April 11 Celebrity Millennium Eastern Caribbean Cruise

I have just booked the April 11, 2004 cruise to Eastern Caribbean with
Celebrity onboard the Millennium. It stops at Casa de Campo, San Juan, St.
Thomas and Nassau. Can anyone offer any tips and suggestions for shore
excursions, shopping (swiss watches), etc...?

I am also looking for tips and suggestions on cruising with Celebrity and/or
onboard the Millennium, anything in particular to watch out for?

I have been on one cruise about 2.5 yrs ago onboard the ms Massdam of
Holland America Line.

Thanks in advance,
MA

A different ship. I cruised on the Veendam, similar to Maasdam, and on
Galaxy and Century, and found the quality of the cruises similar, and
both HAL and Celebrity to offer traditional types of cruises with their
own styles. But that was 1998 and 1999. I cruised onboard the
Constellation in 2002 and found the ship so much different than the
Galaxy and Century. Gone were so many touches from both the ship and
cruise that mattered to my wife and me. The Galaxy and Century had
roaming a capella singers that would pop up and perform all over the
ship, and very much involved the pax. The Galaxy had roaming musicians
in her dining room. The Galaxy and Century didn't have a ton of
balconies but had enough deck space to relax and move about. The
Constellation favors more deck space on top, doesn't have a proper
promenade deck to stroll around. While you can not stroll around the
front of the Galaxy or Century's promenade deck you can around the back.
You can't do this on Millennium (Constellation is virtually
identical), the ship features lots of balconies, and it doesn't have the
same type of layouts in the public areas that can facilitate the same
type of passenger interaction as the Galaxy or Century. HAL's
Maasdam/Veendam had, as you may remember, small intimate conversation
areas in their lounges, an aft pool, lots of open deck area in the back,
wide promenade teak deaks. Celebrity's Galaxy has an aft foyer with
smaller, club like areas and a very authentic 1930s style aft located
lounge that was fantstic for dancing and many types of activities. The
Constellation has a different setup and lacks this lounge. What the
Millennium/Constellation has in its favor is a specialty restaurant, a
more public thellasotherapy pool (body temparature pool with strong
jets) however the jets aren't strong on the Millennium ship and the
feeling is different. Millennium has a piano bar, I'm not sure how it
works, when I was on the Constellation the room was a little-used cigar
lounge and wasn't converted to a piano bar yet. I don't know if you
spent time at the piano bar on the Maasdam but that was the liveliest
and most fun place on our Veendam cruise, so I think it is a good
addition if an entertaining and involving piano bar guy is on your cruise .

But pretty much all of what I say above doesn't apply if you don't use
the ship as I do. My friend, Tom, enjoys the Millennium ships, enjoys
the flow of them, the large amount of space per passenger, balcony
cabins, etc. I prefer, by far, the previous class.

Millennium is a considerably upscale feeling ship, her public areas
remind me of expensive establishments you'll find in New York City, for
the most part. She should be well maintained and noticeably clean. If
you are so inclined I think you should book the specialty restaurant as
soon as you get onboard. You can do shore excursions from your
television set and also keep tabs on your onboard account. There's a
movie theater, no free popcorn as you get on HAL, and I think it may be
undersized and that the screen isn't as large as on the Maasdam/Veendam.
There's somewhat more activity on Celebrity, usually, but sometimes
Celebrity is very sedate.

I think Celebrity is sedate without what I mentioned I experienced on
the Galaxy and Century. I also think that their food is average, not a
standout at all anymore, and reports from experienced cruisers are
almost becoming unanimous that Carnival Spirit class ships offer better
food. The specialty restaurant still is getting very high marks,
however. If you were told Celebrity is the line to cruise because of the
food, it no longer applies.

I'm no fan of vacationing in the Caribbean so I can't get into ports. If
you like to snorkel there's plenty folks here who can tell you the
places to go, especially Tom.

Hope you have a wonderful cruise and that my comments were helpful
though I realize they were rather sober and not the most enthusiastic.

Ben

> We've done two cruises, both on Celebrity. Our first was on their
> SMALLEST ship (The Zenith) and our second on their LARGEST (the
> Millennium). Our next cruise (next month) puts us on the Galaxy, which
> is a little smaller than the Millennium. We love Celebrity!
>

Jaime,

Technically, the Horizon is a wee bit smaller. Also, Celebrity may be
adding a yacht sized ship to their fleet that starts service in June. I
don't think there is any difference in tonnage btwn Millennium,
Infinity, Summit, and Constellation. I'd say that Galaxy is
significantly smaller than Millennium, approx. 77,700 for Galaxy vs
91,000 for Millennium.

Ben S.

>> The Galaxy and Century had roaming a capella singers that would pop up
>> and perform all over the ship, and very much involved the pax. The
>> Galaxy had roaming musicians in her dining room.

Not really, they were a string trio doing mostly standards and some show
tunes.

Ben