Celebrity Equinox Jazz Fest cruise 4/24-5/5 Photo Review

Preamble

Let me just preface this review by saying, yes, this was the Jazz Fest cruise but we didn't book it for that exact reason so we never attended any of the concerts. If you're still interested in reading my review, I thank you. It also seems like CC likes to take away my spaces between random words today so please forgive any "typos."

A little roll call of our traveling party for those whohaven't read my other reviews: Dad, Al (70) and me Danielle (37). Myvery first cruise was on the Celebrity Solstice in a concierge cabinbut for the most part we cruise the suite life over on Princesshaving just become Elite with them. We are from Baltimore so the restof our cruise history is made up of quick jaunts on Carnival andRoyal Caribbean out of the Port of Baltimore. I subscribe to all ofthe cruise lines' promotional emails so when I saw the email fromCelebrity announcing bringing the Equinox to the Caribbean offeringthe Go Best package that included a Classic Beverage Package, FreeUnlimited Internet, Pre-paid Gratuities, and $300 OBC, I was like“Book it Danno!” A little further research into the newitineraries being offered and when we found this unique schedule ofthree days in New Orleans, a bucket list destination for Dad, even hewas saying “Book it Danno!” When we contacted our travel agent,she could only secure a deposit on an Aqua Class stateroom to ensurewe would get the conditions of the sale but put us on a wait list fora suite. Fast forward a month or two later (we booked last summer)and our travel agent calls with the news that a Royal Suite hasbecome available. Dad decided to splurge and enjoy the experience ofa cabin that gets most everything included. Now we were booked inRoyal Suite 1118 and had our perks upgraded to a Premium BeveragePackage, all we could want from the cabin minibar, and all specialtyrestaurants free.

Loads of planning and research later, we had a tentativeschedule mapped out for ports and tickets purchased. We reservedthree ship tours for 3 of our 5 ports on this 11 day cruise as wellas 4 privately booked tours or museum visits planned. Our cruisewould leave out of Miami and visit Freeport, Key West, New Orleans,Cozumel, and finally Costa Maya before returning to Miami. This beingour first experience with Celebrity's suite life, we did a lot ofresearch on the boards as to what we could expect, starting withpre-cruise contact by the shoreside concierge. The general consensuswas that by 2 weeks prior to your cruise, a shoreside concierge wouldbe contacting you to get your preferences for the cabin and makereservations as needed. Shortly before that 2 weeks was upon us, Ihad to contact the Captain's Club due to an overcharging when bookingour ship excursions online. After we finished getting that fixed witheven more onboard credit, the rep asked “Have you guys beencontacted by Jamie yet?” “Umm, I'm going to say no because Idon't know who Jamie is?” I reply. “Oh Jamie is your assignedshoreside concierge. She should be reaching out in the next few daysbut I'm also a shoreside concierge so I can take care of yourrequests right now if you want.” I turned down the offer as Dad andI hadn't yet finalized our list of what we wanted. The rep gave meJamie's direct phone number just in case we didn't hear from hersoon.

Severaldays go by and we're now well within our 2 week before cruisecountdown and still no contact from Jamie. Dad decides that it's timeto call ourselves and the phone rings and rings until finally adifferent concierge named Amy picks up. We asked about Jamie and shetells us that she's Jamie's seat neighbor and Jamie is out for theday. Amy happily offered to take down our requests and seemed veryefficient and pleasant. We like comfort in luxury but we're not onesto quivel over having one brand of wine versus another and the likeso the concept of having requests for a butler seemed so foreign.Here's the basics of what we requested: larger pool towels and robes(we're fluffy), specific soda flavors and some random brand litebeers along with tons of water bottles, orange juice for the morningsand milk to enjoy with a delivery of cookies each night. We initially asked for a secondary evening snack plate of either shrimp, cheeseand crackers, or nuts/fruit. We also asked for extra plates, bowls,glasses, and silverware to be supplied in the cabin for when we bringback food from the buffet when we want to relax. I also asked forstraws for drinking direct from the soda cans. For our 2 bottles ofliquor choices, we swiped from the suggestions posted on the boardsas we aren't seasoned drinkers enough to know what to ask for. We specifically noted a request to have our cabin serviced in themorning while we are at breakfast, something we usually getautomatically at Princess. Since the Royal Suite main bed could notbe separated, we asked for the egg crate topper to be put on the sofabed for me. We also decided to take advantage of the specialty diningperk and had the concierge make reservations for nearly everyevening. Amy assures us that everything has been noted. We ask for anemail confirmation so we can have it in writing and she promises tosend the notes over to Jamie and let her know to confirm with us.

