Live Edge Review - July 3-10, 2021

[guidance lady]

On 7/3/2021 at 9:39 PM, elf426 said:

 

Hi, is the parking garage right next to the ship? Did you have any trouble finding a spot? Please keep us posted on your adventures. Thanks!

[elf426]

1 hour ago, guidance lady said:

Hi, is the parking garage right next to the ship? Did you have any trouble finding a spot? Please keep us posted on your adventures. Thanks!

It's across the street and down just a tad from the terminal. It's no problem for me to walk but I rode the elevator with a nice gentleman who was getting the car while his other half waited at the terminal with the bags. No trouble finding a spot at this point but I've never parked there while it's full.

[elf426]

Ok, here it is, the hot mess of my final thoughts....

 

Reality is four loads of laundry, running and unloading the dishwasher, cooking and going to the grocery store within 24 hours of getting off a cruise. Hell is going back to work on Monday. Purgatory is our neighborhood still setting off fireworks a week after July 4.

 

While I thought I’d take some time to collect my thoughts on our sailing, Celebrity had other plans and we received our survey before noon on Saturday. I’m not certain everyone was off the ship yet. The only person that dared utter the word “ten” to us was our waiter at dinner the last night in the MDR.

 

I guess I want to flush out some notes from earlier in the week and throw out some random thoughts:

 

-          The stateroom doors are very heavy, and as such they slammed a lot. Keep that in mind if you’re an early riser, late-nighter or light sleeper.

o   Speaking of doors, I think our last RCI sailing in “The Before” had a two-sided magnet that was either “do not disturb” or “I’m not in my room” and I thought that was a much better communication system with your stateroom attendant than just “I’m sleeping” or nothing which we had onboard Edge. My afternoon naps are usually unplanned so getting a knock on the door was a little annoying. Cruise ruining? No.

 

-          Best of the week: Café al Bacio – hands down the star for us, Magic Carpet – my favorite afternoon spot and much breezier on 16 than 14, Muster Drill – I cannot stress enough how painless, quick and easy the new system is.

 

-          Worst of the week: Oceanview Café – I’m sorry, there’s just no saving it. I know, it’s just the buffet, but hey, why should its quality be any different than any other venue onboard? It’s the most noticeable spot for contradictory Covid precautions (see previous comments on condiments) and people still reached through to grab tongs and serve themselves on occasion. I also found it odd how many crew ate there. Is that normal and I’ve just never noticed before?

 

-          Spa/fitness center: I’m usually one of those sad, hopeful souls that goes to the spa raffle on embarkation day knowing good and well I won’t win squat but still drops my name in the bucket. This time, as we went to get me signed up for the Peloton, a kind fitness center attendant was waiting at the entrance and asked if we wanted a tour. Hindsight says I should have just told her what I was there for, but in the moment I said “sure”. After a thorough explanation of every single service offered (including the lady stabbing herself with an acupuncture needle to prove how not scary needles are then talking to us with a FREAKING NEEDLE STICKING OUT OF HER HAND), our guide said that if we book a massage today we can get 25 extra minutes free (ie a 75 minute massage for the price of 50 minutes). I returned that afternoon after reviewing the spa menu and was told by the receptionist at the spa desk the offer was good for any massage performed today only – not just booked today. I obviously misunderstood, but I do think our guide didn’t explain it very well. Oh well.

 

I also asked if the yoga classes were free, as I had noticed in the first sailing’s dailies that some of the classes didn’t have the extra fee symbol (see my Day 3 planner – slow flow yoga doesn’t have the symbol, however, it’s there on Day 6). Sadly no, yoga isn’t free.

 

Twice I needed the fitness center staff to log into the Peloton bike for access. When you start your session you should have a screen asking which language you want (English or German), and then you’ll put in your username and password. If you have a screen asking for your access key, you’ll need to find staff to log in. Streaming quality was good. I encourage you to bring headphones. My first session the bikes on either side of me were both working out without them and so I got to listen to not only my class, but theirs too! The fifth bike that was there on day 2 never appeared again the rest of the sailing, so there were four at the gym most of the week.

