(Slightly less so) Cheapo dad's trip report on Independence of the Seas

[harryfat1]

11. Gemini is a supportive and encouraging friend. ;p:D

Oh, thank you. I waas thinking number 12...

 

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[cloud7cruise]

I mostly read CC threads on my cell phone in bed before a sleep. Looking forward to the rest of your trip report. I'm a Gold Crown & Anchor member that is not staying in a suite anytime soon.

 

I can relate a lot to your cheapo dad moniker as I am the type of person that like to seek out the best deal for a given product. Why pay for the something at $10 when you can get the exact same thing at $5 with little effort? If that makes me cheap, then I take it as a compliment.:)

[harryfat1]

I mostly read CC threads on my cell phone in bed before a sleep. Looking forward to the rest of your trip report. I'm a Gold Crown & Anchor member that is not staying in a suite anytime soon.

 

I can relate a lot to your cheapo dad moniker as I am the type of person that like to seek out the best deal for a given product. Why pay for the something at $10 when you can get the exact same thing at $5 with little effort? If that makes me cheap, then I take it as a compliment.:)

 

Very cool. Yeah, it's good to talk to fellow cheapo folks to know I am not the only person that is cheap. You are my target audience.

[harryfat1]

So as with all my previous trip reports, you folks get to see what I see daily for all the meals. Don’t you feel privileged? Just say yes as to humor me…

 

 

 

 

I like buffets in that it has a little of everything and that’s how I eat. I’m not the one type of food guy so I won’t eat downstairs at café promenade or Sorrento’s for lunch. I would go there for snacks but not lunch. For whatever reason, many people on CC have disdain for windjammer as I don’t see too many people say they like to eat there.

 

Anyway, I like it. No accounting for taste, even for CPAs. I like what I like, no need to apologize for it. I just wish more trip reports have positive attitudes about WJ. I know I will always champion for it as it’s not extra charge and had lots of variety.

[harryfat1]

So after lunch at around 1 PM, we still can’t access the cabin yet as per the flyer, they are doing special cleaning to the cabins and won’t be ready until 3 PM.

 

OK, then, time to go to and sign up my bother in law’s girls for the kids camp. It’s been a long time since my kids were in camp so it was nostalgia time.

 

 

 

Whole slew of parents signing up their kids for camp (aka: please take these brats off of my hands so I can relax for few hours)

 

 

[harryfat1]

When we got all our sea passes, I checked each person’s dining table assignment and we were all assigned table 424. Not the 468 as promised in their email? WTH? Great Royal screwed up again on their dining assignment.

 

After that was done, time to go and fix the table seating problem. We get there and it’s like holy cow, seems like half of the ship is in line with issues. Forget that, not going to spend one hour in line to fix my table. Time to walk around and explore the ship.

 

We wanted to go to the helipad before sailing as it would be too windy to go afterward.

 

Overlooking the terminal 29 to the right in the background where we would dock when we get back:

 

 

Johnny Rockets is opened for lunch in case anyone is interested. I'll pass. Not a JR fan.

 

 

 

 

People camping out at the pool area as they have no place to go since cabins are not open:

 

 

What's the name of the ship again? Freedom? Ehhh, I think it's Independence.

 

Would be hilarious if I dropped in Freedom's name picture in to really confuse everyone.

 

[bobmacliberty]

Don't know who else reading these posts are into Astrology. I get the daily email on what my day would look like.

 

Here is what my horoscope says for the day - seems appropriate, no?

 

 

 

I'm also a Gemini (June 16) but don't pay attention to horoscopes. This one though looks pretty accurate.

[golden6911]

I also like buffets, because I like getting a little taste of a lot of foods. Maybe that makes me low brow, but so be it. Plus, I don’t want to spend all my time at sit down restaurants, even if the food is higher quality. It takes over an hour each meal and that can suck up your vacation quickly.

For my upcoming anthem trip, I did spring for the 5 meal specialty dining plan, mostly for my daughter, who loves fancy foods. She is looking forward to Wonderland the most.

 

 

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[cruisemeister8]

For those who are unfamiliar with astrology, take a look at this web site's 21 traits and see if anyone think some of these fits with my online personality? I am bias on self evaluation so others can chime in on which of the 21 traits fits me?

