cruisin73

Oops you are right. I was thinking hockey. We were trying to find NHL games and they didn’t have any on TV.

When we were on Symphony in May for the mediterranean cruise they did not have any NFL games on. There was however a lot of soccer games on.

I’ve narrowed our choice down to the Renaissance on 17th or Marriott Fort Lauderdale airport. Both have restaurants and stores near by. I’d like to have dinner on the water and both areas seem to have that. Would you pick one over the other?

Disembarkation day. We had a nice breakfast one last time at coastal kitchen. Since we were not flying home until Monday the concierge walked us off at 8:45. It was nice not having to rush off in the morning. We had our luggage with us so we didn’t have to go and get. Waiting for a taxi to bring us to our hotel took quite awhile though. Once we checked into our hotel they kept our bags and we got on the hop on hop off bus and went to the beach for a bit. Went back on the bus and back to the hotel put our stuff in our room and off we went to dinner for one last paella. The next morning we got a taxi to the airport and found out our flight to New Jersey was delayed by 3 hours so we finished our trip with a little shopping. Nothing big just some alcohol and souvenirs we don’t need. Lol Flight was long 9 hours. Finally made it home. We booked another cruise while on this cruise. We will be back on symphony on December 2nd for the southern Caribbean cruise. We will be in a crown loft suite. We didn’t have to pay the 10% since that doesn’t start until June 1st but we did have to pay $250 deposit per person. We also got 300 OBC which was actually the only reason I booked while still on board. We loved this cruise just wish we had more sea days to relax a bit. I highly recommend this cruise and anyone already booked you will have a fabulous time. Thanks everyone for reading along.

Some pics from our last day

It is now the dreaded last day of the cruise. This was our only sea day. We were invited to do a bridge tour with our concierge. This was a lot of fun and interesting to see what goes on up there. After the bridge tour we went on the Abyss. Terrifying! I don’t like roller coaster or anything like that so probably for the average person this was fun for me not so much. then it was time for the love and marriage show. We actually tried to get on but the audience liked another couple more. I’m glad they were chosen they were fun to have up there. That night was a very successful for me. Lol i won 2 raffles at 2 different jewelry stores. The first one was at Effy if you bought something there you got tickets for their raffle and I won a small diamond necklace and the other one was at a jewelry store where if you bought something at the shop where they sell the t-shirts, mugs, pens ect…. You put your receipt in a box. I won sunglasses and a watch here. I’m not a gambler but I was told by a few people I should go to the casino. Lol We walked around Central Park for a bit and then off to bed.

Some pictures from the shop and wonderland.

We are now in Naples and this day didn’t turn out as planned. We were exhausted from all the walking in Rome so we slept in a little. That turned out to be a big mistake. The plan was to go to Capri but when we got to the ferry to buy our tickets there was a huge line and another huge line to get on the ferry. We wouldn’t get to capri until Maybe noon and we didn’t think we would have enough time there and get back in time for the ship. We decided we would just walk around Naples for awhile and see what’s there. We did go to the tourist information but all the tours had already left. Walking around Naples is a big mistake in my opinion. In this port you definitely need some kind of tour. After walking around we decided to just go back to the ship have lunch and just relax on the suite deck. For dinner we went to wonderland. It was better then we expected and quite the experience. We had the waiter order for us. My husband has a severe mushroom allergy and they were very cautious with what they brought to us. I highly recommend it. It turned out to be a great day but next time we will be sure to get tot he ferry much earlier.

Sorry had to add one more of us.

Rome

Day 5 brings us to Rome. Well actually Civitavecchia. We took an excursion through RCCL. Express train to Rome. It took about an hour to get to Rome by the train and then we had about 5 hours to walk around on our own. We met up with a friend of a friend who took us all around. We saw all the main sights. We didn’t wait in the lines to go inside anywhere but we did walk around the outside. Places we saw were Vatican, colosseum, pantheon, Trevi fountain and piazza Adriana. We took our guide out to lunch and had more pizza and spaghetti and meatballs. Best pasta ever. Of course we also had to get more gelato. YUM! DAY 5 we ate at coastal kitchen and watched the ice show. Amazing the things they can do on such a small rink. We walked 22,000 steps so after the show it was off to bed.

Jealous!!! I need to go back just not sure when.

Day 4 of the cruise brought us to LeSpezia. I did so much research on this port because I really wanted to go to Cinque Terre. When we woke up it was raining…hard…down pouring. I said to my husband should we just stay on the ship? He said this is the one port you have been talking non stop about there is no way we can stay on the ship. so off we went to breakfast and off the ship to get a taxi to the train station. There was some talk on here about whether the taxi drivers would drive a short distance to the train station but it wasn’t an issue at all. We got our tickets and just a few minutes later we were in Riomaggiore. When we got off the train it had stopped raining. So happy my husband pushed us to go. We walked around a bit and visited a few of the shops. Then off to the next village. We also went to Verrazano and Monterosso. We had lunch on the beach in Monterrosso. Best pizza and gelato. I highly recommend a trip to Cinque Terre. Absolutely beautiful. We then went back to the train and when we got back to LeSpezia. Getting a taxi back was also easy.

Before we left my travel agent asked me when our anniversary was. I remember there was another couple sitting there. We loved that waiter saw him a few times during the cruise.

