Celebrity Solstice Review

Tranquil, solid, pleasant Solstice cruise

Review for the Eastern Caribbean Cruise on Celebrity Solstice
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fumasacra
First Time Cruiser • Age 20s

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Sail Date: Feb 2010

In a nutshell: Celebrity Solstice is a lovely, tastefully designed ship with good food, good service and nice passenger crowd. Overall, the cruise on Celebrity Solstice finally confirmed my observation that as things stand now there really isn't any significant difference between mainstream and premium cruise lines any more. One can have a butler, a villa at sea with a white baby grand piano on NCL or a comparable luxury on Celebrity for more or less the same price. Or one can have a typical balcony cabin on any of these cruise lines and have more or less the same experience. We love classical music but could have a lovely piano trio on Carnival or an equally lovely string quartet on HAL and Celebrity. Where Celebrity scores higher is a better breakfast buffet for people with more varied dietary needs and the noise level from the tacky pool games, gaudy cruise director staff activities, and often seemingly tone deaf calypso bands. If one really wants a premium experience than these days one must pay extra for every little item starting from a cup of tea or book Oceania or a spot in the Queen's Grill on Cunard. As far as I'm concerned, there is no such thing as a set difference between mainstream and premium. One can tailor one's own level of premium on any cruise line, on any ship depending on how much one wants to spend.

