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Live Blog: Group Cruising with a Toddler


Christie

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Hi there! Thought I would start a live blog with our experiences with the group cruise with a toddler in tow! We have one previous Royal Caribbean experience (Oasis of the Seas), many Disney cruises, and a random smattering of other cruise lines. We were originally booked this week on Anthem of the Seas with just my husband and I for our anniversary, but changed itineraries when we found out that our 22 month old daughter would be tagging along as well. Group cruising is a new experience for us. I’m going to attempt to upload and add in some pictures as I can, so check in!

 

Pre Cruise

 

Like all smart and experienced cruisers, we arrived in Orlando the day before our scheduled departure. We decided to stay in Orlando in the Disney area and drive to the port on Sunday morning. We got a great deal on a one way rental car through Costco and Alamo and arrived to the cruise terminal right after 10 AM. My husband dropped my daughter and I off at the cruise terminal, the porters took the bag, he fueled up the car, returned it, and took the bus back over. Flawless procedure that took about 20 minutes. From the time he arrived back at the boat until we were walking on board was about 15 minutes. Terminal 1 is beautiful and the staff is well trained.

 

Onboard

 

We actually got on board prior to the Windjammer opening, so we hung out with other eager guests until they opened the doors. After a quick squirt of hand sanitizer (while my squirt from walking on board was still drying), we were off to the races! My daughter enjoyed her random smorgasbord of food, and my husband and I tagged teamed to get our own food. Surprisingly, we were out of the Windjammer in just about 20 minutes. The rooms weren’t ready until 1, so we wandered around the boat. Our daughter was pretty tired of being cooped up in car seats and strollers, so we set up a corner in R Bar and let her climb in and out of the port hole. We ran into (the fabulous) Annette who is coordinating everything, and it was nice to finally put a face to the name.

 

We went up to check out where the first group cruise meetup was going to be located and discovered a quiet little area called Cloud 9. We were the only people in there and my daughter was able to roam free, so we stayed there until 1 when it was time to check out our state room.

 

On the way down, we were able to get Mackenzie registered for the nursery. I appreciate all the details they want to know about her and for $6-8/hr depending on the time of day, you can’t beat it! You can pre book 16 hours and only one formal night, but can call for availability beyond that. We also checked out a bag of toys for the room which is a great program. Not only is it less to pack, but the toys are new to Mackenzie so she loves them! I think you can even switch out your bag later in the week.

 

Now, on to our room! We booked a Family Panoramic Oceanview stateroom (PF). Let me tell you, this thing is amazing! My biggest concern was that my daughter cannot sleep if she can see us across the room. These rooms are wedged shaped and have a divider for the TV in the middle of the room. We figured we could put her crib directly behind it. It also has a sectioned off area with some bunk beds and a closet. We are using this for storage, but this room would be great for a family with multiple small children. It also has 2 bathrooms- the standard bathroom of a shower, toilet, and sink and then another bathroom with a toilet and sink. Tons of storage room as well. I think the only reason they can’t book this as a suite is because it doesn’t have a balcony. But the windows are incredible and I don’t have to worry about my rambunctious toddler climbing on the balcony. We spent a little extra after final payment date to book this room, and I’m so glad we did. We will be spending lots of time in our room for sure.

 

Even though we had requested a crib for the room, it was not in there, so we called several times to get one. It was definitely nap time for our daughter, but no place to nap. Instead we handed her the iPad and headed off to the meet up where we enjoyed some lava flows and getting to meet names I know so well.

 

We came back to the room (still no crib) and decided to head down to muster early to secure seats. Of course our daughter finally fell asleep during muster, but wouldn’t nap when we got back to the room. We watched sail away from our nice air conditioned room, cleaned up a little, and headed to dinner.

 

We are booked with My Time Dining and decided to see how it would go with bringing our daughter to dinner. Dinner was just above “ok†for me, but my husband seemed to really enjoy it. Our main waiter was hit or miss. One second I thought he was the most attentive server ever and the next I was wondering if he jumped over board. Not sure if we will bring her back to dinner in the MDR or not. Ask me tomorrow :)

 

It wasn’t quite time to head to bed, so we threw on swimsuits and took Kenzie to the H20 Zone, which she loved! It was a giant splash pad. It was a little windy so she got a little cold, but nothing unbearable. While we were out there, my nerves from traveling and getting established finally calmed down and I finally felt like I was on vacation.

