Live from Insignia - Montreal to Boston, Oct 8-19, 2023

[1985rz1]

3 hours ago, PinonNoir said:

They definitely throttle streaming, as they offer a "streaming package for $9.99/day, per device.  If you have to work, that's a small price to pay.  I'm about to head out on an excursion, but I'm happy to run a speed test later this afternoon!

It's more than throttling.  The streaming ports are blocked.  The streaming package unlocks the streaming ports.  The question is does the internet have enough ship-wide bandwidth to make streaming worthwhile, as the streaming package does not provide any additional bandwidth or speed.  Looking forward to your speed test.  Have a great excursion.

[AMHuntFerry]

6 hours ago, Gl3nnG4ry said:

Hi, wife and I will be sailing on Insignia in December 🙂

Wife has been reading chats, excited about the up-coming sailing, saw your post about the wifi and knew I'd be interested. This is why shows that I just signed up, so I could ask a question 😄

If I knew I could stream, and therefore, do video calls while on the ship, could cruise more as I could work from the ship 😉

I saw that you posted that streaming is throttling; so not usable at all? Just hick-ups?

Have you tried streaming separately from the hotspot?

Curious if you've done any speed tests?

 

Apologies for the number of questions. 

Totally acceptable to say, sorry, on vaca, not doing all that lol.

But if possible, would be curious to know. 

 

Thanks!  

If you want to do more cruising, check out Vista that was built with Starlink. O regulars who have craved better internet have been pleased. Riviera is supposed to get it (December or January I think?) and Allura will have it. The others will get it too on an unpublished schedule (assume Marina will get it during drydock in the spring). Without Starlink, the access is better at night (~3 am) or even 5-6 am (my spouse does not have the aversion to morning that I do and tested it out for work).

[PinonNoir]

2 hours ago, 1985rz1 said:

It's more than throttling.  The streaming ports are blocked.  The streaming package unlocks the streaming ports.  The question is does the internet have enough ship-wide bandwidth to make streaming worthwhile, as the streaming package does not provide any additional bandwidth or speed.  Looking forward to your speed test.  Have a great excursion.

Well that doesn't bode well for streaming.  I was able to open streaming on Youtube by using my VPN, but it was unwatchable.  Without the VPN it showed Youtube as inaccessible.  I'll try to test it again with the VPN activated.  In the meantime, here are the results of the speed test.  I find it interesting that it picked up a server in Kansas as the most optimal server for the test.  I tried a server in Charlottetown where we currently are, and it was slower.

 

[AMHuntFerry]

6 hours ago, PinonNoir said:

 The coffee machine is making crappy Cappuccino...not enough milk and the coffee beans seem sub-standard.  I ended up going down to Barristas to get my second cup of coffee.  I've gotta say the coffee from Baristas, while better than the machines in Terrace Cafe, is nowhere near as good as it was from Baristas on Riviera.

The Illy brand is gone. I've seen people talk about another brand (I'm blanking on the name..L__), but the barista on our recent cruise said that they are using a house-brand (bought directly rather than via a branded company) coffee bean from Columbia. They were also having issues with the grind being off, so there is a learning curve with the new beans.

The coffee machine may be being finicky or the settings might be wrong. One time I got all espresso, no milk; another time the opposite. I think the machine is supposed to know when it needs more supplies, but machines misbehave....So just let staff know it's not functioning like you think it should.

[PinonNoir]

On 10/12/2023 at 8:39 AM, WildWanderers said:

I am intrigued by your comment that the crew members are wearing masks.  If you hear why, please let us know.  We were on the same ship in late August and no crew members wore masks.

 

One of the waiters last night told us they've been forced to wear masks on this trip (and the last one) because the crew is transitioning from a warm weather environment to a cold weather one.  Yeah, I rolled my eyes as well.  Idiots.

[WildWanderers]

Hello PinonNoir,

I find the answer (we are transiting from warm to cold weather) to be curious as well.  We were on an August trip on Insignia which went from warm (New York City) to cold (Greenland and Iceland), and there was no such edict.  

