CHEERS & HALF MOON CAY ?

[grandmarnnurse]

2 minutes ago, ray98 said:

 

.....and I've had pretty much the same experience on my last 10 Carnival cruises along with the 1/2 dozen or so on RCCL and the 4 on NCL.  I observed none of the things you claim are commonplace, not on Carnival or any other cruise line for that matter, your claims are so out of the ordinary it is like you are sailing a different line.  The rowdiest group I observed was on a RCCL cruise last summer and even then it wasn't really over the line, just a college aged group who traveled together.

 

As I said earlier, I have ran across those who did not handle themselves well in public on every type of vacation imaginable from cruises, to mountain cabins to beach condos.  They certainly aren't isolated to one cruise line like you claim.

 

I personally have seen more drunk behavior on NCL than on Carnival, and I believe the reason is that most everyone chooses the drink package as their free perk. They tend to over indulge because they aren’t paying for their drinks, so they go a little nuts. I might add that in order to even get a drink on NCL, I had to wait in a roped off que, and there were no roaming bar waiters. They must figure, “why bother”, as that won’t generate any more sales since everyone got it free. No, we experienced a MUCH BETTER experience with Carnival!! And we sailed RCCL also, but we were unhappy with having to book everything prior to cruise. I like to decide while on a cruise what I might want to do that day. I don’t want to be pegged into something because I booked it ahead. And did I say before that Carnival is just way more fun? Sorry, but I think some people are giving Carnival a bad rap that is totally unwarranted.

[ray98]

24 minutes ago, grandmarnnurse said:

I personally have seen more drunk behavior on NCL than on Carnival, and I believe the reason is that most everyone chooses the drink package as their free perk. They tend to over indulge because they aren’t paying for their drinks, so they go a little nuts. I might add that in order to even get a drink on NCL, I had to wait in a roped off que, and there were no roaming bar waiters. They must figure, “why bother”, as that won’t generate any more sales since everyone got it free. No, we experienced a MUCH BETTER experience with Carnival!! And we sailed RCCL also, but we were unhappy with having to book everything prior to cruise. I like to decide while on a cruise what I might want to do that day. I don’t want to be pegged into something because I booked it ahead. And did I say before that Carnival is just way more fun? Sorry, but I think some people are giving Carnival a bad rap that is totally unwarranted.

 

 

I have been on all 3 several times each.  I can tell you my opinion of things they each to great and things they don't do as well as others.  However, I certainly cannot look at one line and say that is where all the trashy people cruise or make a list of trashy behavior and claim it is commonplace, it simply isn't.

[skywalkr2]

Half moon cay is wonderful, and nowadays I pick my itineraries so I can be there once per cruise.  Regardless of drink package.

[Micahs Grandad]

On 4/9/2019 at 12:05 PM, coevan said:

 

 

 

they could set up a wireless server in an hour. I have a wireless booster that could easily reach the ship from the island, the booster was $20. This is not a technology issue. 

Wow only 20 bucks to do this. With all the money people spend on cheers and Carnival still has them pay more. Wow.

[jimbo5544]

1 hour ago, skywalkr2 said:

Half moon cay is wonderful, and nowadays I pick my itineraries so I can be there once per cruise.  Regardless of drink package.

best post of the thread!

[jimbo5544]

25 minutes ago, Micah's Grandad said:

Wow only 20 bucks to do this. With all the money people spend on cheers and Carnival still has them pay more. Wow.

Curious, does Princess have a private island?

[Micahs Grandad]

1 minute ago, jimbo5544 said:

Curious, does Princess have a private island?

Princess Cays. Only time we have been there was on a Carnival cruise.

 

One reason for that is after about 12 or so Princess cruises only 1 with them to Caribbean. 

[jimbo5544]

1 minute ago, Micah's Grandad said:

Princess Cays. Only time we have been there was on a Carnival cruise.

 

One reason for that is after about 12 or so Princess cruises only 1 with them to Caribbean. 

could not remember....thanks

[coevan]

57 minutes ago, Micah's Grandad said:

Wow only 20 bucks to do this. With all the money people spend on cheers and Carnival still has them pay more. Wow.

