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I consider myself as opportunity drinker. I can drink decent quantity if I want to. I can finish a bottle of wine by myself in one evening at home. But I don't often buy alcohol at home, and I can stay dry for half a year without any issue. I had plus on my last Princess trip and had 7-9 drinks everyday. Then I was on a NCL trip without the drink package and I did not buy any drink at all. I have to admit I had a better time on the Princess trip than the NCL one. To me its almost like if I want to pay ~$30 extra per day to drink or just not drinking at all. decision... decision...

I am sorry to hear your involuntary downgrade experience. Each airline has their own rule on who to be downgraded. Very often, it is not about how much you paid but which fare class you booked in. For future reference, DOT has regulations regarding this and you are entitled to a refund in fare difference between the class you booked and the class your end up flying. However, this is often difficult to do as you, the passenger, is unlikely to show proof of lower class ticket price of that trip to get that refund. The gate agent processing this are under enormous pressure to get the flight out and they often can only get the current price for the flight which may be more expensive than your first class ticket, hence not issuing the refund. Also, this is relatively rare situation that most agents are not familiar with the SOP. Major airlines, such as DL, AA, UA, have dedicated team to resolve this and give you refund after your trip (you need to call inand request). Low cost airlines are more likely to play games and refuse to help (they probably don’t have first class service anyways) Another situation that is not well understood by the general public is called YUP fare. You may have noticed that first class tickets these days are not as outrageously expensive as they used to be. A lot of these are actually coach ticket that include an instant upgrade. This is not clearly shown during the booking provess and it is unreasonable to expect consumers to know this is what they have purchased. But this is world we live in. If you read your fare information carefully you will find this buried within. These tickets are often the first in line to be downgraded for many reasons. In this case, some clueless airline agent may claim you never actually had a first class ticket in the first place and the DOT regulation can be difficult to apply.

Hate to tell you this, nothing on air plane tickets is guaranteed. Frankly, they don’t even guarantee you to get you to your destination in a timely manner. Seats can be changed due to many reasons, and in your case schedule change. Even had you booked on AA.com, you are not going to get your seat back unless people had those seats opt to move out. Schedule change happens regularly if you book in advance. Flight schedule more than 3 months from today are nothing more than a suggestion that the airline is thinking about flying that route around that time using that aircraft.

Just an FYI, Copa's newest 737-MAX aircrafts do have lie-flat business class seats. BUT, and this is a big one, COPA is notorious in doing last minute aircraft swap, meaning even if you booked a 737-MAX flights on COPA does not guarantee you will actually fly on a 737-MAX. Avoid COPA for the time being if lie-flat seat is important to you. Without factoring the price on your actual travel dates, here are some routing/airline options in the order I would recommend. American YYZ-MIA or DFW-EZE (best frequency, relatively direct routing), Delta YYZ-ATL-EZE (relatively direct routing), Aeromexico YYZ-MEX-EZE (a bit of detour as you fly west then east), Air Canada YYZ-GRU-EZE (second segment is a fifth freedom flight, you need to deplane and GRU go through security and reboard the same aircraft), United YYZ-IAH-EZE (not daily flights, also a bit of detour). LATAM is not a bad option and probably has the most routing options, but you will have to make at least two stops (one in NA, one in SA). If driving to New York sounds better than a connection to you, you can try flying AA JFK-EZE, but that non-stop flight can be pricy. Airlines to avoid: COPA(high chance of not getting lie-flat seat), Avianca (they are doing away business class, there is an increasing chance you book a business class now and end up flying economy), Aerolineas Argentina (their long haul business class has angled flat seat, not truly flat. This is considered dated even 10 years ago).

I just had my first Carnival cruise on the Miracle to Alaska. Before this I have only sailed RCCL, Norwegian, and Celebrity. Food was one of the biggest let down, the buffet lacks variety and hours are limited. Both the food quality and service were not as good as RCCL or Norwegian. Many dishes does not really match the name. e.g. Korean Fried Chicken during the lunch time is more like a chicken stir fry dish with a little bit of gochujang sauce in it. The next day you will find pepper steak without appreciable amount of pepper. Another issue with the cooking is the extreme uneven cut of the vegetables. You can find both diced, strips, and sticks of pepper in the same dish. Guys burger was not bad but it closes at 6 PM and Bluelguana Cantina close before 4PM despite posted 6PM. No, there is no burger or taco option in the buffer during dinner as a backup option for you. We also did the steakhouse on the first night. The cowboy steak we got looks like only half of the size of photos I saw online. If you care about food quality, keep your expectation low. I agree with others the evening performance is fair to ok. Basically, you can tell the performer splits into dancer and singer. The dancers are not good at singing and the singers are not good at dancing. The internet was decent and not insanely priced. Overall, I am not eager to return to Carnival any time soon unless I can get a very good deal. I will also adjust my expectation for the food.

We did. The ship was still docked next to the landslide, but passengers have to use the water shuttle to get on shore. The process was not too bad. We also had to use water shuttle the day before at Juneau, which in my opinion was a disaster.