twangster

Well that's the thing - they can stop offering cruise only fares at any time. That doesn't mean people who booked cruise only will lose their booking, it just means that someone else booking the same cruise 6 months later may not find any cruise only fares. The fact that cruise only fares are so prevalent on X now is a pretty solid indication that forcing AI across the fleet was a failure. Princess introducing bundles while maintaining a no-bundle fare probably help to reverse the AI requirement on X.

I'm on Radiance these dates doing the canal but we will transit a few days after you. Looks like we are PV together though. I almost went with X for this cruise but I needed some points so I'll get a block on Icon next year. Dollar for dollar Millie was a better deal (better food too) but I get 6 drinks and free wifi on Royal so Royal won.

This morning and everyday for the last several days. The cheapest cruises within the RCG family for ports near me right now are all on X with NOPERKS rates. RCI has priced themselves out of my nearby cruise ports for me. When X introduced cruise only they initially stated it was select cruises only and only on short notice. Indeed during the restart it was hard to find cruise only rates although I managed to get on Edge with one. Since that time cruise only fares have been a tool to fill the ship but they are not a permanent offer. Their desire to return to AI exclusively but with slower than desired sales trends they are keeping cruise only fares around, for now. Even now they are a limited time offer... but I suspect there will be a new promotion that includes cruise only fares when this one expires, sort of like Royal's perpetual "sales". But hurry, these cruise only rates will only be around for one week and expire promptly at 11:59 p.m. EDT, on Monday, April 10, 2023. There is another reason I am looking towards X. Right now I'm aligned to get a crystal block on Icon when she debuts. If I cruise more RCI it will bring the block forward and no Icon block. With Icon prices I'm not looking to sail her again very soon.

Their verbiage was to effect " on select sailings". If the NOPEKS rate is widely available that's a pretty good indicaction of the success or failure of moving to AI.

Celebrity's Always Included is why I rarely sail Celebrity. They are Always priced higher than other options. This is doubly true for a solo since you effectively pay for the perks of two guests but don't get double perks. Only when Celebrity has there NOPERKS rates does Celebrity have rates that are in the ballpark. I have sailed Princess and took advantage of their bundles which are better IMO because the internet they bundle is their full internet, not the Celebrity basic Surf (slowest) internet that's included with Always Included. Bundling only works for the cruiser that buys those extras all the time. If you are not a drinker it doesn't make sense. If you don't use internet on a cruise it doesn't make sense. Celebrity saw a reduction in demand when they went AI which is why they offer NOPERKS rates on select cruises when they need help filling the ship. At the end of the day it's not like you are getting something for nothing. For years NCL has offered their fake free beverage package (free sorry not free) yet most of the time when you put them and others including Royal in a spreadsheet and truly compared the total price including NCL's charges for their "free" stuff, NCL rarely was the least cost option. Something is never free, it's "included". We are all different. Some drink a little, some drink a lot. Some use internet, some use a lot of internet, some never do. Put it all in a spreadsheet and compare all the cruise lines for a specific ships and sail date. Find whatever works best for the way you cruise. Just don't be fooled by bundles.

Hover your mouse over a user icon, avatar or picture to the left of their post. After a few seconds you will some some options including an ignore button.

IMO excursions change in price based on their own dynamics and sales trends. I check often and sometimes find price drops outside of published sales. I also see some go up in price. I check mine regularly long before the cruise. As the cruise gets closer they've probably already stimulated a slow selling excursion through a price drop earlier in time.

The ignore feature of these boards provides a way to filter out the regulars who post content that you may not appreciate or find helpful. After applying the 'ignore' to multiple users over time you can create a more pleasant forum experience that is customized to people who are like minded and aligned to your thoughts while filtering out the junk from those who are not like minded.

