Cruising with a group of friends/Dining questions Celebrity Cruise Line

[Lemonyrae]

My husband and I are going to book a cruise on Celebrity with 4 other couples.  Should we plan on picking a dining time so that we can be guaranteed a table all together? Or if we chose anytime dining will it be difficult to get a table for 10.  I can't imagine that all of us would want to eat in the dining room together every night but I'm sure we will all want to share a few meals together.  Is the anytime dining only walk up or can you make a reservation for a dining room? Thanks!

[jwlane]

It's walkup or make a reservation.

[jsn55]

I'd poll everyone at lunchtime and tell the maitre d' how many and when.  They'll do their best I'm sure. The first day, do it in person and leave a nice gratuity. 

[shofer]

1 hour ago, jsn55 said:

I'd poll everyone at lunchtime and tell the maitre d' how many and when.  They'll do their best I'm sure. The first day, do it in person and leave a nice gratuity. 

The first day will be chaos.  Make the reservation for the first night and you can play it by ear the rest of the trip.  

 

[emmas gran]

10 is a large number to deal with they may need to place a 6 and 4 together so best warn them, maybe tell them on say Tuesday we will be 10 tomorrow and so on

[mickey89]

Goto 'Goggle' enter "Celebrity Dining Room Photos" - you will see that the maximum table size in the regular dining room is for 8 people.  I have observed many times parties of 10 dining in both Tuscan Grille and Murano on S Class ships.  Highly recommend Murano, you definitely need to book early.

[libridge8]

We have been able to reserve a table for 10 on a number of cruises. Usually our TA takes care of it ahead of time by linking all of the booking numbers. This has been for the main dining room and same time each day. 

[Bo1953]

Dining for ten (10) can be a challenge for the servers... I know as I usually travel with a group of ten (10) to 15 friends just about every year.

 

Your goal, as mentioned above, is to have a table for six (6) and four (4) adjacent to each other, that way it is easier on the server, food will be out (reasonably) at one time and conversations will be reasonable without yelling and etc...

 

The way we work it is, each of us know where the tables are and each can sit at whichever table they choose upon arrival.

 

Link the reservations, for sure and set a fixed time to dine that works for everyone and reserve accordingly...

 

bon appetit and bon voyage

[JuliaMS]

See what your group wants to do. We always do fixed dining with a group. That's why we like cruises for traveling with others - everyone does their thing during the day, maybe together, maybe not. Then we all meet up for cocktails, dinner and evening entertainment. No big deal if one couple decides to do specialty dining one night or eat at the buffet, just make sure the others know so they are not waiting to order. No having to make reservations each day or having to wait for a table.

[bigbenboys]

4 hours ago, libridge8 said:

We have been able to reserve a table for 10 on a number of cruises. Usually our TA takes care of it ahead of time by linking all of the booking numbers. This has been for the main dining room and same time each day. 

This is what we did for a group of 11 dining in Select dining. 

[Lemonyrae]

Thanks for the advice!  We just booked yesterday for a September 2023 Greece Cruise. Our group decided on anytime dining and we will pick certain days to eat together and make reservations. I'm so excited this will be my 3rd cruise but for most of the people in my group it will be their 1st.  It was my idea ao I hope they love it!