Is Luminae over-rated or under-rated?

[LGW59]

34 minutes ago, Oville said:

I’ve been on Riviera and it is significantly smaller than M Class and probably C Class.  I will say the speciality restaurants are better than Celebrity but the MDR is on par and very crowded.  We were one and done.

Talk about opportune timing here!  I have been vacillating between a cruise on Riviera (which I currently have booked and can get 100% refund until June 3) and a similar itinerary cruise on Beyond.  Done a ton of research, videos, reviews, inclusions, restaurants etc and yes I know Beyond has not sailed yet , but my gut tells me it is the way to go.  I did a courtesy hold on it last night, Celebrity is calling me multiple times today, offering me my "very own certified celebrity cruise planner" not a complaint, good customer service it seems.  Oceania would be totally new to me and Celebrity not, so I guess I know what I will do.  Thanks for the unsolicited gut check!

[HMR74]

3 minutes ago, LGW59 said:

Talk about opportune timing here!  I have been vacillating between a cruise on Riviera (which I currently have booked and can get 100% refund until June 3) and a similar itinerary cruise on Beyond.  Done a ton of research, videos, reviews, inclusions, restaurants etc and yes I know Beyond has not sailed yet , but my gut tells me it is the way to go.  I did a courtesy hold on it last night, Celebrity is calling me multiple times today, offering me my "very own certified celebrity cruise planner" not a complaint, good customer service it seems.  Oceania would be totally new to me and Celebrity not, so I guess I know what I will do.  Thanks for the unsolicited gut check!

yeah, X offered me a cruise planner and she sent me e mails that she would help get me promotional discounts..3 calls to her and 3 e mails to her got no response.

I sent the executives at X an e mail on this and one other issue and they acted if the cruise planner issue did not exist but gave me 200 of obc on the other issue which was only a quick way to dismiss me and I am working on a response now.

 

Pricing wise I think I got a good deal except my Beyond cruises were pretty much filled and not many choices or places to find re: the discounted cabins an agent would have.

 

I am intrigued by Beyond, I have not been on a fairly new ship since Vision of the Seas.

 

However, the executive and adm and sales//customer  services offices at X needs a shake up so that customers actually feel like the company cares before and after the cruises which are pretty darn good. Take some of the hard working bartenders and maiter d's and perhaps a Captain or Two, and the front office becomes customer oriented just like the ships.

 

If I hurt any feelings at X, too bad. Doubt they monitor these boards in depth or even care. And I really like the cruises. Its just the admin end thats the problem.

 

[NutsAboutGolf]

22 hours ago, HMR74 said:

The real test for X will be with the Beyond. Mgt has said they are going after the premium large ship segment.

 

If the  ship can offer more "things " like the "bigger sunset" bar experience where you can find your own space, and the same idea with Eden, and then can truly go upscale with Luminae, thiings can go well for X, but if all they offer will be higher prices, then it boils down to value.

 

IMO the spa is getting too cutesey and I  from a business perspective wonder if it wil draw customers on a broad based basis where the ship devotes a lot of space to it. We are on it next year for eastern med after a TA. only one sea day eastern med means no real time to enjoy the spa, which on the 7 day crossing we will each buy a 7 daypass if they have them then.

 

The Aqua suites are the same as sky suites at several hundred dollars more PP. So it will be interesting  to see how much they charge for daily or weekly passes.

 

all in all it wil be interesting to see how much of the premium big ship strategy is pricing, and how much is actual product delivered. It has to be more than the big name chefs private high priced specialty restaurant. It should be applied everwhere including the MDR's.

 

Some of that higher suite pricing on Beyond does reflect the  upper level forward section being the somewhat self contained Retreat. Too bad they scattered sky suites all over the ship rather than have them at upper and forward levels, closer to where upper premium suites are.The way they did it, with S1, S2 and S3 at same pricing (except cabins at the magic carpet getting a lower price)  I am not sure I understand that pricing and level concept.

 

I will remind us all that food and energy costs have increased substantially and as well health protocols have increased requiring more costs.

 

I guess late  next month we will hear first hand how much better Beyond is vs Apex or Edge. My other observation is a lot of the extra space of being 20 meters longer allowed for more cabins, not necessarily common space, although the guest to crew ratio wil be better for guests on Beyond than Apex or Edge.

