Day 7—Disembarkation and Rounding It All Up

by | Jun 24, 2026 | Uncategorized

I guess before I round up the entire trip, I need to mention disembarkation. It, like embarkation, was one of our best ever. Because we were in a suite, we didn’t have to wait for a luggage announcement. We finished breakfast, took our carry-on bags to the Retreat Lounge, and when the Concierges told us we could go, we just walked off (Kathleen was wheeled off). We got our luggage (if you need a porter, find one before you get your luggage, as they are few and far between in the check-out area; they are all elsewhere in the check-in area). We were in our van driving away at 9:00 am, back in Chilliwack by 10:15, and on our way to Redmond by 10:30. Perfect. We could easily have made a flight by noon at YVR, and so could you, especially if you walked off with all your luggage, which many people did.

Now, on to the final review. Where to begin? And how do I not forget something? Here’s my final report, and it’s a bit disjointed, so it jumps all over the place. To organize it, let’s divide this up into three ratings—the good, the bad, and the ugly. Or four ways, with the fourth choice being fine, since it was “just fine.”

Most of this cruise was “fine.”

Food

Food was fine but uneven. We ate at Luminae, the buffet (once), The Retreat Sundeck, The Sunset Park Cafe, Trattoria Rossa and Murano. Here are some quick comments about them all.

Luminae: We ate 90% of our meals here—breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Breakfast was usually outstanding—I don’t think I had a bad one. Highlights included discovering things that really weren’t on the menu. Well, they were on the menu, but you have to make a small change.

For example, I tried the Eggs in Purgatory on day one. This is a dish with some of the best tomato sauce I have ever had, topped with five quail eggs cooked sunny-side up. It was great, but the quail eggs were too underdone for me. So the next morning (and a couple of mornings after), I ordered a small omelet with a side of that tomato sauce, which I topped it with. Delish! Other favorites were the Eggs Benedict, the frosted croissant (although it was tough to eat and/or cut, and some wonderful fresh-squeezed OJ. If you are in Luminae and like good coffee as we do (we are from Seattle), then skip the coffee and order an Americano or latte. They take a little time to make, but they are worth it.

Lunch was fine… except for one incredible sandwich I mentioned on our first sea day. The rest of the lunches we had there were just not that special. But I would drive 100 miles for that sandwich. It’s a destination in itself.

Dinner was barely fine and inconsistent. And it definitely did NOT pass the Steve Test. If it were near me here in Washington, I doubt I would ever have dinner there again. The chef had a real problem with meat. He could not figure it out. He served some great-looking cuts of meat with absolutely no taste. His prime rib was a huge cube of meat, not your normal, as was one of his steaks. I got to try the steak, and it was completely tasteless. His lamb loin was the same way. Just big hunks of meat. Nothing really special.

Hot Tip: We didn’t realize until the third day that we could order off the Main Dining Room menu at any meal when our new friends Richard and Randy let us in on the fact. From that point on, we asked for that menu at every meal, and at least one or two people at the table ordered off it.

Other Lunches: Our first lunch was at the Sunset Park Cafe, and it was excellent. They served sandwiches, salads, and desserts. They also bake warm cookies every afternoon around 3:00, but no one in our group who tried them was impressed.

We also had lunch at the buffet just once. We might have tried it a little more often, but the place was so slammed that there was hardly ever an open table. The food I had on the one day we ate there was very good. I just had a hard time deciding what to get. Once I had settled on a Mediterranean lunch (hummus, dolma, etc.) I was fine.

Huge rant here: Something needs to be done about people who have finished their lunch in the buffet, just sitting at tables and in many cases, just staring at their phones. There were even people I saw on two occasions who finished eating, put their dishes on a nearby counter, and started playing cards… while others wandered around looking for tables with food in their hands. That has to stop. All it would take would be for an assistant maitre’d to walk around and ask folks to limit their use of the tables to when they were eating.

I previously wrote about our lunch on the Retreat Deck. Not my favorite by a long shot. Cold food brought from a kitchen too far away. Nothing is worse to eat cold than French fries. They just become conduits of ketchup.