One advantage of newer technology is the ability to handle greater numbers of devices per AP. This really comes into play in settings where you can expect large numbers of wireless clients such theaters, pool decks and promenades. However this doesn't tend to create slow sessions. For the most part roaming issues manifest themselves in the clients themselves. The decision to roam is made by the client, i.e. a device like a smartphone. Access points have little ammunition to influence a device and tell it time to move on. The decision which AP to associate with rests with the client. The single largest user issue tends to be new features that are being written into the OS. Apple Private Relay, randomized MAC addresses, Google One (VPN - which exists primarily so Google knows everything you do) and other "protection" services. In some cases these are being enabled by default without the user knowing something has changed and they can wreak havoc on hotel and ship internet platforms. When one person has a great experience and someone else is "being disconnected every 5 minutes" it's probably their device, or at least 9.5 out of 10 times it is.

There is little benefit to Wifi6 or Wifi6E on a ship. Wifi5 has been in use for years and the later versions can achieve gigabit rates. However in all cases to achieve higher throughput requires consuming more channels or RF spectrum which is a problem when you need more access points to provide better coverage in challenging environments like all metal ships. When you desire to install more access points for better coverage you need to ensure nearby access points are not using overlapping frequencies or else they will interfere with each other. Each wifi channel is 20MHz wide. To achieve greater throughput requires combining multiple channels such as 40 MHz channels, 80 MHz channels or in the case of very high throughput in the 5Ghz band, 160 MHz channels. When you need to add more access points in large scale deployments you need to use lower throughput rates to ensure the access points don't interfere with each other. This applies even in the latest WiFi standards and it will apply in future WiFi standards. Consider Oasis that uses 20 MHz channels. This is representative of pretty healthy WiFi in a large scale deployment. While in a consumer's home a consumer can set their WiFi for greater throughput by combining channels that only works because there are not many access points in a typical home. If someone was to place ten access points in a home setting to achieve better coverage they could actually experience less throughput if the access points were overlapping and therefore interfering with each other. In the example of the Oasis screenshot above for the 2.4 GHz band they are using unique channels 1,6 and 11 as they should be. There is no overlap as there shouldn't be. Let's look at the 5 GHz band on Oasis: Again we see non-overlapping channels (a good thing) and they are ensuring access points minimize interference by limiting channel width to 20MHz. The advantage to limiting channel width to 20 MHz is less interference from neighboring access points. In this case my device, a Samsung S22 Ultra has negotiated a 173/173 Mbps PHY rate with the WiFi5 platform on channel 165 with a channel width of 20 MHz. 802.11ac confirms this is WiFi5. In this example -53 dBm is a pretty decent signal level in the real world. I was in my cabin with the door closed at this time. For a 20 MHz channel in the 5GHZ band 173 Mbps is pretty typical in the real world when you are not standing immediately below an access point. My actual throughput observed in this speed test was 8.9 Mbps down and 4.6 Mbps up due to Royal's policy of rate limiting on a per user basis. Here's the thing - WiFi6 or WiFi6E would not have changed anything unless they used wider channels such as 80Mhz or 160 MHz BUT if they did that many of the ten access points pictured above would begin interfering with each other causing less than ideal throughput due to the interference. The newest WiFi standards don't help large scale WiFi deployments in this regard. The latest wifi standards use higher frequencies and consume more channels to provide high throughput. That's great in a consumer home but have little benefit in a large scale wifi deployments. The higher frequencies penetrate metal less effectively so a ship full of metal won't see many advantages of newer wifi standards in this regard. WiFi6E uses the 6GHz band while WiFi5 and WiFi6 use the 5GHz band but being a higher frequency comes with the cost of penetrating materials such as metal, cement and even glass less effectively. In a typical home with relatively thin drywall the newer WiFi standards can produce better throughput. Let's take a look at Jewel. I was onboard as they were installing the Starlink antennas so internet service was still Speedcast. Jewel uses 40MHz channels with WiFi5 access points. In this example my device negotiated a 243/270 Mbps PHY rate on a 40 MHz wide channel using channel 44. 802.11ac confirms this is WiFi5. Because the ship wasn't yet on Starlink on this date my throughput was, as expected, pretty slow. While we were in Cozumel they did a generator test that involved cutting power to the ship while they switched over to the backup generator. The temporary loss of power resulted in the WiFi controller where they implement per user throttling from doing it's throttling job. In the download direction I was able to achieve 92 Mbps. That's pretty impressive for Speedcast and likely all the satellite bandwidth the ship had access to at this moment in time. It's relevant here because the 92 Mbps didn't come close to the 243 Mbps PHY WiFi rate my device was connected to the ship WiFi using. Here's the thing about Jewel. Her Fortinet "FortiAP" access points are from the 2015 era. WiFi5 existed in 2015 and were capable of rates as high as 450Mbps in perfect conditions. In the real world on a ship or on land it was rare to achieve 450Mbps and my results above, while in my cabin with the door closed are good real world examples of what to expect from WiFi5 using 40 MHz channels. Even with 2023 satellite internet providers, 2015 era WiFi5 is not the exclusive issue that is responsible for the Voom experiences being reported. In a challenging large scale deployment with a lot of metal there would be very little gained by upgrading the access points to the latest standards. Voom would still suck. If they spent millions of dollars upgrading all ship WiFi infrastructure there would be very little gained with the user experience because the all metal nature of ships requires more access points and more access points only play nice with each other when you keep them on their own unique channels and that means restricting channel width which neuters the throughput advantages of newer WiFi technology. On Wonder of the Seas they have placed access points in each cabin to overcome the metal signal loss experienced with access points in hallways. The access points are WiFi5 802.11ac access points. They are Aruba model 303H access points and you are welcome to google the specs on them. These access points top out at 867 Mbps per user but you only get there by using larger channel widths which they don't because they can't without the risk of causing interference. In the case of Wonder there would have been no benefit to using WiFi6 or WiFi6E access points. The Aruba 303H are still a current model even today years after Wonder was built and/or when they placed the orders for all those 303H access points on her which was probably in 2020. Incidentally the app I use is called WiFiMan and it's free. It's available for most Android phones in the Google Play store. The app doesn't require rooting and simply monitors the environment without any unlawful or unethical access required.