 

Pretty much hit the nail on the head; lengthening it adds more cabins which required them to make the retreat bigger.  Luminae is now forward with a forward view and there's now Le Voyage which X correctly carefully marketed as "creating an experience that will be as memorable as if you were to be onshore and go to a starred restaurant"; unfortunately a few media outlets and vloggers took this out of context and said Le Voyage will be Michelin starred.  Michelin stars are awarded to restaurants (not chefs) and if a chef happen to be there when stars are awarded, they can give themselves the title of "Michelin star chef" even if they got hired after the star(s) were awarded.  At the moment, there isn't a mechanism in place for Michelin Star inspectors to visit cruise ship restaurants.  We often hear cruise ship food quality is NOT the same as fine dining and a large part of that is the logistics of sourcing elevated quality food.

[HMR74]

and part of the food quality issue is where and when they source.

Ya cannot provision a ship with food including fresh fish and meat and fruit and vegitables for a week or two, and comapre its dining to a NY or Chicago or Miami LA  etc restaurant where the chefs can get over to the food markets and buy fresh as well as some unusual things.

 

Just a reality of life.

 

 

[Oville]

5 hours ago, LGW59 said:

Talk about opportune timing here!  I have been vacillating between a cruise on Riviera (which I currently have booked and can get 100% refund until June 3) and a similar itinerary cruise on Beyond.  Done a ton of research, videos, reviews, inclusions, restaurants etc and yes I know Beyond has not sailed yet , but my gut tells me it is the way to go.  I did a courtesy hold on it last night, Celebrity is calling me multiple times today, offering me my "very own certified celebrity cruise planner" not a complaint, good customer service it seems.  Oceania would be totally new to me and Celebrity not, so I guess I know what I will do.  Thanks for the unsolicited gut check!

Didn’t mean to give you a gut check.  Oceania simply wasn’t the right line for us.  The Suites Room was a joke, the music onboard way outdated, think “Tea for Two” for a pre-dinner dance. and the venues were very small.  The specialty restaurants were great but Eden is even better.

[HMR74]

1 hour ago, Oville said:

Didn’t mean to give you a gut check.  Oceania simply wasn’t the right line for us.  The Suites Room was a joke, the music onboard way outdated, think “Tea for Two” for a pre-dinner dance. and the venues were very small.  The specialty restaurants were great but Eden is even better.

and the larger ship means more different things to do.

what we like about X is the  undefinable "vibe".  Hard to explain. But it feels right.

 

[mfs2k]

15 hours ago, NutsAboutGolf said:

 

Pretty much hit the nail on the head; lengthening it adds more cabins which required them to make the retreat bigger.  Luminae is now forward with a forward view and there's now Le Voyage which X correctly carefully marketed as "creating an experience that will be as memorable as if you were to be onshore and go to a starred restaurant"; unfortunately a few media outlets and vloggers took this out of context and said Le Voyage will be Michelin starred.  Michelin stars are awarded to restaurants (not chefs) and if a chef happen to be there when stars are awarded, they can give themselves the title of "Michelin star chef" even if they got hired after the star(s) were awarded.  At the moment, there isn't a mechanism in place for Michelin Star inspectors to visit cruise ship restaurants.  We often hear cruise ship food quality is NOT the same as fine dining and a large part of that is the logistics of sourcing elevated quality food.

We have a res at Le Voyage. I’m looking forward to the experience, ambiance, food and service but I wouldn’t be surprised if we leave hungry. That’s ok. 

[mfs2k]

8 hours ago, HMR74 said:

and the larger ship means more different things to do.

what we like about X is the  undefinable "vibe".  Hard to explain. But it feels right.

 

I do have concerns about having enough things to “do” on 9 night Beyond with 6 sea days. I can keep busy in the casino but my DW doesn’t enjoy that. 

[terrydtx]

23 minutes ago, mfs2k said:

I do have concerns about having enough things to “do” on 9 night Beyond with 6 sea days. I can keep busy in the casino but my DW doesn’t enjoy that. 

We will have 39 days on a B2B2B on the Edge in 2024 with many sea days and I never worry about having enough things to do on a cruise ship.

[mfs2k]

12 minutes ago, terrydtx said:

We will have 39 days on a B2B2B on the Edge in 2024 with many sea days and I never worry about having enough things to do on a cruise ship.

I cant imagine ever having 39 days on a cruise ship. Sounds magical. 

