Season 6- November 15-30, 2025: Celebrity Silhouette Cruise

The last blog ended with us arriving on the Celebrity Silhouette and realizing we needed to publish the blog before we went out to sea and were without a cell signal for 8 days. We got it out just in the nic of time as the ship was pulling past the tall condo buildings in Fort Lauderdale. Our first night on the ship was pretty uneventful. We did a little gambling, and a lot of eating. We briefly stopped in to the female entertainer. She had a very nice voice but it’s just not my thing. There are so many bands on board the ship so I don’t really understand why they have headliners that get to go into the main theater to sing and all the other singers that are really good also have to perform in the smaller venues. Anyway, it sounds like I’m complaining. I’m happy to be able to get to see and listen to all of these various singers and bands. 

Next day when I woke up, Greg was not next to me which is super weird cause I wake up at 5:30. Thankfully he did not jump overboard, he couldn’t sleep and went down to get me a coffee and himself a tea. We went down to see the sunrise and then I did some walking and went to the gym. After that we lounged around the pool and then I participated in Zumba. I love Zumba. So much fun. We played a little music bingo and came pretty close to winning but no such luck.

We found this awesome group of chairs on the deck 5 deck that sits and overlooks Cuba. We have been traveling alongside Cuba all day long. It’s very mountainous and quite beautiful. 

Mostly we have been eating in the buffet but we did eat one night in the grand dining room which was amazing. I had the Branzino which I have always wanted to try and it was delicious. 

We made it to Curaçao. This was my first time here and I loved it. Greg had been here before. He’s basically been everywhere. That’s how it is when you have worked on cruise ships for 15 years, you’ve seen it all. But it’s nice for him because he gets to see all the changes and the improvements that have been made to the ports and the small communities. Curaçao was one of those places that has really changed yet stayed the same in so many ways. They have this floating bridge that you walk across to get to the shops and restaurants. If a boat comes, the entire bridge moves and floats to the side. It’s pretty cool. 

We came back to the ship. It took a little longer to get back on. We have been spoiled with the last ship we were on, The Beyond. On that ship, they have a huge room and a system that works really well to get off and on the ship quickly. This one, not so much. I’m not exactly the most patient person so the thought of going back out later in the day was an easy decision. So instead we enjoyed a nice quiet ship. That night was a great show called Boogie Wonderland!! I loved it!! We sat in the front row. The songs and the costumes were so much fun and the dancing was incredible. Came back to the room that night and our room Steward, Dewa, surprised us with some towel art. 

Next morning, we awoke in Aruba. I was up for the sunrise and sat in the back of the ship and enjoyed the peace while listening to some music. These new earbuds with noise cancelling feature are crazy. They literally shut out ALL NOISE!!! amazing!

As I sat and the ship pulled into port a beautiful rainbow appeared.

We got off the ship and went exploring. Lots of shops and restaurants. 

We walked and walked and walked and came across some divi-divi trees on our way to a secluded beach that we had all to ourselves. We brought our travel snorkeling gear and spotted some colorful fish by an abandoned boat. 

The ship doesn’t sail until 10:30 at night so we are going to have some dinner and skip the show for tonight. It’s a country music performer so I have no interest in that. So instead we will go explore a little more of Aruba.

Next morning when we woke up, we were docked and the sun was shining in Bonaire. This island was a real treat and totally top three ports for me. There was no hawking whatsoever which is so pleasant to not have to keep saying no thank you, no thank you over and over again with every 10 steps. The taxis to the beach were 5 bucks but we didn’t even need a taxi because there was a small swimming beach right by the ship at the end of the pier. Absolutely amazing!! And the fish at this location were large, colorful and plentiful. We brought a small bag of Frosted Flakes with us for some absolutely amazing snorkeling. The water was crystal clear and the fish were loving the cereal. There was even an eel hiding under a rock. It was the most amazing day for both of us. 

After snorkeling we went back on the ship for a little lunch and then headed out to explore the town which was a short walk away from the pier. 

After Bonaire, we head back to Fort Lauderdale. The bad news is that the cruise is ending in two days but the good news is that we get to stay onboard and do the next cruise in the same cabin so we don’t even have to pack up

Our stuff. That made Dewa very happy that we were staying in the same cabin. One less room for him to break down for new passengers. We had a meeting with the other cruisers that were staying onboard. They give very specific instructions on how the day will go. We all meet at 9:15 am and they walk us all off the ship together, we show our passports to immigration and then all walk back on board. We then have the whole ship to ourselves until 12 noon when the new passengers come on board. I’m looking forward to some quiet time at the pool. The pool has been a real madhouse. We decided to do the main dining room one more time for Lobster tail night. The food is delicious but it just takes way too much time. Well over 90 minutes to eat dinner. Even though we have absolutely  nothing else going on, we still don’t have time for a 90 minute meal. 

The disembarkation went so smoothly. We basically walked single file off the ship and to the photo recognition and then turned around and got back on the ship. And it was the best two hours of my cruising experience thus far. To have the entire pool area to ourselves from 10 till 12 was so awesome. 

