Noreen411

Hi

I haven’t seen this situation raised yet in the thread so will ask here...

We are booked on a 7 night cruise on Oasis late June 2020 in a Grand Suite.

Final payment was made when it was due with the tiny bit of hope it would happen.  I expect this cruise to be cancelled on the next batch of cancellations so will need to decide if we want to lift and shift quickly.

I see similar sailings for next year, same itinerary, etc

Question 1 - if I shift our booking to next June to be price protected, do they hold my full payment already made or will they just hold the deposit amount for now, refund the rest, and I make final payment next March (or whenever final payment date is)?

Question 2 - we applied about $2,000 in Casino vouchers to our June sailing.  We earned the vouchers on a Prior sailing for either a free cruise (none fit our schedule) or a dollar value.  Since it mentioned you keep promotions, will that Approx $2,000 be used if I shift to next years sailing?
 

thank you in advance

Noreen

If you have any questions or comments please respond.  I love talking about my vacations.

Normally I am wrapping up a report as I am about to leave on the next trip (sometimes I don’t even finish until after I’m back) but right now I don’t know when the next trip we will actually get to go on is.  I hope that doesn’t sound whiny, I don’t mean it to be.

We all need to be thankful if we are staying safe and healthy 

In case you don’t like to look through long signatures and are interested in reading about our first Celebrity cruise on Reflection in 2018 I’m attaching the link below (hopefully I do this correctly and it works).

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2536167-reflection-review-ultimate-caribbean-april-2-2018-april-13-2018/

Future Trips for the rest of 2020

I expect some may be (and one already is) cancelled due to CoronaVirus/COVID19.  As much as we love cruising and Disney the most important thing right now is that everyone stay safe and healthy.  When we are able to we will be happy to get back on a ship or back to Disney World and I will continue writing my trip reports.

April/May 2020 - This was meant to be a road trip driving down to Florida leaving Saturday 4/25, arriving at Disney Sunday 4/26, staying for 12 nights leaving Friday 5/8 and driving home getting home on Saturday 5/9.  Disney World is closed due to COVID19 so this trip was cancelled.

June 2020 - Oasis of the Seas.  7 nights leaving from Bayonne NJ.  We were excited to have a new class of ship sailing out of Bayonne.  I like big ships and Oasis recently went through some renovations to add some things that the newer ships in this class have.    I am expecting this one to be cancelled in the next round of cancellations.

August 2020 - Empress of the Seas.  7 nights leaving from Bayonne NJ.  Scott always wanted to try a small ship and when we saw Empress was coming to NJ this was a chance to give it a try.  I am expecting this one to be cancelled.

September 2020 - Oasis of the Seas.  7 nights leaving from Bayonne NJ.  Since I like big ships, we added another sailing on Oasis.  I’m holding onto a tiny bit of hope that this sailing may happen but know it’s a long shot.

New Year’s 2020/2021 - Anthem of the Seas.  8 nights leaving from Bayonne NJ.  This will be our first time spending New Years on a cruise if it happens.  I’m holding out hope that this cruise sails.

Summary / Random Thoughts - Continued

Overall:

We really enjoyed our trip on Silhouette.  There were a few things that weren’t up to expectations (such as the embarkation) that I’ve mentioned above but overall it was a great trip and we had a lot of fun.

We will continue to book Royal Suites on Celebrity as we enjoy the perks that come with the suite and the layout and size of the cabin.

We will also continue to cruise with Royal Caribbean.  

We don’t have a favorite.  We enjoy both Celebrity and Royal Caribbean.  While both are cruises, the products are different.

Summary / Random Thoughts - Continued

People:

One of the things that makes cruising so special is the people.  I am sure this isn’t specific to Celebrity and Royal Caribbean, but probably cruising in general.

The employees make you feel so welcome.  They are away from their families for long periods of time working tirelessly and yet make you feel like you are their family.

It’s easier to make friends on a cruise than most normal situations.   You already have something in common with the other passengers and often run into the same people.  Some of the friendships are casual and last as long as the cruise and sometimes they extend well beyond the cruise.  While we always have a great time together, it is also fun to share some time on vacation with other people.

