Semi Mini Cruise Review - Equinox Jan 8th, 2024

[dalmoradie]

On 1/18/2024 at 2:27 PM, cwayne said:

Loved, loved the ship! This was our 3rd and 4th time on the Equinox. We are elite with Celebrity so have sailed quite a bit with her. We found the food to be VERY good in the MDR and we ate most of our breakfasts, some lunches and dinners there, with the exception of the specialty restaurants of which we did all 3, Tuscan Grille, Murano and Petit Chef. The filet mignon in Tuscan was outstanding. The lamb in Murano was equally good and the lobster and show in Petit Chef were also wonderful. We are doing the b2b so will be in Tuscan again tonight. The staff as always is top notch. The ship was spotless. She is going in for her"facelift" in April so am excited to see how she looks after that. Embarkation was only slightly delayed due to a Coast Guard inspection. The staff in the Martini bar always put on a great show and I have a couple of new favorite martinis. I already miss some of the wonderful people we met last week. I hope our new shipmates are equally as nice. 

we will be on the Equinox next month can. you tell me which day  the lobster is served at Le Petit Chef?  Thanks

[Cruise till you drop]

22 hours ago, dalmoradie said:

we will be on the Equinox next month can. you tell me which day  the lobster is served at Le Petit Chef?  Thanks

We didn’t eat in this restaurant but I remembered the sales pitches in the entrance to OVC and it seemed like they were doing lobster on several nights in the middle portion of the cruise

[janabelle61]

23 hours ago, Cruise till you drop said:

Tell Suthan “hey” from the party of 8 (DW and I were in room 1668).

 

When we first dined with Suthan, he was the asst waiter and was working alone that night and did a fabulous job. No idea what happens to that waiter but by the next day or two, Suthan was promoted to the main waiter. You will be impressed.

 

Because we were Anytime dining, we got moved to various tables but the bulk were with either Suthan, as well as Yuhda.  Both were tremendous

Suthan said to say hello! He was very surprised that I was aware that he was in Anytime (he's now in fixed seating) and that I was aware of his promotion 😉.   As you say, he's very impressive and I wanted him to be aware he's getting great feedback!

[GoldenZoo]

We will be doing this itinerary in March.  What theme nights did they have?  And was it only 2 nights for Evening Chic?

[Cruise till you drop]

2 hours ago, GoldenZoo said:

We will be doing this itinerary in March.  What theme nights did they have?  And was it only 2 nights for Evening Chic?

Yes only 2 Chic nights but honestly I can’t really tell anymore between casual and chic except for the very few people that dress up to the nines (most have similar dress code for both casual and chic)

 

Not sure what you mean by theme nights

[GoldenZoo]

Some nights are themed Caribbean, or 80’s, or White Party….I have even had a western night on past cruises.  It’s just an opportunity to switch up what you wear and coordinate the music for an activity.

[Cruise till you drop]

5 minutes ago, GoldenZoo said:

Some nights are themed Caribbean, or 80’s, or White Party….I have even had a western night on past cruises.  It’s just an opportunity to switch up what you wear and coordinate the music for an activity.

We had nothing like that but sounds fun

[Beachy_keen]

On 1/18/2024 at 6:06 AM, Cruise till you drop said:

Cruise - 10 night Southern Caribbean from Jan 8 to 18th on Celebrity Equinox.  Stayed in an SV on 11th deck.  Ports of call - Antigua, Barbados, St Lucia, Martinique and St Kitts

 

Travelled with 3 other couples (total group of 😎

 

Background - DW and I cruised close to 25 times on Carnival, Princess and Celebrity.  This is our 3rd Celebrity and first 2 were on the Edge on SV’s (I mention this as some of my ratings are swayed because of traveling on the Edge)

 

Here goes:

 

Embarkation (10 out of 10) - we had 11:30 slot but showed up at 11:10 and got checked through very quickly

 

Ship (8 out of 10) - we thought the ship was in great shape and it was decorated and maintained very nicely

 

Weather (10 out of 10) - we lucked out with both great weather during our cruise and terrible weather back home.  A little rain in St Kitts but it cleared by the time we reached the beach.

 

Staff (10 out of 10) - we thought everyone worked very hard to please the guests and they were all very pleasant.  Room steward Efrain and waiters Yuhda and Suthan were wonderful

 

Celebrity app (7 out of 10) - it was generally ok but there were several activities that were not accurate and we ended up missing some things because the app indicated wrong place and time.

