We were on the EDGE of Glory (can’t get that song out of my head) Review 1/12/2020 Eastern Caribbean

[NBliving]

We sailed on the Celebrity Edge last week!  This review is day by day.  Hopefully I'll touch on items relating to the ship or ports/shore excursions that will help people plan their vacation at sea.  I'm so thankful for everyone who writes reviews.  They really help me make the most of our cruises.

 

First time on the Edge, but we’ve sailed on Celebrity Summit and Equinox.  We love Celebrity! DH and I are in our mid 50’s and love the Caribbean itineraries.  We picked this one because it had a stop in Tortola which we have never been to and the Virgin Gorda Baths have been on my husband’s list of things to see for a long time.  We booked it during the Veteran’s Day sale so we had all 4 perks plus an extra $200 OBC from the sale and another $150 OBC because we moved a cruise we had booked on board to this cruise so had that extra bit.  So $650 OBC total!  We have never had a premium drink package or the internet package.  Our daughter is getting married in March, so it was nice to have the internet package as I was still working with vendors for that.  We probably wouldn’t ever pay extra for the premium drink package honestly.  On past cruises we typically get a martini at the martini bar and just pay the $3 extra plus tip on that amount.  It isn’t a big enough deal to pay the upgrade price for us.  The only other premium drink we had was a Peroni beer just because we could.  We meant to get a smoothie at the Spa Café, but that never worked out.  Overall, we were happy we cruised on the Edge.  We prefer the traditional balcony staterooms, but didn’t mind the IV.  I will say, I feel like the IV balcony tends to offer a “sanitized” version of the world. By that I mean you aren’t necessarily enjoying being out there in the breeze, ocean smells, etc. unless you purposely roll down that window.  You have to hold down the button while it rolls down, so if you are just standing at the window before you head out for the evening, you aren’t going to roll it down. Whereas in the traditional balcony you might step out for a moment before heading out.  We book our cruises based mostly on itinerary and price, so if the Edge or Apex fit that criteria we would sail on her again.

[NBliving]

Pre-cruise day, we flew in to FLL from San Antonio.  We took a Lyft to our hotel, the Hilton Marina. The total was $13.35.  You could tell the hotel had been there a while because of it’s design, but the hotel itself and our room was in very good repair. They upgraded us to a junior suite which was nice.  I've posted pictures below. We booked this hotel with Hilton Honor points and chose the location because we wanted to take advantage of the water taxi stop which was right there.  We took the water taxi to Las Olas Blvd which we had never been to before.  We didn’t have a restaurant in mind, although I had several in my notes from reading CC reviews.  We ended up at Foxy Browns which was a block or two off of Las Olas.  It seemed like more of a local crowd which we like.  The service was excellent and our food was delicious.  We sat outside on the patio and enjoyed the nice weather. After dinner, we walked back to Las Olas to look for a place to get a drink or dessert or just people watch. We really enjoyed the atmosphere of the area.  We ended up stopping at a place called Ann’s Florist and Coffee Bar because they had live music on their patio.  We love listening to live music.  There was a wine bar in the back of the shop so we each got a glass of wine and took it to the patio to enjoy the music.  It was a popular spot.  I hope the guitarist was getting more than tips because he was really drawing the people in.  I got a dessert also, it was really good!  After that we went back to the Hilton via water taxi.  

 

[NBliving]

