M/V Mercury: THE DEFINITIVE REVIEW
Written: Oct 30 '04
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Food, Independent Entertainers, ship condition
Cons: Shipboard production company, stateroom linen condition
The Bottom Line: Mercury is a wonderful vessel that I would feel privelaged to travel on again.
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| garykool81's Full Review: Celebrity Mercury |
M/V MERCURY: THE DEFINITIVE REVIEW
Note: Ratings assigned as follows for services listed at end of review…
POOR – Far below expectations and not acceptable
BELOW AVERAGE – Did not meet expectations
AVERAGE – Meets expectations, but not out of the ordinary
GOOD – Exceeds expectations
EXCELLENT – Perfect in almost all regards and greatly exceeded expectations.
Stretching some 866 feet and weighing in at more than 77,000 tons, Celebrity’s M/V Mercury is the third and last vessel in the line’s Century-class generation of cruise ships. A mid-size cruise liner by today’s standards, Mercury is capable of holding just short of 1,900 passengers that will find themselves complimented with a crew of 908 men and women from around the globe.
Mercury, which entered service in November of 1997, is a nearly identical twin when lined up with her sister ship, M/V Galaxy. Both were revamped after the introduction of Century in 1995 adding an estimated 7,000 tons to the newer vessels.
Though dwarfed by today’s mega-cruisers from Royal Caribbean, Princess and Cunard, Celebrity’s Mercury is still a truly massive mobile resort, offering its nearly 2,000 passengers a remarkable interior with plenty of quiet nooks for those who want to get away from the hustle and bustle of the topside pool deck.
THE GRAND FOYER
Stepping aboard Mercury during embarkation will land guests into what likely will become one of their favorite rooms onboard – The Grand Foyer. Climbing four stories through the mid-section of the ship, the foyer successfully creates an ambiance of relaxed luxury. Combined with Celebrity’s unique taste in mixing unconventional art and carpet design with rich, hushed tones of fabrics and gleaming brass, The Grand Foyer becomes the gem of any three of Celebrity’s Century-class cruisers.
Those who have previously cruised aboard Celebrity’s Galaxy, which took a turn away from the ordinary by placing a spiral staircase directly in the center of the foyer, will find that Mercury mimics her earlier sister. Though it might have appeared out of place and created a somewhat crowded feel inside of what otherwise would have been an open space, Galaxy’s spiral staircase allowed guests the convenience of a main stairwell directly in the center of the Grand Foyer.
Like Century, Mercury’s Grand Foyer makes navigation less than convenient. Those wishing to travel from floor to floor while admiring the prized gem of the ship will have to walk up one level, then travel completely around to the opposite side of the foyer before meeting the next set of stairs.
While the design might have been less convenient than the one onboard Galaxy, the foyer inside of Mercury is perhaps the most luxurious and richly decorated of any of the three ships. Rich tones draperies and carpet mix exceptionally well with darker woods, brass and marble floors near the guest relations desk to create a warm, welcoming feel of luxury that wasn’t found aboard Century or Galaxy. Those who critiqued Galaxy or Century’s foyers as being too cold and sterile looking might find themselves more at home inside of Mercury’s front door.
In the center of The Grand Foyer, atop a slight perch, passengers will find an odd, rotating and shiny brass piece of art that is a massive replica of traditional navigational tools used in seagoing. This massive round object reflects the light aimed right at it from spotlights hidden throughout the foyer’s walls to create a mystical rainbow of colors that bounce throughout every section of the open space.
At the very height of Mercury’s foyer is the crowning touch – a rich, blue ceiling with tiny lights that when dimmed in the evening simulate the stars of the heavens above the rudimentary navigational tool below.
Unlike her sister ships, where The Grand Foyer is simply a decorative touch used for embarkation day with bars that rarely are used by passengers, this section of Mercury has become a focal point of social life aboard the vessel. Instead of positioning the Cova Café awkwardly inside of a hallway between the foyer and galleries, Celebrity has wisely moved the rarely popular coffee bar into the middle-levels of the foyer itself, offering views of live entertainment and the entire four-story atrium.
With frequent live performances by the pianist and string quartets, passengers are seen in solid numbers late into the night enjoying a coffee or cocktail in the adjacent Cova Café while listening to the music of Mercury’s entertainers.
MICHAEL’S CLUB
On the fourth floor of Mercury’s foyer and on deck eight of the ship itself, guests will find the entrance of Michael’s Club. This upscale lounge, wrapping around half of the Grand Foyer and offering beautiful views down towards the lobby, serves as a social meeting area in the daytime and a cigar bar once the sun falls.