 

Food (8 out of 10) - overall I would have to say we were generally pleased.  Breakfast and Lunch in the OVC were very good and dinners in Silhouette were good.  Lots of choices and food was good most nights.  They had Prime Rib on the 1st night and Lobster, Beef Wellington on the 2nd last night

 

Advanced Dining Reservations (1 out of 10) - we all had Anytime dining.  This category was probably one of our biggest pet peeves that we couldn’t ever connect our reservations prior to the cruise so that we could pre book Anytime Dining (we tried everything in vain).  Even when we boarded the ship, we couldn’t get decent dining times together.  Celebrity IT and systems are awful.

 

MDR and Walk in seating (8 out of 10) - Because of above, we relied on Walk in seating and generally were able to get in with a relatively small wait, which made us wonder why they couldn’t give us advanced reservations.  Also we kept getting moved around to different tables in the dining room even though we generally arrived at the same time daily.

 

Specialty restaurant (6 out of 10) - we did one night in Tuscan Grille and it was basically ok but I can’t say it was a step up from MDR to be paying $55pp

 

Casino (9 out of 10) - love that it’s non smoking .  Open hours at 10am seemed odd.  We liked that they had Deal or no  Deal but none of our group ever won enough matches to get a prize.

 

Bars (7 out of 10) - during busy times they lacked enough servers and it was tough to get a drink.  And we never really saw many bar servers roaming around like we used to.  Martini bar show at 10pm was incredible.

 

Music (8 out of 10) - they had lots of music around the ship and the talent was pretty good

 

Theater Shows (8 out of 10) - they had good talented singers and dancers who were in the final week of their contract and they did well.  Acrobats were especially talented.  Craig A Meyers Elton John show was the highlight of all the shows.

 

Pool area (7 out of 10) - if you got there early enough it wasn’t hard to get a deck chair but if you waited till closer to 10am on sea days, the deck got very crowded.  Hot tubs were plentiful but always busy it seemed unless you went early morning or late afternoon

 

Walking track (2 of of 10) - next big pet peeve. Distance is good at 8 laps per mile but the track goes right through many deck chair areas and the smoking areas.  Also many people use the track to get around so you’re constantly running into a lot of slow traffic which was very frustrating

 

Drink package (6 out of 10) - it is very frustrating to have the package yet constantly have to pay an up charge as many drinks exceed the $10 max by like a dollar or two, which many times required you to sign a receipt for the difference.  Very nickel and dime-ish if you ask me.  My guess is it’s to frustrate the clients to sign up for the Premium package. 

 

Internet (8 out of 10) - you can’t do alot of stuff with basic package but it was enough for us for texting, looking up stuff on the internet, checking emails, etc.

 

Stateroom - SV (7 out of 10) - location at back of the ship we love, however, you do get a bit of black soot on the balcony (room steward did a good job to keep it clean).  Room is smaller than the Edge and storage space is terrible. Bathroom size isn’t too bad.  TV channel choices are not great but we could find something usually. Lack of electrical outlets (nothing on the nightstand).

 

Sunset Bar and Green space (5 out of 10) - bar is nice and the views are awesome but in the lawn areas near the bar is smoking so not very enjoyable for non smokers

 

Ports and Excursions 

• Antigua (8 out of 10) - we did a private tour with Lawrence of Antigua to English Harbour, Nelson's Dockyard, Shirley Heights, and the entire national park. Then we went to Valley Church beach.  Unfortunately long time spent in a van getting there from the port.
• Barbados (7 out of 10) - did ship tour to Harbor Lights beach. Beach was nice but Celebrity screwed up with the pick up back to the ship so we were 30 min late getting back.
• St Lucia (6 out of 10) - did a private island tour with Cosol tours which took 7.25 hours instead of 5-6 hours and missed the waterfall stop.  Seemed to spend 4.25 hours of that in a van driving and the tour took us to many short sites where there were many push vendors.
• Martinique (10 out of 10) - did private island tour with Karambole tours which was one of the best excursions we’ve ever done
• St Kitts (7 out of 10) - did ship tour to Nevis which included island highlights, lunch and Pinney’s beach.  Not sure it was worth what we were charged but was a nice day

 

 

Disembarkation (10 out of 10) - we changed to Group 1 with an 8:10am plan.  Ship docked at 6:45am and we got called at 7:45am.  Arrived at airport and through security by 8:30am (flight at 11:06am)

 

 

OVERALL - I would give this cruise a very respectable 8 out of 10.  And again, I think some of my ratings are swayed with us having sailed the Edge in the past.  

We would sail this class of ship again (although our next 2 are on the Beyond and XCel).

Hi!  What type of tour did you do with Karambole?  Having a hard time choosing beaches to south vs rainforest to the north as Martinique is so big.  Self drive or excursion.  I am not a big fan of group excursions so a private tour could be the ticket.

