dr martini

Don’t have a ton of time to type this all up, just going to drop some photos from yesterday and I think you smart people will figure it out.
 










 

Don’t have a ton of time to type this all up, just going to drop some photos from yesterday and I think you smart people will figure it out.
 










 

Don’t have a ton of time to type this all up, just going to drop some photos from yesterday and I think you smart people will figure it out.
 










 

couple other random observations onboard and in our room
room safe is broken, called maintenance and showed our root attendant right away so we weren’t blamed for it, we’ll see if/when that gets fixed  There are USB outlets on the vanity, which is great, but those are also broken.  Seems like someone tried to jam a plug in the wrong way maybe?  Again not a huge deal but that leaves this pretty good sized room with only two real outlets.  I have a USB hub with 6 outputs, thankfully, but we’re still short as the bathroom only has the European shaver plug only type outlet and there are no outlets anywhere else in the room.  We also requested and have a small medical fridge/freezer unit for my wife to store milk in as she’s still pumping for our youngest aka we are running this whole operation on one outlet essentially.  Not the end of the world, but annoying.  There is a usb plug on the phone and yes we’ll be using that. I noticed throughout the day that the pop dispensing guns at the all the bars are Saran wrapped up and not working.  They do have two liters and bottles of all necessary items around but I’m sure it’s a pain for the staff.  I asked our very friendly bartender at schooner and he laughed it off with a shrug and ‘supply chain’ type comment, we all could sure approach the world today more like that.
Wi-Fi on this ship is blazing fast 

Don’t have a ton of time to type this all up, just going to drop some photos from yesterday and I think you smart people will figure it out.
 










 

First order of business was to complete all the safety and check in procedures.  We had already listened to the ship horn sound and watched the short video about life jackets on our phones at the hotel earlier in the morning.  Our muster (in case of emergency) station was C8 on the wraparound promenade of deck 5, so we hung a left as we walked aboard and within the first minute had our entire check in taken care of, boom.  Just like that, let the sail away party begin.
Before heading upstairs to check out our room or the Lime & Coconut we wanted to add a few dining reservations.  The unlimited dining package has one slight trade off and I didn’t fully understand when I booked and I do see a lot of questions about online - the rub of it is basically you’re only allowed to make one reservation beforehand in the cruise planner and then have to wait until you’re on the ship to make the rest of your bookings, which can be done at any restaurant.  There are other people trying to scheme around this but I’m not going to get into that here.  We went right from our muster station and went right to Izumi where we had no problem at all working with a staff member who was right up front on their computer with access to all the specialty restaurant onboard.  Our ten minutes of work being done, it was time for a drink and our own little walking tour of the ship!

 

 
Looking at deck plans and even some of the great YouTube tours and other things online is a ton of fun and helps build anticipation to get people like myself through Midwest winters, but there really is nothing like seeing it all in person.  We chose Freedom for this vacation not because of the itinerary particularly, but for the ship as it was the newest Amplified ship of those on my casino Royale offer and because we loved our Navigator experience so much.  Main differences with Nav to Freedom’s upgrades were noticeable right away - things that blew me away were the playmakers space and the main pool deck.  Playmakers is huge on Freedom!  It really is like walking into a new flashy sports bar anywhere in the states.   We didn’t have reservations but realized Giovanni’s was open for lunch as we walked by and we swung in to check it out.  We were the only people there, rooms weren’t ready yet and we thought hey, why not?

Dining here starts with a nice pair of garlic knots and red sauce with a tiny bit of pesto, we had a couple salads and did our best to split the assorted meat and cheese tray which was huge!  Definitely made more for a group twice or thrice our size.

After lunch we walked back down deck 11 and our room was ready just before 1.
Room 1156 is a junior suite balcony that was added during the 2020 amplification by carving back some space from the spa and workout areas, Matt had a post about it that really helped set this whole mini splurge trip of ours into motion.  The room is huge, enough storage for a transatlantic or to comfortably have our two girls in the room with us.  



The balcony is very generous as well, they have removed that middle pane of glass above the handrail, there are two lounger type chairs and a small table with two matching arm chairs.  Can’t get over how great and new it all is.  There’s also a full set of three different soap, shampoo, and conditioner mounted in the bathroom shower/tub and a huge walk in closet.  I’ll have to grab some more pics there.  We took a quick half hour nap, fully unpacked and stored our bags in the huge walkin closet and below the bed and headed back out to the pool deck to enjoy sailaway with a quick stop up on deck 13 to check out the Viking crown lounge, stilled called Olive or Twist in some of the naming on Freedom.  One of my favorite areas on the Voyager class she’s nearly identical to me here, just great views and never very crowded.

Spent a long time in one of the solarium hot tubs that hangs over the edge with a great view of Miami as we sailed away.  

Cleaned up for dinner, had a couple nice drinks at the Schooner bar, looked around the casino but didn’t play anything (yet) and headed back up top for our dinner reservation at Giovanni’s.  The dinner menu is larger than the lunch and service was still outstanding.  We went with salads and Stromboli, I chose a more traditional looking pasta with a lot of garlic and capers and a hunk of grilled salmon floating on top which was phenomenal and my wife ate most of hers before I could get a great picture so it must have been pretty good!  Haha anyway trying to get as much in as we can without being ‘those people’ on our devices the entire time.




Just got docked at Perfect day and listened to a pretty cheesy pop song that I don’t remember from previous trips but hey!  We’re here. Off to try out the cocoa beach club, let’s have a day.

First order of business was to complete all the safety and check in procedures.  We had already listened to the ship horn sound and watched the short video about life jackets on our phones at the hotel earlier in the morning.  Our muster (in case of emergency) station was C8 on the wraparound promenade of deck 5, so we hung a left as we walked aboard and within the first minute had our entire check in taken care of, boom.  Just like that, let the sail away party begin.
Before heading upstairs to check out our room or the Lime & Coconut we wanted to add a few dining reservations.  The unlimited dining package has one slight trade off and I didn’t fully understand when I booked and I do see a lot of questions about online - the rub of it is basically you’re only allowed to make one reservation beforehand in the cruise planner and then have to wait until you’re on the ship to make the rest of your bookings, which can be done at any restaurant.  There are other people trying to scheme around this but I’m not going to get into that here.  We went right from our muster station and went right to Izumi where we had no problem at all working with a staff member who was right up front on their computer with access to all the specialty restaurant onboard.  Our ten minutes of work being done, it was time for a drink and our own little walking tour of the ship!