New technology from a new service. Eventually it'll work.

That's a new one I've never heard before.

I've always bought internet plans. Even going back to the days when you could buy a certain number of minutes and you had to connect and disconnect or you would burn through your 100 minutes really quickly if you forgot to disconnect. That was super slow internet. I would compose an email offline, connect to send an email and immediately disconnect. Royal introducing Voom and full voyage unlimited plans was a game changer. Being connected 24 x 7? Wow. That was something else. Between Royal and other cruise lines I've purchased internet plans over 75 times. Since becoming Pinnacle it became free as a CAS perk but leading up Pinnacle I bought it on every Royal cruise, except when in suites on those ships that include Voom with suites. I figure I've spent just over $4k on Voom on Royal never mind other cruise lines. When sailing with family they've always had their own Voom plan. That $4k for my Voom doesn't include what I've spent buying Voom for my teen or early adult kids.

In those cases the second guest is required to book the refreshment package.

If person one has 100 points and person two has has 75 points and they are in a CAS relationship they both appear to have 100 points. If person two starts cruising by themselves it will appear to have no effect. The points earned go towards their personal which was at 75 when they boarded a cruise but the relationship points remains at 100. Their personal counter is hidden in the background. If person one doesn't cruise at all and person two keeps on cruising once they have earned 26 above their 75 points only then will the relationship points appear to move from 100. In this example of 26 more points for person two the relationship counter would be at 101.

Accounts in a relationship display the points of the highest person and that determines their status. Every individual has their own actual points counter but for the person with the lower number of points it isn't displayed.

A TA must call to book it kids in a connecting cabin. However some adults prefer to book split so one adult can buy the deluxe drink package and not the other.