When the next several days pass without word from either concierge,we decide to print out our list of requests and be prepared to dealwith getting it arranged on board since we didn't ask for anythingthey wouldn't have at the ready. The day before we are due to fly toMiami for some day before the cruise touring, Jamie finally emails uswith a generalized confirmation citing our dining reservations butgrouping our drink flavor choices into “a variety of sodas” andleaving off the little things like our cookies and snacks requests.Ahh well, still packed our printout so we could make our own requestsonce on board just in case but it did chip away a bit at thatpersonalized special service promised.

Saturday, April 22nd

We've booked a direct flight from Baltimore to Miami onAmerican Airlines so we leave our house at 10:30AM for our 12PMflight. Thanks to a ride from our neighbor, we were at the airport in15-20 minutes on this rainy day. Last year, we had gone through theeffort of applying for TSA pre-check for both of us and our firstflight to a cruise after that was still like a zoo because everybodyand their brother was also in the TSA pre-check security line. Thistime though it was almost spooky because despite being midday on aweekend, the only waiting in line delay we encountered was having towait on the one person being checked in at the ticket counter. Oncewe got checked in and dropped off our checked bags, there wasliterally no one in the security line. It was like a weird amusementpark ride winding quickly through the twisting roped off linebarriers to show our passports and tickets to a TSA agent whoactually seemed bored. One solo traveler did come up behind us inline by the time we moved on to the x ray machine, the only holdupthere being that they wanted my rain jacket taken off and sentthrough with my carry on camera bag and thus it got stuck until theguy behind us pushed his bag through.

We made it to the gate and found the crowd we wereexpecting as our flight was fully booked. A couple announcements madeabout checking your larger carry on luggage but thankfully no askingfor passengers to be bumped. We were called to board soon after andfrom my window seat, I watched the baggage handlers load everyone'sluggage. Then I watched as the one employee who had crawled up insidethe cargo area to pull the bags from the belt returned to the cargoarea door after she'd already left the plane and kept touching andchecking something by the door. Soon came the groan elicitingannouncement from the pilot: “We are scheduled to take off at noonfolks but it seems that the handlers have dented the space by thedoor while loading luggage for this flight today. We have put in acall to the mechanic to come check on whether it's still okay to flyor not.” Sure, a task you do everyday and you manage to dent theplane, that takes real talent. 12:30PM – Pilot comes on theintercom and gives an update that we are still waiting on themechanic and once he gets here, he then has to send the pictures ofthe dent to maintenance and wait on them to send word back that it'sokay to fly. 1:00PM – mechanic has arrived but they're stillwaiting on word from maintenance. At this point, all passengers areordered to disembark removing all carry on luggage and sit waiting inthe gate area once again until American Airlines gets the final wordabout whether the plane can fly today. Several passengers hadapproached the flight attendants as we sat waiting worrying abouttheir connecting flights. Once they made us all get off again, gateagents did their best to tend to those who had connections. Dad askedabout getting a cab voucher for Miami and one of the employeesquickly printed off and signed one for him to use in Miami. Airportstaff warned people to stay close as they didn't expect much more ofa delay and by 2PM we were finally allowed to board again.

Finally arrived in Miami without further issue with theflight at 4:45PM. After all that hassle, we discover that our baggageclaim spot for this flight has been assigned to almost the farthestluggage carousel in the whole airport from where we'd deplaned. Dadkept asking if we'd crossed over into another country at this pointgiven how far we'd walked. On the way, we stopped at a kiosk to askabout where to cash in the cab voucher. The employees there insistedwe'd have to go all the way back upstairs to another counter. After awhile of waiting for the luggage to start riding down the carousel,Dad left me to grab our two checked suitcases while he went upstairsto the counter in hopes that we could get a cab ready and avoid morewaiting. Once he finally returns, he fills me in on the absurditythat was the employees manning the upstairs counter. These AmericanAirlines employees working in the Miami airport refused to honor thesigned cab voucher and kept insisting that we instead wait for theshuttle. In the process of trying to get their computer to processthe shuttle, the employee printed out a bunch of vouchers for diningin any of the airport's eateries. In the end, while refusing to honora $60 cab voucher, they handed over $100 in dining vouchers.Eventually we elected to just pay for a cab ourselves and take thenext one in line outside the airport.

For our two nights in Miami pre-cruise, we booked theHampton Inn Miami Brickell, a Hilton owned property. I'd read inreviews online how unusual this hotel is because the first employeemanned desk you encounter upon entering the hotel is the conciergedesk. You have to take your luggage and your tired arse at this pointbody up to floor 6 where the actual check in desk is. Thankfully atthis point since it was now 6:30PM, there was no line and we werechecked in quickly. This time had no issues being recognized asHilton Honors members. There was a small specific selection of snackfreebies we were allowed to pick from and a little “suite” shopwith snacks and drinks that we were told could be chosen from as wellfor just this one item for being Hilton Honors members. We also gotfree internet and dated tickets to use for a free drink from therestaurant or pool bar during our stay. We each chose a soda can andwere thankful to find that our room was only about 20 steps from theelevators. The room was your basic hotel room with two queen beds. Wehad asked about the possibility of upgrading but they were fullybooked.