The longest vacation I've taken in 40 years is 10 days.

Actually that's not true.  I was home, not working, for 3 1/2 months, when Covid struck.  Ugh. How quickly I've forgotten. 

[asnaleah]

On 3/10/2022 at 2:48 PM, terrydtx said:

The Moroccan chicken has been the only bad meal I have had in Luminae on our two Retreat cruises. Overcooked means it was too dry to enjoy. Sorry, but that is my opinion and I do not think I would bother eating in one of his restaurants if this is one of his signature dishes.

I also found the chicken dry, but my DH had it a different night and loved it. I agree with the OP who suggested rotating Daniel Boulud specials.

[Moby Jones]

I've not read all of the replies but have just spent two weeks on Apex. So here's a few random thoughts in no particular order. And I'll add now that I'm acutely aware I'll be mentioning some very first world problems! 

Apex has a lot more suites than M and S class ships and as a result Luminae is bigger. This results in a loss of the intimate dining experience on the older ships. All four members of our party noticed this immediately. As a result it's also noisy. 

Since we first experienced Luminae in 2015 I've noticed a few subtle cutbacks. There are fewer choices of butters and bread etc. The chocolate sphere is now only available by request to save on time as it takes the waiters longer to serve it etc. 

If the maitre 'd makes the effort to seat your party at the same table or at least in the same area so you have the same wait team your experience will be improved as you build a rapport with the team. This is not always the case though. 

We mentioned that we would like to have Indian food one night. Our waiter liaised with the maitr 'd and head Luminae chef on two night to make this happen and the food was excellent. In fact the head chef actually said he'd be happy to prepare any meals we requested when he was introduced to us. So I think the service is very good there. 

The sommelier service is pretty good. They usually do get to you in time to pair wines with your appetizer and entree. This definitely doesn't always happen in the MDR and not always in Blu. The Luminae sommeliers also seem a touch better and more knowledgeable than in the other restaurants in my experience. 

So overall I think Luminae is very good. It's certainly a much nicer experience than the MDR and a step up from Blu. Though management may want to think the layout on E class ships. We have a booking for Beyond which will have even more suites than E class ships so hopefully they will screen off an area as they do on S class ships otherwise it will be too similar to the MDR. Incidentally when we fed these comments back to our retreat manager she explained that many people have said the same thing and concerns about Beyond and a large Luminae have already been fed back to Miami. I guess time will tell if they are listening..... 

[terrydtx]

1 hour ago, mfs2k said:

I cant imagine ever having 39 days on a cruise ship. Sounds magical. 

The longest vacation I've taken in 40 years is 10 days.

Actually that's not true.  I was home, not working, for 3 1/2 months, when Covid struck.  Ugh. How quickly I've forgotten. 

Prior to retiring in 2020, our longest vacation was also10 days. Now we have all the time we need to go anywhere. Our long cruise in 2024 will be in New Zealand, Australia and then to Hawaii, all on the Edge in a Sky Suite, counting land days we will be gone for 45 days. That is a long ways to fly so we want to get as much seen as possible in this one trip

 

This year we will be gone for 33 days in Italy and Greece, 24 days on cruise ships and 9 land days. Next year we have another long trip with a 7 day river cruise followed by the Apex for 12 days and a few more land days. We are enjoying our retirement and spending our kids inheritance.

[HMR74]

16 minutes ago, Moby Jones said:

I've not read all of the replies but have just spent two weeks on Apex. So here's a few random thoughts in no particular order. And I'll add now that I'm acutely aware I'll be mentioning some very first world problems! 

Apex has a lot more suites than M and S class ships and as a result Luminae is bigger. This results in a loss of the intimate dining experience on the older ships. All four members of our party noticed this immediately. As a result it's also noisy. 

Since we first experienced Luminae in 2015 I've noticed a few subtle cutbacks. There are fewer choices of butters and bread etc. The chocolate sphere is now only available by request to save on time as it takes the waiters longer to serve it etc. 

If the maitre 'd makes the effort to seat your party at the same table or at least in the same area so you have the same wait team your experience will be improved as you build a rapport with the team. This is not always the case though. 

We mentioned that we would like to have Indian food one night. Our waiter liaised with the maitr 'd and head Luminae chef on two night to make this happen and the food was excellent. In fact the head chef actually said he'd be happy to prepare any meals we requested when he was introduced to us. So I think the service is very good there. 

