Mercury scheduled for a face lift?

[kfbesq]

Does anyone know if Mercury is scheduled for dry dock in the next 12 months? I'm considering bringing a few first-timers out on her next May but I'm very concerned by reports that Celebrity is letting her go.

 

I was on Mercury last about 4 years ago and even then she was showing undue wear and needed repair. The reviews I'm reading now don't give me a warm and fuzzy. It has taken me years to talk these people into trying a cruise. I don't want them to be underwelmed.

 

Your thoughts?

[Texasannie]

Don't know about scheduled face lift, but trust me, they would be under whelmed! Even without all the damage done by the constant bleaching in the past month, the ship is fairly shabby. Not a comfortable chair anywhere! Bed mattresses are long overdue for replacement. I would send them elsewhere.:p

[SandyMc]

Last rumor I heard was that it was scheduled for drydock sometime next winter or spring - hopefully before May. It really is something of a mess right now!

[cruiselover20]

Well, add the Summit to the list. We were in a Celebrity Suite, 9096, dirty, old ORANGE furniture. The ship is too well worn for it's age. Celebrity is slipping IMHO

[chessbriar]

Looking at the current schedule for Mercury in 2007, there is a large hole from Sept 21- November 12. They could fill the hole with an extensive drydock or some Pacific coast cruises. We'll see.

[tbelian]

Yea virtually all celebrity ships are in a total state of disrepair. Old, dingy, treadworn. Some ships have problems that even drydock would not correct. You certrainly wouldn't wan't to expend all that effort to convince your friends to take a cruise and wind up sending them on a 'garbage scow'.

 

"

Scotty: Well, sir, I figured it wasn't worth fighting over...after all, we're big enough to take a few insults, aren' we?

Kirk: [Even more confused] What was it they said that started the fight?

Scotty: They called the Enterprise a garbage-scow!!! Sir!

Kirk: I see. And that's when you hit the Klingons?

Scotty: [Obviously proud of himself] Yessir.

Kirk: You hit the Klingons 'cause they insulted the Enterprise, not because.....

Scotty: Well, sir...this was a matta of pride!! "

[Andy]

Looking at the current schedule for Mercury in 2007, there is a large hole from Sept 21- November 12. They could fill the hole with an extensive drydock or some Pacific coast cruises. We'll see.

 

Hi Rick !

 

That's a pretty big hole in her schedule. I wonder if they are getting serious about doing a Century type upgrade. I would think Mercury would be easier to do, as she already has many balconies, where Century does not.

[mcf]

I e-mail Celebrity with this question. Here is the reply.

 

Thank you for your email. We appreciate the opportunity to respond.

 

The next Dry Dock for the Mercury is 4/13/2007.

 

Thank you for choosing Celebrity Cruises.

 

John Balboa

Customer Service Representative

[greeneg]

Interesting......I will be curious to see how much ( if any) refurbishing they do "on the fly". It would certainly seem that they'll have to do something about the damage caused on the bleach cruise.

 

I hope that they do get the ship cleaned up before we get on in January; we have very fond memories of Mercury from a trip around the Horn and South America in 2002. As a matter of fact, Mercury is our second favorite in the fleet; Zenith is still the champ in our book.

[Brad1185]

After hearing nothing but negative comments on the Mercury, we just cancelled the Dec 1, 2006 cruise and changed to the Dec 2, 2006 cruise on Hal. A bleached out, disease invested, tattered, worn ship, does not sound very fun.

[HollyJ614]

I just emailed Celebrity about this drydock for Mercury...........I am currently booked on the April 6th, 2007 10night cruise to the Mexican Riviera.....which means if the posted drydock is correct.........we have booked a cruise to the repair shop!!!! Yikes!!!

[chessbriar]

I e-mail Celebrity with this question. Here is the reply.

 

Thank you for your email. We appreciate the opportunity to respond.

 

The next Dry Dock for the Mercury is 4/13/2007.

 

Thank you for choosing Celebrity Cruises.

 

John Balboa

Customer Service Representative

 

I think I'd e-mail John back and ask what they are going to do with the bookings they have been taking for the last year fot the April 6 and 16th cruises.

 

Once again, CS doesn't seem to know what's going on.

[C 2 C]

We sailed Mercury for 31 days starting Feb 3rd and we had no real issues. I would not hesitate to sail her again.

[Jeano222]

Hey Brad1185: I too have been concerned about the Mercury. we were booked on 12/1 sailing. I ended up cancelling and booked a SS suite on HAL Oosterdam 12/2 sailing for less than I was paying for a category 2A. 179 sqaure feet in a 2A compared to 280 square feet for the SS suite makes a huge difference, plus I understand they have heavenly beds. I'm a diehard Celebrity fan, but willing to give this a try. No way did I want to look at faded carpets, furniture etc.

[FlorenceItaly]

Hey Brad1185: I too have been concerned about the Mercury. we were booked on 12/1 sailing. I ended up cancelling and booked a SS suite on HAL Oosterdam 12/2 sailing for less than I was paying for a category 2A. 179 sqaure feet in a 2A compared to 280 square feet for the SS suite makes a huge difference, plus I understand they have heavenly beds. I'm a diehard Celebrity fan, but willing to give this a try. No way did I want to look at faded carpets, furniture etc.

 

You will LOVE the Oosterdam. The crew and the staff are the BEST. I just got off her last month. I have never stayed in an SS but I hear they are wonderful. Free feel to join us over on the HAL board. We are a very friendly group :).

