gfunkdave

Hubs and I did a 6 night cruise last week on the Celebrity Reflection. Port stops were Grand Cayman, Cozumel, and Bimini. Overall it was a really nice time. It was my second cruise, his third. While we aren't "cruisers" we both think that when we're in the mood for a low-effort, do-nothing, resort-type vacation a cruise can be nice. We both tend to prefer vacations that are more active and more self-directed exploring. We booked a guarantee Concierge class stateroom. Concierge class is a veranda stateroom that is a little bigger than normal and includes a few extras, like binoculars, a welcome lunch, priority tender access, and some special events throughout the cruise.

Embarkation. Embarkation was very smooth. You check in on the app several days ahead of time, and it lets you pick a 30 min window to show up at the port. We picked the earliest (noon-12:30) and when we got to Port Everglades there were a lot of people but Celebrity had so many people directing things that I think it took a total of about 10 mins from getting out of the taxi to getting on the ship. Had to show passports and the bar code on the app several times throughout the process.

We arrived on the ship and our SeaPasses (room key + onboard charge card) were waiting outside our room. There was a sign on our door saying they were still in process of prepping it. The app said rooms would all be ready by 2pm, so we dropped off our bags and explored the ship. When we got back, the sign was gone and the room had been noticeably spruced up a bit. Our main luggage still hadn't arrived, but it did arrive a couple hours later.

Tech. Celebrity uses Starlink satellite internet. The basic wifi (included in all fares) worked fine for sending text iMessages but nothing else. I bought the premium package on the first day, and we used a travel router to share it while we were in the room. I got anywhere from 25 Mbps down to less than 1 Mbps, depending on how many people were using it. Wifi signal was omnipresent throughout the ship. But I do need to give them a shoutout for their app. The Celebrity app is probably the best app I've ever used for anything. Once connected to the ship's wifi, you can do just about everything with it: book restaurants and shore excursions, chat with other people on the cruise, see your bill in real time, buy extras, see deck plans, see all scheduled activities, and more. I've seen a lot of people complaining about it on Reddit and I don't know why - must be user error.

Restaurants. We went to the Concierge welcome lunch in the main dining room on our first day, which was a nice perk. I hear that the welcome lunch is A Thing for many people who book Concierge. Other than that, there are three restaurants included in the fare: the main dining room, the buffet, and the grill by the pools. Overall, the food was good-to-above-average in all three. We did a specialty restaurant one night (Le Petit Chef). The food was noticeably better there than in the other venues. And Le Petit Chef was ADORABLE - they project little cartoons onto your table before serving each course, so you see a little animated chef preparing what you're about to be served. It seemed they didn't really enforce the dress codes for the main dining room - it was clear that shorts and flip flops were not allowed but I saw several people wearing them to dinner. There were a couple of dress-up nights where more people got dressy, but I just wore pants or jeans and a polo almost every night and it was fine. The ship also has a couple dedicated restaurants and a bar for people in suites.

We did the Anytime dining. The first night we showed up and they said there's be a 40 min wait to get a table, so we just went to the buffet. On succeeding nights I just asked for a reservation earlier in the day, and always got 8:15pm, which was perfect for us.

Service. The crew were incredibly friendly and I thought service was attentive without being overbearing. Some people mentioned that the service was not as good as it used to be, but I thought it was better than fine.

Shore. We had to use tenders to get to Grand Cayman. Concierge class got to skip the line, which I felt kinda bad about but not so bad that I wanted to wait in line. I did two shore excursions: a snorkeling trip on Grand Cayman and a bus tour/beach club on Cozumel. Celebrity makes it super easy to meet your excursion, and has lots of people on shore waiting to guide you. When we returned to the ship they were offering glasses of water and cold towels.

Concierge class amenities. I booked Concierge class not really knowing what it was, just that at the time of booking the guarantee Concierge room was the cheapest option to get a balcony. But the perks were really nice and next time I'd probably do it again (though I think I'd get a suite next time). The welcome lunch was nice. Upon leaving Grand Cayman we were invited to a champagne reception on the helipad for Concierge guests, which was a highlight of the cruise for me. We also got to do a free slot tournament in the casino one day, and there were a couple other things. And as mentioned we got to skip the line for tenders. Oh, and we got to get off the ship first. We did have a concierge team, but I am not sure what they were for, as I didn't need to use them for anything. They also left a little snack tray in our room around 4:30pm every day. It was usually a few bites, like small grissini with a bit of proscuitto wrapped around it, some cheese, some tomato and mozzarella salad, and a couple bites of cake.

