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TL;DR - All is well. Christmas is coming. The BOGO process is a Charlie Foxtrot. I promised a live blog for this sailing but in keeping with my utter unreliability for doing live blogs, I have failed again....this being day 3 already. I will skip all of the pre-boarding and boarding details as these are not of particular interest to anyone and it was entirely uneventful. All went well. We are here. The ship is in great shape for her age. We sailed on Adventure relatively recently so there haven't been any changes since that time. Sure, she needs paint in some areas and there are patches of carpeting that are in need of replacing but these are purely superficial issues and have not impacted our enjoyment at all. We are in a Panoramic Ocean View Suite (VP), a room which was converted at the time that part of the spa was removed. The room has an ENORMOUS panoramic view with ceiling-to-floor window panes. It makes for a really lovely view....particularly at sunrise and sunset. LOTS of space. There is a large-ish closet area that they advertise as a second bedroom but that's not fair. It's just a couple of bunk beds in a closet with a curtain. Yes, it provides additional beds. No, it is not a second bedroom. There is a bath-and-a-half (full bath and second toilet and sink) but the full bath is somewhat disappointing as it is the same size and layout of a typical stateroom bathroom with a space tube shower (ugh). Nothing special there. It is considered a full suite so we have access to the Suites Lounge and all of the suites' amenities. Breakfast is in Giovanni's on this ship (it's typically in Chops) b/c Chops is on Deck 4, forward and Gios is the only specialty restaurant on deck 11....and it is in an unusual place (instead of being located inside the Windjammer entrance as it is on most VY and FR class ships, the entrance is outside of the WJ). The food and service have been very good. It's a good thing that the VP is considered a full suite b/c we would otherwise be denied access to the Suites' Lounge on this sailing. There are 65 Pinns onboard this sailing (and I'm sure we are #'s 64 and 65 in seniority !). Only the top 30 are permitted in the Suites' Lounge and we certainly are not among those 30...but since we are in a full suite, we are allowed in. As may be expected, the SL is an empty wilderness and the Crown Lounge (CL) (or Clown Lounge as some are calling it) is a whirlwind of chaos. Since the only [public] computers that I am aware of are located in the back of the CL (there are 2), that is where you will find me in the AM. At least there is SOMEwhere to get on a keyboard ! As one would predict, there are many families and children on this sailing but I have not found it to be a concern. Everyone is having a wonderful time and the children are all looking forward to Santa's arrival. There was a show in the theater last night called "Can't Stop the Rock" which we fully intended to attend but failed (we decided that the hot tub would be a better thing to do)....but I heard it was tolerable. We went to the ice show on our last AD sailing so we will probably skip it this time but as I recall, it was very typical of all the ice shows and definitely worth going to if you haven't been before. We have not stepped foot inside the WJ and intend to keep it that way. Our one night of dining in the MDR (so far) was fine. Welcome Aboard is one of my least favorite MDR menus and that happened to be the night that we decided to eat there (having eaten lunch in Chops on boarding day....didn't think 2 big meals in one day would be a good idea). We will also eat in the MDR on Christmas evening and one more time during the last part of the sailing...which night, escapes me at the moment. We have a 3 night dining package plus 2, BOGO which works soooo well for us. Speaking of BOGO I thought I would relay the mechanics of using the BOGO on AD...or at least, on THIS sailing on AD as it never seems to be the same process, even on the same ship ! We ate at Giovanni's last night (night #2) and told the server that this represented the use of the first of our BOGO dinners and that we would be eating in Chops later in the week. Knowing that it is MANDATORY that you pay for your BOGO meals on nights #1 or #2, we requested that the server go ahead and charge us both, full price for our Gio's meal. That utterly confused her....so she called the manager over. The manager finally decided that the thing to do was to call Chops, have them charge us for our [yet-to-be-consumed] Chops BOGO and then when we get to Chops later this week, we will already have pre-paid. PERFECT ! Exactly what we wanted. We paid for our Gio's BOGO and went home full and happy. Later that evening we checked our onboard account. Gio's was charged...but no Chops. UGH. So this morning when enjoying our breakfast in Gio's we queried the manager...what happened to our charge for Chops ? Blank stare. So she got on the phone with someone...the final determination is that they will charge us for the second BOGO when we get to Chops in a few days. WHAAAAT ? I thought the charge had to be completed NLT day 1 or 2 ? It's an utter mystery and it's yet-to-be-seen whether or not this process will actually work but if I get to Chops and have some bill-issue, I will turn full Karen and somebody's going to be sorry. LOL I will report back. This is already waaaytooo long. That's what I get for waiting 3 days. I will catch up later. Merry Christmas to all ! Santa comes tonite !!!!