Thanks for following up on this.

In the rest of my previous questions to you, I was not clear.  I know very well what a sommelier is, but concluded from your comments that the crew name-tag-labelled as sommeliers (regardless of your assessment of their credentials), had been split now into "wine stewards" and "sommeliers".  I am not sure if your comment was a personal assessment of their abilities or a new categorization.

On a related vein, I am always surprised that contributors have the impression that the Prestige Select provides access to different wines-by-the-glass than the Basic Drinks package, as if there are house wines and special wines.  There is just the one list, but in the Prestige Select you are not restricted to wines at meals, and you have access to wines, spirits and cocktails in the bars.

We're on the Insignia again in December, in the Caribbean, so it will be interesting to see if the crew are still wearing masks by then.  Although many of the August crew will still be on the ship, we are not great at recognizing people wearing masks.

Do continue to enjoy your trip.

Cheers,

Greg from the WildWanderers

 

[Jim and Monika]

1 hour ago, AMHuntFerry said:

The Illy brand is gone. I've seen people talk about another brand (I'm blanking on the name..L__), but the barista on our recent cruise said that they are using a house-brand (bought directly rather than via a branded company) coffee bean from Columbia. They were also having issues with the grind being off, so there is a learning curve with the new beans.

The coffee machine may be being finicky or the settings might be wrong. One time I got all espresso, no milk; another time the opposite. I think the machine is supposed to know when it needs more supplies, but machines misbehave....So just let staff know it's not functioning like you think it should.

Have them check out the machine. Our last cruise on Insignia there was a problem with it not pulling the milk. The milk reservoir was full, but not pulling.

[PinonNoir]

2 hours ago, WildWanderers said:

In the rest of my previous questions to you, I was not clear.  I know very well what a sommelier is, but concluded from your comments that the crew name-tag-labelled as sommeliers (regardless of your assessment of their credentials), had been split now into "wine stewards" and "sommeliers".  I am not sure if your comment was a personal assessment of their abilities or a new categorization.

 

We're on the Insignia again in December, in the Caribbean, so it will be interesting to see if the crew are still wearing masks by then.

 

Greg, they call every wine person a Somm.  I used the term Wine Steward as that is a more appropriate designation.

 

The masks are supposed to come off after our cruise is over.  I've seen several crew members not wearing them in the last two days....I think they are growing weary of the bull crap.

 

Dinner in Terrace Cafe tonight.  As usual, the Sushi and Sashimi are quite good!  The soup tonight with Andouille Sausage was also pretty good.  The wok fried Szechuan Beef was excellent!!  I went up to Polo Grill and asked the Maitre D' for two orders of Key Lime Pie to go.  He was happy to take care of it for me!  The Key Lime Pie was awesome as usual!

[EJL2023]

3 minutes ago, PinonNoir said:

Greg, they call every wine person a Somm.  I used the term Wine Steward as that is a more appropriate designation.

 

The masks are supposed to come off after our cruise is over.  I've seen several crew members not wearing them in the last two days....I think they are growing weary of the bull crap.

 

Dinner in Terrace Cafe tonight.  As usual, the Sushi and Sashimi are quite good!  The soup tonight with Andouille Sausage was also pretty good.  The wok fried Szechuan Beef was excellent!!  I went up to Polo Grill and asked the Maitre D' for two orders of Key Lime Pie to go.  He was happy to take care of it for me!  The Key Lime Pie was awesome as usual!

Did you share the Key Lime pie, or?????? 😃

[PinonNoir]

Just now, EJL2023 said:

Did you share the Key Lime pie, or?????? 😃

Of course!  But now that I think of it, what was I thinking??

[EJL2023]

2 minutes ago, PinonNoir said:

Of course!  But now that I think of it, what was I thinking??

We all have those weak moments where we don’t think clearly! 

