Serenity Review - Miami to San Diego (8-24 June 2024)

[PaulMCO]

Hello fellow cruise critic Crystal cruisers.  We recently completed our Miami to San Diego cruise aboard Serenity.  We have been very active cruisers since COVID and the Genting/Crystal bankruptcy with multiple cruises on Regent, Seabourn, Silversea and one on Explora Journeys.  Admittingly, I was a nay sayer and thought Crystal would never sail again and had 5 bookings lost from the bankruptcy.  This was our first break to schedule a new Crystal cruise and in short – we are happy we did.

 

Embarkation from Miami Terminal E was quick and smooth.  Drove from home to Miami and left car at airport parking and Ubered to the Terminal.  We arrived at 11:30 and by noon we were onboard.

 

First the ship.  Nothing really has changed. Same layout.  Same venues.  New carpets.  Bistro has a new look, and the casino is gone (to be revived in December) and now is an empty unused lounge (soon to be the bridge room).  Ship has a well-maintained old fashion look.  Umi and Osteria (replacing Prego) restaurants have new lighter furnishings. 

 

Demographics. Old. This is something Crystal must improve on going forward to survive.  A few younger families but most of the passengers in the mid to late 80s the rest in late 60s and 70s. The oldest was a spry 101 who did a tour with us.  We are in our 70’s and 60’s and I just retired (except for a few consulting projects).

 

Staterooms.  We had a Saphire veranda suite on deck 9 which was a promotion free upgrade from the Aquamarine suite that was priced.   Totally brand new the cabin we selected was added when the ship was refitted in 2023.    Extremely nice – some annoying nits, which I will discuss later.  Some photos are posted below.  Suite Attendants we fantastic.  Our butler was meh…

 

Food.  The food was exceptional.   From the appetizer to the mains to the desserts, all exceptional.  The complementary wine also was good with lots of selections. Don't like the wine of the day, they have all the previous ones also available.  The select wines and champagnes were extremely pricey around x3 retail.    Still the best overall food at sea.  We were on Regent in April. Regent is probably a close second. All subjective. 

 

Specialty restaurants.  Umi is the same.  Menu the same.  We ate there once, and the food was good. But having been to Japan the previous month, it was good but not over the top.  One issue was that they had ZERO of the specialty sushi/sashimi on board. The best venue is the new Italian Osteria.  Superb.

 

Pool Area – this was not Regent – there were very few chair hogs.  

 

Trident Grill – the same with the same Grill guys – super friendly and efficient.

 

Staff and Management. Nothing changed only better.  Staff are engaged with passengers and willing to do anything possible to please customers.  Managers know passengers’ names.  Our waiter in Waterside was exceptional.  By mid-cruise, we walked up to the Matre’d, and he did not even have to ask for our cabin number and just said table 20.  

 

Enrichment.  Good speakers. Great sessions with Roger McGuinn of the Byrds.  Speakers varied in topics from dry politics/history to engaging personal stories. 

 

Dress.  This cruise is less formal than what we have seen in the past -- a few tuxes.  Many suits and sport jackets on formal nights. There were MANY who brought no jackets, and they had a large supply of these in the office.

 

Excursions had been good.  Well organized and Crystal had one of its staff on every bus.  

 

Let’s talk about the NITs. 

 

TV issues from day 1 – was off more than on.  We had two TVs in the room – both same brand and both used RF remote controls.  Guess what the issue was.  Turn one on and both came on.  Turn one off and the other came on. Crystal is aware of the issues (probably for a year).  The TV reception issue was an antenna issue to be fixed by the contractor MTN in San Diego.

 

Internet.  The Internet was spotty and Crystal is throttling speed and access.  Not all VPNs were allowed by their IT configuration.  Note: I was a Star link beta tester and still a user at home and never have VPN issues.  We are on luxury line, paying luxury prices why are there 2 tiers of service?  (Yes, we know some other lines do same, but some also have download speeds greater than 100 mbs)

 

The lack of an APP was really frustrating for some.  To get the APP on your phone, you need to get a QR code from your room iPad.  I helped several people do this and then pin that link to their browser.  Then again, the APP was very buggy and locked up and there was no way to see your account balance.   The TVs are supposed to allow you to see the reflections and menus daily, but the link on the TV also disappeared after day 2.