Older ships don't have all the whiz bang stuff on newer ships but at one time those old ships were new ships and families sailed them and had great family cruise experiences. Generations change without doubt but do your kids require all the new whiz bang stuff or else the entire trip is a disaster? Old ships have the same internet as new ships now so kids can be glued to their devices on both old and new ships equally. How much does the rest matter? Hotels haven't changed much over the years in terms of kids amenities. Can your family pull off a land vacation that doesn't include a hotel that is a mini theme park to keep your kids occupied? Back in the day a pool in a hotel was all it took to make a great hotel experience. What do you look for in a hotel? If you were to fly the family to Europe for a land vacation what accommodations would you seek that are specific to your kids needs? How about Hawaii? Is the destination good enough or your does your family require a lot of activities tailored for youth to make it a great vacation? No judgement if that is what you must do for a land vacation, it's your vacation money. Spend it to keep your group satisfied. Sometimes though people focus so much on the ship, like with a serious case of FOMO, they miss out on a better itinerary to more interesting destinations. At their core older ships provide all the basic necessities for a great family vacation while experiencing new and interesting destinations. Maybe ask your kids... better destinations or ship with more stuff?

I guess I could afford to stay in suites more than I do but the value equation isn't satisfied for me when solo. When cruising with family I'm more likely to crack the wallet open a little more but when it's just me a plain cabin by myself works out quite nicely. I have occasionally sailed in suites solo. Maybe 30% of the time mostly when I see a suite deal. Other times I see a JS for $1,500 or a balcony for $700 and go with the balcony because it's just me. That's a whole lot different than $20k though. A lot depends on the ship. I don't see value in full suites on older classes. Icon and Wonder? Big suite nope for me. I'm having a hard enough time dealing with the balcony rate on Icon. Yet every suite is booked on many Icon dates. Somebody is willing to spend more money than me. So be it. Great for them. I'm sure they will love it. No ill will. Since we are talking about folks spending gobs of money how about $4k cabanas? O. M. G. Most of my cruises aren't that much yet folks are jumping on crazy cabana pricing. So be it. Great for them. I'm sure they will love it. No ill will.

In case folks haven't been following SpaceX the v2 mini satellites they launched in February are having issues. They have stopped raising their orbit and stopped launching more v2 mini satellites for the time being. The v2 mini were supposed to help coverage and the maritime service by allowing greater use of satellite to satellite relay. For middle of the ocean away from land coverage such as a transatlantic cruising this is critical. This setback will delay Starlink getting better in the near term. Be patient, it will get better in the long term but it's not going to be consistent in the near term.

Some suites scale best when the number in your party is greater than two. For families of four or more some suites are pretty reasonable on a per person basis. Especially so when in Star Class and everything that is included (UDP, DX, Internet, Gratuity). Six or eight in an aqua theater suite can be reasonable. Two people not so much. The first two pay the lion share of that while add on guests are often $600 to $800 each. $20k for two or $23k for six. Big difference in the per person breakdown.

Looking at the website there are no bookable cruises out of Baltimore for any number of guests in April. Appears to be sold out or the ship is heading into a shipyard for maintenance. Old ships go in every 2.5 years.

It's not uncommon when all that's left is some GTY cabins for solo to be blocked. Less than 30 days out are there any cabins for two that aren't GTY? She might be able to call and get revenue mgmt to approve a solo in a GTY.

Not on Southwest but they do on most legacy carriers. I had two consecutive years with over 240 segments on Delta and that's exactly what Delta counted them with 500 mile minimum miles awarded on each. DELTA- Deliver Every Living Thing to Atlanta. Back in the day it was hard to fly anywhere without seeing the Atlanta airport.

Agreed. My kids have no loyalty to Royal. They are now young adults paying for their own cruises. They missed out on a Royal dependent match so it is what it is and Carnival gets the business. On their limited budgets price is huge for them. With nothing tilting the table in Royal's direction Royal doesn't look appealing to the young early career types with no status or free drinks in the equation. Young adults early in careers have limited time off so it's not like these are frequent cruisers consuming seats in Diamond lounges or frequently consuming CAS benefits at a high cost to the company. Right before this age group is getting ready to start spending their own hard earned money is not a great time to demote and snub this age group. In a few years time they will remember and they will book other cruise lines. Letting them keep their status as they enter a phase when they will be cruising infrequently doesn't seem like it costs the company much at all. Later in life as they vacation more with their own kids reaching the cruising age it would be much better to have them locked into Royal.