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Firstly let me thank all on this site for the knowledge they have shared, being a new cruiser i didnt know what to expect but the information and friendliness shared on this site has made me less worried about things. For me this upcoming cruise has been a long time coming, in fact over 20 years, it's a bucket list item that i thought i would never be able to tick off! I have dragged my wife to some strange cities and countries around the world, be it on vacation or for work but one thing i could never do was get her to go on a cruise due to her dislike ( thats an understatement ) of water. However this year as this trip is for my 50th birthday she had to relent ? hopefully this cruise is the first of many! We fly British Airways (BA)from a very cold and wet North East of Scotland on Thursday, heading to New York via Heathrow with a 7hr layover in JFK before boarding our Delta flight down to Peurto Rico for a 2 day stay before our cruise. I booked both of these flights as soon as i was able to (11 months out) and i have watched prices daily, BA has never dropped, Delta i could have saved a little ($100) if i waited one month. Since then prices have risen so it was a good idea to ignore my wifes advice to wait until 2 or 3 months out. The hotel of choice having read good reports on it was the Sheraton in Old San Juan, right opposite the cruise port or so i thought! Thanks to info on here i found out that RC leave from another terminal, that along with the fact my wife saw a photo of a hotel with a beach with hammocks on it where we could just chill on our first day sipping cocktails after a long flight, i decided a change was needed, booked the Courtyard by Marriot Isla Verde ( yes the one with hammocks) as soon as dates appeared available and since then i was watched the prices rocket, so again good idea to book as soon as you can. The cruise itself was booked through a UK travel agent, i didnt have a clue which one to use but noticed one was giving you a price match, $100 OBC and free drinks package and 6 bottles of red wine if you booked through them, the wine was the deciding factor and i must admit they tasted nice. Room is an oceanview on deck 9, i wanted a balcony but had to compromise as my wife wasn't keen on a balcony on first cruise. For UK cruisers i used trivago to look for best deal on hotel, skyscanner for flights and just searched for best deal on cruise, i then went onto TOP CASHBACK and used that as a link to BA, Booking.com and company for insurance and have ended up with a £200 payback which is extra money to spend on holiday ONBOARD Voom purchased for my wife using OBC so she can keep in touch with family back home As i got drinks package FOC, theres no point adding up bar bill to see if i break even, also the fact as im scottish the batterey would probably run out an calculator from over use?? Schedule Thursday 22nd Aberdeen to Newyork Friday 23rd New York to Peurto Rico : 2 night stay CRUISE ITERNERARY BASSETERRE, ST KITTS & NEVIS ST. JOHNS, ANTIGUA CASTRIES, ST. LUCIA BRIDGETOWN, BARBADOS PHILIPSBURG, ST. MAARTEN Back to San Juan SJU TO JFK As we just like to wing it and decide what we want to do when we wake up or sober up lol, the only things we have planned are Bernards tours in St Maarten and Atlantis Submarine in Barbados ( another bucket list item so i had to bribe my wife for this one) After the cruise we head back to the big apple and heres where the bribery kicks in, a 2 night stay in the Grand Hyatt in NYC taking in the xmas lights etc, ice skating in Bryant Park even though i've never skated in my life( just as well i have idiots abroad travel insurance) some Xmas shopping at Jersey gardens, however my wife wants to visit Tiffany's for her present ? and just when i thought everything was done and i could relax without having to spend anymore more money, John Legend announces a tour where his only New York date corresponds with our time there and knowing full well what my wifes reaction would be if we get there and she see's advertisements for his concert, its easier for me to have a quiet life if i just open my wallet and purchase 2 tickets All packed and counting down the days ? Ray

Update: College Ski made it in. Football has had close first half but now a rough start to the 2nd half. Barring an incredible comeback, Football and Mr Ski will be on the cruise. Sad but happy, is that even possible? We are at the Springhill Suites by Marriott airport and cruise port. It’s a dated but clean hotel. We just need a hotel to sleep as we typically come in late the evening before. I like a free breakfast especially when traveling with kids. We ordered from Uber Eats when we arrived and food came in about 20 minutes. Pictures of the 2 queen suite.

My photo from our hotel view..this is why I stick with words ?

When you're the family chauffeur, you get a free ride ???