 

Tastes.  Again, our opinion, they still have not gotten Tastes right and obviously others think the same with the upcoming Beefbar changes.  Dinner was blah.  Lunch is horrible, bad pizza, bad Chinese noodles, and spaghetti.  Can we be more creative here??

 

Marketplace.  I have always had mixed feelings about the food and the space.  I hate those table partitions; they make the space feel even tighter than it is.  The food was just OK.  Nothing special, but temps were very inconsistent.  Other cruise lines like Regent and Seabourn do this better.  We ended up preferring lunch in Waterside on sea days.

 

Would we book another??  YES indeed in a second.  The issue is that at least for 2024/2025 nothing interests us.  Maybe 2026.   Some foodie pics below.

[basenji56]

Great review. Thank you.  Sorry to hear about the Wifi. Was it unusable for basic texting, WhatsApp, Facebook?

 

Any kids on your sailing? 

[PaulMCO]

29 minutes ago, basenji56 said:

Great review. Thank you.  Sorry to hear about the Wifi. Was it unusable for basic texting, WhatsApp, Facebook?

 

Any kids on your sailing? 

Maybe 10 children at most.  
It was good for email, Facebook.  For WiFi calling it was inconsistent.  Did a Teams call at 6am with my office in Austria.  But could not do a WhatsApp call at noon.  

[Catlover54]

Thank you for your thorough review!  

 

Questions:

1.  In post #1, you say

"

Food.  The food was exceptional.   From the appetizer to the mains to the desserts, all exceptional.  The complementary wine also was good with lots of selections. Don't like the wine of the day, they have all the previous ones also available.  The select wines and champagnes were extremely pricey around x3 retail.    Still the best overall food at sea.  We were on Regent in April. Regent is probably a close second. All subjective."

 

But then you later talk about Tastes and Marketplace as having a blah dinner and a few other problems.

So I assume your "best overall food at sea" comment refers just  to Waterside and the specialty restaurants?

(I also assume you have not cruised on luxury Hapag Lloyd for a food comparison, but of course HL cruising with a lot of Germans is not of great interest to most Americans for obvious reasons :).

 

2.  As for the unfortunate TV comedy, I think we would just likely have unplugged the TV we weren't wanting to use, and then get into a rhythm of replugging and unplugging as needed

🙂

3.  I love seeing the bed in the window, with an easy view of the sea.

Did your bathroom have a tub?

Is there a working hot tub somewhere on the ship other than at the pool?

 

4.  Are there any future plans to get Starlink?  

DH and I were recently on an upper mainstream line with just smoking internet (but we were in a suite so we could get better service, priced accordingly ).  Techie DH was totally addicted, as it was the best we'd ever had on a ship (but of course, there are other problems with mainstreaming)

 

5.  I like that a Crystal rep was on each excursion with you.  Which excursions did you do?

 

6.  You said that when you would dine, the MD would immediately refer you to "Table 20".  Does that mean guests can routinely reserve a table for their cruise ?  Or was this a special arrangement? 

 

7.  What was the entertainment (other than enrichment lectures), and how was it?

 

Thank you for your input.  I mix and match cruise lines (and land trips), and am looking forward to booking a new Crystal cruise once I find the right itinerary.  I think enough time has passed for the major (though not all) bugs to have been flushed out of the trial period, and there are fortunately now deep pockets backing the venture so I worry less about losing more money.

 

Edited June 30 by Catlover54
Typo

[ivyleaguegent]

As promised, this is my review of the June 8, 2024 through June 24, 2024 Serenity Panama Canal cruise.

 

Preface:   My wife and I had been on 3 Seabourn cruises and 3 Regent cruises, both older and newer ships, over the past 18 months. This puts us in a unique position to compare and contrast the cruise lines. Since we both are professionally trained ballroom dancers and foodies our views are filtered through these lenses. Prior to COVID we had sailed Crystal and Silversea.