Edited October 14, 2023 by EJL2023

[PinonNoir]

So this morning in Sydney, Nova Scotia, we were advised the weather was too windy and the currents were too strong to dock, so we had to anchor out and tender in.  At least they didn't skip the port entirely!  However, there was absolutely NO WIND, and I saw an object in the water that wasn't moving in the least, both alongside the ship at anchor, and when they dropped us off near where the ship was supposed to dock.  I call bull s h i t on the entire thing.  What is going on with these Captains?  The person taking us on our shore excursion couldn't believe it either.  There must be a financial incentive involved, as it certainly didn't involve wind or currents.

[CardowMD]

If too windy and rough to dock, you would think the tenders would definitely not be safe to use!

[njhorseman]

4 hours ago, PinonNoir said:

So this morning in Sydney, Nova Scotia, we were advised the weather was too windy and the currents were too strong to dock, so we had to anchor out and tender in.  At least they didn't skip the port entirely!  However, there was absolutely NO WIND, and I saw an object in the water that wasn't moving in the least, both alongside the ship at anchor, and when they dropped us off near where the ship was supposed to dock.  I call bull s h i t on the entire thing.  What is going on with these Captains?  The person taking us on our shore excursion couldn't believe it either.  There must be a financial incentive involved, as it certainly didn't involve wind or currents.

 

The decision to not dock was likely made or at least recommended by the harbor master.

 

You can only see the surface of the water, not the direction or strength of the currents underwater . To give you an example, when  beaches are closed to swimmers due to rip currents the surf may appear perfectly normal .

 

Given the shallow draft of the tender deeper currents that would affect the ship's operations may have little effect on the tenders, making tendering possible when docking is not.

 

Port taxes will still have to be paid. It costs money to operate the tenders so there's no financial benefit to the cruise line.

[PinonNoir]

30 minutes ago, njhorseman said:

 

The decision to not dock was likely made or at least recommended by the harbor master.

 

You can only see the surface of the water, not the direction or strength of the currents underwater . To give you an example, when  beaches are closed to swimmers due to rip currents the surf may appear perfectly normal .

 

Given the shallow draft of the tender deeper currents that would affect the ship's operations may have little effect on the tenders, making tendering possible when docking is not.

 

Port taxes will still have to be paid. It costs money to operate the tenders so there's no financial benefit to the cruise line.

I respectfully disagree.  This definitely had some financial implications.  The fact they mentioned wind, which was non-existent, gives their explanation zero credence.  Trust me, this is a wide open harbor area at least a mile across, that could not have zero current on the surface and "unsafe" currents 30 feet below the surface.  I graduated from Cal Maritime with a degree in Navigation, I know a little bit about currents and docking conditions.  This guy was angling towards a savings.  Dockage is a very expensive charge, and the tender operations likely run out of a different budget line item that doesn't impact the Captains bonus at the end of the voyage.  Anchoring out is a minimal charge, and perhaps even a freebie.  You can anchor out in most ports on the west coast of the US with no charges whatsoever.

[PinonNoir]

We had dinner tonight in the GDR.  The Crispy Scallop starter was weird....a tasteless scallop wrapped in fried philo....I don't get it.  Do not order this!  The Harira Duck soup was good.  Not great, but good.  The Seared Ahi Tuna with Porcini Mushroom Ravioli was excellent!  Yummy!  The dessert was...you guessed it...Key Lime Pie!  OMG this is the best Key Lime Pie!  Ultra Yummy!

 

We sat down in the GDR at 7:30, at their peak, and they were slightly slower than our previous encounter.  Not overly slow though.  The wine stewards seemed to be taking good care of everybody.  They seem to be fairly consistent here, which is better than expected, based on our Riviera experience, which is thankfully becoming a distant memory.  We are just 4 days out from the end of the cruise now, so I feel quite confident in saying if you are coming on Insignia, you are going to be happy.  Let's see how the next 4 days play out.

