Mediterranean Cruise Sea Days: Feasts, Trivia & Nonstop Fun

Why are we at Sea?

Back in April, 2025 we traveled to Europe for the first time. Hesitant as we were to travel by land, figuring out transportation and hotels, we instead booked a cruise aboard the Celebrity Apex taking us from Barcelona, Spain, through the Strait of Gibraltar stopping in Lisbon and then Porto, Portugal, with one more stop in La Coruña, Spain before ending in Southampton England. In addition to those ports, we spent two amazing days touring Barcelona before boarding, and two more whirlwind days in London after disembarking.  Everything we experienced is in our collection of Celebrity Apex Barcelona to Southampton (2025) trip reports.

Not long after we came home, a familiar itch to cruise Europe returned, and we began researching Celebrity’s 2026 itineraries. One particular sailing stood out: it departed Barcelona once again, this time sailing east with ports in Valletta (Malta), Kusadasi (Turkey), and the Greek islands of Mykonos and Santorini before ending in Piraeus (Athens). While we are all about the destinations, it was also incredibly cool that this cruise would be aboard Celebrity’s shiny new Edge-class ship, the Xcel, which had not yet launched when we booked. Who knew back then that the Xcel would be ready early and we’d have the opportunity to sail on her preview cruise –  certainly not us.

Well we’ve just come back from that 2026 sailing from Barcelona to Athens, and this post is all about our Celebrity Xcel Mediterranean Cruise Sea days. If you haven’t already done so, check out our Santorini port day post to read about that beautiful island.

The Mediterranean

Mediterranean cruise sea days were front-loaded on this itinerary, with three port days in a row to round out the sailing. Day 2 between embarkation and Malta was spent in the Mediterranean, with day 4 between Malta and Kusadasi in the Mediterranean until crossing the southern tip of Greece into the Aegean Sea. The Aegean Sea is actually part of the Mediterranean, but the Aegean feels different, being chock full of little islands and with narrower shipping lanes.

We mostly cruise for the destinations, and view sea days as a way to rest up between those exciting and busy port days. Barcelona was a crazy day, and while we had embarkation day to eventually relax, there’s usually a sea day that follows and so day 2 at sea was appreciated. We wound up appreciating the sea day after Malta because we were tuckered out afterward. That we visited Kusadasi, Mykonos and Santorini before visiting Athens on disembarkation day seems like it was a lot. But we only spent half our days on Mykonos and Santorini, and apart from casual walking, they didn’t take a lot out of us.

Day 2 – Sailing from Barcelona to Malta

We awoke rested to beautiful skies and calm seas. The bed in our Sky Suite was nowhere near as firm as the one in our Infinite Veranda on the preview sailing, when numerous passengers complained about them. A Bora brunch reservation awaited us at noon, and we were pretty excited because that was a highlight experience on the preview in the Caribbean.

The Bazaar Festival today was Salud from 10 AM til 10:30 PM, inspired by Spanish culture and featuring Flamenco-inspired dance and music. It promised morning crafts and entertainment, plus Spice was open for breakfast down there. Now, now. Don’t judge. It’s a cruise and one can have a light breakfast and brunch, even when they’re spaced out by just two hours. Spice is the casual dining / “grab and go” location that replaces Eden Café on the older ships. Anyway, off to the Bazaar we went, curious how the hallway would be themed and what itinerary-specific dishes Spice was offering.

Spanish and Flamenco dancers filled the digital displays in the hallway into the Bazaar. The breakfast menu at Spice was Mediterranean themed overall, with Spanish, Italian, Greek, and Moroccan options. But before grabbing food we picked up a hot and iced Americano from the Spice coffee bar. It offers a variety of coffees, teas, espressos, smoothies, and some cakes and themed pastries.

If you want to eat hot food from Spice while it’s still hot, get your barista-made drinks first. It’s a separate line, and takes a minute — we learned that lesson in the preview cruise. However, there is no wait for the drink fountain with juices, water, regular coffee and iced teas.

For breakfast, we split a slice of Spanish omelet, Pastiera Napoletana, and a good ol’ egg & ham on a Kaiser roll. We brought our food and coffees to a table in the enclosed seating area with its floor-to-ceiling windows, and enjoyed the views and breakfast.