Cool view from the window by the elevators - really made me wonder how they painted this:

I didn't think to take pics of our hotel room until we were rushing around on embarkation morning so forgive the messy room:

After not really having breakfast and turning down whatturned out to be a mid-afternoon snack by the time we were actuallyin the air, we were desperate for dinner. There are a couplerestaurants that are literally adjacent to the hotel, a Chinese foodplace called 3 Chefs and a barbecue pub style place called BatchGastropub. Both restaurants offered room service delivery to thehotel but we chose to head down to 3 Chefs as we hadn't had Chinesefood in a while. The place was more like a little hole in the wallwith about 8 tables, only one other that was in use. Dad wanted totry the Steak Kew dish but our waitress advised that it would betough to chew. Dad then instead asked for Mongolian Beef and tookadvantage of the menu advising customers to ask for how spicy theywant it. I ordered the Sesame Chicken and Beef mix and I think thewaitress was subtly trying to convince me to just get the regularsesame chicken order because she recited back the order as justchicken. The portion sizes listed on the menu were a little confusingbecause the wording used to describe the sizes varied widely but theprices were really close in amount. We asked about getting some friedrice to share and when the waitress brought it, it was less than whatwe'd get from takeout at home. When we reminded her that we wanted toshare, she insisted on getting my permission to spoon half of it ontoDad's plate for him. Dad's mongolian beef was so mild it could havebeen just roast beef in gravy. The beef in my mix plate wasessentially inedible, must have been the same meat they use in theSteak Kew. In all, my whole dish had about 3 pieces of chicken in itso I was glad I'd also gotten an egg roll.

After returning to the hotel, we asked the conciergeabout breakfast hours and booking a shuttle for embarkation day. Theshuttle scheduling had to wait because they only took bookings theday before it was needed. We asked about whether the shuttle would belike a van or a big bus and was told that it would be dependent onhow many people signed up.

Since we were still hungry, our concierge gave us thesuggestion of walking the couple blocks to Publix in search of snacksfor the room. I'm a bargain hunter/couponer at heart which in turnputs the savings into enjoying the best to the extent we desire oncruises so seeing grocery stores in other parts of the country isinteresting to me. I certainly hope it was because this was Saturdayevening but Publix was a madhouse! We quickly chose a couple thingsand got out as fast as we could. By 10PM we were exhausted and turnedin early.

Enjoying your review and nice photos.

Sent from my iPad using Forums

keep it coming thanks

We are interested in your review but also will appreciate any info you can give about cruising from Baltimore on Royal...

They have a coastal itin we are interested in and it's an easy am flight from NY ...we've driven past the port but never sailed from it,...Thanks!

We are interested in your review but also will appreciate any info you can give about cruising from Baltimore on Royal...

 

They have a coastal itin we are interested in and it's an easy am flight from NY ...we've driven past the port but never sailed from it,...Thanks!

Cruising from Baltimore is super easy! Especially since we always get dropped off. We only live about 20-30 minutes drive away and even when we haven't had priority boarding it's been one of the smoothest ports to sail from. They direct you to pull right up to the porters who have trailer size containers for the luggage so there's no having to flag anybody down or wait for help. Our friendly neighbor follows the path of traffic out of the port and we walk about 15 feet to enter the terminal. A couple security xray machines to funnel passengers through and then we snake our way through the line to check in which I think the most we've ever waited in line (non priority boarding) is 30 minutes. We do get both ends of the severe weather spectrum so depending on what time of year you're looking to sail, you may wish to still arrive a day early.

My review for the Royal trip is in my signature if you're interested in a lot of light reading. Because of the bridges, only the smaller ships can sail out of Baltimore so that may help toward less of a hassle from less passenger size.

I cant wait to keep reading!

Sunday, April 23rd

We flew in an extra day before as Dad wanted to take acity tour of Miami. He settled on booking an all day tour via MiamiTour Company that featured a bus ride in the morning including ashort walking segment, lunch at a Cuban restaurant, and a boat ridein the afternoon. This meant for not only an early morning but alsobeing stuck out in 100% chance of storms. When we woke, the morningnews anchors couldn't stop talking about the big storm that camethrough a couple hours earlier. We must have been totally wipedbecause neither of us noticed and I'm usually a light sleeper. Wecalled down to the concierge desk and arranged for a cab to arrive ata pre-arranged time so that we had some leeway before needing to beat the tour meeting point of Bayside Marketplace. This gave us anhour to check out the breakfast buffet, a nice freebie that must havebeen the Hampton Inn part of the hotel as last year's other Hiltonbased hotel stays charged us. Was glad to find real brand name yogurtbut alas, only healthy cereals. When you haven't indulged in anything“bad” for you in months, you really start jonesing for somethingother than bran flakes. Today's hot food options were a westernomelet, potatoes, or maple flavored sliced sausage. 2/3rds of thebuffet was made up of fruit or bread based choices. Our cab cameright on time and it turned out we were so close to BaysideMarketplace that it only cost $9 for the ride.

