twangster

It's not something I've tried. I just asked on board Anthem, so please do come back and let us know how you made out.

Wind by itself is not an indication of how much motion will be experienced. While wind does drive waves, not all waves are equal and it's much more than wave height that determines if you will feel motion. Waves crests and troughs that are close to each other (high pitch) tend to have less effect compared to when they are spaced out (low pitch). The difference between the crest and the trough are also a factor in feeling motion. Lastly wave direction relative to ship heading plays a big role in feeling motion. Sailing directly into the wind and waves can feel fine but if the wind and waves are coming from the side you might feel it more. All this to say you can't look at a wind forecast and expect to know if there will be motion felt. Often with moderate winds you feel nothing at all. In fact three of my last sailing had high winds at times where they had to close the upper decks but the ship exhibited no motion at all.

Let me make sure I understand the question. Someone buys the Refreshment Beverage Package but during the cruise wishes to have an alcoholic drink, say a rum and coke. Since alcohol is not included with the Refreshment package, the question is do you pay an up charge at a discounted rate or do you pay normal on board prices for that rum & coke? Assuming I understand the question correctly, if you have the Refreshment package you pay normal on board prices for any drink not included in the Refreshment package. The price for that rum & coke on board is the same if you have no package at all or if you have the Refreshment package.

On top of the blog @Sabrinaklai mentioned here https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/boards/index.php?/topic/5211-alaska-recap-celebrity-millennium-june-2017/ RoyalCaribbeanBlog.com is hosting a group cruise to Alaska this coming June. Watch this site for blogs and user reports as the group cruise unfolds June 22, 2018 on the Explorer of the Seas. Alaska is a cruise itinerary where it helps to have a healthy excursion budget. From trains, helicopters and sea planes to whale watching boats there is a lot to do and see at each stop. In many ports simply stepping of the ship you won't get to experience Alaska unless you venture away from the dock. Excursions are a great way to do that and experience Alaska but they add up depending on your group size.

Interesting Voom observation here on Anthem. Without logging into a Voom internet plan certain iOS features work on my iPhone. iMessage for one, notifications for another. I've read reports from users on other forums that iMessage worked for them without purchasing Voom. I can confirm iMessage is working for me when my phone isn't logged in to my Voom account. I've iMessaged several friends back home this way. I'm also getting app notifications, like news alerts on my lock screen although I can't use apps to access content behind the notification. For example I received news alerts about the government shutdown and subsequent resolution while my phone wasn't logged into Voom. When I read other users suggest this I assumed they were still in port or maybe the iMessage was coming in over 'Cellular At Sea'. I've been very careful to test this and after several days I can confirm iMessage works for free. I haven't tried any other wifi based chat apps. Based on other user reports it's been this way for sometime and it's something they could remediate any day so don't count on it. No other ships work like this in my experience. Maybe they are testing it to determine bandwidth impact.

If I'm not mistaken the Galaxy S5 had this capability. I'm always hesitant to say it can't be done because within the Android family there were some devices that could do it natively without rooting but they are few and far between.

It's more of a winter thing. It's also the reason why Royal Caribbean is building a pier at CocoCay which is scheduled to begin taking ships in June of this year. What a lot people don't think of is that tender weather has to be perfect all day. Even if weather is fine in the morning, a worst case scenario would be an island full of people and waves picking up mid-day. They have to consider weather forecasts all day to ensure people can get back on the ship in the afternoon safely as well. Stepping onto my balcony this morning it's pretty obvious why we skipped CocoCay. It's been raining, wind is up. Not the most pleasant day out there. Last night we had a new comedian in the theater. He was pretty good, worth seeing. Met some folks at the Music Hall bar and ended up having dinner with them in the My Time MDR. Time for breakfast... Windjammer here I come.

Found a letter in my cabin. Either the towel animal penned it or its confirmed. No Cococay. Overnighting in Nassau. Safety first.

I'm hearing whisperings of an overnight stay here in Nassau and a missed call on CocoCay for tomorrow. Waiting for the Captain to announce it.