 

We came back to the room just in time to get her showered and to bed. She normally naps for 2 hours, but only had a 20 minute nap today and a very busy day exploring. A note about the crib- it did not come with a crib sheet, and when I asked my state room attendant about getting one, we were told that there was a problem in the past and she had to get special permission from her supervisor. I had brought her blanket, but it may be wise to bring a crib sheet as well to avoid the hassle.

 

We’ve been up since 5:30 today and haven’t slept well all week, so we have decided to call it a night. Since we are all the way forward, there is a slight rock to the ship and I am looking forward to it rocking me to sleep. Tomorrow is a sea day, and I pray that the little one sleeps in some… Hah ha ha

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Random musings from. day 1:

 

-VOOM is definitely not the same on this boat as it was on Oasis. On Oasis, we had a access point in our stateroom and never once had an issue. It's a struggle to stay connected to the network in our room and a lot of common areas. Once connected, it can be super slow. Sometimes it handles things great, other times not.

- We experienced a first today- a lady singing to her husband at the dinner table in the MDR.

- Lots of discounts on specialty dining today. We booked chefs table for Tuesday night at 20% off. It includes a galley tour on the last sea day.

- 1 standard RC pillow is not enough but 2 is too many. Anybody else feel me on that?

- No wash your hands song during muster like on Oasis. Luckily it's on the room TV

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Day 2- Sea Day

 

I love sea days. There's just something about waking up and not having anything to do.

 

I was so anxious to rip open the curtains of our stateroom this morning and see the beautiful ocean. It had a special sparkle to it today. We relaxed in the state room until it we decided to go get some breakfast in the Wind Jammer. I have this special affinity for the hash browns and the corned beef hash. I noticed the custom omelet station, which they did not have on Oasis.

 

After breakfast, we went down to Cafe Promenade for my husband to get his Starbucks. While he did that, I waited in line at the shore excursion desk to book a beach loungers for two on Labadee. For $35, it seems like a steal. We are planning on doing an early beach morning with our daughter and then bringing her back on board to the nursery so we can do some adventurous stuff, so booking a whole cabana didn't really make sense to us. We walked around until it was time to bring Kenzie to the nursery while Nick and I joined the group for lunch at Sabor.

 

Sabor was knock your pants off good. I have only had Sabor on Oasis, which is a slightly different variety. This was a completely different experience and the avocado margarita was to die for. Everything was delicious. I had the empanadas for my main course, but honestly I was stuffed by the time we got to that point. At the end of lunch, they pitched to us a guacamole and margarita making class on the last sea day. Normally $35 pp but because we were eating there, they would do it for $30. Includes the guacamole making tool, lunch, and unlimited margaritas. We signed up. We really enjoyed having lunch with other RCB fans and making new friends.

 

We had some more time to kill after lunch before our reservations at the nursery were up, so we paid a visit to the Next Cruise desk and booked a Thanksgiving 2017 cruise out of Galveston on Vision of the Seas.

 

We picked up our daughter from the nursery and then headed back to the room. I think two days of very short naps had her in a foul mood. I took a post-Sabor cat nap and Nick and her went for a walk around the pool. Apparently she only wants to be in the splash pad. It was getting close to dinner time (first formal night), but we were both still stuffed from Sabor. We decided to let Kenzie burn off some energy in the splash pad and then order room service. After the splash pad, I ran into Windjammer to make a plate up for Kenzie in the room, and decided the food looked halfway decent. So I brought her the food, let her eat in the room, put her in the stroller with an iPad, and then headed back to the Windjammer with Nick to have dinner. This plan worked out well as she stayed still and quiet while we ate.

 

I knew she was super tired, and even though it was early, I decided to bring her back to the room for bed. Nick went down to get some work done on his laptop and Kenzie was bathed and asleep by 8. This is probably just fine because we have an early day at Labadee tomorrow. I'm going to catch up on some z's too.

 

A Few Musings from Today:

- Pro tip: don't walk on the upper deck with a plate full of food while you're at sea

- My cabin attendant is always in my room when we return.

- The ladies in the nursery are a God send. They are so patient with the children.

- It is possible to win a stack of 100 $1 bills out of a claw machine. I watched it happen

- Specialty dining seems to be better booked onboard as they are always running specials. Same goes with the spa

- I hope my kid is in a better mood tomorrow

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Day 3- Labadee

 

I'm beginning to learn that the best way to cruise with a toddler is to have very minimal plans. Thankfully, today went well because we didn't try to overbook the day.

