lorimay

In December it left from Terminal G, but the parking garage was full and we had to park in an open lot quite a distance from actual terminal. Beware if you have mobility issues that you may not be able to park right across the street. The parking garage is shared by the other terminals.

We were on the Summit right after Christmas and noticed a young adult male in the OVC who came in without a shirt on - not even carrying a shirt. Not at the entrance - all the way in the back, so he must have passed by tons of staff to get there. He stood there for at least five minutes having a conversation with his family party and no staff approached. I'm not sure what happened with him that day, but a couple of days later we saw the same guy in the same place shirtless again. However, this time my husband said he saw a staff member come over and we think he was asked to leave. I was shocked he wasn't turned away at the entrance. But then again (and not trying to start a proper attire in dining room discussion) we did see people in the dining room that probably should have been turned away if Celebrity's rules were actually being followed.

In October we did b2b from Rome to Barcelona and then Barcelona to Cape Liberty. The first leg only required a self test. We actually did those, tested negative, but didn't even have to show the pictures on boarding. However, I tested positive for Covid (and was very ill) on the day before Barcelona. My husband tested negative, so apparently that was enough to satisfy the testing requirement for the Barcelona to Cape Liberty leg of the trip. Long and not very pleasant story about quarantine later, they sent someone up to the cabin on day 5 after testing positive. This person was CLEARLY told to make sure that I didn't test positive again. I cannot be sure that she actually even inserted the test swab in my nose because there was no way she actually got a sample. The same thing happened to my husband who had tested positive on day 4 of my quarantine - same person, same method. My point is that I believe they are ticking the boxes but don't really want to know.

We did two cruises last year on Oceania, one on Marina in a penthouse and one on Riviera in a regular cabin. We found the decor on both ships was outdated and our penthouse suite had some pretty beat up furniture. But the bathroom in the penthouse was great and even in the regular cabin it was much nicer even than on our recent Beyond cruise. Yes, you do get some extras with the penthouse cabin, but not enough to make it worth the extra money. Our butler was worthless - didn't even keep our ice bucket full and never even stopped by to see if we needed anything. I know that might be unusual, but the only other perk worth it is that you get better dinner reservations (which is important since they are hard to get in some of the special restaurants). The food is good (MUCH better than our recent cruises on Celebrity) but not very much choice in the buffet and, we did not thing the main dining room food was very good. We spent many evenings in the buffet with steak, lobster and lamb chops cooked to order. As someone else pointed out, the ship is dead once the dining rooms close. A much older crowd than Celebrity and not nearly as much to do. We found the enrichment on the Beyond this fall much better than on either of our Oceania cruises and the entertainment on Oceania (what there was) was about the same. We took the O-life air and the excursions. The air department is 1000 times better than Flights by Celebrity - they are an actual travel service and not a flight consolidator. Excellent, flexible service. The excursions are really not worth the money so we would not do that again. I would really like to do a cruise on Vista but not sure if I would do Marina or Riviera again and I'm not a small ship person - so won't do the R class ones.

I think food is so subjective that it's hard to comment on individual items but overall we find the food is definitely lower quality than pre-pandemic. We spent 21 days on Beyond in October and just came back from a short cruise on Summit. On both cruises, there was a lack of quality in the Oceanview. The Indian food always looks good and there were limited Asian dishes (the same noodles every day with a different name). The fried chicken was unrecognizable pieces - the legs looked the same as the thighs? or whatever other pieces they were. You can always get plain food like a fresh salad, a sandwich, a thin grilled steak, grilled chicken breast, etc. But there isn't anything "fancy" or exciting on the buffet. And the sad part was that the dining room food was no better quality than the buffet. The beef stroganoff I had on the last night was so chewy it was inedible. The cheese ravioli the first night were clearly from frozen. One night the waiter waved off my husband from the Thai coconut soup - he said "I've served it many times and failed every time". Also, the service is so slow (Summit was better than Beyond because they weren't as short staffed) that the old days of extra lobster tails or a double something because you enjoyed it are long gone. It's simply not an option unless you are willing to sit there forever. My problem with the burgers is that they are so dry and compressed with fillers that they don't even taste like beef. Meanwhile, forget breakfast in the main dining room. All you are getting is the same buffet food except delivered to your table. There is absolutely no difference. I'm sure the food is better if you eat in Luminae or Blu but that's not us. On Beyond we ate in Fine Cut one night and although the steaks were much better quality than the dining room or buffet, the sides were extremely disappointing. I think part of our problem is that we did two Oceania cruises last year and while there were many things we did not like about Oceania and they didn't have a huge selection at their buffet, the quality of the food was so superior we are having a hard time going back to Celebrity. The good news about Celebrity is that no matter how bad the food is, the people serving it are always friendly and trying their very best to make you happy!

