Celebrity Summit Cruise – March 1-8, 2008
As always, no guarantee that any of this is worth reading….
We took our second Celebrity cruise on Summit out of San Juan between March 1 and 8, 2008; the cruise was Saturday to Saturday. This was our 19th cruise overall, having cruised primarily on Royal Caribbean, but also on Carnival and Costa. We are Diamond on Royal Caribbean and therefore were classified as Elite Captain’s Club on Summit. Being Elite gave us some nice perks, including a backstage tour, a galley tour, and a bridge tour. I greatly missed the Diamond Club we had had on Freedom last year, however – especially Ricardo and the drinks he made me! Emma, the Captain’s Club person on board Summit was great, but she didn’t have a bar! Hard to compete against Ricardo with no bar, Emma – although we loved you, otherwise.
I used Bonnie Buchanan as agent for this cruise because I had some particular questions and issues on a few things and wanted her cruising expertise to make sure some things got done right and she came through on those. She does go all out – sending lots of literature and putting the gift in the cabin, etc. At her encouragement, because of air fare prices in part, we drove up to Dulles the night before our flight and flew out of Dulles on an AA non-stop, instead of through Charlotte on USAir as we normally do. Being non-stop was great. Since we got back into Dulles very late coming home, however, the shuttle at our park and ride hotel had stopped running and we had to get a cab – and had a fairly long line to get the cab. We were quite tired and I readily acquiesced with wife’s view that I was not going to make the two hour drive home at that point – we just stayed another night at the park and ride hotel, which was fine and they gave us a great rate.
Summit is a beautiful ship, despite its age. We find Celebrity a bit more elegant than Royal Caribbean, but not sure we like it better all things considered – we do not necessarily do “elegant” well. There seems to be an emphasis on a higher level of service on Celebrity and we think it shows. Summit is heading into dry dock in France after a March 29 crossing to South Hampton, but the wear and tear showing on the ship did not affect our opinion that Summit is a great ship. I think I heard that this cruise had about 2050 pax on board, with only about 50 children – not sure I heard that right - the small number of children contributed to as quiet a cruise as we ever have had. Contributing to the quiet is the fact that Celebrity deliberately does not make announcements in the cabins – except in emergencies or true needs to know, of course. Also, the gas turbine/pod system is very quiet. Many times on this ship we looked around and wondered where everyone was. The two times we hung out at Thalassotherapy pool, we had no trouble getting chairs or a seat in the hot tubs. A substantial majority of pax appeared to be in their 50’s or 60’s, primarily coming from Canada and the United States. The crew is about 950, so the pax to crew ratio is about 2 to 1. Gary Walker, the CD, is nice and personable and does a good job. Captain Margaritis seemed like a nice guy who ran a good ship, but I have to say that he was the worst public speaker that I can recall seeing among cruise ship captains – not in terms of what he said, but in terms of his delivery and appearance of comfort with the English language.
We enjoyed the entertainment, especially the ship’s cast, which had just arrived on the ship with us; i.e., our week was their first week on the ship. The fact that the cast had just arrived showed in various ways, especially with costumes. Each arriving cast inherits the last cast’s costumes and getting everything adjusted takes a while. The cast of this type Celebrity ship consists of five singers and 12 singers and dancers, 4 male dancers and 8 female dancers. One of the male dancers was injured in the first show on the first production night and that left male three dancers for the rest of the week. The lead dancer, Andy from England, reblocked the show between the first and second shows and did a great job. Andy was a standout – simply a great dancer with tremendous energy and enthusiasm in everything he did. We met Andy and Matt, one of the singers at a backstage tour, and got to know them a little better. I think that the general talent of this cast as individuals was sensational – better than the shows they are given for the most part. I think that this cast will improve significantly in the shows as they settle in on Summit. The cast did three production shows. They showed their talent best in selections from Les Mis - I happen to love that show, having seen it several times on Broadway before it closed, as well as with road companies, and I only winced a couple times with their brief renditions from the show. Taking the backstage tour gave us extra appreciation for how hard they have to work behind the scenes and all the other details. The headliners were two comedians – Don Gavin and Ron Pearson. Gavin was funny and Pearson was both funny and amazing, with his juggling and other physical comedy. The orchestra was only 7 in number – has this not decreased significantly over the years? – and it seems to me that they are adding more and more electronically into the live music , but it was fine. The Adagio dancers, Sally and ? (what was his name….), were sensational – they performed twice. The acapella group, On Pointe, was OK. The lounge music was alright – we enjoyed the pianist in Michael’s Club, Tim Krause, and he was very good but he was not quite the talent of some pianists we have seen on board various ships. The Kelly Broadway Quartet in the Rendezvous Lounge were OK. No groups in the lounges or on pool deck really impressed us out of the ordinary. We usually were pretty tired out by show time and the evening entertainment, but had a good time at all the shows nonetheless.
