Millennium LIVE Suite Review w/ Kid (3/3-3/7)

RickT · March 3, 2022

Enjoy your cruise….. may the only negative thing be your Covid test!

Oh, and please keep the ship neat and tidy while you’re on her, I board in 18 days and have high expectations! 😋

GenerationX · March 3, 2022

When I’m in this dress you guys KNOW what time it is! Only this time I’m not the only one with a special embarkation day outfit.

Just heard from Red and her flight just landed in Miami. Next time you hear from us we’ll all be onboard Millennium!

GenerationX · March 3, 2022

Oh and in case you were wondering, the answer is no. There’s not a single woman in our family who is capable of packing light.

ecslady · March 3, 2022

Loving your review. Where did you get the "My first cruise" T-shirt? I've got to get some for my grandsons since we finally booked a family cruise.

GenerationX · March 3, 2022

4 hours ago, ecslady said:

Loving your review. Where did you get the "My first cruise" T-shirt? I've got to get some for my grandsons since we finally booked a family cruise.

Thank you! I got the shirt on Etsy. I think there were a couple of different colors you could order and they personalize it with name and year. I think if you search “first cruise shirt” on Etsy.com it should pop up.

MarKay525 · March 3, 2022

23 hours ago, GenerationX said:

Thank you! Oh that sounds wonderful! My mother has a deep fear of being in open water, so I know I will likely never get her to set foot on a cruise with me and it makes me so sad because I know we’d have an amazing time!

Would a Mississippi River cruise work? Not quite the same experience, but at least together on water.

Have an absolutely wonderful cruise.

Please tell Red's friend this former Indy resident wishes her Bon Voyage! (I learned to sail in nearly land-locked Indiana.)

GenerationX · March 3, 2022

Houston we have a problem. My child is now addicted to flying first class and I’m quickly falling in love with sailing in a Celebrity Suite. We’re gonna need a bigger vacation budget.

We got to the port at 11:05 and went straight through to the Retreat lounge. Cami ate a few sweet treats while we completed document verification and then we were invited to board right away.

There was some initial confusion at the door to Terminal 25 as the staff seemed confused about the difference in pre-cruise testing requirements for vaccinated kids vs. unvaccinated kids. Fortunately I was very well read up on this and came prepared to be assertive about what was required for a fully vaccinated child and with printouts from the celebrity website to support my position. I assume these folks are usually assigned to work the same terminal (and T25 is almost exclusively Celebrity I think), so I guess they probably don’t have to deal with the child protocols very much so being rusty is a little more understandable.

I was so excited to see that my Celebrity suite comes with an electric tea kettle! It’ll be nice to be able to get up early and make myself a cup of tea to sip on the veranda while Mini Me is still sleeping. Frequent review followers can probably guess how psyched I was to find a WHOLE HALLWAY of full body mirrors and a walk in closet that I think may be bigger than the entire inside stateroom that I stayed in on my very first cruise on Royal Caribbean back in law school.

The only negatives I have so far on the room are 1) luggage delivery took far longer than on any post-shutdown cruise so far (bags didn’t arrive till 3pm, I wonder if it’s because of our very midship location?); and 2) I noticed this sign saying the in-room Evian is EXTRA CHARGE!

In all of my suite class cruises I have never had to pay for the in room bottled water. I guess at the end of the day $8 a bottle for the in room Evian isn’t gonna break the bank, but it’s a pretty big disappointment to be in a higher level, more expensive suite and be charged extra for something I’ve gotten for free in every sky suite I’ve ever sailed in.

Mini Me has been oooh and ahhh -ing constantly since we came aboard. I know it’s still early on but I’m optimistic that Celebrity is on its way to having a new customer.

Coming soon, reports on the Retreat Lounge, lunch in Luminae and open house at Camp at Sea!