Just sat at breakfast with a gentleman who told me he and his wife have been on 25 or more cruises and this TA on Beyond has been the worst cruise ever mainly due to service issues. He is in Retreat. The Retreat lounge apparently has been closed for two days because the ceiling collapsed in the rough weather. He told me there have been wait times with beepers for Luminae and that even Retreat passengers have been unable to get reservations in the specialty restaurants. They were told to just show up at 8:30 at Fine Cut and they would get in. He said the food showed up at 10. He waited 45 minutes for a drink at World Class bar. we have been restricted because of Covid isolation but room service has been crazy long times (2-3 hours). Al Bacio was packed yesterday morning. I tried to order at the counter to stay and was told to sit and wait for table service. It took the one server over 30 minutes to get to me (I had to wave her over) and another 15 to get my tea. They were understaffed on the previous cruise also and the ship was only 2/3 full. We sat one night in Cyprus with dirty dishes in front of us for more than 15 minutes. It was like that in all the restaurants. It’s a shame - it’s a fabulous ship. So we’ll designed. More like a resort than a traditional cruise ship. But it doesn’t matter what the reason is - Celebrity should have planned for this and been more prepared. This is just bad management.

We were in the previous cruise and are now on the Beyond TA. There were no PPV movies on the previous Rome to Barcelona cruise either. I asked about it when I was in quarantine and told there were 50 movies available. There might be 50 programs available but most are poor documentaries and meditation programs. There are no recent movies at all available on PPV.

I made it out of quarantine today. They will not budge on the five full days for my husband and no one can explain how he was not tested for four days despite sharing the cabin. They did offer me a solo cabin if I wanted but I turned it down. All the crew is now masked so I suspect there may be quite a few cases. I heard quite a bit of coughing in the Oceanview today. Meanwhile, our stateroom attendant cheered when I walked out today and the room service supervisor who calls about meals told me how happy he was and seemed genuine. He gave me his direct number so we can call about my husband’s meals directly. I spoke with guest relations about the credit for quarantine. Most likely we will get one day of the 9-day cruise and 9 days of the 12-day cruise refunded. So probably a substantial amount. i don’t know what we could have done to prevent this. Probably should have gotten the variant booster before leaving. However, Europe is going through a major Covid wave at the moment. Last year our European cruise on Oceania required masks. Our Caribbean one did not. I managed to avoid infection until now and lived through the pandemic in no mask Florida so I think it’s all really a crap shoot. I suspect I caught it on the plane from the Italian woman behind me who coughed the whole trip. But who knows - the ships tour in Cinque Terra was packed on buses, ferries and trains. I guess it’s a story to tell at parties now -

No. They told us we could not get off.

We are on the second leg of our B2B on Beyond. This leg is the TA. First cruise started out great. Really enjoyed the ship and the ports. Then on the sea day, two days before changeover in Barcelona, I started feeling bad. I had a bad cough and progressively kept getting worse. Next day, Valencia, I canceled our excursion and went down to medical. As I suspected, I was positive for Covid. My husband had a few of the same symptoms but he tested negative. I was immediately returned to our infinite veranda stateroom and told I had to quarantine for 5 days. My husband was told he didn’t even need to wear a mask and was free to wander the ship. He was told to come back the next day for a test. We were both given a bag with a bottle of expectorant and some Tylenol and Advil. That was the start of a lot of miscommunication and mistakes. I understand that I took the risk of coming on this trip and catching Covid. We both tested negative before we boarded (self test). I knew this was a possibility. But I assumed that Celebrity had this protocol figured out and clearly the message isn’t getting through to everyone. We waited all day the first day for someone to tell us what was going to happen - like were they going to make us leave in Barcelona or let us continue. No communication at all. Finally late in the day we called guest services and they said we could stay on. We asked if we could get off since I would be missing all the Spanish ports and maybe getting out to see the last stop in Azores. We were told we could not get off in Barcelona. The Barcelona day was a mess. My husband went down and exchanged his room key. They refused to let him do mine. Then they sent someone up to the room to check me in - but he couldn’t understand that I was in quarantine and told me to go pick up my card at guest relations. Meanwhile no internet without the new card. No room service call and they were closed so I got no breakfast. Room service has been spotty. When they remember to call they are great - but a lot of times they forget to call. Since it takes over an hour for delivery, we sometimes call in ourselves. One lunch I ordered a club soda and the woman started arguing with me telling me I would have to pay for it. She refused to listen about quarantine. Then said she would call back. She didn’t and I didn’t get lunch - my husband went up and got me something from oceanview after we waited two hours. Meanwhile, after a couple of days I got a follow up call from the medical center. But no one ever followed up with my husband and, typical of him, he didn’t pursue it either. Big mistake. This morning he got a call demanding that he show up to a 3rd deck cabin to be tested because he had “close contact” with a Covid person. Really? It took you 4 days to figure that out after he tried to self report? Needless to say he’s positive and his quarantine starts today. Hopefully mine ends tomorrow. We are not particularly high maintenance people but I do feel like we are being ignored. Other than only periodic room service, housekeeping has called once. Medical office calls about every other day. No one else called. No information about refunds, services (they didn’t upgrade our internet or give us any on demand movies). BTW, the overall video experience is bad on this ship. No late run movies. Most of my Netflix shows can’t be played on my phone because I’m not using a VPN. News and sports channels ok but not much entertainment. The only good news is I felt so sick the last few days that I didn’t really want to go out. I just wish we could have quarantined in Barcelona and gone home. We missed all the ports and while sea days are great, I would have liked to be home instead of this. It’s not easy with two sick people in a small cabin 24 hours a day!

