OurBigAdventure

Almost a year ago we booked a cruise on the Jewel of the Seas. Teresa, our cruise agent, sent us a list of cruises and deals she had found and out of the few that she told us about we chose this one because of the list of ports that it was going to visit. We told her that if we could book an aft room with a balcony to reserve our spot. As it turned out there was a room available and our trip was planned.

The cruise was leaving out of the port of Miami which is only a four hour drive for us and it would then head to Aruba, Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica and Grand Cayman. It was a 11 day cruise and we had only been to Grand Cayman in the past so this would be a great way to hit some new ports without changing hotel rooms.

Not to mention that we had never been to South America or Central America so we were looking forward to the experience and all of the great new ports as well. So after eleven months of waiting we were excited to finally head out for our cruise and after just loosing Duke we needed a little time away from the house to recover.

Goblin was going to stay with our neighbors who's Ridgeback Foxy was in LOVE with him. He would get some extra attention and plenty of walks and would be in his own neighborhood which should make it easy on him while we were gone.

We will be posting our trip over the next few weeks and it will be full of great photos and stories. Hopefully you will have as much fun reading about our trip as we had experiencing it.

We woke up at 5:30 am to finish packing and get ready for our four hour drive to Miami where our ship was waiting. Goblin has little interest in moving at all at 5:xx am and I am the same way. We both took advantage of Sandra getting the first shower and snoozed until around 6:30 am when she woke us up.

It is 28 degrees outside which is very unusual for Orlando and we heard the CIty of Titusville had left their sprinklers running all night causing icy roads and traffic problems. Hopefully we wouldn't have the same problem on our way out of town.

Heidi came by and picked up Goblin at 7:00 am as we finished loading the car. He was going to visit his girlfriend Foxy while we were gone which should keep him busy.

After picking up breakfast and filling the tank we were off and pretty close to being on schedule, we were planning on boarding the ship around 11:00 am.

After four hours of sleep, a four hour drive is not very easy. We stopped for drinks once to stay awake and spotted the Orlando - Miami shuttle that runs daily for $20/person. It would have been a good idea for this trip especially considering the $20/day parking lot at the port. (Our 11 day cruise cost us an additional $220 in parking fees)

It was too late to worry about that now and as we pulled into Miami we were in need of a bathroom break. We tried a CVS where a really rude employee said they don't have a public bathroom, or even a trash can for an empty soda can we wanted to throw away. Neither did the Hard Rock Restaurant for that matter, they must pee in the bushes down here.

Finally we made it to the check in and were close to boarding the ship. Then one last quick form to fill out, a health form...

"Have you had or been in contact with someone who has had:
runny nose, fever, sore throat, headache, sinus congestion, cough
in the past two weeks?"

"Have you been in contact or close proximity to anyone diagnosed with swine flu in the past two weeks?"

Pretty obvious they are worried about swine flu so "No" and "No". Then Sandra says, "I just had a cold so I have to say 'Yes'." She's just too cute to lie so off to a holding room we went to wait for the ships doctor to check her out.

Twenty minutes go by and nobody has even checked on us. We decided to wait outside of the room where we couldn't be forgotten and where we could watch everyone else head toward the ship coughing, sneezing and sniffling. Liars, every one of them.

Ten more minutes and the guy that sent us to the holding room told Sandra that it was "preferred" that she wait out of sight inside the back room. I was irritated, she was devastated. Me because he was being an ass, and she because we planned this trip almost a year ago and they may not let her on the ship.

Finally the doctor came and asked a few questions. Told her not to worry and said if she had any more sniffles to stop by the infirmary. Finally we were on our way!

We grabbed a quick lunch, a long nap and headed to the muster drill. We seem to always need a nap when we take a cruise out of Miami and overall we have had a pretty good day so far. We had a last minute email check as we pulled out of the port then watched the Hannah Montana movie in the ship's cinema before heading to the room to unpack out stuff before dinner.

We have a great group at our dinner table, there is a couple from New York, a couple from Connecticut and a family from Toronto all places we had been on our road trip this summer. They were all very nice and had great stories from their past cruises.

We finished our dinner and headed off to bed. We loose an hour tomorrow as we sail around Cuba and in two days we hit our first stop... Aruba.