 

We woke up and we're excited to see that we could see Labadee out in front of our stateroom. The captain pointed the nose straight to the dock for most of the approach then swung the nose out to the left and back in. All ashore was right on time at 8 AM.

 

We didn't feel like dealing with the crowds in the Windjammer this morning, so we put out the room service flyer the night before. While the variety wasn't as good (especially since I can't eat eggs), it was nice just snacking on some food as we got dressed. They were even nice enough to call us when they were on their way as to not surprise us.

 

We got off right after the initial rush at 8 and walked straight to the area to check in for the beach loungers for two. These were only $35 and were in a roped off area on adrenaline beach. Because we got there early, we were able to choose one underneath a huge tree. We pulled one lounge chair out and used it to block the entrance to the lounger, and let my daughter play in the sand underneath the shaded area (I will upload pictures when we get back home). This kept her out of the sun and prevented her from wandering off on us. We spent a few hours playing in the sand and going down to the water. I would definitely recommend water shoes for adrenaline beach as it can be quite rocky.

 

We started to notice Kenzie getting "tapped out" so we hosed ourself off at the showers and headed back to the ship. We got to the room and cleaned everyone up. We had originally planned to feed everyone in the Windjammer, drop Kenzie off at the nursery, and head back on shore. I was like "wait, let's let the nursery feed her and actually enjoy lunch together". We didn't have reservations, but they were able to take her as a walk in. Lunch in the Windjammer was great with make your own tacos and ribs. We then decided to bum around the ship instead of going back on shore. We made a trip to cafe promenade, checked out the library, and then went back to the room for a nap. Perfect parent's day out :-)

 

We hung out in the room until it was time to bring her back to the nursery for Nick and I to enjoy Chef's Table together. We did this on Oasis and really enjoyed it. There are 16 people at the table, and a 6 course meal paired wine. The chef introduces each plate with a detailed description of how they prepared it and the server presents the wine to the table. A very nice experience despite some disruptive guests, which the staff handled well. I will post details about all the courses when I get back home. Plan for a 4 hour experience, but it is so worth it.

 

I was nervous about how the nursery would handle night time with Kenzie. When we dropped her off, they asked us questions about dinner, pre bed rituals, and when she would go to sleep. We have a bed time routine that I'm heavily involved in, but they said she did just fine and didn't fuss. Because of this, I'm looking at dropping her off a few more nights so that we can enjoy the nighttime entertainment on board.

 

No amazing revelations today except that you should definitely take off your swimsuit in the shower after spending the day at the beach.

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Day 4- Falmouth

 

It was a sticky one today. Luckily, we weren't due to arrive in Falmouth until 10 AM so that allowed us to take it easier this morning. We tried out breakfast in the MDR, and while it was more laid back than the Windjammer, I think I prefer the variety of the Windjammer better. We decided to bring Kenzie to the nursery while we enjoyed the port area some.

 

On the way down to the gangway, we heard the announcement for the crew drill. My husband has a degree in emergency management and was extremely interested in watching it, so we sat in Boleros and watched through the port holes. I was able to catch up on some emails.

 

Afterwards we went onshore and checked out Margaritaville. Nice place, but we didn't really feel like getting in the pool. We had a frozen drink each and decided to head out because it was so warm. We stopped in a few shops and hit up patty port for a Jamaican patty and came back on the boat. We did what any person without their 2 year old would do- relax. Well, my husband and I are pretty big Apple fans, so we went up to the Viking Crown Lounge to watch the live Apple keynote. We had a great view of the storm rolling in over the mountains. Everything was going great until the cool looking storm wiped out our satellite internet :-). We caught most of it though.

 

After we picked her up, we stopped at Sorrento's for a quick piece of pizza and headed back to the room. It was raining pretty good but we decided to make a dash for it and join the group for the Blizzard meetup at Dairy Queen. Once back on board, it was time to get cleaned up at eat dinner at the Main Dining Room. The rack of lamb was excellent tonight, as was the pavlova. Kenzie did great and the waiters really try to entertain her. She's a pretty serious child, so it's quite funny.

