Summit- 8/18-8/30 Reykjavík to Boston

[soccermommy]

This won’t be a long or detailed thread, but I wanted to give some impressions of this cruise, our first on Celebrity in 2 years.

DH and I are in our youngish 70’s, from the Boston area. We are longtime NCL cruisers but got hooked on Celebrity. We would have sailed them more but family constraints had us on Princess, Royal and NCL last year, which did give us a base for comparing cruise lines.

We really looked forward to visiting Iceland, since Covid took care of the previous two attempts.

ITINERARY 

We flew to Reykjavík from Boston on Iceland Air. We used Celebrity Air, decent price. Only issue was after final payment, they forgot to tell the airline we had paid, but a call took care of that. 
We stayed at the Hotel Von, very close to downtown, and within walking distance to several landmarks, which we did while waiting for our room.Small room, but very clean and perfect for the two of us. A restaurant shares the lobby, but technically not part of the hotel. We ate there quite a bit and enjoyed it. Be advised that food in Iceland is very expensive.

We did a small group Golden Circle tour with Gateway to Iceland, booked through Trip Advisor. We would use them again.

We used Celebrity for shore excursions in Isafjordur and Akureyri, mostly because there just wasn’t much to book. Both had stupendous scenery, lovely people. Several trips would not cover the sights Iceland has to offer.

Greenland. The trip through Prinz Christian Sund was probably the highlight of this cruise. Even the rainy, chilly weather couldn’t affect the glorious scenery. Mountains, glaciers and some narrow waterways. We even entered a small inlet where the Summit did a full 360 turnaround so the glacier could be viewed from everywhere on the ship. I am not sure the Eclipse next year will be able to duplicate this since spaces were tight!

Nanotorlik. A tiny little town which might have had more to offer if the rain, wind, and 40 degree temps hadn’t interfered. Our tour, a small boat tour of the fjord was cancelled. I think the locals were a bit bemused at the sight of so many crazy tourists who didn’t have the sense to get out of the rain.
St. John’s, Newfoundland. A neat, colorful city with an even more colorful history. We booked a walking tour through Viatour, which DH  enjoyed. I didn’t make it, more on that later.

Halifax, booked a small group Lunenberg tour through Viatour. We had been to Halifax before and wanted to see more of the province. We did get Peggy’s Cove again, I think almost every tour does it, but there have have been improvements. Walking is much safer and is now accessible. It’s still as pretty as ever. We did manage to beat the large tour busses, always a major plus. Lunenberg is a very small lovely city. We also got some great coastal views of both Mahone’s and St. Margaret’s bays. 

Boston. Disembarking was simple. We walked a block and got a much cheaper Uber home.

 

SUMMIT

The ship may be getting older, but you’d have to look for evidence. Immaculately clean and maintained. A couple of times restrooms needed attention, generally near the theater or Sky Club, but they were near the crowds.

Service was what I expect from Celebrity, crew friendly, helpful and seemed grateful to have us onboard. I found only one instance of not quite rude disinterest, and that was at Customer Service. But, having seen and heard some of the things they deal with, it could be considered understandable.

Room. We booked somewhat late and the only rooms available were inside and ocean view. We were in 2074, a deluxe ocean view, and enjoyed it. We felt no need to have a balcony crossing the Atlantic so far north and didn’t miss it. Our room attendant, Akhmead, was great.

Entertainment was fine, we aren’t huge show people and the music in the lounges was pretty good.

Food.  
The buffet was good, a lot of choices and generally were well prepared. My major problem was the  prepared scrambled eggs. I suspect eating them was the reason I missed the walking tour. I didn’t keep them down very long.

Specialty dining. We ate at both Tuscan and Sushi on Five. Food quality was excellent, and service excellent. Easily the best food we had on this cruise, but not something we’d want to do everyday.

MDR. A major disappointment. DH will eat anything, literally, but he couldn’t finish the NY strip steak. Tough and overcooked. Beef was often not cooked to order. The appetizers were fine, but choices are limited and repetitive. Desserts were ok, except one night we and our dinner companions all rejected the apple pie, and DH actually complained. It did get better, but I am now under orders to bake a “real” apple pie.