This was our fifth cruise overall and our first cruise with Celebrity. I'm 36 and DH is 43. The reason for choosing this Celebrity Solstice cruise was due to work schedule and a truly great bargain pricing. Parking at the Midport open air lot in Port Everglades was smooth when we arrived around 11 am, and the embarkation process was a breeze. We had an "obstructed view" balcony cabin on Deck 6. As it turned out, it was not really obstructed at all, except that right below the balcony there was a lifeboat rather than another balcony or deep blue sea. No worries about lack of wonderful seascapes! Cabin: really comfortable, practical, well-designed bathroom. The best that we've seen so far and they actually had constantly hot water in the shower without frequent changes in temperature like on HAL. Sliding balcony door was wonderful, we could keep it open at night to fall asleep with natural ocean wave sound without any howling noises as on some other ships. The colors were nice and unobtrusive, good quality furniture. The bed is comfortable even though a bit on the firm side. DH requested extra feather pillows which he promptly got. The towels are small and a bit rough, so we requested extra towels and our request was fulfilled expediently. Storage space is rather cramped even without mountains of luggage or one has to put things under the bed alongside suitcases or in the overhead compartment which is easy only for basketball players. The balcony is quite deep with nice reclining chairs and a small table. The walls are unsurprisingly thin, so don't forget to pack a pair of ear plugs and pray that you don't have a crying baby or an arguing couple next door. The room steward Urban was very pleasant and performed his duties accurately. Strangely, there were creaking noises in several locations, including our cabin, at faster speed and when the ship was rocking a bit more. A German-built almost new ship should not make that sort of noise. Food: MDR meals were very good. That said, being a vegetarian (pescatorian who can't eat dairy, to be more precise) is definitely a minus in the cruising world. Solstice had the best overall food in our experience (comparing to NCL, Carnival, HAL). The best dishes seemed to be beef dishes according to DH who typically does not eat red meat except on cruises for this very reason. Fish was average quality, the lobster tail was smallish. However, there were adequate selections for vegetarians and one could find dishes that were suitable for vegans as well. Service in MDR was excellent, staff was polite overall and this was the first time that the assistant maitre d' actually talked to our table more than once. Deserts were very good but the portions are made to defeat all New Year's resolutions as far as the size goes. Given our present state of waistlines in this country, this is a questionable practice. The salads are smaller than the cakes and a lot of people could not eat those huge slices of deserts anyway, so there is an outrageous amount of waste. Buffet was overall very good even though for dinner the selections seemed to be the least appealing. There were Asian themed dishes available for every meal, plus sushi (with real tuna, salmon, octopus), Miso soup and other healthier items available from 4:30 pm onwards. The breakfast buffet was the best we've seen on a cruise ship so far. Lots of items beyond the boring and unhealthy continental breakfast with the mountains of sugary foods! For carnivores there were carving stations running full speed by 8am, lox for those who don't care for meat and eggs, a good choice of fruit. The coffee, as DH reported was good, while the tea selection was absolutely dismal all over the ship. I brought my own from previous experience. Celebrity is not better than Carnival in this regard. Or one can spend $4 for a cup of decent tea in Al Bacio cafe. And I had occasionally thought that Starbuck's tea was expensive... ha ha. We did not order from the room service menu which was very limited. We did not eat in any extra charge restaurant since the food in the MDR was very good. Cafe Blue with its healthy selections offered a very, very light fare with delicious organic breads but one cannot really live with eating there alone, IMHO. The plates offered there were pre-made and pulled out of the fridge when they opened for lunch so the food was not exactly the freshest while it nevertheless tasted good. The ice cream was disappointing except if one went to the gelato cafe and paid extra. The staff's uniforms are so much like an average restaurant that it's hard to realize one is actually cruising. I can see how they save money on washing and dry cleaning by stripping waiters out of their maritime-type uniforms, but it certainly detracts from the style and makes it very casual. Why require passengers to dress up in a formal style if the staff looks like waiters in Red Lobster? Entertainment: the Solstice show in Cirque du Soleil style was really good, the guest performers, especially the jazz violinist Doug Cameron were good. The Solstice singers and dancers in the regular shows - good effort, better dancing than singing even though they did sing in tune as opposed to some other cruise ship entertainers that we've heard before. Cruise director was very pleasant. Thankfully, there are no announcements of bingos, hairy chest competitions, and similar annoying crap. The ViArt string quartet was wonderful, we wish they could have played more. The big band group was very good and the a cappella group provided a good entertainment so that compensated for the industry average singers+dancers performances. Solstice had the least pushy "port shopping" person and the enrichment program seemed to be the best so far too, compared to other cruise lines. Ports: St. Kitt's scenic railway tour was fun and very informative. This is a real chance to see quite a bit of the island. Basseterre is a small city that can be explored on foot in a short time. Probably the most interesting thing would be to climb the highest volcano peak on the island. On St. Martin things are even more congested than the last time we visited a couple of years ago. Traffic jams are ubiquitous, our island tour ran late and the driver had to repeat "don't worry, be happy" one time too many while performing driving feats of admirable precision as he tried to maneuver the bus through seemingly impassable roads and streets. That island has too many cars and too few and too narrow roads. There are traffic jams all over the place so allow plenty of time even for the shortest trip if that involves driving. Other places on ship: the enclosed Solarium area is lovely with color-changing water fountains and two whirlpools with not really hot water. There are more lounge chairs on the open decks even though some people hoard them as on other cruise lines. There were very few children on board. The grass section on the top deck is one thing where we could not possibly figure out quite what purpose should it serve. There were table tennis tournaments on the ship, DH participated and said that they were well-organized, indoors, not on the outer decks where wind would preclude any meaningful game for those who know the business. Basketball was very disorganized, the staff person in charge never even showed up one day. We did not go to the spa but it was a good feeling that they had an acupuncturist on board just in case if there were a need to quickly and effectively address any pain issues or seasickness - for a premium price, at least for those of us who are not used to NYC pricing. All public spaces were tastefully appointed, the casino was non-smoking, yes!!, we could pass by without need to inhale the fumes and heard other people commenting favorably on the subject. The formal nights were very informal, not many men even wore dark suits, let alone tuxes. That was a bit surprising. The fellow passengers seemed to be very nice, quite a few people were from Ontario and Quebec, as well as UK, quite a few were Spanish-speaking. Disembarkation: it went very well except that the elevators became useless due to the heavy traffic and we used stairs to get around. That may be problematic for people with mobility issues. Breakfast on the disembarkation morning was like a zoo. Finding a table was problematic. This is one time when Celebrity should make announcements to speed up the flow, at least for those passengers who don't need any special assistance. We could have been off the ship even earlier if they would have made at least some announcements. In any case, there were no major delays and we had our luggage in hand and were in our car by 9 am. Final verdict: Good cruise, smooth sailing, good food, a pleasant and relaxing vacation without bells and whistles. We would cruise with Celebrity again provided the schedule, itinerary and price is right. But what is really priceless is the starry Caribbean sky at night with that swooshing ocean sound of the absolutely gorgeous turquoise blue waters.

Cabin Review

6191 no real obstruction of view, life boat below the balcony, no ship noise except if neighbors make noise, thin walls, midships no rocking problems, creaking noises at faster speed

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