Stem to Stern

I agree. It was a night and day difference between having the same core Luminae crew meal after meal from the Maitre D to the waiters to the sommelier vs. Yacht Club Restaurant’s revolving ensemble of team members.

I envision nonstop laughter if the six of us got together. Rosie and I are stealth and persistent deal hunters. We recently capitalized on unbeatable group rates through a newly discovered TA. Dealing with a new TA can be unsettling, but she seems to be legit. Sadly, at this point in time there is no more Retreat in our future. DH and I sail next on Silhouette 4/4/2024. All 4 of us are booked on 9/7/2024 Beyond and 11/30/2025 Xcel. We are looking at quotes on 8/15/2025 Silhouette repo from Iceland to Boston.

Hi Charla, Happy Snowy Saturday! It is so nice to see you come back for the wrap up. I am sure with all of the changes happening at Celebrity a long pause for reflection was needed. As for the negative portion of your post, I really do appreciate how you always call it like you see it with exquisite eloquence and a little bit of humor sprinkled in there. Hopefully Celebrity is getting the many messages like these from all of their loyal clientele. I am very happy to read about your preference of Celebrity Beyond. DH and I will be taking up residence in a Sunset Verandah on board her in about eight-months for our inaugural Edge-class sailing. We are very excited. Our recent trial in MSC Yacht Club was not perfect, but as you said for the money it was darn near close and there was an army of butlers. Seascape's Yacht Club enclave is spacious, service was good, and food was okay. It is great to have options. MSC Yacht Club will remain on our shopping list. Our recent Sky Suite experience on Celebrity Summit really can't be faulted in any way. The food and service were on point. We do not require constant looking after, so even without a large team The Retreat delivered for us. Why not also explore Crystal Cruises for your next solo sojourn? We have not sailed them since 2017, but the experience was most memorable. I have read good reports about New Crystal and I understand the ships are not sailing anywhere near full passenger capacity. So if you are looking to book a little closer to sailing, maybe there are or will be deals on Crystal to be had. Thanks again for all of the wonderful reporting you do on Cruise Critic. Had it not been for one of your live reports, I might never have given MSC Cruises a glance. Please accept my deepest condolences on your family's loss. Best wishes for a better 2024.

Along our walk toward Castillo San Felipe del Morro we enjoyed many artistic, architectural, and natural wonders of Old San Juan. Raices Fountain Puerta de San Juan A Ziggy lookalike Colorful architecture and Mini Icon San Juan Bay Flora Find the cat Door El Morro Once El Morro was in sight we wondered along Norzagaray Street passing Plaza del Cuartel. More incredible sculpture Santa María de Magdalena Pazzis Cemetery At this point I lost my bearings as well as my unwillingness to look at a map.😂 We wandered through Plaza del Quinto Centenario until we stumbled onto Calle del Santo Cristo. At this point I realized we were heading toward the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist which is the 2nd oldest in the Americas. DH has a thing for cathedrals and monasteries. We rarely pass by one without stepping foot inside.😂 In and around the cathedral We popped our heads into Hotel El Convento to have a nose around. The enchanting courtyard inside Hotel El Convento. We made our way down Cristo Street admiring all of the colors and aromas of Old San Juan. We reached Barrachina at 1:50pm. DH was getting hangry.😂 The hostess said we would have about a 25 minute wait, so two of us ordered pina coladas for all of us. I admired more local color and architecture across the street from the restaurant while DH held my cocktail. Olé where they still have hats and maps. So glad to see places stand the test of time.😍 No sooner had we started sipping them and we were seated by 2:03pm. We ordered a variety of Puerto Rican foods for the table to share. Then, came the mojitos. The Al fresco space at Barrachina snapped on the way out after our fantastic lunch. Seen on the walk back. We stumbled back to the ship to be greeted by bar service offering infused water. We were back on board shortly after 3pm. It was a great few hours in port.

