Since I was a kid I've found the final day of any cruise to be depressing, and while I've become better at this, I suspect it's like dividing a prime number: I'll never reach zero.  The good news is that the final day of our Celebrity Edge sailing was gorgeous, and I don't think we could have spent it any better than we did.  While relaxing, we also managed to check off a few items we'd neglected thus far into the sailing.  One of them you'll see, seems to have been word play...

Grand Cayman doesn’t have a cruise terminal, requiring ships tender (take small water shuttles) from the ship.  Some see this as inconvenient, but it’s also makes for a scenic way to arrive.  I went to bed last night hoping the weather would hold so that tender operations were able to take place, and in the final hour of our arrival, the sea smoothed out nicely.

Sometimes we travel to explore and see new things, other times we travel to return to what is familiar and comfortable.  When the places that are familiar and comfortable are also beautiful, it’s all the better – and that’s what made this stop great.

Given our “relaxing” start to the day, we found ourselves alongside beautiful coastline in Costa Maya while primarily enjoying Celebrity Edge on this crowded port day...

You don’t know how a car drives until you’ve had it on the highway and in the rain.  You don’t know how a cruise ship handles crowds until you’re hanging out on a sea day.  While Celebrity generally shines bright on sea days, there was a different feeling on this sailing, but it didn’t slow us down one bit...

Waking up to a phone call letting you know that breakfast is on the way is a great way to start the first full day of the cruise.  What made it all the better?  Our infinite verandah.  Reaching over to my phone and pressing a button to open the blackout curtains, revealing a floor to ceiling view of a very sunny Key West was such a nice experience that for a moment, just a moment, I forgot I was hungover.

Today kicked off the first day of our third cruise on Celebrity Edge.  We don’t often repeat ships so quickly, and while ship preference depends on circumstance and is highly subjective, you can absolutely take this as a sign of how much we enjoyed our past Edge experiences.  From the moment we booked this sailing though, we looked very forward to seeing what was different – an interesting game anytime you see a new class of ship from her very first sailings through to a more refined experience...

After my late night at The Club and the outdoor area of Eden, I stayed in bed fairly late. Late for me, normal for Billy. When I got up, I wanted to check out Eden Cafe for lunch again. Hoping they opened at 11:30am, I got there at 11:45am to find the cafe opens at noon. The staff members were making their final preparations for the day’s lunch service...

When Celebrity Cruises announced the specialty dining venues for Celebrity Edge, they debuted the Le Petit Chef dining experience produced in conjunction with Skullmapping and TableMotion. When the Celebrity Revolution fleet revitalization project was announced, Celebrity Cruises President and CEO Lisa Lutoff-Perlo shared plans to bring the chef to a new home in Qsine on the Millennium and Solstice-class ships. When I was on Celebrity Infinity, I had the opportunity to meet Le Petit Chef and try his menu.

In this version, the tiny French chef is joined by a Spanish chef, an Italian chef, and a Japanese chef — all of the same diminutive proportions...

Today we arrived in Nassau, Bahamas.  This is what some may call a “technical stop”, as the point of this particular sailing is to give guests a taste of Edge - and we’d bet that few guests went ashore for this reason.  Still, we have to stop in a foreign port because of various US laws that prohibit a “cruise to nowhere.”  This morning I awoke to my alarm clock (on my phone) and a dark stateroom, as I closed the blackout curtains on our infinite verandah last night.  Because I am not a morning person, this is when I usually appreciate having light switches next to the bed to aid in my waking up. Today was different however...