All four dining rooms have plenty of tables for two. They will also seat two at a table for four if necessary. The plus is that the tables for two are much farther apart than on M class so you don’t feel like you are eating with someone else!

I am currently on Beyond. This is not only a working vacation for me, but I am from an area directly affected by Hurricane Ian and am helping coordinate recovery at home as a volunteer with a couple of groups. We are just leaving VilleFranche. This is the slowest internet I have had the whole trip. I just did a spee test and got 107.46 mbps download and 3.32 mbps upload speeds. As I said, this is the slowest it has been. I have been doing zoom calls and microsoft team calls, plus emails from my computer and phone. Also streaming lots of videos. In my opinion, most of the time it's almost as fast as I have at home. No complaints here from someone who is working and enjoying a wonderful vacation at the same time.

Even if you are sitting at a table for 2 on the Summit you will be sitting with others because the tables are only inches apart. There’s no private conversations!

Wow. Thank you for this great and detailed information. It is greatly appreciated. Sounds like a great way to spend the day, see Nice and still get to the Villa Ephrussi.

We'll be in Villefranche in October on the Celebrity Beyond. We are sceduled to be there from 7am to 6pm. We have never been to the French Riviera before. We have an interest in seeing the Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild, but I was wondering if we could do that and still have time in Nice. Or would we be better off doing the Nice, Monaco, Eze tour since it's our first visit to the area. Any suggestions would be great. Also, is a private tour better than just a taxi or public transportation if we do go to Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild? Thank you.

We did the Cosol tour in January. We saw a lot of the island but it was not one of my favorite tours. Our driver was fine, but not very communcative. He would answer questions but not point out too many things. The van made loud noises and the driver kept apologizing because he said it needed repairs. We even stopped for him to make a minor repair. First stop was the shop in the banana fields - where you felt you had to buy something. We did go to the waterfall and the mud baths which were both fun. For whatever reason, the original beach we were supposed to go to was cancelled and he took us to the city beach at Soufriere. It was not the nicest beach I have been to. We had to pay some kids for two chairs and an umbrella and then keep waving them off when they tried to earn more money. After about 90 minutes on the beach, the driver came back to get us with his two kids and they drove back with us to the port. We did get to see a lot of sights, but I really felt like the whole tour was just a little unprofessional. However, St. Lucia had just opened back up and you could see they desperately needed the tourist dollars so I felt bad about complaining. Based on my experience, I don't know if I could recommend them.

Also the FBC website with the "what's included" in the airfare is not always correct. For example, we booked with them for a one-way to Rome in October. There is a non-stop from MIA to FCO on ITA (old Alitalia). If we booked through FBC with tickets branded ITA it was half the cost of tickets branded Delta (same plane, just code sharing). However, the Delta flight (according to the FBC chart) supposedly got one free checked baggage and advanced seat selection. We booked Delta, thinking we could use miles to upgrade seats or at least pick seats in advance. Turns out not to be true - ITA says we can't get seats until we check in. Delta says they can't choose the seats. We are basically out of luck. And there's huge wait time to get through to FBC, Delta and ITA. Never again.