Unfortunately, Celebrity’s architects didn’t allow Michael’s Club to be as open, spacious or even as luxurious for that manner as the one located aboard Galaxy. Michael’s Lounge aboard Mercury doesn’t convey the luxury or welcoming feel of many of the ship’s other public spaces. A dull green paint, coupled with tanned leather chairs and small, glass cocktail tables scatter throughout the room. In addition, cigar smokers will find themselves forbidden from enjoying a cigar in half of the lounge, as an entire section has been essentially roped off for fans of card playing in the daytime and early evening hours. Though the card playing section is empty at night, Michael’s Club still technically occupies only half of the room in which it is located.
Like the rest of Celebrity’s fleet, Michael’s Club aboard Mercury boasts a more traditional, toned down sense of luxury. Steering clear of more contemporary art and carpet designs, the room offers a quiet, low-lit place to enjoy a private conversation or perhaps a few moments of solitude with one’s cigar.
Rarely used as an after-dinner destination because of its narrow, cramped feel as it encircles half The Grand Foyer, cigar smokers and those wishing to enjoy a glass of cognac are more likely to be found outside on the promenade deck or in one of Mercury’s many other evening lounges. A piano, seemingly shoved into a room’s far corner as an afterthought, is virtually untouched.
NAVIGATOR LOUNGE
Guests wishing to exercise their tolerance for the ocean-created gravitational forces might wish to venture to Mercury’s furthest forward and highest public space. The Navigator Lounge, located at the very top and front of the cruise liner, is a virtual duplicate of the same space that can be found aboard Mercury’s sisters. Providing a large number of cushioned seats and couches that wrap around a central dance floor, the Navigator Lounge most frequently is used in the late evening hours as the ship’s disco and for occasional daytime meetings for special groups.
Perhaps the most spectacular feature of this high-above-the-ocean room is the view. Offering bird’s-eye, panoramic windows on three full sides of Mercury, guests can enjoy a book in the more quiet daytime hours while watching endless waves of blue pass by them on all sides.
Sitting off center in the room is a piano, raised above the floor, with a circular lit skylight above it. As with the piano in Michael’s Club, passengers will likely find minimal live performances inside this nightclub venue.
RENDEZVOUS SQUARE
On the way to the Manhattan Restaurant for dinner, guests regularly find themselves passing through Rendezvous Square. Nearly identical to the same public space found on her sister ships, Mercury’s rendition includes the same rich, red fabrics and textures combined with the small dance floor and stage that is used nightly by musical artists serenading passengers before or after dinner. Like the Navigator Lounge above it, Rendezvous Square is a virtual ghost town in the daytime hours, used rarely for entertainment before sun fall.
MARTINI/CHAMPAGNE BAR
At the entrance of the Manhattan Restaurant, diners will find one of Mercury’s more unique public spaces with the placement of a champagne and martini bar atop one another. The Martini Bar, which is a fairly narrow almost catwalk-like space directly above the Champagne Bar, serves as a pre-dinner or after dinner destination for diners wishing to enjoy an alcoholic beverage. With limited barstool seating, however, the space fills quickly and can be difficult to navigate in the more popular drinking times of the night.
The Champagne Bar below offers guests a more reasonable amount of space and more comfortable bright yellow chairs surrounding glass tables. The room is one of Mercury’s most colorful, with rainbow colored waves covering from floor to ceiling the two-story wall bordering the Manhattan Restaurant. Narrow and long wood pillars surround the Champagne Bar with square lights built into the wooden beams that form a brick like pattern.
While unique with design, it has proven to be unpopular with guests who frequently comment that the Champagne Bar feels more closed in because of the wooden beams that were vacant aboard other Century-class vessels. Missing is the sweeping, grand staircase into the lounge that was found aboard Galaxy. Instead, Mercury’s Champagne Bar offers a descent on a contemporary wooden staircase, with metal railings and structure, coupled with awkward 90-degree angles.
With their shortcomings, the Champagne Bar and Martini Bar are still a highlight aboard Mercury and an example of Celebrity’s more modern approach to ship layout.
THE MANHATTAN RESTAURANT
Walking into the two-story Manhattan Restaurant for dinner is a truly amazing experience that brings diners into an extraordinarily beautiful room and perhaps the most luxurious dining venue offered in any of the Century-class vessels in Celebrity’s fleet. Passing a live string quartet, passengers will either travel down stairs to their respective tables or remain on the upper level depending on their seating assignments.