Day 13 - Disembarkation ? Time to say goodbye - unfortunately. After our last breakfast at Park Cafe we waited in the Theater until our number was called. At least disembarkation was a breeze - no immigration, no costums, we just walked off. Wish I could say the same about getting to the car rental station. While the new terminal looks beautiful, they apparently didn't think traffic through. Bus and shuttle have serious problems turning and have to reverse out of the berths - this takes time and only worsens the chaos. Additionally, there are no lines for the bus - it's survival of the fittest. Took us 1.5 hours to get on a bus, but getting our car took 5 minutes once we arrived at the rental station. The day was spent shopping at the Disney store and Walmart. When it was time for checkin, we went to our Hotel - Sense Beach House in South Beach. It's a nice little hotel on a quiet block of Ocean Drive. As promised, we went to South Pointe Park for Symphony's sailaway. We also got to watch Mariner's sailaway and the fireworks for Symphony. Sad to see her go, but we'll be back with Oasis 5 ? A little stroll around South Beach: For those who made it that far: thanks for following along, I really enjoyed blogging for you. I'll do our final verdict (and a little comparison to Princess) later, probably when I'm home.

Day 12: The last full day of this cruise and only our second port of call – Cape Canaveral. As we booked the Kennedy Space Center Guided Tour, we had an early breakfast at Park Cafe. Meeting for the excursion was in the Royal Theater at 8 am. As we’d arrived early, we were already in line to get off the ship at 7.50 am. Unfortunately, this didn’t help much. Immigration in Port Canaveral was mayhem for non-US citizens. We stood in line for 2.5 hours, shortening our 8h tour to 5.5 hours. This was our first major gripe with Royal. While they can’t speed up the immigration process, their organisation was truly disappointing. They sold way too many full day tours resulting in thousands of people trying to get through immigration at the same time. And instead of reserving the first hours for full day tours, they also let half day tours and passengers without any tours off the ship at the same time. Never seen such a bad organisation and we’ve already done immigration in Russia. On the bright side: our tour guide Doug did everything he could to show us as many things possible within the shortened time frame. I’m sure we’d have enjoyed KSC more hadn’t we been so tired from standing in line for hours – maybe we’ll just try another time. At least we saw some alligators on the way back to the ship We were finally back onboard at 4.22 pm (all aboard 4.30 pm), so our first stop was the pool bar for some much needed alcoholic drinks. We managed to get first row seats in the Solarium for sail away. Symphony’s arrival in the US generated quite some interest, we had 2 helicopters documenting sailaway and hundreds of people watching. Guess Carnival Liberty never had a bigger audience ? Before dinner we finished packing, then we went to Solarium Bistro. I have to agree with Twangster here, it’s a pity we only did this on the last day. Well, as we were able to share, we had a significant advantage: we managed to try everything we wanted! We tried Greek Salad, Ceviche, Tomato & Bocconcini, Tzatziki & Pita Bread, Seafood Soup, Stuffed Zucchini, Greek-style Roasted Potatoes, All-natural Grass-fed Skirt Steak with Horseradish, Chicken Kebab, Lemon Pepper Roasted Chicken, Kofta, Moussaka, Grilled Salmon, Fresh Mussels, Grilled Shrimp, Chocolate Nocciola, Loukoumades, Torta de Mele, Tarte Tropezienne, Panna Cotta à la Romana, Galaktoboureko. I wouldn’t recommend the Chicken Kebab but everything else was really good. Feeling completely full we changed clothes and headed to the pool for some laps and just relaxing in the hot tubs. We fled when it started raining – yes I know we were already wet, but our cover up clothes weren’t ? The evening ended with some final drinks at – you guessed it – Playmakers. Side notes: 15k steps Nearly forgot to pick up our pictures – fortunately it suddenly dawned on hubby before they closed the foto shop. We’re missing Symphony soooooo much ?

Well, we finally made it down to Miami. Had two standing reservations with Enterprise for a minivan this morning. Got to Enterprise and no minivans. Had to wait a little bit for one to be brought in. Did a little trunk Tetris with the luggage and made the 7-hour drive to Miami. Uneventful other than traffic..but expected cuz Miami and before a big travel holiday..blah blah blah. Our hotel is the Hampton Inn and Suites Brickell. Great location if you are flying as it's about 2 blocks from the Metrorail from the airport. It is downtown Miami so of course not optimal if you're driving because you have to pay to park..so we checked in, ditched the luggage and drove out to the airport to drop off the rental. $14 Lyft or $2.25 Metrorail...hmmmm tough choice there. Now, I don't live in a big city so public transportation is a novelty and I embrace it whenever I can. Rode the 'Rail back and then hit up the gastropub next to the Hampton. Now our hotel rate came with coupons for drinks at two bars. One was this gastropub called Batch. We hit it up and I got their house Black Barrell draft. It tasted like KY Bourbon Stout but much, much lighter. We order some eats..and they made mac and cheese out of gnocchi. This was amazing comfort food and totally worth the hipster we serve grain bowls and avocado toast prices. The wings were alao good and the Brussels sprouts were also a hit. Annnnnd..ladies drink free sangria and well drinks from 10pm-1am. Whaaaaaaat? So remember that if you stay downtown Miami on Friday night..Batch in Brickell..look them up! Currently waiting on my free sangria in plastic cups to take it back to the hotel. Another bonus... @CGTLH paid the dinner tab...haha, sucker.