Celebrity simply has to increase the choices and quality of the food served. 

FINAL THOUGHTS

Our last cruise on Celebrity was September 2021 on our private yacht, the Summit. Nothing will ever equal the attention all 300 of us received, but there was nothing to complain about for service this time. There is still much to appreciate about the Summit.

You can always find something to eat, but there are areas that need work. In Celebrity’s defense, and we don’t consider ourselves cheerleaders, the MDRs on the other three lines we sailed were at best mediocre.

From reading various threads, I think Celebrity has done a lousy job with longtime cruisers who no longer feel appreciated or wanted, which is a really dumb marketing move. We don’t sail suites except for a  one time lovely Sky Suite upgrade, but I understand if you pay (a lot!) for something, you should get what was advertised. And even though the cruise lines are desperate to shed the crushing debt they incurred, I don’t think some of their cutbacks are beneficial, or smart.

But Celebrity is doing a lot right. We have 2 cruises coming up and will book again when the 2025 schedule comes out.

 

If anyone has specific questions, I will do my best to answer.

[CruisinBanka]

Thanks for your honest review! We will be getting on Summit in a few days and hopefully the food will be better than you experienced in Blu. 

[Jim_Iain]

What a wonderful review.   Thanks for taking the time.

 

We took the same cruise last year and loved it.    You are in for a treat and will rewarded with many new adventures.   I hope you are lucky to see the Northern Lights.   They were very active one night on our cruise.  

[gerelmx]

2 hours ago, CruisinBanka said:

Thanks for your honest review! We will be getting on Summit in a few days and hopefully the food will be better than you experienced in Blu. 

They booked ocean view, No Blu

[CruisinBanka]

38 minutes ago, gerelmx said:

They booked ocean view, No Blu

I am aware they were in MDR. We will be in Blu and hoping the food will be better than they experienced. 😀

[1Virgo]

3 hours ago, CruisinBanka said:

Thanks for your honest review! We will be getting on Summit in a few days and hopefully the food will be better than you experienced in Blu. 

believe they ate in MDR.  

 

We were on Summit in April/May and the food in the Blu was fantastic.     That particular Blu has won awards

[CruisinBanka]

4 minutes ago, 1Virgo said:

believe they ate in MDR.  

 

We were on Summit in April/May and the food in the Blu was fantastic.     That particular Blu has won awards

Great! Thanks for letting me know about your recent experience. The Blu on Summit has always been my favorite and much better than Blu on S and E class in my opinion. More intimate and food and personalized service has always been great. Been on Summit in Aqua for 8 sailings, the last being Oct last year. 

[Mr. Click]

Food is so subjective. We were on the Summit in July for a wonderful trip down to Bermuda.  We were in the MDR and found the food to be fine and the service was great.  We are not foodies at all but we enjoyed every meal.  We did one dinner in the Tuscan Grill and a lot of lunches in the OVC and it was all good.

 

The Bermuda trip, our second one, was so nice we booked August 2024 on the the Eclipse for NJ to Iceland.  Looking forward to hearing more about the OPs adventures on their cruise

[karmamule]

Thanks so much for your review! We'll be on the Summit in just under 30 days and will have a couple of those stops in common so this was a very helpful read. 

[soccermommy]

I know food is subjective…DH and I had major differences on some of our meals! For someone who will try anything, he was definitely pickier than I was.  No one will starve on the Summit.  It’s more likely  you come home pounds heavier. I speak from experience.

I saw vegan and gluten free choices in the buffet and MDR, and as I am a diabetic, I found the MDR would modify meals and desserts for me with a little bit of notice to our waiters and hostess. I guess my main problem is the number of choices available on the daily menu, but maybe this being a 12 day cruise had something to do with it. 
i can’t comment on Luminae or Blu but I’m sure others who have eaten in these can chime in.

I definitely would do this itinerary again. We sort of saw Northern Lights, but clouds obscured most sights. We do have pictures of green clouds though.