Summary / Random Thoughts - Continued

The Islands:

We aren’t fans of group tours.  We prefer to be on our own schedule.  We normally find a beach to swim/snorkel for a while then walk around.  When I am researching a beach to visit,  priorities for us include clean bathrooms/changing rooms, comfortable lounge chairs/umbrellas to rent, and ideally a rinse off shower.  This is the first time we have done a tour together (I did some in the past on trips without Scott) and did enjoy it.  We enjoyed the tour because it was a private tour.  It was nice to have a mix of new islands we have never been to as well as some we have been to.

St Croix.  This was a new island for us.  We enjoyed Sandcastle Beach Club.  While we would be happy to go back there, I think we would try another beach next time.  We liked that it was small and they limited the number of day guests allowed in.   The bathroom (yes 1 bathroom) was clean and roomy to change in and there was an outdoor shower to rinse off.

Antigua.  We have been several times and still haven’t found a beach we want to go back to.  The vendors are overly pushy here which makes it uncomfortable to wander.

St Lucia.  We have been just a few times and enjoyed walking along the beach.  We haven’t found a beach to swim/snorkel at yet. The vendors here can also be overly pushy.  I know many of the sights most people see are on the other side of the island and maybe we will give that a try on a private tour when we are back on St.  Lucia.  We are not interested in mud baths but the volcano and the Pitons could be something we would want to see.

Grenada.  This was a new island for us.  Our private tour with JNJ Tours was a perfect way for us to see the island and get a feel for it.  We really enjoyed it and I think we may do private tours in the future at some other islands.  We also thought Grand Anse beach was beautiful and we would probably go back there if we are in Grenada again.

Barbados.  We have several beach clubs (The Boatyard, Pirates Cove, and Harbour Lights) that we enjoy on Barbados and have been alternating among them.  The beach is beautiful here and we enjoy spending time there.  The beach clubs we have been to all have clean bathrooms, changing rooms, and I think most have an outdoor shower to rinse off.

St Vincent.  This was a new island for us.  I’m glad we found the taxi driver to take us to a few places one of the vendors tried to get us to join a group tour to see.  We were pleasantly surprised by how much we enjoyed the botanical gardens.  We did not like the beach that we saw here.

St Kitts.  Probably our favorite island.  We really enjoy going to Carambola Beach Club. It is getting more populate so has been more crowded than when we first started coming here.  There are clean bathrooms, changing rooms, and outdoor showers to rinse off.

Summary / Random Thoughts - Continued

Comparison to Royal Caribbean (our usual cruise line):

The food in the specialty restaurants was head and shoulders above what we have had at Royal Caribbean’s specialty restaurants.  The food on Royal Caribbean is good, I’m not knocking it; the food was just that much better on Celebrity.

While we can’t really compare, we enjoy Coastal Kitchen (the suite restaurant on Royal Caribbean) but didn’t eat in Luminae (other than 1 breakfast this trip).  Since we weren’t as wow’d by the specialty restaurants on Royal Caribbean we would have more meals at Coastal Kitchen.

The shows on Royal Caribbean are better.  Not just the headliner or production shows, but we missed seeing things like a Newlywed type show or a Quest type show.  Some of the late night shows were held in Celebrity Central which was too small a venue; we tried a few times but if it was too crowded we wouldn’t stay.

We preferred the Retreat Lounge and Retreat Sundeck on Celebrity over the Suite Lounge and Suite Sundeck on Royal Caribbean.  The lounges on both lines are nice but Celebrity’s felt much more welcoming.  The sundeck on Celebrity is a true retreat with service to make you feel special.  Some suite sundecks on Royal Caribbean’s ships are better than others.  Some are just a roped off area near the pool and others are a true sundeck, but I haven’t seen one that compared to what Celebrity offered.

While we enjoy the casino on both cruise lines, we loved that the casino on Celebrity is non smoking.  We get a decent amount of perks from Casino Royale (Royal Caribbean’s casino program) that we don’t receive from the Blue Chip Club (Celebrity’s casino program).  Part of this could be that we cruise with Royal more so we get more perks.

There wasn’t as much to do on the ship as we’re used to.  It was more of a make your own fun/relax type of cruise.  Royal Caribbean has things like simulated sky diving, bumper cars, ice skating, zip lining, surfing, rock climbing, water slides, etc on some of their ships.  This doesn’t make one better than the other, just a different type of trip.  

We enjoy both cruise lines.