That was a fun cruise!! I will never forget our hilarious meals with you two in Blu. Do you remember all of the after-dinner Frangelicos we enjoyed?!?🤪

Catch-up Post Tue Dec 12 - San Juan, PR And a bit more from Seascape Some of our best days in port have been those that we freelanced. We have been particularly successful with pre-booking free walking tours in various European port cities by starting with a basic google search. The tours usually only last a couple hours and tips to the tour guide afterward are appreciated. I found one in Old San Juan which I signed up for. The start time was 10:00am, so I had little hope for the ship being cleared early and for us making the tour start time promptly. The weather that day ended up delaying docking, so I emailed and texted to cancel. My backup plan was a self-guided walking tour starting out by following a path to the left of the dock. We had been to Old San Juan a couple of times previously, but we never had the opportunity to explore this end of town. From the you tube videos I watched, it appeared to be an interesting walk. Our new Florida friends we met at the first night’s theater show decided to join us. My day started around 6-ish watching the sun rise from Deck 20 as we approached Puerto Rico. This pic looking forward toward the stern shows the semi-covered, non-smoking dining area around the corner from the MSC Yacht Club Grill & Bar. I say semi-covered because in pouring rain many of the tables were unusable. By the way this area, along with the smoking dining area on the other side of the buffet, are the only areas on the One Pool Sundeck to take cover if inclement weather suddenly sets in. Of course, one can duck into the YC elevator lobby also. The cabanas shown on the left in the pic were usually occupied throughout the cruise. I’m not sure why since my little private corner further aft on the Sundeck provided much more open space, fewer people, and no foot traffic. It was only a few steps from the elevator, the rest room, and the buffet. Perhaps fellow yacht clubbers enjoy being closer to the food and beverages. Most of the previous sea day was spent wining, dining, and sunning in the YC. So, I decided to spend some time exploring and having a walk around the outdoor areas of the rest of the ship before the crowds started to gather. After perusing but not indulging in the buffet breakfast (See food porn in post 432.) up on Deck 20, I made my way down to the Marketplace Buffet for a large cuppa. The tables in the buffet have a button you can press for bar service. DH tried this once during the cruise and the concept worked out good for him. This is the self-service coffee nook closest to the Yacht Club just indide the Matketplace buffet beyond the Jungle Pool Lounge. This section of the buffet dining area was still pretty empty this early in the morning since it is the furthest from the food. Marketplace Buffet bar The Marketplace Buffet was quite manageable at 8:18am. Food porn alert. Ham “Artisnal” Pizza Buffet Pizza!!! Herrings Then, I headed aft through the buffet out to the aft Sky Bar and order the corner to a large area of Al fresco seating. Marina Pool Marina Bar Once the ship finally docked the mass exodus from the ship began. Shortly before noon we along with a small group of other yacht clubbers started our butler-escorted pilgrimage from the Top Sail Lounge through the meandering bowels of the ship toward the gangway. For a new ship one would think a better design could have been dreamed up to better disembark so many people more efficiently. There seemed to be issues with the computer at the gangway. It looked like someone was embarking which forced a change on the computer from disembarkation over to embarkation causing a delay. Comparatively Little Lady Summit disembarkation was a breeze as it should be with a third of the passenger load. Reports on the fancy new embarkation area of the Edge-class vessels indicate a pleasant exit and reentry as well. I haven’t had the pleasure to experience Edge-class vessels yet. We were on the pier at 12:12pm and headed toward Fuente Raices, a historical landmark fountain. A few pics of our stroll toward the fountain follow. In the next post or two I would like to share some shots from the rest of our nearly two-hour stroll before our lunch stop. More to come….

Oh wow! Thank you! If this remains accurate into late-2025 on board Celebrity Xcel, then I will be just fine with Absolute martinis or cosmos. DH finds Beefeater totally acceptable in his martinis and G&Ts. Time will tell with all of the changes that seem to be upending things with our preferred cruise line.

Everything pretty much made sense. Of course, DH was quick to point out the illogical design of the sliding doors on the closet. One of them fully revealed the drawers allowing them to be pulled out. No issue there. But on the other side the door does not fully reveal the hang bar leaving some of the hung clothing hidden. First world problem.

Do have any intel as to which vodka and gin are poured during Elite HH?