Day 1 – We woke up and had a continental breakfast at the hotel which was included.  I’m not sure if it is because of our Hilton Honors level or if that’s for everyone.  We could have paid $6 extra for a full breakfast but figured we were getting ready to have unlimited food for the next week so we would be good for one morning 😉 Our check in time for the cruise was 12:00 so we took a walk around the marina area then got our things together.  We left the hotel around 11:15 and took an uber to the cruise terminal.  Lots of traffic!  We got there about 11:50, gave our suitcases to the porters who are waiting at the curb and walked in to the terminal.  Very easy embarkation.  Maybe 3 people in each line to show them your passport and express pass.  I had ours on my phone which was fine.  I was a little worried that I hadn’t printed it out as well, but on our last cruise the electronic one worked just fine.  We walked right on to the gangway and on to the EDGE!  We’ve stayed in a concierge cabin for our last two cruises but this time we had a regular infinite veranda cabin.  So no lunch in the MDR for us this time.  We got to our cabin to drop off our hand held bags and get our sea pass cards.  Our room attendant Prederick was in the hallway so he came over to introduce himself and show us how the shade/window work for the IV.  It was so nice to meet him first thing.  On our last cruise we didn’t meet our room attendant until about halfway through the cruise!  We decided to explore the ship before finding lunch.  The Edge really is beautiful.  So many nooks and crannies where you can find chairs to sit in and relax. We ended up in the Eden Café for lunch. I got a ruben panini, potato salad and a brownie Jand my husband got the tuna pita sandwich with chips.  Both were very good.  We took our food to one of the chairs/table along the windows facing the back of the ship.  Really, really nice to have all of those windows.  Makes it so bright.  We sat next to a couple who have cruised quite a bit.  We enjoyed talking to them about where they have been, what ships they have sailed on.  One of our favorite things about cruising is meeting new people – both fellow cruisers and the staff on board.  After lunch we found some chairs in the solarium and relaxed until it was time for Muster.  Ours was in the theater which was so much nicer than being crammed in to a specialty restaurant.   I've included a picture they showed on the screen in the theater of the muster station areas. The Captains Club cocktail party was that day so after Muster we checked to see if our luggage had been delivered to our cabin (it had!) so we unpacked a bit then headed to Eden for the CC cocktail party.  Captain Kate was the captain for this sailing.  This was our 3^rdtime sailing under her command – Summit, Equinox and now Edge.  She might feel like we are stalking her lol.  The line to see her as usual was pretty long, so we skipped it since we have introduced ourselves before.  We found some seats and visited with a couple from Maryland.  They were first timers on X, we told them some of our favorite things about X and chatted with them about each other’s travels. After that, we went to watch the NFL divisional playoff game in the Casino Bar.  Unfortunately, our team lost.  We went back to our cabin, changed for dinner (we had 8:30 fixed), then went to get a drink before heading to the 7:30 comedy show in the theater.  We have mixed thoughts on this ships martini bar area. We missed the iced counters and the smaller area found on the Summit and Equinox, but grew to really like the overall space as it is easier to find a seat and we liked the music being right there instead of a floor below.  It really is a mixture of the martini bar and grand foyer on the Equinox at least.  We were usually able to snag 2 seats at the bar every night and thought our bartender, Jomann, was great!  Tonight’s comedy show was with Rich Aronovitch.  He was funny enough, but we felt like he went on and on about people coming in late.  Granted a lot of people did come in late, but we felt like he was too focused on that.  We picked the fixed dinner time for this cruise.  We had select dining on our last cruise and missed getting to know the wait staff.  We also picked 8:30 because we didn’t want to be rushed during port days to get ready for dinner.  There was a card in our cabin that told us we were assigned to the Tuscan Dining Room and our table number. We ate in the MDR 4 out of the 7 nights.  Our head waiter Eri and assistant Roman were both great.  We enjoyed hearing about their families back home and they were very attentive.  After dinner, we went to see the show Revelation in Eden.  A few things I had read here on CC about Eden made me a little hesitant – mainly the smell of incense.  I think they must have gotten rid of that because I am very sensitive to incense and I didn’t smell anything.  I thought the show was great!  My husband thought it was a little too artistic or interpretive….The cast does interact with the audience, but if you don’t want to get up to participate they went on to find another guest to join in.  We turned in after the show.  Very enjoyable first day!