 

-          We only got overhead captain’s announcements on the mornings we were in port. Is that normal? I feel like I’ve been on cruises that someone, sometimes the CD, made an announcement every day. Is that better or worse? I don’t know but Captain Kate threw out a riddle both mornings and now I’m not sure I got the answer to the second one. Cruise ruined obviously.

 

-          Elite perks: uhhhhhh basically didn’t use them. Oops. Our stateroom attendant did ask us if we wanted to have laundry done as one bag is included, but we didn’t need it. I never once set foot in the Captains Club Lounge. Is it nice? It’s not that I didn’t use the perks on purpose, but truthfully, the perks sheet got buried after the first day on the desk and half of the perks are drinks, which we didn’t seek out as we already had a drinks package. Similar to RCI, you no longer need to visit the Diamond Lounge for your three free drinks. Oh well. Reading the list again I see that I could have gone to a second wine tasting but I had plenty of access to booze and I have no regrets about missing it.

 

-          Room review: we had an Infinite Veranda room on Deck 9, forward. The majority of cruises I’ve been on have been balcony rooms so this was a bit of a change. While I much preferred this blackout shade (that still lets some light through) to a curtain, I’d have rather had a sliding door and traditional balcony to this setup. I did enjoy the touch panel controls and the shower was roomy with good water pressure and surprisingly hot water. We had plenty of storage and the included robes were comfy.

 

-          Overall service: I don’t recall every seeing so many “suits” onboard. Maybe with so few guests in causal daywear they just stuck out more? The crew on board were 99% friendly, accommodating and (I think) happy to be back at sea. I can’t blame the poor guy that just wipes down stair handrails all day for maybe not being as enthusiastic as say the CD, but I always got a “good morning/afternoon/evening” from them.

 

Now I’ll begin rambling because I’ve tried writing this five times and can’t quite get a concise thought out of my head:

 

I had seen another thread whose OP said they felt like they paid full price for a less than full-price experience….and some CC commenters tore them to shreds for it. Everyone has their own opinion of the value of a dollar, and to me at least, the point of CC is to share our opinions and then shape our own from them. I don’t fit the mold of the typical Celebrity cruiser. No offense meant, but again, I’ve seen people flat out say that a 30yo couldn’t possibly enjoy Celebrity as it has an older demographic. What I took away from that thread was that yes, cruising is back, but cruising isn’t back as we used to know it and I tend to agree.

 

Does the lack of the Eden “experience” diminish the value of an Edge sailing? No clue, I never experienced it before. Would I like it? Hard to say. Did I feel like something was missing? No.

 

Personally, I felt like F&B took the hardest hit in the new system. There was an obvious lack of assistant waiters in the MDRs, perhaps they were who stayed up in the buffet for dinner? The buffet system needs some work as it stands. No, I don’t want to waste food on people who aren’t eating there, but I have some expectation that dinner should be slightly better than lunch.

 

Was my stateroom any more or less attended to? Not that I’m aware of. We did not opt into the Go Green plan (sorry earth) so we always had fresh linens and a turned down bed each day. Look, if I don’t have to do laundry or cook for a week it’s all worth it in my mind. Did we get towel animals? No – cruise ruined. Do I care? No. Did it probably save our attendant 2 minutes? Sure, I guess.

 

Was sailing at partial capacity amazing? Yeah, it was. Even six people in an elevator felt crowded. These are the parts of “The Before” that I’m not looking forward to going back to.

 

What I want moving forward is this mask/bracelet/judgey side-eye ***** to go away. I’m not diminishing what the world has gone through these last 18 months. But asking over and over again how many cruisers are vaccinated or am I going to be safe or “well someone could forge a document”….I’m going to rip my hair out. I’m vaccinated. I’m reasonably healthy. I don’t plan on licking the walls, hugging strangers or drinking the jacuzzi water. A bracelet isn’t going to protect me. If you’re concerned, maybe cruising isn’t for you at the moment? If once you boarded you were told there were 100 unvaxxed passengers would you get off? I’ve been on a Celebrity cruise with a norovirus outbreak and that ish wasn’t fun. Take twice to three times as many passengers on board and turn the buffet tongs around. That’s chaos bottled. Legit a lady sitting next to me one morning was telling me that her husband had been sick the past day but that they still went to the MDR for dinner (insert Disgust from Inside Out here).

