neminem

Streaming, and a ridiculous number of other sites/things, including, bizarrely, the css for this forum (not the rest of it, but it meant it took about 5 minutes to load a page due to the timeout, and then the page loaded super-broken. That was true for about half the internet. Was seriously annoying. Weirdly, I experienced this all week on the internet on the Solstice, but had not experienced it previously on either the Summit or Millenium.) As far as multiple devices though... modern versions of Windows also have a hotspot function, if your phone doesn't (or if, as in my case, your phone can only hotspot data, but not off of wifi for some reason.) When I wanted to use both my phone and computer, I turned on my computer's "mobile hotspot" and connected to it. Only time it was annoying was when, once, I wanted to run a script on my computer in the room, and then wanted to leave and go use my phone elsewhere on the ship.

I would treat my room like a hotel room - if I had something super valuable, I might put it in the safe, or at the very least, in my luggage rather than being out and extremely visible, but I've never seriously considered the possibility of an employee jacking an old laptop. It'd have to be an employee, since your room is locked. I would treat the pool deck like... a public place. Sure, there are cameras, but it'd still be super easy for someone (a guest) to just walk by and grab someone else's wallet they left sitting, ripe for the yoinking, so why chance it?

Dunno about the evening whale watch, but it is ludicrously easy to get to Mendenhall yourself, for probably a lot cheaper. We did that on our most recent cruise (the one we took this June, that was supposed to have been June of 2020). Was about $40 a person for round trip transportation to Mendenhall. Bus picks you up right outside the cruise dock; once you're there, everything's walkable, then the bus back to town is every half hour, right by where it dropped people off.

Personally I always upgrade my drinks, cause I enjoy walking around drinking cocktails all the time + whatever wine I want at dinner, and I've always gotten the classic package included, so the upgrade price has always made sense for me. If you only enjoy fancy cocktails or more expensive wine occasionally, you can also just pay the difference for each drink, which would also go to your OBC, though. You can also use it on upgraded meals. (Celebrity's basic dinners are great, but the upgraded ones are even better!) And yeah, I've never had a problem with the speed of basic "included" wifi. More of a pain that you only get one device connected per person at a time, so I just have my computer set up to act as a repeater to my phone, so if I'm using my computer, my phone can connect to my computer's wifi, then my computer is connected to the ship's wifi. 😄

Our Alaska cruise last June on the Millenium, had zero Zacapa rum as well, I was disappointed (also very little decent American whiskey). Really hope our cruise on the Solstice next week does better in that regard, at least in terms of Zacapa! Kinda given up on bourbon at this point. Really hope they at least have some Buffalo Trace somewhere, sometimes, though (unlike the Millenium) - one of my favorite whiskeys, really punches way above its price range.

Oh! That is big news, a few years ago, though? I swear nobody ever told my wife that the cruise we took a couple months ago to Alaska, when I upgraded mine immediately because I thought that was the case, but nobody ever told my wife that, and she stayed under the limit the whole cruise? Haha. I guess we'll have to ask next time?

Just making sure you know that even if it's over the package limit, that means something very different and much better if you have the premium package! The classic package, it's a hard cutoff, you can either get it or you can't (mostly can't). I always upgrade mine if the ticket came with the classic one - once you upgrade, it's a soft limit, you just pay the difference. Last cruise, I paid $5 for a full pour of $300 a bottle scotch on multiple occasions, no regrets. D

On an earlier cruise, we were already booked in a balcony. We bid the minimum on a couple upgrades and didn't get them and were fine with that. On our most recent previous cruise, we were in an inside, bid just slightly more than the minimum, and got an upgrade to a balcony :). Have another cruise in December, will see if that works again, haha. But yeah, surely if you're willing to pay "anything", just ask them how much the upgrade will cost, then pay that much? MoveUp is for people like us, who would be willing to pay a little more, but not a lot more. 😄

I've never had a problem with the basic wifi in terms of speed, honestly. (I mean, occasionally it just stopped working for a bit, but I'd guess the ship lost connection, so premium wifi would've, too.) I wouldn't watch Netflix on it, but for uploading some pictures to Facebook? Are you uploading hundreds of them at a time? Haha. Btw, though, our last cruise was a Celebrity cruise from Vancouver to Alaska, we did lose internet for a bit due to the remoteness 😄. Most of the time, it was up, though, and I felt like the basic was fine for, well, basic use. I'd call uploading a few pictures to a website, pretty basic use? (It is one device per person at a time, though - or you can set up your computer as a wifi repeater, haha.)