Our tour was only half booked so 21 participants got tospread out among 40 bus seats. We were the first to arrive to checkin so I wandered around taking pictures as we waited and it was notyet raining. There were a few different options for people who bookedthis tour. You could do just the city tour, the city tour and aneverglades boat ride, or our choice of the city tour and a boat ridearound the harbor to see the Millionaires Row of homes. Once everyonearrived, our bus driver Jim set out on his expected route only tofind that several roads were blocked off due to an AIDS walk. Jimpulled into the center section of a road so he could sit out of theway while he called the company to ask about how to rearrange hisroute. The company had to look into his query so we sat for a bitwaiting for their call back.

Yes Jim, that Children's Museum you're pointing out is lovely - but I see cruise ships!

Since we'd ended up parked outside the Miami location ofthe infamous Kardashian's DASH store, Jim told us the story of takinghis girlfriend in there to get something as she wanted to be able tosay she had something from DASH. They settled on a $50 necklace andit broke once they got home. He tried to return it and they insistedno refunds or exchanges. Finally they agreed to take it back if hebought something more expensive.

I'm pretty sure that sign just inside the doorway that says "load occupants 34" really refers to the age limit for shopping there:

Once back on the road, we got stuck when Jim headed downa street that was also blocked preventing him from turning. He triedto get the cop standing there to move the cones enough to let himthrough but got a firm no. As a result, Jim had to back the large busstraight back the whole length of the road we'd just come down untilhe reached an alley that he could turn into and bypass the roadblock. He apologized for the detour but Dad joked that he should makeit seem like part of the tour. “This alley was where the cops ofMiami Vice chased the bad guy...”

Another stop where we sat and waited for people who'dbooked the tour but weren't there at their meeting point despite allthe wording in our confirmation warning that if we weren't on time,we'd be left behind. Drove to the tour company headquarters to pickup our bilingual guide Hernan and together they took some timefiguring out the different headsets for those who spoke languagesother than English or Spanish. Once back on the road, both Jim andHernan traded off with the female voice on the bus' intercom systemthat got triggered to give information based on where the satellitetracked the bus' location to be at various points of the tour. Hernanwould follow up everything that was said with the Spanishtranslation.

Our guide Hernan explaining our first stop:

Our walking tour started at Muscle Beach and the Versacemansion where it soon started to sprinkle. We walked up toward thebeach for a bathroom break and Hernan pointed out the various thingsto do on the beach.

Versace mansion which is now a restaurant:

A wider shot of Versace mansion:

Hey guys check it out, if I flex my arm muscles like this, my man bun pops open!

Just a bit windy at the beach today:

Not many people choosing the beach on this overcast day:

After a while he offered to call the bus back for anyonewho didn't want to be in the rain and a couple of us asked for thebus just long enough to retrieve our jackets. Jim also brought a fewumbrellas and passed them among the group. We all agreed that it waslight enough rain to finish the last 3-4 blocks of the walking tourand then we returned to the bus.

This was some sidewalk café that gets used in TV and movie scenes a lot according to Hernan:

The irony of a building with no floors but elevator looking buttons on the side:

Managed to get a surprisingly clear view through the bus window of the Norwegian Getaway:

The rain became heavier as we drove to Winwood and sawthe graffiti art. Considerably less people bothered to get off thebus this time when Hernan escorted those of us a block up the road toWinwood Park to see the more concentrated area of murals. Thankfullypart of the area was under tarps but I was still soaked when I madeit back to the bus.

This particular artwork is actually etched into the building, not drawn:

I liked how this piece used both painting and 3-D pieces that stood out from the wall:

A couple more of my favorite murals:

Our next stop was to the La Carreta restaurant in LittleHavana to have a pre-arranged family style lunch that consisted ofsalad, a chicken empanada, garlic flavored plantain strips, and acubano sandwich. You had the option of getting a grilled cheese asthe vegetarian option but when Dad was the only one to request itbecause he doesn't like mustard or pickles, Hernan offered to requesta specially made Cubano without those two ingredients. It was nice toget out of the rain even if the restaurant's bathroom floor was likea skating rink thanks to everyone's wet shoes.

