Alsmez

That was actually one I circled while searching today - looks like a decent place for the price. Out of curiosity, have you ever stopped at Airport Cafe and Liquors to pick up wine for a cruise? It looks like the only place within walking distance to grab a couple of bottles. We haven't cruised without a drink package for many years so I'm out of practice!

We're flying in to MIA in December for a cruise (Virgin Voyages). Planning to stay near the airport since we're arriving around 10:30pm the night before and just want to get to bed asap. I've seen plenty of hotel recs but am wondering whether there is a particular advantage to choosing a hotel on the north vs south side of the airport - is one neighborhood nicer, or is the drive to the cruise port in the morning substantially easier, etc.? Thanks in advance for any advice!

DH and I are sailing on Virgin Dec 27, 2023 - Jan 2, 2024 out of Miami to celebrate his 50th birthday. The problem is, his birthday is Jan 2, disembarkation day! We're considering spending an extra day in Miami (or FLL) so that he doesn't have to spend the day on an airplane. I thought a spa day and a night in a luxe hotel might be nice, but definitely open to other suggestions if there's anything we can't miss in the area. He is NOT a beach person or partier, but might be interested in a trip to the Everglades, a fishing charter, a sporting event, etc. Thanks in advance for your recommendations! Also, if anyone has a favorite spa/hotel, hit me with those recs too. The Fontainbleau/Lapis looked interesting to me but I'm sure there are other fabulous spots.

This is indeed a great little spot on S-class ships!

The stir fry station is usually on the back/aft side of the buffet, kitty-corner from the pasta bar. It was available at dinner on our recent Eclipse cruise, though understaffed and understocked, making for long wait times.

We had bad experiences at Tuscan on Silhouette and Reflection in the "before" times and decided to give them another chance on our recent Eclipse cruise. We were glad we did - both service and food were much improved! Murano, on the other hand, was a big disappointment this time around after many wonderful meals there in years past. Will be interested to hear how Murano works out for you if you decide to visit.

I didn't include airfare or hotel in my calculations since it varies so much, although it is definitely a consideration when choosing a vacation. Caribbean cruises will always be cheaper for us since there are always cheap flights from NYC to be had, and we are comfortable flying in day-of. Europe or West Coast, etc., means a long and expensive flight plus at least a night or two in a hotel.

Impossible to say which wines any given ship will have on any given sailing and in any given venue. Best thing to do is ask the sommelier what they are able to pour by the glass for you. In Luminae especially, they are eager to please and will be able to offer things you won't find on any menu.

Double post

Very true! My one and only cruise on Carnival (with a gal pal when we were mid-20s singles) and subsequent move to Celebrity is proof of that. 🤣

Agreed on both counts. I don't mind paying more when the value is there, or when I feel like I'm getting an acceptable product for the amount I paid. I wasn't bothered at all by the price we paid for our recent Eclipse sailing and IMO it was still a reasonably good value despite certain cutbacks, but the quality of food/beverage definitely got me thinking about how much higher prices could go before I would balk and look elsewhere. Our pre-cruise stay in Vancouver provided an interesting point of comparison, actually - Vancouver is a fairly expensive city, but for our three days there, including a mid-level hotel (in a room about the size of a cruise ship berth!), excellent meals including a Michelin-starred restaurant, many lovely wines/cocktails, and plentiful activities (some which cost extra, some which were free sightseeing), our average spend came out to just about $300 pppd - right around the same price as our cruise. Obviously being at sea is a big draw for us and it's hard to put a dollar value on that, but if the food/dining/entertainment piece goes from very good to barely acceptable on ships, the freedom of land vacations is going to become that much more attractive.

True, but that's not what I was going for by looking at my previous cruise spends - my question was more about my personal perception of value for the dollar (and that of other X cruisers). Do the prices I am paying today for cruises that I expect to deliver a similar experience to my previous cruises actually represent a significant price increase (or decrease) from said past cruises after inflation is figured in? For my small sample, the answer is no, not really. Therefore, I wouldn't expect a drastic improvement in quality in terms of dining, wine, entertainment, etc. - but I also wouldn't expect a drastic decline. Unfortunately, my most recent Eclipse cruise did represent at least a moderate decline in several areas. I hope it's due solely to pandemic-related recovery, but my perception that the value proposition of this cruise was somewhat off has me looking more closely at other lines and what my dollars might get me there.

I have heard great things about the suites on E-class, but the prices are eye-popping these days. I just priced a 7-day Carib on Apex in Feb 2025 and found SVs for around $290 pppd (AI but no dining package), whereas an S1 was $633 pppd on the same sailing and SS closer to $650. That's nuts, IMO. Even if you have to pay $40 pppd to upgrade dining with a regular balcony, you're still paying $320 pppd more for the suite. No way in hell is the Retreat worth that! 🙂

Yes, while I really enjoyed our one cruise in a suite on Summit, I find Celebrity's current suite pricing to be way out of line with the actual suite experience. We were lucky enough to book an S2 on Summit just before her Edgification was announced back in 2018 and paid just $325 pppd - obviously more than any of our other cruises, but WAY less than I have seen on any X ship since. We don't spend a ton of time in our room so the extra space is not worth all that much to us. Luminae was very good, but not necessarily better than a combination of specialty restaurants. The Retreat sundeck was nice, and I'm sure it's even nicer on newer ships designed with the suite life in mind, but we aren't sun worshippers, and found the main pool deck/hot tubs to be mostly deserted when we wanted to use them in any case. For us, the value is not there when low-level suites are more than double the price of a nicer balcony with dining package. That may change as we get older, but for now, no thanks.

