Constellation: Dec. 31 - Jan. 14, 2012. Very long!

[Ineke]

Constellation Southern Caribbean Dec. 31 – Jan. 14, 2012 – just a warning, it’s a very long review!

A little about us: We are members of the ‘gray-haired’ crowd: husband 72, retired, me 65 and employed, from the Vancouver BC area. This is our 11th cruise, 2nd with Celebrity, most of the others with HAL. We’ve cruised a similar itinerary twice before.

We left home at 3 a.m. on December 30 to catch a 6:30 United Airlines flight to Fort Lauderdale, with a Chicago stopover. Our flight went smoothly, luggage came quickly, and a fellow traveler called the shuttle to the Best Western at the airport/cruiseport. After a walk to get some dinner and buy some wine and sun block, we were happy to get some sleep. We also booked the shuttle to get to the cruise port in the morning.

At 11:00 a.m. we were ready for our shuttle, at 11:15 we were on the shuttle, and at 11:30 we were going through the embarkation process. It went quickly and smoothly, and we found ourselves on the Constellation by 11:45. After the champagne welcome, we made two brief stops to purchase our wine package and to make dinner reservations at the Ocean Liners restaurant for Jan. 4. Then we headed up to the Seaside Café for lunch, after which we spent the first of many hours on deck 4 on the very comfortable deck chairs. At 1:15 we were told that the staterooms were ready, so we headed down to our home for the next two weeks, #2025, an ocean view cabin on the port side, towards the front of the ship, and close to the forward stairs and elevators. We were not sure about being this far forward, but it never bothered us, and the location right by the stairs was great.

Our stateroom was nicely laid out and totally adequate for our needs. There was plenty of storage space. Next we went to the theater for muster drill, and especially in view of recent events, I feel that Celebrity’s muster drill is inadequate to prepare folks for the eventuality of a real emergency. Our cruises on HAL, while the actual drills were not fun, did give us a much better sense of what to do, and I would prefer to have a different system, even if not quite as convenient.

When we returned from the drill, our suitcases were waiting outside the door, and I unpacked and stored everything, after which we headed up for the sail away festivities. People were having a grand time and the band helped to make it all very festive. Constellation was the 3rd ship to leave port, to be followed by 3 more. A beautiful sunset helped to make our introduction to the Constellation a day to remember.

When we went down to change for dinner we met our cabin steward, Shetty and his helper Mustara, who looked after us and all the other cabins in their charge extremely well, we couldn’t have asked for anything better. Then it was off to the MDR to meet our table partners and enjoy New Year’s Eve dinner. This was the first of many excellent dinners, we enjoyed every one of them. The selections, portion sizes, and the quality and presentation were very good, and we could not fault anything. Our wait staff, George and assistant Tihomir were great, as were the other dining room staff. No complaints about anything from us, and a very pleasant experience all round.

As it was New Year’s Eve, we checked out the main festivities on the pool deck, where a great time was being had by all. Great band, lots of dancing, it was fun. After a while we went looking for something a bit quieter, and ended up in the Reflections Lounge on deck 11, where we were the only ones except for quite a few of the ship’s officers. This became our go-to place every evening, but things definitely became more lively as the cruise went on, with numbers increasing every day, ending up with full houses during the last week, as everyone enjoyed the music of Carousel. Great band!

Day 2. Sunday, Jan. 1, New Year’s Day. This was a Sea Day, and we took full advantage of the beautiful sunshine and relaxed and read the day away. For breakfast we went to the MDR, but decided not to do that again, as the choices were not really what we were looking for. All the other days we enjoyed breakfast in the Seaside Café. There I immediately found the eggs benedict station, and started off as I meant to finish, with a slice of Canadian bacon, spinach, and 2 poached eggs. Great breakfast! Combine that with some fruit and some smoked salmon, and everyone familiar with Weight Watchers would agree that this was a responsible and yummy breakfast. It took a while for others to find the eggs benedict station, but by the second week there was always a line-up. It was a good choice!

