Sailing on Eclipse

[chamima]

Karen,

 

our Cruise Critic party was held on the first day at sea at 11:15am. Based on the research/reading I did, this was the same for the cruises before our Dec 28 sailing (I did not ready any feedback from the 12/14 sailing).

 

These were the Captains Club events that were listed for Select Members for our sailing:

 

Casino Double Jackpot: Dec 29 (Sea Day #1) 10:30-11:00am

Wine Appreciation 101: Jan 2 (Sea Day #3) 11:00-11:45am

Captains Club Celebration: Jan 2 (Sea Day #3) 1-2pm (Early Seating) and 2:30pm-3:30pm (Late Seating)

Senior Officer's Cocktail Party: Jan 9 (Sea Day #4) 5:15-6:00pm (Early Seating) and 7:45-8:30pm (Late Dining)

Backstage Tour: Jan 10 (Sea Day #5) 10-10:45am

 

Thank you so much for that detailed list of activities.

It will really help us in our planning! :D

[mahdnc]

We had lunch yesterday with a couple who recently cruised the Eclipse and said that the music

Was again to loud in the solarium and in Blu. Any feed back

 

Hal

 

We have not checked out Blu as we are not eating there. Music in solarium was not loud to me during the couple times I was there. My wife and daughter have spent more time there and did not think the music was that loud. Our adjacent table mates loved spending time in the solarium and raved about it. They did not mention anything about the music being loud.

[mahdnc]

Do you know if Sue Denning will be back on board as CD by the February 8, 2014 cruise? She is my favorite! Thanks!

 

Linda

 

Ben said that he will be off the Eclipse by Feb 8 and that Sue will be on.

[GiannaD]

Ben said that he will be off the Eclipse by Feb 8 and that Sue will be on.

 

Thanks for the update on Sue Denning. She is marvelous and we will look forward to sailing with her.

 

Also thanks for all the wonderful information.

[ncdachsiemom]

Ben said that he will be off the Eclipse by Feb 8 and that Sue will be on.

 

Thanks for the confirmation....I love Sue and look forward to her being CD....last cruise i took she came on as we were going off, and we really missed her.

 

Linda

[Ruthk]

Could you please do us a favour and post, at the end of your cruise, what it was like getting off the ship in Fort Lauderdale - did you have to walk forever and wait in long lines to get your luggage and clear customs and then the taxi. I am sailing on Jan.25th and every year I absolutely hate that last day and wonder if it has gotten any better in the last year.

Enjoy the balance of your cruise - it is my favourite agenda and we love sailing the Eclipse!

[riredsox]

Could you please do us a favour and post, at the end of your cruise, what it was like getting off the ship in Fort Lauderdale - did you have to walk forever and wait in long lines to get your luggage and clear customs and then the taxi. I am sailing on Jan.25th and every year I absolutely hate that last day and wonder if it has gotten any better in the last year.

Enjoy the balance of your cruise - it is my favourite agenda and we love sailing the Eclipse!

 

I got off this cruise on Dec 14th. No, it has not gotten any better! Walked quite a ways to get luggage, customs was OK but waited in a long line for a taxi. I don't know why they don't let you go thru customs before you get your luggage. That's why Baltimore was so nice to sail from. Otherwise a fantastic cruise! Enjoy...:D

[mahdnc]

Thank you for starting this thread. We will be on board January 25th.

 

Would you be able to find out if the iLounge has the new iPad Air for sale?

 

We have a good obc on this sailing and I would love to have a good display for pictures of past cruise memories.

 

I talked to one of the iLounge staff members today and he confirmed for me that they have all 3 wi-fi iPad Air models in stock.

[mahdnc]

We are also doing the Christmas New Years cruise in 2014 (hopefully!).

 

For the Captain's Club evening event, are they issuing drink coupons or holding it in the Sky Lounge?

 

Have a wonderful cruise.

 

We are not Elite yet (all four of us including the kids will be Elite after the conclusion of this cruise), so I did not know the answer to this question. But I asked terryrallent1 (Elite Plus) this question during the bridge tour today and he told me that they are NOT doing vouchers and that the cocktails are served in the Sky Lounge.

