Celebrity Constellation Review
Fifth sail on the Connie loses some luster.
Rating by category
Additional details
In what was to be our fifth cruise on the Celebrity Constellation - and likely our final sailing due to the ship's slated repositioning to Europe, the Mideast and an Asian base in the coming year - we were eager for an interesting itinerary on a ship we had come to love. This "grand dame" of Celebrity's Millennium class ships is becoming somewhat obsolete by today's standards for larger, "behemoth" ships and we loved Connie's relative intimacy and less flashy accouterments. We enjoyed seeing crew members from previous sailings including a capable and uncommonly funny and personable Captain Tasos.
That being said, there was one particular trend aboard that we had previously found annoying: the type and volume of music piped into the ship's various dining and common areas and around the central fifth deck shopping venues. The day before embarkation we received a call from a Celebrity Cruise agent inquiring whether we as Captain's Club members would care to upgrade for $100 our Concierge Class veranda cabin on Deck 8 for an Aqua Class cabin on Deck 9. We agreed. And that, as it turned out, was a hastily made decision we would come to regret because our cabin - number 9056 - was directly below the Deck 10 pool deck and what we heard intrusively during the cruise was the sound of deck furniture being moved and scraped on the metal decking over our heads in the cabin and on our veranda. Accompanying those obviously made sounds was a cornucopia of other bangs and noises that could best be described as a sound effects recording.
In about 30 cruises we've taken within the past 8 years, this was by far the noisiest cabin we had ever had. A call to guest services resulted in a prompt "investigation" of the aforementioned sounds and we were subsequently told that it was just the ship's usual noises. A bottle of wine was sent to our stateroom with a note of regret for the inconvenience and by cruise end we were each given a $300 credit certificate good towards a subsequent cruise on Celebrity. Very thoughtful, to be sure, but the noise continued and began each morning by 8 a.m. as passengers and/or deck hands re-arranged pool deck furniture for the day. I assume that the same sounds we heard at day's end were of that same furniture being stacked for the night.
Cabin Review
Aqua Class Balcony
DO NOT chose this cabin unless you enjoy lots and lots of noise of moving furniture and banging, etc, emanating from the pool deck above.
Port Reviews
St. Croix
This port has great potential to be a great stop but to date, the port has little in the way of shopping or dining venues to attract passengers. We've taken an excursion on a previous sailing to the other side of the island and riding through a rain forest and seeing other sights was enjoyable. Otherwise, little to see or do around the dock area.
Tortola
Our first time here and it seemed to be a bustling place of commerce and activity.
Antigua
We looked forward to returning here but arrived on a Sunday when many of the local shops and restaurants were closed in observance of church-related attendance. Very disappointing because our favorite restaurant and shop were not open. But Diamonds International and the usual in-every-port store were not surprisingly open.