The omelet was tasty and the breakfast sandwich was delightful, with the roll Kaiser-shaped, but not like any we’ve ever had. It was small, covered in sesame seeds, chewy and more like a brioche. The Pastiera Napoletana tasted and chewed like a cross between a cheese danish and blintz. Good stuff.

The craft carts out in the Bazaar were all Spanish-themed, with one free option in addition to several for a fee, ranging from $5 – $10, including Spanish canvas coloring and a Spanish fan.

Rona created her free Flamenco rose clip, but also sprung the $10 to decorate a fancy Spanish fan.

While we were there, one of the high-energy Salud festival shows popped up. This Flamenco-style show was themed after an operatic and traditional Spanish fiesta. It featured Carmen, a Matador, and a live band, all of whom were highly entertaining and talented.

By noon we were on our way up to deck 15 to the rooftop garden and Bora for brunch. Because we’d arrived right in time for our reservation, instead of pausing at the unlimited Bloody Mary bar in the garden, we were shown to a table along the edge of the sheltered restaurant, with the Mediterranean in full view.

Drink menus were delivered and Rona ticked off the ingredients for her build-your-own Bloody Mary, which of course included shrimp, bacon, and stuffed olives. I unimaginatively ordered a Paloma, which was good, but probably not as good as the Bloody Mary was to Rona. We also respectively ordered iced tea and a hot americano.

While we were eyeballing the brunch menu, one of the servers brought around a tray of fresh specialty pastries and croissants.

On the preview sailing, we’d declined, which in retrospect had been a huge mistake, so this time, I eagerly pointed to the pistachio croissant. One look at the pistachio glaze gets you drooling, and the first bite surprises you in all the right ways with a velvety pistachio cream against the insanely flaky outside. Obsessed.

You can pretty much order whatever you want and as much of it as you want, as long as you don’t overstay your reservation window (90 minutes). To start, we ordered the Gambas al Ajillo (shrimp in garlic oil and paprika), Lobster Medallions, and Applewood Smoked Bacon. For entrées, I opted for the Eggs Benedict, the Bora way, and Rona went with Avocado Toast with an egg on top. 

We’ve had the shrimp dish, and it is fabulous, loads of flavor and the shrimp are big. We’ve also had the Lobster Medallions, which is served in lemon beurre blanc. There’s plenty of lobster and they are succulent.

On the preview sailing, I’d ordered the Eggs Benedict, the Bora way, which means it’s on a croissant, with gravlax, the poached egg and ricotta, but I wound up with the traditional benedict. This time, it came out the Bora way, and it was amazing. Rona really liked her Avocado Toast with the egg on top.

Three pieces of perfectly cooked bacon came out in a metal dish, and they were every bit as good as what you get at Disney, which is darn good.

As we were finishing up, the song Bella Ciao started playing over the loud speakers and the Bora staff began dancing around the restaurant, waving napkins and encouraging the guests to do the same. What a great way to round out an excellent meal!

We had bought the Specialty Restaurant Trio on a Black Friday sale for $116 per person plus 20% gratuities – $139 in total. This gave us two specialty dinners and one lunch, with Bora’s brunch counting for the latter. At the time of sailing, booking the brunch separately would have cost $35 plus gratuities, and $45 if you booked while on board. Honestly, we’d have paid $35 for this brunch, and did so on the preview sailing. Considering it was part of the trio package and that we wound up using our onboard credit, this was an absolute steal.

It was back to the cabin for a nap and relaxation time on the veranda. Especially on a sea day, it’s great to have a brief refuge from people-ing for the anti-social among us or those who just need some time away from the crowd. The quiet, with only the sound of the sea was pure solitude… until the dulcet tones of our neighboring family “negotiating” with their young kids drifted through the adjoining veranda wall.

It was Chic night, so after changing into slightly more snazzy clothes, we headed down to the Grand Plaza for some games. We snagged seats on deck 3 ½ along one side of the Martini Bar. Waiters will come around and take drink orders from the bar. To be clear, this is the area at the bottom of the first set of stairs coming down from Café al Bacio on deck 4. Maybe this is deck 3 ¼, since there are fewer steps down to the Martini Bar on deck 3. It is a puzzlement. If you happen to know what that deck is called, please leave a comment below!