 

 
Looking at deck plans and even some of the great YouTube tours and other things online is a ton of fun and helps build anticipation to get people like myself through Midwest winters, but there really is nothing like seeing it all in person.  We chose Freedom for this vacation not because of the itinerary particularly, but for the ship as it was the newest Amplified ship of those on my casino Royale offer and because we loved our Navigator experience so much.  Main differences with Nav to Freedom’s upgrades were noticeable right away - things that blew me away were the playmakers space and the main pool deck.  Playmakers is huge on Freedom!  It really is like walking into a new flashy sports bar anywhere in the states.   We didn’t have reservations but realized Giovanni’s was open for lunch as we walked by and we swung in to check it out.  We were the only people there, rooms weren’t ready yet and we thought hey, why not?

Dining here starts with a nice pair of garlic knots and red sauce with a tiny bit of pesto, we had a couple salads and did our best to split the assorted meat and cheese tray which was huge!  Definitely made more for a group twice or thrice our size.

After lunch we walked back down deck 11 and our room was ready just before 1.
Room 1156 is a junior suite balcony that was added during the 2020 amplification by carving back some space from the spa and workout areas, Matt had a post about it that really helped set this whole mini splurge trip of ours into motion.  The room is huge, enough storage for a transatlantic or to comfortably have our two girls in the room with us.  



The balcony is very generous as well, they have removed that middle pane of glass above the handrail, there are two lounger type chairs and a small table with two matching arm chairs.  Can’t get over how great and new it all is.  There’s also a full set of three different soap, shampoo, and conditioner mounted in the bathroom shower/tub and a huge walk in closet.  I’ll have to grab some more pics there.  We took a quick half hour nap, fully unpacked and stored our bags in the huge walkin closet and below the bed and headed back out to the pool deck to enjoy sailaway with a quick stop up on deck 13 to check out the Viking crown lounge, stilled called Olive or Twist in some of the naming on Freedom.  One of my favorite areas on the Voyager class she’s nearly identical to me here, just great views and never very crowded.

Spent a long time in one of the solarium hot tubs that hangs over the edge with a great view of Miami as we sailed away.  

Cleaned up for dinner, had a couple nice drinks at the Schooner bar, looked around the casino but didn’t play anything (yet) and headed back up top for our dinner reservation at Giovanni’s.  The dinner menu is larger than the lunch and service was still outstanding.  We went with salads and Stromboli, I chose a more traditional looking pasta with a lot of garlic and capers and a hunk of grilled salmon floating on top which was phenomenal and my wife ate most of hers before I could get a great picture so it must have been pretty good!  Haha anyway trying to get as much in as we can without being ‘those people’ on our devices the entire time.




Just got docked at Perfect day and listened to a pretty cheesy pop song that I don’t remember from previous trips but hey!  We’re here. Off to try out the cocoa beach club, let’s have a day.

Day 1 - Departing Miami
 
Got a quick walk on the beach down to the south point pier and back before taking a Lyft ride over the port.  Much better experience than the cab from the airport and a beautiful 80 degree day was underway.


 
While it’s true that Junior Suite guests don’t get many of the full on suite amenities and things vary from class to class, one of the best parts of the experience is the suite check in.  There was no line at all outside for Freedom Suite entry at 10:15 AM, we dropped out bags with a tip to the porters and walked right into the Gold elevators that take you to the suite checkin waiting area.  Instead of waiting in lines, diligent staff watch as you come in and come to you with an iPad to scan your checkin documents and passport.  There are also bottles of water, cookies and small sandwiches if you need a quick bite while you wait.  In the name of research I had a sliced prosciutto with cheese, my wife tried an egg salad and we split a cookie.  The sandwiches were incredible!  Just a great little thing they didn’t have to do, but yum.  It’s not a news flash to most people here but Terminal A in Miami is just a gorgeous, huge, efficient facility that really lets you start off the trip on a high note.


Just a few minutes, say by 10:40 we were all up and moving to walk aboard the ship!
 
 

couple other random observations onboard and in our room
room safe is broken, called maintenance and showed our root attendant right away so we weren’t blamed for it, we’ll see if/when that gets fixed  There are USB outlets on the vanity, which is great, but those are also broken.  Seems like someone tried to jam a plug in the wrong way maybe?  Again not a huge deal but that leaves this pretty good sized room with only two real outlets.  I have a USB hub with 6 outputs, thankfully, but we’re still short as the bathroom only has the European shaver plug only type outlet and there are no outlets anywhere else in the room.  We also requested and have a small medical fridge/freezer unit for my wife to store milk in as she’s still pumping for our youngest aka we are running this whole operation on one outlet essentially.  Not the end of the world, but annoying.  There is a usb plug on the phone and yes we’ll be using that. I noticed throughout the day that the pop dispensing guns at the all the bars are Saran wrapped up and not working.  They do have two liters and bottles of all necessary items around but I’m sure it’s a pain for the staff.  I asked our very friendly bartender at schooner and he laughed it off with a shrug and ‘supply chain’ type comment, we all could sure approach the world today more like that.
Wi-Fi on this ship is blazing fast 

couple other random observations onboard and in our room
room safe is broken, called maintenance and showed our root attendant right away so we weren’t blamed for it, we’ll see if/when that gets fixed  There are USB outlets on the vanity, which is great, but those are also broken.  Seems like someone tried to jam a plug in the wrong way maybe?  Again not a huge deal but that leaves this pretty good sized room with only two real outlets.  I have a USB hub with 6 outputs, thankfully, but we’re still short as the bathroom only has the European shaver plug only type outlet and there are no outlets anywhere else in the room.  We also requested and have a small medical fridge/freezer unit for my wife to store milk in as she’s still pumping for our youngest aka we are running this whole operation on one outlet essentially.  Not the end of the world, but annoying.  There is a usb plug on the phone and yes we’ll be using that. I noticed throughout the day that the pop dispensing guns at the all the bars are Saran wrapped up and not working.  They do have two liters and bottles of all necessary items around but I’m sure it’s a pain for the staff.  I asked our very friendly bartender at schooner and he laughed it off with a shrug and ‘supply chain’ type comment, we all could sure approach the world today more like that.
Wi-Fi on this ship is blazing fast 

First order of business was to complete all the safety and check in procedures.  We had already listened to the ship horn sound and watched the short video about life jackets on our phones at the hotel earlier in the morning.  Our muster (in case of emergency) station was C8 on the wraparound promenade of deck 5, so we hung a left as we walked aboard and within the first minute had our entire check in taken care of, boom.  Just like that, let the sail away party begin.
Before heading upstairs to check out our room or the Lime & Coconut we wanted to add a few dining reservations.  The unlimited dining package has one slight trade off and I didn’t fully understand when I booked and I do see a lot of questions about online - the rub of it is basically you’re only allowed to make one reservation beforehand in the cruise planner and then have to wait until you’re on the ship to make the rest of your bookings, which can be done at any restaurant.  There are other people trying to scheme around this but I’m not going to get into that here.  We went right from our muster station and went right to Izumi where we had no problem at all working with a staff member who was right up front on their computer with access to all the specialty restaurant onboard.  Our ten minutes of work being done, it was time for a drink and our own little walking tour of the ship!

