Scott - from what I can tell, the packages are each for 7 bottles of wine - (the regular package or the premium package) - so whether that is sufficient for all your wine needs is up to you (and I think it is only good at dinner - I doubt you can just get a bottle of wine anytime? but that I don't know - I am assuming it would be in essence a "bottle per night" for dinner.)
someone on this board has done an extensive spread sheet about comparing the costs of bringing on your own botttles of wine of the same type and paying the corkage fee - but coming from overseas you'd probably not want to carry that much wine with you.
We will probably do a package - and probably get two bottles the first night - a red and a white - then the waiter is supposed to put them away with your name on it so you can have them the next night - that way I can order beef and my wife order chicken or whatever - and we're covered (plus I generally like red better than whites and she vice versa) - then the next night the waiter can bring them out of storage. So we'd not be buying wine the second night but drinking the leftovers as it were. Or we would take them back to the room for cocktail hour the next day. or for a night cap - there is no rule about wandering the ship, wine glass in hand.
We will probably bring a couple of "really" good bottles and pay the corkage fee as well. (The dining rooms won't "store" wine you bring yourselves - but I'm assuming it will fit in the room "cooler") I've been trying to find an updaed list of the wines in the packages but the latest I could find was november of 2003 (look in the
castaway cay website - which also has recent navigators from June 2004 - inlcuding the kids navigators). The premium package had some good wines in it - and generally speaking about the same [100%] markup from liquor store retail as in most restaurants in the Midwest (perhaps a little higher than I would expect but my liquor store has very good prices on wine)
I think the packages are a pretty good deals so long as you'd have wine every night which we will [one thing I don't know is whether or not those wines are available in Palo - as I'd also read that Palo had an Italian wine list - but my guess is that if you've bought a package they can get you a bottle off that package if you are dining in Palo].
Apparently people offer to sell you the package as you get on the ship, so I figure I can see then what the list is like - and if I like it buy it at dinner (I've also read that the person who sells it gets a "commission" so it might be a spot of goodwill with the dining room server to buy from him/her the first night) if I decide not to get it - I can always hunt down a liquor store in key west the next day and buy some wine, etc. to bring on. -which might be a good option for you given the length of your trip to get to Orlando - I doubt the prices in Key West are bargains but I am sure there is a good wine store or two within walking distance of the ship.
flight tickets, and carhire tickets arrived today, airport hotel confirmation in Londona also arrived. Getting excited now.