[mahdnc]

Aruba: we took a two tank dive with Dive Aruba. I had problems with getting sea sick on the boat ride out to the dive areas. The dives were ok. We met some interesting divers who worked in mining (Congo) and oil drilling (North Sea).

 

Curacao: we booked a two tank dive with Relaxed Guided Divers. Both dives were walk-in dives from the shore (no getting sea sick). The coral and fish were awesome.

 

Grenada: After seeing the prosperous islands of Aruba and Curacao, Grenada paled economically in comparison. We booked a private half day tour with AJ Meddy which cost $40 per person + $4 admission fees. AJ (who is well reviewed on TripAdvisor) did not commit to driving us specifically when I made the booking over email. When we showed up at the Grenada cruise terminal, he had lined up another driver for us. The four of us were driven around the island in a mini-van by a father/son team. The roads were very narrow and winding so the going was slow and it made the trip feel longer than it was.

 

Barbados: this was an easy day for us as we had little planned. We took a tour of a small working chocolate factory (Agapey) located ½ mi away from the pier. The company began 3 years ago by a Canadian engineer and has only 4 employees. The tour had only 8 people total and lasted about 1.25 hrs. The tour has a small fee ($6 pp) and has to be pre-booked in advance because they have so few employees.

 

 

During the CC Meet and Greet Party last week, Celebrity announced that the CC registrants would all be invited to a bridge tour. My family was invited for the tour that was conducted this afternoon (Jan 4). The Second Officer hosted us and gave the discussion and tour. It had been several years since we had been invited to the bridge so we found the whole affair rather interesting. Towards the end of the tour, the Second Officer reviewed with us the path and plan to pull out of the harbor at Barbados which we later watched being executed from our cabin balcony during the sail away.

 

Attention NFL fans, the two Wild Card playoff games were televised live in the stateroom today. It was also shown in the Fortunes Casino Bar and the Celebrity Central area (Deck 4).

 

Tonight’s evening shows featured Perry Grant. He is not my cup of tea but it is impressive to see the devoted following he has in the audience.

 

Our stateroom attendant is Jimmy (Philippines) who has been working with Celebrity for 16 years (he first started aboard Horizon). He and his assistant have been doing a great job for us and they have been patient with us on sea days when our 18 year old son likes to wake up at noon. We are one of 25 staterooms assigned to them. During the first day of the cruise, I noticed that our stateroom did not have a bucket of ice nor a pitcher of water. I ask if he could make those items available to us which he promptly did. He also cleared out the refrigerator for us so that we could store our soda cans. On several nights so far, towel animals have greeted us in our cabin when we returned after dinner.

 

One of the reasons that our family of 4 started cruising with Celebrity in 1996 was the roomy family cabins aboard Century (and her sisters). We have since then booked the fabled FV cabins on Infinity, Millennium and Summit. For our first S-class cruise, we booked one of the 4 FV cabins on Eclipse.

 

As each new generation of Celebrity ships came out after Century, the number of family cabins have decreased but the family cabin size has increased. We are staying in FV 8107 which is located at the front of the ship on Deck 8 (port corner). The cabin is a massive 600 sq ft in size (with two large windows) and sports a 110 sq ft balcony. The cabin has two bedrooms, one (albeit standard sized) bathroom, a living room and dining area. Where the Millennium class FV cabins made it very comfortable for a family of 4 to sleep in, the Solstice class FV cabins have made it very comfortable for a family of 4 to live in. With our two kids reunited with us for this cruise (college winter break), the cabin has been a joy for spending some family time together during the holiday at sea.

 

Our FV cabin has ample storage for our entire family even for a 14 night itinerary. We did buy 3 cheap collapsible storage cubes to organize our items in the bin above the master bed. We also are making good use of a sturdier, heavy duty, collapsible storage cube as a foot rest when sitting in the living room or out on the balcony. We are also making good use of the over-the-door shoe storage unit that we brought to store all the shoes that 4 people in our cabin can bring. The only thing I wished we had brought was a small shower caddy that can hook around the shower head as the existing wire tray in our shower stall is not large enough to store our stuff (again, stuff for 4 people).

