Beyond LIVE Med Review 10/20-10/30: Tales from our Suite Roman Holiday

Von & John · October 16, 2023

Charla - so looking forward to another Fantabulous Cruise!!!

Enjoy those Special Seats

Happy Birthday Jeremy

Cheers - Von & John

dock · October 16, 2023

Safe trip.
Have to wait till Feb for our next cruise,so looking forward to your posts.

WNCtourist · October 16, 2023

So excited for your cruise and can't wait for your adventures!

Lena11033 · October 16, 2023

Safe travels

I love my air tags, coming back from London in April Air Canada was delayed so badly I had 30 mins to connect in Toronto (FYI any Canadians that have AC tell you that you can't make it, you can if you hustle and pre-submit your customs form).

I made it through customs and then from international to domestic terminal where the desk put me back on the flight but warned the bag wouldn't make it so go claim it lost as soon as I land. Once I got to my local airport and claim it as missing, they asked if I had an idea where the bag was, pulled up my phone and could tell them exactly where in the airport the bag was, they delivered it to my house 2 days later.

Silkroad · October 16, 2023

Safe travels! May your flight experiences be so smooth that you find yourself at your destination with cocktails in hand before you know it😊

DingoMom · October 16, 2023

@Silkroad, I am quite confident Charla and Jeremy will have cocktails in hand LONG before they get to Rome! 🍷🍷🍷

@GenerationX enjoy the journey and please send us some Flagship pictures!!

Daneenm · October 16, 2023

So excited to follow! We are on the Ascent next Fall, Rome-Greek Islands-Barcelona, with a stay in Rome before and Barcelona after. This is a great ‘appetizer’ to our cruise. Have a great time Charla and Jeremy!

GenerationX · October 16, 2023

37 minutes ago, DingoMom said:

@Silkroad, I am quite confident Charla and Jeremy will have cocktails in hand LONG before they get to Rome! 🍷🍷🍷

@GenerationX enjoy the journey and please send us some Flagship pictures!!

You know us too well! We aren’t even off the ground in STL yet but already on our second round of mimosas! 🥂

Ill be sure to give a full report on the Flagship experience!

Norwaylady · October 16, 2023

Enjoy your flight!

Can't wait for the rest🍹

Beachlover1989 · October 16, 2023

So excited to finally be able to follow another of your reviews, which I love! I'm really looking forward to following along on your cruise and to hear your very impartial observations for how Celebrity is doing. We were on Apex in August in a Celebrity Suite and we were already seeing signs of things to come...

Wish Jeremy a happy birthday and hope you have a wonderful vacation! Lisa

raudacruise · October 16, 2023

Yay! So excited for a new Charla adventure! 🥂🍾🍸🚢

And Happy Birthday to Jeremy!

mjfship · October 16, 2023

Looking forward to the next installment of the Charla Chronicles with great anticipation! You have a gift for storytelling, effortlessly incorporating details about your voyages: the destinations, the ship life, the culinary experiences, and the libations—all presented with a touch of whimsy. Let the journey begin. And, Happy Birthday to Jeremy. Bon voyage!

Edited October 16, 2023 by mjfship

kellyco · October 16, 2023

You won't have to go to the international terminal at O'Hare for the outbound flight so it should just be a quick gate change in Chicago. We are going on Beyond in May and I am looking forward to your adventure!

zitsky · October 16, 2023

Charla thanks for sharing. I’ve enjoyed your trip reports. I should document more.

I had similar numbers with the cabin upgrade. We paid the same price before the 50%. We ended up in an accessible Sky Suite on the Beyond. It was huge.

We were in Rome recently. I’m sure you’ll have a great time!

I also don’t let my husband look at my checking account. I don’t get all the upgrades I want. He doesn’t sleep well on airplanes. So we only upgrade on really long flights.

Neiman Marcus gave me my first credit card as a poor college student. You have good taste. I wish they had products for men. I used to browse the food section in Chicago in the late 80s-90s.

Edited October 16, 2023 by zitsky

jzad · October 16, 2023

So excited to follow along!

theopup · October 17, 2023

The trip appears to be starting off very well

GenerationX · October 17, 2023

Ciao from Rome friends!

We and all of our bags made it out of FCO in less than 20 minutes including a bathroom stop and now we’re in the taxi on our way to Trastevere!

Can I just say, Flagship Business Class has spoiled flying for me forever.

You guys, I saw a lady boarding the plane wearing an exquisite Hermès dress that I’ve seen in Vogue that costs like 3 of our mortgage payments and I think she may have been traveling with Isaac Mizrahi. I asked Jeremy if he could confirm my star sighting but his response was “who’s Isaac Mizrahi?” Men…sigh…🤦🏾‍♀️

But let me back up and share from the beginning of our Flagship experience.

At ORD, the Flagship Lounge is one floor below the Admirals Club and shares an entrance from the terminal. When we came in the shared entrance and scanned our boarding passes, we were given black laminated Flagship Lounge invitation cards to be given to an attendant waiting to greet passengers getting off the elevator on the flagship lounge floor.

We actually started our long layover a floor up in the admirals club though thanks to a very happy coincidence (that I think also says something about the extent of our cruising addiction).

I made a wheels up social media post about our flight and ORD layover before we took off from St. Louis and as we were coming off our STL to ORD flight, we were surprised at our arrival gate by friends we made on my 40th birthday Bermuda cruise on Summit last year! They saw my post just as they happened to be arriving in the same airport a few gates down from a trip to Ireland!!!

