Here are a bunch of tips and comments that I hope will help make your cruise more enjoyable. This is my 3rd cruise, all 3 were with Celebrity, so I can't compare it to other cruise lines, but we have always found Celebrity cruises to be high quality and fun with excellent food.Arrival - If you are flying in the day of the cruise, I think it is totally worth the $26 each bus fare (versus a $35 per cab charge) from SEA/TAC to the dock. The buses take your luggage and you don't have to lug it around. It just shows up at your stateroom door. You get to skip the long, slow lines at the dock for luggage check in.We landed at SEA/TAC at about 10:30 and were on-board by noon. Not bad. We were also able to skip most lines due to Concierge Class booking. They started a buffet lunch up in the Oceanview at about noon. This gets extremely crowded. Head to the back of the ship. There is more seating there. Also, there is the "Chef's Special" buffet line hidden back there. This is about the only time that the Oceanview gets crowded, but it is a mob because the Trellis isn't open, people still have their carry on luggage plus food trays, etc.Our rooms were available to us about 1pm and our luggage arrived about 4 pm. I don't see any point in rushing to get on-board before noon, unless you want to. I think they wanted everyone on board by about 2:30, so have lunch at the Pike's Place Market or something.Weather - The first week of July we had the following weather. 2 days of sun (first and last). 3 days of overcast (mainly at sea). 2 days of light, intermittent rain (mainly in ports). Temps were pretty mild (50s), except right at glaciers. Light fleece jacket with rain shell was plenty warm as there was not too much wind.Itinerary & Route- The itinerary and course of the ship is different than the last time I was up here on the Mercury. We sprinted up the outside of Vancouver Island and stayed on the outside both up and back. We did not cruise the "Inside Passage" between the islands and mainland at all. This was a bit disappointing as there was nothing to see all 3 days at sea, unlike if we had been in the Inside Passage. The only glacier we really could see was the Mendenhall in Juneau. You take a bus ($8 each way) to see it. You don't really see much of the glacier in Tracy Arm Fjord, although the fjord itself is spectacular. Make sure you get up at 6am to see the whole Tracy Arm experience.Ship Motion - The first day is at sea and the ship did roll a bit. Just enough so that you weaved down the corridors if you didn't hold on. My wife got a bit queasy. We got some motion sickness pills from Guest Services that helped. The 6th & 7th days were also at sea and had some motion to them. I would call it very mild, but it bothered some people. Get a patch before you come if you are sensitive.Ship Condition - I thought that the ship was in excellent shape overall. Yes, some chairs in the Oceanview restaurant had obviously been repaired. If you looked real hard, you could occasionally see a scratch or dent here and there, but nothing real bad. If anything, it was the general sort of "retro" theme of the interior design (especially the rugs) that looked a tad dated. There were people cleaning public areas to get rid of fingerprints and such, but I did not experience any bad smells from cleaning materials or anything. Yes, the ubiquitous Purell dispensers are still around, but due in part to them, I didn't hear of any health problems. Getting Around - The signage on the ship is great. I got one of those little folding deck plan brochures, but didn't need it at all. There are deck plans at all elevators. And speaking of elevators, the glass elevators mid-ships and the 3 other sets of elevators meant that they were not crowded most of the time. T Pool - Unlike the Mercury, the T pool area is very large and free. It was not used much most of the time. The water is not real warm, more like tepid.Persian Garden - This is an odd area off the T pool, I think, where there are steam rooms and such for a fee. You can do a couples mud "ritual" if you want. We skipped that.Room - In the room, bring an extension cord with additional outlets if you need to plug in more than 2 things right at the desk. There is no night light in the bathroom, but you can unplug the one in the room and plug it into the socket on the hair dryer. It gives off just enough light so that you can see if you have to get up in the night and then you don't have to turn on the lights in the bathroom. The bedside lamps are very dim and don't really give out enough light to read by. Bring a book light if you do a lot of reading in bed. The mattresses are firm, but not hard. I slept well which is unusual since I have trouble many times when away from home.I had not had a room with a balcony on previous cruises, but even with the marginal weather, I am totally sold on getting a balcony on any future cruise. The floor to ceiling glass door lets so much more light into the room and it is so nice to be able to go outside at any time without having to go up on deck.If there are 3 of you in a regular room, then it will be cramped when the love seat is folded out into a bed and you can't get to the balcony without climbing over the fold out bed. Entertainment - The shipboard entertainment was uniformly excellent and the cruise director, Steve, did a good job. There were about 13 singers and dancers along with a band of about 6. They did 4 completely different one hour shows over the 7 days plus some other short shows. There was also an aerialist duo, Jouka & Maria. They did incredible work using web straps that came down from the ceiling. A lot like Cirque du Soliel. The magician was good, but it seemed like a lot of his stuff relied on close-ups, like card tricks, that didn't lend itself to a stage show even though it was shown on big projection screens. The comedian was great, but he said he was leaving the ship at the end of the cruise. I'm not sure if he was coming back. There is a crew talent show, but no passenger talent show like Celebrity Idol. They also have a "Dancing with the Stripes" where crew members