The sommelier service is pretty good. They usually do get to you in time to pair wines with your appetizer and entree. This definitely doesn't always happen in the MDR and not always in Blu. The Luminae sommeliers also seem a touch better and more knowledgeable than in the other restaurants in my experience. 

So overall I think Luminae is very good. It's certainly a much nicer experience than the MDR and a step up from Blu. Though management may want to think the layout on E class ships. We have a booking for Beyond which will have even more suites than E class ships so hopefully they will screen off an area as they do on S class ships otherwise it will be too similar to the MDR. Incidentally when we fed these comments back to our retreat manager she explained that many people have said the same thing and concerns about Beyond and a large Luminae have already been fed back to Miami. I guess time will tell if they are listening..... 

Take  a look at the layout of Luminae on Beyond.  Besides the obvious of being at very front of ship, it wraps around and that should cut down noise. While there is more capacity, it does appear that the tables are separated a bit more. We will know soon. I wonder if the height of the room has been increased which would help.

 

They have a business to run, and if their targeted customers, us, believe the value quotient has declined, they have a problem.

 

Then it's up to them to be stubborn or change.

 

One of my questions is will there be sufficent space and chairs, in sun or shade, at the Retreat Sundeck, so I do not have the school vacation experience where its not enjoyable. I would think they have thought that out but one never knows.

 

My other thought from yesterday is that while most of the sky suites on Solstice are on same level,  with Edge  class they are spread out. I just wonder if there is a breaking point in numbers where it becomes difficult for the cabin steward to serve the suite class cabins and as well the "butler" on certain nicities like snacks delivered in afternoon and drinks.

 

Perhaps they, bigger X company they,  cannot handle a premium suite segment within a bigger ship. eg, We love the Sunset Bar-will that expanded one get overcrowded?

 

You pay your money and you take your chances.

However, as a customer, it is always nice to see change that improves the experience.

 

 

[terrydtx]

33 minutes ago, Moby Jones said:

So overall I think Luminae is very good. It's certainly a much nicer experience than the MDR and a step up from Blu. Though management may want to think the layout on E class ships. We have a booking for Beyond which will have even more suites than E class ships so hopefully they will screen off an area as they do on S class ships otherwise it will be too similar to the MDR. Incidentally when we fed these comments back to our retreat manager she explained that many people have said the same thing and concerns about Beyond and a large Luminae have already been fed back to Miami. I guess time will tell if they are listening..... 

Maybe by moving the Luminae on the Beyond and Ascent from the 12th deck to the 16th deck it will be larger to accommodate the added suites. Hard to tell by the deck diagrams how the new Luminae will be laid out and overall size. I agree the Luminae on S ships is nice with the divider that makes it into two distinct dinning areas.

[terrydtx]

40 minutes ago, Moby Jones said:

If the maitre 'd makes the effort to seat your party at the same table or at least in the same area so you have the same wait team your experience will be improved as you build a rapport with the team. This is not always the case though

Is this something new in E Class Luminae? We have not been on an E Class ship but on S Class we had the same wait staff no matter where we were seated in the Luminae.

[HMR74]

5 minutes ago, terrydtx said:

Is this something new in E Class Luminae? We have not been on an E Class ship but on S Class we had the same wait staff no matter where we were seated in the Luminae.

Same here on waitstaff. Sometimes just the 2 of us had a small table and other times  we expanded to 4 and 6 as we met others. Then we would be the noisy ones. Thats the "vibe" I alluded to--it is what makes the trip exceptional.

 

We are (hopefully) doing the long b2b2b next year,  34 nights  and 14 post cruise land tour. 

 

 

[morpheusofthesea]

17 hours ago, HMR74 said:

Ya cannot provision a ship with food including fresh fish and meat and fruit and vegitables for a week or two,

Just as an aside. Years ago we sailed on a cruise around Australia/New Zealand. Was really looking forward to fresh New Zealand lamb for dinner. Sure enough it was on the menu. I made mention of how excited I was to the maitre d' as he made his rounds. He was very honest, he said yes it was indeed New Zealand lamb, but the cruise line gets all its provisions flown in from the US. So much for fresh sourced.