 

https://zodiacfire.com/gemini-personality/

 

4. The Gemini mind is constantly racing with thoughts and ideas.

12. Gemini can be a bit of a weirdo sometimes.

14. Gemini is restless and always on the go.

20. Gemini has a wickedly sarcastic sense of humor.

[harryfat1]

I'm also a Gemini (June 16) but don't pay attention to horoscopes. This one though looks pretty accurate.

 

I think you might fit few of the 21 traits on the list as well.

 

Looks like your chart was a big hit. Many people like it. That could be your side job here at CC.

[harryfat1]

I also like buffets, because I like getting a little taste of a lot of foods. Maybe that makes me low brow, but so be it. Plus, I don’t want to spend all my time at sit down restaurants, even if the food is higher quality. It takes over an hour each meal and that can suck up your vacation quickly.

For my upcoming anthem trip, I did spring for the 5 meal specialty dining plan, mostly for my daughter, who loves fancy foods. She is looking forward to Wonderland the most.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

 

Cool. Another buffet fan. I am not saying they have the best food and certain things can improve but given how crowded WJ is everyday, most of the people eat there. But in reading some of posts and comments, people wants to avoid it as much as possible.

 

Have a wonderful cruise with your daughter on the Anthem. We have yet to sail on the Quantum class and thinking about Ovation in Alaska in 2019.

[harryfat1]

4. The Gemini mind is constantly racing with thoughts and ideas.

12. Gemini can be a bit of a weirdo sometimes.

14. Gemini is restless and always on the go.

20. Gemini has a wickedly sarcastic sense of humor.

 

Thanks for the feedback.

 

Numbers #4 and 20, is reflective on how I write these trip reports. Jumping from topic to topic. You thought you are here to read about a Caribbean cruise but instead we are talking about astrology and rocks in Arizona.

 

Think 14 explains why I am not a big solarium fan. So if you combine that with number 6, I would rather attend an art auction instead.

[harryfat1]

We had a late family holiday dinner at our house last night as some of us were out of town on vacation during Christmas. So we had it after the new years when everyone was back in town.

 

Inspired by the lamb shank from the cruise, that was what we had last night. We are not gourmet cooks by any means so won't share what the final product looks like but you can buy these guys at Costco when they have them periodically.

 

Toss them in the slow cooker, recipes came found all over the internet and you have a cruise like holiday dinner.

 

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[Reader0108598]

DAY 0 – December 20, 2017

 

So I barely slept a wink from the red eye flight. First of all, I don’t sleep well on planes. Different environment always bothers me as I am anal and creature of habit (ha, bet you didn’t know that about me). Then that blinding TV with people watching movies at 3 AM didn’t help either.

 

We were scheduled to land at 8 AM but arrived early as this first picture of FLL was timed at 7:44 AM. Just as SFO was familiar in departing, FLL looks the same from when we departed last year since VA uses the same terminal. I remember eating the Shula burger for dinner on the plane home from the Freedom cruise. Same as it ever was. Which leads to this song in my head as we groggily dragged our sorry buns to baggage claim.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1wg1DNHbNU

 

BTW: That’s what I look/felt like at the 1:45 mark of the video, same as David Byrne, when we got off the plane without any sleep.

 

Each of us had our own big luggage as we stuffed in what we could for the 9 days, including formal clothes in case any fashion police here on CC wants to check if we are fulfilling suggested the formal attire.

 

Oh, speaking of which, since it was a holiday cruise, they had THREE (not 2) formal nights on a 9 day cruise. Which is not what the web site says for 9 day cruise but we had planned for dressing up anyway for Christmas day, we were fine. But nowhere was it ever mentioned that this cruise has an extra formal night. So for those reading this report that is looking for info on your 2018 holiday cruise, pack an extra formal dress or tie, just in case. Anyway, we will talk more as we get to the exact cruise days.

 

As for the hotel stay, those that have read my previous trip reports knows I love the Double Tree GalleryOne with its kitchen and proximity to stores and food and water taxi. For this cruise, since I know we will be feeling and looking like moose poop after the red eye, I opted for the airport hotel at Dania Beach instead.