[NBliving]

Day 2 Sea Day– “The sea was angry that day, my friends” - George Castanza on Seinfeld.  The next two days were very rough seas.  The Edge handled it beautifully.  Captain Kate told us we would be using all 5 engines to get us to San Juan on time, but we would be cruising through very strong winds and taking a different route to keep us out of some nasty weather.  We walked the track this morning.  One direction we were being pushed and another we were walking against the strong wind.  We did get our mile in though before heading to the solarium.  The main pool deck was too windy for us.  We had a super relaxing day, ate lunch from the Mast Grill, read by the pool.  It was great! We decided that day we really didn’t want to wait until 8:30 to eat dinner so we got dressed around 5 then went to Tuscan to see if they could seat us earlier.  They could have sat us right then, but we also didn’t want to eat that early lol.  So we went to the martini bar and found two seats and ordered our drinks.  About 6 we went back to Tuscan but now it was a 45 minute wait.  We walked over to Normandie and they said it would be about a 15 minute wait for us so we got a buzzer and went back to the Grand Foyer area to listen to music.  About 10 minutes later our table was ready.  It was nice to try a different MDR, but really the only thing that is different is the specific restaurants 4 or 5 appetizers and entrees and those stay the same for the whole cruise.  It was nice to find that out because one of our nights in Tuscan I didn’t see anything that I wanted so I asked our waiter to bring me the menu from Normandie so I could get one of the items I liked from there.  Another night, we went to each MDR and looked at their specific menu so we knew what they had to offer in case we wanted that instead of what Tuscan ordered.  After dinner that night my husband wanted to watch the College Football Championship game so he watched that in the Casino bar while I made a donation to the slot machines.  We had run into some friends from our hometown earlier that day who were watching it on the Rooftop Garden so after halftime we went up there to find them. It was a great space to watch it in with the big screen, even though it was a bit windy if you sat in the wrong spot. DH stayed there to finish watching the game and I called it a night.

 

[NBliving]

Day 3 San Juan – we were supposed to arrive in San Juan at 3:30, but because of the strong winds we didn’t arrive until 6:30.  Captain Kate told us the winds were around 50 – 60 mph so even with all engines going we were making slow progress.  It didn’t really matter to us as we have been to San Juan 2 other times to start our cruises on the Summit.  We had made a dinner reservation for 8 at Carli’s Fine Bistro thanks to a CC post I had seen.  We ate breakfast in the Cosmopolitan MDR then went over to the Future Cruise desk to look at 2021 European cruises.   We had them hold one for us on the Constellation.  New for us was that they are really pushing the non-refundable deposits. They are “giving” you the 4 perks with that.  After thinking about it over the course of the day, we decided even though it costs us about $500 more we really couldn’t do a non-refundable deposit for a cruise that far away.  So we eventually changed it to the refundable deposit with 3 perks.  We ate lunch in Le Grand Bistro ($20 pp).  Unfortunatley, my husband wasn’t really hungry because of the rocky ride, but we had the OBC so we tried it.  We both enjoyed our food and the wait staff.  I especially liked one of the assistant servers (I think her name is Valeria) because she insisted we share 3 desserts instead of 2 and we really liked the 3^rdone she brought us which we probably wouldn’t have picked.  The island in the cloud.  We arrived in San Juan as I said at 6:30 and since our dinner reservation wasn’t until 8 we decided to get a drink on board first and wait for the crowd to disembark. Besides our dinner in town I wanted to stop at CVS and buy some shampoo.  I am the least picky person I know about shampoos, but I did not like the shampoo in our stateroom.  The first day both my husband and I thought the bottle had been mistakenly filled with body wash.  It hardly lathered and I used about 15 pumps or more in my hair to get any lather. Very strange.  We asked our stateroom attendant to replace it and make sure it was shampoo.  He did, and my husband said it was a little better.  I wonder if there is different shampoo in the concierge level staterooms? Anyway, I just decided to buy some I knew I liked since we could.  We are so glad we made a reservation at Carli’s.  Very small restaurant, great food, great entertainment.  We stayed there until about 10:30 then went to the ship. Captain Kate had negotiated an 11:30 all aboard instead of the original 10:30 since we had arrived so late. Tomorrow is Tortola and we had a shore excursion meeting time of 8:15 so we turned in.