 

We do not hear any noises from the adjacent cabins or areas above and below us. Noise and vibration when the ship pulls into and out of port is not too bad—better than I expected. You can definitely feel more of the ship motion in this cabin, but it is not too bad.

 

To save time in the morning during port days, we have been ordering room service for breakfast. Using the breakfast ticket that you hang on the outside of your stateroom door, we have been able to write in an order for ham and cheese omelets even though plain omelets are the only choice available.

 

One disappointment—the Luggage Valet program is not available for Southwest Airlines, at least for this sailing. We were hoping to take advantage of this to deal with the lousy disembarkation experience that awaits us on Jan 11 (a week from now).

 

That is it for now. Time to go to bed to get ready for St. Lucia tomorrow (scuba diving).

Edited January 5, 2014 by mahdnc

[rjrpar]

We are not Elite yet (all four of us including the kids will be Elite after the conclusion of this cruise), so I did not know the answer to this question. But I asked terryrallent1 (Elite Plus) this question during the bridge tour today and he told me that they are NOT doing vouchers and that the cocktails are served in the Sky Lounge.

 

thanks

[mahdnc]

We are in Antigua today. Like everyday on this cruise, we had rain showers. But on the whole it is beautiful. We booked a Segway tour from a company that is well reviewed by TripAdvsior (Segway of Antigua?). There were two Eclipse passengers (a nice couple from Pompano Beach) that had booked as well and was part of our group. It is somewhat surprising how fast you can get the hang of driving one.

 

When we pulled into the port, the old Mercury (Mein Schiff 2) was there to greet us. We docked right along side of her today.

 

Yesterday we were at St Lucia and took a two tank dive in front of the beautiful Pitons. There were two experienced divers (passengers) from the Eclipse that joined us at the last minute by just blindly showing up at the ferry dock looking for diving space. They were great people. The coral, underwater terrain, and fish were absolutely amazing. We used Iyanola Divers. We will use them again when we do our 1/4/2015 Eclipse cruise.

 

Our 18 yr old son developed what we thought was a perforated ear drum (from diving). The ship's doctor told us that he simply had an ear infection. He will not be able to dive for the rest of the cruise (or get his ear wet which limits most water activities). But he is still just loving his cruise. He loves getting room service at midnight as his fourth meal. Teenagers and their metabolism....

 

Meanwhile our hometown of Chicago is enduring a deep freeze. I guess we picked a great time to be gone.

 

Crew is doing a fabulous job. I am extremely impressed how pristine the ship is (I remember being a bit disappointed with the shape of Galaxy when we boarded her at roughly the same age (1998) as Eclipse is now). The ship and cruise experience is absolutely fantastic.

Edited January 6, 2014 by mahdnc

[Fouremco]

We are in Antigua today. Like everyday on this cruise, we had rain showers. But on the whole it is beautiful. We booked a Segway tour from a company that is well reviewed by TripAdvsior (Segway of Antigua?). There were two Eclipse passengers (a nice couple from Pompano Beach) that had booked as well and was part of our group. It is somewhat surprising how fast you can get the hang of driving one.

 

When we pulled into the port, the old Mercury (Mein Schiff 2) was there to greet us. We docked right along side of her today.

 

Yesterday we were at St Lucia and took a two tank dive in front of the beautiful Pitons. There were two experienced divers (passengers) from the Eclipse that joined us at the last minute by just blindly showing up at the ferry dock looking for diving space. They were great people. The coral, underwater terrain, and fish were absolutely amazing. We used Iyanola Divers. We will use them again when we do our 1/4/2015 Eclipse cruise.

 

Our 18 yr old son developed what we thought was a perforated ear drum (from diving). The ship's doctor told us that he simply had an ear infection. He will not be able to dive for the rest of the cruise (or get his ear wet which limits most water activities). But he is still just loving his cruise. He loves getting room service at midnight as his fourth meal. Teenagers and their metabolism....

 

Meanwhile our hometown of Chicago is enduring a deep freeze. I guess we picked a great time to be gone.