 

I selected the Home2 Suites by Hilton(what dummy in Hilton marketing came up with this odd name?). It was $122 per night plus tax with AAA discount. That includes free airport pickup and free daily breakfast. Cheapo dads/moms always love the word “FREE”.

 

The hotel is very new, built in 2016/2017 era. Not a lot of people know about it so the word isn’t out yet on what a hidden value this place is. Found it on Trip advisor as I rely on them exclusively for hotel selection during my summer road trips.

So we got our luggage from the carousel and called the hotel for a shuttle pickup. It came quickly as the driver was probably not that busy at 8 AM on a Wednesday morning.

 

 

 

 

 

Yep thought it was great when the guy next to me broke out a tuna fish sandwich...of course we celebrated the last night of vaca ....dear god!!!

love planes!

[harryfat1]

(Couple quick housekeeping items before I continue with the trip report.

First, I have over 10 people emailing on the newly created email address so it’s working. Go ahead and email me if you don’t want to post here.

Second, I am pretty sure I skipped few people’s responses in my effort to venture on the trip report. For that, I apologize. Didn’t mean to ignore or bypass your post versus the ones I actually responded. It’s like attending a party but the host greets other guests and not you. That’s not cool but sometimes it’s hard to re-trace the previous posts to search out on what was said the night before. Besides, Bob is measuring my post count totals and I need to post decent benchmark scores by the end of day 1. Blame him for my rudeness);p

 

Few pictures as we explored the ship. I have always liked the view from Port Everglades with its various cargo shipments and the condos and the water taxi, just a wide variety of places to take pictures. If there is a cruise hotel situated right here in port, similar to Queen Mary in Long Beach, I would love to stay here the night pre cruise and soak up the activities here:

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

Here is the only other cruise ship docked in port for the day. The smaller Princess ship.

 

Ha, guess what? We got bigger butt than your tiny butt! You can't compete against the size of our butt.

 

And of course that only means one thing - drum roll please, here's my favorite rap song.

 

Now I gave you folks the original Sir Mix A lot link in my Allure trip report. Then in the Freedom report, I gave you the link to the Seattle Symphony. With the understanding that not everyone likes rap music or classical music, here is the country version of the song (you still with me - BIBPHOTOGRAPHY? - sing it out loud to the wife):

 

 

 

 

Zoomed in 60X from my camera

 

 

Their flags

 

 

 

Cruisers on the other ship:

 

[harryfat1]

Here is my wife at the "Titanic" signature spot:

 

 

 

So cool to watch the cranes working at the dock side:

 

 

 

Ahh, my favorite ropes. Except this shot is from above:

 

 

[harryfat1]

Here is us at the helipad. We asked the nice guy walking around to take this picture for us as the brother in law ran off with his family to swim.

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

Few more random ship pics before around 2 PM, they made the announcement that the cabins were cleaned ahead of schedule and we can all have access now. Cool.

 

My son caught this rare photo on his cell phone

 

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

At slightly after 2 PM, they made the announcement that the cabins were cleaned ahead of schedule and we can all have access now. Cool.

 

My default cabin type for Voyager and Freedom class is the Promenade view cabin. We just love them. Another thing I disagree with many of the folks at CC (come to think of it, what do I typically agree with the majority of the people on the boards?) Whatever. I digress. But for this cruise, I opted for the ocean view – which is my default for all other cruise ships as they don’t have PR cabins.

 

When I was booking the cabins, I saw the special deal the TA web site had for the oceanview cabins. Think they got some sort of “group discount deal” or whatever you call it. Being cheap and already feeling the pain of holiday cruise premium, I went for the OV cabins instead of PR cabins to save $360 total.

 

Cheapo dad needs to make up for the premium paid for the holiday cruise. On paper that sounds like value deal as you don't always see an oceanview cheaper than basic inside.

 

 

Another advantage of Royal Promenade cabin is you can see who is walking down below on deck 5. Such that if you meet some really obnoxious person from your roll call at Meet and Mingle (like yours truly that you want to punch but can't), if you have the RP cabins and sees them shopping below, you can just take your pants off and moon them from your cabin above by plastering your butt next to the cold window to show how you feel about them. Can’t do that in the regular inside cabin…

[harryfat1]

In theory money saved is money saved but the entire cruise, all of us looked up at the PR and sigh with envy that we could be up there and especially since the OV has only one tiny sofa instead of 2 wide ones in PR cabins made things worst. Maybe the OV are better on the newer ships as the beds are configured differently but on Indy, you have to step on the bed to see the outside window if your bed is combined. Oh, yeah, that’s a good design…Or not.