[Silkroad]

Following. Enjoying your review very much😊

[NBliving]

Day 4 Tortola – For today, we had booked a ship’s excursion to the Virgin Gorda Baths.  I had read so many reviews about it – do we do it ourselves via ferry or take the ship’s excursion, or to do the boat ride in or by bus. Since we had the OBC and had never been, we decided to do it through the ship and we chose the bus ride over the boat ride. I was able to book it during a shore excursion sale so it was only $44.80 per person.  Our main concern was that it would be super crowded.  We really didn’t think it was.  If we go again we would do it on our own, but the tour guides were great and even though we wish we could have stayed at both the Baths and Devil’s Beach longer we had enough time to enjoy it.  We brought our own snorkel masks and enjoyed seeing some fish and coral at devil’s beach. The water was crystal clear! So gorgeous!  We were back at the port around 1 and didn’t really know what else to do.  We decided to go back onboard, eat lunch and hang out at the pool while it was less crowded. We went to the 7:30 performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.  It was very good, high energy, excellent talent.  After dinner we ate at our MDR table then went to the casino for a bit before calling it a night.

[NBliving]

Day 5 St. Martin – This was our 3^rdtime to visit St. Martin on a cruise. It is our favorite island.  We decided to rent a car as we did our first time and head to a new area – Grand Case. We first went to check out Marigot. We had been there on our first cruise in 2016 before the hurricane in 2017.  It had been our favorite spot.  Unfortunately, while it has come back a bit it is still really devastated. The shopping stalls are there selling t-shirts and other souvenirs, but we only saw 2 or 3 restaurants along the main road.  Nothing else was open there but there is a shopping mall that I think is new. I've posted a picture looking out at the marina there.  Lots of beautiful boats.  After our walk through Marigot we drove up to Grand Case.  We had a reservation for 2 beach chairs and umbrella at Rainbow Café.  We didn’t know what to expect since that area had also been hard hit by the hurricane.  There is still a lot of damage, but several beach side restaurants are open.  We found a spot on the street a few blocks away to park and walked in to the restaurant.  Our chairs and umbrella were waiting for us.  The water was gorgeous!  The sand was very, very nice.  Service was excellent.  I’m sharing the drink menu.  We ate lunch in the restaurant part.  We had cod fritters and split a Caribbean Salad.  Everything was spectacular.  Very fresh. We stayed there until about 2:30. The people at Hertz had warned us to leave enough time in case of traffic.  We drove back through the other side of the island and didn’t hit any traffic. We were back at the port by 3:30. The car return is right at the port where you check in to get your car.  Very easy.  Went back on board, headed to the pool and enjoyed the rest of our afternoon. Beautiful sunset tonight. The entertainment tonight was another comedian, Doug Funk. We went to his 7:30 show and thoroughly enjoyed it.  He does mostly improv with guests participating.  It was hilarious!  After dinner we went back to Tuscan for dinner.  Stopped at the casino for a little while begore heading to Eden to listen to Bryan James who was doing a Simon and Garfunkle playlist.  We had heard Bryan elsewhere on the ship and really like his voice.  We stayed for his whole performance then called it a night.

 

[NBliving]

Day 6 – At Sea   Luckily the seas weren’t as rough now and our trip back to Ft. Lauderdale was fairly smooth and uneventful. Today we did our usual relaxing but also my DH attended a Beyond the Podium presentation by Dan Benedict.  He has had presentations each day about Astronomy and space travel.  Today was the only one DH attended.  He said it was very interesting.  After that, I joined him for a presentation by our excellent Cruise Director Giuseppe about ship life.  It was interesting to hear how the crew live.  We were surprised to hear they worked 10 hour days.  We knew they worked 7 days a week but that is a long day even if it’s broken up!  We very much respect these individuals who work in the cruise industry.  Even with months off at a time, that’s a lot of working! This night we had reservations for dinner at Fine Cut Steakhouse, our own specialty restaurant dinner.  I had tried to make some reservations before we boarded, but the only times available were 9:00 or later.  We made this one right when we boarded the first day.  Our reservation was for 6:15.  It was very good food and service.  We’ve eaten in Murano and Tuscan Grille.  Our only complaint was the restaurant is open concept and so you can hear the music from the grand Foyer as well as any guests noises coming from that area.  We didn’t think it had the intimate feel of the other steak house restaurants on other ships.  We caught the end of the show in the theater that night – Uptown.  It was a high energy, Motown music show.  After the show we went to the Club for the ABBA mania sing and dance along party.  It was so much fun!! For me 😂  Luckily my DH is a great sport!  After the Club we went to the Grand Foyer and listened to Bryan James again. I've posted some random photos from around the ship. It was a great day!

