We had been looking for something different to try for a holiday and when we saw some beautiful advertising about Celebrity cruises we thought we would try one for a special birthday treat.Having never been on a cruise before this was going to be a memorable time. We decided on the Celebrity Solstice..We flew from Christchurch New Zealand to Sydney Australia the day prior to embarkation. The whole experience totally lived up to all our expectations and then some...This boat is beautiful inside and out.. From embarking,which was made so easy for us newbies, to the finale disembarking every step was dealt with smoothly.No mean feat when so many passengers were being handled...Cabin was just as shown is booklet. Light and comfortable,reasonable room to move around,and well appointed.The food and dining was a treat every night, beautifully cooked and presented, from one of the many and varied dining rooms.Fantastic chefs there.Wine staff were very knowledgeable offering great suggestions for interesting tastes,and the wait staff were,attentive very helpful and made the whole evening fun.High class live shows,and good range of activities and presentations thoughout the day and evening were also a credit to the activity director.The staff went out of their way to be helpful and welcoming.Every aspect of service was excellent. Tenders service to get to and from the interesting ports were well dealt with,making the whole visit enjoyable. Would we go again? Yes!! as soon as we can!! Read Less

Celebrity Cruises South Pacific Sydney to Sydney To put our trip report into context, this was our third cruise and the first one on Celebrity. Our previous cruises had both been with Royal Caribbean which we understand owns Celebrity as well. The RCC ships were all a bit too gimmicky for us and we hardly ever used all the facilities and rather got annoyed by all the screaming little kids and multi-generational families you encounter everywhere. So this time, we thought we go a bit classier and give Celebrity a go. We are a gay couple in our mid 30ies and traveled together with one of our best friends who stayed by himself in a separate stateroom of the ship. We had a really good deal so we all stayed in Concierge class which turned out to be totally not worth the money had we paid in full instead of getting a discount, but more on that later. For our friend, it was his first ever cruise so we were very keen to ensure he has a great trip. As always, we did extensive research on forums like this beforehand but many little quirks had to be found out directly on the ship, as we soon realized. But let’s start from the beginning: We had learnt on previous cruises that the “recommended boarding time” is a simple measure of crowd control which can be completely ignored, as was the case on this ship. Actually, had we followed the cruise lines advice, we would have missed the lovely welcome lunch for Concierge class guests which turned out to be one of the few real benefits of this cabin class. This lunch is not very widely published and only runs from 12 to 1:30pm on embarkation day. Luckily, we arrived just shortly before 12 and the boarding process in Sydney was very fast and efficient. About half an hour after arriving all up we had cleared check in and emigration and got onto the ship. There we headed straight to the main dining room for our welcome lunch which turned out to be lovely. Great to avoid the usual zoo up at the buffet on your first day and the lunch consisted of about 5 different choices for main, plenty for everyone to find something for their taste. We had ordered and paid for both the Premium Alcohol package as well as a Dining Package for the specialty restaurants online before the cruise which helped us to brush off the constant and often borderline aggressive attempts to upsell us at every possible occasion. This is one of those many things that just don’t fit well with the so-called “Modern luxury” image that celebrity portraits in their advertising. The other big thing that is totally removed from all the happy mid 40ies couples in their ad material is the average age on this ship, which is decades older that what Celebrity shows in their advertising collateral. I actually didn’t mind it quite so much as I find most of those oldies to be very friendly and polite but my slightly younger partner and our friend found the old age rather depressing. One bad side effect of this which turned out to be the biggest issue with this entire cruise was the music played on the ship. Wherever you go, nothing but music for our parents’ generation or even older. And regardless of this rather old average age, we still had dozens of the usual screaming babies on board, I seem to attract them like a magnet wherever I go. After the lunch, we went to see the one guy who has access to the table bookings in the main dining room and had to queue up for about half an hour because the guests from hell were in front of us trying to sort out their dinner bookings for a party of 20. Once we finally got to see the guy, we were lucky that we did, as the Celebrity online systems had failed us as ever so often: We had linked our two bookings ages ago online but no trace of this was to be found once on board. We had specialty dining booked for this first night anyway which gave staff a chance to move people around and were promised to sit together (as requested all along) from night 2. Unlike some other requests, this one actually worked and we got assigned a lovely table in the middle of the MDR from the second night onwards. When we got to our stateroom shortly past 1pm, there was no trace of our room attendant which turned out to be the regular thing with her and we were disappointed to find none of the promised Concierge class amenities in the room. No trace of “Plush bathrobes” or a welcome sparkling on arrival. Once our attendant, Marion, finally showed up, we had a whole list of things to ask her. Besides the amenities, my partner uses a CPAP machine at night for his sleep apnea and we had requested an extension cord and some water beforehand but nothing was there so we asked her for these as well as all the other little things that were missing. We wanted to do the right thing and specifically took some US Dollar notes with us for tipping which is a highly unusual thing to do here in Australia so a 10$ note indeed did wonders with her. Unfortunately, we were about to learn that we had the slackest room attendant ever on this cruise which was very disappointing. She was always the last one in our hallway to start servicing the rooms compared with the otgher super efficient attendant on our floor who we saw constantly working and if you didn’t tell her every single thing, she wouldn’t do it (and even then she sometimes ignored it!). Our friend at the other end of the ship had a much better experience so I am certain it was just her specifically. Most of the time, if she would show up at all, you’d find her at the end of the hallway having endless chitty chats with other crew members and overall we had the feeling that she didn’t like working. Somehow, the cruise line managed to knock off the name tag from my partners luggage and stuffed it into an incorrect bag, missing the fact that that other bag actually had someone else’s name on it too. The missing bag was found by the late evening but it was still an inconvenience that could have easily been avoided. Let’s talk a bit about Concierge class as some of you might wonder if it is worthwhile. If you were to pay extra for it, let me assure you it is not (unless you are after the additional Captain’s club points, that is). We got our bathrobes and the free welcome sparkling later on the first day but both were nothing to write home about. The “Plush bath towels” were a total lie as they were thin and ripped and crappy on most days- if they were any worse in the normal cabins, you’d dry yourself in paper! Speaking of it, Celebrity uses the cheapest possible toilet paper which you usually only find on the lower shelves of US supermarkets, so prepare yourself to wipe your bum with sandpaper. Top tip: We found the facial tissue in the bathroom to be the much better option so do your behind a favor and use these instead! Aside this, neither the pillow menu nor the apparently upgraded bedding was anything special. As always with these “Twin bed converts to a King” configurations, we could always feel the gap between the two single matrasses- a bit like the princess and the pea. In general, we found the room to be exactly the same size and, unfortunately, also the same décor as the RCC ships we’ve been on before. The upgraded massage showerhead offered in Concierge class was also one big joke as it’s still one of those old-fashioned showerheads that are attached on the wall of the