Our two most outstanding meals were at specialty restaurants. Our first night dinner at Trattoria Rossa was a wonderful experience and set the bar for the disappointing week we had at Luminae. The restaurant is easily the best on Solstice right now (at least for my tastes). A massive A+ on the Steve Test. This place (if here in Redmond) could become our go-to venue for dinner. WOW! Just delicious. And, oh, those cannolis.

Our last night’s dinner in Murano was almost as good. The food is fancier than I prefer, but I did have an amazing piece of venison, Celebrity’s signature soufflés (goat cheese appetizer and Grand Marnier for dessert) and everything else that goes with fine French dining.

That said, I had my only letdown in service that night. The sommelier didn’t like me for some reason. He didn’t like Kathleen either. Four of the six of us were drinking wine by the glass. Judy had white, Cathy had champagne, and Kathleen and I were drinking red. THREE different times, the man refilled their glasses and skipped ours. I did my best to catch his eye, coughed, etc. I even asked (one time, after refilling their glasses) if we could get some as well. When I got my venison (which would have gone wonderfully with the cabernet I was drinking), not a single server could be found. I basically ate a really great piece of red meat with water. And then, when he showed up just as the plates were being removed to ask me if I wanted more wine, I told him, “Yes, I did want more wine, WITH MY ENTRÉE.” He acted like he had no idea what I was talking about.

Service

That entire incident brings me to the best thing about any Celebrity cruise, since we went on our first one in November of 2004—the service. We have been on seven different cruise lines, and I have never had service like I have every time I board a Celebrity ship. If everything else onboard was as good as the service, we would never sail with any other cruise line. From the moment we met Melissa in The Retreat waiting area until the second we stepped off the ship, the sommelier in Murano was the only Celebrity crew member who didn’t make me feel incredibly special and that they were truly happy with their jobs.

I want to mention a few that knocked it out of the park, so if you cruise with them, you will know that you are getting the best people at that job.

Our room attendant, Putu, was not only great at his job but truly a great guy who would always ask when we saw him in the halls (and we saw him a lot) if there was anything we needed.

The three Retreat Concierges (MMR=Melissa, Melody, and Rossana) were awesome, fun, and always smiling. They met us as we came aboard and were among the last to see us off. Make sure to tell them we miss them when you see them in the Retreat Lounge.

Of course, the amazing Hilario, our butler, will never be forgotten. He made this trip. And if you are in a suite, make sure you have downloaded the WhatsApp app on your phone before you go. When he met with us on the first day, he added himself to our contact lists, so we could WhatsApp him whenever we needed something. It was amazing how fast he would reply and then follow up in minutes. He also seemed to be everywhere on the ship. I actually think he may have a twin brother. It would not have been the cruise it was without Hilario. And I should say he is overworked because he has far too many staterooms to cover, but he does it magnificently.

Everyone in Luminae was great to us. Except for one person, and she wasn’t just great…she was wonderful. Over our 20+ years of sailing with X, we have been so well taken care of by everyone, but one night I remarked to the Mates that, in that time and across those 24 Celebrity cruises (actually in all 43 of our total cruises), there are certain crew members we will remember forever. Our first bar waiter on the Infinity, Eliseo. The OG Martini Bar bartender, Sudi from Bali. Marta, a wonderful server in multiple restaurants on Century and Galaxy. Christian, who was the assistant maître d’ at Infinity’s United States specialty restaurant. Main Dining Room Asst. maître d’ Jayson, from Africa, whom we sailed with three times, who always remembered us, shared his outside life with us and took such good care of us. The incredible Olexi from Ukraine, who was the greatest bartender of our cruising lives, greeted us like family every time he saw us, and made me fabulous, one-of-a-kind cocktails.

All of these people live in my travel memories, as if we were with them yesterday. And now there’s Mary. Mary does the “scut work” in Luminae. She pours the coffee, brings around the bread and pastries, and clears the tables, all while being one of the most effervescent people I have ever met. A beautiful smile is always on her face, a word or sometimes a song for us, and so much more. She is one of those people you just love from the moment you meet her. Mary will not be in that job for long. She is too good. I can see her as a Retreat Concierge or maybe even the Hotel Manager one day. She is that good. She makes you feel like a Celebrity and will now join our ranks of most memorable people who have taken such good care of us over the years.

No matter what I might say about the cruise line I used to love more than any other, their service and especially their people are and have always been the best.