An overnight in Turkey gives you time to visit both Istanbul and Constantinople.

Suite Decorations Berty decorated the suite with a variety of pictures of us. It took us a moment to ask him “how did you find these”. Well, he was resourceful and pulled them from Facebook.

Room Arrival Snacks Apparently there is a new F&B director who felt the embarkation snacks were underwhelming so they have been replaced with these. Lindsay enjoyed.

A few more pics

Icebergs ahoy! You can see one in the distance to starboard. It seemed to change shape in the time it took to get closer. This one to port was much larger and further away.

Just a few highlights of the ways that AD may differ from other ships in her class. Giovannis is the only specialty restaurant located on deck 11 and it has a unique entrance location (starboard side NOT inside the WJ like most of the others). Sorry…mentioned this above but repeating it in this summary There is a complimentary sauna/steam room on AD (deck 11 forward in the vicinity of the gym…at least that’s what I’m told. I don’t go there, but Dan does). Most of these spaces have been removed or are $$ on most of the other ships. Izumi is located smack dab in the middle of the Promenade ! That’s the good news (I love the location). The bad news is….there is no kitchen associated with this Izumi so it’s basically sushi or sushi. I think they have some Mizo soup but nothing that really requires “cooking” such as dumplings, soba dishes or tempura. So, if you’re not a sushi eater this is probably not going to be your Santa’s list this year. I love sushi (as long as I can get soys wrappers…I loathe the seaweed ones) so I’m a cappy hamper. AD still has a Champagne Bar. YAY ! One of the only ones left that I am aware of. There are no computers in the Card Room/Library on deck 5 forward. I also mentioned this above so forgive the repeat. AFAIK, the only complimentary computers are located in the Crown Lounge. Maybe the VOOM bubbas have some somewhere but I haven’t found them yet if that’s the case. The Suites’ /Pinns breakfast is in Giovanni’s vs Chops on AD. No biggie. Same menu. Same great service. If other differences come to mind or to my attention I will review this topic downstream. In other news, a US Coast Guard helicopter just buzzed us. We are in Labadee. I did not hear an Alpha, Alpha, Alpha so hopefully they were just visiting.

Happening now

Another beautiful sea day. Breakfast in La Terrazza. Panorama Lounge on deck 8 looking aft. Slight roll to the ship today, up to 5° according to a level app on my phone.

Some of the holiday decorations around the ship: The deck crew were busy making a Christmas tree from one of the lines. A bit of a Clark Griswold moment with a tree too big for the space - they had to remove a ceiling tile to make it fit .

Greetings from me, my daughters and our self decorated tree

A word about the internet on board. When I first boarded the Silver Wind I saw the included internet package performed much like the internet did on the Silver Origin. That was just under 2Mbps down and just under 1Mbps up. Since I am doing this live thread and planned to upload a lot of photos I splurged for the Premium Internet upgrade. That wasn't cheap for an 18 night cruise at $345 but it was essential if I wanted to upload as many pictures as I hoped to during this cruise. The Premium Internet increased the performance to what has been fairly typical up to this point: This is the same performance I observed on the Silver Origin with the premium internet upgrade making me wonder if it is a fleet standard. I am hopeful this level of performance will continue for the remainder of the cruise as we head farther south in the days to come. It's not clear to me if Starlink has an operational Southerly limit that we may venture past next week. Time will tell. On my travels with ships that belong to sister cruise lines such as Celebrity and Royal Caribbean International I've learned that they tend to install multiple Starlink systems on a particular ship and they load balance guest devices across them by associating each device to a particular Starlink antenna and modem. This is evidenced by different devices having a different public IP address. A benefit of the premium internet package is the ability to connect four devices at the same time. Having multiple devices connected has allowed me to observe at least two public IP addresses on different devices which leads me to believe there are at least two Starlink systems on the Silver Wind just as there were on the Silver Origin. The Silver Wind has been upgraded with newer WiFi access points. Professional grade WiFi is something I do for a living so it's a topic I'm somewhat familiar with. The platform on the Silver Wind is very good and it has performed well. When the onboard system reports medium usage I've continued to experience the same ~9Mbps down and ~4Mbps up performance. With the ship rolling a little today the internet has remained stable. I've also seen this level of performance on Royal Caribbean's largest Oasis class ships so it's not uncommon for the RCG family. If this level of performance continues while in Antarctica I'll be thrilled with my $345 upgrade despite not being thrilled about the price. In summary I'm happy with the performance of the internet onboard and that they have upgraded the WiFi technology on the Silver Wind. By placing access points in each suite as noted earlier in this thread they have done everything they can to ensure the best possible experience.