[HMR74]

35 minutes ago, morpheusofthesea said:

Just as an aside. Years ago we sailed on a cruise around Australia/New Zealand. Was really looking forward to fresh New Zealand lamb for dinner. Sure enough it was on the menu. I made mention of how excited I was to the maitre d' as he made his rounds. He was very honest, he said yes it was indeed New Zealand lamb, but the cruise line gets all its provisions flown in from the US. So much for fresh sourced.

About 2 years ago there was an article/youtube about the Solstice cruising around Austraila. One aspect of it was the customers were complaining about the buffett not being exciting.

The chef took petty cash at one of the ports and went to buy fresh fish at the market and did so and it was well accepted by the cruisers.

 

We went from LA to Santiago in late 2019, and the fruit on board was terrible, littel taste and hard. I erroneously thought as we worked our way south thru the tropics we could pick up some real fresh fruit. Nope.

 

The apparent reason for the logistics is the cruise lines do not have enough approved vendors to provision at the ports.

 

So most  everything is palletized and air freighted to foreign ports.

 

That was also one of the issues when they restarted cruising last year out of Carribean ports-they did not have the facilities to provision many ships for food also including the refrigereration and freezer  buildings  needed as well as bringing in that food by air as well as passengers. Much easier and cheaper to have 1 week cruises out of Miami and  FLL . Full set ups  with infrastructure there.

 

 

[mfs2k]

1 hour ago, terrydtx said:

Prior to retiring in 2020, our longest vacation was also10 days. Now we have all the time we need to go anywhere. Our long cruise in 2024 will be in New Zealand, Australia and then to Hawaii, all on the Edge in a Sky Suite, counting land days we will be gone for 45 days. That is a long ways to fly so we want to get as much seen as possible in this one trip

 

This year we will be gone for 33 days in Italy and Greece, 24 days on cruise ships and 9 land days. Next year we have another long trip with a 7 day river cruise followed by the Apex for 12 days and a few more land days. We are enjoying our retirement and spending our kids inheritance.

 

amazing and fortunate.  

[NutsAboutGolf]

8 minutes ago, HMR74 said:

About 2 years ago there was an article/youtube about the Solstice cruising around Austraila. One aspect of it was the customers were complaining about the buffett not being exciting.

The chef took petty cash at one of the ports and went to buy fresh fish at the market and did so and it was well accepted by the cruisers.

 

We went from LA to Santiago in late 2019, and the fruit on board was terrible, littel taste and hard. I erroneously thought as we worked our way south thru the tropics we could pick up some real fresh fruit. Nope.

 

The apparent reason for the logistics is the cruise lines do not have enough approved vendors to provision at the ports.

 

So most  everything is palletized and air freighted to foreign ports.

 

That was also one of the issues when they restarted cruising last year out of Carribean ports-they did not have the facilities to provision many ships for food also including the refrigereration and freezer  buildings  needed as well as bringing in that food by air as well as passengers. Much easier and cheaper to have 1 week cruises out of Miami and  FLL . Full set ups  with infrastructure there.

 

 

 

Standard practice in the cruising industry, even on longer TAs and PTs is to get all their provisions and supplies from the embarkation port.  Almost all the food coming on board is frozen on pallets, much of it is immediately put into the refrigerator to begin the thawing process.  Many reasons for this, the chief reason is because it's the cheapest but also avoids problems if a port visit is cancelled.

 

If X decides to pay for something special while in port like local lamb in the example above, that is simply an additional menu item.  The MDR menu will still offer a sirloin steak.

[Moby Jones]

3 hours ago, HMR74 said:

Take  a look at the layout of Luminae on Beyond.  Besides the obvious of being at very front of ship, it wraps around and that should cut down noise. While there is more capacity, it does appear that the tables are separated a bit more. We will know soon. I wonder if the height of the room has been increased which would help.

 

They have a business to run, and if their targeted customers, us, believe the value quotient has declined, they have a problem.

 

Then it's up to them to be stubborn or change.

 

One of my questions is will there be sufficent space and chairs, in sun or shade, at the Retreat Sundeck, so I do not have the school vacation experience where its not enjoyable. I would think they have thought that out but one never knows.

 

My other thought from yesterday is that while most of the sky suites on Solstice are on same level,  with Edge  class they are spread out. I just wonder if there is a breaking point in numbers where it becomes difficult for the cabin steward to serve the suite class cabins and as well the "butler" on certain nicities like snacks delivered in afternoon and drinks.