General overall impressions

Solstice Refurb: The public areas they redid were done wonderfully. The Sunset Park area is so much better than the Glass Show, though I do miss the Lawn Club Grille. I didn’t get to see a show in the Boulevard Lounge or play games in The Parlor—too many people. But the improvements are much better than what was there before—Quasar and some room they used for lectures, the name of which I don’t remember. Both were a waste, and that entire area on deck four is fully revitalized. I can’t speak to the improvements to The Retreat Deck because we have never stayed in a suite on an S-class ship before, but it is very nice. The Retreat Lounge, formerly Michael’s Club, has been vastly improved with better lighting and furnishings. All in all, the public areas have improved significantly.

That said, the staterooms saw little to no improvement. It is almost criminal in today’s world that there are only two plugs in an entire stateroom. TWO! Three, if you count the EU plug. What is up with that? There are USB plugs that I think Bob discovered under the night lights by the bed, but they don’t work. No power to them. Be aware that inside the EU plug there are two USB-C plugs. You have to look for them, but they are there. But anyone who needed a CPAP machine had an extension cord stretched across the room that had to be taped down. That’s nuts. Kathleen and I charge at least three devices each, and if you add in my Mac and my camera’s battery charger, it was really fun (NOT) swapping plugs and making sure everything was charging.

The couch in our stateroom needs replacing, as sitting at either end leaves you fighting to keep from sagging toward the center. It’s just old. Beds were OK. I kind of found the furnishings just blah, besides being old. The Suite seemed darker to me than our verandah staterooms on Viking or Celebrity’s own Flora.

The bathroom is the worst part of the stateroom. When I compare it to our stateroom bathroom on Celebrity’s Flora or any Viking Ocean ship, it comes up wanting. The shower is in a tub, and the tub is raised so high that I had to bend over to use it. If you are over six feet tall, you will have to bend over during every shower. I will say there was plenty of storage in the bathroom, but that didn’t make up for the short shower. Who uses a tub on a cruise ship? It’s a tiny tub.

At least we had plenty of hot water, but I can’t say the same for our friends on the ship’s port side. Our buddy Bob’s suite, almost exactly across the ship from ours, had major hot water problems. When you get a suite, you deserve hot water. To X’s credit, after Bob and Judy endured several days of no hot water in the evenings, they worked hard to fix it. When they couldn’t, for about 4 days, they presented them with future cruise certificates for $1000 US. I am impressed they made things right. Well done, Celebrity.

On an entirely different note, there is one thing we all wish Celebrity would put a stop to. It’s a practice that has been around for years, and it could easily be taken care of with one directive from Celebrity HQ. Crew members should stop begging for ratings. We had our Luminae waiter, our bartenders, our bar waiters in the Retreat Lounge, and the servers in Murano all asking us to give them 10s on the post-cruise survey. When they do that, they automatically get 9s. Their service is outstanding, and I would normally give them all 10s (on the service, not the food), but the begging has to stop. None of our favorite people mentioned above asked us for any rating whatsoever, and we were happy to give them a stack of 10s.

Speaking of the post-cruise survey, this is what I told X when they asked why I said I would no longer be sailing with them and that I would not recommend them to friends and family:

Your ships are too big; we have outgrown you, and you have outgrown us. Too many kids, too many people. We need smaller, quieter ships now that we are older. Apparently, you agree with us, as you no longer market to our age group, who have supported you throughout our cruising lives. I fully realize this is because we will soon stop cruising. But in the meantime, we will continue to cruise. While we believe you still have the best mid-range cruising product, I can sail on a Viking ship for the price of a suite and enjoy myself a lot more. Get rid of the casino, photo gallery, art auctions, and humans under 18, and we might come back. But that’s doubtful. We will miss your people. Your crews have always served us above and beyond any other cruise line, and you treat them well. Kudos. We will still recommend X to people from 40 to 60 who are looking for a great cruise experience at a moderate price, don’t mind paying for many things that are free on other, more expensive lines, and are willing to put up with things we would rather be replaced with places we would prefer to use.

