2nd timers back from the Sunrise - Trip Report

[jjsparkles]

7 minutes ago, RRLLAL said:

 

Ah gotcha. We saw them 3-4 times so it was easy to see the lead singer was different. My kids, 22 and 21 yearly old, really liked them and went up on stage a couple times during breaks to chat with them. I bet my kids spoke with your son! 🙂

 

One other missing person was in that horn section on the left. I don’t remember her name but it was a black female. She was AMAZING. 

 

It's Stephanie, she's still there - maybe just missing from this photo. I agree, she was fantastic 👍

[Host Carolyn]

The topic here is the OP's review.

 

Please don't attempt to interject the ongoing  debate re the refurbishment out of respect for the OP. I do not want to disrespect this wonderful review by removing parts of it because others attempt to hijack it.

 

thank you for respecting your fellow member's review.

[balcony bound]

Lovely review!  Can't wait for the rest.  Think I'm going to be sad when it ends.

[GB Chicago]

Loving your review!  We will be on the Sunrise out of Fort Lauderdale on November 16th.  Will Mark still be on there?  

 

[lazydayz]

Loving your review. Keep it coming. 

[DebOinKC]

Loving your review. So far it looks like you & your family had a great time.

[WMQueenie]

Where'd you go!?  Come back and tell us more!  Love your review so far...

[mandmcruise]

Fantastic review-looking forward to reading more.  Will be on the Sunrise October 6th

[jjsparkles]

On 7/14/2019 at 4:17 AM, Host Carolyn said:

The topic here is the OP's review.

 

Please don't attempt to interject the ongoing  debate re the refurbishment out of respect for the OP. I do not want to disrespect this wonderful review by removing parts of it because others attempt to hijack it.

 

thank you for respecting your fellow member's review.

 

Thanks 

On 7/14/2019 at 11:15 AM, balcony bound said:

Lovely review!  Can't wait for the rest.  Think I'm going to be sad when it ends.

 

Thanks for reading along 

On 7/14/2019 at 8:23 PM, GB Chicago said:

Loving your review!  We will be on the Sunrise out of Fort Lauderdale on November 16th.  Will Mark still be on there?  

 

 

Thanks, no he'll be away mid October.

On 7/14/2019 at 8:39 PM, lazydayz said:

Loving your review. Keep it coming. 

 

Thanks 

 

On 7/15/2019 at 12:01 AM, DebOinKC said:

Loving your review. So far it looks like you & your family had a great time.

 

Thanks, we did 

4 hours ago, WMQueenie said:

Where'd you go!?  Come back and tell us more!  Love your review so far...

 

 I really should have taken the week off work to get this done  More coming up soon 👍

3 hours ago, fyree39 said:

Just taking a break from all the aftershocks to catch up on your review. Looking forward to the rest!

 

Thanks 

2 hours ago, mandmcruise said:

Fantastic review-looking forward to reading more.  Will be on the Sunrise October 6th

 

Thanks - typing as we speak 

[Joebucks]

This thread tells you so much about cruisers. Whenever I see a review post that starts off with a smiling family/couple, it's almost guaranteed that they are going to have a good time. It's almost like it's in people's demeanor's....

 

Then you have people fighting if it is "new" or not. Getting to what is important.

 

Enjoying the review so far. Boggles my mind how more people don't enjoy a day or so in the port, adding to the vacation, instead of stressing themselves out on the day of the cruise.

[Charm2018]

Looking forward to reading the rest!  Love it so far! 🙂 

[jjsparkles]

Tuesday 25 June

 

So, it turns out I got sea sick during the night  I've never experienced this before and it only happened as I lay down in bed. It was awful.....After a couple of hours John phoned guest services and they arranged for a couple of tablets to be delivered, costing $2. I would have paid $200. They were delivered within about 5 minutes of us calling and I was so thankful for it because I was asleep about 20 minutes after taking them. I've never felt so bad and all I could think about was that I was going to feel like this our entire holiday and our time with Mark would be ruined. 

 

Details of the rest of the day are a bit sketchy.....I'm going to attempt this by looking at our photos, whatsapp chat and our Carnival invoice  Sorry no photos until dinner time 

 

The Carnival hub had started working last night during our time in Red Frog Pub, so I was happy to see my cruise cash safe and sound in our account. We had also activated the chat facility for all 4 of us so we could keep in touch. Last night we'd agreed to meet for breakfast around 10:00 I think. The kids slept a bit longer so John and I made our way to the Lido and grabbed some toast and tea to try and settle my tummy. We went to the shop and bought a packet of sea sickness tablets. I also got the motion ease stuff for behind your ears and lathered it on, lol. Total cost $25.99, again I'd have paid a hundred times that to never have that feeling again.