Cruise Day: All 6 of us are onboard. Left the hotel at 10 and they were boarding at 11:30. We were the first on the ship! A quick photo drop. Suite area pier 18 i don’t remember seeing umbrellas in splash away bay. Handwashing stations in windjammer skypad fun. I’ll describe later. JS toiletries

Sounds better than my wife so thats a positive straight away lol

One interesting note is how they bundle the deluxe package with VOOM. One my currently booked sailing on Symphony-- Separate Deluxe -- $52.00 VOOM Surf and Stream -- $12.99 Total -- $64.99 Bundled (Deluxe with VOOM Surf and Stream) -- $66.00 So, we get to pay them another $7.00 for the convenience of buying it bundled over the course of the cruise...annoying...gotta check everything... #therearenorealsales

It is Officially Cruise Day here in Miami. In the meantime here are some pictures taken from the 6th floor pool here at the Hampton Inn and Suites.

Yep, but fortunately the "auto" mode is generally a safe place to allow the camera to figure it out while you get used to it. As you use it more and learn it better you can start taking over and digging into the settings more. I consider the 'auto' mode to be "drink package compatible" meaning when you don't want to think about ISO and f-stop and shutter speed just put it in auto and enjoy your drink(s)!

T-2 Packing and stressing out Who? Welcome to the Skis crazy family travels. I'm Mel, married to Mr. Ski and we have 4 kids: DD18 College Ski, DS15 Football Ski, DS12 Soccer Ski and DD7 Cutie Ski. I'm not a great blogger and I'll be without my computer this trip. All updates and pictures will be on my Iphone. I'll try to remember to upload the daily activity sheet and I'll send Matt the Cruise Compasses after the cruise. Where? This sailing will be Independence first regular Caribbean cruise after her TA and the "Bliss" clothing optional cruise. Yes, I have medical grade sanitation wipes to wipe down the stateroom. This 5 night Western Caribbean takes us to Labadee and Falmouth. Why? Why this cruise instead of the amazing group cruise on Symphony also going on this week? I'm having a bit of FOMO but this works better for us. We typically go to WDW every 2 years this week and I just couldn't do it again! WDW is the exact opposite of a relaxing cruise vacation. So in January, I looked at cruises and felt that we got a good deal during a school holiday for 2 connecting Junior Suites. Also, in the mix was College Ski. She wanted to spend some time at home seeing friends. So the 5 night was a compromise. I want my kids to want to vacation with us as we will most likely only be able to do family vacations with everyone for a few more years. What could go wrong? Flying separately on 3 flights over 2 days. Soccer, Cutie and I will fly out tomorrow. Weather looks good. I'm not worried which probably means I should be! And here comes the drama(s). When I booked in January, I knew there was the slimmest chance Mr. Ski and Football Ski would not make the cruise. That slim chance has become a 50-50. DS HS football team is in the quarterfinals (awesome) and if they win Friday night Mr. Ski and Football Ski will not be on the cruise (bummer). I have to root for the win even if that means missing the cruise. If the team loses tomorrow night, they will fly out Saturday morning. A day of the cruise flight and it would be horrible to lose and then miss the cruise due to a flight delay. Next, College Ski is in the path of the nor'easter that is hitting today. Hopefully by Friday night, it looks that by tomorrow night it will be dry. This is her first flight by herself to somewhere other than home and school. I've checked the aircrafts entire path for tomorrow and other airlines flights out to FLL. Fingers crossed. Starting to question the decision to take this trip. Too much pre-cruise excitement and I haven't started packing! Speaking of packing, I should start! I'll come back with plans, excursions, etc. It will be my reward for packing. Brothers Osborne "It Ain't My Fault" is my packing theme song!

Muster drill time!

Here are some Terminal A photos (including a strange attempt at a “green roof”.)

Was just on Freedom in October, did the St Thomas, Curacao, Aruba and St Kitts itinerary. Even though Freedom hasn't been AMPED, she is a very well maintained ship and only slightly showing her age. If you do the specialty dinning, try Giovanni's and order the filet, a side note, no matter what you see on the menu, ask the waiter for the pasta of the day and you can't go wrong, whatever it is. Following and have a great cruise.

