Cheapo dad's trip report on Freedom of the Seas

[harryfat1]

Thanks for the fabulous pics! We did the water taxi in November and really enjoyed it. We are staying at the Hilton Marina next month and hopefully will have a view of the ships ⛴

 

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Yes, if you take the Hollywood Beach connection, you will sail next to the cruise ships, especially if there's a ship in terminal 29 the day before your cruise.

 

I have some pics of the boats taken from the ship on day 1 so just imagine the reverse if you are on the water taxi.

[harryfat1]

Sun starting to set in FLL with the winter sunset much earlier in the day

 

 

 

 

Check out the tilt angle of this bad boy/gal

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Remodeling the house – see how they prop up the trees

 

 

[harryfat1]

This water taxi set wouldn’t be complete without the “white house” looking place

 

 

 

 

I took many more pics but I’m sure folks are getting bored so I will wrap it up soon

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

For the life of me, I can’t recall why I took this first picture. Maybe someone with a sharp eye on CC can point it out for me…:p

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To show what a crappy photographer I am, took this pic but it was too dark when I came home and reviewed it. But with some basic software enhancement, it looks presentable. So far the first enhancement used for this trip report. May not be the last, depending on how the rest of the set turns out:

 

 

 

 

OK. Enough water taxi pics.

[dani negreanu]

You can go to the other sections of CC to ask this question as I am sure folks from overseas ask this question daily and there’s a Bob’s version on those boards that will answer your question within the hour.

 

Excellent advice :) Had a good laugh :D

[harryfat1]

So we made it back to the hotel around 5 PM and just rested. Here is what the back of the hotel looks like and the water taxi stop just right off of it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are few more pics from the room and balcony.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

In summary, the water taxi was a lot of fun. Many great photo opportunities and as an added bonus feature, you can be next to the cruise ships.

 

If you are staying one night post cruise and do the water taxi, you can go to the hotel and drop off the luggage and ride the Hollywood connection and take pictures/wave goodbye to the cruise ship you just disembarked.

 

Just remember to download the app so you know when the next boat will show up.

[harryfat1]

Then after 6, I walked with my father in law to Primanti’s to get a pizza. For those who read my trip report from 2 years ago will recall that’s exactly what we ordered as well. See what I mean about being a sequel? I am creature of habit as well as developing my own vacation tradition.

 

You can Google or Yelp them for info. They are opened 24 hours a day. $20 for a big ass pizza we didn’t come close to finishing (I ate it for breakfast also) as my wife also prepared pasta and salad from Publix using the basic kitchen provided. For those family traveling on a budget, try to get a place that has kitchen and close by to super market and get a simple dinner instead of going out to eat. Just supplement it with pizza or whatever. Save $$.

 

So if you have a family and don’t mind basic food, look into staying at the Gallery One. Or you can stay there and go out to eat as there are many restaurants within walking distance and the neighborhood felt safe walking around at night. The hotel has convenient location for water taxi/shopping/food and is 3 blocks from the beach if you want to head out that direction but we didn’t make it this time.

 

View of the hotel as we walk toward the beach side and have to cross the drawbridge

 

 

 

 

Water view at night taken on Samsung cell phone walking on the bridge

 

 

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

They are opened 24 hours & located in various states.

 

 

 

 

Dude making our pizza after we placed the order

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are few restaurants on the way to the pizza place if you want to there instead of slumming it and eating in the hotel.

 

 

Street of Fort Lauderdale beach area

 

 

 

 

On the way back, had to stop for the draw bridge to come down

 

 

 

 

As a tourist, I like the draw bridges as they are neat and something we don’t have back home. But as locals, I am sure they are not always happy to be stuck on the back end of the wait line while some billionaire sails around in his expensive yacht

 

 

[harryfat1]

Here’s what we had for dinner.

 

Pics of the pizza and salad and ravioli we bought from Publix earlier in the day

 

 

 

[Crism]

Holy PIZZA! That looks awesome!