Day 6 - Nassau We arrived early with the morning mist yet to be burned off as the sun began to rise. First into port this morning. Soon after we docked another Royal Caribbean ship entered the harbor. That's Independence of the Seas executing a turn so she could back into the slip beside us. Nice day here today. Later in the day I was walking laps around the ship and caught Gigi looking whimsically at me with North Star looming over her shoulder.

I think it's 350-ish. Suites and Pinnacle have reserved seating during events upstairs where I took these pictures from.

Anyone cruising on other ships is welcome and encouraged to confirm or note any differences from Anthem.

Typically most (but not all) devices can't be a wifi hotspot with wifi as the source. For Apple devices there is a jailbreak solution, for Android devices most require rooting to accomplish this. If in doubt, try it at home right now. Can your tablet while in airplane mode connect to your wifi at home and become a hotspot?

I have a standard balcony cabin. The few solo (studio) cabins go quickly plus I was seeking double C&A points which you don't get in Studio cabins.

I got a $100 gift card one year from a company. I'd rather have this stock deal even with restrictions. There's two sides to it. If they just gave cash away to employees there are lots of investors that would not be pleased, possibly preferring that money be used in other ways. They could do nothing or throw a one time party. I see this as a win-win. Employees get rewarded for their contribution to the goal, get something lasting even if it is just a handful of shares and now have a sense of ownership.

Thanks! I'm solo this cruise as I often am. Not many family or friends have the flexibility I do at the moment.

I'm on board Anthem and watched the NFL Playoffs Sunday on ESPN. Yesterday I went to tune my cabin TV to ESPN as I got ready for bed and oddly it wasn't on the same channel it was on Sunday. I've noted that the overall channel line up has changed mid-cruise losing some channels while gaining others. I went back to my Anthem cruise photos from December 2017 and looked at the channel line up: Here on my current cruise in January 2018 the line up has become: I looked again today just to see if this was a one day change so far the new line up remains. Has anyone else noticed a different channel line up on any other ship?

For the record, RCI ships are no more prone than any other ship. Last summer five Holland ships had outbreaks. Carnival recently got busted in CDC inspections for failing to properly document on-board illnesses. Cruise lines and nursing homes in the U.S. are the only places legally required to report illness when a certain number of people become sick. Schools, colleges, churches, work places, airlines, trains and no other place is required to report outbreaks. Ships don't generate viruses, someone who is sick boards with it and with guests deciding not to wash their hands are more susceptible to propagating it but no more than on an airline or train.

"Two70 Tonight" is much like Nick Weir's presentation showing off the capabilities of this venue. It takes you through many different short pieces of entertainment created just for this room by Royal Caribbean Entertainment. The virtual fleet is usually only shown in the Top Tier event. The Virtual Symphony is often it's own event in the cruise planner one night. Absent from Nick Weir's presentation were live performers that are part of the "Two70 Tonight" event on day 1. In my last live blog from Anthem the Virtual Fireworks was offered on the last night at 11pm. Here is the blog post for the "Two70 Tonight" show on December 2, 2017: https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/boards/index.php?/topic/5068-anthem-112517-712-b2b/&do=findComment&comment=50344 In my experience Two70 Tonight is only offered on day 1. I missed it on my very first Anthem cruise in all the day 1 hoopla. I recorded video of much of Nick Weir's presentation but I'm not sure which pieces may be subject to copyright so I'm not going to post that here.

I'd need to go through my past cruise compass and look but I think the Virtual Fireworks is also offered on it's own one night. It may vary depending on cruise length since Two70° has a lot of different things going on at night.

Depends on group size and how fast dinner progresses. As a solo I'm often through My Time MDR right around the hour mark. I've not done a late seating before but perhaps others who have can comment.

Since this was Anthem's first visit to Miami I went overboard taking pictures. Go figure, me taking pictures. Here are some of them: And with that it was time to leave...

Look for a show on day 1 called "Two70 Tonight". It's usually day 1 around 9:45pm although that could change over the course of a year. With all that's going on day 1 it's easy to miss this event that showcases Two70°.

