Today’s the day we finally embark on our long awaited cruise. After having in room coffee, we decided to get some breakfast and headed to The Breakfast Bar. It had good reviews on Yelp and was open at 6 am.
Unfortunately, when we navigated there we couldn’t find parking anywhere. They only had street parking and it was filled with residents who weren’t up yet (bad side of being early risers).
Going back to Yelp I saw there was Denny’s 3-4 miles away so we went there and had no problem finding parking.
Service was okay but I had to send my English muffin back so it could look at least a little toasted.
After our appetites were sated we headed back to the hotel where Steve and I went for a walk to the Queen Mary for exercise AND to see our first good glimpse of our home for the next week.
We had noticed an event setup the evening before from our balcony. Preparations were in full force this morning and it was clear it was for a wedding.
When leaving for the front desk and our shuttle, there were about hundred people in beautiful Indian style clothing for the wedding.
They had photographers who were taking still photos, video and drone photos. The Bollywood style music was blaring. I wish I could have stayed!
We booked the 10:30 am shuttle when checking in and walked to the reception area shortly after 10.
We waited about 20 minutes for the shuttle and loaded up with another group for the short ride. I made sure all our bags were tagged and left with the right person.
There were still passengers getting off the ship when we arrived but all were off by 11 a.m. We went to the faster to the fun check in line and were next. After getting checked in we settled in by the priority embarkation area. One wedding party boarded before priority passengers. The lady managing the priority line said they had 9 diamond and 120 platinum passengers. Then the suite guests boarded and we were called to board at five till 12.
After a quick stop to get through screening we took the escalators up where we had a boarding pictures taken and then went to board the ship.
We went directly to our cabin (6232) to drop off our carry-ons.
We loved the balcony!
I’ll try to get these types of cabin for sure if ever on a Spirit class ship again.
We had a letter explaining our Faster to the Fun benefits.
Then we went up to the buffet for lunch. It was pretty good and I was hopeful the buffet would be much improved from my last Carnival cruise. Afterwards we toured the serenity deck.
My husband and I went to the Red Frog Bar where we met Dwayne. He ended up being our favorite bartender this trip. I ordered a Ting Mojito for the first time and it was pretty tasty!
We loved seeing our pictures on the “big screen”.
All the bags were delivered by 2:30 or so and we quickly unpacked. I was worried about storage for four people but we had plenty of space.
The safety drill took much too long for having people stand on the decks. I really liked the way they did it on Celebrity better where we were comfortable in the theatre. Finally we were done about 4:15 and free to leave.
The ship left almost an hour late but they did have a crane doing something around the pool area. In fact, we weren’t able to get to the mid pool at all until sailing time.
After getting ready for dinner we went by the taste bar. Tonight’s items were from the Blue Iguana.
The chicken tortilla soup was good but I wasn’t a fan of the roasted pork. We then went to have a pre-dinner at the Alchemy Bar. I had the Cucumber sunrise which was so tasty.
Dinner tonight was at the steakhouse which will be detailed in a separate entry. I did pictures of tonight’s main dining room menus.
After dinner in the steakhouse, we went to the cabin to read and relax.
We found a sting ray waiting for us! Unfortunately there was also a letter with a weather warning.
As it turns out, the weather did impact the itinerary, but that is a tale for another day.
Click the image below to see today’s Fun Times program.
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