 

 
Looking at deck plans and even some of the great YouTube tours and other things online is a ton of fun and helps build anticipation to get people like myself through Midwest winters, but there really is nothing like seeing it all in person.  We chose Freedom for this vacation not because of the itinerary particularly, but for the ship as it was the newest Amplified ship of those on my casino Royale offer and because we loved our Navigator experience so much.  Main differences with Nav to Freedom’s upgrades were noticeable right away - things that blew me away were the playmakers space and the main pool deck.  Playmakers is huge on Freedom!  It really is like walking into a new flashy sports bar anywhere in the states.   We didn’t have reservations but realized Giovanni’s was open for lunch as we walked by and we swung in to check it out.  We were the only people there, rooms weren’t ready yet and we thought hey, why not?

Dining here starts with a nice pair of garlic knots and red sauce with a tiny bit of pesto, we had a couple salads and did our best to split the assorted meat and cheese tray which was huge!  Definitely made more for a group twice or thrice our size.

After lunch we walked back down deck 11 and our room was ready just before 1.
Room 1156 is a junior suite balcony that was added during the 2020 amplification by carving back some space from the spa and workout areas, Matt had a post about it that really helped set this whole mini splurge trip of ours into motion.  The room is huge, enough storage for a transatlantic or to comfortably have our two girls in the room with us.  



The balcony is very generous as well, they have removed that middle pane of glass above the handrail, there are two lounger type chairs and a small table with two matching arm chairs.  Can’t get over how great and new it all is.  There’s also a full set of three different soap, shampoo, and conditioner mounted in the bathroom shower/tub and a huge walk in closet.  I’ll have to grab some more pics there.  We took a quick half hour nap, fully unpacked and stored our bags in the huge walkin closet and below the bed and headed back out to the pool deck to enjoy sailaway with a quick stop up on deck 13 to check out the Viking crown lounge, stilled called Olive or Twist in some of the naming on Freedom.  One of my favorite areas on the Voyager class she’s nearly identical to me here, just great views and never very crowded.

Spent a long time in one of the solarium hot tubs that hangs over the edge with a great view of Miami as we sailed away.  

Cleaned up for dinner, had a couple nice drinks at the Schooner bar, looked around the casino but didn’t play anything (yet) and headed back up top for our dinner reservation at Giovanni’s.  The dinner menu is larger than the lunch and service was still outstanding.  We went with salads and Stromboli, I chose a more traditional looking pasta with a lot of garlic and capers and a hunk of grilled salmon floating on top which was phenomenal and my wife ate most of hers before I could get a great picture so it must have been pretty good!  Haha anyway trying to get as much in as we can without being ‘those people’ on our devices the entire time.




Just got docked at Perfect day and listened to a pretty cheesy pop song that I don’t remember from previous trips but hey!  We’re here. Off to try out the cocoa beach club, let’s have a day.

Day 1 - Departing Miami
 
Got a quick walk on the beach down to the south point pier and back before taking a Lyft ride over the port.  Much better experience than the cab from the airport and a beautiful 80 degree day was underway.


 
While it’s true that Junior Suite guests don’t get many of the full on suite amenities and things vary from class to class, one of the best parts of the experience is the suite check in.  There was no line at all outside for Freedom Suite entry at 10:15 AM, we dropped out bags with a tip to the porters and walked right into the Gold elevators that take you to the suite checkin waiting area.  Instead of waiting in lines, diligent staff watch as you come in and come to you with an iPad to scan your checkin documents and passport.  There are also bottles of water, cookies and small sandwiches if you need a quick bite while you wait.  In the name of research I had a sliced prosciutto with cheese, my wife tried an egg salad and we split a cookie.  The sandwiches were incredible!  Just a great little thing they didn’t have to do, but yum.  It’s not a news flash to most people here but Terminal A in Miami is just a gorgeous, huge, efficient facility that really lets you start off the trip on a high note.


Just a few minutes, say by 10:40 we were all up and moving to walk aboard the ship!
 
 

couple other random observations onboard and in our room
room safe is broken, called maintenance and showed our root attendant right away so we weren’t blamed for it, we’ll see if/when that gets fixed  There are USB outlets on the vanity, which is great, but those are also broken.  Seems like someone tried to jam a plug in the wrong way maybe?  Again not a huge deal but that leaves this pretty good sized room with only two real outlets.  I have a USB hub with 6 outputs, thankfully, but we’re still short as the bathroom only has the European shaver plug only type outlet and there are no outlets anywhere else in the room.  We also requested and have a small medical fridge/freezer unit for my wife to store milk in as she’s still pumping for our youngest aka we are running this whole operation on one outlet essentially.  Not the end of the world, but annoying.  There is a usb plug on the phone and yes we’ll be using that. I noticed throughout the day that the pop dispensing guns at the all the bars are Saran wrapped up and not working.  They do have two liters and bottles of all necessary items around but I’m sure it’s a pain for the staff.  I asked our very friendly bartender at schooner and he laughed it off with a shrug and ‘supply chain’ type comment, we all could sure approach the world today more like that.
Wi-Fi on this ship is blazing fast 

First order of business was to complete all the safety and check in procedures.  We had already listened to the ship horn sound and watched the short video about life jackets on our phones at the hotel earlier in the morning.  Our muster (in case of emergency) station was C8 on the wraparound promenade of deck 5, so we hung a left as we walked aboard and within the first minute had our entire check in taken care of, boom.  Just like that, let the sail away party begin.
Before heading upstairs to check out our room or the Lime & Coconut we wanted to add a few dining reservations.  The unlimited dining package has one slight trade off and I didn’t fully understand when I booked and I do see a lot of questions about online - the rub of it is basically you’re only allowed to make one reservation beforehand in the cruise planner and then have to wait until you’re on the ship to make the rest of your bookings, which can be done at any restaurant.  There are other people trying to scheme around this but I’m not going to get into that here.  We went right from our muster station and went right to Izumi where we had no problem at all working with a staff member who was right up front on their computer with access to all the specialty restaurant onboard.  Our ten minutes of work being done, it was time for a drink and our own little walking tour of the ship!

