Solstice Sydney - Vancouver April 12

[h & m]

Just finished packing, we are boarding the Solstice in Sydney on  Friday, doing the BTB Sydney- Honolulu and Honolulu- Vancouver.    I don't intend to do a full review, but will post every few days,  from an Aussie perspective, and am happy to answer any questions.

 

Hilary 

 

 

[MMDown Under]

3 hours ago, h & m said:

Just finished packing, we are boarding the Solstice in Sydney on  Friday, doing the BTB Sydney- Honolulu and Honolulu- Vancouver.    I don't intend to do a full review, but will post every few days,  from an Aussie perspective, and am happy to answer any questions.

 

Hilary 

 

 

Bon Voyage!  

[MicCanberra]

5 hours ago, h & m said:

Just finished packing, we are boarding the Solstice in Sydney on  Friday, doing the BTB Sydney- Honolulu and Honolulu- Vancouver.    I don't intend to do a full review, but will post every few days,  from an Aussie perspective, and am happy to answer any questions.

 

Hilary 

 

 

Great stuff, Bon voyage and I look forward to hearing how you go. The Solstice is my favourite ship, I am sure you will love it.

[Chiliburn]

Have a ball ,don’t spend to much time at the martini bar.

[MicCanberra]

1 hour ago, Chiliburn said:

Have a ball ,don’t spend to much time at the martini bar.

Agreed, the World Bar deserves a shot as well.

[OzKiwiJJ]

She's in good condition, sparkling clean inside and out, and has the best Captain onboard. 

[MMDown Under]

1 hour ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

She's in good condition, sparkling clean inside and out, and has the best Captain onboard. 

Good to know that Solstice is in good condition, sparkling clean inside and out.  

[OzKiwiJJ]

They wash down the balconies at every port stop and every day there are people wandering around the public areas cleaning and polishing everything in sight.

[h & m]

Good to hear the ship is still in great shape.  We have never cruised with Captain Tasos, but hear great things about him.

Just dropped off the cat at the cattery, and we are leaving for Adelaide Airport soon.   Have a 9.30 flight to Sydney tomorrow morning, rather than facing the early morning traffic we are spending the night at the new Adelaide Airport Hotel.

 

 

 

[MicCanberra]

Bon Voyage

[NumnuT]

following - great to hear an Aussie's perspective...😎

[Carole2313]

Following as well, Hubby and I are doing a B2B next spring on the Solstice, Auckland to Sydney, Sydney to Honolulu.  We have never been on the Solstice or been “down under”.  Have a wonderful cruise!

[OzKiwiJJ]

We disembarked Solstice this morning. 😥

 

Bon voyage to all of you who are embarking today. Have a great cruise. Tip: if you like trivia brush up on phobias, flags, and juices!

[Barwick Cruiser]

18 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

We disembarked Solstice this morning. 😥

 

Bon voyage to all of you who are embarking today. Have a great cruise. Tip: if you like trivia brush up on phobias, flags, and juices!

 

Edited April 12, 2019 by Barwick Cruiser

[MicCanberra]

1 hour ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

We disembarked Solstice this morning. 😥

 

Bon voyage to all of you who are embarking today. Have a great cruise. Tip: if you like trivia brush up on phobias, flags, and juices!

Welcome back.

[OzKiwiJJ]

15 minutes ago, MicCanberra said:

Welcome back.

Thanks, Mic. It was a great but noisier than usual cruise. Announcements were very loud and entertainers' music was coming through the ship's speaker system for that bar, rather than just from speakers near the musicians, and the volume was just a bit too high for comfort or for conversation. I don't recall that happening on previous Solstice cruises.

[MicCanberra]

2 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Thanks, Mic. It was a great but noisier than usual cruise. Announcements were very loud and entertainers' music was coming through the ship's speaker system for that bar, rather than just from speakers near the musicians, and the volume was just a bit too high for comfort or for conversation. I don't recall that happening on previous Solstice cruises.

Perhaps the sound technician is a bit deaf.

[h & m]

On 4/12/2019 at 9:27 AM, OzKiwiJJ said:

We disembarked Solstice this morning. 😥

 

Bon voyage to all of you who are embarking today. Have a great cruise. Tip: if you like trivia brush up on phobias, flags, and juices!

Thanks for that advice, should have read it before this morning's trivia - we got flags and phobias already.  Trivia was in the Sky Lounge, the presenter will take a little getting used to.