The food was good but the cubano could definitely haveused some more moisture as it was very dry. We enjoyed niceconversation with our nearest tablemates as we ate. Hernan was quickto offer more of any food, including more of the specially madeCubano sandwiches for Dad but he had had enough. We did get served aflaky guava filled pastry at the end of our meal and Hernan dishedout a thimble's worth of true Cuban coffee to anyone who wanted one.I decided to try it but probably should have paid more attention whenI saw Hernan pour half a coffee mug worth of creamer into his owndrink. It was super sharp and bitter tasting but I gave my neverreally liked coffee in the first place self a couple sips to be sureI truly gave it a chance. Such a strong aftertaste too! We stoodaround outside for a couple minutes waiting for Jim to return withthe bus and I must have looked like a dog with peanut butterdesperately trying to get that taste off my tongue.

Hmm, perhaps standing next to the rooster statue while you grab a smoke is not the best idea while my warped sense of humor self is taking pictures:

Why hello Mr. Rooster, I shall call you Wilson:

After leaving the restaurant we drove over to Azucar andwere treated to a single scoop of ice cream. On the ride over, Hernantold us about some of the unusual flavors Azucar offered like sirachaand talked up their famous Abuela Maria flavor only to learn uponarrival that they were out of Abuela Maria.

Dad went with his go to flavor of chocolate and I triedthe flavor dubbed “Elvis” because it was chocolate, peanutbutter, and banana flavored. We stepped outside with our ice cream and I couldn't resist taking an "Elvis has left the building" pic:

We were encouraged to take our ice cream to go as it wasa small venue and explore the nearby area that included Domino Park.It was interesting to learn that these people gather to play everyday and if it rains, they just pull down the screens around thetables.

The tile path surrounding the park was inlaid with painted domino tiles:

Back on the bus we quickly drove past the Bay of Pigsmemorial and multiple sightings of docked cruise ships greeted us aswe headed back to Bayside. Those people who were just doing the citytour bid their goodbyes then while those who were doing theeverglades portion stayed on the bus for Jim to drive them to theirnew location. We were led off the bus and escorted to the harbor tourbooth in the center of the marketplace by Hernan where he checked usin, gave us stickers to wear showing we'd paid and tickets to turn inon board for free drinks. He instructed us to be back at this meetingpoint at 3:15PM and left us to return to the remaining tourpassengers on the bus.

Despite the light drizzle, Dad and I killed the time inbetween wandering the mall and geeking out at the cruise ships dockedin front of us from Royal Caribbean, Carnival, Fathom, and Norwegian.

Yeah your yachts are nice and all but I'll take that RCL Navigator of the Seas in the back please:

From a whole section of Miami's airport dedicated toCarnival and now seeing Royal Caribbean's headquarters, this cruiseaddict was soaking it all in and we hadn't even yet boarded the shipwe came to Miami to sail on!

Umm Royal Caribbean, don't look now but I think you have a spy sneaking in the back:

By 3:10 or so, we headed back to the kiosk and were soonjoined by several others who had booked the boat ride. The rain hadstarted to pick up again so the guy at the kiosk barely covered by acanopy of trees, suggested everyone go over to the nearby mojito barand wait for them to come get you. We all crowded into the outsidecovered seating area of this bar where the only standing space wasthe path between the bar and tables. Add to that, the bar staff keptscreaming and jumping around in reaction to the soccer game beingshown on TV and we were super relieved when they finally came tocollect us. Led to the boat, we were left standing under the stairsleading to the mall's second level as the boat company was shortstaffed and was waiting on the photographer to bring back picturecopies for the previous riders. Once we'd each filed past to have ourown picture taken, Dad and I decided to head downstairs on the boatand sit inside at the tables rather than be out in the rain.

Our boat for the harbor tour this soggy afternoon:

These teens look about as thrilled to be on this tour in the rain as I felt:

Beautiful photos!

Thank you all for your kind words! I've been slowly working my way through laundry left over from our trip. Even though we did take advantage of the laundry suite perk I still like to wash everything myself before it goes back into my own dresser drawers. I did appreciate that Celebrity's laundry did not put the little sticker tags on the clothes like Princess does. Always end up finding them months later. Did see one guy waiting for an elevator who had one of those stickers stuck to the hem of his shirt. Was tempted to walk up and greet a fellow Princess sailor like the tags were some sort of secret identifying calling card for us to recognize each other on other cruise lines.

I did somehow lose a single sock either from unknowingly dropping it while packing or it never came back from the laundry. I also lost a single sock that I know never came back from the laundry on the first Princess cruise that we used the laundry perk. I like to think that there's a new Bachelor sock themed reality show being played out where my now well traveled Princess sock and my newly traveled Celebrity sock eventually find each other on some island and reunite as a pair once again. I promise, there was only orange juice in my glass at breakfast this morning. ;)

The young guy doing the announcements as we rode aroundthe harbor was charismatic and funny but I found my interest morefocused on the view of the cruise ships from the water.

This may just be the weirdest looking aft I've ever seen:

All the ducklings lined up in a row - (from closest to farthest: RCL Navigator, Fathom Adonia, Carnival Splendor, and Norwegian Getaway)

Fathom Adonia really does look like the baby of the family:

Well howdy Mark Cuban, spot any sharks lately?