dance with guests and a chef cooking competition, a la Top Chef.There were also several musical groups who mainly played in the bars. The classical string trio was very good. I didn't care much for the main "bar band". There was also a guy who played piano, mainly in Michael's Club, who was fun.Naturalist Brent Nixon - This guy apparently has amassed a huge following over the years from the other reviews and comments of the people on our cruise. I am apparently one of the few who do not care for his style. He is probably an excellent naturalist, but his presentations are delivered in a gravel voice like he is channeling George Carlin and accompanied by a lot of physical comedy like rolling around on the stage or simulating the waddle of a seal. Although many call it entertaining, to me his performance is over-the-top exaggerated and detracts from the otherwise excellent information that he conveys. By contrast, his comments over the public address system during the cruising in Tracy Arm Fjord were really good and appropriate.Aqua Spa - We both had several spa treatments with mixed results. First the bad. Laurel had a massage and the woman didn't speak much English and either couldn't understand or ignored her requests. It is nice that they are doing men's treatments including shaving now. The shaving is with a safety razor, not a straight razor, but they are still fun to get. Also, they have a Salon Exotic Relax Package where you pick 3 mini-treatments from a list for about $80 for an hour total. This is a great deal and a good way to start off the cruise. Yes, the spa staff still pushes products, but they are not too overbearing about it.Food - We mainly ate in the Trellis main dining restaurant. We did not try the SS United States specialty restaurant ($35 pp extra). They were promoting it hard and maybe it was not fully used. We had the late dinner seating at 8:30. This was not as bad as I thought it might be. When we boarded, there was a line of people yelling/begging, etc at the maitre d trying to get moved to the early seating. This will probably not work as there are 2,000 people, many of whom want to eat in the restaurant with a capacity of about 900. If you have to eat early, sign up for the cruise way early. With the late seating, you either go to the 7pm show or the 10:45 show as they alternate times each day so you can still see everything. It is still light out at 8:30, so it doesn't seem like you are eating so late. We had a snack and nap at about 5pm and that seemed to help. The Cova Cafe has excellent appetizers and live music to pass the time.We were seated at table 405 which is at the back next to the Captain's table. Great views through the windows, but significant vibration/rumbling from the engines. The food at the Trellis was just as good as past cruises. Also, they have a new corporate chef and the food will be revamped in the coming months. Still, it was generally excellent with just a couple of the side dishes being a bit bland. The portions are small, so you can order a 5 course dinner and not feel stuffed. There are 2 formal nights in the Trellis. PLEASE DO NOT CRASH THE FORMAL NIGHTS IN THE TRELLIS BY WEARING CASUAL ATTIRE. They will not turn you away, but make no mistake, by wearing casual attire, you are crashing the party. Formal nights are when they take pictures at the tables, so either bring nice clothes or go elsewhere. The Oceanview buffet on deck 10 was the usual buffet fare. I have no idea why anyone would eat there other than it was always available and quick. They are not doing the midnight buffet, instead they do a dessert extravaganza in the Constellation bar. They are also doing a "brunch" extravaganza in the Trellis on the last day at sea.Communications - I have AT&T for my cell phone and I had better reception on the ship than I have at my house in San Francisco (although this would not be hard). I was getting calls even on sea days. If you don't want this, you had better turn off your phone.Crew - As always, the crew was very friendly. It was unusual to pass any crew member without being greeted by them. After a while, it almost gets old. You have to give these people credit for doing a long, hard job away from their families for 6 months at a time. Our waiter, a single mom, had a 2 year old daughter in Peru being raised by her grandmother. This is not unusual. Some of the crew do not speak very good English, so be patient, you may have to work to be understood. For example, one morning a woman in the Oceanview Buffet requested eggs "sunny side up" and was met with blank stares. First, they cooked plain egg whites. Then they poured 2 whole raw eggs on top of them, broke the yolks, stirred, and cooked that. Then they folded it over like an omelet. She gave up and took it. The sole exception to the cheerful crew was the guy in the fitness center who seemed to think that all fitness classes should be "bootcamps". He was not very friendly and gave classes that were too hard and advanced for a cruise. His pilates classes were $12 extra and largely empty.Excursions - The only excursion we did was the scenic bus tour + castle in Victoria. This was very nice and lasted about 3 hours. Since you get into Victoria at 6pm, this is about all you can do. The dock at Victoria is located about 1 mile from the central business district and Empress Hotel.There was no tendering on this trip although I heard that the ship has to tender at Juneau, I think, every other week. Most of the ports had 3-4 ships docked. That means 6,000-8,000 people in port. The ports were generally crowded, especially Juneau. Loved the Ranger led, free walking tour in Skagway that starts at the visitor center. Disembarking - This went quickly. There is time for breakfast and Trellis is open until 8am. You have to be out of your room by 8:30 and assemble about 9am. We were off the ship and had our luggage by 9:30. Homeland Security wanted to see a passport getting off the ship. Not sure what they would do if you didn't have one.Overall the cruise went very well and was enjoyable. It is hard not to have a good time on a Celebrity cruise.