 

Service.   In one word, superlative.  Examples abound, but the attention to passenger’s happiness started for us even before the cruise. Through research on this website, with the particular help of Keith and others, I determined that while the Symphony offers ballroom dancing in the Starlight Lounge, the Serenity limited ballroom dancing to the Palm Court. The floor in the Palm Court is far too small to do quintessential ballroom dances such as waltz, foxtrot, and tango. Prior to leaving for the cruise I reached out to Crystal administration through social media requesting that the ballroom dancing be moved to the Stardust Lounge. I received a response almost immediately from senior management that they would reach out to onboard staff to determine whether it was possible. Being a cynic, I expected some canned response that it would not be possible. To the contrary, several days before the cruise started I received a message from senior management that ballroom dancing would be offered in the Stardust Lounge during the after-dinner set whenever use of that facility was not preempted. During the cruise ballroom dancing was offered the vast majority of the evenings in the Stardust Lounge.

 

Our Butler, John, and cabin attendant Hela, were above and beyond.  They were always available by phone and whatever we requested was instantly supplied.  It sounds like a cliché but in our experience Crystal just doesn’t know the word “no.”  We requested chaise lounges on our patio and they were provided promptly.

 

There appeared to be more pool servers on deck than passengers.  By the third day of the cruise each of the pool servers  knew our names and what we liked to drink. They were never more than one nod away from being available and frequently inquired whether we wanted anything. Special thanks to Benjamin who went out of his way to supply anything we requested and who has been on Crystal ships for 18 years.

 

The Ship.  One would never know that the ship was over 20 years old from its appearance. The entire ship was immaculate and the renovations are outstanding. We had a newly renovated Sapphire Veranda cabin and it was well-designed, spacious, and beautiful (We did not object to the carpet at all as others have). The shower was large and had a rain shower head, a hand-held shower head, and two body sprays. The water pressure was stronger than my shower at home!  The bed was incredibly comfortable and if the sheets weren’t Pratesi or Frette they sure felt like it.

 

Food.  As stated above we are foodies.  The food was uniformly excellent. Far superior to the food on Regent and Seabourn.  The variety of the offerings in The Waterside are adequate but we thought a bit on the skimpy side. We would have liked a larger menu. The selections at the breakfast and lunch buffets in The Marketplace were very good. The servers were excellent and the food always arrived hot (assuming, of course, that the dishes were supposed to be hot). The hamburgers at the Trident Grill were just average and a grilled chicken sandwich instead of a “chicken burger” should have been offered.  We were underwhelmed by the food in Tastes at both lunch and dinner.  It’s a good thing it is being replaced by  BeefBar.

 

Entertainment. We generally do not go to production shows so I cannot comment on them. However, the Freddie Mercury imitator was poor.  The duo who played the ballroom music in the Palm Court and in the Stardust Lounge, Keys & Melody Duo, were excellent.  Very talented and they actually knew what a waltz, foxtrot, and tango were as opposed to every other band on a cruise ship we encountered who had no idea whatsoever.  All of the ballroom dances were well attended and there were four ambassadors hosts who were busy dancing most of the evenings as well as being very nice guys. The DJ, DJ Emotion, was atrocious. He had the same infirmity as most musicians we have encountered on ultra-premium cruise lines which is that he was unaware that any music was created after 1975. Any requests we made were met with blank stares. There were a large number of sea days on this cruise which is one of the reasons that we chose it. The music on deck was the same one half-hour loop over and over and over again for the entire 16 days. I requested a change of the music but that did not happen.  There were no on deck parties during the entire cruise that featured music and food unlike on our Seabourn and Regent cruises. Crystal’s idea of a deck party was having the servers circulate with trays of the drink of the day and the aforementioned terrible DJ playing “YMCA.” The band should have been playing on the pool deck at least several hours in the afternoon on sea days. I share Paul's comments about the Internet, which is StarLink.

 

Personal Preferences.  We were not pleased with the Ortigia bath products. We would have much preferred L’Occitane or Moulten Brown.  The alternative bath products were Tazarin which were unimpressive and the bars of soap were postage stamp –sized.

 

Summary. There is no question in our minds that Crystal is superior to all of the other ultra-premium cruise lines by far. We will not sail on another cruise line in the future unless there are unusual circumstances, such as the need for an expedition ship or a river cruise.

 

I hope this review has been of helpful.

[ivyleaguegent]

Ps. The spa needs major work.  The steam room and sauna were far too small and the water temperature in the showers changed from hot to cold and back again without touching the controls.  Only a few jets were working in either of the hot tubs.

[PaulMCO]

2 hours ago, Catlover54 said:

Thank you for your thorough review!  

