Live on Reflection: 14 Nt Exotic Southern Caribbean (Jan 4)

[mahdnc]

13 minutes ago, chamima said:

I thought the Silhouette wasn't scheduled to arrive until Sunday?

 

When I was researching Celebrity sailing schedules a year ago, I had her listed as being with us today.

 

A couple more photos of her from a few minutes ago. We are docked at the new Terminal 25. 

Edited January 18, 2019 by mahdnc

[chamima]

2 minutes ago, mahdnc said:

 

When I was researching Celebrity ship schedules a year ago, I had her listed as being with us today. 

 

My bad - I guess there's a 2 night Bahamas cruise leaving today.

I have friends boarding on Sunday and since she does alternate 12 day, 9 day the rest of the winter I didn't expect that 2 night cruise.

[mahdnc]

We've just been cleared to get off the ship

[mahdnc]

Here's a photo of Reflection's shadow on Silhouette

[mahdnc]

Group 1&2 were called to debark five minutes ago

 

Edited January 18, 2019 by mahdnc

[mahdnc]

3&4 are now being asked to debark

[mahdnc]

We bypassed all this thanks too

Global Entry. We're getting a taxi 

Edited January 18, 2019 by mahdnc

[mahdnc]

In the taxi to FLL

[Bonita232]

13 minutes ago, mahdnc said:

In the taxi to FLL

Your sons expression is the same as mine when I get off the boat and back to reality lol

[Bonita232]

Glad u guys had a good time thanks for taking us on your journey! Safe travels home! This kinda makes me want to do a live report for our mardi gras cruise in March!

[mamaday]

Customs at the port took an hour. We need Global Entry!  Left the ship at 8 am and in taxi by 9am. Five customs agents. Do not use first line as they also add in handicap pass with same custom agent making the line much slower. 

We also used luggage valet. Worked out great. Airport a breeze as we have sky priority with Delta. Three hours until our flight. 

[mahdnc]

55 minutes ago, mamaday said:

Customs at the port took an hour. We need Global Entry!  Left the ship at 8 am and in taxi by 9am. Five customs agents. Do not use first line as they also add in handicap pass with same custom agent making the line much slower. 

We also used luggage valet. Worked out great. Airport a breeze as we have sky priority with Delta. Three hours until our flight. 

Teresa, well at least you got out fairly early. It was nice to meet you albeit briefly at the CC party. I hope you had a great cruise. 

 

I don't know about you, but we are flying home to snow and perhaps a snow storm. 

 

We are trying out  Luggage Valet for the very first time.  It makes me nervous not to have our luggage!

 

Waiting to board our plane

 

Edited January 18, 2019 by mahdnc

[micheleata]

Safe travels.   Really enjoyed your report and pictures.

[chicagopaul]

27 minutes ago, mahdnc said:

Teresa, well at least you got out fairly early. It was nice to meet you albeit briefly at the CC party. I hope you had a great cruise. 

 

I don't know about you, but we are flying home to snow and perhaps a snow storm. 

 

We are trying out  Luggage Valet for the very first time.  It makes me nervous not to have our luggage!

 

Waiting to board our plane

 

 

Glad you're on an early flight. Both MDW and ORD have a handful of cancellations for the afternoon and evening in preparation for the storm. I don't think it will be too bad, they're saying between 4 to 8 inches. You should be fine for your drive home. I enjoyed following along, thanks for writing and posting all the photos!

[merinski]

On ‎1‎/‎17‎/‎2019 at 4:06 AM, mahdnc said:

Good morning, this is Sea Day #5 and tomorrow we arrive back at Port Everglades. It's always a bit depressing to have something that you've looked forward to for two years to be behind you. 

 

But at least my family and I have this to look forward to when we get home:

Aww so cute!

[mahdnc]

Regarding using Global Entry while my memory is fresh:

 

This is the first cruise that the entire family had Global Entry. I had our Global Entry cards ready to prove that the entire family

 

This is also the first time we were at a port that used Mobile Passport (a free app that's like a poor man's Global Entry).  I had the Mobile Passport app open and I submitted an immigration application so that we were ready to go with either Global  Entry or Mobile Passport. 

 

We left our cabin at 8:05am. 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2019 by mahdnc

[mahdnc]

We were routed to Deck 5 and were told to follow the line that went in to and then out of the Reflection Theatre to exit the ship on the port side. We saw Pierre waiting for his nice wife, Samantha (sykimball1498). 

 

We used our SeaPass cards for the last time at 815am and got off the ship and into Terminal 25.  

 

 

Edited January 18, 2019 by mahdnc

[mahdnc]

At 8:17, we passed all the baggage that was set out and then we entered a very long line. 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2019 by mahdnc

[mahdnc]

At this point I began looking for some type of line for Global Entry. I didn't see one. I asked the attendant standing next to me if there was a special line for Global Entry or Mobile Passport. She said no. 

 

I asked a second attendant and he said yes, but he looked around and couldn't see it. He asked if I had the Global Entry cards, I said yes but he didn't look at them.

 

He then asked another attendant to let us in to an empty line. Based on the back and forth conversation been the two attendants, it appeared that this other line was used for other purposes (suite passengers? Wheelchairs?). 

 

Well this empty line led us past the long line and then the switchback crowds to the next available immigration officer at 8:20am.  

 

 

At 8:21am we exited the terminal and saw Ranee, Reflection's Event Coordinator, standing outside. She is from Hong Kong and is an extremely interesting person. If you get a chance, be sure to talk to her!

 

Edited January 18, 2019 by mahdnc

[SleepingUgly]

You are lucky!  When we debarked at Terminal 25 earlier in the month off the Silhouette, they didn't have a Global Entry line at all.  We were in that long line for probably around an hour.  Happy that you got to take advantage of it.  We love Global Entry - it has saved us from many hours of waiting in airports (mostly Dulles) when arriving back home from overseas trips, where we are tired after a long day of travel and just want to get home.  The last thing we want to do is to stand in a long, seemingly-unmoving line!

 

Linda

 

[CHEZMARYLOU]

When we got Global Entry we were told that if there were no kiosks just go to the front of a line and show the GE card. We saw a sign for Global Entry when we disembarked T25 in November.   We just kept asking about it since the terminal was chaos. Somehow ended up in the front in a line that was not suppose to be open, showed our GE card to the staff person and was directed to the Customs Agent when the other couple were done.  We were also in a RS and did not see the line for suite passengers.

[mahdnc]

We did not see marked signs outside the terminal for the taxi stand and it wasn't obvious where it was just by looking around. There was a very long line of taxis but you couldn't tell where the front of the line was. 

 

We had to walk a little ways south along the terminal and then we crossed the street and some how found the taxi stand (or a taxi stand) which was on the other side of the road from the terminal. 

 

By 8:27 am, we were in our taxi and leaving the pier for FLL. 

 

The top of Reflection is visible as we drive away from the terminal

 

Silhouette at Terminal 18

 

Silhouette and Silver Wind

Edited January 18, 2019 by mahdnc

[mahdnc]

7 hours ago, Bonita232 said:

Glad u guys had a good time thanks for taking us on your journey! Safe travels home! This kinda makes me want to do a live report for our mardi gras cruise in March!

 

Thank you. And I hope you do a live report!

[mahdnc]

We're at IAH waiting for our connecting United flight to ORD. The 2 kids got upgraded to 1st Class! Mom and dad are flying economy plus. 

 

Our son is Premier 1K with United because of all his business flights to China. We used his complimentary upgrade certificates for all of us. 

Edited January 18, 2019 by mahdnc

[mahdnc]

My kids are first class!