Summary / Random Thoughts - Continued

General Suite Perks (for all suites):

The Retreat Lounge:

While we weren’t regulars here each day, we spent a bit more time here than we normally do at the Suite, Concierge, or Diamond lounges on Royal Caribbean.  We also spent more time here than we did at Michael’s Club on Reflection.  Joao and Diego (The Retreat Concierges) were so welcoming and helpful that we enjoyed coming here.  The bartenders and everyone else in the lounge were also always attentive and pleasant.  We spent several nights here for pre-dinner cocktails and would spend time socializing with others that were there.

The Retreat Sundeck:

The addition of the Retreat Sundeck is a great one.  It is well done with great views and fantastic service.  I think they need a bit more shade as it gets very hot in certain parts.  Service was amazing on the sundeck whether it was bringing you drinks, food, helping you get situated in chairs, etc; you really felt special there.  By comparison, Celebrity’s Retreat Sundeck is much better than the suite sundeck we have been to on some of Royal Caribbean’s ships

Luminae:

We cannot give a fair assessment of the suite restaurant on Silhouette as we only went once for breakfast.  It was very comfortable and we enjoyed our breakfast there.

Special Seating in the Theater:

The special seating area for shows on formal nights was a nice touch.  I would like if they expanded that to all nights in the theater as well as a reserved section in some of the other show venues.  This would be similar to how Royal Caribbean does it.

Summary / Random Thoughts - Continued

The Royal Suite:

The Royal Suite is a great cabin.   

It is spacious and well appointed.  

We spent some time in the suite because it was comfortable to hang out there.  Having the bedroom separate from the living room/dining area made it feel more homey.

Even with our overpacking we had plenty of room to put everything we brought away; there is a good amount of storage space.

While the bed was comfortable, we missed the Reverie Bed that was in the Royal Suite on Reflection.

We liked the jacuzzi on the balcony but thought the lounge chairs on the balcony could have been more comfortable.

The master bathroom layout is great with a. Separate tub and stand up shower.  The extra guest half bath is also nice to have.

Perks of the Royal Suite:

There are some extra perks that come with the Royal Suite 

Having the bar set up was great.  Not so much for the alcohol but the soda and bottled water.  It was super convenient to have it there and replenished for us as needed.

Complimentary specialty dining was well used by us.  We knew we would miss developing a relationship with a constant waiter at Luminae, but once we found our favorite waiter and table in Murano, we had the best of both worlds.  All the specialty restaurants were very good.  I don’t think we had a bad meal.  There may have been some dishes we liked better than others, but overall we had a great dining experience.

The premium beverage package was nice to have.  Scott gets more use out of it than I do being a wimpy drinker, but I did enjoy trying a few different cocktails.

The internet was a well used perk.  We have gotten so used to having internet on vacation that we would have purchased it if it wasn’t included.  It worked well throughout the trip.

While it didn’t work the way we expected this trip, we know how great the Special Delivery Embarkation process can be from our experience on Reflection.  I understand they were in a different terminal, but having a Celebrity employee there to guide things along would have gone a long way in making the boarding experience better.

The Butler (Alex) was great at his job.  I think all suites get a butler but I am including this topic here.  His personality worked perfect with us.  Maybe he picked up on the type of easygoing people we are right away and tailored how he did things to that.  We don’t need someone fawning over us, but to take care of the few things we may need or want.  He did that and more.  He took care of anything we asked for an even things we didn’t think to ask for.

Summary / Random Thoughts - Continued

Celebrity Silhouette:

The ship is beautiful.  It is classy but comfortable at the same time.

The Silhouette is smaller than the ships we are used to on Royal Caribbean but it was big enough that we didn’t feel anything was missing.  

The food in the specialty restaurants was great and where we ate the majority of the time.

The shows were OK

We appreciated that the casino was smoke free

The employees working on the ship were great.  We felt very well cared for throughout the trip.

There were a lot of places around the ship for people to hang out and relax.  It seems like it’s more about relaxing and making your own fun than having a lot of things on the ship to do.  

Summary / Random Thoughts

Since writing the review took a while and there is a lot of information all spread out, I wanted to do a sort of summary/final/random thoughts section(s) to tie it all together hopefully.

Driving to Florida:

Scott isn’t a fan of flying and would prefer to drive when we can.  While the first time we did a long road trip I was apprehensive, I ended up enjoying it also.

I think we are getting closer to the best plan for us when we drive to Florida.  This was the first time we split the trip rather than driving straight through. It made the ride much more enjoyable and I think we will continue doing this.