We have done several Mexican Riviera cruises. Cabo and Puerto Vallarta are just as charming as some of the Caribbean ports. Mazatlan is not. However, don't think that just because you take a ship's excursion you might not run into trouble. The last time we were in Cabo we took an excursion where you drive your own jeep in a convoy into the countryside and then to the beach. We were way out in the country on a dirt road when some men in a pickup truck forced the leader off the road and stopped the convoy. There was intense negotiation going on for quite a while but we were finally let go. Added a dimension of excitement to the excursion. As in most ports, if you stick to the tourist areas you should be fine - which is the same advice I would give if you were visiting Belize City, Puerta Plata (there's armed tourist police on every corner from the port to the main square) or Costa Maya (was on a ship's excursion there and had the tour bus stopped and searched by someone in a uniform with a machine gun). I think one of the big differences between Caribbean and Mexican Riviera ports is that in the Caribbean tourism is everything and a lot is done to not let the tourists see what real life is like. There's a lot of governmental control. In Mexico, tourism is important but the areas are not as regulated, which is why you see so many people begging on the beaches and there's a little bit of lawlessness wherever you go.

I had my travel agent (who probably won't be my travel agent for any more travel) reprice our B2B cruises in order to get the OBC that Celebrity was offering in the 60% off plus OBC sale. The cabin price was the same but he told me that supposedly we got $100 per person for the first cruise and $200 per person for the second cruise. However, I'm not seeing it connected to the reservations on the website or on the app. I asked him when it would show up and he said the first or second day of the cruise. Has anyone had the OBC from this sale show up on their account before the cruise? I'm just not trusting him on this and I don't want to lose those OBCs. Thanks.

We have done a few short cruises on Celebrity (and RCCL) because we live close to the FLL and MIA and it's a nice weekend getaway. Frankly, there was more "partying" on the 7-night Bermuda cruise out of Port Liberty we took in 2019 than we ever saw on a Celebrity short cruise and that was before almost everyone got Always Included. You definitely get more family groups and other groups on the Bermuda cruises than you do on Celebrity cruises in other destinations. Everyone talks about how Celebrity has more upscale clientele, but I don't care what cruise line you are on there are always those people that are going to get their money's worth out of their drink package. They only spoil your cruise if you let them. And it does happen on more upscale cruise lines as witnessed by the couple in the next cabin on our last Oceania cruise. The wife came back from shore and passed out halfway in and halfway out of her cabin and the next day a team in protective clothing had to come and deep clean the room.

Looking for a recommendation for a hotel in Rome in October. Last year we stayed at Albergo del Senato and it was wonderful. Can't say anything bad about this lovely hotel (except it was a holiday weekend and with the shutters open very loud out in the square). This year we only have an afternoon before heading the next day to Civitavecchia. We are planning to spend most of the afternoon at the Baths of Caracalla. I was wondering if there is a hotel similar to del Senato but closer to the area where the Baths are, or is it a mistake because that area isn't as nice? Thanks for any input.

No, they are the same as Celebrity. You can pay to add additional devices (one account per stateroom is included) and you can upgrade to faster internet. I was able to do whatsapp phone calls and even stream a couple of youtube videos, although they would stop and buffer a lot. I could get on most websites with standard but it was slow. When I upgraded for the last couple of days I was able to do zoom calls and much faster internet, including working on the shared google drive. I haven't been on Celebrity with an internet package recently but I think because Oceania allows whatsapp calls with standard internet it has a slight advantage.

I booked with FBC last week for an upcoming October cruise. ITA has a non-stop from MIA - FCO. Last week if I booked it as an ITA flight the cost was $50 one way. As a Delta code share operated by ITA it was $240. FBC said that if we booked Delta we got one extra bag and could reserve seats (plus the frequent flyer miles) so we booked that. Found out today that I can't book seats in advance for the flight. Delta says ITA has to do it and ITA says no seats until we show up at the gate. But the prices have gone way up - the ITA flight is now over $250 and the Delta $450. So apparently I paid extra for basically nothing. Not happy.

It's still the same - you have to upgrade to stream. I worked on our Caribbean cruise in March and did upgrade the last couple of days because I had to do a couple of zoom calls. But I could not do them from my cabin - had to go to one of the public rooms to get internet that was good enough, even with the upgrade, to zoom. The basic internet is free and does everything you want it to do except stream although it's slow. However, I hear Celebrity isn't much better -

We are on Beyond in October and we’re assigned late dining even though we request select. I called Captains club today to make sure I was on the wait list and was told the wait list doesn’t exist and there was nothing I could do. I guess I will keep calling until someone at least acknowledges there is a wait list.