Silent Penguin

Same. In fact, if it wasn't for my snorkel gear and Scrabble game, I might not fill my suitcase to capacity. What I do bring now that I didn't 10 years ago is my laptop. Of course, it has it's own bag. I also pack more "medicine chest" items just in case.

I completely agree. You get what you pay for with shapewear. Spanx are "spendy" but do the job. I've also been happy with Honeylove. FYI: I'm short, in my 50's, and have birthed 4 babies, so I have a bit of a saggy belly and a wee bit of middle age flab in the back to deal with. In my experience, nothing flattens the belly completely. Posture definitely makes a difference too.

I'm enjoying your report and photos very much. You are spot on about cruising being the easiest way to travel with a GF family member. Getting decent GF bread for sandwiches and toast is the hardest part regardless of the cruiseline.

Thanks!!

Absolutely, anyone who expects the games to have all their pieces on any ship (regardless of cruiseline) is a newbie!

Thank you! That's exactly what I wanted to know, and I thrilled to hear from someone who is on the Silhouette right now. I hope you are having a wonderful cruise. BTW, in the US, we call the "throw a beanbag in a hole" game Cornhole.

Every ship I've been on has games in the library, but we're sailing Celebrity for the first time this November, and I don't want to assume anything. We'll be on the Silhouette. Are there games in the libary? Specifically, I like to play Scrabble. Although I usually travel with my own set, it would save me some space in my suitcase if I only had to pack my bag of tiles (in case the ship's set is incomplete). Thanks.

I hear you. For 3 years I worked from 5am- 2pm, and even on vacation, I was up by 4:00 or 4:30 am. Not an easy time of the morning to find a hot meal or a good cup of coffee.

In my experience, it's not just Celebrity! In my experience, it's the ubiquitous buffet experience except for the chocolate cake I ate on my last Carnival cruise.

Good to know. We mostly fly Southwest but we've never been early enough for a flight to have considered whether it was too early to check our bags.

When we started cruising our children were school-age and DCL was our line of choice because the onboard kid programs were out of this world. No cruiseline comes close. Then, we hit a time in our life when, if we wanted to continue cruising, we were going to have to try a more affordable cruiseline. With an open-mind and low expectactions, we took our first Carnival cruise. That was just fine for several years:we never had a bad experience on Carnival. Now, our kids are grown, we can afford to branch out, and what's looking pretty appealing -at least on the Youtube videos I've been watching-is Celebrity. Looking forward to booking, a couple questions have come to mind. One is about the onboard app. How realiable is the chat feature? I'm aware that the WiFi isn't so hot, but might it be more reliable to use Messenger rather than using the app? Another question. It's about presenting proof of vaccination. With Carnival, you can opt to upload a copy of your certificate to the Verifly app but you don't have to. You can just show up at the port with your card in hand, which is what I did on my last cruise since it was a very last minute booking (less than 24 hours), and I wasn't sure it would be approved in time. Also, I was reading someone's recent cruise report and she mentioned there was a problem verifying her husband's vaccination card, and I don't want that hassle. That's all for now. I'm going to read more posts and reports and watch more videos before asking anymore questions.

Too bad there isn't a special price for passengers doing B2B cruises. Or is there? I wouldn't know since I haven't cruised with Celebrity and am still in the planning/research phase for a cruise next year.

Wow! Thank you for sharing this!

As someone who has enjoyed several Carnival cruises but is ready to raise the bar when it comes to food and atmosphere, this sounds good to me.

This is compelling since one of the reasons we're thinking of trying Celebrity after several Carnival cruises is because we would like a different atmosphere and dining experience. Thank you for posting this.

The baguette was served at dinner in the dining room. It was small and sliced in chunks. I wonder, though, if a GF guest could ask ahead of time to have some available at other venues.

My daughter is gluten-free. She's been with us on several different Carnival ships and has always felt well taken care of. She hates the GF sandwich bread but loves the baguette. In regards to dessert, you have to ask for the gluten-free version of melting cake since the regular recipe includes flour. It's slightly soupier but still yummy.

I'm not minimizing your situation in the least, but I would rather weed smell than cigar smell. We had a cigar smoker next door on a 15-day cruise. At least he only indulged for a short time in the early morning and later in the evening.

And it's back down again! June 15th. VIFP pricing

I'm thinking of buying more too, but the stock sites I'm reading are strongly suggesting Hold not Buy or Sell.

You are astute. Yes, I got the kind that starts with extreme fatigue and seems like a cold (or bad allergies) but comes and goes quickly except for a lingering little cough.