[h20skibum]

Love Primanti Brothers. They started in our area. Good choice. Now I know where I am eating Monday. You can't go wrong with them. Makes me hungry just looking at it.

 

 

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[harryfat1]

Holy PIZZA! That looks awesome!

 

Love Primanti Brothers. They started in our area. Good choice. Now I know where I am eating Monday. You can't go wrong with them. Makes me hungry just looking at it.

 

 

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Yeah, great stuff. Found them 2 years ago when we stayed at the same hotel. Had to walk over there again to get the pizza.

 

$20 for a 18 inch with 5 toppings of your choice. I ate the leftover as breakfast the next morning before boarding the ship. :D

[harryfat1]

Nothing special happened the rest of the night as we were pooped from 5+ hours of sleep the night before and just rested. About the only thing worth mentioning was that the maid somehow never made it to our room to clean the place so I had to call for housekeeping to bring us fresh sets of towels for shower that night. Then we also realized we ran out of coffee and teabags in the kitchen.

 

Just then the hotel supervisor texted me again and asked how is our stay and I texted back explaining the problem and he personally came up stairs to give us a bunch of tea and coffee bags along the a whole can of their signature Double Tree cookies for dessert that night. How cool is that? After the stay, when Hilton sent me the survey to ask about our stay, I specifically pointed out how great he was. I will likely go to Trip Advisor and compliment him there as well.

 

 

Here is what he brought up:

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

So here’s the room area. As there’s no maid and we were too tired to clean up, excuse the mess but just wanted to show the size of the living space. And on each side, there are 2 bedrooms for total of 3 beds in total as well as 2 baths for the 6 of us. It worked out well for big families. All cheapo dads and moms should add this hotel on your watch list.

 

The place is listed as 935 square feet that can sleep 6 with 2 bedrooms and 3 beds (1 king and 2 queens) and 2 baths and kitchen and living room and balcony with a view. Check their price on the Hilton site as well as Last Minute Travel’s phone app (LMT). GalleryOne is listed there often. Great value if you can snag a decent price for your sailing pre cruise stay. At less than $120 per bedroom for FLL and view, it was a super bargain.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes, finally done with all the pre cruise stuff for day 0 (you thought we never make it here as you are already snoring away back at day minus 2)

[scottygirl]

How did I just stumble upon this report? I'm on CC everyday. Anyway now I have something to do while my husband and son watch the stupid football game. Thank you Cheapo Dad from a fellow bean counter.

 

 

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[harryfat1]

Day 1 – Yes, finally cruise day after all this blah blah stuff

 

We woke up around 8 AM to have breakfast and drank the coffee and tea bags that was brought up last night. Couple more pictures of the great water view and time to start packing up and be ready to leave.

 

The hotel has a concierge desk at the lobby that they can arrange shuttle to take hotel guests to the port. I didn’t ask what the cost was as I already made my own arrangement from home months ago. Part of the 9+ score on the analality scale. But if you don’t have pre planned transportation, they can arrange it for you.

 

For the shuttle to Port Everglades, I opted for South Florida Shuttle as they have the best price. I would have liked to use them for the airport pickup the first night but they don’t work past 10:30 PM at night.

 

The deal I got from them was for 6 people, the base price is $7 per head. Then they charge $10 extra for just a private shuttle meaning the entire shuttle is just our family. We’re not making a mailman route to pick up people from 3 other hotels and have to wait for Uncle Dave to come out of the bathroom. But then they also gave us a $12 discount just because they love me. Throw in the 20% mandatory tip; we are looking at $50.40 for the 6 of us out the door price. That’s $8.40 per head including tips to get a private shuttle that you dictate the time and not have to share with tons of people.

 

Good value. Check them out if you want pre-arranged shuttle service for a family.

 

 

I am sure everyone has received the infamous RCI email request to ask you to show up later on the day for embarkation. For those people reading this that will be sailing on the Freedom – you will likely received some sort of email from RCI around 3 to 5 days prior to sailing asking you to show up after 12:30. It’s your decision to follow it or ignore it.