 

 

Marie

[barbydaul]

I just emailed Celebrity about this drydock for Mercury...........I am currently booked on the April 6th, 2007 10night cruise to the Mexican Riviera.....which means if the posted drydock is correct.........we have booked a cruise to the repair shop!!!! Yikes!!!

 

My husband and I are also booked for the 4-6-07 cruise on the Mercury, plus to boot, we were on her for the 4-7-06 10-night sailing and had a wonderful time. So we booked again for next year-even same cabin.

 

Barb

[LETS PARTY]

Hey Brad1185: I too have been concerned about the Mercury. we were booked on 12/1 sailing. I ended up cancelling and booked a SS suite on HAL Oosterdam 12/2 sailing for less than I was paying for a category 2A. 179 sqaure feet in a 2A compared to 280 square feet for the SS suite makes a huge difference, plus I understand they have heavenly beds. I'm a diehard Celebrity fan, but willing to give this a try. No way did I want to look at faded carpets, furniture etc.

 

I've been on both out of San Diego B2B Nov 05 Mercury OK:eek: but you'll love Oosterdam SS cabin, of the 40 cruises we've taken It may be the best we've ever been on!!:) :)

Rob

[FlorenceItaly]

again, but I wanted to give Celebrity a try. The only Celebrity ship I have been on is the Horizon in Oct 2004. I do alot of solo cruising (3 out of the last 4 HAL) and solo cruising on Celebrity is very cost prohibitive. Dh will be on this cruise with me so I saw the opportunity to cruise Celebrity again. My solo pricing on the Horizon was very low due to it being a older ship, and it was a longer itinerary. My Mercury cruise is more than almost a year away, so there is room for improvement. Unfortunately, our sailing is BEFORE the drydock. I always seem to just miss the drydocks :). We cruised on the Zuiderdam in Dec, and it was the sailing JUST BEFORE Drydock!

 

Marie

[Brad1185]

We completed the cancellation and rebooking of the Oosterdam today. Same price ($20 cheaper) as you said leaves a day later exact same ports. We were on the Maasdam earlier in the year, older ship, great condition, enjoyed the food, service, etc. The Celebrity rep said not to believe was has been written on the internet. The Mercury comments are more than one or two disgruntled passengers making unfounded statements.

 

Maybe if more people do what we did and Jeano222, Celebrity might start getting the message.

 

We live in SD so either way, its an easy trip to the pier.

[Jeano222]

Don't get me wrong I love Celebrity but they seem to be cutting corners everywhere, I was very disappointed in the changes to Elite program, we are Diamond on RCCL and the perks are wonderful. I can tell you that every Celebrity ship we have sailed on has had the finest service and food. We sailed on Zenith last month and the condition of the suite was awful, I can only imagine what the other cabins were like. The carpet was so dirty we wouldn't walk without shoes on. There were new bedspreads, bedskirt and drapes in the suite and I believe in all the other cabins too. I suspect they are planning to sell her in the not too distant future, like Horizon

 

Brad would love to meet you on Oosterdam, for some reason I can't get my email address in my profile, my email is

jstultz2002@yahoo.com.

[awinner]

Interesting......I will be curious to see how much ( if any) refurbishing they do "on the fly". It would certainly seem that they'll have to do something about the damage caused on the bleach cruise.

 

 

Can someone elaborate on this "bleach cruise"?

[CRUZBUDS]

Maybe we were having too good a time to notice the terrible condition that some are reporting- we got off the Mercury three weeks ago, sailed on her 6 months ago and are booked again this October. We think she is a wonderful ship with very good food and service. We saw none of the bleach damage. They were replacing carpet and mattress while we were on board. We had about 40 CC people on board who I believe were uniformly happy with he ship. We've toured the Oosterdam and it is a lovely new ship. We'll probably sail on her someday, but please look at the postive reports on the Mercury as well.

[tarheelmjfan]

We were also on the 4/7 cruise. I didn't really see that many things wrong with the ship. Yes, some of the carpet had bleach streaks, but it's not like that negatively affected our cruise. The biggest impact we saw of all the bleaching was that the elevators missed various floors. You had to try to remember which one skipped which floor or get off at the closest floor & walk the steps. This may have been corrected by now. To be honest, I didn't like the way she was decorated compared to the other ships in the fleet. If you've already sailed on her, you know how she's decorated, so that's not an issue at all. Personally, I think the wear & tear on the ship has been exaggerated. The issues we encountered had nothing to do with the way the ship looked. I wouldn't worry about her appearance. :)

[Lois R]

Hi Rick !

 

That's a pretty big hole in her schedule. I wonder if they are getting serious about doing a Century type upgrade. I would think Mercury would be easier to do, as she already has many balconies, where Century does not.

 

Hello Andy and Rick:)

 

Home from sailing Mercury to Alaska....had a FABULOUS TIME.:D

 

As for the above statement.....I heard from more than a few folks

Mercury and Galaxy would be going the same way as Century.

Nothing definitive of course but that was the rumor....yes, I know

rumors sometimes are very INaccurate but just telling you what

I heard.

[sammiedawg]

Its very interesting for me to read the comments about the conditions on various Celebrity ships. I posted 18 months ago about the rundown conditions on the Century and I was roundly derided on these boards. My comments were 100 % truthful and correspond to critical posts about the Mercury, Summit and other Celebrity ships. My TA friend in another state told me this line is not competing well in the marketplace. Word of mouth has not been good