Home in Florida and our Caribbean Cruise

The RV problems are behind us and we made it to our RV Lot in Lily Lake Golf and RV Resort in Frostproof, FL on Wednesday evening the 15^th.  It was good to get “home” and know that we weren't going to be driving the RV for a while.  NOW the Cruise excitement begins as we spent the next three days getting things done and packing for our Royal Caribbean Cruise on the Allure of the Seas that will depart on Sunday!  The lot looked good with almost no weeds growing; a few dead queen palms had some dead frons that Dick removed within an hour of arrival.  Haircuts done, last minute shopping for some clothes since we had not planned on a cruise and don’t carry many “dress up” items in the coach, and washing the car along with just resting filled the time.

Sunday morning the 19^th the weather was great and we headed down Florida Route 27 South to Fort Lauderdale and the ship.  WOW!  When we planned the cruise a few weeks ago we really just looked for one at the right time and departure location going to the Western Caribbean since we had not done that before.  We did not pay much attention to the ship itself!  What a surprise when we got there and saw that the Allure of the Seas is the LARGEST CRUISE SHIP AFLOAT with over 6,000 passengers and a crew of over 2,500!  It is simply HUGE!!!! 

The view of our ship towering over buildings by pier

We were assigned to an INSIDE BALCONY Stateroom #699 on the 12^th DECK!  Now most cruise ships have outside and inside rooms but I never heard of an inside room with a Balcony but on the Allure of the Seas they have opened up the entire inside of the ship from the 5^th or 6^th level up and have rows of staterooms with inside balconies above that up to the 14^th level. (The ship does not have a 13^th floor so our 12^th floor was very near the top!)  There is a carousel on the 5^th deck that we look down on from our balcony! 

View looking aft from our inside balcony

Solarium Starboard side

Solarium

Pat in Central Park area on ship

The Allure of the Seas - It's HUGE

The cruise schedule takes us for first day – at sea, 2^nd day – at Royal Caribbean’s Labadie Island Haiti, 3^rd day – Port visit to Falmouth, Jamaica, 4^th day at sea, 5^th day – Port visit to Cozumel, Mexico, 6^th day at sea with arrival and departure on Sunday.   Of course this large ship also has a large casino as well as something like 9 bars and 3 main dining rooms plus half a dozen specialty restaurants and numerous shops.  The main theater is absolutely huge with seating for what seems like a thousand and is larger than many of the Broadway theaters!  During this cruise the show Chicago was presented and we saw it one evening.  It was essentially the full show and was done very well.  We attended the water show that was held outside in the pool and stage area we could see from our balcony on the aft of the ship.  They cover the pool with a stage for some events and have the pool open for other events.  The ship also has a great children’s pool area and there were quite a few children aboard to use it. 

  There are two separate wave riders up on the 16^th deck on the fantail, one for surfing standing up and one for surf boarding on your knees if you can get up on them without falling.  Right across from our balcony was the landing area for one of the Zip Lines, it runs from the back of the ship forward and looked like it was about 150 feet long about 7 decks in the air, and it was used a lot! 

Zip Line Landing in Blue across from our stateroom

We chose to have regular dining with early seating and were seated at a table for six.  The other two couples were very nice folks, one couple, Ken and Maryanne are from the Washington DC area and he is a retired government worker, the second couple, Dexter and Ruthann were from Florida and he is a retired pastor while she is a nurse and is still working.  We enjoyed our evening meals and conversation with them.  Food?  The food was awesome!  Our waitress was a really great young lady named Mary Lee from the Philippines and she took excellent care of all of us and enjoyed joking around.  Here is a couple of photos from meals and of the dining room area.

Dining Room - multi levels

Music and Piano in Dining Room

Dick and Mary Lee with Lobster

 I can’t say enough about how warm and friendly all of the staff on the ship is.  Whatever Royal Caribbean is doing to select and train their staff personnel it works and all the other passengers we spoke to agreed and enjoyed them also.  Our cabin steward, named  Henry  Smith was top notch and made sure to always greet us most pleasantly and fulfill our every request as well as keep the cabin clean.

We certainly took advantage of the casino which was open nearly all the time.  We both played the slots and found a couple of machines that we tended to play a lot.  Of course we chose those few as they were the ones that paid us well.  The third night Dick hit one machine for over $200 on a $1 wager and even took a photo.  There were three of that particular slot machine in the casino and of course he returned to play them later.  He hit one of them for about $525 and brought his ticket up to the cabin to show Pat.  Of course not every machine paid but for the cruise we came out ahead even though we played a lot! 

Our Visit to Labadee Island was just to swim and snorkel and have lunch on the beach at one of the Royal Caribbean buffets they had set up for everyone.  We did take a snorkel boat out and Dick did snorkel while Pat stayed at the boat and did swim some by the boat.

Enjoying a drink on Snorkel boat

During our stop at Cozumel we took a tour to the Mayan Ruins and a bus ride around the Island.  Our visit to the ruins was not exciting but it was very informative as our guide was herself of Mayan ancestry and she presented them in an interesting way with great details.  The Mayan civilization covered much of the central Caribbean countries.  There are many theories as to why it essentially disappeared many years ago and many new discoveries about it continue.  We did observe several large Iguanas at the ruins and a photo of one is below.

Mayan Ruins

Iguana at Ruins

Our guide - Sylvia

  

After visiting the ruins our group continued on a bus ride around Cozumel Island stopping at a nice scenic rock formation on the coast.  Most of the island is actually a nature preserve and the road is the only thing between it and the shore except for a few small shops.  Here are some pictures of the beach and shops.

Beach on Cozumel

Beach cave at Cozumel

Beach Shop

Beach Shop

Pat at Beach Shop

All in all the cruise was really nice and we had a great time.  It was a great way to end up this 2014 Trip West.  We will leave the RV on our lot here in Florida and drive the van back home to Pennsylvania to spend the holidays with our family.  Here’s wishing all who may be following us along on this journey via this blog a warm and wonderful rest of the year and a Very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and yours.

Dick & Pat