Marseille

Day 3 of the cruise brought us to Marseille France. We went on an excursion to Aix en Provence. It was a bus tour and then walking tour in Aix. After the walking tour we had about 2 hours to walk around on our own. My only mistake with this tour was we didn't get to eat lunch because we did too much shopping. We did get some nice lavendar soap and a few other things from the small boutiques. Side note bathrooms are not free to use unless you are eating in a restaurant. We had to pay 1 Euro. The excursion was only 4 hours so if we wanted we could have gone to Marseille and have lunch but we opted to have lunch on the ship instead. After lunch we hung out in the hot tub on the suite deck. My husband also went on the waterslide which he said was alot of fun. We ate dinner at Coastal Kitchen and then went to see Hairspray. They really did a great job. Both of us really enjoyed it.

I'm sure it's no problem. we walked right onto the beach and when it was time for lunch we just walked over the hostess told her we had reservations for lunch but the people infront of us didn't have reservations and were seated. We didn't use any of the other amenities though. I hope that answered your question.

Mallorca and anniversary celebration.

Day 2 of the cruise brought us to Mallorca. Doing some research before the cruise I heard about Balneario beach club. You can get a taxi right there. We did have reservations for lunch but we didn’t rent a sunbed. The sunbeds are $40 each and come with an umbrella and a welcome alcoholic drink. They looked nice but we decided to just sit on our towels we brought from the ship. My husband swam in the Mediterranean Sea but for me it was freezing, The water does look amazing though. For lunch we had paella my new favorite dish. My husband had the cheesecake for dessert and said it was the best cheesecake he has ever had. When we ordered dessert we also asked them to call a cab for us. Lunch was delicious and the service was great. We walked up to get the taxi. When the taxi arrived two guys got in the car we told them we think that’s our taxi but they were assured it was theirs. No big deal we just waited for the next one which came about 10 minutes later. When we got back to our room there were anniversary decorations everywhere. Nice touch royal. Tonight was formal night and we were celebrating our anniversary too. We ate at 150 Central Park. I had the Cesar salad that was made table side. It was very good. I can’t remember what I had for dinner but I did have the fried cheesecake for dessert which was delicious. I also got my anniversary present from my hubby which was a beautiful aqua marine ring from the jewelry store Effy on the ship. we had a great day and we are now off to France…

Views from the castle

So sorry it’s taking me so long. Life seems to be getting In The way. Continuing on… Its finally cruise day. The night before we asked the front desk to reserve a taxi for 10:15 we had a check in time for 11:00 for the cruise. Unfortunately that plan didn’t work out quite as well because there was a marathon that morning which delayed all the taxi’s. We finally got our taxi and we’re still at the cruise port at 11:00. Took about 15 minutes and was about 15 Euros. Not so bad and I got there pretty much when I wanted to. Check in was super simple. we got out of the taxi and got our bags we walked over to the porters and they took them put them on the carts. We went to the suite doors to get inside. There is no line so we could put all our carry-on on the conveyor belt and then we walked over to a woman who had a a tablet and she checked us in right there. I haven’t been on a cruise in five years but this is way simpler than It ever was in the past. Not sure if that’s because we were in Europe or if that’s just how they’re doing it now. I thought we were walking to a waiting area to get on the ship we were actually walking right onto the ship there was no wait at all. So there we were walking on the gangway I could not have been happier. As I said we haven’t cruised in quite a while so I felt like a new cruiser. We took our first steps onto symphony of the seas and we walked right to the bionic bar. Which unfortunately was broken at the time. It did work later so we were finally able to get those drinks from those adorable robots. Since we couldn’t get our drinks from the robots we decided to go to Central Park and go to the trellis bar. My husband got some sort of sunrise drink and I got a piña colada. Piña colada‘s are always my first drink of our cruise vacation. Then we’re off to chops to make all of our dining reservations. Usually when the concierge sends us our email I just have them make all the reservations for us but unfortunately this time we never got that email. After making all over the reservations we walked up to the suite lounge and talked to the concierge explaining that we never did get her email and turns out they did send it but there was some sort of system glitch at least that’s what they told us. Honestly they really did make up for it during the entire cruise. We sat in the suite lounge for a while just kind of people watched and then shortly after our room was ready so we walked down to our grand suite. Pretty much the exact same as any of the other oasis class grande suites the only difference is between the living room and the bedroom on Symphony there is a wall whereas an oasis it was just a curtain I think I actually like the curtains better because it makes the room more open. After we put our stuff down and let our room steward Leo we just walked around the ship and kind of got the way of the land as you will. That night we were eating at chops which was amazing we both had steak and it was probably the best meal we had the entire cruise . After dinner we had reservations to see the Aqua theater show called Hiro. Royal Caribbean has definitely stepped up their game in the entertainment department. This was an absolutely amazing show and if we had time I would’ve gone to see it again. I’m so happy we saw this on the first night though because it was actually the warmest of the nights as the cruise went on the nights seem to get cooler and sitting out there in the cooler weather and sometimes even a little bit of rain would not have been as fun. After the show we just walked around a little bit and went up to bed since we knew we would have an early morning the next day in Mallorca .

Views from the castle

Some aquarium pics

Happy anniversary!!! That sounds like me. 🤣