Review of Oct 16 B2B on Summit - Part I

[jode]

We are mid-60 cruisers (about 20 cruises) although have been doing land trips recently and this is our first cruise in 5 years. We had sailed Celebrity before and loved it and were looking forward to this b2b on the Summit.

 

While it was a very good experience this time - it did not "exceed" our expectations as they say. Maybe cruising generally has declined in a lot of areas that made it so special, maybe the Summit is just such an older ship that it cannot provide excellence in certain areas. But here goes:

 

We flew Boston/Newark on 10/16 - took a Dial 7 car service to pier which was a great way to get there. We arrived in Newark around 9:30 - got luggage/met car service and were in the waiting line at Celebrity by 10:30. Lines were handled very well and we were on the ship by 11 am - nice! Had lunch at buffett - excellent choices - and able to sit and relax a bit.

 

Our room was ready by 1 pm and we were in balcony room 9039 (which we were able to keep for our second week as well). Met Roberto our cabin steward from Costa Rica - a true delight! We mentioned that we would be with him for the second week and he said he may not have our room as they were changing out the room assignments due to cutting out the "Assistant Steward" position. He said that they would be working alone starting the next week and he would have less rooms because of that and he was not sure where his rooms would start and end. As it turned out, the second week he happily told us that management decided to postpone this change in staffing as it was not "ready to do yet without bumps". Glad they didn't force a roll out without making sure it would work both for the passengers but especially on the staff.

 

Staff cutbacks are apparent everywhere and it is starting to impact the cruise experience (more on this later).

 

We chose Select dining for 7pm and we got a great window table for two. Well the for "two part" was merely a suggestion as the table next to us was about 6" from our table! Great waiter and overall great meal. I had the Shrimp St. Louis which I thought was great - the shrimp were tiny but the sauce had big flavor. We also tried Thai Spring roll. Both had the Salmon which was excellent. My dessert blueberry crepe was barely so-so. Soggy and again just a "hint" of blueberry. Hubby got the cheesecake and said it was excellent so that is what I get for trying to pick a somewhat healthy dessert !

 

We went to the welcome show - comedian and singer - good show. The theater was never really full to capacity for any of the shows. Good because you could always find a seat but wonder if it is due to lackluster shows being offered. The shows did repeat the second week for the most part. They were "good" but not outstanding. Of course we are not in Vegas and didn't expect to be dazzled but admit that on past cruises (RCCL) they had some performers that really wowed you and had you saying "that person or production should be on Broadway" it was that outstanding. These shows were entertaing for the night but not particularly memorable.

 

We had the next three days at sea which were very relaxing. Gave us time to figure out the cozy sections on the boat - and they do have plenty. One thing we loved about the Summit is the manageable size and the many many lovely intimate seating areas both inside and out.

 

We had breakfast in buffett each morning (except our last) and found the omlette station to be quick and excellent. Took us two days to realize they also have a waffle/pancake area - you really have to walk completely around that buffett area to see everything offered. Waffles were great - pancakes were dry most times - they did have cheese blitzes which hubby loves! Nice selection of fruit - oddly they only had grapefruit the first couple of days and we never saw it after that for two weeks - something that would happen with other items we found out as the days went by. My WOW item for breakfast was the brioche roll they had with the various breads and rolls for breakfast - - be sure to try it! I had one a day (and my tight clothes bear witness!) with a little butter and jam. They are eggy/rich but light - yum! I planned to make them once I got home but after researching the recipe yesterday I realize that it is a very time consuming dough to make and appreciate them even more now!

 

Minor point - but it was hard to find dishes and silverware together. Seems that they had napkin wrapped silverware in one spot but dishes were down the line a bit. Also they had a hard time keeping the dishes stocked - often the spot would be empty which is no big deal but you had to figure out which direction to go in order to find a spot that had more. Wish they had one section on each corner of the buffett area with dishes AND silverware so it would be easier. It made for a LOT of walking aimlessly around to find what we needed but given the amount of bacon we ate that was probably to our benefit ! ! Speaking of bacon - they were pretty consistent with nice crisp bacon except for one morning when tray after tray was barely cooked - - the bacon cooker must have had a bad morning that day because no one was taking the bacon due to it being very undercooked.

[kenevenpar]

Good start, thanks!

[CruiserN1]

Sailing Summit in a couple weeks, enjoying your review

[easyboy]

We have noticed crew cut backs in other cruise lines too.