Edited March 3, 2022 by GenerationX

peanut head · March 3, 2022

Thank you for another great thread! Your writing style and optimistic, quirky joy is infectious. I hope that you and your dtr have an incredible rest of the cruise.

ecslady · March 3, 2022

45 minutes ago, GenerationX said:

Thank you! I got the shirt on Etsy. I think there were a couple of different colors you could order and they personalize it with name and year. I think if you search “first cruise shirt” on Etsy.com it should pop up.

Thanks so much for taking the time to answer. Enjoy the cruise!

jcpc · March 3, 2022

If you have the premium beverage package you will not be charged for the Evian in your Suite. Speak with your Personal Retreat about this.

MarKay525 · March 3, 2022

Was that Mini Me enjoying the aft view on Deck 10 at sail away?

ChrisNY2 · March 3, 2022

Well I'm already hooked on Celebrity (it's my first time on Celebrity)!

So glad that I got to meet Generation X and Generaton Z right away! Looking foward to an amazing cruise!

Happy Cruiser 6143 · March 3, 2022

Talk to your butler about the water situation. If they are going to be so foolish as to charge for that stuff in the room, have them take it away and load up on what you want in the Retreat Lounge where it is at no charge. I've never stayed in a suite where I was charged for bottled water. Perhaps the setup crew made a mistake.

GenerationX · March 3, 2022

20 minutes ago, ChrisNY2 said:

Well I'm already hooked on Celebrity (it's my first time on Celebrity)!

So glad that I got to meet Generation X and Generaton Z right away! Looking foward to an amazing cruise!

Welcome to the club! Looking forward to sailing with you and seeing you at our night 3 CS party!

Jim_Iain · March 3, 2022

Agree with Linda. Ask about the bottle water. On our recent cruises I asked our Butler and he assured us we would not be charged for it. He said some of the new butler's play by the book but his feeling is that if we are in a Suite and have a Premium Package we shouldn't have to pay for it. He also offered to stock some beer for us also gratis. Obviously he earned a nice tip.

islabahia · March 3, 2022

We get our bottled water from Michael’s Club (now called Retreat Lounge). We get canned sodas for the fridge in the room also so that whenI want soda it is there.

GenerationX · March 3, 2022

Current Situation: Gen Z and I are enjoying an hour of down time in our cabin before dinner in Tuscan Grille. She’s found a kids movie she loves in the free offerings on the tv and is chilling on the couch in air conditioning and I’m sipping champagne on the veranda and perusing the in-room wine menu that out butler Verun, brought me so that I have something to sip in the evening while writing after Gen Z goes to bed.

I think I’ll go Girl Power and order something off of the Women Winemakers list.

BTW, I checked with Verun and he assured me that since we have the premium beverage package we will not be charged for in room water.

Thank you so much Janice, Linda and Ian for your help with that!

jcpc · March 3, 2022

And a big THANK YOU to you, Charla, for going that extra mile for me.

Janice

GenerationX · March 4, 2022

Gen X and Gen Z ready for dinner at Tuscan Grille! What can I say? She does a way better sassy face than me.

luvcruzing · March 4, 2022

22 minutes ago, GenerationX said:

Gen X and Gen Z ready for dinner at Tuscan Grille! What can I say? She does a way better sassy face than me.

Beautiful!

MarKay525 · March 4, 2022

Priceless photo! Making good use of those mirrors. 😄

I would imagine that the two of you had a lot of fun getting ready for this trip.

Edited March 4, 2022 by MarKay525

TPCRUISER2 · March 4, 2022

You Ladies are stunning! Enjoy!

Cruising Is Bliss · March 4, 2022

Your mother/daughter dresses are perfect!

GenerationX · March 4, 2022

15 hours ago, MarKay525 said:

Was that Mini Me enjoying the aft view on Deck 10 at sail away?

Yes it was! I’m so glad she share’s my joy at watching the wake!