 

For comparison sake, look at what RCI is doing with blocking seats in the theater, removing seats at bars, bracelet checks at entry points of the casino and unvaxxed hours at the gym (per a live review on Adventure, where that poster also mentioned there were 140 kids on board). That sounds miserable. I’m thankful that the environment we were in was relatively non-invasive.

 

I struggle making an iron-clad opinion because I didn’t pay for this cruise, my husband did. This is not an audit of our personal finances, let’s leave it at that. Would I have paid face value for this cruise out of my pocket? No. But I’m out of Celebrity’s price range as a solo traveler. Did we want to cruise from the US over the July Fourth holiday? Yes, so this fit the bill. Unfortunately, RCI doesn’t honor casino promotions over holidays or we would have been with them for a much lower rate (and apparently greater restrictions).

 

Well I’ve gone and talked myself into a knot so there you have it. Our first post (mid) pandemic cruise is in the books. Sea pass cards and blue bracelets have been added to my memory board and we’re already researching what’s next. Anyone have any suggestions? We’ve been thinking of dipping our toes into the premium/luxury pond but our options out of the US are limited (not to mention likely being the youngest on board by a margin scenario).

 

Thanks for following along, commenting, asking questions and being as excited as I was get to get back on board.

[George C]

Our cruise was just so so, except for our penthouse suite and winning a thousand jackpot at casino , my next cruise we have a grand suite on rccl , that will feel small after the penthouse 😁😁😁

[Ken the cruiser]

1 hour ago, elf426 said:

Ok, here it is, the hot mess of my final thoughts....

 

Reality is four loads of laundry, running and unloading the dishwasher, cooking and going to the grocery store within 24 hours of getting off a cruise. Hell is going back to work on Monday. Purgatory is our neighborhood still setting off fireworks a week after July 4.

 

While I thought I’d take some time to collect my thoughts on our sailing, Celebrity had other plans and we received our survey before noon on Saturday. I’m not certain everyone was off the ship yet. The only person that dared utter the word “ten” to us was our waiter at dinner the last night in the MDR.

 

I guess I want to flush out some notes from earlier in the week and throw out some random thoughts:

 

-          The stateroom doors are very heavy, and as such they slammed a lot. Keep that in mind if you’re an early riser, late-nighter or light sleeper.

o   Speaking of doors, I think our last RCI sailing in “The Before” had a two-sided magnet that was either “do not disturb” or “I’m not in my room” and I thought that was a much better communication system with your stateroom attendant than just “I’m sleeping” or nothing which we had onboard Edge. My afternoon naps are usually unplanned so getting a knock on the door was a little annoying. Cruise ruining? No.

 

-          Best of the week: Café al Bacio – hands down the star for us, Magic Carpet – my favorite afternoon spot and much breezier on 16 than 14, Muster Drill – I cannot stress enough how painless, quick and easy the new system is.

 

-          Worst of the week: Oceanview Café – I’m sorry, there’s just no saving it. I know, it’s just the buffet, but hey, why should its quality be any different than any other venue onboard? It’s the most noticeable spot for contradictory Covid precautions (see previous comments on condiments) and people still reached through to grab tongs and serve themselves on occasion. I also found it odd how many crew ate there. Is that normal and I’ve just never noticed before?

 

-          Spa/fitness center: I’m usually one of those sad, hopeful souls that goes to the spa raffle on embarkation day knowing good and well I won’t win squat but still drops my name in the bucket. This time, as we went to get me signed up for the Peloton, a kind fitness center attendant was waiting at the entrance and asked if we wanted a tour. Hindsight says I should have just told her what I was there for, but in the moment I said “sure”. After a thorough explanation of every single service offered (including the lady stabbing herself with an acupuncture needle to prove how not scary needles are then talking to us with a FREAKING NEEDLE STICKING OUT OF HER HAND), our guide said that if we book a massage today we can get 25 extra minutes free (ie a 75 minute massage for the price of 50 minutes). I returned that afternoon after reviewing the spa menu and was told by the receptionist at the spa desk the offer was good for any massage performed today only – not just booked today. I obviously misunderstood, but I do think our guide didn’t explain it very well. Oh well.

