We spent a relaxing night at the hotel and awoke refreshed and ready to head south to begin the cruise. We ate breakfast in the buffet at the hotel, and, as is typical, it was only fair. They had both hot and cold items, but nothing is really ever that warm.
After breakfast, we went back to the room to repack our small carry-on bag, loaded up the rest of our suitcases onto the cart and checked out of the hotel around 8:45 AM. After getting some gas for the rental car and making a stop at WalMart for a couple of items, we headed south on I-95. We had about 1.5 hours more to drive to get to the port in Ft. Lauderdale, and unfortunately, the last hour is always congested as we pass through some of the larger cities, and deal with some remaining morning commuter traffic. Today was no different.
We planned on stopping at the Harbor Place shopping area near the port in Ft. Lauderdale to scout it out. We will be going there between the two cruises for some supplies. It is less than a mile walk from the cruise terminal, and there is a Publix and a Total Wine Store there.
After going to a couple of stores in the shopping center just to look for some of the items we know we want to purchase between the cruises, we drove through the security gate at the port, and headed to the port Terminal to drop off our checked luggage. Stephanie was going to handle all of the carry on luggage while I drove to the Ft. Lauderdale Airport to drop off the rental car, and returned on the free shuttle bus. There was not much traffic at the port terminal yet, so the drop off went very quickly. I drove to the airport and dropped off the rental car, and headed outside to catch the shuttle back to the port. Unfortunately, it took a little over 30 minutes for the shuttle to arrive, and then it stopped first at the Carnival Cruise terminal before heading over to the Princess Cruises terminal. By this time, the traffic had gotten really bad heading into the terminal to drop off passengers for our cruise, and I waited on the bus for another 30 minutes while we crept through the backed up traffic. There is a lot of traffic when there are 3,500 passengers arriving.
Stephanie had been waiting in line anticipating that I would not be gone for an hour dropping off the rental car. It took so long for me to get back that she had to get out of the line because she had gotten up to the entry point and I was still missing. Luckily we had been keeping each other informed of our progress via texting. By the time I arrived back at the terminal, the line had actually disappeared, the first wave of waiting passengers had already gotten though, so we proceeded into the terminal and through security in about 10 minutes. After checking in we were placed in an Elite Status holding area, where we were told we would be in the first group of passengers to board.
They had anticipated we would board before 1:00 PM, but due to having to process the entire crew through Immigration, and a subsequent Coast Guard inspection, boarding was delayed until about 3:00 PM. These additional inspections were required because the Royal Princess ship had just returned to the USA this morning from her European cruise schedule. Needless to say, there were a lot of tired, hungry and generally unhappy cruisers as a result of the additional wait time.
Luckily, we were in the first group to board, and when we arrived at our cabin, our luggage had actually already arrived, which was nice.
We headed to the buffet for some lunch, and since hardly any other passengers had boarded yet, it was pleasantly empty.
Afterward, we went back to the cabin and unpacked. Of course, due to the delays in boarding, our departure time from Ft. Lauderdale was also delayed from 4:00 PM to 6:00 PM.
We had to go through the safety and evacuation drill in our designated muster area, but once that was completed, we were free to finally relax and have a couple of adult refreshments.
The sail away was uneventful, and as we headed out to sea, the sun was setting behind some inland rain clouds.
As is usual for our first night on board, we were not going to eat in the dining room, opting instead to eat in the Alfredo’s Pizzeria that is one of the separate restaurants on this ship. The food was quite good, they had several specialty pizzas that were made fresh for each order.
We headed back to the cabin, we were quite tired from all of the travel over the past two days, and the stressful check in this afternoon.
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