Oh, one last thing. I have complained a lot about how crowded every place on the ship is, and I have been roundly scolded on Cruise Critic because of it. They said that this is not X’s fault that their cruises are so popular. But that’s not my quibble with X. My problem is that Celebrity keeps adding staterooms every time they do any kind of refit. Solstice has increased by more than 54 new staterooms, which, when fully booked, means there were 108 new passengers onboard. They have done the same with the M-class ships and will undoubtedly do so on the rest of the S-class ships. Since they can’t make the ships bigger, this means they will become more crowded. Our experience at the buffet and Sunset Park proves that this has already happened. And that’s sad.

I hope you have enjoyed following along. Come join me on my next trip in early September when I travel by myself to a Scott Kelby Photography workshop in Belgium. The Martini Mates rode again, and we had an awesome time.

 

But at the laste, as every thing hath ende—Geoffrey Chaucer

Day 5-Juneau

by | Jun 20, 2026 | Uncategorized

We have been to Juneau on all 12 of our previous Alaskan cruises, so going back there would be pretty much the same for us. Most of those visits just involved getting off the ship and walking around downtown. Maybe we would take the cable car tram to the top of the mountain. (Sadly, that cable car is now closed due to an accident earlier in the season.) Maybe we would just stay on the ship. This morning was no exception. While Kathleen stayed on the ship, I got off and walked around. I wanted to send some postcards and needed stamps. I found a cute little shop that was also a contract post office with a really nice clerk. We chatted for a while, mailed my postcards, walked around, and took some photos (see them below). Then it was back on board for lunch before our one big excursion of the entire cruise.

But way back in 2007, when we were here with Mike, Carol, Bob and Jude, we went whale watching with a wonderful company called Harv and Marv. At that time, it was just the two guys with two boats, and it was a highly personalized whale watching experience.

We have told everyone this story, but I will quickly repeat it. On that whale-watching trip, we left the marina in their small boat (only six people) and headed out to see whales. About five miles out, just off an island with houses on the shore, we stopped. We saw a woman come out of one of the houses holding something small in her hands. She got into a kayak on the beach and paddled toward us. When she reached the boat, she handed Marv a small plastic container. We then learned that the woman was his wife and that she was bringing us freshly baked chocolate chip cookies. It has become a legend with us. That’s how you build a business. As a retired marketing person, that’s the best marketing you can do. We have told that story again and again, and when people hear it, they want to book with Harv and Marv.

So with all of us coming back to Alaska, we had to book another tour with Harv and Marv. Of course, they now have a bunch of boats, both big and small, and Harv or Marv no longer take you out; they have employees for that. And sadly, there are no more cookies. We were picked up just off the pier by one of their bus drivers (they now have multiple buses) and whisked north to the Auke Bay Marina, where we boarded our boat with our guide for the day, Jace. A very fine young man, and he knew his stuff, but it just wasn’t the same as sailing with the original guys.

If you have never been whale watching, as Mike pointed out while we were out in the boat, it is a lot like fishing. Most of it is just sitting around waiting for something to happen. Except, unlike fishing, when you whale watch, you have to keep looking everywhere for the tell-tale flume as they surface to exhale. Thank goodness they are air-breathing mammals, or humanity might not have a clue they were down there.

So that’s what we did. We drove around and looked. And then there’s the excitement when you find them (or the disappointment when you’re faked out by the wake of another boat). Then you race to get closer (boats are only allowed to be no closer than 100 yards from the whales), but by the time you get there, they’ve gone under again. The next time they come up, they could be a good quarter mile away. Sometimes you get lucky, and they come up closer to your boat, so you get to take pictures.

Here’s the crazy part. Obviously, whales are HUGE creatures, but unless you get incredibly lucky enough to see one breach almost completely out of the water, all you ever see is their backs and their tails. I shot more than 600 photos while we were out looking, and in the photos below, you will probably see only six to eight of the whales—mostly tails. I take that many because I set my Nikon to the highest repeat settings, so when I press the shutter, I get about 20 photos a second (or it seems like it’s that many), and I get a ton of the exact same photos of all the whales. In our years of taking Alaska cruises, I have never seen a breach, so if you like whale photos, below are some tails. It is exhilarating to see one, but when you think about it, it’s fairly anticlimactic.

We saw a couple of other things while we were out. First (and most surprisingly), we saw the sun come out. It was glorious and almost as rare in Alaska as seeing a whale breach. We also saw some sea lions sunning themselves on a buoy. I believe visiting that buoy is one of the highlights of every Harv and Marv excursion. It’s way out in the bay and usually has six or eight sea lions on it. I have photos from 2007 that match the ones I took this week, except these are in the sunshine.