Couple minor things I wish I had known and appreciated ahead of time with regard to Summit:
1) there is an informal night, for which I should have packed a sport coat – I had read this but then forgot about it and did not bring one; and
2) the laundry services were a good deal and fairly cheap; to dry clean a suit was only $7.50; to get a bag of laundry done with a coupon in the Elite book was only $15.
Pre-cruise, we arrived in San Juan on Thursday, staying at the Holiday Inn Express in Condado – simply the cheapest and easiest that I could find in the area. The hotel had no working computers in its “business center” and no one showed any interest in worrying about it, which annoyed me but there was nothing I could do about it. I also could not get a wireless signal. I used the cell phone in San Juan, but I still needed access to email and I walked over to the Comfort Inn next door two times to use their computers, which worked fine – they charge $3 for 15 minutes (if I am remembering right). The continental breakfast at the HI Express was not very good compared to other HI expresses or similar such places at which I have stayed. On the plus side, the room was fine, and the pool was fine. On Thursday night, we ate on the water in Condado at the Mexican restaurant next to or near the San Juan Hotel and whose name I never can remember – we have eaten there before and always have had a good meal. The location is great.
On Friday, we took a day sail snorkeling trip with Eastwinds Island Flyer out of Fajarto. Included in the price of the day sail was transportation from our hotel to the boat – over a one hour drive. The Flyer is a power boat that tries to go to Culebra, which is what we really wanted to do on this day, but as often occurs, the weather was not good for making the run to Culebra in the open water between the main island and Culebra. So, we stayed close to shore and ran over to some near off-shore islands. The snorkeling at the first stop of the day at Icacos Island was very good. This boat dropped anchor a bit off Icacos for the first stop before beaching and the snorkeling was much better out there then just off beach. When we had gone to Icacos on the Spreadeagle on a previous trip, they only took us to the beach – this stop off shore was definitely better. We also stopped at a tiny island near the larger off-shore island that the El Conquistador uses – it apparently has been used in music video’s. The lunch was simple sandwiches and salads, but fine. Friday night, after getting back, we were exhausted and just grabbed some sandwiches and ate in the room.
On Saturday morning, I got up earlier than my travel companion, as usual, and I walked around the Condado area a little. I walked around La Concha, which has fairly recently reopened after significant renovations. It looked great. It has a small man-made beach on the water. We hung out at the pool a little later in morning, meeting some pax heading for the Crown Princess, which has a very similar itinerary. We checked out of the Holiday Inn Express around 11:30 a.m. or so, and got a taxi to the pier. We boarded Summit right after arriving at the pier - a little after Noon – there was no line whatever (at least not in the Elite Captain’s Club line – and I do not think there was a line otherwise but I have no memory of what overall situation was) and we simply paused at the counter to get our seapass cards. They were offering champagne to those boarding, but we just immediately headed to our cabin, wanting to throw down our stuff and go back ashore quickly and forgetting that you are not supposed to go to the cabins until 1 pm or so. We interrupted our Cabin Steward, Meriam, and her assistant getting our room ready and messed up their work a little. They were very nice and gracious when they just should have told us to stay away for a little while longer to let them finish. Things seemed a little disorganized at first in the cabin, and it was our own fault. Sorry about that, Meriam! Meriam and her assistant did a very good job during the week – she also was unfailingly cheery and smiley every time I saw her. She was the only one I tipped a little extra in cash above the suggested amounts which I otherwise pay through the seapass card account. I have read that some crew prefer cash to having their accounts credited, but those with whom I have raised question have told me that it makes no difference to them – I find it easier to run it through the card.
We went back into Old San Juan after boarding and looked around. Took our traditional stroll through El Morro, and stopped at Ben and Jerry’s for some ice cream after lunch at a good lunch at Maria’s. Old San Juan looks better and better over the many years we have gone there to catch a ship. We always get hit with a wave of nostalgia in Old San Juan, thinking about all the cruises we took out of San Juan with the girls, starting when they were in elementary school. Back then pigeon park was always our first stop in San Juan.