Trimmed with lightly-colored wooden beams and paneling, the dining room successfully combines a modern but conservative blue carpet design with the contemporary luxury frequent Celebrity passengers have come to expect.
In the daytime, the Manhattan Restaurant offers fantastic views of the ocean from its aft location aboard Mercury. In the nighttime, the floor to ceiling windows are covered with beautiful photographic murals of downtown New York City that create a wonderful atmosphere for formal nights.
Rather than leave the ceiling of the Manhattan Restaurant covered in dreary, typical cruise ship tiles, Celebrity has once again lived up to passenger expectations by adding contemporary light fixtures and graceful, sweeping panels that come off the ceiling and angle to the floor below, impersonating the waves below them.
With all of its positive attributes, the dining venue aboard Mercury has by default of design inherited some of the less popular flaws aboard Galaxy and Century. Though large dining venues with multiple floors often look beautiful, the sound they resonate due to their openness may leave diners frustrated as they try to communicate over the cafeteria-like echo effect. Additionally, guests not seated at a table directly next to the string quartet should not expect to be able to hear the beautiful sounds of the violins in the evening, because they won’t. The sounds of Mercury’s live string quartet, regrettably, are drowned in the almost deafening noise of passengers talking to one another.
On a separate note, reports of distracting or extreme vibrations in Mercury’s dining room have been greatly exaggerated. While the Manhattan Restaurant does indeed have a slight vibration that is always noticeable, the same as any liner with a public room in the aft of the ship, the vibration is not serious enough to make so much as a slight chime with table settings. We found the vibrations to be of the same magnitude (if not better) as those aboard smaller and larger vessels with similar configurations.
All in all, the restaurant is a wonderful place to share stories of the day with fellow tablemates and passengers visibly enjoy the room, frequently opting for lengthy two-hour dinners while they enjoy the company of others.
CELEBRITY THEATER
One of the largest floating theaters found anywhere; the Celebrity Theater is perhaps the most popular nighttime destination of passengers aboard Mercury. Playing host to a myriad of daytime activities, independent entertainers and the Celebrity entertainment staff, the room is a gorgeous combination of state-of-the-art visual effects and classic, luxurious rose-red seating.
With seats oriented on a stadium-style layout, and with side balconies hovering over the entire length of the theater, Mercury’s crew can truly feel comfortable in saying that there “isn’t a bad seat in the house.”
Unlike older ships with more cramped entertainment lounges, passengers aboard Mercury were rarely compelled to show up for popular shows 30 minutes in advance in hope of finding seats with a superb view. High ceilings in the theaters, also absent on smaller vessels, offer guests the chance to view first-rate acrobatics and Broadway style performances.
PAVILION NIGHT CLUB
Located on the same level as the Celebrity Theater, but in the aft of the ship, Mercury’s Pavilion Night Club is a hotspot for shipboard karaoke and other late-night contests and festivities.
With a large, wooden dance floor that frequently doubles as a stage on certain evenings for live entertainers, the Pavilion Night Club shares the rich, red colors of the ship’s many other public spaces. Comfortable lounge-style seating and long couches adorn the room while very unique triangular lighting columns climb from the floor to the ceiling providing a calm, amber glow.
OTHER PUBLIC ROOMS
Passengers will also find themselves drawn to the AquaSpa, Mercury’s equivalent of a gym and spa. Offering the popular thalassotherapy pool found on her sister ships and larger M-Class vessels; AquaSpa also boasts a gym-quality fitness center with cardio theater style equipment and the expected massage and hairstylist parlors.
Mercury is in superb condition for a ship that is closing in on its tenth birthday. Carpet throughout the entire vessel, though it showed minimal signs of wear, is in excellent condition and not visibly worn or close to falling apart. The ship is remarkably clean and shining as though it was delivered to the fleet a matter of days ago.
DINING EXPERIENCE
Advertised by both Celebrity Cruise Lines and critics alike as having some of the finest food available for the premium cruise market (note: premium is not luxury. That is another step up.), one cannot help but go onboard any of their fleet members with high expectations. Master Chef Michel Roux was contracted out for a fee as a culinary consultant in helping Celebrity to set its original food standards and overall menu design. And, Celebrity has put that money to good use, touting it several times throughout their website and inside marketing material.
The actual experience aboard Mercury, unlike a previous review of a cruise taken aboard Galaxy in March 2004, was exceptional. For a ship of her size, Mercury’s chefs and waiters perform their jobs with remarkable execution worthy of nothing short of praise.
Night after night, food quality in terms of desserts, vegetables, fruits and meats were close to perfect. Meats, particularly beef selections, were of such quality that they met expectations for a high-end three star restaurant. And, in the world of cruise ships, that’s commendable considering your restaurant serves 1,000 passengers at a time.
