CelebrityCruises

Who it suits

Celebrity sits a step up from the big family ships without becoming formal about it. The ships carry fewer people than their size suggests, the service is attentive rather than hearty, and the food is the part guests talk about afterwards. Couples book it, and so do two or three couples travelling together.

The Edge-class cabins are worth understanding before you choose. An Infinite Veranda turns the balcony into part of the room: the whole glass wall opens, so on a cool morning off Norway you get the view without the wind. AquaClass adds its own restaurant and the spa deck.

Where they sail

Three sailings carry special fares with us.

Celebrity Xcel runs seven nights from Barcelona in June, calling at Valletta, then Rhodes, Santorini and Mykonos before Athens. Celebrity Apex does eight nights round trip from Southampton in May, up the Norwegian coast to Haugesund, Molde, Trondheim, Olden and Bergen, the fjord run, in the month the light gets long. Celebrity Millennium takes twelve nights round Japan from Tokyo in April, by way of Kobe, Kyoto, Kochi, Nagasaki, Kagoshima and Mount Fuji, with Busan in Korea on the way.

Twelve nights is the longest sailing on our current list, and for Japan it is the right length.