 

Crew is doing a fabulous job. I am extremely impressed how pristine the ship is (I remember being a bit disappointed with the shape of Galaxy when we boarded her at roughly the same age (1998) as Eclipse is now). The ship and cruise experience is absolutely fantastic.

Did you do Superman's Flight? Great drift dive!

[rjrpar]

We are in Antigua today. Like everyday on this cruise, we had rain showers. But on the whole it is beautiful. We booked a Segway tour from a company that is well reviewed by TripAdvsior (Segway of Antigua?). There were two Eclipse passengers (a nice couple from Pompano Beach) that had booked as well and was part of our group. It is somewhat surprising how fast you can get the hang of driving one.

 

When we pulled into the port, the old Mercury (Mein Schiff 2) was there to greet us. We docked right along side of her today.

 

Yesterday we were at St Lucia and took a two tank dive in front of the beautiful Pitons. There were two experienced divers (passengers) from the Eclipse that joined us at the last minute by just blindly showing up at the ferry dock looking for diving space. They were great people. The coral, underwater terrain, and fish were absolutely amazing. We used Iyanola Divers. We will use them again when we do our 1/4/2015 Eclipse cruise.

 

Our 18 yr old son developed what we thought was a perforated ear drum (from diving). The ship's doctor told us that he simply had an ear infection. He will not be able to dive for the rest of the cruise (or get his ear wet which limits most water activities). But he is still just loving his cruise. He loves getting room service at midnight as his fourth meal. Teenagers and their metabolism....

 

Meanwhile our hometown of Chicago is enduring a deep freeze. I guess we picked a great time to be gone.

 

Crew is doing a fabulous job. I am extremely impressed how pristine the ship is (I remember being a bit disappointed with the shape of Galaxy when we boarded her at roughly the same age (1998) as Eclipse is now). The ship and cruise experience is absolutely fantastic.

 

We did the segways in Antigua 2 years ago and had a blast. Nice beachfront restaurant by the Segway office.

Thanks for sharing and have a great cruise.

[mahdnc]

Did you do Superman's Flight? Great drift dive!

 

Yes, our first dive was Superman's Flight. The current was not too strong that morning. After that we went to Grande Caille (another drift dive) which was spectacular. We were told by our Dive Master, Curtis John, that the visibility has been temporarily adversely affected by the tropical storm that visited St. Lucia last month and caused a lot of water to run off the island and into the sea.

[luv2cruise391]

Enjoying your posts- more please. I'll be getting on as you get off on Saturday:)

[YVRCanuck]

mahdnc,

 

Been following you review with great interest. We will be on the Eclipse in April and this will be our first Celebrity cruise. Our original poster that was keeping track of our roll call with updates to the roll call list and other vital cruise information had to recently cancel the cruise, so now we have no one keeping track of our activities.

 

Can I have your permission to use your awesome spreadsheet, cabin locator, hometown and hotel google maps? If so, could you please advise were I have to go to get these maps and etc. and how they work. I have never seen this before and they are absolutely awesome.

 

Jim

[jagoffee]

We are in Antigua today. Like everyday on this cruise, we had rain showers. But on the whole it is beautiful. We booked a Segway tour from a company that is well reviewed by TripAdvsior (Segway of Antigua?). There were two Eclipse passengers (a nice couple from Pompano Beach) that had booked as well and was part of our group. It is somewhat surprising how fast you can get the hang of driving one.

 

When we pulled into the port, the old Mercury (Mein Schiff 2) was there to greet us. We docked right along side of her today.

 

Yesterday we were at St Lucia and took a two tank dive in front of the beautiful Pitons. There were two experienced divers (passengers) from the Eclipse that joined us at the last minute by just blindly showing up at the ferry dock looking for diving space. They were great people. The coral, underwater terrain, and fish were absolutely amazing. We used Iyanola Divers. We will use them again when we do our 1/4/2015 Eclipse cruise.

 

Our 18 yr old son developed what we thought was a perforated ear drum (from diving). The ship's doctor told us that he simply had an ear infection. He will not be able to dive for the rest of the cruise (or get his ear wet which limits most water activities). But he is still just loving his cruise. He loves getting room service at midnight as his fourth meal. Teenagers and their metabolism....