The first night on board in formal dining room is open seating, when you board they give you a slip of paper indicating whether you should go to the first or second seating. We were first seating – as we were for the rest of the nights. Overall, we found the food not great but very good and perfectly satisfactory for us. We only ate dinner in the main dining room and we enjoyed the dinners. From everything I had read and heard, I did not think the Normandie (the specialty dining room) worth the extra price for us. We had very friendly dinner table-mates, which always helps make dinner enjoyable. We often were one of the last tables to leave the dining room. Our waiter was Sarrasso – who was fine, although he always seemed a little nervous – perhaps that was us making him nervous. The assistant waiter was excellent – after first night he remembered every one’s drink preferences and he always was very friendly and pleasant. I never could catch his name. We ate breakfasts in the buffet and enjoyed the waffles, in particular. We were only on the ship for one lunch – which was the day at sea on Friday. That day they had a barbecue lunch on the pool deck and we also discovered the aqua spa café or whatever it was called – very good food at the aqua spa café.
Leaving San Juan on March 1, we traveled on this cruise to St. Martin, Dominica, Grenada, Bonaire and Aruba; a great itinerary for us which we really enjoyed, although it kept us very busy and tired out. In San Juan, we brought onto the ship five cans of a six-pack of Diet Coke. No one made any comment whatever about it. On some past cruises, the wife has purchased the soft drink sticker thing - $5 per day for the cruise, plus the tip amount. She did not buy it this time and wound up buying only 1 or 2 Diet Cokes a day. On the last night, she finished off the Diet Cokes we had brought on. I had bought a small bottle of rum in San Juan after we had arrived, and brought it on board in the checked luggage. I left it next to TV in plain view (learning that the cabin stewards do not confiscate liquor in the cabin – not that I expected them to, of course) and wound up drinking from it only a couple times. I do not think having it or the Diet Cokes in the cabin had any effect on how many drinks we bought when out and about the ship. I was able to suck up a lot of free drinks at the various Captain Club things.
On Sunday in St. Martin, we took a taxi to Orient Beach. We took a cab with another couple; the cab driven by a nice woman. I deliberately got her fired up by asking her about the local political situation and how the move to autonomy was going. Be prepared when you ask a taxi driver a question like that! Suffice it to say, not surprisingly, she was not very trusting of the local politicians’ ability and integrity. Sint Maarten faces substantial challenges as it moves forward with some form of greater autonomy, as does Saint Martin (the French-side) and it was interesting to hear what this particular person thought. She charged $7 pp. She asked where we wanted to be dropped and I said Pedro’s was fine. We just walked down and put our towels on the Club O beach and then made the swim over to Green Cay for snorkeling and to hang out. There was a significant current but we made the swim over in about 25 minutes. I carried our “water” bag over with me which held the water bottle, some snacks, hats, suntan lotion, etc. Although it rained several times during our time at Orient, the snorkeling at Green Cay was excellent, with great visibility – but for a few moments when the rainclouds affected the light. We saw the same porcupine fish (or its twin) in the same spot we have seen it before, the last time being on our land trip last Fall. We saw a turtle who swam with us more than usual and we were able to get a real good look at it. The reef continues to improve, although the improvement is very slow, of course. After lots of snorkeling and a bit too much sun, we swam back and had a late lunch at Papagayo’s – got there just before kitchen closed. Our food and the service was very good and it was a very pleasant lunch. It rained fairly hard while we were in Papagayo’s and by the time we were done with lunch the beach was pretty empty. We laid about on the beach a little more before heading back to Phillipsburg. On this Sunday afternoon, from up the beach, I think I saw an old white haired guy with a cheeseburger flag that had been on a white collapsible pole, leaving the beach with two chairs. He was getting no assistance, no lawyers were around, nor did I see any duct tape, so I was not sure enough of my tentative identification to yell out something. We left Orient later than most of the other cruise ship types and as we stood in the parking lot behind Pedro’s looking around, a young woman asked if we wanted a taxi. We assumed she was a taxi driver and we said yes, and she put us in a van where we waited briefly, before she loaded up another 7 people or so. I did not realize until we reached the pier that she was not a licensed driver – she let us off before going into security area, not being able to get in. Ironically, she charged us $10 pp, which is overcharging by posted rates. The wife started to object, properly enough, but I said forget it, and just gave the woman the $20. I have never been overcharged the posted rates by a licensed driver in SXM – in fact, I have only been undercharged by a licensed driver – that is, a driver who took just the two of us charged me a lower per person rate than on the chart. Although I had thought we might do some shopping downtown, we never made it to Front Street for any shopping – we were overcome with that dread sand gravity and spent the entire day at the beach. Any day in Saint Martin is a good day and this day was no exception.