 

There was actually one rather heated debate on a thread couple months ago whether or not it’s a request versus suggestion. Whatever. I care not what they say. I show up early. They can have me wait at the pier or wait at the hotel lobby. I choose the former.

 

Having said that, it should come as no surprise to anyone that I arranged for a 10 AM shuttle. In theory, that’s on the early side but 2 years ago for the Allure, when we stayed at one of the 50 Holiday Expresses in the area, the other shuttle company’s driver got confused and went to the wrong HIE to look for us and came late to pick us up. So my 10 AM time has some “buffer” time in there in case they run late/lost me in their system, I still have time for plan B. So how anal am I? Don’t answer that.

 

Speaking of the prior driver, last time, the other company had called me one plus hour prior to arriving confirming the pick up that morning. So by 9:20 AM when I haven’t received any call, I was getting worried. So I called them up and they told me the driver is already on his way and will be at the hotel in less than 20 minutes. WHAT? So early? OK, time to get ready to leave the hotel. Gotta to go/Move it, Move it…

 

So we gather the troops and went downstairs at front lobby to check out as well as borrow their stapler to put on the 6 luggage tags that I printed out from home. Looked outside and sure enough, the shuttle is parked by the side and the driver is on the phone – probably calling dispatcher trying to get my cell phone number. No worries. Flagged him down and we got our stuff loaded and off we went. As you can see from the photos, the Mercedes van is huge & comfortable for all 6 of us and could easily fit few more people but we paid extra (with discounts) for direct transport so we are all good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited December 31, 2016 by harryfat1

[harryfat1]

So we are off to the port. As there has been some discussion on when to arrive at the port, I will try to time stamp the key points on when we were there. Your mileage will certainly vary by each sailing and end up with a delay compared to ours but if you want a rough guide, take a look at what we did. I’m sure European ports might have different embarkation time as well.

 

 

For those who have cruised out of Port Everglades (PE), this check point will look very familiar. For those new to the PE area, make sure you have your passport out at the check point and not in the back of the van where your luggage is. For the Freedom, the pier is WAY down there at terminal 29 so it seems to be a longer road to get there than the terminal 18 of the Oasis class. We didn’t take the taxi but there may be an extra cost to go to terminal 29 versus 18 just because it’s further out.

 

 

I’ll wait for other cheapo dads/moms to tell me their cab charges on going to terminal 18 versus 29. Final thought is GalleryOne is further north on the road so if by taxi, budget in couple more dollars than the average airport hotel.

 

 

The time stamp at the hotel front curbside with the shuttle van was 9:40 AM so he was 20 minutes early.

 

 

 

 

Time stamp of the backup at the check point is 9:58 so you figure a 15+ minute ride from GalleryOne to the outside of the port area.

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

Our shuttle driver is nice but new on the job as this is only his first month. He mentioned that the PE is more security conscious than the port of Miami and he thinks it may have to do with all the fuel they are storing there. I don’t know as I never sailed out of Miami so I leave it to the wise people of CC to chime in on why PE has more security concern than Miami. With terminal 29 being in the back, it’s a longer route to get there.

 

 

 

 

We saw the first close up of the Freedom at around 10:03 AM when my kids in the back yelled out, “there’s the Freedom”. Unless you have cruised so many time that you are jaded with sights of the cruise ships, the first time of seeing “your ship” always brings the excitement and gets the heart pounding faster.

 

 

 

 

Being there early has its own drawbacks in there are lines of people trying to pick up passengers as well as drop offs so the cars are going every which way. Our driver being new wasn’t sure where he had to go for drop off and had to ask for help from the person directing traffic on where to drop us off. It’s over there at the right hand side yellow bins behind the guy in red t-Shirt. After dropping off the luggage and tipping the porters. Which by the way, the porter supervisor didn’t call it a tip, she asked if we are willing to make a “donation” after checking all our luggage to see if the luggage tags are on there. Just semantics. We know the drill and already have the tip money out already so we are good to go.