 

Meanwhile our hometown of Chicago is enduring a deep freeze. I guess we picked a great time to be gone.

 

Crew is doing a fabulous job. I am extremely impressed how pristine the ship is (I remember being a bit disappointed with the shape of Galaxy when we boarded her at roughly the same age (1998) as Eclipse is now). The ship and cruise experience is absolutely fantastic.

 

 

As we are on the 1/25 cruise we have been enjoying your posts. Thank you for taking the time to post. We are going to try the Segways in Barbados.

 

Yes, it has been a very snowy and cold winter in Chicago while you are enjoying your cruise. The temp reached -16 F the other day at ORD. It is warming up starting tomorrow and it may be close to 40 F when you return. Hopefully some of the snow will melt so I can take down my outside lights.

 

By the way, I retired early and it is GREAT playing golf, spending quality time with my grandkids, cruising, and traveling.

[hurwitz5]

To the OP - did you experience rough seas during this cruise? If so, (1) how many days, and (2) near which islands?

We will be boarding the Equinox this Saturday, January 11. Enjoy the rest of your cruise.

[mahdnc]

mahdnc,

 

Been following you review with great interest. We will be on the Eclipse in April and this will be our first Celebrity cruise. Our original poster that was keeping track of our roll call with updates to the roll call list and other vital cruise information had to recently cancel the cruise, so now we have no one keeping track of our activities.

 

Can I have your permission to use your awesome spreadsheet, cabin locator, hometown and hotel google maps? If so, could you please advise were I have to go to get these maps and etc. and how they work. I have never seen this before and they are absolutely awesome.

 

Jim

 

Jim,

 

Of course you can use the roll spreadsheet materials. After I get back on land (where internet is more affordable), I can walk you through it (my email is mahdnc at yahoo dot com). For starters, tt is all done through Google Docs and Google Maps. You will need to set up a free Google account to allow you to create your own documents (tutorial)

[mahdnc]

I hand wrote a request for poached eggs and eggs benedict on the pre-printed room service breakfast menu and successfully received them.

 

Well my son developed an ear infection and saw the ship’s doctor on Monday—got anti-biotics and pain medicine. I woke up on Tuesday with a head cold and saw the ship’s doctor. I was diagnosed with having an upper respiratory infection and received anti-biotics as well. Too bad Celebrity doesn’t offer the Classic Medical Package.

 

St. Maarten: we did almost nothing this day—mainly because we did not have anything booked in advance and because of my cold. If we had all felt well, we probably would have gone to Maho Beach for some sun and to watch the low flying jets. Instead we got off the ship around noon time and went to the shops around the pier for 1 hour before we headed back. I had been to this port only one other time—back in 1996 aboard Century. Back then there were no piers and we had to tender in. Today, there were five cruise ships docked at the pier.

 

St. Thomas: this was the only port that we had to tender. We were able to on to the 1st tender that left Eclipse after the Shore Excursion passengers were taken care of. The tender dropped us off in the middle of Charlotte Amalie at 8:40am. As a whole tendering was a pretty quick affair. The tendering was done by Eclipse’s own boats (as opposed to a tendering service) and there were five tenders used simultaneously. Consequently there was virtually no waiting in line to grab a tender to or from shore. However the location that the tenders drop you off at is small and is crowded from the shore excursions passengers lining up for their tours (only a problems during the early part of the morning). Taxicabs were all parked on the other side of a very busy main street that fronts the island. My wife and daughter did a two tank dive with Aqua Marine St. Thomas (my son and I were not able to go because of our respective medical conditions). I ended up taking the aerial tram ride to Paradise Point which overlooks the harbor. The tram cost $21 per person. Perhaps because of the price, the number of people up there was not large considering the expansive view that you get (to see the six cruise ships that called on St. Thomas that day).

 

There were 200 kids under the age of 18 on this sailing which is low for a holiday sailing on a ship the size of Eclipse. The 14 night itinerary evidently keeps the number of kids low. The kids program was staffed with 9 counselors during our cruise. The Fun Factory facility itself is expansive. The teen area even had the latest X-Box one console. We attended one of the Hot Glass Shows where a design submitted by one of the kids in the Fun Factory was selected and used to make a glass piece in front of the kids and the rest of the audience.