 

We had about an hour until the nursery had room to drop her off, so we enjoyed walking the Royal Promenade and then around the outside of the ship on Deck 4. It was a beautiful night despite the rain. We finally dropped her off and headed to R Bar for the first time. I chose the Raspberry Ricky per Matt's recommendations. We tried our hand at trivia and did decent, although we didn't stick around long enough to find out how we did compared to others (I know it wasn't good enough to win the free pens ooooooohhhhh). The highlight of the evening was the headline act, a magician named Drew Thomas. He was SO GOOD. I highly recommend this if he's on board during your cruise. We picked Kenzie up from the nursery and headed back to the room to call it an evening. We have a fairly early morning tomorrow in Grand Cayman, so it's time to get some rest.

 

Random thoughts-

- Isn't it funny how you always see the same people on the boat?

- The cruise is now halfway over. Boo

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Day 5- Grand Cayman

 

Today was an early day off the boat, but thankfully Kenzie woke up just when we needed to. We quickly threw some bags together for our day and got a *very* quick breakfast at the Windjammer. We dropped her off at the nursery and headed down to the tender. The nursery normally opens at 9, but if you have an early excursion, they will open earlier for you which is awesome of them.

 

I think the initial rush of people off the boat was past and we walked right onto a tender. It was a nice 10 minute ride in and then off to find a taxi. I was glad we decided to leave Kenzie on the boat. She's a squirmer, and it wouldn't have been fun on the packed boat and bus.

 

We had a slight change of plans today and wound up spending time in the Camana Bay Area. We loved this area so much that we joked about selling everything and moving in. It's a higher end living and shopping area. We found some great (fast) wifi at a coffee shop and tried to figure out what else to do since the shops weren't yet open. I hopped on trip advisor and saw that they had an escape room place on the island. This is something my husband and I really enjoy doing back in the state, and it had great reviews. Turns out it was right by the cruise terminal. We walked through a nice book shop while they called the cab for us.

 

The escape room place was called Locked Inn Cayman. It was more expensive than the rooms back in the states, but we felt like the room was really good quality. The air conditioning worked great too! She recommended we do the "death row" room since it was just the two of us. Basically we were two inmates trying to break out of jail. Most places in the US give you an hour to get out of the room, but this room was only 45 minutes. We escaped with a few minutes to spare.

 

We caught a tender back to the boat and picked up Kenzie from the nursery. Unfortunately, she had already napped. We brought her out to the splash zone for a good long while and we had it mostly to ourselves. We then came back and tried to get her to nap again... Nope :-). I dozed on and off while she played in the room. Afterwards, we grabbed some snacks from Cafe Promenade. We didn't want to eat too much today since we knew tonight was formal night.

 

Yesterday, I saw an ad by the spa for a "lash lift" which is basically a perm and a tint on your eyelashes. I've always wanted to do something like this since my lashes stick straight out and are super light. It's nearly impossible to get them to curl. The man doing the procedure described my lashes as "super strong!" Which I found amusing. It took about an hour and I'm pretty happy with the result.

 

Then it was time to get dressed for formal night and head down to the MDR. We actually remembered to bring one of the bottles of wine that we brought on board. Dinner was delicious and our wait staff really goes out of their way to cater to Mackenzie. They even cut up her food into bite sized pieces, which I could just about kiss them for. I've always said I would pay extra at a restaurant for them to cut up her food for me.

 

Kenzie was definitely tired since she took an early nap today, so I headed back to the room with her to put her to bed. Nick is off to do some work on his laptop and have a drink or two. Tomorrow is Cozumel and Nick and I have a food tour planned with Cozumel Chef. I''m super excited for that.

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Day 6- Cozumel

 

Mackenzie woke up bright and early this morning, and since we didn't have to be off the boat until later on, I left with her to allow my husband to sleep some more. We walked around Deck 12, scoped the sunrise, and wound up in the Windjammer. Before the sun comes up is the perfect time to go to the Windjammer. After we ate, I went out to the helipad with her. I was surprised at how calm it was up there. Definitely a new favorite spot on the ship. She managed to break the screen on her iPad, so we headed back to the room to tell dad the wonderful news

We called home and took our time getting ready as we watched the ship dock in Cozumel. As I said yesterday, we had big plans today for a food tour. We dropped Kenzie off at the nursery and headed on shore. The line was the cabs was extremely long and hot, but we eventually made it. We had to meet our tour guide at the Mega near downtown Cozumel. It wasn't quite time to meet him yet, so we decided to find a geocache in the area. For those who aren't aware, geoaching is where someone puts a cache (anything from a keybox all the way up to an ammo can) hidden in an area and publishes the GPS coordinates and hints to help you find it. This one was at a bar across from Mega and the staff knew all about it. We dropped off a travel bug in the cache, grabbed a beer from the bar, and enjoyed the scenery. We walked around Mega until it was time to meet up with our tour guide.