 

 

I am making a point. Of course it would cost more than $20, but the price would be negligible. I travel with a portable wifi booster which costs $20 and has a 1/4 mile range.  https://www.amazon.com/Alfa-AWUS036NHA-Wireless-USB-Adaptor/dp/B004Y6MIXS/ref=sxbs_sxwds-stvp?crid=2C1BW6HD2YF07&keywords=alfa+wifi+booster&pd_rd_i=B004Y6MIXS&pd_rd_r=12929f29-307a-42b2-ada5-5609b98bed7f&pd_rd_w=oaERL&pd_rd_wg=ScXnR&pf_rd_p=5c5ea0d7-2437-4d8a-88a7-ea6f32aeac11&pf_rd_r=8TF6ZV68YJA7PTV24AZE&qid=1554930715&s=gateway&sprefix=alfa+wifi+booster%2Caps%2C260

 

When I bought it years ago it was around $20

[Micahs Grandad]

10 minutes ago, coevan said:

 

 

I am making a point. Of course it would cost more than $20, but the price would be negligible. I travel with a portable wifi booster which costs $20 and has a 1/4 mile range.  https://www.amazon.com/Alfa-AWUS036NHA-Wireless-USB-Adaptor/dp/B004Y6MIXS/ref=sxbs_sxwds-stvp?crid=2C1BW6HD2YF07&keywords=alfa+wifi+booster&pd_rd_i=B004Y6MIXS&pd_rd_r=12929f29-307a-42b2-ada5-5609b98bed7f&pd_rd_w=oaERL&pd_rd_wg=ScXnR&pf_rd_p=5c5ea0d7-2437-4d8a-88a7-ea6f32aeac11&pf_rd_r=8TF6ZV68YJA7PTV24AZE&qid=1554930715&s=gateway&sprefix=alfa+wifi+booster%2Caps%2C260

 

When I bought it years ago it was around $20

If we paid for cheers would buy some drinks the night before and pour them off into a travel cup and bring them to HMC. At our age we do not drink that much anymore and not a candidate for cheers but no way would I pay for Cheers and buy drinks on their private island. 

[jimbo5544]

44 minutes ago, Micah's Grandad said:

If we paid for cheers would buy some drinks the night before and pour them off into a travel cup and bring them to HMC. At our age we do not drink that much anymore and not a candidate for cheers but no way would I pay for Cheers and buy drinks on their private island. 

I echo your thoughts on age and value of cheers, I also know that lots of cruisers get beer from cheers unopened and bring them ashore, not quite as creative as your ideal but the same concept.

[StephenA]

Honestly I think they wouldn’t even need to do it electronically and it might still be feasible.  They could give you 15 raffle tickets to use as drink tickets.  The ones you bring back (with your specific numbers on them) get added back into your sign n sail.   Probably not the best idea because of so many people hahaha but its possible.  Or use RFID wrist bands.  I dunno, i kind of agree that it would be relatively inexpensive to accomplish if they wanted to.  

[jimbo5544]

2 minutes ago, StephenA said:

Honestly I think they wouldn’t even need to do it electronically and it might still be feasible.  They could give you 15 raffle tickets to use as drink tickets.  The ones you bring back (with your specific numbers on them) get added back into your sign n sail.   Probably not the best idea because of so many people hahaha but its possible.  Or use RFID wrist bands.  I dunno, i kind of agree that it would be relatively inexpensive to accomplish if they wanted to.  

I believe they are doing what they want.

[Retired_to_Cruise]

2 hours ago, coevan said:

 

 

I am making a point. Of course it would cost more than $20, but the price would be negligible. I travel with a portable wifi booster which costs $20 and has a 1/4 mile range.  https://www.amazon.com/Alfa-AWUS036NHA-Wireless-USB-Adaptor/dp/B004Y6MIXS/ref=sxbs_sxwds-stvp?crid=2C1BW6HD2YF07&keywords=alfa+wifi+booster&pd_rd_i=B004Y6MIXS&pd_rd_r=12929f29-307a-42b2-ada5-5609b98bed7f&pd_rd_w=oaERL&pd_rd_wg=ScXnR&pf_rd_p=5c5ea0d7-2437-4d8a-88a7-ea6f32aeac11&pf_rd_r=8TF6ZV68YJA7PTV24AZE&qid=1554930715&s=gateway&sprefix=alfa+wifi+booster%2Caps%2C260

 

When I bought it years ago it was around $20

So how many transactions are you doing per hour on your $20 portable wifi, and how many stations are on it doing those transactions?

[lostsoulcruiser]

On 1/13/2019 at 11:54 AM, RiotAct said:

Under 80 degrees?!?!?

 

Feh!!!  It’s 20 in Buffalo right now, I’d kill for anything over 50.

As a former University of Buffalo , I understand. Funny post.

[Micahs Grandad]

1 hour ago, jimbo5544 said:

I echo your thoughts on age and value of cheers, I also know that lots of cruisers get beer from cheers unopened and bring them ashore, not quite as creative as your ideal but the same concept.

