MISTER 67

My favorite HAL ship, unfortunately we had a pretty lousy cruise on her last December with bad food and entertainment.

Die hard White Sox fan here, a fan for 71 years and this past season was brutal.

Some points in regards to the OP's comments. We have sailed on the Equinox 5 times since the restart and thought for her age she is in fine shape. We do agree on the condition of the verandas, some rust and in need of some paint and varnish. Entertainment has been pretty good except for the production shows which have been the same for 4 years. MDR has cut down on selections with main courses and dessert, food is good but not great, we sailed on the Equinox a couple of times right before the pandemic and had some memorable meals in the MDR with a great Beef Wellington, we had Beef Wellington in August on the Equinox and it was just OK. We eat breakfast and lunch in the OVC and the selection is fantastic, why such a great selection in the OVC but not the MDR. We have been cruising since 1980 and refuse to eat in specialty restaurants, we feel that we shouldn't have to pay extra to get a great meal on a cruise but the OP wasn't raving about the specialty restaurants which is not good, I've read this on other threads also. Service continues to be great with twice a day cabin service and mints on the pillows.

So have we after many years with HAL, we had wonderful cruises with great food, entertainment and service, not the case anymore.

We hate to fly but love to cruise so we moved to Florida 30 years ago and have our choice of 5 ports that we can drive to to get on a cruise ship, granted we are basically limited to cruises to the Caribbean, the Panama Canal and South America, that’s OK because we’ve seen everything we want to see in various parts of the world. Back to flying, at one time it was a very nice experience, now I’d rather hop on a Greyhound bus than get on a airplane and all the lousy things that go with flying including flight delays, flight cancellations, unruly passengers, crowded airports and filthy airplanes.

Since 2005 when she was a year old we have sailed on the Caribbean Princess 10 times, of course she was in great condition that first year, since then and finally in 2017 we thought she was sort of showing her age with worn our carpet and a lot of the furniture pretty beat up, we also had the worst cruise we ever had on a Princess Cruise in 2017 with pretty bad food especially in the buffet, we vowed never to sail on her again. The pandemic came around in 2020 and by the time late 2021 rolled around we were ready to start cruising again, received an email from Princess with a fantastic rate so we tried the Caribbean Princess at Thanksgiving of 2021 and had an absolutely fantastic cruise with the ship looking spotless with new carpeting and furniture, the food was outstanding as was the service and the entertainment was very good. The ship was just over half full which was great since Covid was still with us but we had been vaccinated, masks were mandatory. When we returned home and few days later our personal cruise consultant called us and asked how we liked the cruise, we said we loved it and she said she still had some great rates and we booked a Christmas Cruise for that December and again had a wonderful cruise with the ship again a little over half full. Now here we are in October of 2023 and we have been on 10 cruises since our start up in 2021, we have sailed with Holland America and Celebrity with the HAL cruises being pretty bad and the Celebrity cruises very good but we have noticed the cutbacks and the nickel and diming and of course aren’t happy but no one is forcing us to cruise. Our next cruise is on the Sky Princess and naturally we are a little concerned with all the bad revues we have read on Cruise Critic especially with the complaints about food as bad as I’ve ever heard, we still plan to sail on that cruise and hope that things aren’t as bad as we have read. We won’t sail with HAL again and hope things aren’t that bad that we won’t sail on Princess again.

Probably because every year there are more and more new people cruising and they have no idea what cruising was like 30 or 40 years so in turn the cruise lines continue cutting back on things with only the older generations complaining, I guess there are not enough of us as the cruise lines aren’t listening or caring.

The problem with all these issues from food to entertainment to ship maintenance is the quality of things are going down while the prices keep going up. We had a horrible cruise with Holland America this past February and were very loyal to that line but things were so bad that they lost us as customers. We have been on 5 Celebrity cruises since we started cruising again in November of 2021 and have had some very nice cruises with the food being pretty good but along with not enough of a selection in the MDR the quality has gone down a notch but the selection and quality of the food in the OVC buffet has been outstanding. We sail again on the Equinox in February but before that will sail on the Sky Princess in December and to tell the truth don’t know to expect with reviews all over the place but the first 2 cruises we had after the startup were on the Caribbean Princess and everything was great, the ship was only half full on both cruises with outstanding service with the food being very good and the cruise prices were unbeatable as the lines were trying to get people to cruise again.