Monday was Dominica. We got off ship about 7:30. We took a private tour with Levi Baron (bumpiingtours.com) and he was great. (He is pretty internet active so Levi, if you googled yourself again and found this – HI!) We did the usual stuff, Emerald and Trafalgar Falls, etc. We visited Mr. Nice and his fruit stand for the first time and it was great fun. Lots of fresh fruit eaten (I shamelessly stuffed my face with all kinds of fruit) while Mr. Nice paid attention to the women in the group with lots of patter. Levi had warned us that if we let Mr. Nice start talking, he would not stop – very true. At the end of the tour, after dropping off the others in the group back at the pier – because certain people who shall go unnamed here in case they read this wimped out on snorkeling – since when is hungry and tired an excuse - we went to Champagne Reef for the first time and had a great snorkel. Apart from the bubbles, which give the reef its name, it is a very interesting reef, with good fish and a great collection of sponges, tube and barrel in particular. The only problem was that I apparently managed to lose my water wallet in the water there (I say apparently because I am pretty sure that is where I must have lost it but cannot be certain). One of the guys on the beach very kindly walked over the rocks past the beach for quite a distance, thinking he might be able to find it where the current may have taken it, but without success. It had our two seapass cards and some cash. Fortunately, I did not have any credit cards in it and we had the photocopy of our passports in the bags left on the beach. I normally take the water wallet out of my pocket if the pocket is not able to be secured closed (as this one was not) and string it around my neck in the water or otherwise leave it in a secure location on beach, but for unknown reasons I simply did not secure it properly this time. In this case, I could easily have left a bag of stuff with Levi and it would have been perfectly safe. Stupid move on my part, but it was only money and inconvenience, not worse. Having the photocopy of our passports with us made things easier with security when getting back on ship. The port security consisted of a woman who really did not seem to care that much that we had no seapass to show and did not want to look at our photo ID; she just scolded us for losing our seapass cards and wished us well. The wife said that she acted like a mother, not any kind of security guard. I had to make Levi wait while we got through security, got new seapasses at Guest Relations, got more money from the safe, and made it back outside to pay Levi what we owed. It only took about 20 minutes to do all of that. Levi was nice about it – he seemed more upset at my losing the water wallet than I was – I had to assure him that it was my fault entirely, which of course it was. When I cam back out, I startled him kind of dozing in his van. I was ready to pay him, but just asked how much was it, like I normally do – he said $44 a piece, which was wrong, because we owed him $49 a piece by our prior agreement. I do not know if he just was too startled to remember the right price for us with the reef, or had forgot what we did, or what our agreement was, but I told him that I had agreed to pay him $49 x 2 and I paid him that plus a nice tip. He covered all the entry fees at all the places where there was a charge and his prices were very good.
Tuesday was Grenada. We took the ship’s excursion – Shadowfax Champagne Lobster Cruise. This excursion was excellent but somewhat pricey. First, we took a bus ride across town to the marina to meet the boat – the name of the bus was King Elvis in case you need to know that. We made a snorkel stop before lunch. The current was very strong, it was a little rough, and many people had trouble staying where the crew wanted people to stay in the water. A couple people who obviously were not that comfortable in the water got a little panicky. One woman grabbed my shoulder kind of upset with conditions and she got right out back onto boat. There was not that much to see, in any event, the snorkeling was not all that good. We felt sorry for people who had wanted to snorkel but were not experienced in the water, thinking that this would be easy for them on this daysail. The two of us and one other couple stayed in water until called out, but most on boat stayed in only briefly if that. After snorkeling, the boat beached at Hogg Island where we had champagne, wine, and a lobster lunch. The lobster was excellent, making the lobster on the ship taste like an eraser by comparison (albeit a tasty eraser). The lunch was very nice – we were sitting with very interesting and fun people and it was a really good time. We had motored over on the boat , but we sailed back to Rosseau. David, the Captain, let people take turns at the helm. It was pretty windy and it actually took some thought to keep boat going as the Captain wanted it to do – which meant I was pretty bad at it and quickly returned to my drink. It was a great daysail, even though the snorkeling was disappointing. Some of the resorts along the coast past which we sailed looked wonderful. If the air connections to Grenada were better, I believe that they would get a lot more tourists from the USA.