 

I also asked if the yoga classes were free, as I had noticed in the first sailing’s dailies that some of the classes didn’t have the extra fee symbol (see my Day 3 planner – slow flow yoga doesn’t have the symbol, however, it’s there on Day 6). Sadly no, yoga isn’t free.

 

Twice I needed the fitness center staff to log into the Peloton bike for access. When you start your session you should have a screen asking which language you want (English or German), and then you’ll put in your username and password. If you have a screen asking for your access key, you’ll need to find staff to log in. Streaming quality was good. I encourage you to bring headphones. My first session the bikes on either side of me were both working out without them and so I got to listen to not only my class, but theirs too! The fifth bike that was there on day 2 never appeared again the rest of the sailing, so there were four at the gym most of the week.

 

-          We only got overhead captain’s announcements on the mornings we were in port. Is that normal? I feel like I’ve been on cruises that someone, sometimes the CD, made an announcement every day. Is that better or worse? I don’t know but Captain Kate threw out a riddle both mornings and now I’m not sure I got the answer to the second one. Cruise ruined obviously.

 

-          Elite perks: uhhhhhh basically didn’t use them. Oops. Our stateroom attendant did ask us if we wanted to have laundry done as one bag is included, but we didn’t need it. I never once set foot in the Captains Club Lounge. Is it nice? It’s not that I didn’t use the perks on purpose, but truthfully, the perks sheet got buried after the first day on the desk and half of the perks are drinks, which we didn’t seek out as we already had a drinks package. Similar to RCI, you no longer need to visit the Diamond Lounge for your three free drinks. Oh well. Reading the list again I see that I could have gone to a second wine tasting but I had plenty of access to booze and I have no regrets about missing it.

 

-          Room review: we had an Infinite Veranda room on Deck 9, forward. The majority of cruises I’ve been on have been balcony rooms so this was a bit of a change. While I much preferred this blackout shade (that still lets some light through) to a curtain, I’d have rather had a sliding door and traditional balcony to this setup. I did enjoy the touch panel controls and the shower was roomy with good water pressure and surprisingly hot water. We had plenty of storage and the included robes were comfy.

 

-          Overall service: I don’t recall every seeing so many “suits” onboard. Maybe with so few guests in causal daywear they just stuck out more? The crew on board were 99% friendly, accommodating and (I think) happy to be back at sea. I can’t blame the poor guy that just wipes down stair handrails all day for maybe not being as enthusiastic as say the CD, but I always got a “good morning/afternoon/evening” from them.

 

Now I’ll begin rambling because I’ve tried writing this five times and can’t quite get a concise thought out of my head:

 

I had seen another thread whose OP said they felt like they paid full price for a less than full-price experience….and some CC commenters tore them to shreds for it. Everyone has their own opinion of the value of a dollar, and to me at least, the point of CC is to share our opinions and then shape our own from them. I don’t fit the mold of the typical Celebrity cruiser. No offense meant, but again, I’ve seen people flat out say that a 30yo couldn’t possibly enjoy Celebrity as it has an older demographic. What I took away from that thread was that yes, cruising is back, but cruising isn’t back as we used to know it and I tend to agree.

 

Does the lack of the Eden “experience” diminish the value of an Edge sailing? No clue, I never experienced it before. Would I like it? Hard to say. Did I feel like something was missing? No.

 

Personally, I felt like F&B took the hardest hit in the new system. There was an obvious lack of assistant waiters in the MDRs, perhaps they were who stayed up in the buffet for dinner? The buffet system needs some work as it stands. No, I don’t want to waste food on people who aren’t eating there, but I have some expectation that dinner should be slightly better than lunch.

