terrydtx

The MDR food on Celebrity has even gotten worse post covid with cost reductions and add on costs. That was why we have booked only suites to have access to Luminae, but even Luminae has gone down in quality.

That was the service we got in Sky Suites on the Equinox and Reflection in 2022. Instead of beer our butlers kept the min fridge stocked with 1/2 bottles of red wine and bottles of Evian bottled water at no charge. On the Reflection last August in Rome the mini fridge was empty when we boarded and the butler asked us on the embarkation day what we wanted it stocked with, and he took great care of us.

BTW if you want a drink in your cabin, you can call your butler and have him/her bring it to your cabin and it is included in your PDP. I found out about this on our first Retreat Sky Suite in 2021, when we were bringing drinks to our cabin from the pool bar and our butler saw us, he said next time we wanted a drink to call him and he would bring it to us in the cabin.

I forgot to add when FE rebooked us it did not cost us anything more. Because of the time difference from Venice to Seattle, when I called the FE emergency line, the agent I talked to told me it was 2am his time and that FE provides 24/7 emergency service.

Very simple, can be done online in your account or call Flight Ease and have them cancel the flights. Note, if you do cancel the cruise the flights are automatically cancelled too. We prefer to book with FE when we find a good deal on a fare and itinerary and make changes with them online if we find better deals. Then before final payment, if we find a better deal that we can't get with FE, we cancel FE and book directly with airline. Here is our story from last year on the Oosterdam from Venice and why we believe in using FE when possible. We had booked business class seats with FE for our cruise. When my wife got Covid before the end of the cruise, we had to spend 3 days in quarantine in Venice and missed our return flights home. I called FE and they canceled our flights home and told me to call back when we were cleared to fly home. On the day she tested negative, I called FE and they got us booked home the next day in BC on the original itinerary we missed earlier in the week. I was very impressed with their customer service.

That ship has already sailed, LOL

Thank you so much for your help. We will have to look into these recommendations. Have a great cruise this year.

There is not an Oosterdam cruise leaving from Athens on Oct 22, this year, I did find one for Oct 20th leaving from Pireas (Athens) hope this helps.

Yes

On E Class ships I prefer a SS midship as far forward as possible on deck 11 or 10 to have easy access to the Retreat Luminae on deck 12 and the Retreat lounge and deck elevator.

Here is a great website to find cabin layouts and actual pictures from members of many cabins. We use it before we book any cruise. Cruise Deck Plan Database and Pictures (cruisedeckplans.com)

Unless you booked on a group all Retreats cabins can only be booked with premium drinks, Wi-Fi, gratuities and OBC. You will love the suite Retreat on Celebrity. We are in a Sky Suite on the Apex in September from Amsterdam.

Yes it shows up on my booked cruises too in the Retreat. Celebrity's IT department is just a step behind everyone else.

They look like a decent size too. Was that in MDR or Luminae?

I agree with you on AA. In the last year we have flown with AA, Delta and United and AA has made more flight changes that the other 2 combined. Living in Texas it is hard to NOT fly on AA, but they are never our first choice.

I would book a private transport to Venice. Just because the ship docks at 5am doesn't mean you can walk off the ship at 5am. You would need to be at the airport at least 2 hours before your flight and it can take 2 hours or more to the airport from Ravenna. Last year I seem to remember that the first shuttle left the port at 8:30am. We decide to spend the night in Venice and fly home the next morning.

Can't wait for our first cruise on O in the Marina in 2025. We are getting so disappointed in the food on Celebrity.

We have our first Oceania cruise booked in 2025 and looking at some others. Luminae is the is the main reason we are not cancelling our upcoming Celebrity cruises. The other reason is we booked them at great rates and would not be booking at the current rates. Last year we found the MDR food in the HAL Oosterdam to be on equal with Luminae and far superior to Celebrity MDR. That HAL cruise followed our cruise on the Reflection in the Retreat so it gave us a great comparison and all 4 in our party agreed with my opinion above. We have 2 future cruises booked on HAL and with what we are saving over one on Celebrity we can eat in specialty restaurants every night and have money left over. Our Oceania cruise is 18 nights from Santiago to Buenos Ares and it is costing us $200pp less in a top concierge class Varanda than 14 nights on the Equinox in a Sky Suite with similar itinerary.

Deck 13 was lost when the ship first cruised through the Bermuda Triangle and is in limbo somewhere.

Can't believe they still serve Tilapia for a fish entree. Tilapia is the cheapest trash fish you can buy and I will never eat any. Google how Tilapia is farm raised in 3rd world countries and you would not eat it either. You find Tilapia being served in places like Golden Coral and low end Mexican restaurants in "fish" Tacos. This is not what I would expect in the MDR of a cruise line that sells itself as Modern Luxury.

We did the same for our first O cruise in 2025, and I feel the same about our A3 Concierge booking.

We have used FBC several times and never had anything but a positive experience, and not once lost control over our flights and not once did FBC make a change of flights on their own without contacting us first. I am a very savvy traveler who flew all over the world for business but I never take anything for granted. On our upcoming FBC bookings I check almost every day for any itinerary or flight changes, so I do not have any surprises. Even when I book directly with any airline, I do the same thing. I booked our flights to FLL for our June Equinox cruise direct with American Airlines. Last month they moved our outgoing flight from DFW to FLL by 2 hours earlier than booked. I saw it the day after it got changed, but it took AA 2 weeks to notify me by email. Last week we booked with FBC our airfare for next January to Australia. We have a B2B cruise with a 10 day post cruise driving trip in Australia. We are flying from San Antonio to Sydney on American Airlines in Premium Economy. Our flights home are on Air New Zealand from Melbourne to Aukland and then direct to Houston, TX in Premium Economy. The whole itinerary was ideal for us, we wanted to fly home on Air NZ as their premium economy is one of the best rated in the industry. There was no way to book this itinerary directly with the airlines involved and the pricing was about the same as doing either United or AA round trip booked directly. Air New Zealand RT was about $1200pp more if booked direct. After booking online, I called FBC to get our seating assigned and it took only about 15 minutes to get all of our seats chosen. Best part is we do not pay until final payment in October, and we can change or cancel flights at any time if we find better deals with no penalty.

Do they get to keep the tips?

You must be on a wide body FLL to Chicago flight, love those BC seats.

We have booked a couple of S class Sky Suites cruises and love the very large 30" tables for dining on the balcony. The extra sq feet of space is really nice. Unfortunately, the E class ships do not have a functional table for balconies in Sky Suites.