 

 
Looking at deck plans and even some of the great YouTube tours and other things online is a ton of fun and helps build anticipation to get people like myself through Midwest winters, but there really is nothing like seeing it all in person.  We chose Freedom for this vacation not because of the itinerary particularly, but for the ship as it was the newest Amplified ship of those on my casino Royale offer and because we loved our Navigator experience so much.  Main differences with Nav to Freedom’s upgrades were noticeable right away - things that blew me away were the playmakers space and the main pool deck.  Playmakers is huge on Freedom!  It really is like walking into a new flashy sports bar anywhere in the states.   We didn’t have reservations but realized Giovanni’s was open for lunch as we walked by and we swung in to check it out.  We were the only people there, rooms weren’t ready yet and we thought hey, why not?

Dining here starts with a nice pair of garlic knots and red sauce with a tiny bit of pesto, we had a couple salads and did our best to split the assorted meat and cheese tray which was huge!  Definitely made more for a group twice or thrice our size.

After lunch we walked back down deck 11 and our room was ready just before 1.
Room 1156 is a junior suite balcony that was added during the 2020 amplification by carving back some space from the spa and workout areas, Matt had a post about it that really helped set this whole mini splurge trip of ours into motion.  The room is huge, enough storage for a transatlantic or to comfortably have our two girls in the room with us.  



The balcony is very generous as well, they have removed that middle pane of glass above the handrail, there are two lounger type chairs and a small table with two matching arm chairs.  Can’t get over how great and new it all is.  There’s also a full set of three different soap, shampoo, and conditioner mounted in the bathroom shower/tub and a huge walk in closet.  I’ll have to grab some more pics there.  We took a quick half hour nap, fully unpacked and stored our bags in the huge walkin closet and below the bed and headed back out to the pool deck to enjoy sailaway with a quick stop up on deck 13 to check out the Viking crown lounge, stilled called Olive or Twist in some of the naming on Freedom.  One of my favorite areas on the Voyager class she’s nearly identical to me here, just great views and never very crowded.

Spent a long time in one of the solarium hot tubs that hangs over the edge with a great view of Miami as we sailed away.  

Cleaned up for dinner, had a couple nice drinks at the Schooner bar, looked around the casino but didn’t play anything (yet) and headed back up top for our dinner reservation at Giovanni’s.  The dinner menu is larger than the lunch and service was still outstanding.  We went with salads and Stromboli, I chose a more traditional looking pasta with a lot of garlic and capers and a hunk of grilled salmon floating on top which was phenomenal and my wife ate most of hers before I could get a great picture so it must have been pretty good!  Haha anyway trying to get as much in as we can without being ‘those people’ on our devices the entire time.




Just got docked at Perfect day and listened to a pretty cheesy pop song that I don’t remember from previous trips but hey!  We’re here. Off to try out the cocoa beach club, let’s have a day.

Day 1 - Departing Miami
 
Got a quick walk on the beach down to the south point pier and back before taking a Lyft ride over the port.  Much better experience than the cab from the airport and a beautiful 80 degree day was underway.


 
While it’s true that Junior Suite guests don’t get many of the full on suite amenities and things vary from class to class, one of the best parts of the experience is the suite check in.  There was no line at all outside for Freedom Suite entry at 10:15 AM, we dropped out bags with a tip to the porters and walked right into the Gold elevators that take you to the suite checkin waiting area.  Instead of waiting in lines, diligent staff watch as you come in and come to you with an iPad to scan your checkin documents and passport.  There are also bottles of water, cookies and small sandwiches if you need a quick bite while you wait.  In the name of research I had a sliced prosciutto with cheese, my wife tried an egg salad and we split a cookie.  The sandwiches were incredible!  Just a great little thing they didn’t have to do, but yum.  It’s not a news flash to most people here but Terminal A in Miami is just a gorgeous, huge, efficient facility that really lets you start off the trip on a high note.


Just a few minutes, say by 10:40 we were all up and moving to walk aboard the ship!
 
 

First order of business was to complete all the safety and check in procedures.  We had already listened to the ship horn sound and watched the short video about life jackets on our phones at the hotel earlier in the morning.  Our muster (in case of emergency) station was C8 on the wraparound promenade of deck 5, so we hung a left as we walked aboard and within the first minute had our entire check in taken care of, boom.  Just like that, let the sail away party begin.
Before heading upstairs to check out our room or the Lime & Coconut we wanted to add a few dining reservations.  The unlimited dining package has one slight trade off and I didn’t fully understand when I booked and I do see a lot of questions about online - the rub of it is basically you’re only allowed to make one reservation beforehand in the cruise planner and then have to wait until you’re on the ship to make the rest of your bookings, which can be done at any restaurant.  There are other people trying to scheme around this but I’m not going to get into that here.  We went right from our muster station and went right to Izumi where we had no problem at all working with a staff member who was right up front on their computer with access to all the specialty restaurant onboard.  Our ten minutes of work being done, it was time for a drink and our own little walking tour of the ship!

 

 
Looking at deck plans and even some of the great YouTube tours and other things online is a ton of fun and helps build anticipation to get people like myself through Midwest winters, but there really is nothing like seeing it all in person.  We chose Freedom for this vacation not because of the itinerary particularly, but for the ship as it was the newest Amplified ship of those on my casino Royale offer and because we loved our Navigator experience so much.  Main differences with Nav to Freedom’s upgrades were noticeable right away - things that blew me away were the playmakers space and the main pool deck.  Playmakers is huge on Freedom!  It really is like walking into a new flashy sports bar anywhere in the states.   We didn’t have reservations but realized Giovanni’s was open for lunch as we walked by and we swung in to check it out.  We were the only people there, rooms weren’t ready yet and we thought hey, why not?

Dining here starts with a nice pair of garlic knots and red sauce with a tiny bit of pesto, we had a couple salads and did our best to split the assorted meat and cheese tray which was huge!  Definitely made more for a group twice or thrice our size.

After lunch we walked back down deck 11 and our room was ready just before 1.
Room 1156 is a junior suite balcony that was added during the 2020 amplification by carving back some space from the spa and workout areas, Matt had a post about it that really helped set this whole mini splurge trip of ours into motion.  The room is huge, enough storage for a transatlantic or to comfortably have our two girls in the room with us.  



The balcony is very generous as well, they have removed that middle pane of glass above the handrail, there are two lounger type chairs and a small table with two matching arm chairs.  Can’t get over how great and new it all is.  There’s also a full set of three different soap, shampoo, and conditioner mounted in the bathroom shower/tub and a huge walk in closet.  I’ll have to grab some more pics there.  We took a quick half hour nap, fully unpacked and stored our bags in the huge walkin closet and below the bed and headed back out to the pool deck to enjoy sailaway with a quick stop up on deck 13 to check out the Viking crown lounge, stilled called Olive or Twist in some of the naming on Freedom.  One of my favorite areas on the Voyager class she’s nearly identical to me here, just great views and never very crowded.

