@Majestic Share photos of your amazing trip (and Mesh!)
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Will do! Just got back last night. Need to come here and post my updates. 
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Ok so here’s a summarized report of my findings.
Before I start let me recap that there were 5 cabins in our group. 4 of those cabins had 2 GoTenna devices. I had 4. One of mine was dedicated to be a relay which I hung out on my balcony.
I had instructed everyone to upgrade their units to the latest code before we left. This would hopefully avoid us having any problems.
The ship I was on is Royal Caribbean’s Freedom of the Seas. She is 1,112 feet long, 209 feet high, and can accommodate 3,634 passengers and 1,300 crew on fifteen passenger decks.
Our cabin, 9598, was located MidShip on the Port (left if you are at the back looking forward) side of the ship. We had a balcony with our cabin. The group of 5 cabins total were all pretty close to each other on the same side of the ship. We were all on Deck 9.
Stateroom to Stateroom: We never had problems. Worked perfectly for the most part. I say that because one party in our group had constant problems with their GoTennas. In the end, one of them didn’t update properly and the other kept losing connection to the phone so they never got messages. When I realized that one wasn’t updated they tried to do it and I thought it worked. We were able to chat with that party for most of the day but then that night, the unit died and wouldn’t power up. Their other unit would receive but not send messages. Needless to say, these guests were not happy with the units and didn’t really get to see the value they brought. They told me they returned them which is a shame because they liked how the units worked. They figured once the kinks get worked out they would consider trying them again.
Throughout the Ship: I think the general consensus was that the GoTenna’s worked great throughout the ship. We were “regularly” relaying through one or two nodes so I am sure that the fact many of us had a GTM helped. There were some times where the message would not go through at all. I personally recorded successful messages from Deck 5 Midship to Deck 9 Midship, also from Deck 5 Forward to Deck 9 Midship and usually through one or two relay nodes, and from Deck 3 Aft (dining room) to Deck 9 Midship. The last one being a stretch considering all the steel the messages would have to go through.
On the Islands: I’d say the only island I can remember using mine is St. Maarten where we communicated with some of our friends who were further down the beach from us and also one person communicated with his wife on the ship which was over a mile away from us. I also used mine while I was in the port area in St Kitts to chat with my wife who was still on the ship. Most often those messages were relaying but I did get a few failed messages. While we were in Barbados we used the GTMs to chat with each other on the beach a bit but mostly when one of us was getting drinks to see what the others wanted. 
In all, I am pleased with the performance we got and can only see things getting better from here. I am keeping mine and looking forward to the next adventure where I can use them. Many of my GTM pics are on my phone so I’ll post pictures in the next few posts after this.
Let me know if you have any questions.
Fred
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The Pitons on St Lucia.
Freedom of the Seas docked in St. Maarten. This is the view from where we were on the beach.
Freedom docked in St. Kitts.
Freedom docked in St. Maarten.
Antigua
St. Kitts
Barbados - Brandon’s Beach
Leaving St. Maarten.
Out at sea…ahhhhh…
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Awesome pics and funtastic views
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Love that balcony mount, so easy and neat. Having something on the balcony rail would be even better, but I’d say it was a quite successful test (other than the problems with the one pair that had some issues.) Thanks for the report and the awesome pics! 
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Thanks Fred,
We leave this Sunday on Oasis of the seas which is a bit larger ship for Royal Caribbean. We have four Gotennas for a family of 3 so we can leave on on our 8th “floor” balcony.
Do you think any of your relays were through other guests that were not part of your group?
Thanks for all the info and great pictures.
John
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Remember we had 5 cabins with a total of 11 regular and 1 relay GTMs. Yes we did relay often so I do believe that some of the success we had was because of the number of units we had deployed.
Enjoy your cruise and please do come here and share your experience with us. 
Fred
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Cruise was great. Big sucker of a ship. I hung one relay on my balcony. We used the gotennas several times and we were always able to connect. Usually this was through relay if one of us were in the cabin with the door closed.
A few other observations as this was the first time really using them at all.
- Battery lasted all day
- GPS was way off at times. Once in port it had me a quarter of a mile away so I am not sure what that was from
- I was never able to test ship to shore distance as we were all off at the same time
- I do appreciate how quickly they pair to your phone
- It would be nice to have a Gotenna model that has a simple small screen for texting build in so you can carry just one devise. I know that is not the point but even if it was slightly larger I would buy one to have when you are not using your phone for anything else but gotenna.