Enjoying your report. I hope you are doing okay after the fall.

Yacht Club Interior Suite bathroom pics. Plenty of space for us. I did not get a pic of weird, trapezoidal shaped sink. Small Med by MSC mildly fig-scented toiletries, hand soap, and wash clothes. Yacht Club crest embroidered on bath towel. Shower has a glass door and two grab bars. Choice of rain shower head or hose. Second longer grab bar shown at left. Large Med by MSC toiletries. My own loofa and Bulgari shower gel. Same squarish on-trend faucet shapes as revolutionized Summit Sky Suite bathroom. Careful with the hot setting. It is very hot. Rust. Professional measurement of trapezoidal shower footprint. I did not bring a tape measure. The shower was small, but not a problem for either of us. Plenty of headroom for my 6’2” stature under the rain shower head. No drainage issues. There are huge open showers in the thermal area of the MSC Aurea Spa. I presume there was at least one shower in the men’s changing room, but I did not take close enough note of the facilities. If one were to consider showering in the spa, then a journey into the Gen Pop and an elevator ride down to Deck 8 would be required and rather inconvenient.

There is a final wrap up post coming. In the meantime let’s discuss some of the valid suggestions posted recently. The notion that we may have had a closer to stellar experience had our booking been in a YC on board a smaller, older, more seasoned MSC ship such as Divina does give me pause. It was from Divina that GenX first wrote of her inaugural whirlwind romance with YC. According to a fellow Yacht Clubber on our sailing in her recent review on the MSC boards, our YC Director did acknowledge to her that he does glance at the CC boards. So, maybe crew were instructed to shower GenX with healthy doses of 6-star service knowing she had a live blog in progress. I would be curious to learn actual YC booking numbers garnered by MSC Cruises from her influence. The other notion was that we may have had a more enjoyable time in a larger YC suite other than our 226 square foot interior. This is the number on msccruisesusa.com but I did not take any measurements. There is some validity to the notion that an interior stateroom negates the idea of luxury. After all, on land isn’t an oceanview room the optimal choice? Personally I was not bothered by the interior other than the whooshing noises in the middle of the night. I slept and showered there. That’s it. The room had all my necessities and a continuous supply of swag. Sure it would have been nice to fling the curtains and sliding door open every morning and let the sun and salty air pour in, but for another $2K I can pay for a large part of another vacation. I can rationalize just about anything, but $2K for a balcony on a 7-night cruise on a new-to-us line not so much. DH on the other hand tends to linger in the room slightly longer. He also suffers slight anxiety from the closed in feeling of the interior. Neither of us spend much time in there reading or watching tv or taking meals. If your mindset is more like mine, then you may appreciate these pics of the interior suite. I will put the bathroom pics in a separate post. Coffee machine as found blocking all of the outlets. There was an additional bedside USB outlet. Phone, shelves with tea bags and coffee pods. One drawer stowed stemware and other barware. Sturdy chair and very bright overhead lighting. DND button pushed. Outside the door the corresponding light illuminated for the crew’s awareness. Make up room button pushed. Room card inserted in slot inside door. This is how power is restored to stateroom including lights and power outlets. Don’t try to charge your phone if one of you doesn’t leave their card in the slot. Light switch. Easy to feel in the dark.😂 Thermostat. Sadly, no numbers so bring a thermometer with you if you care to know the actual room temperature. This was not an issue for us. Do any ships actually show the temp? Fancy leatherette tv remote case. I impress easily.😂 Non-hanging side of closet. Safe. Closet drawer. Outlets hidden behind coffee machine. We brought a multi-outlet cord and moved the coffee machine out of the way. Chrome wall hooks just inside door of suite. Daily newspaper of your choosing. We already subscribe digitally to Washington Post. Bottom of newspaper was cut off so bottom line of crossword was missing. I improvised. More a figment of my amusement than a first world problem. Another suite’s complimentary newspaper left behind in Top Sail Lounge. I was shocked at the thickness of the newspaper which translated as excessively indulgent and wasteful in my mind. Our hallway. Framed black-and-white photography at end of hallway. Second obligatory pic of fancy remote holder on gray and green toned bed runner.