In my younger and more drinking days we were rather good at successfully bringing on 5 gallon boxes of wine. These days we are content with our two.😁😁

Edited April 11, 2019 by Micah's Grandad

[JaxsMama]

What I did (prob against the rules) is take my allowed bottles of wine to HMC and drank them. I had cheers so it helped with my drink costs that day. No one seemed to care. 

[coevan]

2 hours ago, jimbo5544 said:

I echo your thoughts on age and value of cheers, I also know that lots of cruisers get beer from cheers unopened and bring them ashore, not quite as creative as your ideal but the same concept.

 

 

This is exactly what we do, 4 beers in a cooler.

 

 

50 minutes ago, Retired_to_Cruise said:

So how many transactions are you doing per hour on your $20 portable wifi, and how many stations are on it doing those transactions?

 

 

I have no idea what you are talking about. We use it on our boat to pick up free wifi and some hotels where the wifi is weak.  I can pick up a signal from a restaurant or hotel ashore, we go in, buy a drink, and get the wifi password and bring it back to the boat. 

[bjfitz0703]

On 4/9/2019 at 7:14 AM, hotsauce126 said:

It's not ridiculous to think that cheers would cover drinks on HMC, especially since other lines do it. Also the technology to link the drinks to the ship's accounts could be installed on a day. The only reason they don't, like somebody else pointed out, is that it benefits them not to

Exactly - Look at CCL's earnings per share trend over the past few years.  Effectively doubled compared to 3 years ago.  Full disclosure I own CCL stock and while the stock price is sort of down/flat over that time, earnings per share have doubled.  That is mainly driven out of increasing "on-board spending" or their tie to off ship spending such as cruise related excursions etc.  HMC is effectively an extension of a Carnival cruise ship.  By not allowing Cheers to cover HMC drinks, they are increasing per passenger revenue.  Look at what Royal is building with "Perfect Day at coco cay".  Big  bucks from Royal from their passengers.  Carnival must hate Jack's shack at Grand Turk.  This is why I laughed.

[ProgRockCruiser]

14 hours ago, Retired_to_Cruise said:

So how many transactions are you doing per hour on your $20 portable wifi, and how many stations are on it doing those transactions?

 

A typical wifi router is more than capable of streaming video.  Minimum requirements for streaming video is 0.5Mbit/sec, or 500kbit/sec.  Keep in mind most home wifi routers are now gigabit routers in bandwidth: 1000 Mbit /sec.

 

A drink transaction would not be all that data heavy - maybe a hundred bytes, or about a thousand bits (rough rounding), or 1kB.  If the transaction needs the guest photo as part of the data pack (should be pre-loaded for local use, but hypothetically), that might mean a 10kByte image, or a 100kbit transaction.

 

So, depending on protocols, I suspect a minimum of 5 transactions per second could be processed, probably tens or hundreds, in the same bandwidth required for video streaming, using the most basic of equipment (so basic, probably not available any more).

 

I am sure using some current, not bleeding-edge tech, Carnival could set up a wireless system to process thousands of transactions per second for negligible hardware costs, even accounting for the portable POS equipment required on the island.

 

They choose not to because it benefits them not to bother.

[coevan]

wow, I was talking about a wifi booster, not whatever you are talking about

[ProgRockCruiser]

19 minutes ago, coevan said:

wow, I was talking about a wifi booster, not whatever you are talking about

 

Not sure to whom you are responding, but a wifi booster still needs to handle the data traffic.

 

Either way, I was simply pointing out that the data xmt/rcv tech is out there dirt cheap, that is not a limitation.

[BTHodgeman]

Honestly, it's not even a data/technology issues. Royal does it. On Labadee, some of the bars have registers and some just have paper pads. The drinks package is valid there and, presumably, the drinks are "rung in" when back on the ship. The only difference I can tell is that RC doesn't have a per day drink limit and Carnival does, so they would potentially have no way to enforce the drink limit...

 

As others have said, I think it is a matter of making more money by not honoring the drink package on land. I can't entirely fault them, but I do understand that people would be disappointed...

[SNJCruisers]

On 4/8/2019 at 1:59 PM, Retired_to_Cruise said:

...... but not worth arguing about. 

It is indeed worth arguing about and it's very frustrating that you can use the drinks package on Labadee with Royal and Celebrity, but you can't use Cheers while at HMC.  Just another way that Carnival wants to put more money in the coffers. 

[myjillian]

On 1/28/2019 at 2:32 PM, KimEadler said:

We are purchasing the Cheers package.  Do you think my husband and I would be able to order a couple mimosas in the morning on the ship, transfer them to a thermos, and 5 minutes later order a couple more mimosas to put in the thermos?  Would I be able to take the thermos to Half Moon Cay?

 

Sounds like a good plan to me😍