After the sea lions, we headed back to the marina because we had to catch our ship, and Jace had to take out one last tour (he did four that day—Harv and Marv are doing very well). We had dinner, then it was off to bed.

I should mention one other thing about evenings. There are shows—we just don’t go to them. As regular readers of this blog know, we just went on a theater tour to Broadway last month and saw some amazing productions. After that, cruise ship shows just don’t do it for us. I usually will stay up for a comic, but that’s about it. We truly have become old fuddy-duddies. Which is OK. Mike always does a full report on every cruise, and he goes to all those shows, so when he publishes his report, he will have all that and much more (menus, additional ship photos, etc.). I will let you know when his report is up.

Of course, I have photos for you, and they are below. Don't forget: if you click the first shot, you can scroll through using your arrow keys or by swiping. That way, you can see the captions as well. And PLEASE... don't look at my photography on a phone. Please...

 

"We owe it to our children to be better stewards of the environment. The alternative? - a world without whales. It's too terrible to imagine." —Pierce Brosnan

Day 4—Hubbard Glacier

by | Jun 19, 2026 | Uncategorized

Sometimes when I am doing a live blog like this, it is hard to remember the day before yesterday. Especially when you have a really big excursion on the intervening day. Yesterday we were in Juneau and went out whale watching but that’s a story for tomorrow. Today is Hubbard Glacier which we visited on Wednesday—the day after we visited Icy Strait Point.

For the uninitiated, one of the biggest reasons people cruise to Alaska is to see the glaciers. There are four glacier-viewing areas any ship can visit, though some are much better than others. In our 13 cruises to Alaska, we have visited all four. By far the best is Glacier Bay, followed by Hubbard, Misty Island Fjords, and Tracy Arm.

This year, there are only three because Tracy Arm has been experiencing rockslide activity, and the cruise lines are avoiding it. When I first went to Glacier Bay, I was so impressed that I wanted to know why everyone doesn’t go there on every cruise. I found out it’s an environmental issue. Glacier Bay is a national park, and the number of ships that can sail in is highly regulated through a permit process. Because the permits are grandfathered (cruise lines that have been here the longest get first call), if you want to see Glacier Bay, you need to cruise with either Holland America or Princess, as they have been doing Alaska the longest and have the permits to show for it. Or you can take one of the smaller cruise lines that leave midweek, when Princess or HAL are not sailing and not in the Bay. Permits are issued to X number of ships per day.

Hubbard is used by the second tier of cruise lines (in terms of the number of years they have been cruising in Alaska, then Tracy Arm and finally Misty Island Fjords. While in Glacier Bay, you may sail by more than 10 glaciers. When you visit Hubbard, you see two—Hubbard and Turner. Hubbard is the main attraction as Turner is receding.

According to Wikipedia, receding glaciers, also known as glacial retreat, occur when a glacier melts and shrinks faster than it can accumulate new snow and ice. Because glaciers naturally flow downhill like slow-moving rivers, “receding” simply means the ice is melting away at its lower edges—or terminus—faster than the glacier can replenish itself.

Hubbard is an advancing glacier. When a glacier advances, it gains more snow and ice (accumulation) than it loses to melting or breaking off (ablation), causing the end of the glacier (the terminus or snout) to grow and push further downslope or out into a valley.

In layman's (and photographic terms), Hubbard advancing means the front of the glacier is pretty much a beautiful white and blue, while Turner (right next to it) is white but covered in all kinds of black debris. Check out my photos to see what I mean. In the distance above is Hubbard.

Whew! Now that you know more about glaciers than you ever wanted to know, here’s what happened to us on our Hubbard Glacier day. Wait. You still need to know about the ice. As glaciers advance, pieces of ice fall off. And if there is a huge ice field in front of the glacier, the ship can’t go there. And when we went to Hubbard, there was a HUGE ice field in front of us, so we barely got to see her. We spent 90% of our time in front of Turner's dirty face, and later in the day got to see Hubbard from afar.

