Tipsy

Breakfast, drank.

The 2nd of the 3 major pursuits aboard is drinking. With a selection of 10 bars at which to park yourself and order a drink you never have to go far before topping up your glass. This is before you even order that bottle of wine with dinner or get your nightcap delivered to your room.

Coffee, drank.

It doesn’t really matter what time of day it is, you can find a drink and have it brought to you. Most of the bars open at midday, or 4PM for your pre-dinner cheeky cocktail, if you can find a waiter, you can get a drink. People at the coffee and pastry shop can just as likely be found mid morning with a cocktail as a hot drink, and even amongst the hot drinks half of them have been irished up.

Lunch, drank.

By the pool, in the dining halls, at the pizza parlor, in the theaters, whatever and whenever you are, you can get a drink. Just walking around the ship, take a drink with you. People going up and down the stairs are clutching the railing with one hand while nursing some colourful glass in the other.

Siesta, drank.

They have quite the assortment of cocktails available all arranged by your favourite spirit. I find myself gravitating towards a Lynchberg Lemonade which is Jack Daniels, Sprite, a slice of lemon, and something else that doesn’t really matter. Otherwise I might go for a Moscow Mule which is vodka, ginger ale, some lime, and other things not relevant to getting me a warm tingly feeling. My brother has developed a fondness for a guinness cocktail that I have no idea what they put in, but 2 or 3 of those before dinner tends to sort him out nicely.

Dinner, drank.

You can order a bottle of wine (or anything for that matter) to your dinner table. You don’t have to finish it that night, unless you want to, they will happily recork it and put your goon away to be finished the next night. Or you can have it delivered to your room for a nightcap.

Theater, drank.

The pricing of the cocktails isn’t too bad, coming in about $11 for a 3 shot cocktail. Quite reasonable for the casual alcoholic. Or if you can find cheap booze while ashore you are allowed to bring 1 bottle back aboard with you for consumption at a charge of $15 corkage. Unlike most bars you won’t be handing over money either, you give them your cabin card and it is charged to your room and at the end of the trip your credit card. It feels like you’re spending nothing at all. I am told a tale of one gentleman who was arguing his bill at the end of a 20 day trip. He had budgeted for $10k worth of expenses, which seems quite adequate to me, but somehow this committed consumer had blown $14k on personal alcohol consumption alone. This was before any additional charges or gratuities had been applied.

Bed time, drank.

All the bars are open till late, and you can take your drink back to your room to finish in bed. It would not surprise me to find that there are people on the ship who haven’t been sober at all on this entire journey. The shops are well prepared for this eventuality with Alta Seltzer, Barocca and sports drinks stocked to relieve the previous nights indulgences, or you can just opt for a little hair of the dog. It’s about 12:45PM at the moment and my brother has just knocked on my door for us to head down to a bar, perfectly timed too as my drink is empty.