 

I'm going to do a whole post on the food tour (and will link to it), but it was fabulous! We got a great taste of local culture and food and our tour guide was super great as well. Our cab driver for the day dropped us off at the ship and we headed back on board. We picked up Kenzie from the nursery and headed back to the room to shower.

 

We decided to head up to the rock wall when it opened. I haven't done rock climbing in a really long time and my post baby body wasn't really cut out for it. I got half way up the wall and got nervous and came down. Oh well, I tried. We took Kenzie to the open play toy area in Fuel and let her burn off some energy and then down to Sorrento's for a snack. Annette, the group cruise coordinator, was down there and we sat and had a wonderful conversation with her and her husband.

 

We had to run upstairs real quick and change clothes for dinner in the MDR. Tonight was Italian night, which everyone raves about. Unfortunately, it wasn't my favorite. We've really enjoyed the MDR and the staff works so hard to interact with Kenzie.

 

After dinner, we went to Sabor to cancel our guacamole making class for tomorrow. We are super bummed about this, but the nursery is fully booked up. We are on the waiting list, but it doesn't look good.

 

And just like that, the day was over. Long day, it was hot, and we are ready for bed. Just one more sea day and then it's back to reality.

 

Some interesting things today:

- Many places in Cozumel did not want you to flush the toilet paper down the toilet. I didn't realize this until after I threw it in. Whoops. Complete habit

- I am surprised the nursery has been so booked up (completely booked tonight too). On our Christmas sailing, they were never full. If you know you need a specific time, go ahead and book it right then. I goofed by not booking tomorrow earlier in the week

- Our waiter told us tonight that they are taking the lamb chops off of the Jasmine menu very soon. This is disappointing to me- this was probably the best food I had in the MDR

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Day 7- Sea Day

 

Well, it's the last day of the cruise. Of course, part of me is sad, but this has been a very successful trip for us. I am ready for a couple of comforts of home too.

 

Kenzie woke up right at 7, and I decided to give my husband some time to sleep in. We hit the Windjammer nice and early again with minimal crowds. We walked around the ship and sectioned off a corner in the R Bar to serve as her jungle gym. When it hit 9:00, I brought her up to the open play area in Fuel. We certainly loved the large open play area on Oasis that was open 24 hours a day, but they do a nice setup here too.

 

My husband texted me shortly thereafter and said the nursery called with a cancellation and we could now do the guacamole class. We dropped her off, went downstairs 45 minutes before the class, told us no problem, and then told us they were full. We tried to figure out something else to do for lunch, but Giovanni's Table wasn't open for lunch. We booked Giovanni's Table for dinner instead. Then, Sabor contacted us and said they could squeeze us in. So we ran back down just in time for the guacamole making class to begin.

 

The class was a good price point I thought. It is normally $35/person but they were running a special of $30/person. This included make your own guacamole, a margarita making demo, a margarita (and later they offered a second), lunch, and an avocado slicing tool per couple. The ingredient that surprised me the most in the guacamole was the fire roasted tomatoes. I think it definitely adds that extra flavor that we have come to love. I'll add pictures on Monday. Tons of fun.

 

After 2 margaritas and a fully belly, I needed a nap. So we napped until I had to go back to the spa because the eye lash lift did not hold like it was supposed to. They offered to redo it for free. Very nice of them. I am definitely more pleased with the results this time.

 

When I was done, we picked up Kenzie, spent some time in the open play area, got milkshakes from Johnny Rockets, and a slice of pizza from Sorrento's for Kenzie. We had some time before dinner, so we decided to go ahead and do most of our packing.

 

We wound up cancelling Giovanni's table for dinner and sticking with the MDR. Dinner was pretty good tonight and Nick ordered the up charge steak from Chop's for dinner. He really enjoyed it. I had the Turkey and Dressing, but it was the smallest portion of dressing I had ever seen! I ordered more :-)

 

We dropped Kenzie off at the nursery one last time after dinner, met some group cruise folks at the Schooner Bar, quickly lost $20 in the casino, had a glass of our favorite wine at Vintages, took a trip out to the helipad, and had one last drink at the Schooner Bar. I was getting pretty tired so we decided to head back to the room.