Wednesday was Bonaire, an island to which we had not been before. The ship was scheduled to tender to shore, that is what the literature had all said, but apparently the Captain is able to do last minute deals and get a pier. So, the very good news was that we were at a pier. The bad news was that the pier was very small and there was only one gangway for the entire ship. They announced that the ship was cleared and the pax could go ashore, but when everyone then headed for the gangway, it was a bit of a mess for a while with everyone jockeying for position on the stairs. They then took the shore excursion people down through the crowd on the stairs to get them off, first. Other people tried to follow behind the shore excursion people, getting past other pax who had been waiting, and the staff did the best they could to stop that and deal with people complaining. The wait to get off really was not that bad, we waited for perhaps 20 minutes in line max, but a number of people kind of lost it, acting rather rudely to the staff and other pax. We have seen a lot worse in trying to get off a ship and the fact that we docked made it much better for everyone – a simple fact that a lot of people did not seem to appreciate. The activities staff on the scene did the best job possible to keep people orderly and calm – much better than we have seen on other ships. The CD, Gary Walker, or the Captain, Michail Magaritis, perhaps could have done a better job of communicating the situation, but again, things were not at all bad enough to justify the complaints made. When the end of the funnel is a single file line going through security out onto the gangway it just takes a while – duh! The other slightly bad news was that when the hundreds of pax coming off Summit started lining up to get taxi’s, there were very few taxi’s to be had. Crown Princess had beat us on shore and had pretty much put all the taxi’s to work. The dispatchers did their best at keeping order but it was tough. Most people on line here behaved very well and tried to take their turn. I was a bit surprised by how many people wanted to go to Sorobon; they filled a number of vans while we were waiting. We joined two other couples to go to Windsock, where I had read about great off-shore snorkeling. Windsock is just south of town and the fare is only $3 pp. At Windsock, we found that this was where both Summit and the Crown Princess (which had a similar itinerary for the week) took pax on an off-beach snorkeling excursion. The snorkeling was good, but not great. One reason the snorkeling was not better was that it was overcast and relatively dark. The best part of the reef is at the drop off into deeper water and the lack of light made it impossible to see as deep as we could have had the day been sunny. We did have a good time, however. Our driver showed up as promised - although 10 minutes late. I took our stuff back on board while wife stayed on shore and then came back out and met the wife for some shopping and looking around. Especially after Rosseau and St. Georges, Kralendijk looked very clean and neat – a nice town.
Thursday was Aruba. This day we did another ship’s excursion, the Mi Dushi sail and snorkel. It is unusual for us to do ship’s excursions, but we find them OK for day sails and sometimes they are the only good alternative for daysails given time in port and availability of boats. We generally avoid any land ship excursions, except on the last day between ship and airport. The Mi Dushi is a wooden, 1925 ketch. Interesting boat. To get to the boat, we were bussed out to the Palm Beach pier and then took a water taxi out to the boat. We snorkled over the German wreck off Arashi (Antilla?) and then in two places off Arashi and Malmot. We had a good crew, the lunch was good, and it was a very enjoyable day.
Friday was our day at sea and we had a good day. With our Elite Captain’s Club membership, among other things, we were able to take a bridge tour and it was very interesting,. We played trivia three times and were on the winning team twice, picking up four Celebrity visors. A good part of day we hung out at the Thalassotherapy pool and the hot tubs. Very nice day. They still give out lots of pool towels on Celebrity, unlike Royal Caribbean.
Saturday, we took the ship’s excursion to El Yunque, which was very enjoyable. We were dropped off at airport about 1:15 and we checked in for our 7 p.m. flight. We had a long lunch at Wings at the airport, shopped the shops, and I caught up with some business matters on the cell phone which I had seriously neglected on the ship. I had thought I might use cell phone on ship but when I realized how expensive that was going to be, I said forget it. I used their terminals for email, but let some things that needed conversation slide. Our fight was 3.5 hours late back to Dulles – bummer! Oh well, getting back to reality is never easy.
Another great cruise.