 

Questions:

1.  In post #1, you say

"

Food.  The food was exceptional.   From the appetizer to the mains to the desserts, all exceptional.  The complementary wine also was good with lots of selections. Don't like the wine of the day, they have all the previous ones also available.  The select wines and champagnes were extremely pricey around x3 retail.    Still the best overall food at sea.  We were on Regent in April. Regent is probably a close second. All subjective."

 

But then you later talk about Tastes and Marketplace as having a blah dinner and a few other problems.

So I assume your "best overall food at sea" comment refers just  to Waterside and the specialty restaurants?

(I also assume you have not cruised on luxury Hapag Lloyd for a food comparison, but of course HL cruising with a lot of Germans is not of great interest to most Americans for obvious reasons :).

 

2.  As for the unfortunate TV comedy, I think we would just likely have unplugged the TV we weren't wanting to use, and then get into a rhythm of replugging and unplugging as needed

🙂

3.  I love seeing the bed in the window, with an easy view of the sea.

Did your bathroom have a tub?

Is there a working hot tub somewhere on the ship other than at the pool?

 

4.  Are there any future plans to get Starlink?  

DH and I were recently on an upper mainstream line with just smoking internet (but we were in a suite so we could get better service, priced accordingly ).  Techie DH was totally addicted, as it was the best we'd ever had on a ship (but of course, there are other problems with mainstreaming)

 

5.  I like that a Crystal rep was on each excursion with you.  Which excursions did you do?

 

6.  You said that when you would dine, the MD would immediately refer you to "Table 20".  Does that mean guests can routinely reserve a table for their cruise ?  Or was this a special arrangement? 

 

7.  What was the entertainment (other than enrichment lectures), and how was it?

 

Thank you for your input.  I mix and match cruise lines (and land trips), and am looking forward to booking a new Crystal cruise once I find the right itinerary.  I think enough time has passed for the major (though not all) bugs to have been flushed out of the trial period, and there are fortunately now deep pockets backing the venture so I worry less about losing more money.

 

 

To answer specifically:

1) Overall Crystal is tops on food.  Majority of meals eaten in Waterside.  I think Regent does do the buffet morning and afternoon better than Crystal.No Hapag Lloyd cruises so far.  Considering I have worked for 30 years for an Austrian firm, no issues with German.

2) Yes the TV was unplugged in the bedroom.  other issues were not so simple.

3) Large shower only with three modes, rain water, hand spray and body spray.  This is for the 2023 and 2018 designs.  The Classic has a tub and a small separate shower.  Two spas by the pool, were broken at the start of the cruise - supposed to be fixed by day 3. 

4) That was Starlink.  Crystal throttles Starlink.  For what reason? Possibly the the rest of the IT infrastructure cannot handle this.  We were on Explora journeys and that being a new ship had no limits as to speed, bandwidth, or content allowed.

5) We did private tours most of the time.  One excursion was the Mangrove Cruise in Quepos.  Which was excellent.

6) Not really.  We are early diners.  We like to keep the same waiter. So being one of the first in Waterside mad that easy.

7) We did not attend any of the formal shows. You can see what was available in a previous thread where the Reflections was being posted daily.

 

Hope I answered most of your questions...

 

Edited June 30 by PaulMCO

[Txcotn]

2 hours ago, ivyleaguegent said:

Special thanks to Benjamin who went out of his way to supply anything we requested and who has been on Crystal ships for 18 years.

 

 

The band should have been playing on the pool deck at least several hours in the afternoon on sea days. 

 

We met Benjamin in 1999, which makes his tenure at least 25 years!

 

Why  on earth would you want the band all afternoon????? That's my place of refuge and most people are reading or napping. Live music during lunch, great, but all afternoon? Deliver me!

 

And why complain about bath amenities? Can one not put up with the provided soap and shampoo for a couple of weeks? Or bring your own if you're that fussy! The ship soap and other is probably miles above the grocery store soap you use at home.🙄

[Keith1010]

We were in the same suite category but the classic one on the Holiday Cruise.  Same issue with the TV but also had it when we stayed there under old Crystal.  My success rate though was around 80% being able to turn one TV on and not the other. I would point the remote down towards the floor of over towards a wall and this would turn on the one closest to the remote but not the otter one. 

 

Keith

[Emdee]

If you like a particular table just ask for it.

On Serenity we liked one and it became ours….when we returned to the ship after a couple of months it again became ours.