We have to figure out the best time to leave and I think we’re pretty close.  Maybe we should have left the house a little earlier to start the drive down.

Using one of our cars rather than a rental car was also better for us.  It eliminated the time to pick up and drop off the car and we also had the comfort of a car we are familiar with.  We both lease our vehicles so will probably alternate which one we take for future road trips.

Not having a set plan of when we would stop for the night each way worked for us and gave us the flexibility to decide as we were going.  We had a tentative idea of wanting to get at least halfway before stopping but nothing was set in stone. 

Hotels on the Drive:

We stayed at Fairfield Inn & Suites by Marriott in Santee SC (driving down) 

We stayed at Townplace Suites by Marriott in Florence SC (driving home)

These were both very nice properties and had the amenities we looked for.  They were clean, close to I95, had a gym, and good room layouts.  We would stay at either of these properties again.

Pre Cruise Hotel:

We stayed at Hyatt Place 17th Street in Fort Lauderdale FL

The location is great.  The facilities at the hotel are very nice.  Since we didn’t care for the room layout (not having a fully contained bathroom) we would probably look for another hotel for a pre-cruise stay in Fort Lauderdale.  That was really the only fault we found with the hotel and that’s our personal preference.  While it may not be the best for us I would definitely recommend the hotel in general.

2 hours ago, Arzeena said:

Just finished reading your review. Loved it! Loved the pictures. Thanks for keeping us entertained.

Hope you both are doing well.

Thank you

I hope to do my summary/random thoughts this weekend.

Stay safe

On 4/28/2020 at 11:41 AM, willma said:

Hi Noreen. Thank you very much for an entertaining review. I think yours was quite possibly the last one in existence on the boards, and I am pleased you have spread it out a bit to make it last longer.

How I miss all the photographs and tales of people’s cruise trips! 

Thank you for your kind words

I can’t take credit for intentionally spreading it out.   It takes me a while since I basically work on it on the weekends.

Stay safe

On 4/28/2020 at 6:00 AM, cookie_monster said:

Hi Noreen.  We also were on this cruise. I’ve so enjoyed following along with your review, and remembering the good times! Funny this is, we also booked an 11 day on the Constellation out of Tampa. Hope to meet you there.

Thank you.

I enjoy writing these even though it takes me a while to do it.

Come say hi if we are on Constellation together since you know what we look like 😀

Stay safe

Noreen

On 4/27/2020 at 8:28 PM, vms said:

Thank you for a wonderful review! Your food photos were lip-smacking delicious. Glad that you returned home safely.

 

Looking forward to your final thoughts.

Thank you.

I have a lot of food pictures.  It is easier to remember to take those than action shots where you have to stop what you are doing to pose.

I should get to the final random comments this weekend

Stay safe

On 4/27/2020 at 5:39 PM, Missusdubbya said:

Thanks for another great review Noreen! Stay healthy

Thank you

Stay healthy too

On 4/27/2020 at 2:57 PM, Arzeena said:

Noreen,

I was thinking about you and Scott as I woke up this morning. I was wondering how you both were doing amidst the lock downs and hoping both of you were safe and healthy. Came across your latest post so I assume you are doing well.

Glad I found this review!!!!!!

Hi.
 

Cruise Critic is like a little family isn’t it?  We look for certain posters.  Thank you for looking for me.

We are doing OK.  Staying home trying to stay safe and healthy.  I have been working remotely since we got home not commuting into NYC.

We were among the last group of cruisers that had a “normal” cruise before everything changed.

I hope you and your family are safe and healthy too

Noreen

On 4/26/2020 at 9:08 PM, Reel Love said:

Thank you for a great review!  😊   Really enjoyed reading it!!

 

Thank you

On 4/26/2020 at 8:39 PM, reallyhooked said:

Enjoyed reading your review.  Silhouette would have been our 3rd Celebrity cruise in March, but the virus changed that.Glad you got to have a great time. The pictures are great. 

Stay safe 

Thank you

We were so lucky to be able to cruise before everything changed.

That 3rd Celebrity Cruise will just be that much more special when you can go.

Stay safe

On 4/26/2020 at 5:45 PM, Bimmer09 said:

 

A great trip and a great read!

Thank you Noreen

 

Norris

Thank you 

Saturday 3/7/20 - Continue Driving, Arrive Home in NJ

When we got up we showered, got dressed and headed out.  