Good to know. We have 699 days to educate ourselves on the Elite HH inclusions. We can hold out until 5:00pm if I can have Smirnoff cosmos and DH can have Tanqueray martinis. Then, we will be good. I will take a hard pass on the HH wines unless Columbia Crest Merlot is being poured. That is one on the Classic Package that I do enjoy.☺️

I do have an interest in art and design. Thank you for the recommendation. Would this tour be something available on Beyond? Free or for a fee?

The pleasure was all mine. Enjoy your time in the YC. Oh, and the tiramisu tasted as amazing as it looked.😊

We are booked cruise only. Had to in order to stay on budget. This will be our first booking without a bev pkg since our first cruise together on 2014. We will carry my wine on board, take full advantage of Elite happy hour, and pay for DH’s martinis. We shall see if the reduction in alcohol consumption results in less weight gain. Of course, I have 699 days to cave and add the bev pkg on a flash sale.😉

Yes!! And while we are at it, let’s make sure we ask about a tour of the bridge.😜

Thank you! I will pass your very kind words along to the chef in the morning. He did not make it to midnight. This was our dessert on Christmas Day. His 88 year old mother made the request and he was happy to oblige. Happy New Year!!!

This is what we are hoping for. We are booked in Sunset Verandahs for our first two E-class bookings coming up in 2024 and 2025. It took us long enough. We are looking forward to trying out the various public spaces and the four main dining rooms. We most likely will not invest in any specialty dining other than one meal in Eden.

Excellent point and I am in total agreement with you. Not having been in The Retreat on board an E-class ship I can only go by the many unfavorable reviews of the larger, impersonal, more bustling, culinarily deficient E-class Luminae. These adjectives also accurately describe Yacht Club Restaurant. Luminae on Summit was never crowded and usually quiet and peaceful depending on who was in there. Yacht Club Restaurant at dinner was much the opposite. Lunch wasn’t as bad. We are eager to try E-class next year and again in 2025, but we won’t be in Luminae unless we submit a successful Move up bid. We can’t justify the current high prices and reduced perks in The Retreat. Thanks for reading.