Fun of no tab at Playmakers, note this was four people enjoying.

Playmakers wings are the best I have ever had at sea!

All the footballs...or the ones they have rights to.

First day dining, depressed Hooked isn't open for lunch. Oh well, Playmakers will do.

LyftXL

Enjoy! This itenerary is on my bucket list.

Epic trip ! So glad to be following along with you !!

Very nice job. Sorry it's over !!

Those particular islands on your itinerary are beautiful. St. Kitts and St. Lucia are breathtaking. Enjoy!

Thanks ? TBH ship & Itinerary were booked before i joined this blog, Caribbean was a bucket list item for reasons mentioned on " why do you cruise thread" ? Having read various posts i guess i got lucky with my selection

You are going to have a great time! Great choice of ship/itinerary too for your first cruise!

Saw him in MSG last year and yeah he was great, which is why i knew i would live to regret it if i didnt get her a ticket for this trip

Made it and waiting to board, Genie is chillin' with us.

What an epic trip. Can’t wait to follow along. I’m hoping your wife takes to the water by the end!

How exciting! Can't wait to read along!

Following. Have an awesome time. John Legend is going to be great with his new Christmas CD. Loving your blog and sense of humor.

I have found that $18 was always the "sale price" when you were looking it must of been on sale and you just didn't realize or it was Royal's lovely IT issues. The real price was always $26 so good thing you booked for $18 because its not going to get lower than $18. Infact it is supposed to be going up for 2019 so you really got a good deal.

Following! Have a safe flight and great cruise!

Yay! Have fun!!!!

Sounds all great and well planned. Following... Enjoy your cruise!

There is no additional charge to use the onboard computers. They will display the Voom login page where you enter the access code provided when Voom is pre-purchased. His phone will be logged off while he is using Voom on the ship computer. The access code only allows for one device at a time and the ship's computer is counted as one device.

Thanks Sis for the recap of the exciting day and you're welcome for dinner.

I don't think they are planning to block JS acces to CK as much as not making easy to figure out. Numbers fluctuate week to week. Sky class, Star class, Pinnacles. By not making it overly convenient trimming JS provides a buffer to accommodate the rest.

First of all great blog. Regarding the CK , Also on the Symphony Of the Seas the CC indicates its for GS and above so I guess its a cruise ship "mistake", I guess they want the option to deny JS if there are many Pinnacles during the cruise. The JS keys never opens the CK , do not know why it so problematic to program the door in a way the JS key will work. Anyway, on the Symphony we found it very easy to book the CK (we stayed at a JS) during the first day we just called GS and asked to transfer us to the CK and booked for the first night. after we enjoyed the first night dinner, before leaving we booked another dinner at CK ,in total we eat three times there. most of the times the CK was half empty.

Writing quickly as I'm about to pick up Soccer and Cutie early from school and head to the airport. We'll get in around dinner time and I plan on just using Uber Eats. If anyone has a suggestion for Uber Eats near FLL, I would love to have it! As of now, College Ski's flight out of the northeast is on time and I'm happy to see an earlier flight already departed from the airport. In 10 hours, we'll find out the fate of Mr Ski and Football Ski! Excursions Day 2 - Cruising and I scheduled the On the Roll Sushi class for myself, College and Football. It is at 11:30 so a perfect lunch! Day 3 - Labadee. The ship is here from 7:30-3:30 which is quite early to me. We have the Dragon's Breath Flight Line scheduled at 7:30 for 3 of us and the Beach Bungalows. Both of these IMO were a great deal. $78 each for the flight line and $197 for the bungalow. It was just a random sale and I haven't seen it that cheap again. I actually have 2 bungalows booked and need to cancel the more expensive one. I couldn't figure out online how to cancel only one and not both. Day 4 - Falmouth - No plans. We've done Blue Hole and loved it but didn't want to make the drive again. I was thinking of the white water river rafting but never booked it. Day 5 - Cruising I never saw any Sky Pad reservations on the Cruise Planner. I plan on asking once onboard. Dinner Plans We love MTD and plan on eating in the MDR each night. I am not sure what I did but I didn't book the MTD reservations accurately. The first night I included all 6 of us but the other nights I didn't. When I figured that out the 6:15 slot wasn't available and we'll be eating at 7:15. It may actually work a bit better for us as it gives us more time to enjoy the pools in the afternoon, get a snack without feeling like you could ruin dinner, etc. We'll see if it works for the shows too. Trip Insurance Some of you may be wondering if I have Trip Insurance and I do. I do not have Cancel for Any Reason Insurance. I did investigate and read the fine print but from what I saw I would need to cancel at least 3 days in advance of the trip under the Cancel For Any Reason clause. For this trip, I would need to cancel about 18 hours prior to the cruise. We knew the risk and we were accepting what could happen.