Spent a long time in one of the solarium hot tubs that hangs over the edge with a great view of Miami as we sailed away.  

Cleaned up for dinner, had a couple nice drinks at the Schooner bar, looked around the casino but didn’t play anything (yet) and headed back up top for our dinner reservation at Giovanni’s.  The dinner menu is larger than the lunch and service was still outstanding.  We went with salads and Stromboli, I chose a more traditional looking pasta with a lot of garlic and capers and a hunk of grilled salmon floating on top which was phenomenal and my wife ate most of hers before I could get a great picture so it must have been pretty good!  Haha anyway trying to get as much in as we can without being ‘those people’ on our devices the entire time.




Just got docked at Perfect day and listened to a pretty cheesy pop song that I don’t remember from previous trips but hey!  We’re here. Off to try out the cocoa beach club, let’s have a day.

Day 1 - Departing Miami
 
Got a quick walk on the beach down to the south point pier and back before taking a Lyft ride over the port.  Much better experience than the cab from the airport and a beautiful 80 degree day was underway.


 
While it’s true that Junior Suite guests don’t get many of the full on suite amenities and things vary from class to class, one of the best parts of the experience is the suite check in.  There was no line at all outside for Freedom Suite entry at 10:15 AM, we dropped out bags with a tip to the porters and walked right into the Gold elevators that take you to the suite checkin waiting area.  Instead of waiting in lines, diligent staff watch as you come in and come to you with an iPad to scan your checkin documents and passport.  There are also bottles of water, cookies and small sandwiches if you need a quick bite while you wait.  In the name of research I had a sliced prosciutto with cheese, my wife tried an egg salad and we split a cookie.  The sandwiches were incredible!  Just a great little thing they didn’t have to do, but yum.  It’s not a news flash to most people here but Terminal A in Miami is just a gorgeous, huge, efficient facility that really lets you start off the trip on a high note.


Just a few minutes, say by 10:40 we were all up and moving to walk aboard the ship!
 
 

Sunday - Night Zero

 We took a random cab from Miami International after grabbing our bags and I have to say, that was a mistake and I know better.  We’ve been in plenty of cabs before and are used to the rambling and chatting, the not so fresh or new vehicle, the terrible driving, helping the cabbie navigate through the concrete jungle etc but this guy has to win some kind of award for being the most big city cab experience of all time.  We survived and I will be arranging an Uber black or something a bit more polished for the rest of our trip.  Waved at Oasis as we passed by, we would see her sail away later on in the day.

 
After a pretty good amount of research combined with talking to friends and family who live in south Florida and are in the Miami area often we decided on the Hilton Bentley South Beach which is in the south point neighborhood, all the way at the bottom tip of the island.  There are hundreds of places to stay in south Florida, many certainly cheaper or closer to the airport/seaport but after being here I can say this is a new favorite.  I booked the cheapest room I could with Hilton Honors points (95,000) and had planned on tipping some cash to our check in agent upon arrival to see if any upgrades were available.  This is a lot cheaper than paying the full price ahead of time online and I just trust the staff’s opinion more than some pictures online.  A good photographer and web marketing can make things very deceiving. 
Anyway, I’ve used this trick a lot on other trips to Vegas, Key West, Chicago etc. Just slid $40 cash along with my credit card and driver’s license at checkin and asked our clerk if any rooms with a nice view were available.  She said she would work on it and call me back in the meantime the pool and other amenities were available to us.  Our $35 resort fee at the hotel came with two beach chairs, bottles of water and towels.  We changed into some proper attire we had previously put in a packing cube for the day so we didn’t have to dig through our whole bag in the middle of the lobby, grabbed a couple rum and cokes at the pool bar and headed to the beach.

This will do nicely, thank you.
 
 
Quite the mix of a crowd on the beach on a Sunday, but it made for good people watching and seeing the parade of ships sail away did not get old.  While watching, the front desk called and told me she had a few options, a tenth floor room with a great view of the city and the bay but no balcony and a ninth floor room on the corner that didn’t have a straight view out at the beach, but had a balcony and a view to the south.  Needless to say, I chose the room with the balcony and we were not disappointed.  





This is a two room suite on the corner with a full kitchen, bathroom with separate shower, tub, toilet and bidet.  The fridge came pre stocked with a selection of wine and beers, the kitchen had all of the necessary cups, plates and silverware one would need to do some basic cooking, but we were just cleaning up to head out for dinner.  When in Rome, do as the Romans and in this case being in South Point meant only one restaurant would do, and that’s the original Joe’s Stone Crab.

 We had no reservation but only waited at the bar for 15 minutes or so before being seated and had an amazing meal.  Bread, constant touches from a variety of staff filling water, cleaning the table, topping off wine, sweeping crumbs, keeping pace of service (we chose a family style large platter of stone crab claws with fried tomatoes and hashbrowns as sides.  This was how I remember the main dining room as a teenager on my first Royal cruises two decades ago but that’s a whole other story.

 
I’m honestly a bit sad we don’t have a whole week to spend here on Miami Beach and in this hotel room but Freedom will be in town to pick us soon, as I type this the other ships are making their way into port.  We checked in on the Royal app the first day we were able to and secured a 10:30am checkin time.  I never understand why people would ever try to fly in the day of or not get to the ship early, but then again we don’t get to cruise often and I am well aware we are overdoing it a bit this time around, but it’s precisely because we don’t get to travel as much now with the kiddos in our lives that I wanted to splurge and make this trip special.  Anyway, time to get packed back up.  We’ll grab a small bite to eat and some coffee and head to the port soon.  Cheers!

 
 
 
 

First order of business was to complete all the safety and check in procedures.  We had already listened to the ship horn sound and watched the short video about life jackets on our phones at the hotel earlier in the morning.  Our muster (in case of emergency) station was C8 on the wraparound promenade of deck 5, so we hung a left as we walked aboard and within the first minute had our entire check in taken care of, boom.  Just like that, let the sail away party begin.
Before heading upstairs to check out our room or the Lime & Coconut we wanted to add a few dining reservations.  The unlimited dining package has one slight trade off and I didn’t fully understand when I booked and I do see a lot of questions about online - the rub of it is basically you’re only allowed to make one reservation beforehand in the cruise planner and then have to wait until you’re on the ship to make the rest of your bookings, which can be done at any restaurant.  There are other people trying to scheme around this but I’m not going to get into that here.  We went right from our muster station and went right to Izumi where we had no problem at all working with a staff member who was right up front on their computer with access to all the specialty restaurant onboard.  Our ten minutes of work being done, it was time for a drink and our own little walking tour of the ship!