There have been many comments about the coffee. I didn’t mind it. My husband did not care for it at all, until he found that if he added a good dollop of whipped cream and some sugar, it tasted pretty good! (He’s not on Weight Watchers J)

Monday, Jan. 2. Second sea day, repeat as above.

Tuesday, Jan. 3 – first port Aruba. We took a bus which showed us some of the sights, with stops at the Calibari (sp?) rocks, the oldest church, the lighthouse, and the beach. We had 2 hours at the beach, and had a lovely swim and enjoyed our time there. On return to the ship, we had a snack, and then watched a beautiful sunset. Sail away was at 8:00, followed by dinner, and a nightcap in Reflections Lounge.

Day 4: Curacao. Curacoa was a new port to us. We spent the day wandering the streets and sights of this beautiful town, did a bit of shopping for the usual gifts for the grandchildren. There were a few heavy downpours, but the temperature remained warm and the rain didn’t really bother us. We almost had a ride on the pontoon bridge, but the wind came up just as it was about to be opened, and they waited for it to calm down. Eventually we did get to see this unique bridge get opened. In the evening, we had our dinner in the Ocean Liners restaurant. It was amazing, without a doubt. Beautiful ambience, wonderful attention to detail by all the staff, delicious food! I had the rack of lamb, DH had the surf and turf, fantastic. We really enjoyed our special evening.

Day 5: Sea Day. Sea Day: see days 1 and 2. In the past we didn’t enjoy sea days all that much, this time we found them wonderfully relaxing. We spent much of the day on deck 4 with our e-readers, enjoying the sunny side of the ship part of the time, and the shady side for the rest.

Day 6: Grenada. Grenada was another new port to us. We truly enjoyed it. We took the water taxi to Grand Anse beach, walked quite a ways down the beach, and rented two chairs and an umbrella for the day. Aaahhh, that’s the life! Beautiful beach, gorgeous water, and a lot of fun as there were many children at the beach having a great time.

Day 7: Barbados. We had done an island tour of Barbados the last 2 times we were there, so we took a taxi to Carlisle Beach, and again had a very enjoyable day of relaxing, swimming, reading and people watching.

Day 8: St. Lucia. We had also toured St. Lucia, so decided to walk into town. Unfortunately for us, it was Sunday and everything was closed in town. We had a nice walk, and enjoyed a chat with some people we met along the way, and for the rest enjoyed deck 4 once again.

Day 9: Antigua. We had toured Antigua as well, but decided to take a taxi and do it again. We had a great tour, and were gone for much of the day. Mike, our driver, dropped us off at Castaways to spend a few hours on the beach, and then picked us up again at the appointed time. Another excellent day, and the best beach yet. It was the kind of beach that when you pictures you think they have been photoshopped, but it was for real. Beautiful! One of the interesting things we learned from Mike is the influence that the Chinese have on the economy there, they are building public facilities and businesses, such as a brand new stadium where the Caribbean cricket tournament was starting that afternoon and would be continuing for a week. Mike pointed out how Antigua’s economy has really suffered the past number of years, and the initiatives being taken to try and improve the situation.

Day 10: St. Thomas. The last time we were in St. Thomas we had a great time, wandering around town, enjoying all the small shops and markets, it was the only time I can ever recall DH saying he enjoyed shopping! We were hoping to repeat that experience, but things appear to have really changed. It seems many of the small independent businesses have been bought up by the large chains, such as Diamonds International, there were at least 6 of them in town, and all are associated with other similar businesses. We were dismayed and disappointed. We had lunch at a restaurant on the waterfront and tried to use their Wifi, but a very slow connection made that an exercise in futility as well. We were back on the ship pretty early and spent time in our usual place on deck 4.

Day 11: St. Maarten. We had been there several times as well, but DH was a man with a mission, as he wanted to find a certain lens for his camera. We were happy to find more independent businesses here, even though the same efforts are being made by the large companies to buy up small private businesses, and we enjoyed walking around and checking out a number of stores. We took the water taxi from the cruise port, that made a huge difference in how far we had to walk, and went back and forth several times. After the camera lens had been tracked down and purchased, we rented some chairs and an umbrella at the beach, and spent some nice beach time. It was incredibly busy, as there were 6 cruise ships in town, but it was fun to people watch, and it certainly didn’t bother us. Because the Celebrity Eclipse and Millenium were there as well, it was neat to see many crew members from the 3 ships get together on the dock, I guess many of them know each other. It was another good day.