Every time I get on a ship, I expect this to happen to me, but so far it hasn't.I'm sure, after 13 cruises, it's just a matter of time. I don't know what I would really do. I think I would complain, but I doubt I would have the guts to confront anyone. I've read stories about the offenders raising the bar just to be a**holes after they are confronted. Heck, I bought a house from a man who would do just that when the next door neighbor complained about the parties he and his teenage kids threw. Honestly, how many people who behave like your neighbors are going to say, "Oh, sorry. My bad. It won't happen again." I thought we were going to have this problem on the Vista earlier this year because starting on day one of our cruise, we were woken up by the sound of people having a loud conversation around 4:30 in the morning. It lasted until almost 6:00 am. No music or shouting, just conversation and some laughter. I figured some family group was traveling from another time zone so they were wide awake when they should have been sleeping. So, I let it go. But the the next night, the same thing. It started around 4:30 in the morning and went on for a couple hours. Before taking my problem to Guest Services, I did my best to find the source. It wasn't from next door, or the floor above me. I stood on my balcony and I couldn't hear it. It sounded like it was coming in through a vent. Security come to my room. They heard it too, and did the same thing-walked around trying to find the source in my room and around it. About an hour after they visited my room, it stopped. I got a call from Security. It turns out there is a staff break area right below my stateroom! That explains the fact that it was only adult voices speaking languages I couldn't translate and the fact that it sounded like they were in an empty metal room. I wish I could say it didn't happen again for the rest of the cruise, but it only stopped for a couple days. After another visit to Guest Services, the noise stopped.

I was thinking the same thing last month when I was on the Elation.

May 21 - Disembarkment Day Who doesn't dread the hassle of disembarkment morning? Our morning was probably no different than anyone else's. We had breakfast (no Java Cafe stop this morning) in the dining room, collected our bags from our stateroom (we chose self-assist), and sought out a waiting spot until we could leave the ship. It felt like the wait was much longer than any I could remember but at least it was just the two of us and no children to wrangle or grumpy relatives to placate, so we just played on our phones or watched the people a deck below and waved goodbye to some of our new shipboard friends as they left the ship. Matt was easy to spot with his white bucket hat with pink pelicans on it. LOL. Once off the ship, the line to leave the port was also a slow grind. Is Jacksonville's port always like this? I don't know what the embarkment pace is because, like I said, Leah and I didn't get to the port until after 2:00, so were were the only passengers left to board, and it was a ghost town. Fortunately, our flights weren't until later in the afternoon, so were only a little bored but not stressed out. As we finally approached security, a clutch of law enforcement personnel (Business dress, badges on lanyards, handcuffs on hips) strode through. It wasn't the first time during the cruise, we witnessed the presence of security and law enforcement in action, so we weren't surprised that someone (or more than just one person) was being met at the port. Later in the morning, we ran into a crew member at the Walmart, and he said, "it happens every week". Also, not a surprise. People definitely smoke pot on the ship, behave badly, or conveniently forget the conditions of their probation or parole. Once we left the port, we got an Uber to the Walmart because we needed a couple things that couldn't wait until we got home. On the way out, we ran into some of the ship crew who were waiting for their ride back to the ship. Had a good chat with one of them, and Ubered to the airport. We had the good fortune of getting an Uber driver originally from Long Island who had a very interesting story about his relocation to Jacksonville. He's currently living in a nice camper (the kind you haul) while he builds a house on the land he bought, but he's finding the trailer so comfortable with the modifications he's made, he's not in a hurry to build the house. He says his wife is happy there too, but I wonder. Leah and I had a surprisingly affordable and delicious meal at the Chili's in the airport. I like the way you seat yourself, scan the QR code on the table to order, and the waitress comes with your food. This may be old news to most of you, but not for us. Even though Chili's is Tex-Mex, the turkey club sandwich is outstanding. It's packed full of smoked turkey. This one was too light on avocado but avocados are insanely expensive right now, so I get it. (FYI: They were also one of the things that either ran out or weren't available on the ship.) I took most of it on the plane with me to eat later. Since Leah was heading straight to NYC to see a friend and I was heading home, I left her at the Delta gate and then headed to my SW gate to wait for my flight. On my flight home I sat next to a very interesting woman-about my age- who was returning home from a wedding and family vacation at Disney World. She was wearing a mask, so I asked her if she would feel more comfortable if I wore one too. She said, no, it's just that I caught a cold while I was in Florida and I don't want to spread it. Guess what? It wasn't a cold..... Back at BWI, I got on the wrong parking lot shuttle bus twice! The first time, I mistook the Daily lot bus for the Long-Term bus. The next mistake I made was getting on the bus for Lot B instead of A. Thank goodness, I had taken a picture of the pole sign nearest my car. When it was obvious to the driver I had ridden through the whole lot, he asked me where my car was, and I showed him my picture of the pole sign. He said, you're in the wrong lot. I didn't want to start all over again by riding back to the airport, so I had him drop me off at the exit of Lot B and I walked across the road to the correct lot. Duh, me.