 

 
Looking at deck plans and even some of the great YouTube tours and other things online is a ton of fun and helps build anticipation to get people like myself through Midwest winters, but there really is nothing like seeing it all in person.  We chose Freedom for this vacation not because of the itinerary particularly, but for the ship as it was the newest Amplified ship of those on my casino Royale offer and because we loved our Navigator experience so much.  Main differences with Nav to Freedom’s upgrades were noticeable right away - things that blew me away were the playmakers space and the main pool deck.  Playmakers is huge on Freedom!  It really is like walking into a new flashy sports bar anywhere in the states.   We didn’t have reservations but realized Giovanni’s was open for lunch as we walked by and we swung in to check it out.  We were the only people there, rooms weren’t ready yet and we thought hey, why not?

Dining here starts with a nice pair of garlic knots and red sauce with a tiny bit of pesto, we had a couple salads and did our best to split the assorted meat and cheese tray which was huge!  Definitely made more for a group twice or thrice our size.

After lunch we walked back down deck 11 and our room was ready just before 1.
Room 1156 is a junior suite balcony that was added during the 2020 amplification by carving back some space from the spa and workout areas, Matt had a post about it that really helped set this whole mini splurge trip of ours into motion.  The room is huge, enough storage for a transatlantic or to comfortably have our two girls in the room with us.  



The balcony is very generous as well, they have removed that middle pane of glass above the handrail, there are two lounger type chairs and a small table with two matching arm chairs.  Can’t get over how great and new it all is.  There’s also a full set of three different soap, shampoo, and conditioner mounted in the bathroom shower/tub and a huge walk in closet.  I’ll have to grab some more pics there.  We took a quick half hour nap, fully unpacked and stored our bags in the huge walkin closet and below the bed and headed back out to the pool deck to enjoy sailaway with a quick stop up on deck 13 to check out the Viking crown lounge, stilled called Olive or Twist in some of the naming on Freedom.  One of my favorite areas on the Voyager class she’s nearly identical to me here, just great views and never very crowded.

Spent a long time in one of the solarium hot tubs that hangs over the edge with a great view of Miami as we sailed away.  

Cleaned up for dinner, had a couple nice drinks at the Schooner bar, looked around the casino but didn’t play anything (yet) and headed back up top for our dinner reservation at Giovanni’s.  The dinner menu is larger than the lunch and service was still outstanding.  We went with salads and Stromboli, I chose a more traditional looking pasta with a lot of garlic and capers and a hunk of grilled salmon floating on top which was phenomenal and my wife ate most of hers before I could get a great picture so it must have been pretty good!  Haha anyway trying to get as much in as we can without being ‘those people’ on our devices the entire time.




Just got docked at Perfect day and listened to a pretty cheesy pop song that I don’t remember from previous trips but hey!  We’re here. Off to try out the cocoa beach club, let’s have a day.

First order of business was to complete all the safety and check in procedures.  We had already listened to the ship horn sound and watched the short video about life jackets on our phones at the hotel earlier in the morning.  Our muster (in case of emergency) station was C8 on the wraparound promenade of deck 5, so we hung a left as we walked aboard and within the first minute had our entire check in taken care of, boom.  Just like that, let the sail away party begin.
Before heading upstairs to check out our room or the Lime & Coconut we wanted to add a few dining reservations.  The unlimited dining package has one slight trade off and I didn’t fully understand when I booked and I do see a lot of questions about online - the rub of it is basically you’re only allowed to make one reservation beforehand in the cruise planner and then have to wait until you’re on the ship to make the rest of your bookings, which can be done at any restaurant.  There are other people trying to scheme around this but I’m not going to get into that here.  We went right from our muster station and went right to Izumi where we had no problem at all working with a staff member who was right up front on their computer with access to all the specialty restaurant onboard.  Our ten minutes of work being done, it was time for a drink and our own little walking tour of the ship!

 

 
Looking at deck plans and even some of the great YouTube tours and other things online is a ton of fun and helps build anticipation to get people like myself through Midwest winters, but there really is nothing like seeing it all in person.  We chose Freedom for this vacation not because of the itinerary particularly, but for the ship as it was the newest Amplified ship of those on my casino Royale offer and because we loved our Navigator experience so much.  Main differences with Nav to Freedom’s upgrades were noticeable right away - things that blew me away were the playmakers space and the main pool deck.  Playmakers is huge on Freedom!  It really is like walking into a new flashy sports bar anywhere in the states.   We didn’t have reservations but realized Giovanni’s was open for lunch as we walked by and we swung in to check it out.  We were the only people there, rooms weren’t ready yet and we thought hey, why not?

Dining here starts with a nice pair of garlic knots and red sauce with a tiny bit of pesto, we had a couple salads and did our best to split the assorted meat and cheese tray which was huge!  Definitely made more for a group twice or thrice our size.

After lunch we walked back down deck 11 and our room was ready just before 1.
Room 1156 is a junior suite balcony that was added during the 2020 amplification by carving back some space from the spa and workout areas, Matt had a post about it that really helped set this whole mini splurge trip of ours into motion.  The room is huge, enough storage for a transatlantic or to comfortably have our two girls in the room with us.  



The balcony is very generous as well, they have removed that middle pane of glass above the handrail, there are two lounger type chairs and a small table with two matching arm chairs.  Can’t get over how great and new it all is.  There’s also a full set of three different soap, shampoo, and conditioner mounted in the bathroom shower/tub and a huge walk in closet.  I’ll have to grab some more pics there.  We took a quick half hour nap, fully unpacked and stored our bags in the huge walkin closet and below the bed and headed back out to the pool deck to enjoy sailaway with a quick stop up on deck 13 to check out the Viking crown lounge, stilled called Olive or Twist in some of the naming on Freedom.  One of my favorite areas on the Voyager class she’s nearly identical to me here, just great views and never very crowded.

Spent a long time in one of the solarium hot tubs that hangs over the edge with a great view of Miami as we sailed away.  

Cleaned up for dinner, had a couple nice drinks at the Schooner bar, looked around the casino but didn’t play anything (yet) and headed back up top for our dinner reservation at Giovanni’s.  The dinner menu is larger than the lunch and service was still outstanding.  We went with salads and Stromboli, I chose a more traditional looking pasta with a lot of garlic and capers and a hunk of grilled salmon floating on top which was phenomenal and my wife ate most of hers before I could get a great picture so it must have been pretty good!  Haha anyway trying to get as much in as we can without being ‘those people’ on our devices the entire time.