[njhorseman]

1 hour ago, PinonNoir said:

I respectfully disagree.  This definitely had some financial implications.  The fact they mentioned wind, which was non-existent, gives their explanation zero credence.  Trust me, this is a wide open harbor area at least a mile across, that could not have zero current on the surface and "unsafe" currents 30 feet below the surface.  I graduated from Cal Maritime with a degree in Navigation, I know a little bit about currents and docking conditions.  This guy was angling towards a savings.  Dockage is a very expensive charge, and the tender operations likely run out of a different budget line item that doesn't impact the Captains bonus at the end of the voyage.  Anchoring out is a minimal charge, and perhaps even a freebie.  You can anchor out in most ports on the west coast of the US with no charges whatsoever.

There's a recent paper analyzing seiches in Sydney Harbor found in Proceedings of the Nova Scotian Institute of Science (2022) Volume 52, Part 2, pp. 225-255 . It says in its conclusion:

 

"Seiches in Sydney Harbour, given their episodic nature and high frequency, have elevations that can exceed the amplitude of the major tidal constituent M2 by a factor of 2; seiche currents in the Arm were ~10 times greater than tidal or mean flows. Consequently, their impact on harbour shipping and safety could be significant."

 

I don't have a degree in navigation, but the above hints at the possibility of something that may not have been obvious to the naked eye.

Edited October 15, 2023 by njhorseman

[Gl3nnG4ry]

On 10/13/2023 at 4:01 PM, PinonNoir said:

Well that doesn't bode well for streaming.  I was able to open streaming on Youtube by using my VPN, but it was unwatchable.  Without the VPN it showed Youtube as inaccessible.  I'll try to test it again with the VPN activated.  In the meantime, here are the results of the speed test.  I find it interesting that it picked up a server in Kansas as the most optimal server for the test.  I tried a server in Charlottetown where we currently are, and it was slower.

 

 

Appreciate you doing the speed test. That's actually worse than my DSL on the mountain! ouch. Upload is actually better, but download, yeah, streaming would have a hard time.

[PinonNoir]

10 hours ago, njhorseman said:

There's a recent paper analyzing seiches in Sydney Harbor found in Proceedings of the Nova Scotian Institute of Science (2022) Volume 52, Part 2, pp. 225-255 . It says in its conclusion:

 

"Seiches in Sydney Harbour, given their episodic nature and high frequency, have elevations that can exceed the amplitude of the major tidal constituent M2 by a factor of 2; seiche currents in the Arm were ~10 times greater than tidal or mean flows. Consequently, their impact on harbour shipping and safety could be significant."

 

I don't have a degree in navigation, but the above hints at the possibility of something that may not have been obvious to the naked eye.

While that is interesting,  the claim of high winds was immediately verifiable to the naked eye.  If it was indeed a current issue, why throw in the lie?

[PinonNoir]

Forgot to mention that during our happy hour with friends we were flipping through the music stations on the TV.  I out on "Oldies" to see what Era they might be playing...40's?, 50's?

 

Imagine our surprise when the first song was Led Zeppelin, followed up by Tom Petty. Holy crap!  I've officially jumped the shark!

[Gl3nnG4ry]

9 hours ago, PinonNoir said:

Forgot to mention that during our happy hour with friends we were flipping through the music stations on the TV.  I out on "Oldies" to see what Era they might be playing...40's?, 50's?

 

Imagine our surprise when the first song was Led Zeppelin, followed up by Tom Petty. Holy crap!  I've officially jumped the shark!

I feel your pain! Lol

[PinonNoir]

Dinner in Polo Grill tonight.  I had the "Pancetta Wrapped Filet of Veal with Bay Lobster Tail Oscar Style".  This is the FIRST time I've had lobster on Oceania where it was cooked appropriately, and it was excellent.  The filet was covered in a sauce that looked like hollandaise....not necessary....I would ask them to hold the sauce.  Otherwise it was good!  My wife had the "Grilled Colorado Rack of Lamb" and she was raving about it!  Ok, if we get into Polo again I have to get that.  All in all a great meal, followed up by, you guessed it, KEY LIME PIE!!!  We even got the adjacent table to order it, and they thanked us on the way out.