First up was musical bingo. We each grabbed a paper with its grid of seemingly random song titles and hope in our hearts. We didn’t win, and I don’t think we ever have, but to be fair, musical bingo is pure luck. We did chat with another couple as we waited for the inevitability of someone else shouting Bingo! I hung onto our seats on magical deck 3 ¼ while Rona went up to Café al Bacio to fetch us some caffeine before General Trivia started.

We have indeed won at General Trivia, but we need there to be less competition. We gave it our best shot, pulling random facts out of the space in our brains that could be better used for other information, but alas. We did not win.

There was a Retreat Officers Soirée in the Retreat Lounge at 5:15 PM, which we’d done on our Apex sailing the prior year when we won our Move Up bid to a Sky Suite. Back up we went to deck 15 toward the Retreat Lounge, and enjoyed the hiss of the lounge doors opening after tapping a SeaPass card on the reader.

We were a little early, so went up to the bar and ordered an Old Fashioned for me and a gin and diet tonic for Rona. Soon after the soirée got well underway as some servers began bringing around spritzers, champagne, and various other drinks, while other servers brought around a variety of hors d’oeuvres. We accepted a few nibbles and a couple of crispy Coke Zeros in the cool narrow cans they were doing for the World Cup, which we don’t typically see back home.

The officers mingled with guests, and we wound up chatting with one of them for a while. Like with any of the crew, it is truly fascinating to learn about other people, other cultures and the places folks come from.

We opted for Luminae for Chic night dinner, and without any wait were brought to our table beside the floor-to-ceiling windows toward the very front of the ship. As would always happen here, Mario greeted us with our menus and took our drink orders, while Kendra came by with the bread service. I ordered the Luminae signature Bourbon and Peaches, while Rona picked her favorite on-board iced tea. I went with the sourdough bread and Rona chose the crispy, thin kind.

Kendra next brought out the nightly amuse bouche, which tonight was a goat cheese mousse. For starters, we both ordered the Slow Poached Lobster, while I also ordered the Shrimp Cocktail and Rona added a Caesar salad. For entrées, I chose the Roasted Prime Rib and Rona picked the Pan-Seared Red Snapper. 

You can’t go wrong with either poached lobster or shrimp cocktail, and they did not disappoint. The prime rib was cooked perfectly for me – medium rare – juicy and delicious. Rona really liked the red snapper; it was tender and flaky.

For dessert, Rona treated herself to the Crème Brûlée, though it was not on the Luminae menu. At Luminae, you can order anything that is available in the main dining rooms that night. I ordered the Chocolate Palet.

Celebrity’s Crème Brûlée is always really good, and my dessert was rich and sweet, topped with fancy sea salt and served with caramel gelato. 

Tonight’s main theater show was Between Takes, but we’d seen it on the preview sailing, and so opted for other entertainment. The game show Pitfall was going on at The Club. It’s an interactive stage game show where contestants try to answer trivia questions while avoiding the hidden wrong answers, a.k.a. pitfalls, which eliminate them from the competition. The audience participates by shouting out answers or warnings to the contestants. There are also some crowd-response segments.

Our final activity for the evening was the main Bazaar festival show, Salud at 10 PM. Given our experience on the preview sailing where most nights we could not arrive early enough to get a seat, tonight we arrived 45 minutes early, and were rewarded with good seats. 

Scenes from Spain, including Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, illuminated the brilliant digital walls along the right side of the Bazaar.

This immersive setting continues as the main show begins. Salud is a vibrant Spanish fiesta, featuring Flamenco dancing, crazy quick footwork, plenty of dramatic performances, lots of energy and a terrific live band. 

We highly recommend getting to the Bazaar festival shows early so you can be comfortably seated and truly enjoy the experience. We sure did. With that, we called our first full sea day a wrap and headed up to the stateroom for bed.

Day 4 – Sailing from Malta to Kusadasi, Turkey

We woke to calm seas and the loss of an hour as the ship sailed east from Malta and was now somewhere in the Ionian Sea section of the Mediterranean between Italy and Greece. After the heat and business in Malta and with three active port days in a row coming up, it was a good time for another Mediterranean cruise sea day.