 

We had a great stay in Sydney at the Sheraton on the Park.   I had requested early check in, which we got, and a room close to the elevators.   Mick has had a knee replacement, so trying to make life easy.   Our allocated room was a long hike from the elevator, and seeing the floor plan I understood the room type we had requested were all quite far.   Mick said don't worry about it for 1 night, but I am a firm believer in giving people a chance to fix a problem, which the manager did.   Moved to a much more convenient room, bags moved for us with no effort on our part.

 

The Club lounge was one of the best we have experienced in Sydney, with great service.  The coffee there was so good  I was not even in  a rush to go to Cafe Al Bacio,  usually my first stop. 

 

Embarkation was painless, the longest wait was trying to get a luggage tag for our carry on which we had decided to check in at the last minute.  Porters did not have spare tags,  so we had to queue to get someone to write one out for us and attach it to the bag.   After that, straight on and exploring the ship at 11.25 am.  

 

Everything good except the main dining room is very dark, and the  table we were assigned to was missing a light above it.  Literally could not read the menu or wine list.   We did like the people we were seated with, so going to stick it out and see if they can improve the lighting.   Last time on Solstice was 2 years ago, they had electronic candles on the tables then, but not now.

 

The Captain is so funny, I can understand why he is so popular. 

 

The ship is in good condition, we did notice some rust on our balcony, but maintenance were already onto it, and have been fixing it today. 

 

Sea days today and tomorrow, the the first stop is Bay of Islands, NZ.

 

Any questions, happy to  answer.

[OzKiwiJJ]

26 minutes ago, h & m said:

Thanks for that advice, should have read it before this morning's trivia - we got flags and phobias already.  Trivia was in the Sky Lounge, the presenter will take a little getting used to.

 

Yes, he's a bit of a character. You need to have a very broad general knowledge but even that doesn't always help. However much to our surprise we actually won twice during our cruise, and it was just the two of us - well, mostly DH. The diversity of information stuffed into his brain sometimes amazes me.

[OzKiwiJJ]

31 minutes ago, h & m said:

 

Everything good except the main dining room is very dark, and the  table we were assigned to was missing a light above it.  Literally could not read the menu or wine list.   We did like the people we were seated with, so going to stick it out and see if they can improve the lighting.   Last time on Solstice was 2 years ago, they had electronic candles on the tables then, but not now.

 

 

You wouldn't be at one of the tables tucked behind the staircase by any chance? We had one of those on our first Solstice cruise and the lighting was a bit dim there. This time we were down near the wine cellar and the lighting was OK there.

[MicCanberra]

5 hours ago, h & m said:

Thanks for that advice, should have read it before this morning's trivia - we got flags and phobias already.  Trivia was in the Sky Lounge, the presenter will take a little getting used to.

 

We had a great stay in Sydney at the Sheraton on the Park.   I had requested early check in, which we got, and a room close to the elevators.   Mick has had a knee replacement, so trying to make life easy.   Our allocated room was a long hike from the elevator, and seeing the floor plan I understood the room type we had requested were all quite far.   Mick said don't worry about it for 1 night, but I am a firm believer in giving people a chance to fix a problem, which the manager did.   Moved to a much more convenient room, bags moved for us with no effort on our part.

 

The Club lounge was one of the best we have experienced in Sydney, with great service.  The coffee there was so good  I was not even in  a rush to go to Cafe Al Bacio,  usually my first stop. 

 

Embarkation was painless, the longest wait was trying to get a luggage tag for our carry on which we had decided to check in at the last minute.  Porters did not have spare tags,  so we had to queue to get someone to write one out for us and attach it to the bag.   After that, straight on and exploring the ship at 11.25 am.  

 

Everything good except the main dining room is very dark, and the  table we were assigned to was missing a light above it.  Literally could not read the menu or wine list.   We did like the people we were seated with, so going to stick it out and see if they can improve the lighting.   Last time on Solstice was 2 years ago, they had electronic candles on the tables then, but not now.

 

The Captain is so funny, I can understand why he is so popular. 

 

The ship is in good condition, we did notice some rust on our balcony, but maintenance were already onto it, and have been fixing it today. 

 

Sea days today and tomorrow, the the first stop is Bay of Islands, NZ.

 

Any questions, happy to  answer.

Wonderful, enjoy he sea days and then NZ.