A safe place to start with any camera you don't know is to use "Auto". On most Sony cameras there is a dial on the top right of the camera that rotates. One choice should be "Auto" in green. For low light situations the camera will automatically adjust the ISO but in extreme circumstances that will create a lot of noise or grain in pictures. The camera will try to remove some of this when it creates the JPEG file but sometimes you need to use software to further reduce the noise in low light photos. You'll have to experiment and try different settings. For action photography such as the ice skating show you will want to use Shutter mode with shutter speeds of 1/200 or higher, such as 1/400 to capture people who are moving. The camera should have 'Scene' mode using that same dial that has Auto on it. Once in scene mode you can choose a particular scene such as 'sunset', 'landscape', 'night scene', 'portrait' , etc. With any new camera you will need to experiment and try different settings in different situations. You learn just as much from screwing up and not getting a perfect shot as you from picking the settings and getting it right. Take lots of pictures and learn what works and what doesn't by trial and error.

Fantastic blog so far!! I love it when the crew interacts positively with my little one! Makes my day to see him happy!!

Day 5 - Sea Day Another beautiful day on a ship. We really spent today together as a family, and I totally took zero pictures... I’m updating this from my phone since I have no pics, and we are off to Nachi soon. We woke up and had Solarium Bistro for breakfast. It was serviceable. I do like that it is less crowded than Windjammer. After that, V went to AO, I went to the casino, and Abby went to run the track. We all got back together for lunch in the Windjammer. The food so far there has just been ok. Nothing to write home about. While we were there, one of the managers was making balloon animals, and made V a butterfly. That made her happier than anything so far this trip. In a small flash forward, it gave me a heart attack when it popped in our room at around 11 pm when we were just about to sleep... After lunch we went to the pool deck for a while. V loves the swirl pool thing. It’s actually warm. The rest of the pools are a little chilly. We were having some waves yesterday, so the pools were a little sloshy, but nothing too terrible. After the requisite pool deck ice cream cone, it was back to the room for a nap, and to get ready for another formal night. After Giovanni’s last night, we decided we’d go again tonight, this time taking V with us. We had seen the kids menu, so we thought we’d give it a shot on a walk in. They found us a table immediately, and we got to ordering quickly since we were going to the 7:30 show. We got V the butter noodles. For apps we got beef carpaccio, which was pretty tasty. Pastas we had the tagliatelle again. For our mains, I had the filet this time, and Abby had the prawns. The filet was just as good tonight. Virginia decided she wanted the prawns instead of her noodles. Our waiter was amazing with her, and when he saw this, he brought out an order of prawns just for her. It has been awesome to see all of the staff interact with her. For dessert, V got ice cream, and both Abby and I got the chocolate torte with ice cream. After eating it again, this has been the best dessert we’ve had. It is amazing, and not too rich. I can say that we are definitely #TeamSpecialtyDining. After dinner it was off to see the shows. First was Come Fly with Me. There was a little delay as the shipped experienced a blackout for a few minutes, and they had to restart the power system completely. The show was ok. Talent was good, but again there was not real story line. I was shocked at how rude so many people in the audience were. Many of them holding conversations at normal volume. It was very annoying. Due to the delay, we missed the start of Frozen in time. We got over there to see most of it though, and it was spectacular. In terms of storytelling, this was the best show, and very impressive athletically as well. Of all the shows, I would watch this again. On the way out, we had to grab a $3 box of popcorn. Seems silly to charge that much for a small box of popcorn... all in all it was a very nice sea day. V is still asleep this morning. She’s having so much fun. Going back to school is going to be rough on her.

these promotions mean nothing when it comes to best prices. They could do a 99% off promo and I guarantee magically the prices would still come out to be similar to what you see on any other day. Their pricing is based on time of year (for far out bookings) & how well the ship is filling up. Beyond that these promotions are just ways to say "Hey come look this new sale we have going on". What i would recommend is to price out which cruise you think you want to go on then over the following days or weeks keep looking at the prices. With the same 60% off sale or whatever the sale may be you will see the prices change within a sale. You just have to find a price you find to be of value. With the non refundable deposits it makes the YOLO book-it a little harder to swallow these days if you are just looking to HOLD a cruise. Yes you can reprice before final payment but in the past many of us would book 2 - 3 and pick the one we found to the the best value and cancelled the others before the final payment.

We actually only have 2 JS. I made a last minute switch so I am the one who would be solo.