ask in advance (24 hours)..

We have never cruised and not got off the ship at all but in recent years we have seen more the ship as our destination and been selective where we get off for excursions or a walk… Some ports are great for a short walk at some point in the day, like Antigua. We love to visit the Cathedral, just a short walk uphill. Other ports like St Lucia are nice to view from. We loved to see the sea planes and light aircraft take off and land. When staying on board we love to just take the day slowly…We will usually have coffee and pastries in the room leaving the buffet and restaurants for those in a rush to get off. We will then make up for it by having an early lunch. We will enjoy a quiet buffet slowly ‘grazing’ from station to station. No rush, the unhurried bar staff will have time to bring you leisurely drinks… In the afternoon we will enjoy a prime position sun bed before the am excursions return and enjoy until the pool area starts to get busy… at about 2.30 - 3.00pm…Time then to take a drink back to your room for a siesta or to people watch from the veranda… Just as an aside. It was the point in our cruising lives when our cruises became more about rest and relaxation and less about exploring the world that we found it was worth paying a bit more for a better room as we were spending more time in it. Just as with the beverage package you definitely get more value from the $ spent the more time you spend on the ship…

Silhouette is the S class ship that has had this modification. I certainly added to the seating area at the sunset bar. Games were still being played in the central lawn area.

Keep the reports and photos coming!

We have an Infinity cruise booked for next Autumn… After that nothing. I the past we often had 2/3 cruises booked and would then sneak in an extra! Like you we are finding prices eye watering….Also E class is now cruising from Southampton and the RS and PH are very expensive and I don’t like the layout as much as the S class! Paying more for less… In addition to looking at other cruise lines we are also (like many I think) still enjoying some staycations. So many nice cottages and chalets available at a fraction of the cost of a cruise with just a couple of hours drive and no airports and flying! Whatever cruise line you try next keep us informed, definitely interested in your opinion.

Having followed your posts for many years I really hope you don’t say goodbye…I have always found your posts both useful and interesting…If you do move to an alternative line let us know your opinions…