Celebrity Infinity 6/08

[relo854]

First cruise - thinking about booking the above. I don' see too much info on the Infinity or their Alaskan cruise. Any comments are greatly appreciated...thanks in advance.

[GMoney]

You will find that some folks are passionately against X in Alaska due to their poor track record of azipod problems on ships there.

 

I like X and spent 14 days on Infinity to Hawaii. I love the ship and I don't think I'd let past pod problems scare me away. It would all boil down to itinerary and price for me.

[GMoney]

I checked the itinerary and I would not opt for this cruise. IMO, you simply do not get enough time in Juneau and Ketchikan.

[Sunshine Gal]

First cruise - thinking about booking the above. I don' see too much info on the Infinity or their Alaskan cruise. Any comments are greatly appreciated...thanks in advance.

 

The problems mentioned above are caused by a design flaw in the propulsion system (PODS) on some Celebrity ships. The problem that plagues Celebrity m-class ships (Infinity, Summit & Millennium) are not Azapod problems. The Azapods are used by many other cruise ships and have never had any major recurring problems. The propulsion system (pods) used by Celebrity are made by a different manufacturer and are called Mermaid pods.

 

Of the three Celebrity ships that are having these problems the Infinity is by far the worst offender, with eight of the same failures in less than the six and 1/2 year life of the ship. The Infinity began the year with this same pod problem that began back in the middle of November of last year and sailed until May 20 before Celebrity finally put the ship in dry dock to make repairs. This decision affected the passengers on the first cruise of 2007 to Alaska. When the pods are failing the ship must reduce speed which in turn causes missed ports and late arrivals to ports. While the good service, food and entertainment lure some back to these Celebrity ships, in my opinion taking a big additional risk of one of these failures ruining your trip, is just not a good bet, especially since that the same good service, food & entertainment are available on most major cruise lines.

While it is quite true that the chances of not encourting one of these problem cruises are better than the chance that you would, when it does happen, trust me, it can ruin a cruise.

 

Hope this helps.

 

If you have any other questions please post on this board or feel free to email me at: dwnbolton@yahoo.com

 

Dawn

 

 

 

 

Hope this helps.

[relo854]

I'm really shocked at your responses!! The travel agent raved about this ship - she said she went thru the Panama Canal on this ship a couple years ago and loved it!! I'm wondering why I can't find too much info/comments on this ship!! We were looking at RCCL first, then she recommend this one...it is A LOT cheaper than RCCL. I just checked this ship and the RCCL .... both spend the same time at Juneau, The Celebrity spends 6 hours in Ketchian...spends a full day in Sitka and spends a long time in Victoria, BC. In addition to Juneau, RCCL spends a full day in Icy Strait and in Skagway. I don't know what to do...we really want to see Alaska and the beauty of the glaciers and wildlife. We also don't want to be on a ship that is prone to problems. RCCL seem to have better excursions.....the stops with Celebrity seem to have more historical rather than glacier/wildlife.....There is a big price differance between the two cruise lines..still is an expensive trip (we're coming from the Boston area). I think I'll check out the other 2 cruise lines to see what they have to offer............thanks for your comments. More comments on this thred are still welcomed!!

[NancyIL]

Are you looking only at roundtrip cruises? Holland America has some very good roundtrip initieraries from both Seattle and Vancouver. I especially like the Westerdam's itinerary out of Seattle: http://www.hollandamerica.com/dest/itinerary.do?selectedItin=20080608:W838:A8W007&dest=A Most ships that stop in Victoria are there for only a few hours in the evening, and the Infinity is no exception (7 p.m. - midnight).

 

We loved our one-way cruise on the Coral Princess, followed by 8 days driving around Alaska with a rental car. Next summer I'll do another northbound cruise + land trip - this time on HAL Veendam to see a different glacier and several different ports.

[relo854]

We are looking for roundtrip...I will check out the HA cruise you mentioned...thank you. I also want to check out Norwegien Cruiseline.

[Sunshine Gal]

I'm really shocked at your responses!! The travel agent raved about this ship - she said she went thru the Panama Canal on this ship a couple years ago and loved it!! I'm wondering why I can't find too much info/comments on this ship!! We were looking at RCCL first, then she recommend this one...it is A LOT cheaper than RCCL. I just checked this ship and the RCCL .... both spend the same time at Juneau, The Celebrity spends 6 hours in Ketchian...spends a full day in Sitka and spends a long time in Victoria, BC. In addition to Juneau, RCCL spends a full day in Icy Strait and in Skagway. I don't know what to do...we really want to see Alaska and the beauty of the glaciers and wildlife. We also don't want to be on a ship that is prone to problems. RCCL seem to have better excursions.....the stops with Celebrity seem to have more historical rather than glacier/wildlife.....There is a big price differance between the two cruise lines..still is an expensive trip (we're coming from the Boston area). I think I'll check out the other 2 cruise lines to see what they have to offer............thanks for your comments. More comments on this thred are still welcomed!!

 

Princess also offers some very good round trips from Seattle. The HAL ships are also very good. If you can another option is to cruise one way to Alaska. These cruises on Princess often have one full day at Glacier Bay and one full day at College Fjord.

 

Your travel agent was no doubt telling the truth about her Panama cruise on the Infinity. The ship is good as long as there are no pod problems. As I said the problem only comes in when there are mechanical problems and you start missing ports!

 

Your travel agent either is not knowledgeable about cruise ships or even worse knew about these possible problems on Celebrity ships and did not tell you. In my opinion any TA worth their salt would have warned you about these serious mechanical problems. That said, in defense of your TA, Celebrity is not very forthcoming about these problems when asked.

Dawn

[Sunshine Gal]

Hi again relo834:

 

I was thinking about my post and I don't in any way mean to imply that you could not have a good time as long as one of the Celebrity m-class ships (Infinity, Summit or Millennium is not having pod problems. On our cruises on these ships the food, service and entertainment have always been fine. There are many who have been lucky and have not encountered any of these recurring pod problems on their cruises and are of course are satisfied with Celebrity and their experiences.

If you want the facts about this problem, instead of posts that say "I hate Celebrity m-class ships" or "I love Celebrity m-class ships", there is a thread devoted to this problem at the top of the Celebrity board.

[relo854]

We didn't like the itenary of this ship and decided on one of the Princess ships. To my amazement, the ship had limited cabin availablity for it's June 2008 cuise!!! Also, we would have been on a waitlist for early dinner seating. We decided to wait for the 2009 season and start as soon as the pricing comes out. Maybe next season Celebrity will have an itenary that we like and we would consider that line....