Dad dubbed the above yacht and its "mini yacht" docked behind as the "his and hers yachts"

Loving the pics. :cool:

By the time we reached the Millionaires Row section ofthe tour, we were looking at each house through streaks of heavy raincoming down the windows and my energy was wearing down.

Our view for most of the ride:

I don't remember exactly whose mansion was owned by which celebrity but here's a few of the better pics:

I do recall that this one belonged to Ricky Martin because the dome on top being a hot tub was memorable:

This was either Will Smith or Gloria Estefan so I'll just say Bienvenidos a Miami Sound Machine:

Another memorable one was Elizabeth Taylor's mansion featuring the rabbit sculpture:

This picture is being brought to you today by the makers of Windex:

This one reminded me of an old Italian/medieval castle, like you expect Juliet to step out at any moment asking "Where fore art thou, Romeo?"

Aww, you didn't think I forgot about those cruise ships did you? We sailed past just as Norwegian Getaway started their sailaway:

Once the boat ride was over, there was no one eventrying to entice us or show off the pictures they took of us. Withthe rain pouring heavily, we ditched our plans of waiting for an UBERto take back to the hotel and grabbed the first cab we saw.

And of course once back at the hotel, the clouds partedand the sun shone. After a quick pit stop in the room, we headed backout for dinner at the other affiliated restaurant, Batch Gastropub.The music was so overly loud we couldn't hear each other to talkduring the meal. The waitress wanted to seat us at a table surroundedby high bar stool style chairs but rather than feel like Thumbelina,I asked to switch to a booth. We were shown the booth that could havefit 8 people and even sliding over to the other side to sit closewith Dad left us straining to hear when the waiter came by. The foodwas pretty good though. Dad tried the brisket topped burger, I gotmargarita pizza, and we shared pretzel bites. The beer cheese saucethat came with the pretzel bites was so good that I used it to dip mypizza crust! Brought my leftover pizza back to the hotel (a littledisappointing to not have a fridge or microwave in the basic room forissues like this) and after a quick self guided tour of the pool andfitness center (yes I was still carrying the pizza while checking out the gym, doesn't everyone bring snacks to their workout?), I grabbed a cold can of $2.30 ice tea from the suite shopto help wash down this now cold leftover pizza. There was a coke vending machine next to the ice machine 10 steps in the other direction from the elevators so probably their $1.50 or so for a 20 oz bottle would have been a better choice.

With no reason to get up early since our ship wouldn'tbe arriving in Miami until 2PM, we relaxed watching TV until finallyheading to bed.

Thanks for the review.

Thank you for the review. I actually burst out laughing at the man bun comment!

Carry on!

Monday, April 24th

It's embarkation day! I thank you all for not posting tosay “hurry up and get to the cruise part of your review!” as Iexperienced in previous reviews.

Unlike most of our usual embarkations, the Equinoxwouldn't arrive in Miami for us to board until at least 2PM as it wasdropping off the last cruise's passengers in Ft. Lauderdale beforeswitching home ports. Because of this, we booked the last availableshuttle time through the hotel at 1PM. When you reserve the shuttletime at this particular hotel, your name gets put on the reservationlist with the number of passengers in your personal party and aregiven a “receipt” to turn in when you pay in cash to the shuttledriver. They don't let you charge it to your room. For the two of us,it was to cost $16. After showers, repacking, a less than stellarsecond breakfast from the buffet (scrambled eggs that had gone coldand pancakes that were hard and stiff), and a whole lot of TVwatching back in the room to kill time, we finally headed downstairsto floor 6 to wait with our luggage around noon. (I may or may nothave typed deck instead of floor at first. My body may be currentlyon land but apparently my brain's always on cruising) Met and chattedup some fellow cruisers while we waited. Around 12:40PM I was tiredof sitting so we headed down to level 1 where we found a small crowdstanding in front of the hotel by a small shuttle attached to a supersmall U-Haul trailer. This shuttle was provided by Miami SunshineShuttle company and we stood around with the group, including acouple who had brought enough luggage to clothe the entire ship, asthe rep from the company just kept wandering around. Only one couplein the crowd was going to Oceania, the rest of us were headed to theEquinox. Several of us started noticing that the size of the crowdeasily surpassed the number of available seats on this shuttle busand there was no luggage storage except for that U-Haul trailer. Timecontinued to tick past 1PM and everyone was getting restless.