 

We had a bit of a rest and then met up with the kids on Lido. It was now lunch time. I had a sandwich from the deli, honestly can't remember what but it was nice. Then we sat in the Redfrog Pub for a bit and the kids took part in the Marvel Trivia. The big comfy chairs there are wonderful and I could feel my eyes drooping. I finally gave in and went back to the cabin for a rest. 

 

Mark took the rest of the family for a tour of the crew areas, including his room and they ended up in the Sports Bar.

 

I felt a lot better when I woke up, really had needed that nap. Tonight was elegant night (oh, the thought...) so I took a wee walk to the laundry and ironed a few things for later. I may have tumbled into a corridor wall or two on the way 

 

Abbey used the hub to reserve us a table at the Your Time dining room, The Sunshine. The easiest way for us to get there was to walk right to the back of the ship from our corridor on deck 2 and then up the stairs. We were early, I think around 5:20pm. Mark joined us for dinner. He doesn’t get to eat here normally and can only do so when family are visiting so it was a nice change for him. Because we needed a table for 5, but the hub only reserved for 4, the maitre d spoke to Mark when we got there and said it would be best not to reserve next time and provided we were eating early (which we would be) to come to the desk instead. 

 

The dining room looked nice. Here's a photo of it from upstairs that I took later in the cruise when it was empty:

 

 

 

We had a nice table beside the window in the downstairs section on deck 3. 

 

 

I'm still feeling a bit dodgy here...

 

 

Abbey treated herself to a wee cocktail $11.21

 

 

I started with the Romaine Salad - really lovely

 

 

And then the salmon which was good 

 

 

Finally creme brulee - absolutely amazing

 

 

Here's a selection of what everyone else had - sorry I don't recall what everything was

 

 

 

 

Abbey adored the Carnival melting chocolate cake - but only managed about two mouthfuls of it, lol

 

 

Completely full up now we went for a wander and then went back to the cabin for a bit. Abbey was a bit cold and wanted to change. We found this wee guy waiting for us:

 

 

Which reminds me....I think we got 2 bottles of water in each cabin last night, now that we have our red cards 

 

Then it was off to the Red Frog Pub to get ready for Mark's first set, which was instrumental with the Have Mercy Horns

 

 

He had 3 more sets tonight with the rest of the Hip Stars and played into the wee small hours. 

 

 

I gave up around 11:00 and wanted to try and get a decent sleep before our day in Bermuda tomorrow.  Although I was feeling better, I took one of the sea sick pills I'd bought earlier as I didn't want to risk being ill again. 

 

Today had been exhausting but also lovely as we'd had the full day to get our bearings and relax. We said our goodnights and were soon back in the cabin, where we chose a movie to watch whilst we drifted off to sleep.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 16, 2019 by jjsparkles

[jjsparkles]

28 minutes ago, Joebucks said:

This thread tells you so much about cruisers. Whenever I see a review post that starts off with a smiling family/couple, it's almost guaranteed that they are going to have a good time. It's almost like it's in people's demeanor's....

 

Then you have people fighting if it is "new" or not. Getting to what is important.

 

Enjoying the review so far. Boggles my mind how more people don't enjoy a day or so in the port, adding to the vacation, instead of stressing themselves out on the day of the cruise.

 

We live too far away not to make the most of it. And it takes me too long to save up for it so I keep my rose tinted glasses on and choose to enjoy myself 

 

19 minutes ago, Charm2018 said:

Looking forward to reading the rest!  Love it so far! 🙂 

 

Thanks - will try and get some more done soon 👍

Edited July 16, 2019 by jjsparkles

[AtSeaWithChris]

Nice Review. Thanks for posting it.

[bunnyette]

I hope you feel better. Sometimes our bodies are so exhausted that sea sickness can take a hold much easier!  Make sure you get lots of rest.

[jjsparkles]

Wednesday 26 June

 

Today was Bermuda day!!!

 

We agreed last night not to go for breakfast too early as we had the whole day in Bermuda and our only plan was to go to the beach. I slept much better thankfully and enjoyed a leisurely start to the day. 

 

Mark knocked the door when he was up and organised and we headed up to Lido for breakfast. It was really busy and it took much longer than planned.