 

Was my stateroom any more or less attended to? Not that I’m aware of. We did not opt into the Go Green plan (sorry earth) so we always had fresh linens and a turned down bed each day. Look, if I don’t have to do laundry or cook for a week it’s all worth it in my mind. Did we get towel animals? No – cruise ruined. Do I care? No. Did it probably save our attendant 2 minutes? Sure, I guess.

 

Was sailing at partial capacity amazing? Yeah, it was. Even six people in an elevator felt crowded. These are the parts of “The Before” that I’m not looking forward to going back to.

 

What I want moving forward is this mask/bracelet/judgey side-eye ***** to go away. I’m not diminishing what the world has gone through these last 18 months. But asking over and over again how many cruisers are vaccinated or am I going to be safe or “well someone could forge a document”….I’m going to rip my hair out. I’m vaccinated. I’m reasonably healthy. I don’t plan on licking the walls, hugging strangers or drinking the jacuzzi water. A bracelet isn’t going to protect me. If you’re concerned, maybe cruising isn’t for you at the moment? If once you boarded you were told there were 100 unvaxxed passengers would you get off? I’ve been on a Celebrity cruise with a norovirus outbreak and that ish wasn’t fun. Take twice to three times as many passengers on board and turn the buffet tongs around. That’s chaos bottled. Legit a lady sitting next to me one morning was telling me that her husband had been sick the past day but that they still went to the MDR for dinner (insert Disgust from Inside Out here).

 

For comparison sake, look at what RCI is doing with blocking seats in the theater, removing seats at bars, bracelet checks at entry points of the casino and unvaxxed hours at the gym (per a live review on Adventure, where that poster also mentioned there were 140 kids on board). That sounds miserable. I’m thankful that the environment we were in was relatively non-invasive.

 

I struggle making an iron-clad opinion because I didn’t pay for this cruise, my husband did. This is not an audit of our personal finances, let’s leave it at that. Would I have paid face value for this cruise out of my pocket? No. But I’m out of Celebrity’s price range as a solo traveler. Did we want to cruise from the US over the July Fourth holiday? Yes, so this fit the bill. Unfortunately, RCI doesn’t honor casino promotions over holidays or we would have been with them for a much lower rate (and apparently greater restrictions).

 

Well I’ve gone and talked myself into a knot so there you have it. Our first post (mid) pandemic cruise is in the books. Sea pass cards and blue bracelets have been added to my memory board and we’re already researching what’s next. Anyone have any suggestions? We’ve been thinking of dipping our toes into the premium/luxury pond but our options out of the US are limited (not to mention likely being the youngest on board by a margin scenario).

 

Thanks for following along, commenting, asking questions and being as excited as I was get to get back on board.

Thanks for your insights while you were on your cruise. Just curious, you didn't mention the evening shows. Was that an oversight or did you just not go to them? For us that's one of the things we enjoy going to in the evening as well as going to the game show that is usually held between the two evening shows.

[elf426]

7 minutes ago, Ken the cruiser said:

Thanks for your insights while you were on your cruise. Just curious, you didn't mention the evening shows. Was that an oversight or did you just not go to them? For us that's one of the things we enjoy going to in the evening as well as going to the game show that is usually held between the two evening shows.

Hi Ken, it’s not oversight but thanks for mentioning it. We generally had dinner around 6 and so the first show had started by the time we finished and I kind of just forgot about the second one. I did stop into the singer on night 2 (the Aretha covers) but didn’t stay for the whole thing. She was amazing and I slightly regret not seeing her set in Eden on night 6 or 7. The magicians don’t really do it for me and I’ve been burned by the production shows in the past. My evenings were mainly spent in the casino or watching the Stanley Cup Final. I’m sure others can give you a better idea of the show quality.

[Ken the cruiser]

3 minutes ago, elf426 said:

Hi Ken, it’s not oversight but thanks for mentioning it. We generally had dinner around 6 and so the first show had started by the time we finished and I kind of just forgot about the second one. I did stop into the singer on night 2 (the Aretha covers) but didn’t stay for the whole thing. She was amazing and I slightly regret not seeing her set in Eden on night 6 or 7. The magicians don’t really do it for me and I’ve been burned by the production shows in the past. My evenings were mainly spent in the casino or watching the Stanley Cup Final. I’m sure others can give you a better idea of the show quality.

