RCCL Diamond Cruisers try Celebrity: A Constellation Cruise Review

BACKGROUND

My DW and I are Diamond RCCL cruisers, we decided to giveCelebrity a try to open up more itinerary choices. The fact that Celebrity gives us Elite statuswas another deciding factor. We havesailed smaller ships and mega ships before and are ok with either, understandingthat we usually have to give up size for a more unique itinerary. We chose this Constellation 9 night cruisebased on the Barcelona to Venice Mediterranean sailing that included Croatiaand Montenegro.

PRE-CRUISE

Had no problems with the Celebrity website, the bookingprocess, selection of meal times, tours, etc. I was able to set up my schedule exactly the way I wanted. Bought a couple of excursions. So far sogood…

I have to say that I was a bit dismayed with some of therecent Constellation reviews on Cruise Critic. A few of them described the ship as being “in major disrepair” and asbeing filthy. There were also reviewsthat complained about terrible service and rude staff members. As anexperienced reader of reviews, I understand that opinions can vary widely. I also understood this ship wasn’t builtyesterday.

EMBARKATION(BARCELONA)

Was a breeze. Thistime we opted for a later pier arrival (so that we could enjoy a few last hoursof Barcelona) of around 2:30ish and we basically were able to walk on, godirectly to our room, etc. We hadpriority boarding but really didn’t need it. We were able to buy some wine inthe port store and carry it on with no issues.

THE SHIP

Obviously not a new ship, the Constellation does show somewear and tear. To describe it as beingin “major disrepair” or “filthy” is simply ridiculous. Ship was certainly clean and we observedadequate ongoing cleaning activities. Wespent most of our deck time in the solarium and there was always an attendantthere cleaning and drying the floors from pool and spa splashes. Most of the deckchairs looked brand new. The carpetingdidn’t even appear that worn to me. After reading those scathing reviews read pre-cruise, I was very pleasedwith the ship’s condition. Layout wasalso easy to learn.

THE CABIN – 8002

We usually opt for a balcony but settled for an Oceanview(booked a Guarantee) in order to spend more on sightseeing, etc. We were assigned cabin 8002 which turned outto be a really oversized oceanview (due to the shape of the outside of the shipand the hallway, this cabin is like 30-40% longer than the standardoceanview. We really enjoyed thespace!! The location of the cabin(extreme FWD) was not of any consequence regarding noise or movement on thissailing. Regarding condition/cleanliness – perhaps a little (and I mean a little)wear and tear, but very clean. We had nocomplaints about the cabin. Our Cabin Steward, Neil from India, was fantastic(best we’ve ever had on any cruise). Always a big plus when the Steward seeksyou out on day one to both greet you and to find out if you have anyquestions/requests.

DINING

Always subjective, but here goes. We had Select Dining and I made reservationsfor dinners pre-cruise. We only reallyhad an issue on night one when we waited in the reservation line for 30 minutes(behind a large group of suite guests with NO reservation that were trying toget multiple tables together, by the windows, etc, etc). IMO, the hostess really should have pulledthis group aside to seat those in line WITH reservations. When we finally gotto the hostess, she declared “you’re late for your reservation”, to which Ireplied “think it’s the other way around because we were here on time”. We were automatically seated at tables fortwo, which by the way, are like 6 inches from other tables for two. Really more like a table for four. We didn’t mind the closeness (we met somereally great couples) but there is a bit of awkwardness because the food is comingat different times at each table of two - since the couples are seated atdifferent times. On to the dining roomfood quality: overall, a bit better than RCCL. The prime rib was really good, as were the fish dishes. Loved havingsome new choices. Service in the diningroom was very good overall, think we had one waiter on one night that was justaverage. No issues at all with wine anddrink service either. We have had issues in the past on RCCL (getting timelydrinks in the dining room), no issues onthe Constellation.

The Oceanview Café was also a positive experience forus. A big plus was that there werealways open seats (which is not the case on the larger RCCL ships). I give the food quality and selection aslight edge over RCCL.

We did not eat in any specialty restaurants.

THE STAFF

Our overall experience with Constellation staff members wasexcellent. I already mentioned ourexemplary Cabin Steward. Many, many staff members called us by name (more sothan any previous cruise). Of theseveral dining room teams that served us dinner, we only had one waiter thatwas “so-so”. The Captain’s ClubAmbassador was very attentive during the evening happy hour. Our one interface with Guest Services(complaints about the really crappy internet) was handled to our satisfaction. The staff members in the Oceanview Café werevery efficient, dirty plates were always quickly removed- pleasantly. I was also impressed with how organized thequeues for excursions were handled by those staff members. I mentioned theslightly snooty Select Dining hostess -after the first night our interactions withher were fine. So, call me completelypuzzled by those negative staff reviews I’d read pre-cruise…..

CAPTAIN’S CLUB

Certainly enjoyed the nightly cocktail hour(s). No drink coupons loaded on the card for thiscruise, the cocktail crowd was alwayspretty small in the Reflections Lounge (loved this venue though - much better view than most RCCL Diamond Lounges). Appetizers at the Elite happyhour were pretty weak, IMO the RCCL Diamond Lounge had better offerings. Thefree bags of laundry were fantastic. Also enjoyed the Elite breakfast. Already mentioned our Ambassador who was very visible at the happy hours, etc.

MISCELLANEOUSCOMMENTS

BEDDING- we slept fine but the mattresses could definitelyuse an upgrade. Also, it appears Celebritydoes not use that foam “crack filler” when beds are pushed together?