I created a small map to show you how close we got to Hubbard and its position relative to Turner. We could go no further around the point than into the aptly named Disenchantment Bay due to the buildup of ice in the water. On previous visits to Hubbard Glacier, the ship we were on had been able to get much closer to the face of the glacier—not on this trip. If this were your only cruise to Alaska, you would not get the big deal that many of us make about viewing glaciers.

All this said, I will just let you look at the photos, and the captions will do a better job of explaining our distance, viewing angles, etc.

 

“A glacier doesn't die in thunder. It dies in silence. Drip by drip. Story by story. What we're losing isn't just ice— It's the future, melting away.” —Anurag Maloo

Solstice Day 1—Embarkation

by | Jun 15, 2026 | Uncategorized

Good day to all of you! It’s a sea day (haven’t had one of those in a while), and we are sailing up the Canadian Inside Passage (which is usually like glass) on a cloudy day. After the 80+ degree temps in Vancouver yesterday, this is welcome weather to me.

First, I have to make a quick correction to my last post. Mike and Cathy's flight was canceled, and United Airlines didn't even tell them. Thank goodness Mike checked. If he hadn't, they would have arrived at the gate and been told, "Sorry, no flight for you." But this meant I didn't have to make the trip from Chilliwack to YVR (Vancouver International Airport—all Canadian airports start with Y) and back again.

But that was only the start of their woes. Their original flight was from FLL to SFO, then SFO to YVR. Their new flight was SUPPOSED to be from FLL to ORD (Chicago), then ORD to YVR. But when they got to ORD, they were told their flight to YVR had been canceled. In case you are keeping track, that is two canceled United flights. So they rebooked them on a flight to Toronto. Which sounds crazy because they had flown west and were heading west, but now they were flying east. Once in Toronto, they would switch to Air Canada and fly west to YVR. A totally miserable flying experience. They did make it to YVR and out to Chilliwack…eventually, but the original plan was for all of us to go to dinner before they went back to their hotel for the night. They had been scheduled to arrive at YVR by 2:00 pm. That would have put us back in Chilliwack around 5:00, just in time for dinner. They actually wound up arriving at their Chilliwack hotel around 11:30. That’s a long day when you get up around 5:00 am in the EDT. It would have killed us.

That gets you up to date on everything before yesterday. And that brings us to one of the smoothest embarkations on a cruise ship we have ever had, from Canada Place (Vancouver’s cruise ship terminal) or maybe from anywhere. The last time we had embarked from Canada Place was two years ago. It had been the absolute worst embarkation experience of our cruising lives, worse than most airports. It had taken us 3+ hours to go from luggage drop-off to being on board. We totally missed lunch, and by the time we had finished all the safety stuff and unpacked, it was time for dinner.

Not this time! Bob had hired a van and driver to take us into Vancouver. He picked us up right at 9:00, and we were on our way. After a totally uneventful ride, we arrived at Canada Place at almost exactly 10:30, drove down into the parking garage, unloaded our luggage, got Kathleen and Judy into their wheelchairs, went through Customs and security, and then checked in. By 11:05, we were standing on the ship. That may be a record.

I do need to add (though I don’t think it made THAT much difference) that we were in a suite, which did get us through even quicker. The wheelchairs helped as well, since you can pretty much go to the head of many of the lines.

Once we were onboard, we were invited to leave our carry-on bags in our suite (it’s not really a suite, as you will see in the photos. For something to be a real suite, it has to have more than one room—not counting the bathroom). I have included stateroom photos below in the gallery. This was just a bigger stateroom. Then the six of us met up in the new Sunset Park on deck 15 for lunch (see photo at top). It was a glorious day, and we really wanted to eat outdoors, so that kind of made our choice for us. On past Celebrity cruises, when we boarded, we could pretty much eat at the buffet, and that was it. This worked out so much better. They had a variety of salads and sandwiches, and the nearby Sunset Bar provided the Aperol Spritz (for you cruisers out there, when you get a suite, you get a Premium Beverage Package). And the roast beef sandwich I had was delicious. There’s a picture in the gallery of the selection we had.