Recently, I've only cruised with Celebrity. I went on one 2-week cruise ages ago with HAL - thoughts on that, though it was ages ago: their buffet was decent, the poolside burgers were fantastic, the appetizers and entrees at the MDR were fantastic, desserts at the MDR (and buffet) were lackluster by comparison (though the MDR did serve a great cheese course, which I enjoyed doing as a "dessert"). If I recall, they also had a pretty solid breakfast in the MDR some days. The one upgraded dinner we tried, their steakhouse, was legitimately one of the best meals we've had, anywhere. The one upgraded lunch we tried, at their pan-Asian restaurant, was also quite good. I'd love to go on another HAL cruise sometime, though, that was ages ago! By comparison, Celebrity: also has a pretty decent buffet, again, nothing to write home about for the most part (funny enough, the Indian food, especially the Indian food at breakfast, were the surprise winners.) Poolside burgers are just burgers. Appetizers and entrees at the MDR also quite good, desserts at the MDR also quite good (though funny enough, a much more lackluster cheese course!). Breakfast at the MDR just a boring subset of the same food at the buffet. We've only tried one upgraded dinner restaurant, Tuscan Grille (fancy Italian pasta and steak), but it's been consistently so good, we've done it one night on every cruise we've been on with them (so three times so far 😄). Again, legitimately some of the best food we've had. I also tried their sushi (a la carte) for lunch last cruise, it was... mediocre.

On our last cruise (not on the Constellation, but another Millennium-class ship), a decent amount of the buffet was the same every day, but some also changed. Funny enough, their Indian food at the buffet ended up being the surprise winner, buffet-wise. We would probably have gone a little crazy if we'd only eaten at the buffet, though? I'm confused why you would want to avoid the MDR - Tuscan Grille is exceptionally good, but honestly, so is the MDR food. Far and away the best "free" food on the ship. No idea about your questions about the dining packages, but I can confirm that Sushi on 5 is a la carte, also pretty mediocre compared to sushi you can get in LA! (Good cocktails, though.) And that Tuscan Grille and Qsine are the only upgrade dinner restaurants on a Millennium-class ship. Tuscan Grille is still one of the best restaurants we've eaten at, but again, so is the MDR food, so we generally eat at one upgraded restaurant one night, and the MDR the rest of the cruise (and are always sad about missing the MDR menu the night we do the upgraded dinner, because that's also where all the creativity and most of the daily change goes!) You know you can show up any time the MDR is open and ask for a table, right? 🙂 (You might have to wait a little while if it's right during the dinner rush, but they'll give you a buzzer and you can take it to a bar!)

For dinner, we generally order 3 courses: 2 appetizers each (that's one course), a main each (often with an extra meat and/or side of something in the middle - that's the second course), then dessert. 😛 (One exception so far, the upgrade Italian restaurant, Tuscan Grille, specifically has four courses baked in - appetizer, *pasta*, main, dessert, so obviously four courses are ordered there. 😛) For lunch, we try to eat lighter, since dinner is always so good! (Well, that and most port days, we'd be eating lunch on shore, anyway.)

Funny reading this thread - from a year ago, but living in California, sometimes you don't realize you're spoiled! Does Kerns not exist everywhere in the US? In California, it's everywhere (their guava nectar, while very sugary, is pretty solid.) The POG juice on Celebrity is the even sweeter and more processed-tasting stuff from a concentrate, but it's still not bad. Honestly, it's hard to make a bad POG juice, haha. My favorite "juice" at breakfast when I'm cruising with an included drinks package, which I've gotten super-spoiled about at this point... is bloody mary mix and gin 😛. (And extra hot sauce. Maybe a slice of bacon?)