[Cruise till you drop]

4 hours ago, Beachy_keen said:

Hi!  What type of tour did you do with Karambole?  Having a hard time choosing beaches to south vs rainforest to the north as Martinique is so big.  Self drive or excursion.  I am not a big fan of group excursions so a private tour could be the ticket.

we did the Pilet et Face tour and loved it

 

https://www.karamboletoursmartinique.com/en-GB/offers/pile-et-face.html

 

 

Edited January 26 by Cruise till you drop

[Beachy_keen]

Thank you!  Info and recommendations are always good!!

[baypeople]

On 1/18/2024 at 2:27 PM, cwayne said:

Loved, loved the ship! This was our 3rd and 4th time on the Equinox. We are elite with Celebrity so have sailed quite a bit with her. We found the food to be VERY good in the MDR and we ate most of our breakfasts, some lunches and dinners there, with the exception of the specialty restaurants of which we did all 3, Tuscan Grille, Murano and Petit Chef. The filet mignon in Tuscan was outstanding. The lamb in Murano was equally good and the lobster and show in Petit Chef were also wonderful. We are doing the b2b so will be in Tuscan again tonight. The staff as always is top notch. The ship was spotless. She is going in for her"facelift" in April so am excited to see how she looks after that. Embarkation was only slightly delayed due to a Coast Guard inspection. The staff in the Martini bar always put on a great show and I have a couple of new favorite martinis. I already miss some of the wonderful people we met last week. I hope our new shipmates are equally as nice. 

So nice to have met you both!  I echo your thoughts.  We, too, loved the ship and will be excited to sail on her again after she gets her facelift.  We were in Aqua so had meals in BLU which were fabulous.  Also, there were no wait times for tables.  It's  a smaller venue so it's quieter than the MDR.

Hope our paths will cross again.

Lynn

[baypeople]

On 1/18/2024 at 3:28 PM, Cruise till you drop said:

 I could be wrong but I recall both port and starboard sides of Sunset bar to have ashtrays on the tables

Only on one side when I was up there.

[baypeople]

On 1/18/2024 at 4:27 PM, Cruise till you drop said:

One of the things I noticed is many smoking areas (more than any other ship we’ve experienced).  There are several on Deck 5 deck, Sunset bar, Deck 14 by the Master Grille, maybe other areas

I don't believe that there is any smoking near the Mast Grill.  I love going up there for burgers and would certainly have noticed if there was smoke in the air.

[baypeople]

Ship tours that were excellent--

Barbados - George Washington House and Garrison Tunnels

St. Kitts - Culinary adventure and plantation house (not the exact name)

[cwayne]

11 hours ago, baypeople said:

So nice to have met you both!  I echo your thoughts.  We, too, loved the ship and will be excited to sail on her again after she gets her facelift.  We were in Aqua so had meals in BLU which were fabulous.  Also, there were no wait times for tables.  It's  a smaller venue so it's quieter than the MDR.

Hope our paths will cross again.

Lynn

Lynn, we SO enjoyed meeting both of you and wish we could have had more time together. I surely hope our paths cross again. We booked the b2b May 3rd 2025 Barcelona to Rome on the Equinox.  Take a look at it. Till we meet again, Monika and Wayne

[Cruise till you drop]

11 hours ago, baypeople said:

I don't believe that there is any smoking near the Mast Grill.  I love going up there for burgers and would certainly have noticed if there was smoke in the air.

You are correct.  It was the other side called Master Bar.  Or was just beside the walking track.  Some days it wasn’t bad and others were really bad as you walked past it trying to get a healthy stroll

 

Edited January 29 by Cruise till you drop

[Z'Loth]

16 hours ago, baypeople said:

Barbados - George Washington House and Garrison Tunnels

 

I actually did that on my own along with visiting the Barbados Museum & Historical Society. It was a short walk between the two locations. 

[CruiseAngel218]

Hi,

Sailing on the Equinox on Feb. 15th, Quick question who is the Cruise Director onboard?

 

Thx

Liz

[Cruise till you drop]

53 minutes ago, CruiseAngel218 said:

Hi,

Sailing on the Equinox on Feb. 15th, Quick question who is the Cruise Director onboard?

 

Thx

Liz

It was a gal from Oklahoma but can’t remember her name.  She was pretty good

[horseymike]

46 minutes ago, Cruise till you drop said:

It was a gal from Oklahoma but can’t remember her name.  She was pretty good

Her name is Crystal.

[Cruise till you drop]

9 hours ago, horseymike said:

Her name is Crystal.

Yes that’s it.  Thanks