We woke up early and not just because the room was moving with the waves but because we had a huge breakfast buffet waiting for us. It was nearly endless, there is no way you could go hungry at this buffet and the best part was that you didn't have to clean up!

There is something that you learn very quickly about a buffet and that is the conflict between your stomach size and the amount of food you have piled on your plate. You also learn that your stomach always wins. But it's not about winning it's just breakfast after all.

So after breakfast we headed to the steam room. It was 28 degrees when we left Orlando so a little warmth was what we needed to get us ready for the Caribbean. The only problem with our plan was that the Thermal Suite had not had enough time to heat up so the steam rooms were only just warm. In fact we found that the steam rooms in the spa bathrooms were more steamy than the ones in the Thermal Suite throughout the cruise.

We headed to the pool to get some sun where we found half of the seats taken and the other half of the seats reserved with towels. There is a nice rule on the ship though... "no reserving seats". So we moved some towels out of the way and started working on our tans.

The best part of sitting by a pool on a cruise ship is watching the people. You can tell if the water is cold and based on that you can spot the ones from warm and cold climates. You can also spot the first time cruisers because they don't realize that the pool is filled with sea water until they get in.

We only stayed at the pool for about 45 min and the people whose towels we moved from the chairs never showed up. That's why you shouldn't feel guilty about pitching their towel and stealing the chairs.

The reason we chose this cruise was because we were able to book an aft room which looks out of the rear of the ship and has a larger balcony. (roughly 12'X12') We decided to spend some time watching the waves and had a glass of wine while we were on our balcony. It was a sea day after all so we didn't have much planned for the day.

We headed off to the Meet & Mingle for the Cruise Critic group where we met a few people who had been chatting about this cruise on the board. It is nice to go and meet people at things like this because you will see them all over the ship. They you don't feel like you are on a ship with a bunch of strangers.

After another trip to the buffet for lunch we headed back to our balcony to read for a while. I don't know about everyone else but it seems that the only time I ever actually sit and read anything is when I'm on vacation. Today I was continuing "Emergency" by Neil Strauss which I had started last July (6 months ago) on our East Coast Road Trip.

We decided to give the Thermal Suite another try before getting ready for dinner. The steam room was much warmer but not entirely steamy yet so we opted for the heated tile lounge chairs. So far on this trip we had calm seas and not much rocking at all. While we sat overlooking the northern coastline of Cuba however the ship shook as if it hit a large wave. I jokingly told Sandra that we must have hit a small fishing boat. Then we felt it again two more times a little later. Without thinking much of it we headed off to the Captain's Reception before dinner.

Our plan was to go to the first Captain's reception then relax before our dinner which was 2 hours later. We ordered an appetizer from the early dinner menu and were organizing the room when the Captain came over the ship's speakers and told us of the 7.0 earthquake a few hours earlier in Haiti. We turned on the news which was clueless at this point because it was so early but we couldn't help but wonder if those "fishing boats" we had hit earlier were actually shock waves from the earthquake.

After dinner I had a stomach ache/headache combination so I only wanted to lie down. I wasn't sure if it was from over eating or from a drink that I had earlier but I was in no shape to go dancing. We found "7 Pounds" with Will Smith on one of the movie channels and watched for a while. I fell asleep half way into the movie, not because I wasn't interested but I just didn't feel good. Sandra filled me in on what I missed because she said it was too sad for her to watch again.

I'm not sure if the movie ended at 2 am or if Sandra did something to wake me up but she couldn't sleep and wanted to go refill her water bottle. I decided to go too and we headed upstairs to find a water station. When we got there we found a couple making out on a couch near by. (I guess they thought they were alone)

We refilled our water jugs and walked around a little. We noticed both hot tubs full of people, the dance club apparently still full and every other area of the ship completely vacant. It appears that the only people wandering the ship are us and the couple making out.

We headed back to the elevator from the 5th floor thinking this would be the first time on this cruise that we didn't stop on every floor. There were 5 elevators and nobody in sight so our odds were good that we could go from 5 to 9 with no stops.

As we stepped onto the elevator we heard voices. We pushed 9 and the doors closed. On 6 (one level up) we picked up two girls who had been out at one of the bars. What floors do you think they picked? You guessed it... 7 & 8. Once again we hit every floor. I did mention there were 4 other elevators and stairs right there as well didn't I?

Oh well, maybe tomorrow an elevator might skip a floor for us.