 

Perhaps they, bigger X company they,  cannot handle a premium suite segment within a bigger ship. eg, We love the Sunset Bar-will that expanded one get overcrowded?

 

You pay your money and you take your chances.

However, as a customer, it is always nice to see change that improves the experience.

 

 

I'll be brutally honest other than noting Beyond has an extra deck I've not really paid any attention to the deck plans. But hopefully the design will be much better. 

We didn't really have any Retreat issues but our sailings had 1800 and 2000 passengers respectively. I'm not sure how full the suites were, though with the move up program I'd imagine  full or very close to full. 

If I'm being very picky I did note that Apex seems to have 101 different styles of chairs and tables dotted around the ship. The chair and tables in both Luminae and the Retreat were not overly comfortable and I did think there was an element of style over substance. But this seems a common theme onboard Celebrity under the stewardship of Lisa Lutof-Perlo. All in my humble opinion of course! 

Going forward will be interesting. I've watched X really hike up suite pricing. Whilst there's reduced capacity sailings and a lot of people desperate to cruise and see the world return to normal I think they'll manage to get away with it. Will people continue to pay high suite prices when all of the cruise lines are back to 100% capacity? We shall see. M class suite prices look very ambitious to me right now though! 

[Moby Jones]

3 hours ago, terrydtx said:

Is this something new in E Class Luminae? We have not been on an E Class ship but on S Class we had the same wait staff no matter where we were seated in the Luminae.

This has always been our experience. We did feedback and were seated with the same wait team after the first few nights. And we thought the service from Hernando, Marco and our sommelier Dino was superb. I'd be delighted to see any of those guys again. 

The front of house team were not in the same league as other Luminae restaurants in our opinion though. 

[HMR74]

11 minutes ago, Moby Jones said:

I'll be brutally honest other than noting Beyond has an extra deck I've not really paid any attention to the deck plans. But hopefully the design will be much better. 

We didn't really have any Retreat issues but our sailings had 1800 and 2000 passengers respectively. I'm not sure how full the suites were, though with the move up program I'd imagine  full or very close to full. 

If I'm being very picky I did note that Apex seems to have 101 different styles of chairs and tables dotted around the ship. The chair and tables in both Luminae and the Retreat were not overly comfortable and I did think there was an element of style over substance. But this seems a common theme onboard Celebrity under the stewardship of Lisa Lutof-Perlo. All in my humble opinion of course! 

Going forward will be interesting. I've watched X really hike up suite pricing. Whilst there's reduced capacity sailings and a lot of people desperate to cruise and see the world return to normal I think they'll manage to get away with it. Will people continue to pay high suite prices when all of the cruise lines are back to 100% capacity? We shall see. M class suite prices look very ambitious to me right now though! 

A lot of the older guests complained about the low, sunk chairs which are difficult to get out of. Stylish, yes

Prices are reflecting fuel and food and new protocol costs. They seem a bit more now with some of that due to the Retreat concept.

The booking I have in Retreat S1 for 2023 on Beyond is already 15% above what I paid. And I thought mine was high. If I was younger and stronger I'd be doing the land tours  like we used to, but the packing and unpacking and busses or flights or trains or a combo is tough now. So if I want to travel, cruising makes a lot of sense and we have come back to it.

 

Its a trade off, we lose the nightlife of a city.And an early morning relaxed breakfast streetside.

 

Aqua and Suites have been priced a certain % above veranduh, and I do think the Retreat concept has added a bit to the difference.

 

whats it gonna mean 50 years from now.

 

Edited March 15, 2022 by HMR74

[terrydtx]

16 minutes ago, Moby Jones said:

This has always been our experience. We did feedback and were seated with the same wait team after the first few nights. And we thought the service from Hernando, Marco and our sommelier Dino was superb. I'd be delighted to see any of those guys again. 

The front of house team were not in the same league as other Luminae restaurants in our opinion though. 

On our last cruise on the Equinox last year, the first night our waiter introduced himself and said he would be our waiter for the entire cruise for breakfast and dinners.  His name was also Marco, were you on the Equinox? It was like being in traditional MDR seating, but being able to chose our seating every night specially when a window table was available. He also knew our likes and dislikes and made recommendations on the menu items. Made it easier to leave him some extra cash gratuities at the end of the cruise too.