[NBliving]

Day 7 – At Sea  The Cruise Director was giving a presentation today at 10 about his hometown of Sicily.  That is one of the port stops on the cruise we booked on board so we went to hear his take on it.  His presentation was great!  After that we stayed for Captain Kate’s Q & A.  It was packed!  The day was a bit rainy and overcast so that might have accounted for the crowd, but she is really personable and I think everyone just likes to hear what she has to say.  She brought her hairless cat, Bug, out at the end for everyone to see. Pictures below, sorry for the poor quality... We spent the rest of the day playing cards or reading in Eden, the Solarium and our cabin.  Ate dinner in Tuscan.  Eri brought me a crème brulee J  He brought my husband 2 helpings of seared scallops he had seen on another MDR menu. After diner we went to the late night show of Doug Funk.  He was hilarious once again.  We decided to call it a night after that.  We had an early debarkation to go on a shore excursion – air boat ride through the Everglades.

Edited January 25, 2020 by NBliving
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[NBliving]

Day 8 – Fort Lauderdale   Our meeting place was in the Club at 8:15.  We ate breakfast in the Cosmopolitan MDR and then went to check in.  We were called around 8:30 and debarkation was a breeze. Our luggage was waiting for us so we grabbed it and headed for the exit! With the facial recognition we just walked up and they verified it was us and we walked out of the terminal because we didn’t have anything to declare.  We were escorted to our tour bus where the driver separated our luggage by airport and left shortly thereafter.  Our tour guide, Bonnie, was wonderful.  She gave us lots of history of the area while we were driving.  We went to Sawgrass Recrational Park for our airboar ride.  In addition we saw some gators who had been rescued and also another area with rescued animals such as panthers, snakes, a porcupine, etc.  We heard from guides in both areas.  Next, we boarded our airboats – much bigger than we expected.  They fit around 40 people each.  The captain was hoping to find us an alligator to see.  We didn’t realize this was the goal of the trip lol.  We lived in Houston for 30 years and have seen a few gators just walking in our neighborhood!  We were lucky and saw 2 of them while we were out.  The trip before us didn’t find any.  After the airboat ride, we were driven to our final stop.  I can't remember the name of it, we think it was something with Long Key in the name. There was a museum which showed what happened when they drained the swamps to the Native Americans and wildlife.  There was also a nature trail you could walk to see some beautiful old oak trees and other local plants.  We were driven to FLL and had enough time to grab lunch at the airport before we caught our flight home.  It was a great week on the Edge.  Beautiful ship, top notch staff from the Captain on down.  Let me know if you have any questions and I'll try to answer.

 

[hcat]

Great review...we never get tired of hearing  good things about EDGE!

Glad to hear that the  St Martin side of island is slowly coming back.

[micheleata]

Great review!   Sounds like you had a wonderful time,  and you pictures are terrific!    We sail the Edge for the first time next month, and am excited to be sailing again with Captain Kate.

 

Thanks for sharing!

[mafig]

Thank you for your review.  I enjoyed reading it.

[crusinpeg]

Great review and pics! I know what you mean about that song! We’re back on the Edge in a few weeks and that song keeps going through my head! I remember walking around singing it onboard! Did they finally get rid of the shrubs that used to block view of movie screen? Do you know what any of the movies were?