INTERNET- Absolutely horrible on this cruise. Wecould hardly get into our email, forget about uploading more than one pictureat a time. After complaining at Guest Services, we were sent to talk to the“specialist” in the IT Lounge. Headmitted that on that cruise the bandwith was “not what they had hopedfor”. We ended up getting a 50% refundwhich I thought was fair.

INTERACTIVE TV- How about posting the dining room menushere? Also was able to view my dailyschedule on the newer RCCL ships, missed that here….

FELLOW PASSENGERS- Maybe it was the itinerary, maybe it wasCelebrity – not sure which, but as a whole, we experienced a great group ofsavvy travelers (with the exception of the guy grabbing the buffet food withhis hands – there has to be one on every cruise). Average age was also younger than weexpected.

CONCLUSION

We enjoyed our first Celebrity cruise and would not hesitateto consider this line in the future. Welook at Celebrity as an extension of RCCL,. The better food, better service and new itineraries being extra perks. We will likely sample one of Celebrity's newer ships next. Really wish westill earned RCCL points for Celebrity sailings though!!

Not sure what happened to the word spacing after this was posted????

Thanks for the review and I'm glad you enjoyed your first Celebrity cruise. Yeah, the ship board wireless internet performance leaves a lot to be desired.

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Thanks for the review. We took a similar cruise last year, going the other way and we loved the itinerary and really enjoyed the ship. Our experience matched yours. Yes, the ship is older but it is still very nice, the crew is great and indeed the MDR dragons can be a pain but once you stand up to them they seem to calm down.

Thank you for your review. We also tried Celebrity as RCCL Diamond and shared a lot of your opinions about the experience. In fact, we share some other experiences. The Connie was our first sailing on an M class Celebrity ship and it was on a Trans Pacific from Japan to Vancouver with a lot of sea days. We were also concerned before the cruise about some of the bad reviews. We enjoyed the Connie and found the public lounges very comfortable. We loved the non-smoking casino which you could walk through with out getting smelly. One other experience we shared is the big outside cabin way forward. We were in 8003 and loved the extra space. Ours was sort of a cooler weather cruise and the outside area was often windy so we never missed the balcony. I was happy to be able to sit on the sofa and look out at the sea. We did build a fort of pillows across the big window at night to block out the morning light but that was not a big deal.

Again thanks for your review, it brought back fond memories of our Connie cruise.

Wingman2010...thanks for taking us along on your cruise.

Not sure what happened to the word spacing after this was posted????

Enjoyed your review.

The spacing may be caused if you used a program like word and then copy and paste into a message it often drops the space at the end of a row. I've not found a way around it.

Thanks for the review. I enjoyed reading it. We will be on the Connie next week, first time with Celebrity; so I am glad I got to read your review beforehand.

Enjoyed your review. We are celebrity cruisers and last year were with RCCL due to itinerary and date and thought it had really gone downhill especially the food in the MDR. We are back with celebrity in October.

I love it when someone goes w/ limited expectations and then is so pleasantly surprised.

I kind of did the opposite by being a long time Celebrity cruiser and when I tried RCI a few years ago I wasn't expecting it to be nearly as good as it was. It's nice to have more than ONE cruise line to consider when planning a vacation. Though the 2 lines IMHO are more alike than different, just the slight tweaks on each line helps me to appreciate things about the other line.

I don't hesitate to cruise on either of them.

Thanks for such a balanced and positive review.

I was going to say that I thought you might be even more WOWED on one of the S class ships. But then I tell myself that about the "big girls" on RCI since I've not done anything larger than the Freedom class. So many cruise ships. So little time! :D

Thinking of booking our first Celebrity Cruise on Constellation May 2019 and wondering when you were assigned your cabin? Are the gty's usually assigned when booking or much closer to sailing? Can you change rooms once assigned within the category? We've been successful doing this before with RCI , not sure if the Med prices will continue to rise or hopefully we can catch a price break and pay to upgrade to Balcony. Thanks for the review!

Thinking of booking our first Celebrity Cruise on Constellation May 2019 and wondering when you were assigned your cabin? Are the gty's usually assigned when booking or much closer to sailing? Can you change rooms once assigned within the category? We've been successful doing this before with RCI , not sure if the Med prices will continue to rise or hopefully we can catch a price break and pay to upgrade to Balcony. Thanks for the review!

If the price is right now, book what class of cabin you can live with. My client had booked an OV and bid fairly high for a balcony; they suggested $600 and she bid $450. She won the bid just 7 days before sailing. Her sister had booked a balcony originally at the same time, so I compared pricing. My client saved about $1500 on her upgrade.

Enjoyed your review nicely done. Sailing the Equinox on Sept 24, 2018 for the third time we love this ship.

By the way there is something wrong with the text here I have had to correct all through my comments.

Oh by the way how did you enjoy Croatia and Spain we were thinking of that cruise for 2020?

If the price is right now, book what class of cabin you can live with. My client had booked an OV and bid fairly high for a balcony; they suggested $600 and she bid $450. She won the bid just 7 days before sailing. Her sister had booked a balcony originally at the same time, so I compared pricing. My client saved about $1500 on her upgrade.

Thanks Nanatravel,

We would be fine with an OV but I'm not familiar with bidding for a balcony? Is this unique to Celebrity?

Thank you!

We actually got the cabin assignment early, several months prior to sailing.

We loved Croatia and Spain. Kotor was also a nice treat, the sail in and sail out is magnificent!!