skybluewaters

Thank you @artbcpa But I can’t agree with you regarding the reasonableness of the pricing of their excursions. The price on quite a few of them on my upcoming June 24 - July 9 cruise on Serenity can best be described as outrageous or absurd (that varies by specific excursion). But Crystal must know what it’s doing, because we signed up for four excursions nonetheless.

This was also done on one of our cruises within the past year. I wasn't sold on the idea of it, but it worked out ok (at best). My preference would be for them not to make this a regular occurrence, although I applaud them for trying something new.

Thanks for your review! Could you explain what you mean by Crystal being more flexible with regard to pricing.

Apparently, that ~ $500/pp increase is just since yesterday. There was a much larger mark up which occurred prior (see @Sunprince's comment #19 above).

Regarding the 21-day Sojourn cruise, I just checked and a V1 (with a complimentary upgrade to a V3) is now $13,399. That's ~ $500 more since yesterday, assuming we both are correct. Are you sure about the $7500 price before the sale? That seems awfully low for a Med cruise, even in October/November.

I, too, love the old Crystal ships, but can Crystal survive without new ships? Given the extended time it takes from conception to delivery of a new ship, I think Crystal's best hope is to purchase existing luxury ships from another cruise line...or merge with Seabourn. Carnival, which owns Seabourn, has immense debt and has already sold off one of Seabourn's ships. Perhaps it would be in both Crystal's and Carnival's best interests for A&K to acquire Seabourn.

Many travel sites do. Here's one (I think I'm not supposed to say the name of the group here). And, yes, all of Seabourn's ships are 6* on this site.

Occassionally I’ll find a cruise that has few cabins available, with perhaps only one or two being desirable. I book online to secure the cabin and then transfer the booking to my TA. I’ve done this with other cruise lines and, if memory serves, this was possible on the old Crystal website.

I understand the desire to have a printed copy in hand, but the Crystal website has a smooth and intuitive platform for searching cruises. There are multiple filters you can select, such as which month you want to cruise, destinations you want to visit (by regions of the world or by country), duration of cruise, and even cruises with special offers. You can then sort the cruises by calendar, price or duration of cruise. As much as I enjoy leafing through brochures, the website is an excellent alternative. The one qualm I have is that you can't actually book a cruise online with Crystal as you can with other luxury lines. Hopefully that will change soon.

I don't think that there's a public coffee machine on Seabourn, at least I've never seen or heard of one. You could get coffee through room service, perhaps a standing order for daily delivery at your choice of time.

...and most importantly, you can see the menus for all of the restaurants for the ship that you are scheduled to be on for your next cruise.

Are there many multi-generational families and children aboard?

Just got off the phone with Crystal: the representative said that the exact date of the formal night won't be known until the cruise begins. That seems strange to me. But no big deal.

Thank you Patty and Rob. And thanks @CruisePfan...I'll try the phone route and see if they'll talk to me (don't want to bother my TA with this minor issue).

False

Is there any way to know in advance which nights will be formal nights?

Feel free to sit in the front row center if you want to be picked on...🤭

Given that Beefbar's menu is heavily weighted towards beef, I suspect that the surviving Tastes dinner dishes might be gambas al ajillo, hamachi crudo, and/or ahi tuna poke. There's no need to keep chimichurri steak on the menu. Looking forward to finding out in person!

"APT...is eyeing an expansion of the alliance into Seabourn’s legacy ocean vessels." First the Odyssey (to a Japanese company), now the expedition vessels, and soon perhaps the remainder of Seabourn's fleet...feels as though the brand is being nibbled away. Could it be that APT is using the expedition ships as a lease-to-own trial with regards to the entirety of Seabourn's fleet?

Unfortunately, "elegant" is subjective and will always be disputable. I would suggest that an objective measure of jeans be employed, and what better objective measure is there than price? In order to gain access to The Restaurant if wearing jeans, you would need to bring a receipt for your jeans that shows them to have cost at least $149.95 USD (tax not included).

The ability to book Keller reservations online closes 15 days prior to the cruise, so that is why you can't make reservations currently for your March 2 cruise.

So help me on this, Nancy (or anyone else): we have a 24-day cruise coming up, which is actually two 12-day cruises back-to-back. On the website I'm only able to select one Solis reservation per each 12-day cruise. If it were considered one 24-day cruise, we could get three reservations. What do you think?

...but good luck finding the place to do so on the website

My in-suite vodka bottles have always been 1.0 Liters, which is a size I don't usually see at local stores, which usually sell 0.75L or 1.75L bottles. In general, standard spirit bottles are 0.75L, so the size I usually receive on SB is 1/3 larger than that.

In my opinion, the marginal utility of upgrading from a standard room with veranda to an aquamarine suite is minimal compared to the ability to double the number of days you get to spend on the ship. I don't like to use the term "no-brainer," but it's the best description for this choice. Enjoy Alaska!