shower. I couldn’t really care less whether it’s a Grohe showerhead or whatever brand it might be, as long as I can’t remove the damn thing to properly clean my body. You really have to wonder why Celebrity can’t install a proper showerhead if every decent 4 or 5 star hotel can do it and Emirates even has one on their airplanes which is better than that! As for the “Evening canapés”, this was a typical case of on Celebrity, the only consistency being nothing being consistent: On the first night, we asked our hopeless room attendant how we order these. She, truly herself, told us incorrectly that there is no need to order and they “simply show up every night”. Only to two hours later leave an order form for the canapés on our bed (imagine an eye rolling emoji here). And then, over the 9 nights of the cruise, we experienced every single possible combination: Filled in the form, got the canapés. Filled in the form and didn’t get them. Were in the room at the scheduled time of delivery (the form tells you that you only get them when you are present at that time) and still didn’t get them. Were not in the room and got them anyway. Then one night, we didn’t get any form but canapés showed up anyway. Another night, again no form so we left a Post-it note instead asking for our canapés but guess what, nothing arrived. Writing all this, I realize that it was quite futile anyway as these canapés were always TRULY awful. And I am not exaggerating here, not only were they “nothing special” but they were always soggy and had clearly stood there for hours which (especially with the always included seafood) was nothing too appealing. Our friend never touched them at all and we tried a few but really, get some crackers with cream cheese and olives at ALDI and you’ll have (way!) better quality canapés than what Celebrity offers. Besides those canapés, the food turned out to be one of the highlights on this ship and in our eyes, the biggest difference to Royal Caribbean main line. The specialty dining in Murano was out of this world and we decided to come back a second time towards the end of the cruise (they pretty much flambé everything at your table from the lobster to the desert which is pretty amazing) and Tuscan Grill was also very nice. We were told that the Sushi place is excellent also but Silk Harvest, the Asian specialty restaurant sounds to be really awful as we are really spoilt for good Asian cuisine here in Australia (we haven’t been ourselves but our friend ate there and didn’t rate it at all). The biggest surprise, however, was the MDR. We opted for fixed seating this time as the flexible seating in our experience always ended up with being shoved to some side table and waiting in line forever and indeed we did not regret: The flexible dining always had endless lines on deck 4 while the fixed seating on deck 3 was lovely. We can only recommend to anyone to choose the fixed seating and we will definitely continue to do so from now on. Staff was always very friendly and attentive throughout even though a little bit scripted as always on these ships. This became particularly clear when our waiter raddled of the his “Tips of the day” which he had clearly learnt by heart from some prepared script and probably never eaten himself. Our favorite each night was the freshly baked super-crispy “French” style baguette which we remembered had been exactly the same on Royal Caribbean. One important point worth nothing: A lot of things on this ship are making it very obvious that it’s an American ship. We actually LOVE the US so for us it wasn’t a big deal but the food, for example, is VERY American- from whipped butter to the salad dressings and calling the main an “entrée”, it’s all clearly US-influenced. Again, we actually liked this but many Aussies would probably not agree (they even had “proper” American deep fried cheese sticks which is a rarity outside the US, yumm!). The same was true for many of the wines but unfortunately not for the beer selection on this ship- we had looked at many menus posted online but in reality, they turned out to be useless on an Aussie cruise as most of the beers had been swapped with delicious Bogan-delights like VB or XXXX, yikes. While all the menu cards still told you there nice beers like Blue Moon or Sam Adams available, unfortunately this was a lie- I tried every single bar and the only thing I could find was some rather odd leftover Sam Adams ale which I didn’t like. Luckily, you could get Heineken and Beck’s at most bars so I was happy with these. But again, no complaints at all with any of the staff at the restaurants and bars with the sole exception of two Bartenders, both Indonesian to no big surprise, who clearly displayed a whiff of Homophobia towards us- one of them at the Passport bar which was shockingly bad anyway and another one at the Casino bar which we didn’t really enjoy very much either. Not sure where they were during the Diversity training sessions that Celebrity apparently does but luckily, they were the absolute exception. Other than that, we were treated with respect everywhere in the ship and the staff was a delight throughout. We particularly loved the bartenders at the Martini Bar and the Worldclass Bar on deck 5, Alin at Martini and Janathan & Dimitri up at the World Class bar were our favorites as was our sommelier in the main dining room, Fatma. Finally, a few general observations: We found both the captain and the cruise director highly annoying when they came on the intercom which they did far too often and always when we wanted to have a sleep in- the Greek captain didn’t speak English too well and had a super annoying way of speaking and “sing-sanging” his sentences which was usually followed by the equally annoying Canadian accent of the cruise director who was strangely upbeat even on grim days with constant rain. I must leave him that though- he did a great job moderating the “Newly wed not so newly wed” game show one night which was absolutely hilarious. Similar to those announcements, there were of course the usual sales messages on the phone EVERY SINGLE DAY trying to peddle some shore excursions or worse, overpriced handbags and jewelry in the rip-off shops on the ship. And to top it off, they had nothing better to do on land days than announcing every single damn tender boat throughout the entire ship- because the weather was pretty bad on most days we opted to sleep in instead rather than heading to a deserted rainy Island and were furiously annoyed by these announcements and didn’t understand why they couldn’t have been limited to the lower floors of the ship were guests would wait for their tender boat to be announced. Regardless of the older crowd, we still had some families with small children on this cruise and while some of them were very well behaved, others were not so creating a total nuisance for everyone else on board. The highlight was that Bogan couple (“Bogan” in Australian is similar to “Rednecks” in the US or “Chavs” in the UK so uneducated, noisy, small-minded people from the country or outer suburbia) who took their little one into the Adult only Solarium to change its dipers (!). Before I could complain, some others had done so already and it took only about 5 minutes until they were told to leave the area. The smell was still lingering for a while but I did appreciate the staff to react so quickly to the complaints. What else, hygiene is a big thing on this ship, they are obviously dead scared of these Nuro viruses and hence there are cleaners everywhere. I wondered what would happen if Airlines had to worry about the same thing- would they suddenly bother to clean their planes properly? No issues on this ship at least. All the entertainment on the ship was made for an older generation and even on the Silent Disco night you had the choice between Motown (what the heck…), 80ies and “Top 40”. The two latter styles were were US-focused, no trace of some modern dance music, house, techno, trance, anything like that- nope. As a result, the Nightclub, Qasar, was always dead empty unless there was Karaoke on which was certainly not our thing. On the pool deck, they often played American country rock which was just deadly and some of the live musicians playing… I won’t go into more details but the music on ship was just absolute horror for us but I am sure the older folks would have liked it. Despite some of the criticism, we still had a good time, met some lovely people and great staff, enjoyed the food and all the alcohol that we definitely indulged in too much and all in all had a great time. So good actually that regardless of all the complaints, we went into the “Book your next cruise” office on the ship to put the deposit down for a cruise through the Greek Islands next year on Celebrity’s new Edge ship. Read Less