We sailed on the Infinity a year ago and thought that she was in great shape for her age. My only complaint if any was because of its size the buffet lacked the variety of food in the Ocean View Cafe on the Equinox.

Our first cruise was on the Fairwind, still the most fun we ever had on a cruise, we were hooked, if Sitmar was still around we probably would still be sailing with them, they were the best. BTW our favorite HAL ship was the Westerdam that was the original Homeric bought by HAL from Home lines, she was a classic beauty. HAL did a stretch job on her IIRC about 100 feet shortly after taking possession.

Sometimes if ships are well maintained, old isn't bad. When we started criuising in 1980 a lot of our cruises were on old former ocean liners that were converted to cruise ships, some of our best cruises were on classics like Sitmar's Fairwind, Costa's Carla Costa, the Costa Riviera, Dolphin's Seabreeze and Regency's Regent Star. All those ships were built in the early 1950s and had charm that will never be duplicated.

We’ve been on 9 cruises since the startup with 5 Celebrity cruises and have had twice a day cabin service on all 5 cruises. Not so on Holland America with only once a day with 2 cruises. With Princess we had twice a day service on 2 cruises but that was early in the startup with the Princess ships only half full.

Agree on HAL, we are 4 Star Mariners and were very loyal to HAL but they have taken too much of a downward spiral and we won’t sail with them anymore, I just hope Celebrity doesn’t cutback too much more.

Since the pandemic just about all the mainstream cruise lines have cut back on things but Celebrity has not lowered their standards to that of Carnival and don’t expect that ever happening.

Excellent point, we remember the days when loyal passengers were given upgrades at no additional charge.

We’ve been on 10 Celebrity cruises, 5 before the pandemic and 5 after, for the most part everything has remained pretty much the same including the service and entertainment, the ships are still very clean and well maintained. There has been some nickel and dime issues with things like a charge for room service and up charges on some items in the MDR. As far as food, there has been a definite decline in the MDR of quality and selection, someone said it’s down to Golden Corral level, I won’t say it’s declined to that level, I’ll just say that it was at an A level before and now probably a B or C+ now. I’m thinking that Celebrity wants passengers to fork out extra dollars in the Specialty Restaurants and as long time cruisers of 42 years that is something we aren’t willing to do, we remember when food was always excellent in the dining rooms of all the lines we sailed and remember nights when Caviar and Champagne were served on the Formal nights. What has really impressed us is the food in the Ocean View Cafe, outstanding selection including a different food theme everyday with everything being very tasty, we always have breakfast and lunch in the OVC and can’t remember something we didn’t like. One thing I don’t understand is the great selection of desserts in the OVC but at dinner in the MDR Cheesecake is not available every night like in the past, only 1 night now, Cheesecake is one of our favorites and it was nice that it was available nightly just in case you didn’t care for any of the other desserts that evening.

The same can be said how the Carnival Corporation has ruined Holland America and Princess.

Last month on the Equinox every dish except when we ordered pasta had mashed potatoes and the portions were minuscule, maybe a shot glass full.

We do the early walkoff and a most of the time are the first or close to the first ones to disembark and it’s usually around 7:20 AM. A few times there has been some kind of a delay and IIRC the earliest was 7:15.

We got ours about a week before sailing

Beautiful clean classy ships with nice sized cabins including the washroom, we book inside cabins for the most part and the inside cabins on Celebrity ships are the largest compared to the other lines that we have sailed with. Very good service. Best Buffett on the high seas with great variety, MDR food is good but not as good as in the past, variety could be better. Very good entertainment except for old production shows. Since the startup we have been impressed with the Captains especially Captain Kate and Captain Matt, very visible and personable with a good sense of humor.

As we’ve been to everywhere we have wanted to see and at this stage in our lives (late 70s)for us the ship is the destination and part of the experience is the entertainment.

The majority of the production shows on Celebrity are horrible, it’s time to retire Topper and Elysium, they’ve been around way too long.

Exactly plus menu selection are one thing and quality is another.