 

So I got the connecting cabins of 2630 and 2632. They are near the aft elevators. Very convenient when you bring back food and drinks from café promenade as it’s just around the corner from the elevators. Or when you drag your sorry buns back to the cabins after a long hot day at the ports, you will appreciate the shorter distance from gangway.

 

Now do note the outside corridor has a slight slant you walk up which meant one of the cabins is like 6 inches taller than the other one. Not an issue if you remember it or else you will either stub your toes or fall when you enter/exit one cabin to next in the dark.

 

I originally wasn’t going to mention this but my wife made me take a picture of it and told me to comment on it at CC. I said this isn’t a big deal for me to say anything about it but she said, don’t you guys at CC complain and comment about every small thing like not having pepper shaker or if the cabin steward didn’t smile at you daily? This is a safety issue that should be made known to people booking these connecting cabins. So there you have it. Group trip reporting at its best…

 

Ah, first picture on days of the week from the elevator:

 

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

Now another clear sign the cheapo dad series is going downhill fast, I don’t think I ever took pictures of the connecting room door itself. Did it on the previous 2 cruises. Oh, well, just pretend the area above the step has a connecting door. You all know what a connecting door looks like, right? No need to show that…

 

Actually you never have the connecting doors open whenever you walk into any connecting door sets upon boarding. They are always closed. You have to wait to see the cabin steward, who shows up typically in the middle of the afternoon just prior to muster drill. Just ask him to open it and he will get the “magic key” from his supervisor. Typically they are opened by time you come back from the muster drill. Once the cabins door is opened, you feel it’s much bigger as now you have over 300 square feet of space to walk around and having 2 toilets and showers are a must on formal nights as you need to shower and get dressed when you have 4 people waiting in line.

 

OK, now that we are in the cabin. Rested up but luggage hasn’t arrived yet, it’s time to go to MDR to work out the dining table problem. So if you recall, I made the request with royal dining and they gave me the pretty screen shot of green tables that said they have table 468 reserved for our family of 8. But then why do all 8 of our sea pass cards say table 424? NOT GOOD.

 

So we made another trip back to MDR. Now at almost 3 PM, the line is much shorter. Tried to talk to the “head waiter” as that is what he name tag says. Showed him the email from corporate HQ that said we were granted table 468. I might as well show him in Japanese as he barely glanced at it as the guy says he can’t do anything. He says the tables are reserved “by Miami”. Of course, my email from Miami says the ship confirmed my reservation. Typical corporate run around.

 

So after 20 minutes of debating with the guy and him walking us to table 424 two times, which is interior, not the balcony view we requested, he basically said we are screwed. He wrote our name down on a list and say he will see if anyone wants to change and let us know. Of course, we never heard from him. Next cruise, cheapo dad will be super anal and double/triple confirming the table assignment prior to cruise.

 

OK, rant over. I do want to note that we were very very lucky in getting a great set of workers at table 424 areas with Jesus and Simona. Jesus came out nightly with magic tricks to show my nieces. Maybe we would have gotten not so great waiters over at table 468. And Indy has less dancing and activities in MDR than Freedom so there is less to see from the balcony. Guess sometimes things work out.

 

If anyone is sailing soon on the Indy, don’t hesitate e to get the 424 table area if you don’t need the balcony view. Tell Jesus and Simona we say hi.

 

Picture of MDR before they are set up for dinner on day 1. There will be better pictures later on

 

 

 

On the Indy, the decks are named after Shakespeare plays.

 

 

Partial menu on screen for day 1 dinner:

 

[PhoenixCruiser]

Enjoying your review, thanks!

[harryfat1]

Before we move onto the story, it’s time to show the day 1 compass scan. Couple items to note: Not really sure these scans will be useful for future Indy cruisers as ours was a special eastern Caribbean cruise. They typically sail the shorter 4 or 5 day western Caribbean. On top of that, these holiday sailings have many “one off” events. They are effectively useless for regular cruisers sailing in later periods.