This was our fifth time on Solstice, and third time to the Islands. Embarkation was a breeze, we were onboard around noon with little waiting. Very smooth process. We had balcony cabin 6195 which has lifeboats below. It is classed as an obstructed balcony. Our cabin was fine, a good size and clean. I like the bathrooms on Celebrity, the showers have a glass screen, not a shower curtain. And both the bathroom and cabin are larger than other lines. This was my 35th cruise, and I have sailed on several other lines. Celebrity is my favourite line though. We travelled with four others, so spent a lot of time with others at trivia and shows and meals. The entertainment on the cruise was great, the singers and dancers were fabulous. The guest entertainment was really good too, a 'rock' violinist and pianist- both were fabulous. There was also Bane Bacon, who told old jokes about how women are terrible. His whole show was very dated, but he could play the piano beautifully. We ate in Tuscan Grill on the first night (a tip, if you hook for the first night you will get a discount, this applies to all the pay restaurants). The six of us had a terrific meal, more food than we could eat, and left feeling very full. I think it was $30USD discounted. Service was excellent. All other meals we went to the main dining room, which is a lovely space. We were often seated away in a corner though, which was a shame but the food and service was excellent. I find the food quality on Celebrity better than Princess, P&O and RCCL. The Captain's Club hostess Kirsty was wonderful. She was everywhere, very helpful and friendly. We had a fabulous time. Our itinerary was Isle of Pines, Mystery Island, Lifou, and Noumea. On the islands we just swam and snorkelled as we brought our own gear. At Noumea we bought Hop On Hop Off bus tickets for $12 each and explored. Was our third time there. We had a drink at Barca Cafe, they have good free wifi. Bought some gifts at the little markets atop the tourist centre. Read Less