Day 12 and 13: Sea days. See days 1, 2, and 5 for sea day routines. Aaaahhhh, so relaxing! We were amazed at how flat calm the seas were, it was almost eerie, but we weren’t complaining! On Friday evening we packed before dinner, had a final dinner with our wonderful table companions, had a final drink in the Reflections lounge, and knew that when we got up, we’d be in Fort Lauderdale. Where did the time go?

Day 14: Fort Lauderdale. We had chosen early disembarkation, as we were meeting my brother and sister-in-law, who were about to leave on the Constellation that morning. The process went extremely smoothly, and we were outside waiting for a shuttle within half an hour. Well done, Celebrity! While having coffee with my brother the images of the Costa Concordia disaster were playing on the screens, a brutal and frightening contrast to our experiences and a sobering wake-up call.

Final thoughts: Entertainment: we truly enjoyed Carousel every night in the Reflections lounge. In the Celebrity Theatre, we saw 3 production shows, of which the last one was definitely the best (Around the World), we saw Doug Cameron (violin!) who was excellent and very entertaining, Fred Kletsch (comedian) who was OK, and juggler Dan Bennett, who was OK. We also heard the accapella group, they were good, the string trio, OK, and the band who played at sail aways, who were loud and enthusiastic and played well. And the singer at the Seaside Bar, whose name escapes me, but who was excellent.

Formal nights: many men in tuxedoes, looks great, and the ladies in lovely sparkling gowns and dresses. I hope this tradition isn’t discontinued. The other evenings I noticed that people tended to dress very nicely at dinner time, even when dress was smart casual. I enjoyed that!

Even after an exhausting day of flying, and arriving home to snow at 2:30 a.m. Vancouver time, there wasn’t anything about this trip that I didn’t enjoy, and I would recommend it to anyone.

[Igggy]

Do you remember what nights were formal nights?

[ME Guide]

thank you Ineke for the wonderful review. We are sailing the Constellation for the first time in March. Your review was honest, straightforward, and informative. Thank you for taking the time to post the review and to make my cruise dreams more exciting. Thank you, thank you!

[Ineke]

The formal nights were: Sea day 1, Sea day 4 and it was supposed to be Sea Day 3, but they did it on the Grenada day instead.

[Tinkerbellcgy]

Thank you so very much for your enlightening review. I'll be on the Connie (for the first time) in April and I have taken note of Deck 4 for the quiet times. I enjoy peace and quiet and solitude and Deck 4 just might fit the bill for those times for me too.

[cruzccl]

Thanks for your review! I will be on the Connie in 3 weeks from tomorrow doing the same trip.

Thanks for the deck 4 tip. I plan on doing a lot of reading and relaxing.

 

Bill

[Tinkerbellcgy]

Ineke, I note that you are a fellow Canadian. Can you advise whether there was the Luggage Valet* being offered to Canadians on your cruise?

 

* I'm not sure if Luggage Valet is the proper term but what I mean is that for $20.00, your luggage will be routed through from the cruise ship directly to your destination airport. You don't see it from the time you put it outside the stateroom door on the final evening until you pick it up at the luggage carosel at your home airport.

[TeaBag]

A great review which I enjoyed reading. I'm sorry you had to come home to snow.

[portofrome]

Thanks for your review.

[Ineke]

I don't recall a special offer for routing luggage straight through, sorry. If it had been offered we probably would have taken advantage of it, since our flight didn't leave till after 5 p.m.

[gwilli]

Thanks for your informative review. We too have been HAL cruisers, and have "jumped ship" this time and will be sailing on Connie in July. I was wondering how the two compared, as we have been happy with HAL. It is nice to hear that Celebrity will be a nice change. You answered all of my questions. Cheers!