Celebrity had loads of entertainment and activities in store for us, including the Silk and Spice Festival at the Bazaar, Captain Kirk’s Rock Show and the Shamrock Tenors in the theater. There would be some excellent food and drink to look forward to as well.

We got the morning started by heading down to Spice for breakfast, curious how the Bazaar would be decked out for the Silk & Spice Festival. Inspired by Moroccan and Turkish cultures, the digital displays in the hallway to the Bazaar were filled with warm desert sands, glowing Moroccan lanterns, mosaic tiling and minarets!

After a short wait for our morning Americanos at the Spice coffee bar, it was go-time on the food portion of breakfast, which we brought to one of the available tables in the natural light-filled seating area. On this sailing we’d not had any issues getting a seat out here, which was pretty sweet.

I started with a Simit, Turkish street bread with salmon. Given the chewy nature, this was like a Turkish bagel, and with the salmon was a very familiar experience. Rona and I shared a Strapatsada, a Greek concoction of eggs, grated tomatoes and olive oil, which was tasty.  Rona added some Greek yogurt and we shared some fresh fruit. 

After breakfast, we checked out the Bazaar’s craft cart. Among today’s activities were an $8 make-your-own candle and a free henna tattoo. The little candle was actually one of those little battery-operated jobs that came with a votive holder on which you glued decorative tiles. 

Soon after 10 AM, the morning Silk & Spice popup show began. The performers appeared as a wandering market troupe of Middle Eastern belly dancers arriving at a desert trading post. The live band accompanied them, playing traditional Moroccan and Turkish string and percussion instruments. The talent and diversity of the performers are amazing, given the range of movement, dance, and songs they did on this sailing alone.

We decided to try out the Retreat Sundeck on deck 17 for some reading and relaxation. Probably late morning on a sea day isn’t the best time to find a primo shady spot in this venue. Don’t give up, though, because while the good spots were taken up here, there is a Retreat Sundeck Part Deux on deck 16, in which we found comfy couches in the shade.

As happens on a cruise ship though, time passed and we were ready for lunch. Luminae was calling, so we had to brave the long commute down one flight to deck 15 and into the restaurant.  Now that they somehow knew us by sight, the crew at the front desk welcomed us back in and brought us to our regular spot along the windows near the very front of the ship.

We both had Rona’s favorite iced-tea on board, which is basically just the fresh iced tea they brew in Luminae. For starters, I opted for the Prawn Ceviche while Rona asked for an appetizer portion of the Cobb salad entrée, and they obliged no questions asked. We had both heard good things about the Luminae Signature Burger, and so both ordered that as an entrée, though Rona did so without a bun and was able to substitute sauteed spinach with garlic for the french fries.

The Prawn Ceviche was jammed with shrimp, light and delicious. The appetizer portion of the Cobb salad was, I suppose, smaller than the entrée portion but pretty darn big, and the lardons were… chef’s kiss. The burgers were served with cheddar cheese and an onion jam. The burger itself was as advertised – pretty good, though not particularly amazing. The onion jam did elevate it somewhat, and the truffle fries were solid.

After lunch, we chilled back in the room for a while, this time enjoying solitude on the veranda uninterrupted by the neighbors. Captain Kirk’s Rock Show was set for 2:30 PM and is popular, so we wanted to get there early, taking advantage once again of the reserved Retreat seating. For the uninitiated, Captain Kirk is none other than the Celebrity Xcel’s real-life master, Captain Kyriakos “Kirk” Matragkas, who happens to be an accomplished musician.

On the way to the theater, we stopped at Café al Bacio for some coffee. It was here I discovered that a flat white made with low-fat milk is called a skinny flat white, and not a flat white with low-fat milk. You’re never too old to learn something new. 

Captain Kirk’s Rock Show is filled with high-energy rock anthems. He sings and plays lead guitar with the ship’s backing band, with the show going on for more than an hour. Today, they played Bob Dylan’s Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door, though it was closer to the Guns N’ Roses cover, which they then followed with GnR’s Sweet Child O’ Mine.