Thought this was a quality cruise but it wasn't. entertainment in theatre too loud and quite boring. Food average.Excursions way too expensive. spa staff really pushy. Boarding was a crush and quite badly managed, concierge class was supposed to be better boarding experience but was no different to anyone else. Bars were congested and often a thorofare which meant nowhere to stand when no seat available which was most of the time. Was largely ignored by bar staff and wondered if it was because we had a drinks package and bar staff paid more attention to those that didn't. My travelling companion had to see the ships dr who understated and under prescribed to her condition which meant she was very ill for longer than necessary. She attended a dr immediately on disembarking and got a proper diagnosis and an effective prescription. Unfortunately the delay in the proper treatment meant the rest of her cruise was ruined. Read Less

Embarkation was quick and simple. The ship was spotless. Our cabin was well maintained and clean. The entertainment was great especially the Celebrity singers and dancers. The main dining room meals were fantastic as was the service by the waiters there. We did experience several customer service issues which were disappointing as we expected more as this is not a budget cruise line. Issues ranging from waiting 25 minutes to order a drink at the bar and eventually giving up. When asking Guest Services for the time and date of your online event booking only to be told to go upstairs to Cellarmasters and ask them ( one would expect guest services to pick up the phone and find out for you). The steak I ordered in the Tuscan Grill was very fatty and not edible, in their defence they did offer me another one however my husband had finished his meal so there was little point. Given the extra cost to dine there we expected a better experience. The compulsory safety drill was drawn out, a bit unorganised (at our muster station) and showed a childish video about the procedure. Disembarkation was simple and well organised. In Summary= A good cruise but not a great cruise ! We may cruise with Celebrity again but they will not be our first preference. Read Less