No problem. Since we're in our late 60s and pretty much stay at home and work around the farm when we're not cruising, we usually keep our expectations low so we're usually wowed by everything we experience while on a cruise. Of course, having a glass of Bailey's to sip on while watching the show always helps! 😎

[George C]

I walked out on a couple of the shows at night , definitely not as good as rccl, but loved the music by martini bar and eden. They had music starting at 1pm , there were a couple different guitar players , a great duo and some small groups they would play 45 min set then about 30 mins later another performer did a set. 

Edited July 14, 2021 by George C

[RoamingRetirees]

1 minute ago, George C said:

I walked out on a couple of the shows at night , definitely not as good as rccl, but loved the music by martini bar and eden. They had music starting at 1pm , there were a couple different guitar players , a great duo and some small groups they would play 45 min set then about 30 mins later another performer did a set. 

I guess it depends on what you like. We really liked the shows on Edge because they are very contemporary and not the same old production shows you see everywhere else.

[elf426]

22 minutes ago, Ken the cruiser said:

No problem. Since we're in our late 60s and pretty much stay at home and work around the farm when we're not cruising, we usually keep our expectations low so we're usually wowed by everything we experience while on a cruise. Of course, having a glass of Bailey's to sip on while watching the show always helps! 😎

A glass of Baileys was exactly the drink I needed to watch the dumpster fire of a DJ in the nightclub the first night 🤣

[MamaFej]

34 minutes ago, elf426 said:

A glass of Baileys was exactly the drink I needed to watch the dumpster fire of a DJ in the nightclub the first night 🤣

<<<<<imagining a 32oz tumbler 

[Bakeman02]

Thanks for this review!  It was great!

[jg51]

On 7/14/2021 at 5:27 PM, elf426 said:

...   The stateroom doors are very heavy, and as such they slammed a lot. Keep that in mind if you’re an early riser, late-nighter or light sleeper.

.

Good day, "elf426."

 

We have been victimized (awakened from naps, startled, interrupted, etc.) by door-slammers on more than half of our many cruises, going back fifteen years.  We have found that slamming is almost never necessary.  It can be avoided by taking hold of a door's handle/knob and gently pulling it closed.  When we close a door this way, we also immediately test it, to make sure that the lock has engaged.  We believe that slamming can be excused only if a person has his/her hands so full of objects that it is impossible to take hold of the handle/knob to close the door quietly.

.

Quote

Oceanview Café ...  I found it odd how many crew ate there.  Is that normal and I’ve just never noticed before?

...

Thanks for following along, commenting, asking questions and being as excited as I was get to get back on board.

.

We have only rarely seen a crew member eating breakfast or lunch at the buffet, but we have seen -- countless times -- crew members and entertainers having dinner there.  This includes officers from the bridge, folks from Guest Services, sales personnel from the shops, entertainers, etc. -- but not stewards [stateroom/dining] nor maintenance personnel. 

 

We believe that uniformed crew members, sales staff, and entertainers are allowed to have dinner at the buffet or in the "crew mess" (on a very low deck), but not in the MDR.  Rarely, we have also seen crew members having dinner in specialty restaurants (even some non-uniformed crew members, who were apparently being rewarded by supervisors for their performance).

.

Thanks for your review.  With interest, we read everything you wrote (but never left a comment until now, if we recall correctly).
 

Edited July 15, 2021 by jg51

[peanut head]

On 7/11/2021 at 12:55 PM, George C said:

We had a 2pm checkin, I had asked celebrity rep does that apply to us since we are in suite, they said yes, called the concierge and was told we could show when we want , we arrived at noon , we did move from sky to penthouse a couple of days before sailing.

How did you like/dislike the Penthouse?  We will be staying in it on a cruise next year and not many people post much about their stay in the PH.  Any tips for a better stay?