This is a very good point indeed. We initially booked our 2023 cruise in November 2022, well after inflation had gone insane but probably not before cruise lines cleared their "inventory" of inflated FCC to be used up. The pppd when we booked was around $310, but eventually came down to $290 pppd through a combination of price drops and better promotions. It would be interesting to know what the final average price for a given cabin class was once all rooms were sold and how that aligns with inflation vs 2020.

Yeah, I'm a little worried about this. Their drink prices are much more reasonable than X, but it is still WAY easy for us to run up those tabs on vacation. They do let you buy bar credit at a discount pre-cruise (I think you pay $300 for $400 in credit), but still. We happen to be traveling with friends who will have a suite that comes with an included bar set up, so that will help some, but I still anticipate drinks will raise our pppd price by at least $50-60, maybe more.

I figured in any OBC that came with my AI deal, but not any extra that came from my TA.

So I'm told. I am very into food so I'm looking forward to the comparison. The only negative I can see with Virgin at the moment is the limited itineraries, but I assume those will improve as the company gains a foothold.

We're planning to do the same. In fact, we had a YC inside booked for 2021 but of course that was canceled. Even more curious to see how the experience stacks up now.

That's what we're trying to figure out as well. Or rather, whether we're willing to pay a bit more for a (hopefully) much better experience. Our most recent X sailing (Eclipse to AK in May) was $290 pppd with a dining package and AI; we're paying $295 pppd for an upcoming Virgin cruise to the Caribbean without drinks (so will probably be $350 pppd after paying our bar tab). I'm hoping that Virgin will be an upgrade in terms of food and entertainment (plus the kid-free guarantee, which has value), but we'll see.

With all the discussion of Celebrity's cost-cutting measures and price hikes, I started getting curious about how my previous cruises on X stacked up against my most recent one (Eclipse to Alaska, May 28, 2023), both in terms of experience and pricing. To try to get a fair comparison, I looked up the stats on all of my previous cruises back to 2014 and put together a price-per-person-per-day (PPPD) chart including things like dining upgrades, included drinks/grats, etc. to see how much we actually paid for our experiences. I also looked up inflation numbers over the past 10 years: "The dollar had an average inflation rate of 2.70% per year between 2013 and today, producing a cumulative price increase of 30.55%. This means that today's prices are 1.31 times as high as average prices since 2013, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics consumer price index." So, all else being equal, we should expect to pay 31% more for the same experience today as in 2013. Are you finding that to be true of the cruises you are booking? I was expecting today's numbers to be much, much higher, but after looking at my own cruises (an admittedly small sample), they weren't that far off. For instance, in early 2014 we sailed Reflection to the Caribbean in an A2 for $185 pppd including drinks/grats. This year's AK cruise in an SV was $290 pppd including drinks/grats and a specialty dining package (which I consider equivalent to or better than Blu), for an increase of 56% pppd. More than inflation, but not that much more given that AK is a more expensive market. In 2016, we sailed Reflection in a 2C and paid around $228 pppd with drinks/grats/dining package. Inflation since 2016 is around 27% according to the BLS, and our 2023 cruise was almost exactly 27% more expensive than 2016. I felt both the 2014 and 2016 cruises offered a decent value proposition, though I do remember being surprised at how much more expensive 2016 was than 2014. We also sailed Silhouette in 2018 for $183 pppd, so maybe we overpaid for the 2016 cruise. Still, the numbers aren't shockingly far off from inflation. We also had an AK cruise on Solstice booked and paid for in May 2020 (canceled, obviously), in an A2 with drinks/grats/wifi for $250 pppd. Cumulative price increase since then is around 19% according to BLS. We paid just 16% more in 2023. However, the cuts were noticeable in 2023, especially to dining and wine. As a result, Celebrity's value proposition is starting to look a little less attractive to us, even though the 2023 price was not outrageous compared with 2020. Anyway, I'd be curious to hear from others about their pppd numbers and how they're feeling about the X value proposition post-pandemic. We are eager to try an Edge-class ship, but I'm mostly seeing prices north of $300 pppd (with AI) for an SV in the Carib (we're not interested in the IV), and I'm not sure I'm willing to pay that for a basic Caribbean on X. That said, we're booked on a Virgin Voyages Caribbean sailing in an XL terrace for $295 pppd over New Year's this year, including grats/wifi/dining but no drinks, which I'm guesssing will ultimately bring our pppd price to $350ish. Will we love Virgin $50 pppd more than X? Time will tell, especially as reports of cuts/menu changes etc. on X continue to roll in. So, what's your magic pppd number for Celebrity? How are the recent changes affecting it?

Exactly! I noted in my recent review that I was a bit disappointed they have done away with this. It had nothing to do with the beverage itself (which of course was low quality champagne and can be obtained easily at any bar). It was all about the ritual, and picking up a glass from a tray at Bacio is just not the same. We still had a great cruise and I'm sure the next time I sail Celebrity I won't notice the lack, but it was a bit jarring to come back after a pandemic-forced hiatus to a very different initial impression.

It will be hard to miss if it is happening on your sailing - they displayed the menu prominently at the reception desk of every dining venue and on a separate "booking table" they had set up in various locations at various times. Not to mention the staff they had stationed at the buffet entrance to hawk specialty dining in general and special events in particular (on my recent AK sailing, they did an Alaskan seafood lunch as well as the Taj X night).

Given this statement, I would suggest you choose a line that focuses on great service (which usually means an engaging and friendly crew) and offers a good variety of on-board entertainment/enrichment activities. We really enjoyed the naturalist lectures on our recent AK cruise (Celebrity Eclipse) despite the fact that we were off doing active excursions at every port. Also, do a little research in terms of general passenger profiles on various lines and ships to make sure your DH will find plenty of likeminded fellow passengers on board.

Oh, is that what they mean by "unlimited premium beverage package"? MY BAD! 🤣