This is our second time on the Solstice and like last year, the price dropped for this same cruise out to the islands and so a group of us bought a cabin. Overall we loved the luxury of this ship from the cabins to the public spaces. Whilst the weather may not have been so forgiving, it was just good to sail on this ship. We also love the level of service we receive from the crew. They are well trained and focused on giving passengers a very high level of service. You notice the difference in comparison to other ships. Overall, loved the cruise and we have booked a future cruise on the Solstice because we want to come back and experience it all again. Whilst we have seen the same entertainment on a previous cruise including guest artists, it was very high in standard and we enjoyed the production shows. In comparision to other ships, musical entertainment was lacking and it was presented at odd times like 3/4 hour before the early dining service at 5.30pm but then nothing until after 8pm or late at night. There was no artists playing in the pool early during the day. Disappointing in the lack of musical entertainment. The ports of call were excellent with 3 tender ports out of 4 ports. Both the tender process was well managed and with six tenders in operations they got passengers of the ship very quickly. Also impressed with the Port of Noumea where the ship managed the shuttle services by issuing shuttle bus tickets. This prevented a mass rush to waiting buses, it is the first time we experienced this at Noumea and it worked very well. Speciality Restuarants - we only went the Murano and I can state that it is not a place to eat, it is a place to indulge in a high quality restaurant with food that teases the taste buds and service that you makes you feel you are very special. Loved the experience. In contrary to what I just stated, we rated the dining experience as low not because of the service by waiters or food presented in the dining rooms, because each time we would describe it as a dining experience and have praise for the staff that provided us with that opportunity to enjoy those experiences. In the buffet there was serious dietary problems with the labelling of food, Particularly with Gluten Based food. They were labelling wheat based food as gluten free and only after the management was challenged on a number of occasions that the food couldn't be gluten free, they simply removed the labels from the buffet. Never an apology!! Over five days we found 8 incorrect labels which could have exposed a number of passengers with gluten intolerance to the side effects of consuming gluten.ie 8 meals were labelled safe to eat by people with gluten intolerance. Eventually we demanded a meeting with the Food and Beverage Director, the Executive Chief. The Food & Beverage Director never turned up to three planned meetings but the Executive Chief and Restaurant Operations Manager did turn up and we got a partial resolution in which all incorrect labels were altered by covering up the gluten free symbol on the menu label, The labels are produced by Miami and the ship has to request for new labels. If these are standard labels produced by Miami, the problem of incorrect labelling maybe fleet wide. If gluten intolerant Challenge any meal before consuming it. In conclusion, I have to give praise to Restaurant Operations Manager, it was she that understood the seriousness of the issue and it was she that got the labels changed. Well done!! Read Less

Was reccommended this Line by our Travel Advisor and all I can say is Thank you, it was a wonderful experience from start to finish. We arrived early 11:00 hoping to maybe put our Cases on board while waiting around Sydney for our embarkation time of 4:30 and were told we could immediately embark so by 11:30 we were sitting onboard with Drink in hand. All in all a wonderful experience with great food in fact we ate most of the time in the Cafeteria as the food was so tasty with such a great range to choose from you couldn't fault it. So many different Bars to choose from but the Ensemble Bar became a favourite with wonderful friendly Staff and great Music from live Entertainers to listen to. The Gym had a wide range of equipment and had classes for Yoga and Fitness for the more Athletic. Even those wanting to escape the crowds were catered for with little nooks and crannies all over the Ship in the Library, Card Room and Team Earth. We didn't do any of the Ship excursions but were quite happy to go our own way. The Shows were very good with fantastic Entertainment and a very large and comfortable Theatre. The Ship is a very elegant grownup Ship and even though there were 300 Children on board you very rarely saw any and those you did see were having a wonderful time. Nightlife is lively with different themes and areas to choose from. Even disembarkation was a dream we chose to disembark with our Suitcases on the day and it was basically line up walk off with cases and Keypass and you were done. All in all a wonderful relaxing stress free Holiday in fact we are booking another one next Week Read Less

I was disappointed that the entertainment in the Atrium was so loud. It was impossible to have a coffee and conversation. That the ship only used US dollars. All the goods in the shops had a huge markup, i.e. $45.00 items marked down to $10.00. The Medical Center, what can I say. My wife had a slip on Mystery Island, and hit her head on a rock. I took her to the Medical Center only to be told by a smart crew person in a white shirt that the Center was only open on certain hours. This is contrary to the sign saying that the Center is open 24hrs a day for emergencies. I went to Customer Relations and spat the dummy. She was told to to back only to be greeted by a staff member through a part opened door that the costs are US $145.00 upfront. Then sign an indemnity form saying I will pay! They misdiagnosed, saying that she had a cut to the arm, and bruising. Nothing about the head. On arrival home I took her to the Hospital for a CT scan. She has a brain bleed! Thats that. Not happy Jan. We get better service on Princess. The main Dining Room service was excellent, Alvin and Valentino (Table 453) deserve a special mention. 12/10. Good on you guys. Read Less

We have friends who had cruised with Celebrity Solstice, and this being our very first cruise, we thought we would start with the best. We were not disappointed. Our cabin was spotless, and very well looked after by our friendly, cheerful Cabin Steward. Food was delicious with so many choices. We tried Silk Harvest and Tuscan Grille and both of those were excellent. Discovered later on that you can ask for a discounted rate for the specially restaurants. Staff throughout the cruise were polite but friendly. When it rained, we could not visit two of the islands, but movies were added as well as more things to do. The entertainment was fabulous. How those dancers danced so well when the seas were very rough just amazed me. This was the highlight of our night. I must also note that Jeff, one of the hairdressers really did a wonderful job on my hair for the Evening Chic night after I had truly battled with humidity and unruly curls. Read Less

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