Just got docked at Perfect day and listened to a pretty cheesy pop song that I don’t remember from previous trips but hey!  We’re here. Off to try out the cocoa beach club, let’s have a day.

Day 1 - Departing Miami
 
Got a quick walk on the beach down to the south point pier and back before taking a Lyft ride over the port.  Much better experience than the cab from the airport and a beautiful 80 degree day was underway.


 
While it’s true that Junior Suite guests don’t get many of the full on suite amenities and things vary from class to class, one of the best parts of the experience is the suite check in.  There was no line at all outside for Freedom Suite entry at 10:15 AM, we dropped out bags with a tip to the porters and walked right into the Gold elevators that take you to the suite checkin waiting area.  Instead of waiting in lines, diligent staff watch as you come in and come to you with an iPad to scan your checkin documents and passport.  There are also bottles of water, cookies and small sandwiches if you need a quick bite while you wait.  In the name of research I had a sliced prosciutto with cheese, my wife tried an egg salad and we split a cookie.  The sandwiches were incredible!  Just a great little thing they didn’t have to do, but yum.  It’s not a news flash to most people here but Terminal A in Miami is just a gorgeous, huge, efficient facility that really lets you start off the trip on a high note.


Just a few minutes, say by 10:40 we were all up and moving to walk aboard the ship!
 
 

Day 1 - Departing Miami
 
Got a quick walk on the beach down to the south point pier and back before taking a Lyft ride over the port.  Much better experience than the cab from the airport and a beautiful 80 degree day was underway.


 
While it’s true that Junior Suite guests don’t get many of the full on suite amenities and things vary from class to class, one of the best parts of the experience is the suite check in.  There was no line at all outside for Freedom Suite entry at 10:15 AM, we dropped out bags with a tip to the porters and walked right into the Gold elevators that take you to the suite checkin waiting area.  Instead of waiting in lines, diligent staff watch as you come in and come to you with an iPad to scan your checkin documents and passport.  There are also bottles of water, cookies and small sandwiches if you need a quick bite while you wait.  In the name of research I had a sliced prosciutto with cheese, my wife tried an egg salad and we split a cookie.  The sandwiches were incredible!  Just a great little thing they didn’t have to do, but yum.  It’s not a news flash to most people here but Terminal A in Miami is just a gorgeous, huge, efficient facility that really lets you start off the trip on a high note.


Just a few minutes, say by 10:40 we were all up and moving to walk aboard the ship!
 
 

Sunday - Night Zero

 We took a random cab from Miami International after grabbing our bags and I have to say, that was a mistake and I know better.  We’ve been in plenty of cabs before and are used to the rambling and chatting, the not so fresh or new vehicle, the terrible driving, helping the cabbie navigate through the concrete jungle etc but this guy has to win some kind of award for being the most big city cab experience of all time.  We survived and I will be arranging an Uber black or something a bit more polished for the rest of our trip.  Waved at Oasis as we passed by, we would see her sail away later on in the day.

 
After a pretty good amount of research combined with talking to friends and family who live in south Florida and are in the Miami area often we decided on the Hilton Bentley South Beach which is in the south point neighborhood, all the way at the bottom tip of the island.  There are hundreds of places to stay in south Florida, many certainly cheaper or closer to the airport/seaport but after being here I can say this is a new favorite.  I booked the cheapest room I could with Hilton Honors points (95,000) and had planned on tipping some cash to our check in agent upon arrival to see if any upgrades were available.  This is a lot cheaper than paying the full price ahead of time online and I just trust the staff’s opinion more than some pictures online.  A good photographer and web marketing can make things very deceiving. 
Anyway, I’ve used this trick a lot on other trips to Vegas, Key West, Chicago etc. Just slid $40 cash along with my credit card and driver’s license at checkin and asked our clerk if any rooms with a nice view were available.  She said she would work on it and call me back in the meantime the pool and other amenities were available to us.  Our $35 resort fee at the hotel came with two beach chairs, bottles of water and towels.  We changed into some proper attire we had previously put in a packing cube for the day so we didn’t have to dig through our whole bag in the middle of the lobby, grabbed a couple rum and cokes at the pool bar and headed to the beach.

This will do nicely, thank you.
 
 
Quite the mix of a crowd on the beach on a Sunday, but it made for good people watching and seeing the parade of ships sail away did not get old.  While watching, the front desk called and told me she had a few options, a tenth floor room with a great view of the city and the bay but no balcony and a ninth floor room on the corner that didn’t have a straight view out at the beach, but had a balcony and a view to the south.  Needless to say, I chose the room with the balcony and we were not disappointed.  





This is a two room suite on the corner with a full kitchen, bathroom with separate shower, tub, toilet and bidet.  The fridge came pre stocked with a selection of wine and beers, the kitchen had all of the necessary cups, plates and silverware one would need to do some basic cooking, but we were just cleaning up to head out for dinner.  When in Rome, do as the Romans and in this case being in South Point meant only one restaurant would do, and that’s the original Joe’s Stone Crab.

 We had no reservation but only waited at the bar for 15 minutes or so before being seated and had an amazing meal.  Bread, constant touches from a variety of staff filling water, cleaning the table, topping off wine, sweeping crumbs, keeping pace of service (we chose a family style large platter of stone crab claws with fried tomatoes and hashbrowns as sides.  This was how I remember the main dining room as a teenager on my first Royal cruises two decades ago but that’s a whole other story.

 
I’m honestly a bit sad we don’t have a whole week to spend here on Miami Beach and in this hotel room but Freedom will be in town to pick us soon, as I type this the other ships are making their way into port.  We checked in on the Royal app the first day we were able to and secured a 10:30am checkin time.  I never understand why people would ever try to fly in the day of or not get to the ship early, but then again we don’t get to cruise often and I am well aware we are overdoing it a bit this time around, but it’s precisely because we don’t get to travel as much now with the kiddos in our lives that I wanted to splurge and make this trip special.  Anyway, time to get packed back up.  We’ll grab a small bite to eat and some coffee and head to the port soon.  Cheers!

 
 
 
 

Sunday - Night Zero

 We took a random cab from Miami International after grabbing our bags and I have to say, that was a mistake and I know better.  We’ve been in plenty of cabs before and are used to the rambling and chatting, the not so fresh or new vehicle, the terrible driving, helping the cabbie navigate through the concrete jungle etc but this guy has to win some kind of award for being the most big city cab experience of all time.  We survived and I will be arranging an Uber black or something a bit more polished for the rest of our trip.  Waved at Oasis as we passed by, we would see her sail away later on in the day.