[Madio]

3 hours ago, NBliving said:

Day 5 St. Martin – This was our 3^rdtime to visit St. Martin on a cruise. It is our favorite island.  We decided to rent a car as we did our first time and head to a new area – Grand Case. We first went to check out Marigot. We had been there on our first cruise in 2016 before the hurricane in 2017.  It had been our favorite spot.  Unfortunately, while it has come back a bit it is still really devastated. The shopping stalls are there selling t-shirts and other souvenirs, but we only saw 2 or 3 restaurants along the main road.  Nothing else was open there but there is a shopping mall that I think is new. I've posted a picture looking out at the marina there.  Lots of beautiful boats.  After our walk through Marigot we drove up to Grand Case.  We had a reservation for 2 beach chairs and umbrella at Rainbow Café.  We didn’t know what to expect since that area had also been hard hit by the hurricane.  There is still a lot of damage, but several beach side restaurants are open.  We found a spot on the street a few blocks away to park and walked in to the restaurant.  Our chairs and umbrella were waiting for us.  The water was gorgeous!  The sand was very, very nice.  Service was excellent.  I’m sharing the drink menu.  We ate lunch in the restaurant part.  We had cod fritters and split a Caribbean Salad.  Everything was spectacular.  Very fresh. We stayed there until about 2:30. The people at Hertz had warned us to leave enough time in case of traffic.  We drove back through the other side of the island and didn’t hit any traffic. We were back at the port by 3:30. The car return is right at the port where you check in to get your car.  Very easy.  Went back on board, headed to the pool and enjoyed the rest of our afternoon. Beautiful sunset tonight. The entertainment tonight was another comedian, Doug Funk. We went to his 7:30 show and thoroughly enjoyed it.  He does mostly improv with guests participating.  It was hilarious!  After dinner we went back to Tuscan for dinner.  Stopped at the casino for a little while begore heading to Eden to listen to Bryan James who was doing a Simon and Garfunkle playlist.  We had heard Bryan elsewhere on the ship and really like his voice.  We stayed for his whole performance then called it a night.

 

Your review of the Rainbow Cafe on St. Martin brought back great memories for us.  We were on a Silhouette cruise about 3 years ago, and Rainbow was recommended to us the guy at the rental car agency.  Nice people, great food and fabulous scenery!  Have been following your review bc we will be on the Edge on March 15.  You are giving some very useful info.  Thanks!

[Travelexpert35]

Great review. We’re sailing on Feb 9th on your itinerary. I hope the weather is better though as I have someone travelling with me who has never cruised before. We have the 6 pm dining slot as we are still waitlisted for Select Dining. It looks like we could dine at a different time like you did. Was the second show at 9:30pm in the Theatre?

[BaumD]

Shows were at 7:30 & 9:30. Was on the same cruise.

[WrittenOnYourHeart]

Thank you so much for your review!! Super excited to board the Edge three weeks from tomorrow!!

[lauraapp]

Awesome review!  Thanks for sharing!  Who was the cruise director!  Leave in 4 weeks for the Edge can't wait!

[Oville]

We were on the same cruise, great review.  Thanks

[NBliving]

16 hours ago, Travelexpert35 said:

Great review. We’re sailing on Feb 9th on your itinerary. I hope the weather is better though as I have someone travelling with me who has never cruised before. We have the 6 pm dining slot as we are still waitlisted for Select Dining. It looks like we could dine at a different time like you did. Was the second show at 9:30pm in the Theatre?

Yes, the second show in the theater is 9:30.  We thought the Edge handled the high waves beautifully. My husband can get a little motion sickness from time to time, but he wore the seabands and was fine. 

[NBliving]

11 hours ago, lauraapp said:

Awesome review!  Thanks for sharing!  Who was the cruise director!  Leave in 4 weeks for the Edge can't wait!

The Cruise Director was Giuseppe. First contract on the Edge. He came from the Reflection I think. He was great! One of our favorites. 

[portofrome]

Thanks for your review.

[canadianbear]

Enjoyed reading your review and seeing all the photos!  
 

We are contemplating the Edge in an infinite balcony for a transatlantic cruise.  We have only been on Celebrity once and really liked it.  We have always had a “real” balcony before and a little concerned about what looks like a better version of an ocean view?   Any comments of pros and cons on your cabin?

 

Thank you.