I had the opportunity to browse through my camera roll, chat with DH, and reflect on our twelve nights side-by-side on two different vessels. MSC Seascape’s Yacht Club and Celebrity Summit’s The Retreat are two very different experiences. MSC excelled at creating a Yacht Club on board its Sea ships that is a true ship-within-a-ship experience. We enjoyed a spacious, fully-encapsulated, indoor/outdoor resort enclave. Our major beef (pun intended) in YC was the Yacht Club Restaurant falling short of our culinary expectations. Personally I found it easier to overlook the food having been a pushover for the new experience; the fantastic, almost all-inclusive cruise fare; the YC pampering; and all of the MSC Voyagers Club swag. DH, on the other hand, is the cook in our household. This Irish bloke conjures up a mean bolognese and a to-die-for tiramisu. So, it is safe to say he had high hopes for this Italian cruise line’s dining experiences. DH’s tiramisu. MSC has a very hard-working crew. However some bar and wait servers we encountered lacked confidence, experience, professionalism, and showmanship. There were a few shining stars in the YC including our butler Renuka, our stateroom attendant Ainul, TSL waitperson Kimberly, and grill waiter Chandan. I was really starting to get settled into the day-to-day life of MSC Yacht Club by the time Day 7 rolled around despite the three or four shortfalls mentioned throughout this thread. MSC designed the YC on Seascape in such a way that I did not feel like I ever had to leave. The expansive One Pool sundeck and plush Top Sail Lounge provided the necessary living spaces to either mingle and socialize or nest alone. MSC Grill and Bar was adjacent to the One Pool and provided an adequate Al fresco spread during breakfast, lunch, and tea hours. DH was not nearly as enamored with the YC experience as I was. He was fairly impressed by the initial impressions with the white welcome tent with the rolled-out YC blue carpet, the wristbands, the butlers, and the splashy ship decor. But uninspired food and a few poorly crafted cocktails slightly soured his glee. So, time will tell whether I will convince him to return to MSC Yacht Club. MSC Yacht Club’s deficiencies were emphasized even more so when we moved over to The Retreat where we were blown away by nearly everything we tasted and most of the crew. From the moment we stepped into the suites waiting room of the Celebrity terminal prior to embarking Summit and saw the fabulous spread of eats and drinks, we knew we just arrived home. By the way there was no spread to speak of in the MSC terminal that I am aware of. Although it was nice to experience a new line and a new suite experience, returning to The Retreat did not disappoint.👍👍 The whole change in Celebrity's butler situation did not have a tremendous negative effect on us. We are the type that enjoy the walk to the cafe every morning to fetch our own coffees. We have never dined in suite unless we were quarantined. And I would never allow someone else to unpack my belongings or worse yet draw my bath. Good grief.😫 But it was nice to be looked after by our own personal butler in the Yacht Club. YC set a tone of pampering with the butler, the stateroom attendant, the daily in-suite treats and surprises, and the concierge desk. If they could now just seek to impress in the Yacht Club Restaurant. The tone in the restaurant remains more main dining room and less specialty restaurant. On board Summit Luminae’s food, staff, and atmosphere read specialty restaurant full stop. Did we feel pampered in The Retreat? Well, I would prefer to call it “low-key attentiveness.” I am not even sure who The Retreat manager was. I think we may have met him in passing, but I am not positive. If that was him, he seemed a bit shy and failed to introduce himself. The Retreat Concierges were available if needed, but not overflowing with congeniality. Personally I found the true faces and shining stars of The Retreat to be Luminae Maitre D Serdar, Luminae waitpersons Andy and Anna, and The Retreat Lounge bartender Karla. The Retreat spaces are beautiful, but on Millennium-class ships they are retrofitted from existing Pre-Retreat spaces scattered throughout the ship. I will clarify that The Retreat Lounge is not nearly as beautiful as Luminae and lacks functional, adult-sized furniture. This is not breaking news.😂 Walking from The Retreat Lounge to Luminae involves a walk through the casino, Martini Bar, and Rendezvous Lounge. This was not an issue for us because we enjoy the walk and the lively atmosphere of these spaces. In contrast YC Restaurant was directly upstairs from Top Sail Lounge. Although we witnessed several fellow Yacht Clubbers requiring assistance up the stairs by crew. The elevator (and the nearest rest room) was an inconvenient long walk down the hall from TSL and then a long walk back to YCR. I have not discussed The Retreat Sundeck at great length since we spent barely a few minutes enjoying it. The gale force winds were just too much for us. The space is pretty simple in design. I found the bottles of sunscreen to be a nice touch. I only took a few pics.😢 Comparing the deck plans of the two ships reveals The One Pool sundeck trumps The Retreat Sundeck multi-fold. Although with almost triple the residents it should be larger. Pics of The One Pool sundeck on Deck 20. Liquor secured after hours. Larger forward YC jacuzzi with plastic fish sculpture. Other similar plastic sculptures were found throughout YC.🤪 The other YC jacuzzi. Food porn alert.😉 Pics of breakfast buffet at MSC Yacht Club Grill and Bar.😋

Thank you for remembering Chandan’s name. He was a very good waitperson at the grill. He hustled, took drink orders as soon as we sat down, and delivered them promptly and with a smile.😊

Seascape Side Note: Before disembarking Seascape on the morning of December 16th, we returned to our suite 18029 to retrieve our bags and our butler Renuka for our escort. The door to Handicapped MSC Yacht Club Deluxe Suite 18035 was propped open. Renuka said I could have a look. The suite was very spacious. It featured a sofa, two chairs, and a coffee table indoors. The gorgeous curved, forward-facing balcony housed two padded loungers like the ones on the YC Sundeck. All of the Yacht Club suite doors were adorned with identical holiday wreaths.

Two videos shot from Summit Sky Suite 6120 on Saturday, December 16th during sailaway. IMG_0827.mov First one sailing beside MSC Seascape. IMG_0832.mov Second one sailing by the new MSC Terminal currently under construction.