 

Nevertheless, it’s easier to have a cruise compass to refer to in the report so I will continue to scan them for each cruise day.

 

First of all, a reminder from Royal to wash your hands and be clean.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now for those of you with a sharp eye, you will notice that Johnny Rocket is not listed here as being open on day 1. But on the 2 page summary that you get when at the counter when you get the sea pass, they say JR would open at 12 noon. As I said before, not a JR fan. I prefer Guy's burgers more from Carnival, besides those are free.

 

But if you dislike WJ for whatever reason, you can check out JR upon boarding. I don't know if Indy opens up JR for every cruise or just this sailing since everything is delayed, they need to have JR open to alleviate the traffic cramming into WJ at 12 noon. Don't know. Other cruisers that have sailed on Indy can chime in.

[harryfat1]

Well, after wasting time at the MDR with zero results, we went back to the cabin to see if the luggage have arrived and they did. So we started to unpack.

 

Now I don’t cruise often enough to have a “system” of where I store the socks versus underwear versus khaki pants.

 

Obviously the formal clothes are on hangers but the rest of the stuff is decided between the closets shelves and drawers. Being lazy and dumb, I just took whatever was in the next group in my luggage and plopped those in the next drawer but that made things inefficient when I get my clothes for the next day.

 

If I was more organized (politically correct way of saying anal), I would out my shorts next to my t-shirts, not too far from my underwear so it’s a one stop shopping when I get my clothes for next day. Due to poor planning, I had to jump back and forth between the closet and the drawer’s everyday in getting fresh clothes. Would appreciate anyone with a “system” on where they pack away the clothes on the cruise.

 

As we packed, the cabin steward showed up and we told him the preference of bed arrangements for the 2 cabins (separate for boys, together for ours) and requested for the connecting door to be opened.

 

Originally things were pushed back for 1 hour on the sailing time since we had a delayed boarding and access to cabins but since nobody knew about the revised time before 11 AM when they handed out the info, everyone arrived to the port thinking sailing time was at 4:30. As such, they were able to hold an earlier than scheduled muster drill and keep the 4:30 sailing time instead of the later time on the compass that I just posted.

 

Woo hoo! Now you ask why does it matter whether it’s 4:30 or 5:30 sailing? That’s because the prior 2 sailings, we were sailing off in the near darkness. Allure was supposed to sail off earlier but we had to return to dock few hundred feet after departing due to medical emergency. Freedom has the bad late sailing of 5:30. Not a big deal in summer when sun sets after 8 PM but in winter when sun sets by 5:30, you can’t see anything during the late sailing. So this will be my first FLL sail away in many years where I can do the wave.

 

I made the request on the Port Everglades web cam. Told them 8 Asians in bright Hawaii clothes standing near the port side near the back. In theory that should be easy to spot. But it didn’t work out. They never zoomed into us. Only some folks in the balconies. Oh, well.

 

But before that, we had to do the mandatory muster drill. This one seems to be faster than the Freedom one for whatever reason. Maybe it’s just psychological as I didn’t have a stop watch to it. Maybe other trip report writers more anal than me (don’t laugh, they do exist) can time how long their muster drills were and start to compile a master list for Bob the engineer to plop them in his magical graph of how long each ship’s muster drill is from the beginning of the horn blast to being dismissed. For example, Freedom might be 17 minutes and 25 seconds but Navigator is 16 minutes and 39 seconds and Harmony is 18 minutes and 3 second and so on to do a ranking to see how efficiently each ship runs its muster drill.

 

This info is a must read info on CC, no? Bob is eagerly waiting for the results every Friday afternoon...

 

Another random pic as we walked around the ship:

 

Note the happy faces of cruiser at guest services on day 1. Unless it's something urgent, I would avoid that place for first few hours upon boarding and come back late at night instead

 

 

OK, Muster drill itself. No need to time stamp this picture as you can tell from the clock in the background. Seas of humanity as far as the eyes can see. You appreciate the burly big dude in the tank top next to you did showered within the past week as you are packed like sardines out in the heat.

 

 

OK, people, pay attention as your life might depend on tying the life vest.