 

I would not be surprised if the number of Americans made up less than half the ship’s passengers on this sailing. There are quite a few European passengers on board.

 

The Captain and his staff have been very visible throughout the entire trip. During the last few nights, we have seen them standing in the Entertainment Area on Deck 4 to meet passengers that come streaming out of the Eclipse Theatre after the 1st evening show.

 

We received an invitation to attend an official Cruise Critic farewell get together on Friday Jan 10 at 11:15am. It will be located at Cellar Master, Deck 4 midship (where last week’s CC Meet and Greet occurred). Terrytallent1 (Terry) is also coordinating a farewell luncheon to be held immediately afterward.

[YVRCanuck]

Jim,

 

Of course you can use the roll spreadsheet materials. After I get back on land (where internet is more affordable), I can walk you through it (my email is mahdnc at yahoo dot com). For starters, tt is all done through Google Docs and Google Maps. You will need to set up a free Google account to allow you to create your own documents (tutorial)

 

 

Excellent! I will email you in the next day or two. In the mean time I will log into Google and check out the Google Docs and Maps. Enjoy the rest of your cruise.

 

Jim

[Redtravel]

Sounds like you had a nice cruise. I will be on the Eclipse Saturday. First time on the Eclipse. I have been on many other ships. +Do you have any suggestions for things that I shouldn't miss? Nice that you had multiple cruisecritic gatherings. Did you get notices in advance? On my last cruise, we missed several events during the first few days. Cabin steward neglected to leave us all of the information that we needed. Enjoy the rest of your cruise. Perhaps we will pass in Fort Lauderdale. Looking forward to some warm weather.

[mahdnc]

Redtravel,

 

Like you, this was my first cruise aboard Eclipse. I think you will be favorably impressed.

 

There were three Celebrity sponsored Cruise Critic functions on this cruise: 1. Meet and Greet (11:15am 1st sea day) 2. Bridge Tour 3. Farewell Party (11:15am last sea day). Formal invitations for all 3 events were delivered to our stateroom.

 

I am not the right person to ask about the best ship events to see as we did not attend that many of them! I wish I could have gone on the Galley Tour which occurred on the 1st sea day at 10:45am (which slightly conflicted with the CC Meet and Greet). We enjoyed the evening shows that featured comedians (there were two of them) and the pickpocket (Bob Arno). The Hot Glass Show is also worth seeing.

 

The most impressive event on the ship was the New Year’s Eve party. One of the CC’ers who was on last year’s NYE cruise said that this sailing’s NYE party was better because it rained last year and it put a big damper on the outdoor festivities. Also our sailing had the great fortune of just off the coast of Aruba on NYE and we were able to see their massive island-wide fireworks display.

[chamima]

Redtravel,

 

Like you, this was my first cruise aboard Eclipse. I think you will be favorably impressed.

 

There were three Celebrity sponsored Cruise Critic functions on this cruise: 1. Meet and Greet (11:15am 1st sea day) 2. Bridge Tour 3. Farewell Party (11:15am last sea day). Formal invitations for all 3 events were delivered to our stateroom.

 

I am not the right person to ask about the best ship events to see as we did not attend that many of them! I wish I could have gone on the Galley Tour which occurred on the 1st sea day at 10:45am (which slightly conflicted with the CC Meet and Greet). We enjoyed the evening shows that featured comedians (there were two of them) and the pickpocket (Bob Arno). The Hot Glass Show is also worth seeing.

 

The most impressive event on the ship was the New Year’s Eve party. One of the CC’ers who was on last year’s NYE cruise said that this sailing’s NYE party was better because it rained last year and it put a big damper on the outdoor festivities. Also our sailing had the great fortune of just off the coast of Aruba on NYE and we were able to see their massive island-wide fireworks display.

 

Wow!

We will be on the Eclipse in February and I certainly hope that either your CD, event planner or Captain's Club Host/ess , or whoever it was that planned these events, will still be on board for our cruise!