 
After a pretty good amount of research combined with talking to friends and family who live in south Florida and are in the Miami area often we decided on the Hilton Bentley South Beach which is in the south point neighborhood, all the way at the bottom tip of the island.  There are hundreds of places to stay in south Florida, many certainly cheaper or closer to the airport/seaport but after being here I can say this is a new favorite.  I booked the cheapest room I could with Hilton Honors points (95,000) and had planned on tipping some cash to our check in agent upon arrival to see if any upgrades were available.  This is a lot cheaper than paying the full price ahead of time online and I just trust the staff’s opinion more than some pictures online.  A good photographer and web marketing can make things very deceiving. 
Anyway, I’ve used this trick a lot on other trips to Vegas, Key West, Chicago etc. Just slid $40 cash along with my credit card and driver’s license at checkin and asked our clerk if any rooms with a nice view were available.  She said she would work on it and call me back in the meantime the pool and other amenities were available to us.  Our $35 resort fee at the hotel came with two beach chairs, bottles of water and towels.  We changed into some proper attire we had previously put in a packing cube for the day so we didn’t have to dig through our whole bag in the middle of the lobby, grabbed a couple rum and cokes at the pool bar and headed to the beach.

This will do nicely, thank you.
 
 
Quite the mix of a crowd on the beach on a Sunday, but it made for good people watching and seeing the parade of ships sail away did not get old.  While watching, the front desk called and told me she had a few options, a tenth floor room with a great view of the city and the bay but no balcony and a ninth floor room on the corner that didn’t have a straight view out at the beach, but had a balcony and a view to the south.  Needless to say, I chose the room with the balcony and we were not disappointed.  





This is a two room suite on the corner with a full kitchen, bathroom with separate shower, tub, toilet and bidet.  The fridge came pre stocked with a selection of wine and beers, the kitchen had all of the necessary cups, plates and silverware one would need to do some basic cooking, but we were just cleaning up to head out for dinner.  When in Rome, do as the Romans and in this case being in South Point meant only one restaurant would do, and that’s the original Joe’s Stone Crab.

 We had no reservation but only waited at the bar for 15 minutes or so before being seated and had an amazing meal.  Bread, constant touches from a variety of staff filling water, cleaning the table, topping off wine, sweeping crumbs, keeping pace of service (we chose a family style large platter of stone crab claws with fried tomatoes and hashbrowns as sides.  This was how I remember the main dining room as a teenager on my first Royal cruises two decades ago but that’s a whole other story.

 
I’m honestly a bit sad we don’t have a whole week to spend here on Miami Beach and in this hotel room but Freedom will be in town to pick us soon, as I type this the other ships are making their way into port.  We checked in on the Royal app the first day we were able to and secured a 10:30am checkin time.  I never understand why people would ever try to fly in the day of or not get to the ship early, but then again we don’t get to cruise often and I am well aware we are overdoing it a bit this time around, but it’s precisely because we don’t get to travel as much now with the kiddos in our lives that I wanted to splurge and make this trip special.  Anyway, time to get packed back up.  We’ll grab a small bite to eat and some coffee and head to the port soon.  Cheers!

 
 
 
 

Sunday - Night Zero

 We took a random cab from Miami International after grabbing our bags and I have to say, that was a mistake and I know better.  We’ve been in plenty of cabs before and are used to the rambling and chatting, the not so fresh or new vehicle, the terrible driving, helping the cabbie navigate through the concrete jungle etc but this guy has to win some kind of award for being the most big city cab experience of all time.  We survived and I will be arranging an Uber black or something a bit more polished for the rest of our trip.  Waved at Oasis as we passed by, we would see her sail away later on in the day.

 
After a pretty good amount of research combined with talking to friends and family who live in south Florida and are in the Miami area often we decided on the Hilton Bentley South Beach which is in the south point neighborhood, all the way at the bottom tip of the island.  There are hundreds of places to stay in south Florida, many certainly cheaper or closer to the airport/seaport but after being here I can say this is a new favorite.  I booked the cheapest room I could with Hilton Honors points (95,000) and had planned on tipping some cash to our check in agent upon arrival to see if any upgrades were available.  This is a lot cheaper than paying the full price ahead of time online and I just trust the staff’s opinion more than some pictures online.  A good photographer and web marketing can make things very deceiving. 
Anyway, I’ve used this trick a lot on other trips to Vegas, Key West, Chicago etc. Just slid $40 cash along with my credit card and driver’s license at checkin and asked our clerk if any rooms with a nice view were available.  She said she would work on it and call me back in the meantime the pool and other amenities were available to us.  Our $35 resort fee at the hotel came with two beach chairs, bottles of water and towels.  We changed into some proper attire we had previously put in a packing cube for the day so we didn’t have to dig through our whole bag in the middle of the lobby, grabbed a couple rum and cokes at the pool bar and headed to the beach.

This will do nicely, thank you.
 
 
Quite the mix of a crowd on the beach on a Sunday, but it made for good people watching and seeing the parade of ships sail away did not get old.  While watching, the front desk called and told me she had a few options, a tenth floor room with a great view of the city and the bay but no balcony and a ninth floor room on the corner that didn’t have a straight view out at the beach, but had a balcony and a view to the south.  Needless to say, I chose the room with the balcony and we were not disappointed.  





This is a two room suite on the corner with a full kitchen, bathroom with separate shower, tub, toilet and bidet.  The fridge came pre stocked with a selection of wine and beers, the kitchen had all of the necessary cups, plates and silverware one would need to do some basic cooking, but we were just cleaning up to head out for dinner.  When in Rome, do as the Romans and in this case being in South Point meant only one restaurant would do, and that’s the original Joe’s Stone Crab.

 We had no reservation but only waited at the bar for 15 minutes or so before being seated and had an amazing meal.  Bread, constant touches from a variety of staff filling water, cleaning the table, topping off wine, sweeping crumbs, keeping pace of service (we chose a family style large platter of stone crab claws with fried tomatoes and hashbrowns as sides.  This was how I remember the main dining room as a teenager on my first Royal cruises two decades ago but that’s a whole other story.

 
I’m honestly a bit sad we don’t have a whole week to spend here on Miami Beach and in this hotel room but Freedom will be in town to pick us soon, as I type this the other ships are making their way into port.  We checked in on the Royal app the first day we were able to and secured a 10:30am checkin time.  I never understand why people would ever try to fly in the day of or not get to the ship early, but then again we don’t get to cruise often and I am well aware we are overdoing it a bit this time around, but it’s precisely because we don’t get to travel as much now with the kiddos in our lives that I wanted to splurge and make this trip special.  Anyway, time to get packed back up.  We’ll grab a small bite to eat and some coffee and head to the port soon.  Cheers!