GenerationX · March 4, 2022

A very good morning from the Millie in Key West! It looks like it’s going to be a beautiful sunny warm day. I’m starting my day with a cup of English Breakfast on the veranda. There’s not a cruise ship protestor in sight. I guess it’s not worth the early rise for them when the ship has less passengers on it than 2 747’s. Speaking of which, the report I’ve been given was that we were to have about 750 passengers IF no last minute no shows. I’ll see if I can get a count today of how many actually boarded.

Wifi last night at sea was really slow and I couldn’t get CC to fully load. In case that’s going to be par for the cruise, I’m going to try and do some catch up posting while I have US cell signal in Key West today. It looks like I’ll have more posting time than I thought since apparently my kid plans to ditch me for Camp @ Sea far more often than I expected (full details later).

Which reminds me, you know how I mentioned that part of parenthood is your kids proving you wrong? Well, I was pretty confident that with everything we’d done in the past 48 hours, Gen Z wouldn’t make it to 9pm before collapsing last night.

It turned out, I had to drag her off the crowded dance floor of the sky lounge at 10:45pm as she waved and screamed goodbye to her new dance partners. I should have known better. After all, fruit doesn’t fall far from the tree.

Last night’s dinner was Tuscan Grille. Gen Z was given both the kids menu (which was mainly pizzas and pastas, sorry I forgot to get a pic) and the adult menu and decided to order from the adult menu. It was nice that she could order the adult food even though we paid a much lower kids cover charge for her for the restaurant. I believe it was about $10 for her with the 30% off first night discount.

We started with the calamari and Caesar salad, then Gen Z had the bronzino and I had a ribeye and we split a half order of spaghetti and meatballs. Gen Z enjoyed her fish so much she asked me if we could order another plate of it (I said no). My ribeye was very good but much thinner than the ones I had on Equinox and Summit the past few months. Same with the steak in the steak frites Gen Z had for lunch in Luminae in fact. Maybe they’re scaling back the M-Class protein supply orders to help fund the final payments on building Beyond. lol

I had to play the mom guilt card against to get a few rings of calamari shared with me (“you know mommy took all this time off work and is spending all this money just to have some special time with you…you think she could have a little more calamari?”) before the plate was empty.

The Tuscan spaghetti and meatballs are a favorite of mine, but last night it fell way short. The meatballs had good flavor but were kind of mushy and something MAJOR changed in the sauce. It was runny and overly sweet and needed way more oregano and basil. Our waiter seemed to notice we weren’t enjoying it much and before I could even say anything had already brought us a big bowl of rich, garlicky mashed potatoes so we could get our carbs in.

For dessert, Gen Z tried to order the fig gelato but our waiter stopped her because it has a nut topping (points for allergen awareness!). Instead we shared the lemoncello cheesecake and strawberry short cake. Once again I use the term “shared” loosely. I think I was able to get like 4 small bites of cheesecake before the plate was empty.

Like I said, I figured we’d be off to the stateroom after dinner to maybe work our puzzle in PJ’s for a few minutes then head to bed. Gen Z had other plans. She sternly reminded me that “my new friend Ms. Claudia” told us at camp registration that it would be open from 7-10pm at night and she wanted to go. I reminded her that there are only 3 kids under 12 on the whole ship and she’d probably be the only one there, but she didn’t care. It’s her vacation too so I dropped her off at camp and went for a walk around the deck then got an espresso martini.

Gen Z was not thrilled to see me when I showed back up to get her at 9:45. She’d been having a ball playing Just Dance on the Xbox with both of the staff members on duty and begged to stay late. (The camp is available after hours until 1am with a $6 per hour charge after 10pm…most insanely cheap babysitting prices I’ve seen this side of 1995!). The only way I could convince her to leave was to remind her there was a Motown show scheduled in the sky lounge at 10pm.

The show singers and dancers were great and Gen Z was dancing in her seat the whole time. That is until the performers announced that the dance floor was open. Then we took to the floor!

The little dancing queen is still in the bedroom doing some snoring that gives my husband a run for his money but she’ll have to wake up in a half hour when Verun brings our breakfast.

More to come soon!