 

Tomorrow we have a pretty early flight out of MCO (10:30), so we will be doing express walk off. This entails taking all of your luggage off with you. I didn't think we would have time to wait for a rental company to open at 8 and drive ourselves, so we have private transportation that is supposed to pick us up at 7:30. Tight time frame, but hopefully everything goes smoothly.

 

Tomorrow I'll post some final thoughts on this cruise and hopefully edit the old posts with some pictures. Let me know if you have any questions, specifically about traveling with a toddler.

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I enjoyed reading about your trip. I think I missed the part about which ship you went on and out of which port. I'm planning to go to WDW pre-cruise and our Allure cruise leaves out of Fort Lauderdale. Is this where you left out of? Which Alamo did you rent from? I'm thinking if returning to FLL airport but wondering if there's something better/closer to the port?

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Drewmommy,

 

She left out of Port Canaveral on the Freedom of the Seas. Port Everglades (where the Allure leaves out of) is actually very close to FLL. I doubt you'll find a closer Alamo drop off and I bet they'll even have a bus over to the port but I would double check.

 

CMcLarty,

 

I'll be curious to see how your departure goes. We got off the Freedom on Sept 4th with twin 3 yr olds and flew out of MCO as well. We had a 10:30am flight as well on Delta to Atlanta. I've taken the boys on 3 trips on the Freedom out of Port Canaveral now and we've flown twice and driven once. Both times we flew we took private transportation and the only hairy thing is the car seats. The place provides the car seats but I have to install them. They're also usually pretty old and beat up. This time around we got #2 luggage tags and did the normal departure. We told them to pick us up at 8am but it wound up being closer to 8:15am when we finally got through. I had checked us into our flight on board and paid for the luggage while on board (Delta actually put us on stand by originally and I had to nudge them over Twitter that its not acceptable to place 3 year olds on stand by). We dropped the bags off and one was slightly over weight but Delta shockingly let it slide. We actually have TSA Precheck which made the line a breeze and we were sitting at the gate by 9:30am and played "entertain the toddlers" for an hour before our flight.

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Day 8- Debarkation

 

Well, until the day that I'm able to retire on a cruise ship, this day must come. It was a great cruise and I felt fulfilled and good about our trip when it was time to go. Not to mention, I was ready to soak in my tub at home and get my pillow back.

 

I spent a lot of time planning this morning before we left. We were only allowed one duffel bag and backpack each. I was going to push the stroller with Kenzie with my backpack underneath. On my back was her car seat in a carrying bag and I was pulling a duffel. My husband was pulling two duffels and had his backpack. We walked out the room at 6:40 and were like aaahhh the ship is soon quiet and we are going to walk right off. Take the elevator door down to 4 and BAM! Found all the people. Now we had to navigate through the casino with all of this stuff, around people's bags and casino chairs to find the end of the line. No one was helpful. Someone was kind enough to light up a cigarette about 5 feet away from my daughter. It was by far the worst part of the cruise.

 

Once the line started moving though, everything was fast. Love the ramp in the terminal. It was just under 20 minutes from the line starting to move to us waiting for our private transportation.

 

We had booked through Town Car Now from recommendations on here and great reviews on Facebook. I would give them a 3.5/5. The rate was good and communication beforehand was excellent. I personally feel that a private transportation should be there 5-10 minutes early with a sign with our name on it. This man was 5 minutes late and we had to truck through bushes with all of our stuff to get to the car. The car was clean, but there was a terrible rattle and at one point I noticed the check engine light on and another alert light on the dash. I was honestly worried about our safety with the baby in the car and if something happened if we would miss our flight. At one point, we definitely smelled oil burning. Luckily, we made it safely to the airport, but I'm not entirely sure the driver made it home.

 

We arrived at MCO with plenty of time to spare. We were able to get some breakfast, speed through TSA pre check (the best $85 I have ever spent), and then had to entertain Kenzie in the gate area. She stayed awake through the whole flight to AUS, but luckily slept on the 2 hour drive home. All in all, a successful trip home.

 

While the early flight made the beginning of the day somewhat stressful, I totally appreciated getting home relatively early on a Sunday. I have the laundry done, groceries bought, and I don't feel behind starting the week tomorrow.

 

Tomorrow I'm going to go back and add photos to all my posts and give my overall impressions of the ship, plus some pointers that I picked up with traveling with Kenzie. Stay tuned!

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