On Vision of the Seas I was informed by a waiter that very few people liked the Mexican night dinner. When we asked how could a meal on such a wonderful ship actually be undesirable, he told us he would show us the entire menu the following night. What I did not understand at the time was that he would actually bring out every single dish on the menu, except the desserts because those were great. And he was right, they were all subpar. I learned a valuable lesson, always trust the waiter.

Our guitarist and vocalist Tomás. He is pretty good. Gingerbread houses and one of many Christmas trees on board. As we sail into South Georgia waters overnight the ship must not have external lights to minimize impact to wildlife. We have been instructed to keep our balcony lights off and curtains closed. Around the ship blackout covers have been applied. The Dolce Vita bar before the shades were lowered.

Do you mean how tall you have to be? Because those are two different things I'm tall enough to do the zip line on Oasis, but I don't know if I could get high enough to try.

Lunch Jaime’s Because the weather was overcast we opted to dine in at Jaime’s. We tried a sampling of appetizers, Caesar salad, the chicken sandwich and penne pancetta Alfredo pasta. It was nice to see some familiar crew faces from last year. Food was good as always.

Laundry Before After mentioning this mess to Berty, we come back from lunch to this. The items to be pressed were taken along with all the dirty laundry. I told him he has no idea how much I appreciate his genie magic.

for my side hustle, i spent the last 14 hours wrapping gifts for my client and... i would like to collapse now. my wrapping station:

ATS #9730 We were in #8730 last year so the set up of the room is essentially the same. A slightly smaller eating area, different closet configuration in the master bedroom and access to the deck via 1 door instead of 2. The large deck is definitely a highlight of the room.

Whether you celebrate Christmas/Yule or something/nothing else. I wish you and yours the very best. Here in Norway we celebrate on 24th (in the evening) with dinner and gifts, but many other European countries celebrate on the 25th. 23rd (tonight) is often marked with family/friends, tv and porridge + drinks. Since I am a 50% parent I get my kids tomorrow so today I am enjoying nuts, fruits and Harry Potter Movies. I am really happy to be a psrt of this community, you all (and especially @Matt ) have been a huge help already. 2024 marks my (2) first cruise(s) ever and I can not wait. Hope the next days are good for all of you, and as I have said before If you need any help/info about Norway (or UK, having a dad from Wales I am pretty well versed in UK too..) message me whenever. Being on a different timezone than most of you I am able to help at times others might be sleeping. Now to round this off before my Adhd mind makes me go all over the place again: Positive holiday vibes and energy from Kristiansand,Norway to all of you! -Chris-

On this sea day I thought I show some photos from around the ship. Let's start with the fitness center. Small but functional. There is also an aerobics room where they hold some spa related classes.

Today is Christmas Eve. I am up early at 6am. I left off yesterday at lunch. We ate in the Eden Cafe. I had the pork belly tacos and the spinach salad. The salad esp. was really good! We sat around the ship in the afternoon and read or listened to audio books. Hubby tried an expensive bourbon at the Eden bar. With the premium package you just have to pay the difference over $`17, but it was a nice opportunity for him to try it. We opened up the Martini bar at 2pm and then went to see a Beyond the Podium presentation on Caribbean cooking at 3pm in the Club. I usually like these talks, but this one was disappointing and only lasted 15 minutes. Dinner last night was at Cyprus. For appetizers, I started with Escargot and hubby got a Caesar salad. We decided to order all 3 exclusive entrees to Cyprus for the table so we had lamb, short rib, and Pappardale pasta. All 3 were good. We both agreed that we liked the combination of all 3 and enjoyed the experience of trying them all more than any 1 dish alone. I think I liked the lamb a little better than the short rib. The pappadale paired nicely with both. I got some kind of Cocoa creme thing for dessert. That was only meh!! The nice thing about dinner is we were done in an hour so we headed to get a spot at the 7pm show for Arte, one of Beyond's 3 exclusive production shows. I really liked it. I think I liked it more after we did the behind the stage tour for Elite guests yesterday morning with the lead singer. Here are a few pics! I am looking forward to the holiday events today!

I it!!!

We are in for the night. We had a pretty quiet day; walked through the shops downtown, drove to NASA and went for a drive along the coast. We’ve packed what we can. Berty will see us in the terminal at 10:15am. Lindsay will drop Reyd and I and the luggage at the terminal early, drop the rental and meet us back at the terminal. Berty confirmed Reyd and I can get ourselves and the luggage checked in and they will have Lindsay join us in the suite lounge. Weather has remained good in Galveston but the forecast calls for rain throughout the night, morning and afternoon. So we will see what happens. Berty said it has been raining today. I’ll checkin with you all tomorrow!!