We all had a catch up drink in Admirals Club and shared lots of hugs all around, then they headed to make their domestic connection while we went to see how the 1% does airport lounges.

When Jeremy and I walked in the Flagship Lounge we were greeted with flutes of champagne (took me back to the old Celebrity embarkation days, but with actual champagne) and given a tour of the lounge when we told the attendant it was our first time visiting.

There are make your own cocktail stations and a full buffet of sushi, salads and hot food that is much elevated from the food stations and the always a line a mile deep guacamole kiosk in Admirals Club.

I tried a little bit of the hummus, Caesar salad and the white wine chicken and all were very good. Jeremy spotted Patron on the make your own cocktail bar and his eyes lit up like Gen Z’s coming in the living room on Christmas morning.

When it was time to board our flight, as evidenced by his face in the photos, it was very clear that my husband had no idea what all “board and turn left” entailed.

Nobody tell Jeremy but I got this upgrade for a very good price and I’ve now been made some marital promises in exchange for this expression of love that well outweigh my ticket investment.

We were greeted on boarding with welcome glasses of champagne which were refilled regularly during boarding.

Dinner was served in courses with warm bread service. Jeremy and I both had the cheese enchiladas which didn’t wow me but still definitely beat out any first class meal I’ve had in non-Flagship. The star of the meal was the ice cream sundae dessert course. After eating and a couple of glasses of cote de Rhône, I put my seat into lie flat, curled up in my Casper pillow and blanket and slept like a baby until the lights came up for breakfast service. Nice little transition into Rome time.

Apparently Flagship is where AA has been hiding the decent eggs at breakfast too!

The only complaint I have is that wifi didn’t work for the entire flight. As a result, there’s some work I was hoping to wrap up in the air that I’ll have to take care of once we check into our VRBO.

More to come later today from Rome!

Von & John · October 17, 2023

Charla - Fabulous way to travel!!

Maybe someday…

We have enjoyed lay flat business class rarely - but Flagship looks like a whole other world.

Enjoy your time in Rome!!

AJS1984 · October 17, 2023

Excited to follow this. We are on the same cruise. We start our journey tomorrow afternoon - Singapore to Bangkok, night in hotel, Bangkok to Muscat, Muscat to Milan, night in hotel 5 am start to get down to Civitavecchia. I think I could have found an easier journey but as it looks like in your posts - the journey is the start of the experience!

Roll on Friday morning!

LouChamp · October 17, 2023

Aloha. Have been blessed to travel first and business class regularly for decades including my every six weeks between NY and Honolulu on Hawaiian. Problem is I sleep all the way lol. So when I fly alone without the Mrs, it is premium economy as I can sleep sitting up! Our daughter was blessed to be spoiled and now married she is just like me but her husband is awake for an entire flight. They just got back from Japan and it is a 14 hour flight so she has the same “problem”. I suggested when we travel as a family she travels with me premium economy and my wife and her husband travel first or business! 😂 Enjoy the trip!

ILgirl · October 17, 2023

Hi Charla!! I am BEYOND excited for your review!! I returned from the airport this morning after dropping off my very talkative friend who had been here for a week. In the blessed quiet of my house I thought, hey, Charla and Jeremy have to have started their adventure by now. Yay!! I just booked a transatlantic on another line (Celebrity is pricing me out as I am a solo traveler) for April that ends in Rome. I hope to spend three or four days post cruise so am excited to experience the land portion of your journey as well. Thanks, as always, for taking the time to bring us all on your journey. Hope you guys have a blast!!

txtechmk · October 17, 2023

Looking forward to your adventures. Thanks for sharing!

Azulann · October 17, 2023

Happy for both of you that your marvelous trip and cruise in Europe has begun. Hope you do lots of wine tasting tours. I feel in love with Italian wines both white and one reds. Vernacchia and Brunello are my favorite.

GenerationX · October 17, 2023

You guys, I feel like I’m living in a dream!

Jeremy and I were just woken from our afternoon nap by the sounds of ringing church bells echoing through the cobblestone streets outside our apartment.

Speaking of said apartment, when we finally made it here (Rome morning rush hour traffic is no joke. Easily as bad as Chicago), our hostess Antonella met us at our taxi and she and our driver helped bring our luggage into our gorgeous traditional Roman home for the rest of the week!

Can you believe we got this massive apartment for hundreds less than we would’ve paid to stay in a 1 king bed room at a Marriott?

The apartment is on the second floor but fortunately there was a small elevator so Jeremy didn’t have to lug my heaviest bags all the way up. There are a few stairs inside the apartment and up to the doorstep, so this probably wouldn’t be the best choice for anyone mobility challenged.

The second bathroom has a European style washer and dryer which I’m going to have to google up some directions on how to use. But will definitely come in handy to be able to do some laundry before we get on the ship.

Antonella showed us around and left us a sheet with some suggested restaurant info and a number where we can reach her with any questions or issues at any time.

We’re going to shower and dress and head out for an early dinner and exploring in Trastevere. Then we’re planning to grab some gelato and maybe some suppli (watch, I’m gonna gain back all 12 pounds I lost in preparation for this trip in like 48 hours).

We’re still recovering a bit from our long trip and not getting much sleep the past week getting ready (plus a 2 week European tour is a marathon not a sprint) so our late evening plans tonight are to be chill and break open the welcome vino that Antonella left us and enjoy the evening breeze on our terrazzo.