We noticed that there was a yellow cab just parked onthe other side of the street, barely able to be seen behind theshuttle bus and trailer. Dad walked over to ask the cab driver if hewas waiting on a call and indeed he had just been parked therewaiting for someone to want his services. Dad decided to hire him andthe guy drove the cab up around the shuttle bus and into the hoteldriveway in front of the crowd waiting on the shuttle. Several othersstarted asking how much for the cab and a couple copped an attitudewith us because they thought this cab had just randomly pulled up andwe were automatically claiming it for ourselves. We offered to havethe cab driver call for more taxis to come rather than react in kind.As we were hopping into the cab, the shuttle driver suddenly rushedover promising that he was leaving right now and come with himinstead. Sorry pal, too little too late. Despite a little traffic onthe way, we were riding up over the hill just in time to see thesmokestacks of the Equinox pulling into the harbor. I had via freehotel wi-fi watched the Equinox on the Port Everglades webcam leavearound 10AM and here we were literally beating it to the port ofMiami by minutes around 2PM so Celebrity's estimate was right onschedule for that transfer. In the end, the cab ride cost us $15 andwe were met by a porter the instant we pulled up. We knew the shuttlewas probably still sitting at the hotel and there'd be an even longerwait waiting on them to unload everyone else's luggage. Definitelywish we would have just gone the cab route from the beginning.

We asked about suite check in and the porter told us tobypass the crowds and head to the signs that read “G.” We got towhere one line seemed to be wrapped around the corner to keep the lotentrance clear but just walked past them to where the end of anotherline stood by the sign labeled G. I realized after I crossed theentrance that Dad had been stopped by a port employee who was tryingto insist that we needed to instead get in the back of the line onhis side. I returned to Dad and discovered that he and a few othercouples were arguing with this employee because we were supposed tohave priority boarding but this guy stuck to his claims literallysticking his nose in the air refusing to look at us after a while. Wedecided to just go ahead and walk over to the line standing by thesign G like we'd been told to do and joined the end of that line.Soon some other couples did the same. This line was moving a lotquicker though still no rep from Celebrity monitoring for priorityboarding. At one point, a port employee the first employee had beencomplaining to came over to our now small group and questionedwhether we'd been in this line all along. Dad replied that we hadbeen here because we're in a suite. That apparently was the magicword and the guy skulked away muttering “Oh, you're in a “suite”okay then.”

Just as we moved up in line far enough to see the door,I noticed a sign directing to another door labeled xpress pass. Aport employee came out of that other door, shut it behind her, andchanged the arrow direction of the sign to face the door everyone wasbeing led into. Thankfully once inside the terminal things weremoving along slightly quicker with splitting people up into two linesto have our boarding passes checked against our passports and headedthrough security. At least it was quicker for us since we only had mycamera bag and a laptop carrying bag we use to house our electronics,meds, and paperwork. Some people in line looked like they'd broughttheir whole luggage set along. Despite the level labels adorning thecolumns next to each check in agent's podium, we were directed to theZenith line after showing our suite labeled boarding passes as thesuite line was full of those with physical disabilities. Both lineswere relatively short so we just filed in where told. At other portswith priority boarding, you get directed to bypass the line and standthere off to the side so that as soon as any agent becomes available,you get to be next to be checked in. Here, we stood next in linewhile not only did our Zenith guy take someone from the disabled line(the couple being waited on by the suite guy had 600 questions) butwhen the nearby concierge club agent became available, we wereskipped again while she took the next person in the big long windingline.

At least our form of entertainment as we waited wasreenacting the viral video from that guy's deck claiming the Equinoxwas going to crash into his house as we watched through the floor toceiling windows behind the agents the Equinox come closer and closeras it docked right next to the terminal. Such a perspective reallydoes make it look like you're a tiny creature about to be bowled overby the charging dinosaur. Finally we get checked in by the Zenith guyand get handed our cruise cards in a little silver brochure with“Royal Suite” and our names stuck on via a label.

Inside was tucked a form letter from the hotel directorlisting the basics of being able to use Michaels Club and Luminaealong with our Michael's Club Concierge Manuela Becker's businesscard and desk hours.

Because of the circumstances, we were not able to haveour sea pass linked photo taken at check in because the photographerswere still on the currently docking ship. The check in agent put alittle blue sticker on our cards and explained that this would signalto the crew member checking us in for the first time once on boardthat they still needed to take our picture.

Since our premium drink package was part of the sale we booked under, this is how pre-purchased packages are shown on your sea pass cards. I left the little blue sticker on my card the whole trip because it made it easy to tell whose card was whose. I must say though my OCD was really irritated at how they cut off the "t" at the end of "Guest."

