FionaMG

Following! Hope you have a really amazing time. 😊

We leave on Friday for our 8-night Southern Caribbean cruise. I will be very busy Thursday - Saturday of this week, so I'm starting now in hopes that it will be easier to keep up with some smaller posts as we begin our travel. 
This will be our first time on Symphony - I'm super excited to cruise on this ship! There will be six of us: me, DH, DD (just turned 17) and DS (14) plus my parents (more below).
Our itinerary is -
Day 1 Cruising from Fort Lauderdale/Port Everglades
Day 3 Labadee (I'm fairly sure we won't stop here, but haven't heard yet what we'll have instead)
Day 5 Aruba
Day 6 Curacao
I'm bummed about Labadee. The last time we were here was in 2014 (kids were 4 & 7) so we were very excited to do all of the adventure activities this year - superman zip line, coaster and jet skis - and bought them all on Black Friday special. Hopefully we'll have some sort of stop since they've had two weeks to figure it out. With an eight night, spring break (crowded) ship, I'd prefer for 3 of the days to be in port.
We're flying from Newark, which is not our home airport - it is about 2 hours away - but was half the price. We also have a mix & match flight: JetBlue to FLL on Friday night and United back from PBI on Sunday. I've prebooked a parking space at a private location.
My parents are cruising with us for the first time. The company my Dad works for used to charter ships in the 80s so they have cruised before, but nothing like what they'll experience on Symphony. They are retired so got a good flight deal by going down on Wednesday. They are renting a car and have a great price for the three nights for a room in a condo complex (offered as an add on to their Southwest flight). They will be picking up a bottle of wine, some bottled water and maybe a few other things since they'll have so much time. We don't get in until 9pm so essentially just sleeping, breakfast and an Uber to the port. We have an 11:30am check in but plan to get there around 11am. 
They originally booked a GTY ocean view, which was the same price as an interior at the time. I caught a sale and upgraded them to a GTY ocean balcony, they were assigned 6th floor really early, and then our fabulous TA moved them two doors down from us on the 8th floor.
On our last cruise, we did a Discover Scuba for the first time and loved it. So we decided to do our PADI cert over the summer and our OW dives in a quarry in October - that was not fun at all - but we're fully certified and have a dive planned for both Aruba and Curacao. We also rented a car in Aruba. We have a very late day there (9 or 10pm) so we'll dive in the morning and then plan to drive around sightseeing for the rest of the afternoon. We rented from Top Drive and added on the chairs/snorkel/cooler package so my parents will hang out at Eagle or Palm Beach while my family dives. 
On Curacao, we will dive, my parents will snorkel, we'll change and grab lunch back on the ship and then we plan to just do a self-guided walking trip to the bridge, etc. I also want to check out the artist that @FionaMG mentioned and maybe pick up a print or two. 
We have all the shows reserved, Escape room booked, specialty lunch at Giovanni's on boarding day, and a meal at Wonderland booked to celebrate my daughter's birthday. I also got the birthday package for her, with the room decorations and cake. 
Have to run, but more to come!

Serious lack of eating today. Heat is one thing that kills my appetite & I was too hot to stuff myself at CocoCay. I didn’t even have a funnel cake. That’s unheard of for me.
We got back on the ship, showered, cooled off (the a/c is insanely strong in our cabin), & destroyed a small crowd at cartoon theme song trivia (it was nearly all 80s/90s stuff). We gave away one of the highlighters we won to a young boy & went back to the cabin to relax. I planned to hit up ELF but dozed off instead. I needed it but now I’ll be making up for lack of food with CL snacks, MDR Italian night, WJ & Sorrentos… I’d rather have ELF tbh but we’ll see what I find.
Nothing really planned after dinner. Still have plenty of vouchers to use.

If you haven't seen it already, you might like to take a look at my recent recap blog from our Symphony cruise last month. I cover our evening meals in there, with pics. I hope it helps and you have a wonderful cruise. 😊
 
 
 

That's exactly how it works.

You just use whatsapp or another app that works through wifi, such as FB messenger.
 

Off the ship not long after the gangway opened & it’s empty by the Oasis pool. This is not an early morning crowd & we’re the only ship here. Will use my Bezos holder for something frozen later.

Random food/drink pics…
Chicken Saag (MDR)

Key Lime Pie

Desert Pear Margarita with black salt from Schooner Bar (Patron in @Lovetocruise2002’s honor)

 
Goalpost Margarita from Playmakers (one of my go-to’s)

Ranger Cookie stash for the cabin

Pool deck is nucking futs. Out here cause kids want to do slides. Oh lawd help me! 

For the record, I also went to Park Cafe but didn’t get anything. And I had a ranger cookie on my way out of WJ.
Cabins were ready at exactly 1:00 and our luggage was waiting for us! We also met our cabin attendant within minutes. He quickly introduced himself & said he’d be back at 3:00. We told him no rush but asked if he could bring us extra hangers when he returned. He knocked on our door 5 mins later with a dozen hangers. Great first impression!

You’ve already been to the WJ AND ELF ?  OMG….youre going to explode before the ship leaves the dock !  😱😵😂

Just stayed in 6286 on Odyssey, and the view was horrible. Also, starboard side aft on 6th floor is right over a restaurant, you get no sleep.

It all looks amazing 🤩. Keep it coming 😄

It all looks amazing 🤩. Keep it coming 😄

See ya during the week @GatorCruiser!
First meal from empty WJ as it just opened. Beef curry that was actually spicy & fried rice. Went back for more curry. Not sure why the Indian food in the MDR is so mild compared to WJ.
 

Incredibly already met @OCSC Mike and his lovely bride during boarding. I can confirm car to bar in 15 mins 

Easy drive (aside from the car fire we passed, hope everyone was ok).
Through check-in in less than 10 minutes as usual. Just waiting for boarding to begin.

Have fun!!!! 😄

Insane clown duo ready to cruise !! They have their embarkation gear on as well. 

CRUISE DAY!!!

5pm update...
Wife - Basically done packing
Me - I have piles of stuff that just need to be put in my suitcase and my shirts hanging up to be folded tomorrow morning before we leave. I consider that basically done.

I haven't gotten much fitness on since HS, lol. I get plenty of exercise on the ship. Some of those food venues are kinda far apart and I hate taking the elevators.

Pic outside our balcony of the sea. Total millpond out there. Hope it stays that way for tomorrow. I was thinking I’d see @OCSC Mike out there paddle boarding getting his fitness on pre-cruise. 

Shout out to @OCSC Mikebwatdhed live launch of spacex falcon 9 rocket. Was freaking cool 😎 

If anyone's interested in China/Japan, Spectrum sailings out of Shanghai have just gone up on the website through to April 2026.