On one evening only, we found a chicken selection to be rather dry and almost unseasoned. On other nights, however, cuts of steak, veal, fish and other options were always fresh and delectably tender and moist.
Fruits and vegetables offered aboard Mercury’s dining room were among the best we’ve had. Consistently ripe and fresh, the fruit choices were an excellent addition to desserts, appetizers and chilled soups. Vegetables, likewise, were consistently prepared to be perfectly crisp and tasty.
We found dining room service from the wait staff to be above average. The staff, in general, was quick in their turnaround of orders, personable and consistent with the quality of service offered from night to night. The Assistant Maitre D’ aboard Mercury and other Celebrity ships is excellent. On a nightly basis, the individual approaches and converses with every table to check on satisfaction with the dining room food quality and service.
On formal nights, the ship’s staff chose not to enforce the dress code as strictly as on past cruises. Though the vast majority of passengers opted for dark suits and in some cases the more traditional tuxedo, there were passengers admitted to the dining room wearing jeans.
Overall, Celebrity’s Mercury pulls in barely at the EXCELLENT category when it comes to the dining experience.
ENTERTAINMENT EXPERIENCE
While expectations for food are quite high aboard Celebrity ships, those reading frequent reviews of premium or luxury level liners know not to expect the glitzy, popular Las Vegas-style shows found aboard Royal Caribbean or Carnival. Though Celebrity and other premium lines frequently try to mimic this apparent well-kept secret of mass-market lines, they continue to fall short in regards to their own entertainment staff dancers, singers and production crew.
Independent artists brought onboard continue to exceed expectations, in particular with musical impressionists, Cirque du Soleil-style performers, and comedic ventriloquists.
We found the comedian aboard Mercury, as with many cruise lines, to be providing the same old, tired cruise-style jokes. One can only hear about how funny the shower curtain that touches you is perhaps fifteen times before it is no longer roll-on-the-floor, laugh-out-loud hilarious.
Musical performers employed by Celebrity are exceptional, with the pianist and string quartet being a favorite of many passengers in the evening hours. Their performances on a nightly basis, without a single day off, are extremely respectable and difficult.
Overall, we found entertainment aboard Mercury to be excellent with the exception of the ship’s own singers and dancers, whose productions seriously lacked the quality of professionalism and polished image found aboard other lines. Because of that fallback, Mercury earned a rating of GOOD for its entertainment quality.
STATEROOM CONDITION/SERVICE
Residing in a premium ocean view stateroom with sitting area on deck eight, we found the condition of our cabin to be good. With ample wardrobe and drawer storage for the 11-night itinerary we were booked on, the stateroom was routinely cleaned and turned over to expectations twice a day.
Perhaps the only disappointing feature of the stateroom was the bedspread, which we found to be falling apart in sections and in desperate need of replacement due to high levels of wear and tear.
Overall, the stateroom condition and service receive a rating of GOOD.
OVERALL RATING
Mercury is in top-notch condition for her age and is perhaps the first ship I have traveled upon that I would seek out again in the future, due to her superb entertainment, excellent food and dining room service and the unique feel of luxury created by the design and decoration of the ship’s many public spaces. She is a vessel that is large, but not too big and has a feeling of personality as well as luxury that is missing from many premium level ships.
Food was among the best we’ve experienced on any of our cruises. Entertainment was also better in regards to independent artists brought onboard, but needed improvement in the shipboard department with singers and dancers in the Mercury production company.
Mercury is ranked an overall ****+ (FOUR and a HALF STARS) or GOOD/ABOVE AVERAGE
Previous reviews:
Celebrity Galaxy: ****
Norwegian Sea: **
Norwegian Majesty: ****
Carnival Holiday: ***
SIDE NOTES:
While speaking with numerous officers, entertainment staff and crew members onboard Mercury, we found that well over 50 percent of them described their experience living and working aboard the ship as deplorable. Though it didn’t show, thankfully, in the superb service that they offered guests, every single crew member, officer and entertainment staff member we spoke with planned to not attempt to renew their contract with the cruise line. Instead, they planned to leave the ship as soon as possible.
While not an expert on the working conditions of Celebrity’s ships, it would be expected from a corporate management standpoint that someone address the morale of their staff immediately. That such good people are so disheartened by their living and work conditions demands attention as soon as possible.
Recommended:
Yes
Best Suited For: Couples
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Epinions.com ID:
garykool81
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Reviews written: 8
Trusted by: 1 member
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