One of the advantages of a cruise is the opportunity to see many different places instead of just one island or destination. On the down side, you may find yourself rushed at every port of call trying to cram in as much as possible. We tended to want to do everything and had a great time although there were a few things we would skip if we had to do it again. If you book a shore excursion through the ship, the best ones fill up fast. Some of the excursions, however, are things you could do for less on your own. In Key West for example, you’re better off going on your own. In Mexico, you may be better off going on a ship excursion and avoiding transportation around Mexico.

In some of the ports you will feel very rushed if you’re trying to pack a lot in to a few hours. That doesn’t mean you won’t have a good time by any means but it is something to consider. To give you an idea - In Key West we toured the Hemingway House, walked around the town, went to the Key Lime Pie store for a slice of their famous pie, went to Smokey Joe’s - the famous Hemingway bar for a cocktail and some music (the acoustic guitarist played our wedding song - Van Morrison Into the Mystic so that was an added bonus) walked around some more, did a little shopping and then went to Hog’s Breath Saloon for an appetizer and a drink at the end of the day. That’s a lot in a few hours.

The bar where Hemingway drank a whole lot!

Cozumel was even more hectic and despite warnings and instructions to get an agreed upon price before you get in a taxi - we were still ripped off by the taxi driver. We split a taxi from one of the parks to the pier with another couple. The driver agreed to one price. The other couple stopped at their pier and the driver then told us our pier was farther and it would cost extra. We specifically told him which pier in advance and repeated it twice to him. Beware the cabbies! Even in the morning on an earlier cab ride we had to haggle - and when we finally got a cab the ride was frightening - he drove at 70 miles an hour darting in and out of traffic, barely missing pedestrians and travelers on bikes and mopeds. I sat in the back cowering because not only was he a bad driver but the cab didn’t have any seat belts. I was holding onto my husband’s hand so hard I cut off all his circulation and almost ripped his arm out of his socket. Yeah - I’d avoid the taxis.

What was the best part of Cozumel? By far the snorkeling. The water was crystal clear, fish were all over the place and you didn’t have to hunt for them. Snorkeling equipment rentals were inexpensive (unlike the cab ride) and the park at Chankanaab had plenty of other things to offer as well. Another interesting stop was the Mayan Ruins at San Gervasio. Do bring your bug spray, however since it is within a tropical jungle. Shopping - well, it really was not a nice experience or even fun. I think I ended up getting one thing I was so disgusted. The impression I got from the Mexican people was one of "here come the fat, rich Americans." The poverty in Mexico is so great that they practically accost you to buy something. Same in the Bahamas. Additionally, the day we were in Cozumel there were 8 cruise ships in port so you couldn’t walk on the sidewalks; they were too narrow. And because it had rained that afternoon the sidewalks, made of orange ceramic tile, were extremely slippery and many people slipped and fell. In our 9 hour stay in Cozumel we had a few extremely expensive taxi rides from hell, went to 2 state parks, snorkeled, went shopping and had food and drinks at Carlos N’ Charlie’s. If we had to do it over again we wouldn’t bother with the shopping and would probably spend the whole day snorkeling having drinks and appetizers late in the day at Carlos N’ Charlie’s.

The biggest disappointment of the cruise - and a very big one - was missing Belize. The Galaxy had engine trouble and had to stay in port at Key West so we never got to Belize. The ship had been scheduled to be in port for 11 hours in Belize - the longest in-port stay for any of the destinations, and the most exotic. Instead, we were given a few extra hours in Key West and a $100 on-board ship credit for missing Belize. Celebrity Cruises no way planned this but my husband and I felt the credit did not make up for missing the port. Some customers felt they should get a free cruise out of it. I thought that would be a bit much since we were having a lot of fun on the cruise and the food and service were excellent. But I still feel the $100 on-board credit was unacceptable. Belize was the most exotic port of call on the trip with the longest in-port time. It was one of the main reasons most customers booked that particular cruise. Additionally, Celebrity stood to make more money just by having everyone on the ship for the extra time - between drinks, the casinos, onboard shops and art auctions. In fact, my husband and I have written a letter to the cruise line expressing our disappointment in missing this port. We loved the cruise and would like to take another one sometime but our choice of cruise line will definitely be affected by Celebrity’s response. You can see other passenger’s comments on the same cruise at cruisecritic.com.  Our cruise was the 10-day Ultimate Caribbean Cruise out of Baltimore from June 7-17, 2002.

Entertainment:

Entertainment ranged from a Poolside reggae band to well, stuff that only your parents or grandparents would like. It was obvious that the entertainment was designed to appeal to a wide range of tastes and age groups. The dj in the Stratosphere and the reggae band were perhaps the best offerings for younger passengers however, by the end of the cruise I had heard "Girl from Iponema" and "Feeling Hot, Hot, Hot" a few too many times. Some of the shows in the evening were surprisingly good. One show had a magician/comedian who was hilarious. Some of the other shows were Broadway-medley variety shows that harkens back to the era of The Sonny & Cher Hour and weren't quite our thing. Movies were another option - recent movies showed each night in the movie theater and first run movies such as Harry Potter and Spy Game were available in your room via a remote ordering system. Ours didn’t work so we don’t know if you had to pay extra for the movies or not. Of course, there are plenty of romantic places on board at night - just walking around outside on the ship can be nice.

Throughout the cruise you’ll find contest after contest after contest. Some are a lot of fun and you should involve yourself in at least one. Most of the prizes were really poor.  For example,  The Seinfeld Trivia contest prize was a notepad and one of prizes they gave out in the scavenger hunt was a key ring. The Newlywed, Not So Newlywed contest however, had great prizes - a bottle of champagne and a massage at the AquaSpa. For the most part, though, the prizes stunk and I thought a better prize would be to let me push the cruise director in the pool but he does that himself in one of the contests as part of his "act."  I found the overblown enthusiasm of the people running the contests - the hyped voices and what not - to be so annoying and artificially enthusiastic that I really wanted to throw one of them overboard. They all sounded a little too much like game show hosts!

One of the best things about our cruise, surprisingly, was the group of people we were seated with for dinner. When we arrived on board we decided to switch to an early dinner seating. In so doing, we arrived at our table the first night to see that we were seated at a table where my husband was the only man at the table. What’s more, the women were  all of a certain age (i.e. our parent's age or ...) It definitely seemed, that by glancing around the dining room, they tried to match young people together at a table, couples together at a table etc. Initially, my husband was on edge about the situation, kicking me under the table and what not. That lasted all of about 30 minutes. Let’s just say, our table ended up being the most fun and our waiter referred to us as Sir William and ladies. Other guests even asked what went on our table since it looked like we were having so much fun. At many tables there were people who barely spoke. Our table was never at a lack of things to say - unusual, funny, unbelievable things - one of those you had to be there to believe it kind if things! We feel lucky to have been thrown together with such an interesting and unique group of people who were a lot of fun and so young-at-heart that they made 30-year-olds seem stodgy.  Having dinner with them every night was half the fun of the cruise!

*Addendum: In response to our letter to Celebrity expressing our disappointment on missing Belize, they were unable to stop at that port, Celebrity Cruises was nice enough to issue a coupon good for a discount on a future cruise within the next year.  While we doubt we will be able to use it we thought it was a nice gesture on their part and thought it worth noting.