kruzgal

Thanks, that's really helpful.

Thanks for this. Out of interest how easy would it be to book a table for 5 people at the 45 days ahead release? I really don’t want to spend a lot of money and then find we are left not able to try the different restaurants. It is the one thing that is putting me off this trip.

When you are booking on the app can you book for more people than are in your party? We are considering booking and joining our son and partner but want to be able to dine with them. Our bookings will be separate and I worry we won’t be able to get reservations together as a result. Thanks.

I really enjoy my job so don't want to retire early but it does mean I am tied to school holidays. If your children are grown up then presumably there is no reason why they couldn't sail with you on an adult only ship? If you had grandchildren you could go on the Celebrity ships that are newer and bigger. To me, making at least a couple of their older ships adult only is a no brainer, as P&O do. We are not loyal to any particular line and will always shop around, largely looking at dates, then itinerary and price. Celebrity has 14 ships so making 2 of them adult only would barely make a difference to me, but could attract others to them. I think they are missing a trick.

Thanks for your comments. I am a teacher and so the option to sail out of school holidays isn’t there at the moment. I don’t particularly mind there being children onboard but it struck me that Celebrity could easily make a couple of the M class ships adult only and offer something different. For as many people as they lose (families) they would undoubtedly gain with people who prefer adult only ships with different itineraries. They have a lot more ships than they used to and rather than trying to be all things to all people across all ships they could create something different with the M class ships. I imagine the alternative eventually will be to sell them off. I don’t think Celebrity should be an adult only line as we also enjoyed the brand with our children but it would be nice to have options.

Should Celebrity make some of their M class ships adult only? We are currently on Infinity and whilst there are very few children (because there isn’t much for them onboard) it would seem to make sense to me for Celebrity to have at least a couple of their ships as adult only. P&O do this with their older, smaller ships and it is very popular. The teen/kids club could be converted into alternative dining venues which would be a bonus. Throw in some different itineraries and I think this could be a win for Celebrity. Thoughts?

That makes sense.

This is very interesting. I have noticed that on Arvia there are whole areas of the ship that say the cabins “cabins cannot be released”. No doubt this is because they don’t currently have the flight capacity to match the number of cabins on the ship. Hopefully, once they have signed up with someone, more cabins will be released.

We loved the 4 voucher system on Royal for the equivalent diamond level, that could be used throughout the day. A cocktail during the afternoon, a pre dinner drink, one voucher for 40% discount on a bottle of wine over dinner and then a post dinner drink was great and we weren’t forced to use our loyalty drinks within a 2 hour window, which isn’t good for anybody.

The bid up from balcony to concierge guarantee is £100 more than if we had just booked concierge in the first place. What is the point?

Can you get 20% off a bottle of wine every night at dinner with Elite or is it just a one use voucher per person? On the fact sheet it just says 20% off any bottle of wine.

Thanks for the responses. We haven’t sailed Celebrity since 2017 when the Captains Club event was held in the Sky Lounge or similar, rather than drinks available in the bars around the ship, so it wouldn’t have occurred to me to ask for bottled water, but that will be great.

So can you get free bottles water during 5-7pm if Elite? That would be good if you can!

Exactly, they have undoubtedly over priced it. Cunard have been marketing their brand new ship Queen Anne considerably cheaper than Apex (thousands cheaper) and it is getting sold out as a result. We will definitely take our chances and wait until after final payment to book. Plenty of other options out there!

Thanks for this as you answered my question. We are looking to return to Celebrity having not sailed with them for 7 years. We are interested in a trip on Apex from Southampton this summer but the prices are horrendous so we are going to wait until after final payment and take our chances. I can see there is plenty of availability at the moment, no doubt because of the price compared to similar cruises also departing from Southampton. I wasn’t sure if the price drops still happened, but clearly they do, so we will wait and see. There are other sailings we could go on so not fixed on Celebrity Apex but would like to give it a try.