My fifth cruise and first on the Royal Caribbean owned Celebrity Solstice was over the Christmas Holidays. Although I initially thought it was great and actually had booked three more cruises with Celebrity, my opinion soon changed. Eight people went on the Celebrity 4 X 4 Jeep excursion in ST Maarten.initially the program was to be cancelled as one of their employees did not show up, but after a late start we drove across the island and were dumped off at a beach bar where the tour guide took the keys to the Jeeps we were driving and left saying someone would be back in one hour. Half an hour later someone called and said someone would be back in 2 additional hours. Stores close in St Maarten around 6 pm and that would have left us no time for shopping. After being abandoned, four of us took a cab back to town. The other four waited, drinking rum punch for three hours prior to being handed the keys for their Celebrity condoned drunk drive back to the ship. They arrived around 6pm as the stores closed. Being abandoned, having no way to contact the ship, and not being concerned about passenger safety is unacceptable. Celebrity offered a refund of half the tour and received cancellations of my future bookings. This experience ruined my experience and made every flaw more prominent. They never missed an opportunity to "conveniently charge" something to our room pass, and try to direct purchases to the stores from whom they extort "advertising fees": They even went so far as to say that shopping outside the "approved list" was at "your own risk". Actually, I found the quality and deals better at those stores not on the list. I am extremely disappointed in Royal Caribbean Celebrity and even though they have a new ship, the Solstice, they just put lipstick on a pig.
Kevin
MELBOURNE, Florida
U.S.A.
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