There was a small gym that we saw but didn’t use since we headed right out today.  I forgot to take a picture but did peek in and it had all the normal equipment.  

We also saw a small laundry room, a pool, and a breakfast area (that had those same waffle machines that we used in the beginning of our trip).  Since it was early when we were leaving the breakfast wasn’t set up yet.

We were in the car by about 6:30am.  We figured we should hit the road early to get home.

We would definitely stay at this hotel if we were in the area again.

We got to North Carolina just before 7am.  We stopped for coffee for Scott.  I got an iced mocha.  Scott also got us Lucky Charms cereal bars to snack on.

We were in Virginia by about 9:45

We were by Maryland around 1:45 and it was nice to see the sign on I95 that said New York.  We knew we were getting closer to home.

We passed the Grandeur of the Seas docked in Baltimore around 2:45

We were hungry so stopped at the Maryland Welcome Center around 3:30.  We got in line for Wendy’s and it took a really long time.  We had a burger, fries, and a Coke.  

We made it to Delaware by 4.  

We got to New Jersey at 4:15.  We live near the top of New Jersey so knew we still had a little while to go before we would be home.

We made it home by 6:30.  

The cats, after giving us an initial cold shoulder, were happy to see us.  We played with them for a while.

We did some unpacking and got some laundry started.

We originally planned to go out for dinner and while we were driving home were trying to decide what restaurant we were in the mood for.  By the time we got home we weren’t really in the mood to go out.  We ended up ordering pizza later.  

We had a great trip.

I’ll come back with some final/random thoughts.

Friday 3/6/20 - Continued

We went to the Townplace Suites by Marriott in Florence SC.   There were a lot of hotels in the same area.

We left most of our luggage in the car just bringing in our carry on bags, the hotel bag, and the cooler.

We were pleasantly surprised by the hotel.

The room was very nice.

There was a kitchenette

A decent sized closet

The bedroom area/living area with a desk, cabinets, TV, a couch, a bed, etc.

And we were happy to see a normal fully contained bathroom.

We watched some TV, poked around on the internet, and talked about our trip.  Breaking up the drive is working for us.  

We went to bed relatively early (probably by 11).

Friday 3/6/20 - Continued

We were hungry and kept seeing signs for Cracker Barrel.  Scott said he was in the mood for Fried Chicken, let’s give Cracker Barrel a try.  There was one in the same town as the hotel so we headed there for dinner.

We were seated quickly.  

Scott had chicken fried chicken (what exactly is that?), dumplings, and corn.  I had fried chicken breast, corn, and mashed potatoes.  We were also brought biscuits.  The biscuits were the best part of the meal.  The rest of the food was edible but I don’t think we’ll be rushing back to Cracker Barrel soon.  The waiter brought our check with our food.

We ordered the buttermilk pie to share for dessert.  This was very good.  The waiter had to redo the bill and bring it back.  This was a very cheap dinner.

Friday 3/6/20 - Continued

We pretty quickly got onto I95 headed north.

Florida is a very long state.

When we were near Daytona I received a call from my boss who wanted to talk about all the changes happening at work due to COVID19 and how it’s gotten much worse since I left for vacation.  She said they were starting alternating weeks for people in the NYC office of people working from home to have less people in the office.  I normally work from home 2 days a week but I would be in the first week of working from home all week when we got back.  She figured I wouldn’t mind being in the first group working home which I didn’t mind at all.  I think they probably were worried since I just got off a cruise ship that I should self quarantine anyway.  The original plan separated the teams into two groups.  One group group would work home the first week, then the second group the second week, rotating back and forth.  It didn’t end up working out that way.  By the end of the first week that my group worked home, the firm decided nobody would work in the NYC office and we would all just work remotely.

We got to Georgia about 4:25.  

We got to South Carolina about 5:25.

While we originally thought maybe we would go to Charleston on the way home we decided not to and to just stay along I95.  I started googling to see where we should stop for the night.  Florence SC seemed about halfway and I started looking at hotels there.  I would check trip advisor as well as the hotels websites.  I know this is silly but since we like the regular self contained bathrooms I looked at the room pictures to find a hotel that had that type of setup.  I found the Townplace Suites by Marriott in Florence SC had good reviews and the pictures looked nice too.  I made the reservation online when we were about 40 miles away.