IYKYK

There is a reason for the delay this time….

@SweetPea Look, matching shirts

Speaking of that sailing, when does that live blog start? Pretty late for you

in just 42 days... we go on oasis AGAIN. let's just hope it's less eventful than the last time. also! check in was this week and i snagged the 10:30 slot!! since we are not in a JS this time around (at least, not yet), i am looking forward to having that spot

In my defense there were truffles in the fries.All this talk of truffles on your blog has inspired me …..what are the must have truffle dishes.

You are too easy! lol In my alternate universe I would have a live in genie.

A man walks into a bar… oh wait, Iceberg! Christmas tunes with Tomás.

Forgot to mention Berty said there are 6697 guests onboard this week.

I shouldn't complain b/c it was a last minute bonus cruise that got us there but I've been staring at 173 since last month and it's super annoying!

oh and how could i forget the BEST part of our vacation???? seeing @WAAAYTOOO while in cococay!!!!!!! literally the silver lining on the cruise from hell doomed sailing

tinerary MIA > nassau > PDCC > labadee > falmouth > MIA (same as last time, but hopefully FAR better weather!) some general details we will still fly in and out of FLL. guess we will roll the dice on those ubers we are in a standard aft oceanview balcony on deck 10, BUT i have submitted RU bids for a JS. and also a grand suite, but again; we have NO business winning that bid. a decent amount of OBC this time around but i have prepaid my gratuities so that it doesn't eat into my half of the OBC this will be my fifth time on oasis and J's third and probably the closest thing we will ever do to a B2B or S2S sailing. (until we retire???) other interesting things to note the new, larger duffel has arrived. it is already stuffed with all my cruise specific gear since i have made diamond plus, we will get our BOGO dinner!! i think we will do giovanni's on night two maybe? portside BBQ will be night one, as is our custom aboard oasis while J did not make diamond (because i can't do math; she's one point off), i did make diamond plus!! so it will be exciting to see what comes of that -- since i will never in my lifetime ever reach pinn. (unless i marry into it????) if i never hear an ALPHA ALPHA ALPHA call, it will be too soon. also i don't even want to THINK about snow in february for when we leave. let's just.... think of sunny, happier thoughts!

What IS that elephant doing ?

ITS CRUISE DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I just got off the Celebrity Beyond for 19 days around Thanksgiving and the first of December. The 4 main dining rooms are slightly different with different staff. I ended up going to the one with the staff I liked the best. I had dinner reservations but that did not mean much. You can walk up to any of them and get seated with or without a reservation. The specialty restaurants were the same way. I had a 4-night dining package and was told by the maître d that I could just show up and they would find me a room. Like @SebagoSue said the Edan and Le Voyage are busy, and it would be safe to get a time once on board.

Since that video upload went okay here is a zodiac ride from New Island back to the Silver Wind. I sped up the video to make it shorter but that makes it look a lot more bumpy than it was. I normally like to add music and such but YT has gotten so hard to work with music I've just uploaded it with natural sound.

If anyone is wondering what 4m seas look like it's really not that bad. Here is 2 minute video using my 360 camera from the balcony. This video was captured a few minutes ago so about as live as you can get. December 24, 2023 - 1:45pm South Georgia Island time.

Information posted for our consumption. Holiday greetings from the crew: The card/conference room:

Around the ship a common theme for the artwork is photos from various early Antarctic expeditions. Admiral Byrd: Captain Scott.

It’s cruise day!!!!

Not sad to see B&J go and JR can head that direction as well IMO. For me, where did all the cows go? Where will they show up? I hope they were kept and will become Easter Eggs of the past at some point on ships.

Interesting. Berty mentioned that CK was packed, particularly on the 24 & 25th. We only ever eat there on night 1 so I don’t have a sense of how busy it is throughout the week. (#blamethestarclassbubble)

We often cruise during the holidays and we are again this year. I have to say, this has been the best holiday cruise ever...so far...and I have no reason to believe it will not continue. We had a number of friends sailing with us this year and have run into new old friends that we didn't expect to see. I have had a wonderful few days. Looking forward to the rest of the 2 weeks with the same anticipation.

You know cruise day is close when …… Berty sends you his what’s app number and says to start messaging him. He has arranged a sailaway get together in our suite where we will celebrate Reyd and Michael’s upcoming graduation. I am praying that the rain holds off. All remaining celebrations will be finalized once onboard.

Not Voyager, but we had an overnight in Istanbul in October sailing on Celebrity Beyond and the gangway was open all night. The port area is beautiful, with lots of restaurants and shops. At certain times in the Fall, they even have free open air concerts at the port in the evenings.

Anything would be better than Johnny Rockets. A decent burger and fries would be great.