 

It was interesting that the ship is continuing the trend of arriving in Port early...we were supposed to arrive at 1100, but we were all tied up by 1030.  Also, if you want to get off ASAP, don't wait for the Cruise Director to say the ship is cleared.  We had to get off quickly for an excursion this morning, and there were people disembarking 10 minutes before he announced we were clear to go ashore.

Edited October 16, 2023 by PinonNoir

[PinonNoir]

Our cruise ends tomorrow, and I've got to say I've been quite impressed with how different the Insignia voyage has been versus our Riviera experience this past July.  It might have something to do with being on a smaller ship or maybe just the people in charge holding staff to a higher standard, but it's back to what I remember from Oceania pre-covid, and what I actually expect Oceania to be.

 

My major issues:

 

• Coffee remains poor in Terrace Cafe, from both the coffee machine and basic coffee they pour.  We have basically given up on coffee everywhere except Baristas.  However, while it's the best coffee on the ship, the Baristas coffee on Insignia is nowhere near as good as it was on Riviera.  Coffee is super important to a lot of passengers, so this area needs some immediate attention.
• The face masks on the crew bugged the hell out of me, but once we entered US Waters they were allowed to take them off.  Covid apparently knows where the border is, which is good to know.
• John Clelford talks too much, and the speakers are TOO LOUD!
• We have shown up early in some ports, and left early in others.  This messed with my ability to plan shore excursions appropriately.  If the crew knows we are going to be arriving early, maybe let the passengers know?  In Saint John, New Brunswick, all passengers were told to be back by 9:30 PM (ship departure was 10:00 PM).  We went to the local Irish pub for dinner, and walked back to the ship.  When we walked in the terminal gate at 9:05 PM, the guard told us the ship had been waiting for us as they wanted to leave early.  W T F?  You can't change the departure time on passengers who have already left the ship for the day!

 

Otherwise, I've gotta say, the food issues, when we had them, were minor.  The staff has been excellent.  Our butler Sanjay has been top notch, and the Maitre 'd at Polo Grill, Shanley, has been super accommodating with getting me the incredible Key Lime Pie!  We will be disembarking tomorrow as very happy campers, so Oceania has done their job! 

[deck chair]

Hi!    That is so awesome of you to share your thoughts about your Insignia cruise.  I will be on her for 40 days on a LA to Sydney passage in January.   I t typically sail on Cunard Line.  Announcements unless absolutely necessary are limited to the captain's noon report on Cunard ships.   Thank GOD!  I am wondering if the Insignia CD made incessant, intrusive and annoying announcements about events that are already in the program as if the passengers are blind or haven't learned to read yet.  If that is the case, it will mirror what I experienced on the Sirena for 20 days this past Winter.   I could never get a clear answer if this was corporate policy or left up to the CD.   Any thoughts?  Thanks again for your review.   Be well.

Deck Chair.

[PinonNoir]

15 hours ago, deck chair said:

Hi!    That is so awesome of you to share your thoughts about your Insignia cruise.  I will be on her for 40 days on a LA to Sydney passage in January.   I t typically sail on Cunard Line.  Announcements unless absolutely necessary are limited to the captain's noon report on Cunard ships.   Thank GOD!  I am wondering if the Insignia CD made incessant, intrusive and annoying announcements about events that are already in the program as if the passengers are blind or haven't learned to read yet.  If that is the case, it will mirror what I experienced on the Sirena for 20 days this past Winter.   I could never get a clear answer if this was corporate policy or left up to the CD.   Any thoughts?  Thanks again for your review.   Be well.

Deck Chair.

I don't know if this was the CD's fault or just Oceania policy. He would announce all of the days activities that were listed in Currents, so there was no need for him to repeat those. At the end of every announcement he would spend about 30 seconds advising people to stay in their staterooms if they felt sick and to call 00, and then a reminder to always use the hand sanitizer while walking around the ship. It got quite tedious.  I would say there were at least 3-4 announcements a day, but then we were ashore in each port, so there might have been more.