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Will need to remember zip ties for my next cruise (it’ll be my first too).
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I just completed one week cruise on NCL Star (~900 ft long of usable deck space) using two relays mid ship opposite sides with my wife and I each having one set up to on our iphones as well as a window unit in our stateroom. For the first time with the GTM, I have to say I was disappointed. I could go top (floor 13) and next to it (pool level - level 12)) front to back of the ship same side and that was it. I had my relays mid ship mid level (level 7) just forward of the mid ship elevators secured to the bottom of the tender with a couple of long wire ties. No hassles changing daily though was expecting to get caught or lose one in the process but never happened. I could not connect via our room on the 5th floor level even though had a unit in the window (didn’t have balcony unfortunately) to anywhere on ship and too much steel between that and my relay position midship. Our room was 200 ft back of the bow, port side.
It worked virtually where I could see my wife and that was it, ie the open area level 12 and 13. 7th level tests front to back even with relay failed but that’s partly obstructed by metals areas too.
I couldn’t make any shore to ship tests as my wife was with me and my pings to find if anyone else had any on board failed too. Even around Venice (our starting point), Corfu and Santorini failed to find any other units to chat with.
Dave
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That’s somewhat disappointing. The balcony may be key to getting enough signal out from the superstructure to reach other units. It’s possible that two relays, one each near bow and stern, would have worked better, but you have to take what opportunities present themselves, too. I’m sure other cruisers will appreciate the effort and it is instructive despite the poor results.
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Couple things to comment. I had 8 units with me, so could have tried more but 1. front of ship impossible (or at least challenging) to hide and swap daily. The rear of the ship had more potential. The reality of a 5th level stateroom though is on the star, vertically, that’s 2 levels of solid steel decking to pass to any semblance of rf transmission potential. Same thing levels 8-11. Could quite likely have near room communication as walls were paper thin - could virtually carry on a conversation between them. They have steel bulkheads every so many rooms, also of steel which would limit communication horizontally too.
Hiding units in halls on our floor a challenge too.
Hiding units on the open floors 12/13 also a challenge given the number of people always there. I was up there at 5am on morning and several people still walking about.
As I said, disappointed but not surprised. I was hoping to defy the laws of physics I guess 
A cruise ship is a tough environment to work in.
D.
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@dcbour Haha that about sums it up! With RF literally and metaphorically, YMMV (your mileage may vary). No RF environment is equal and all cruise ships are constructed differently. But I agree with @MikeL that your experience is instructive regardless.
Where @Majestic reported good performance throughout Royal Caribbean’s Freedom of the Seas, @john_C_Wisconsin reported good connectivity on Royal Caribbean’s Oasis of the Seas, and someone else in an older thread reported a good experience throughout Celebrity’s Eclipse, now we know — thanks to you — that Norwegian’s Star might require a more robust set up to ensure RF propagation.
Either way, hope you had fun — you went to beautiful places. 
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With one exception, cruise itinerary was great, never having been to Greece before. Corfu left a lot to be desired, economic conditions of Greece’s issues very visible there.
Unfortunately, the ending was a challenge. Don’t know if you heard about the woman overboard 2 weeks ago. She jumped overboard and caused a whole lot of issues and millions of dollars in search and other costs, 1/2 the boat missed flights home, as well as 3 other cruise ships had their scheduled messed up looking for her too. Never mind the one tanker as well as airplanes and coast guard too. It cost me another $15000 to get home, double the cost of the cruise - awaiting insurance to pay me back for that now. Whole lot of stress to an otherwise great holiday.
Yeah, i don’t think anyone can accidentally fall off a cruise ship. I’m 6 foot tall and the balcony rails are always well above my belly button. I would have to pull a chair up to get over the rail. I noticed in another forum they show the back of the ship that she went off of and it flared out significantly. If she had “fell” she would have slammed onto steel. Should would have to of leaped off the back to clear it. Sorry to hear it cost you so much for the flight re-booking. I rarely purchase trip insurance, but that certainly would we a reason why.
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I’m sending 3 Gotenna Mesh units with my in-laws on their next cruise. 1 for each of them and 1 to leave as a relay for their cabin. Hoping it works for them!
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