At this point, people were just getting on board, so the ship was still kind of empty. Which brings us to the only thing we don’t like about this cruise so far—TMP (TOO MANY PEOPLE). It has been at least two years since we were on a ship this big, and we had forgotten how many people were on board. And we try to forget that cruise two years ago, so it has really been four. When all beds are occupied, Solstice can accommodate more than 3,100 guests. My guess is that we are pretty close to that on this voyage. Another thing we aren’t used to is kids. This is the first full week off from school in many places, and there are a TON of children on board. That’s another thing we just aren’t used to. Most of our recent cruises have been on Viking (either ocean or river), and they have a rule: no humans under 18. So seeing this many kids (an estimated 200-300) is just crazy for us. To be honest, I never understand why anyone brings kids on Celebrity. If you have kids, take them on Royal Caribbean. It’s a nice cruise line owned by the same people, with about 1,000 times more activities for kids. Here, there is a kids' club, but that’s about it. And it certainly can’t handle all the kids on board at one time. It’s much too small for that. It’s supposed to serve every kid, from toddlers to teens. Not sure that is going to happen. So if you haven’t cruised before, take my advice—when you cruise with your kids or grandkids, choose RCL or Disney; ships that cater to kids.

Speaking of first-time cruisers, there are a lot of them on board, including a lot of first-time Celebrity cruisers. We ran into a couple while we were checking in at our muster station. She was happy to be on a cruise, and he just wanted to know where the nearest bar was. Seriously, he was thrilled that he could get 25 drinks a day on his Classic alcohol package. We told him he was on the wrong cruise line. That Carnival didn’t sail until Monday. She told us that her mother had bought the cruise, so they wound up on X. OK, if his MIL was on board, maybe that’s why he was drinking so much ?.

After lunch, I walked around the ship taking photos (see gallery) until about 2:30, when Kathleen called to say our bags had arrived. I went back up to the suite to unpack. Kathleen had read online about someone complaining that there wasn’t enough storage in the Sky Suites. We can’t imagine how many clothes she must have brought with her because we have SOOOOO much storage. Two full dressers and two full closets. I have four drawers that are so big and deep that I am using one just for dirty clothes. Usually, I have to put those in a plastic bag. By the time we had unpacked, it was time to meet the gang for sail-away at 4:00.

We had decided to meet at the same table in Sunset Park where we had sat for lunch, but Sunset Park was now JAMMED with people. No chairs, no place to even lean. Cathy finally snagged us a table and four chairs, and we hung out. Bob and Judy told us they were going to stay on their own veranda. We finally gave up. The crowd kept growing. We headed back to our stateroom, and Bob and Judy joined us on our veranda.

At lunch, a member of the food staff stopped by our table and offered us a 35% discount if we wanted to eat at a specialty restaurant on our first night. We had previously discussed skipping those, but I secretly (OK, it wasn’t a secret—I told everyone) wanted to try the new Italian place because I had seen they made cannoli at the table. We all thought about skipping it, but then Mike said he was paying, so we had dinner there last night. It was delicious. And it’s a beautiful restaurant (pics below). And the cannolis were amazing. The rest of the dinner, the ambiance, and the service were all top-flight. I would eat there again. It passed the Steve test.

We had decided to meet for pre-dinner cocktails in the Retreat Lounge. The first (and last) time we were on this ship, it was called Michael’s Club. It is now a cocktail lounge for Retreat (suite) guests only. We found it to be just what we were looking for. We had a table for six. There was no loud music, so we could have a nice time conversing. For the first 20 minutes, we were the only people in the place, so we received amazing service from our bartender, Christian.

Speaking of service, that is the one thing Celebrity has ALWAYS done well. The people who work on Celebrity ships are truly amazing. From the woman polishing stair rails who greeted me with a huge smile to the bartenders, waiters, counter staff, and everyone else, they provide some of the best service at sea.

Dinner was excellent. I had a decent octopus appetizer. I had lasagna Bolognese as my entrée. Kathleen had lamb, and of course, we got the cannoli for dessert. All of those were superb. The octopus could have been better. Our server said it was steamed for two hours (to make it more tender) and then thrown on the grill. But the problem with that is that the steaming made the outside kind of mushy.

After dinner, Kathleen went off to bed, and I joined the rest of our crew to see the first night’s main entertainment in the theater, a comedian named AJ Jamal. If you ever get a chance to see him, DON’T! While introducing him, the cruise director told us he had been on HBO. He must have meant he was playing Scrabble and dropped the letters h, b, and o and sat on them, because this guy was horrible. He had no actual set; he just kept trying to make a fool of audience members or find something funny to say about them. When he wasn’t doing that, he made all the usual cruise jokes about booze, food, embarkation, etc. Not a single original and funny line in his 45-minute set. Sad.