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

These pictures were taken around 10:15 and my younger son was actually worried we were there “TOO EARLY” and I assured him there’s no such thing. If there’s one thing I learn from CC is that there’s always someone more anal than you and will be there earlier than you and ignoring the RCI email request/suggestion/requirement.

 

Sure enough, we entered the building and are lined up behind at least 100 people to wait for the security screening by 10:20. Someone out there will always be earlier than you – what RCI email? I didn’t get see any RCI email telling me to come later. Me speak no English…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

No worries. We are good, we are on vacation & giddy with excitement to get our sailing cards. 10 minutes later we are through the security check.

 

Terminal 29is certainly not as pretty as terminal 18 but it’s decent. Since we were so early, there was no line to speak of for any of the repeat passenger levels. We are gold (or as I call it peasant plus one) level and had our own line.

 

We walked right up to be first in the queue. Looking closely at this picture, if you look way toward the back, by the orange shirts, I think those are the newbie cruisers and that might be the longest line of perhaps 10 people? Regardless, not too bad at this early in the day.

 

Serena from our roll call mentioned on her later arrival that the gold level people had extremely long wait if you arrive after 12:30 PM as per the RCI email request. Your mileage will vary depending on how crowded your sailing might be. Just reporting what we experienced.

 

By 10:45, we all have our sea passes and just sitting in the seats chilling – well, not literally chilling as the place has no AC but we’re good. Took couple more pictures and did an upload to CC: onto my previous post for the few old friends following me “live”.

 

One more note – there’s free Wi-Fi down stairs in that waiting area. Later on, when you get moved upstairs, there’s no Wi-Fi to speak of. So this will likely be your last free Wi-Fi access but if you have phone data plan you are still good at upstairs. Only matters to people on iPad or other Wi-Fi dependent devices. Maybe you won’t be in a hurry to go upstairs when they call you to go – Wait, I’m still playing Candy Crush. Can I go up with the next group instead as I need the WI-FI connection?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Looks like there were few people n the queue for the Emerald and above levels right around 11 AM but still looks OK.

 

 

 

 

The newbie peasant lines looks like it has the most people at 11 AM.

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

There was a discussion on one of the threads couple months ago on when your cruise vacation starts? Different people have different interpretation. For me, it starts when I got my sea pass. From that point on, SHOW ME THE ENTERTAINMENT. Thus, I am strong believer that they should at the minimum have the entertainment staff from the ship to come and do the YMCA with the waiting people to get them in the vacation mode.

 

 

If dancing is too much work for the lazy crowd, then at least RCI should email to us the day 1 daily compass so we have something to read. The technology is there to easily have that info sent to all our email. Prior to the cruise, RCI spams me daily with “Harry, let us show you way to spend even more money on your cruise that you haven’t budgeted it with drinks and dining programs”. So they know how to reach me. They even email me few days before to tell me to come later to the port. Therefore, they can easily attach a PDF of day 1 compass in an email as that info was prepared at least the day before.

 

 

Like I said in the beginning, I seek the various “E”s on my vacation. So either entertain me (YMCA) or educate me (show me the day 1 compass) instead of me sitting and looking at my belly button…

 

Some of the people in the previous pics looks like they need some YMCA dance music to loosen them up.

[janabelle61]

Great to see another Harry review. I'm settling in for a great read and lots of wonderful pictures :)

 

I think I'm up there on the 'analility' scale (think I got that right!). I use spreadsheets for everything and tell the folks that work for me that if you can't do it in Excel, it probably doesn't need to be done :rolleyes: Yeah, I'm another of the bean counter types. You might have guessed.

 

Great idea about sending the day one Compass as a PDF. For one thing, I usually have enough in my hands - Sea Pass, carryons, etc. - so trying to figure out where to put the Compass is annoying when I just want to get on the ship.

[mszmek]

Thank you for your in depth review! I love how you are covering everything!

[Carlos A.]

 

 

 

Loving your trip report. It's so funny to see myself on this pic dropping the luggage just almost at the same time as you!!! :eek::cool: