Summit Review 4/16

[jp1]

Just back from the Summit, I thought I would take a minute to offer some of my input as I have read and appreciated so many of those that take the time to do so. We previously sailed on the Zenith twice and did quite a few of the other cruise lines in between before coming back to Celebrity. I must say there is such a BIG difference in Celebrity vs the other lines. We are sold on Celebrity and will make this our line of choice for future cruising. Celebrity is pure class and really goes the extra effort with small details that make a world of difference.

 

Embarkation-This was THE most quickest check in we have ever encountered. Since we are founding members of the Captains Club, we have priority embarkation. They quickly sailed us thru the line.There is plenty of staff directing you, you won't have a problem if you have priority embarkation, just tell the staff that when you enter the building and they will guide you accordingly. The check in attendant accidentally kept our passports; didn't realize until we were already on the ship because I was so excited to get on the ship I didn't notice not getting them back; of course my husband thought I had misplaced them in my bag, but after carefully checking, I called the front desk and they quickly found them and I received them back. We arrived at the terminal at 12:30pm and were on the ship by 1pm.

Staff - Every single person on this beauty of a ship is so nice. They are all smiles, greeting you with Good morning, etc. throughout the day. I have never seen a more delightful staff on any ship ever. It really makes your day to see those making sure you are well taken care of and mean it.

Food - I can't say enough about the GREAT cuisine on this ship. There is such a variety each and every day. Our table the first night in the dining room was terrible; it was right by the door to the escalator/kitchen area and the waiter traffic was awful; we felt very rushed thru the entire meal. The ***'t matrd came by the first night and asked how everything was; we started to mention the table location and he immediately picked up on it and said he was going to relocate us. He did so and the next night we were at a much better location and our waiter/***'t waiter were great (Zoran and Jorge were really, really attentive). We also ate in the Normandie one night; the food and service were outstanding just as everyone said it would be ($30/pp extra), however, the ambiance seemed a bit stuffy for us. We actually chose from there on out to stay in the main dining room since we really enjoyed our dining staff. We were fortunate enough to also sit at the captains table one night; that was also a great experience and the same staff from the Normandie also served this table which made the dinner even more special.

Entertainment - The entertainment on board is OK. I would not say great or excellent, just OK. They had a pair of aerialists that were entertaining, but didn't really sit thru a lot of the other shows.

Additional parties-The captains party for the first formal night was a bit disappointing. We are accustomed to usually having a cocktail party before dinner and greeting the captain, taking a picture, etc. The captain of the Summit does a very short after dinner introduction of the staff. It was a whole 15 minutes; with a terrible glass of champagne. It was over and done with very quickly. The party for Captain Club repeat passengers was much better; it was before dinner and the captain greeted you at the door with a quick handshake (no pictures). They had appetizers and much better drinks served here.

Cabin-We had an outside cabin with verandah on deck 7. The room was fine and having the verandah is always nice. We would definitely go with the new Conceirge Class next time. We booked too late this time and was not able to get a suite or the CC class. Our room attendant, Ryan, was just wonderful. He made sure we had our lemons and limes each night for our own pre-dinner cocktail hour.

Pool-So much has been said on these boards about chair hogs around the pool. We never had a problem finding a lounge chair. The chairs right near the pool were always taken, but we like to sit on the top deck and look out at the ocean in the sun anyhow. We saw plenty of the pool action from there and were just fine.

The islands-We were the last ship cruising to the ports of St.Thomas, St. Kitts, Barbados, St. Lucia, St. Marten for this season so I won't go into detail about each of these ports, but we did reserve taxis at St. Kitts and St. Lucia and that was a really great experience. If you are interested in who we booked, I can provide you with phone numbers and contact names. I would highly recommend them both. I will say we took a ferry to St. Johns from St. Thomas this time since we have been to St. Thomas so many times, this was our first and certainly not out last experience to St. John, Trunk Bay is THE BEST beach we have ever been too and we have been to a lot. It is breathtaking!! Highly recommend!!!! The extra additional touch of cold hand towels given to you as you re-enter the ship from the islands a great perk too!!

Debarkation-We had early flights out at 11am; we had grey tags indicating the 2nd off the ship; we were told we would be called no later than 8:45am, however, it was getting close to 9am and we wandered on down to deck 3 where they were offloading and mentioned we had an early flight, the attendant said no problem and we quickly were off; once again, a Celebrity breeze.

 

Our experience on the Summit was one of our BEST cruise trips ever; this was our 10th cruise and look forward to booking another very soon (on Celebrity of course!!). If there are any questions I can answer, please feel free to let me know. We met several fellow cruise critic passengers; everyone was very nice and friendly. These boards are a great source of info and I am thankful there are so many people who take the time to offer their comments and opinions.

[LMKohler]

I couldn't agree with your review more!! We just came back from a Summit cruise in March and will go again on Summit to Southern Caribbean next March. We love all of the islands.

 

I'm so glad to hear you had a wonderful time.

 

Lucy