Ship. I'd love to try a small ship (Silversea, Viking, Crystal) some day but I enjoy the array of spaces and options on a big ship. The Reflection was in dry dock a couple years ago, and felt close to new. There were a zillion bars and places to hang out (including The Hangout on deck 7, lol). Mr Gfunk loved watching football on the giant outdoor screen on deck 15. I was impressed how accessible the captain and senior officers were. The captain gave a few talks in the theater and he and the bridge crew were periodically just hanging out on deck 4 to chat with people. He was also very personable and pretty funny. He's Greek but goes by Kirk, so of course was always referring to himself as Captain Kirk. But the ship has a lot of nooks and crannies, and is so big that it never felt unpleasantly crowded.

Housekeeping was twice a day. In the evening they left chocolates on the bed.

Debarkation. We were supposed to leave by 7:30 but didn't realize that was a deadline. So we left at about 8:30. We carried our bags ourselves, and walked right off the ship, through customs, and to a taxi.

mahasamatman

Have you ever actually used any other apps? In addition to being slow and having a clunky user interface for some simple operations, the Celebrity app is one of the worst I've ever used in terms of data accuracy. Menus are often wrong. The schedule is often wrong - valid events are frequently omitted, events are listed at the wrong time, and events that don't actually exist appear in the app.

gfunkdave

It's the only one I've used, but I didn't experience any of the issues you mentioned. Actually, not quite: the app showed an old menu for Le Petit Chef, but they also gave us the same old menu in paper form when we sat down, so it led to a little confusion when we ordered.

mahasamatman

Concierge Class does not include priority tender access. That's limited to suites and Elite (or higher) members.

gfunkdave

And yet, they left a sheet in our room the night before saying "Concierge class guests please proceed to the Opus restaurant on deck 4 for priority tender access." I went to the restaurant, where there was a sign saying "Welcome Concierge class guests," showed my room key, and was escorted down the stairs, past the line, to the front of the line.

BamaVol

It sounds like the two of you had a good experience. What other line(s) have you sailed? I recently booked our third cruise with Princess. I liked what I have seen so far. Previously, we had sailed Royal Caribbean and Norwegian. It’s interesting to go to any of the CC forums and read how disappointed experienced cruisers are due to frequent guest program “enhancements”. As a nube, I’m clueless - just comparing with other lines I’ve sailed.

wrp96

Of the cruiselines I've sailed, like the OP I found Celebrity's app to be one of the better ones, also Carnival's. Absolute worst was Virgin's which rarely if ever worked, which when they require you to use the app for everything is very frustrating (couldn't make any reservations, couldn't order room service, couldn't shake for champagne, wasn't getting my messages, etc), and then also HAL's although that may have been a function of their terrible internet because we couldn't ever access it because the internet didn't work.

gfunkdave

I've only sailed on Celebrity (this was my second - first was on the Celebrity Century, which they've since sold, in 2010). Mr Gfunk took a cruise on Royal Caribbean in maybe 2007 as well. We have friends who are avid cruisers and take probably 5-10 cruises a year. They usually go on Celebrity but will also do Royal Caribbean or Norwegian sometimes based on itinerary/timing/price. I asked him the other day if he's done a Princess cruise, and he said he hasn't but their reputation is "a bit older and slower pace," so take that as you will. My understanding is Princess and Celebrity are generally at the same quality level but Celebrity markets itself as a little more young/hip/freewheeling. I would generally describe the Reflection's decor as "modern hotel lobby chic," for whatever that's worth. If you're looking for a cruise and want to try something new, I thought (and still think) Celebrity is a really nice experience.

I will probably not take enough cruises to get past Celebrity's "Classic" loyalty tier for the forseeable future, but the perks at Classic aren't really that interesting anyway. I think the most exciting one was 10% off wifi.

​​​​​​​Also probably worth noting that a lot of the app's functionality only appears when connected to the ship wifi.