The amazing cruise director and hype man, Luigi Del Mar, came on stage, and while Captain Kirk jumped over to the drum kit, Luigi sang Summer of ‘69 by Bryan Adams. Launching into the ultra-familiar opening riff, Captain Kirk closed the show with the Eagles Hotel California. 

This is a don’t miss show. If you have the opportunity, see it. But this was only the first of three shows we’d planned for today.

Next up was the Bazaar festival show, Silk & Spice. Much like Eden on the other Edge-class ships, the Bazaar isn’t really designed to comfortably accommodate large crowds in a way that people can see the show. Presumably because of the popularity of the Bazaar Festival shows, where possible, Celebrity has added three showtimes. Today, Silk & Spice was at 3, 5 and 10 PM, with the middle showing fitting perfectly into our entertainment schedule. Right after the rock show we swung by Café al Bacio again – don’t judge – for coffee and iced tea and headed for the Bazaar.

We found good seats in the middle more than an hour before showtime, but need not have arrived so early. Plenty of open seating remained available until about 30 minutes before showtime. On the bright side, we got to watch the spectacle that was the Silk & Spice Dance Fitness class while we waited.

As for the festival show, it’s a loosely defined story about travel, exploration and connection between cultures, in particular Turkey and Morocco. It’s filled with high-energy music and whirling dancers, their flowing silk veils and spinning skirts simulating wind and sand. As with Salud on day 2, the setting and performances were enjoyable and deeply immersive.

And just like that, it was time to eat again. Go figure. Also, it was lobster night, which is never a bad thing. Why isn’t it always lobster night? Maybe throw in a king crab legs night?  Anyhow, we went back to the room for the traditional gussying-up for dinner and returned to Luminae, which was a habit we refused to break.

Mario was reliably there to take our drink orders – yet another Bourbon and Peaches for me, and a Spicy Passion for Rona. Along with the bread service, Kendra brought out the amuse bouche, which tonight was a white gazpacho concoction made of toasted almonds, garlic, and olive oil, with some kind of tomato drizzle on top. It was quite tasty.

For starters, Rona chose the Creamy Tuscan Kale Soup and I picked the Octopus Shell Pasta Salad. For entrées, Rona chose the Poached Cold Water Lobster and I ordered the off-menu chef’s special Seafood Risotto. When I hear “seafood risotto,” I am typically unable to resist, even with lobster on the table.

Rona really liked the soup, which reminded her of Zuppa Toscana from Olive Garden. That’s not a knock on the soup — she really does like the Zuppa Toscana. I had no idea what to expect with the Octopus Shell Pasta, but found it clever that it was actually a cold octopus salad sitting in a cooked jumbo shell pasta. It didn’t hurt that it was supremely delicious.

The lobster was as good as lobster gets, cooked perfectly and served over quinoa with slices of grapefruit. The risotto was filling and delicious, served with one large shrimp, a few scallops, and several calamari.

For dessert, as is my predilection when it’s offered, I chose the Luminae Baked Alaska. I love me some baked Alaska.

Rona ordered the Chocolate Bar, which is made of caramelized banana, peanut gelato, and sesame nougatine. That sesame nougatine. As noted in the Mykonos trip report, this is the one that was potentially Rona’s best bite of the entire sailing.

After dinner, we kept the entertainment going at the speakeasy, enjoying some craft cocktails to modern music performed in the 1920s style, and the inevitable police raid that always seemed to happen while we were there. We once again chatted with Sarah, the assistant manager who always stopped by to say hello.

Our final show of the day was the Shamrock Tenors in the main theater. They’re a charismatic four-piece harmony group that combines beautiful Celtic melodies and modern-day vocals. We really enjoyed their performance, which covered a range of traditional and modern Irish songs.

And that was it for day 4. Three terrific, planned shows, one popup show. Across the two smooth Mediterranean cruise sea days, we had lots of entertainment, great food and drink, plenty of trivia and relaxation with views of the open sea.

Keep an eye on the Xcel Mediterranean 2026 page or subscribe down below to be notified when the next trip report goes live. Next up is disembarkation in Piraeus and what we get up to in Athens. Stay tuned! In the meantime, here is some Celebrity Xcel art.