I was accompanied on this trip by a friend who lives in my neighborhood. Although a generation older, she shares my enjoyment of travel, good cooking, good wine, good plays and movies, good books, good political scandals, and good pets, even though the pets are invariably bad at times. She has travelled broadly, but had never been to the Caribbean before-- so when I mentioned my winter escape plans, she figured, "hey, it's now or never", and booked a cabin down the hall, as well as a room at the hotel. This trip certainly seems to have made her a fan of the tropics, particularly the Gallery Inn, (about which more shortly) and she was likewise impressed by the way Celebrity does things.

My plans, made about a year in advance, proved prescient, in that the trip happened to coincide with Round Two (of I don't know how many rounds) of "Polar Vortex" action, with temperatures back home in Massachusetts something like 20 degrees BELOW NORMAL-- and of course, even "normal" in Mass is damn well cold enough in January, thank you very much, without any "help" from the north pole. We felt fortunate that the New England weather, though frigid, did not interfere with our direct mid-day flight (Jet Blue) from Hartford to San Juan.

My first cruise with Celebrity had been in Jan of 2003-- also a week out of San Juan, on the then-new Constellation, a twin of the Summit. I was quite knocked out by that ship, particularly since my only other cruises before then had been on antique vessels like the late lamented Norway (former ss France.) Read more