We asked about the suite waiting area and were directedto an area off to the left that had only about 30 chairs and somevending machines. The space was overrun by the crowd of those withphysical disabilities waiting to board to the point that they evenran out of wheelchairs to use. As we stood waiting, a port employeecame in and called out to ask if everyone here was waiting becausethey needed physical assistance boarding. A few passengers includingus tried to get his attention to say we weren't and probablyshouldn't have been directed here but after talking to the firstpassenger, he claimed he was losing his voice and yelled for anotheremployee to come over. Our small group tried to question this secondguy but he decided he didn't want to be bothered and turned rightaround to leave. Even though I was already backed against the wall, Istarted getting pushed around by the continuing influx of passengerswho needed physical assistance joining the group. Another portemployee wandered through desperately trying to find more wheelchairsand we questioned her about the suite lounge. She explained that “theplace with the nice couches” is actually on the other side of theterminal which would have meant having to walk past everyone in line.

To thwart the feeling of being trapped inside thatcrowd, Dad and I moved back out to stand by the elevators. We watchedas still more people paraded in from the lines outside and werestopped just past us by employees directing them into lines. Therewas no way we could have made our way across the terminal to thesuite lounge at this point as the lines were backed up to the samewall we stood against now. After a while, we noticed the small crowdgathering by the escalators just off the check in area. We observedone employee constantly turning down people who approached to use theescalator after looking at their sea pass cards. We decided to tryand see if our suite card would get past the bouncer even thoughtechnically we had no idea what this magic escalator led to thateveryone seemed to want to ride. It turns out we had the magic cardto unlock the magic escalator and our bouncer handed back our cardand silently gestured up the escalator with her head as apparentlysecret code for yes, here's that priority you've been waiting for asyou get to watch everyone shoot proverbial daggers at your backsidesriding up the escalator.

Once at the top, we were greeted by a small space setoff from the double doors leading to the ship full of genericdoctor's waiting room style chairs lined up. It was not only asmaller group away from the crowds (though no one from what I couldtell had the suite colored card so perhaps this was a Zenith waitingarea?) but there was a table set up with the small generic brandwater bottles and several small Subway sandwiches for passengers tohelp themselves. Dad grabbed a sandwich and we took 2 of the fewremaining chairs finally relieved to be able to at least sit down. Wewatched as a line formed at the upstairs entrance to the elevatorwith crew members who'd brought more wheelchairs from the ship tohelp escort those with physical disabilities. We were glad that wedidn't stick with the plan to use the elevator as we'd probably stillbe standing there waiting. A few suit clad employees soon startedwandering just outside the retractable rope barrier keeping our groupfrom venturing to the doors. As everyone started getting anxious andwanting to stand at the ropes, one of the suit clad gentlemen askedfor suite people and pulled aside about 3 cabins worth including usand led us from the doors, up the gangway, and through the process ofgetting our sea pass card pictures finally taken and dinged for thefirst time. Along the way he made small talk with everyone and toldeach of us who our butlers would be after learning our cabin numbers.We made our way past the crew offering trays of mimosas and champagneand our escort directed us to our first butler experience by passingus off to our butler Arsim who was waiting just inside the doorway.It's a good thing both Arsim and our room steward Jose gave us cardswith their first names and numbers to contact them because we almostcalled our butler Arson a few times.

We aimed to put the drama of check in behind us andbreathed in the luxury as Arsim asked if we wanted to go to the cabinor eat first. We chose cabin so I could drop off the carry on bags soArsim called for an elevator and away the three of us went. Ourcabin, Royal Suite 1118, was on deck 10. An unusual occurrence asyou'd think that number would mean deck 11. Our deck also had cabinsthat started with the #12 as well so definitely check those deckplans to be sure your #11 cabin is actually on deck 11. We had seenon the deck plans that our cabin was just off the elevator bank pastthe library and while during the cruise we did occasionally hear amuted elevator ding when in the main cabin space, it wasn't enough tobe annoying. It was certainly nice to not have far to go when we wererushing to something or exhausted and ready to get back to our cabinat the end of the day.

The elevator bank has a small wall between it and the actual cabin corridor so we were always 10 feet and a turn into the corridor away from our cabin if we took the midship elevators. Because of this slight turn, anyone standing by our cabin was hidden out of sight until you turned into the corridor. Thank you Arsim and Jose for the mini heart attacks this first day when we'd turn to suddenly find one of you standing there.

Arsim even joked that the cabin doorbell sounds like the sound the captain uses to make an announcement except that the doorbell makes the sound twice. Thankfully, no one elected to play ding dong ditch on us, though perhaps only having 5 children and one of them being the captain's kid on board helped with that.

Our view just as we turned into the corridor:

Our view as we stepped out of our cabin:

On a weird note, we noticed several times throughout thecruise how often elevators would just skip whichever deck we hadcalled for it on. Another time I was waiting for the up elevatorwhile two ladies were waiting to go down. The down elevator came tostop at our deck but in the time it took the second lady to walk downand join her friend, the elevator setting changed to going up. Ihopped in to join them in the meantime and when the second womanfinally got there, she took one look at the lights and chastised herfriend for getting in the elevator going up. The first woman insistedthat she'd gotten into the down elevator but then got out completelyconfused when she saw the up light on instead.