It’s time for Southampton to bid farewell to Celebrity Silhouette, the Celebrity Cruises ship set to make its last journey from the British port on October 22. Over the years, Silhouette has charted a staggering 230,000 nautical miles, equivalent to circumventing the globe nearly nine times over.
The ship’s been a part of several special occasions including the 105 weddings celebrated on board since 2018. But from the more than 199,000 guests who’ve sailed on Silhouette over the years, there’s one superfan who will find the goodbye particularly poignant.
Matthew Forrest has travelled on Celebrity Silhouette an incredible 21 times and even worked from the ship during the pandemic. Express.co.uk caught up with the cruise superfan to find out how it feels to say goodbye.
Despite having many memorable experiences on Silhouette, for Matthew, the happiest moment is always stepping onboard on the first day of a cruise. He said: “It’s that moment where you’re walking up the gangway at Southampton and you see Celebrity’s name through the glass.”
Perhaps his most unusual onboard experience, Matthew even spent some time working onboard the ship during the pandemic.
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After working almost entirely from his garden shed throughout lockdowns, Matthew saw an opportunity to enjoy a much more interesting view as soon as Silhouette was back on the water.
He said: “I did a couple of weeks where I was just going around the UK and I ended up sort of sitting outside Liverpool. I got a day’s work tidied up and then there’s nothing nicer than being on a multi million pound cruise ship with someone to cook for me and everything onboard to do. The ship felt like such a safe environment.
“I think it probably brightened a few colleagues’ days seeing a slightly different backdrop from me every day.”
Nowadays Matthew is pretty much always on holiday when he cruises but some of the crew would still say he answers his work phone too much.
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Although Matthew has sailed with other cruise lines, there’s something particularly special about returning to the same ship, almost a holiday home on the sea, and a huge part of that is the crew.
He told Express.co.uk: “It’s a pleasure to be recognised in a very subtle, quiet way. I’ve travelled with friends and family before, but quite often on my own.
“Silhouette is an amazing environment to do that, in a world where it isn’t always amazing to travel solo. It’s lovely to have people who know how you like your coffee and what drinks you like.”
Perhaps the person who knows the ship best, Matthew has stayed in a huge variety of cabins on his many voyages, from a penthouse suite to the most basic room. But he says location is most important on a cruise ship.
He told Express.co.uk: “If you’re lower down on the ship, you can hear the sea. If you know the ship and the layout, there’s little places you can pick where you get a little bit of extra space on the veranda. Or because I’m an utter geek, there’s some rooms where you can spot what they’re doing when they’re tying the ship up and stuff like that.
“Some people will pick a room because it’s one flight of stairs away from the bar or the buffet so you learn from experience where you want to be.”
Matthew also recommends rising early. He said: “When you sail in somewhere it’s completely different to the sail out in terms of the sunrise, sunset or the weather. I’m always amazed people will spend a fortune on a Norwegian fjords excursion but they could have seen all the views from a huge luxurious ship if they hadn’t been fast asleep.”
It’s not a “complete breakup” with Silhouette for Matthew as he’ll be “dusting off his air miles” and flying out to join the ship in Rotterdam next year. He’s also booked to sail on Celebrity Apex from Southampton next May.
He added: “Although the ship will change, I don’t think all the crew necessarily will so I’m expecting to see some familiar faces.”
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