They were so organized about this procedure and we all, about 50 of us, had stickers to make it run even more smoothly. Very impressed. I think we might have to do another back to back in the near future.

That day went from complete Zen to total chaos. I guess when we booked this back to back cruise we didn’t realize that it was a holiday break for the kids from school and the cruise is totally and completely packed with children, teens and young adults. This is totally not the norm especially for Celebrity. There are no water slides or game rooms or rock walls like some of the other cruise lines so we very rarely see a child on board. They have completely taken over and there are twice as many people this week than last week. It’s crazy. Getting a lounge chair by the pool is like an Olympic activity. Thankfully I’m an early riser but even then it was pretty chaotic. The shows and all the activities are packed with people. And it definitely isn’t the normal Celebrity Clientele of wheel chairs and canes. We are still having a great time. Our first port was Key West. We walked all over the place and went to a place called Dante’s which is right on the water and has a pool you can swim in with no cover charge. 

We walked all over and came across this family from the cruise last week that I referred to as donut boy because he was pretty much the only kid on the ship last week and he couldn’t make up his mind what color donut he wanted and the guy serving the donuts was super nice to this kid and all the requests he was making before finally settling on a brown donut. I guess when donut boy got off the ship in fort Lauderdale, they decided to spend a few days in key west. 

That’s him in the photo, the smaller boy. Of all the millions of people in the world for us to run into them the day after their cruise ended is hysterical. 

Today we decided to go to the Captains welcome party which we have been invited to a bunch of times but never actually have gone. It was in the Sky Lounge and they had a band playing and free drinks and pass around hors devours. It was actually pretty nice and we will probably go again next time. 

Last night at the casino, I was playing the Little Shop Of Horrors slot machine. It was a 75¢ push of the button and I won $600.00 bucks!!! Very exciting!! I put two hundred of it back into other various slot machine to pretty much guarantee us getting more offers for free cruising for next year. That’s the secret to getting the free cruise. If you win, you have to continue to gamble on their dime. That’s how you get the offers. So instead of going back to the room with 600, I went back with 400.

Next day was a sea day. Pretty uneventful and then we tendered at the Cayman Islands. Tendering instead of docking is always an experience. It usually involves a ton of people not moving. We did finally get to shore along with the other six cruise ships that were also tendering so needless to say there were thousands of passengers in a pretty small space. We managed to break away and get away from the crowd. We walked for a bit, did some fake shopping and then went to the library for some WiFi to check emails and stuff. All is well on the mainland with both our families and friends. No news is good news. We walked around a little more and the. Headed back to the tendering vessel and back to the ship. 

We had a nice lunch of lamb gyros and Baclava for dessert. The buffet has a theme each day for lunch and dinner. Today’s lunch theme was Mediterranean and tonight’s theme is Caribbean. After lunch we decided to watch Superman in the theater. Unfortunately we had to leave 15 minutes before it ended because we got invited with the other back to back cruisers to go to the heliport for the Sail Away Party. The heliport is the very very front of the boat. Pretty nice views and a great spot. 

The next day was Cozumel, Mexico. This port is definitely my least favorite port. The people here are extremely aggressive and pushy trying to sell their products. There’s just nothing enjoyable about being harassed by someone every 30 seconds. We found a spot with free WiFi. Checked up on things and then got harassed a bit more and then headed back to the ship where I made the declaration that I am never going back there again. Never again. 

That night we decided to eat in the main dining room because it was Thanksgiving and we wanted to get the Turkey Dinner. It was delicious. I forgot to take a picture of our plates but remembered to take a picture of our pecan pie for dessert. 

The show for Thanksgiving was the Broadway Production show that we had already seen last week so we decided to do a little musical bingo instead and then just hangout on deck 5 and enjoy the night skies. 

Woke up the next morning to some major rocking. Lying in bed or sitting down wasn’t too bad but walking was a whole nother story especially walking with coffee. So I found a spot in the back of the boat and sat and listened to a couple of podcasts and enjoyed some people watching. Hopefully the sea calms down at some point and the sun comes out on our last day before we arrive in Fort Lauderdale tomorrow.

Nope. Cold, rainy and windy day all day with rough seas. We watched the movie Reagan in the theater on board and also went to the show that night. It was a wasted day as far as poolside activities but still fun. I participated in a trivia challenge called Dual with the activity’s staff and won a T Shirt. 

We said goodnight to our room Steward Dewa and headed to the room to pack for the next days departure.

Next day was calms seas and blue skies in Fort Lauderdale. Had some coffee and headed off the ship to grab an Uber back to the van. Chaos at cruise ports seems to be the norm especially when there are 6 ships debarking in the same day but we managed to get a driver and off we went. The van was just as we left it. That’s pretty stressful to leave the van on a public lot for any extended period of time but thankfully all was well. 

From there we headed across Florida back to the west coast because our next cruise leaves from Tampa in a few days. More about that in the next blog. 

Had dinner and stayed the night at Cracker Barrel in Fort Meyers and then in the morning we headed another hour north to the Oscar Sherer State Park (site 62) for a night of camping.

This month went by pretty fast. I hopefully will have a good signal later to publish the blog. Below is the calendar of expenses for the month.