Internet Connection On British Isles & Arctic Cruise On Jewel OTS

[ReneeFLL]

For those that have been on these routes on the Jewel how was the internet for posting pictures? Did you have the voom surf or the voom surf & stream?

[RobInMN]

I had S&S. I would say that the entire time we were on the Arctic Circle leg, internet was fine to tolerable. Even when we were at Honningsvag. They warned us that while we were in the fjords, the mountains could block the satellite connection for periods of time, but I honestly don't think I ever experienced that. I actually had a firestick connected to our TV and watched a little YTTV every day. Once we were above the Arctic Circle, quality was questionable, but it was still watchable.

Now, on the Iceland & Ireland leg, which we should have arguably had less issue with, we had more issues, especially on sea days. It would be unusable for hours. We ended up getting 2 days of internet credited back. Might have been that, for some reason, the passengers on that leg skewed quite a bit lower, with a lot more kids. So maybe there was a lot higher demand? The Voom desk person said that they were also having technical issues with the satellite connection and working with the home office IT to try to fix it. I don't know. I think it was more demand.

 

For picture uploading, I have our phones set to backup all pictures to Amazon Photos and videos when connected to the internet. Photos would upload without issue. Definitely slower that at home. Videos could take forever depending on size. Short ones would usually end up uploading overnight when there was less demand, large ones would eventually time out. The best thing for that was to connect to free wifi in ports long enough to get the videos uploaded.

 

This picture was taken on our Honningsvag excursion. Note the angle of the satellite dishes. They're basically angled for a satellite being on the horizon 🤣

 

Edited September 1, 2022 by RobInMN

[twangster]

I'm booked for the summer of 2023.  I am assuming it will be similar to Alaska.  Okay at times, pretty bad at times.  

 

It's not clear if a Starlink migration will help by the summer of 2023 in this region.  I am preparing for it not to help but if it does that will be icing on the cake.  

[mac_tlc]

26 minutes ago, twangster said:

I'm booked for the summer of 2023.  I am assuming it will be similar to Alaska.  Okay at times, pretty bad at times.  

 

It's not clear if a Starlink migration will help by the summer of 2023 in this region.  I am preparing for it not to help but if it does that will be icing on the cake.  

We are on Jewel 6/17/23, let’s hope for decent internet, Starlink would be a plus. 
 

mac_tlc

[ReneeFLL]

@RobInMN and @twangster Thanks for the info.