That about covers our day. A gallery of photos awaits you below. Don't forget: if you click the first shot, it will fill your screen, and you can scroll through using your arrow keys or by swiping.

"Money doesn't buy happiness... but it buys a cruise ticket, and that's pretty much the same thing."   —Captain Stubing on Love Boat

Day 7–Our last Day…Hudson Theater Tour and I Sum Up

by | May 11, 2026 | Uncategorized

Wednesday was our last day in NYC, but our flight didn’t leave until almost 7:00 pm, so we had a whole day ahead of us. The only full-group activity on the schedule was a tour of one of Broadway’s oldest theaters, The Hudson. At 9:00 am, we met in the lobby and walked over to the theater, where we were again met by the best guide in Manhattan, Tim Dolan (that's him above, taking the ussie). I think that, as great as our other sessions with Tim were, this was his finest hour. He obviously loves Broadway, but I truly believe he would move into the Hudson if they would let him. Later, he showed us a secret apartment that has not been used since 1992, and I think he would love to live there.

The show currently playing at the Hudson was Every Brilliant Thing, a one-man show starring Daniel Radcliffe, so the theater was decorated for it. To be honest, I wish we had seen this play instead of Oh, Mary. I think everyone would have enjoyed it much more. There isn’t much more I can tell you about the Hudson Theater tour other than that Tim was at his best, telling story after story about the couple who built the theater, sailed on the Titanic, and eventually went broke during the Depression. We got to see videos of the theater’s ups and downs, from being a porno theater to housing the original Tonight Show with Steve Allen. It was the scene of performances from Elvis singing to an actual hound dog to Barbara Streisand’s first television appearance.

After the tour, we headed back to the Westin to check out by noon and then hung out until our bus left for the airport at 2:30. I grabbed a couple of sandwiches for lunch, and we were ready to go. Once the bus was loaded, it took more than 90 minutes to cover the 16 miles from the hotel to the airport. We, of course, made it in plenty of time. Kathleen and I hung out in the Admiral’s Lounge (American Airlines has a deal with Alaska to provide lounge access at JFK). The flight went well. We arrived on time, got our luggage, and joined 26 people headed back to Trilogy. We got home about 11:00 pm and found a very wound-up dog that just wanted to play.

Of course, I have a few photos left from our Hudson tour, so here they are. Remember, if you click them and view the slideshow, the captions explain what is going on.

Let Me Sum It

While doing tech support in our clubhouse here at Trilogy, many of our travelers stopped by to say how much fun they had and how they loved 90% of our time on Broadway. Their biggest complaint was all the walking and all the stairs. I have to admit that this trip far exceeded all my expectations. I had a great time, and about half of the reason was all the great people from Trilogy I got to know. Some I had known or worked with before we left, and others I barely knew.

We loved the shows, especially Maybe, Happy Ending. We (just the two of us) even liked Oh, Mary. I love a good, broad farce, and that’s exactly what it was. We loved about 95% of the food. Nothing incredibly special, but for us, dining was more about the people we were eating with. The best meal was the tapas dinner at Boqueria, and the worst was easily the chicken parm at Bond 45.

The Westin Times Square is an excellent hotel. Nothing special that we haven’t encountered before at hundreds of hotels in our travels, but it is incredibly well situated for attending Broadway performances.

I can’t say enough good things about Alex Tobias, one of the owners of Break-Away Tours, which planned this entire trip. The schedule was excellent. The tour guides at venues all over the city were outstanding, and Alex is a joy to work with during planning. As President of the Travel Club, I have talked, texted, emailed, and visited as we planned this trip. I could not have asked for a more responsive business partner. I look forward to working with him again on our London West End Theater Tour in June of 2027.

But the absolute best thing (at least for me) was all the sessions we had with Tim Dolan. This man is a walking encyclopedia of Broadway and the theater, and his delivery is amazing. After we got back from the trip, I subscribed to his newsletter and found that he writes just like he talks. It is truly awesome to both read it and hear it. He has a fan in me. That’s him in the giant selfie at the top of the page.

There is nothing that can match Broadway for stature and dignity. — Sammy Davis Junior