I stayed on the ship today and that decision would pay dividends for me. In my last live blog I talked about a venue that is unique to Quantum class ships - Two70°. Here is the Two70° venue on Anthem of the Seas during its first ever visit to the Port of Miami with Miami as a backdrop: With Royal Caribbean's Headquarters right here they took an opportunity to introduce this Quantum class ship to many HQ employees and local travel agents who may not have had an opportunity to set foot on board one before since the other two in this class, Quantum and Ovation, are not based in North America. Walking around the ship I saw numerous employees taking it all in. Just before noon our cruise director announced that none other than Nick Weir would be doing a presentation in Two70° and guests were welcome to attend. For those that don't know Nick Weir, he is the Vice President of Entertainment for Royal Caribbean. If you've seen a show on a Royal ship lately, you've likely experienced the work of Nick Weir and his team. I follow him on twitter @NickWeirShowbiz where he occasionally leaks tidbits about the new entertainment coming to Symphony of the Seas. For those that saw Project Atlantis, the RCTV production about the last time Allure went to the Freeport dry dock - that was Nick Weir hosting it. Walking into Two70° today the room was rotating through some background scenes. The room was filling up, my daily KümmelWeck from Café270 would have to wait. Have you noticed how the color of the house lights change based on the content that is being displayed? Also note this was at noon during full daylight outside. Consider my first photo above and how this room has transformed since, in the middle of the day. Cool stuff here. Nick took the stage and began his presentation. Today Nick would be showcasing the incredible Two70° venue to an audience that consisted mostly of Miami employees and local agents - there were only a handful of ship guests other than myself in attendance. The room cost an estimated $27M per ship plus the cost of content. He discussed not only the evolution of these Quantum class rooms but the need to create content for them. With eighteen individual projectors synchronized to produce the 'Vista Display' as it's called, it amounts to a 12k screen with a 5:1 aspect ratio (if you thought 4k was impressive, ha!). The problem is no one has content for this screen size or resolution so Royal Caribbean Entertainment had to create it from scratch. During Top Tier events I've seen the virtual fleet presented before. Nick explained this was created for a Royal Caribbean Board of Directors meeting that took place on Ovation a few years ago. Since it was such a hit, they have kept using it and made it part of the Crown and Anchor Society Top Tier event. During the presentation more and more of the fleet, old and new are brought to life on the screen sailing virtually behind us. Nick stepped us through various pieces that were produced for this venue some of which simply don't photograph well since they combine both the Vista Display and six robotic screens that move and are choreographed with content on the Vista Display and each other. One piece that stands out is called 'Dance In A Box'. They literally made two boxes the size of two robot screens and recorded dancers in a studio constrained to dance within those dimensions. The robot screens move and rotate, separate and come together in three dimensions all choreographed to music. This had never been done before. It's one thing to make a robot that can build a car on an assembly line but Nick explained frankly it's quite boring watching a robot repeat the same move over and over all day long. They needed to make the robotic screens performers themselves and that is what they have done. I've seen many of these productions before on previous Anthem cruises but hearing their origins and how Nick and his team produced them brought new respect for each show. I'm really not doing the entire presentation justice in this blog. It's something you have to experience which is the magic of this room. It's not just a video played on a big screen, it's the manner in which the technology of the room is used to immerse the audience into the production. In the interest of brevity I'm skipping several pieces of great entertainment but Nick brought it to a close with a virtual fireworks show his team created for New Years Eve one year that was so popular they play it on all Quantum class cruises now. Watch your cruise compass for it when you sail on one. Our Miami visitors had a lunch to get to in the dining room so the few guests like myself that attended then saw the virtual symphony orchestra on the Vista Display. I had an opportunity to meet Nick after the event and talk briefly with him. Nick if you ever read this, I decided to spare you from displaying how you showcased the rotating stage using yourself as a prop in the process. Well done sir!

After Epic Chocolate Brownie I need to wait a few days before loading up on more sugar. I'm still convulsing...