Celebrity Eclipse, Celebrity Cruises

This was our second cruise on the Eclipse this year, taken to celebrate our granddaughter's 13th birthday. We now regard the Eclipse as our favorite ship, and is truly 5 star in all respects. The service, cabin accommodation, cleanliness, staff attitude,food quality and choice, on ship facilities and entertainment are faultless. The attention to detail and genuine crew friendliness is outstanding. Amazing how the staff remembered us from the previous cruise and all our personal requirements. The care taken to organise our granddaughter's special dietary needs was again outstanding, agreeing the menus for the following day with her during dinner. The birthday cake they presented was magnificant with it's 13 candles and baked for her diet. Her birthday highlight was the special tea they organised in the Tuscan restaurant at the rear of the ship with it's fabulous view, as we departed Lisbon. With having our daughter along this trip, who had lived in Italy, we were able to organise our own shore excursions to Pisa, Rome and Sardinia. Very easy and cheap with the train and local buses. Rome was a breeze, getting off the train at the Vatican before the crowds and to the other main sites with the right bus, enabled a very full itinerary during the 12hr stop. The girls certainly enjoyed the participation with the dance and musical lessons/events, especially performing before a packed audience in the main theatre. Only complaints this trip was the main pool tended to be dominated by teenage boys, but in the peak of school holidays is only to be expected. The theatre entertainment lacked some of the sparkle of the last cruise, with a couple of the solo acts very poor. The drinks are still too expensive compared to other lines but overall still the best cruise at this standard for the price we have experienced. Our only disappointment with Celebrity is their somewhat restricted dates and venues from Southampton, not wanting to ever fly cruise again after been stranded in Italy with the volcanic ash fiasco last year. Our first cruise organised by Iglu, hopefully the first of many.

We had a fantastic holiday on this ship, visiting Spain, Italy and Portugal. All public areas are most impressive, rooms are very well thought out and didn't feel cramped at all but I have to say the service and food were the most memorable such a high standard that they made this holiday. This was our first cruise and we will definitely cruise again. We opted for select dinning which suited us very well sometimes eating alone or joining small tables, we also selected the drinks package and felt this was good value for us. The musical entertainment was very good, although we were not over impressed with the shows in the theatre.