 

**I have so many suggestions about how to make the entire area more efficient, but I'll leave that for my summary at the end. Needless to say this was our last day eating on here**

 

Fed and watered, we headed off the ship with our bags for the day. I'd researched a wee bit and knew we could get a minibus/taxi to take us to Horseshoe Beach Bay for $7 each, each way. I'm astounded that Carnival charge almost $50 for transport for this trip 

 

Anyway we were in busses within about 5 minutes and enjoying the beautiful view on the way. I had a wee laugh to myself listening to the other passengers speak about how we were driving on the wrong side of the road - I wasn't on the wrong side 

 

The journey took about 20 minutes and soon we were on the beach 👍 It was a beautifully sunny day with a wee bit of wind too. We walked along, away from the crowds and set ourselves up near the back. We just used our towels and didn't bother renting chairs or umbrellas. 

 

 

 

We were in the water within minutes

 

 

It was freezing when we first went in and we laughed at everyone in turn as we tried not to run back out again, lol. The waves were fantastic!

 

 

 

 

 

We enjoyed a few hours in and out of the water and then the boys went off in search of food. They came back with burgers/fries and some drinks which we all shared between us. No pics of this.

 

 

Filled up and having really enjoyed our afternoon, we headed back along the beach where there were plenty of busses ready to take us back to the ship. The last bus was to be around 7pm I believe. 

 

Soon we were back at the port. The Norwegian Escape was docked beside us. It's HUGE!

 

 

I think the Sunrise looks lovely though.

 

 

 

The Royal Dockyard

 

 

All a bit tired, we headed back to our rooms to shower and change and rest for a bit. This is where having two rooms with kids is amazing 👍

 

The ship was docked overnight in Bermuda and originally we'd planned to have a wander around the Dockyard in the evening or go into Hamilton. The reality was we were just too tired today so happily agreed to have dinner in the Sunshine again and enjoy Mark and the band playing. 

 

We met up with Mark and were in the dining room around 5:45 tonight. It was quiet. We were found a table in the same section as last night. We'd found it a bit cold last night, but tonight it was freezing. I think we must have been under a vent or something. I'm not even going to pretend that I know what we ate tonight, but I did take photos...

 

 

 

 

 

I do remember this. It was some kind of crispy chicken which the kids said was amazing

 

 

 

 

 

Same again for Abbey - and same again, she hardly ate any of it, lol

 

 

This was a marshmallowy thing, delicious

 

 

Then the waiter came over and asked me to move my seat so that I was beside John. He then said, we know you're having an anniversary....OMG....I knew what was coming. All the waiters started singing 'happy anniversary to you' and in between lines held up a napkin in front of our faces and said 'kissy kissy'....Can you even imagine that happening in Glasgow.....

 

Anyway it was really nice of them and we got a nice wee cake with a candle

 

 

We popped back to our cabin to warm up and grab a cardigan.

 

 

 

Then we nipped up to the Java Blue cafe for my daily latte and enjoyed a game of Connect 4.

 

 

Then we were off to the Liquid Lounge to watch Liar's Club which was fun. I forgot to mention that we watched Soulbound last night and it was fantastic too. 

 

Abbey wasn't feeling great and despite us all lathering up with mega watt sun cream, her poor wee legs still managed to get burned. She had an early night with a movie.

 

We ended the evening in the Red Frog Pub watching Mark and the band who again were fantastic.

 

 

Another fantastic day. John and I wanted to go into Hamilton in the morning and we said that we'd message the kids and see how they felt, but no pressure if they wanted a lazy morning. 

 

Goodnight 

 

 

 

[Cairns Cruisers]

Congratulations on this great review,looking forward to the rest.

Our family had a week in NY a couple or years ago, and like your "thing" being ESB

mine was the Chrysler building from TV shows and movies. Although we had great pizza on the visit,I had to have the 99 cent pizza as well. My wife loved the bagels,Grand Central Station,and we all thought Central Park was the highlight.

 

[suggie123]

Thank you for the great review!  We are looking forward to our sailing on August 19th. Happy Anniversary to you and your husband.

[jjsparkles]

On 7/16/2019 at 11:41 PM, Cairns Cruisers said:

Congratulations on this great review,looking forward to the rest.

Our family had a week in NY a couple or years ago, and like your "thing" being ESB

mine was the Chrysler building from TV shows and movies. Although we had great pizza on the visit,I had to have the 99 cent pizza as well. My wife loved the bagels,Grand Central Station,and we all thought Central Park was the highlight.

 

 

Thanks.  I loved seeing the Chrysler building too, it's stunning lit up at night. 

 

On 7/17/2019 at 1:00 AM, suggie123 said:

Thank you for the great review!  We are looking forward to our sailing on August 19th. Happy Anniversary to you and your husband.

 

Thank you, hope you have a great time on your sailing.

[jjsparkles]

I forgot to say that had taken another of the magic pills last night and slept well. I also forgot to say that we’d decided to get some room service breakfast for this morning as didn’t want to waste time in Lido before going to Hamilton. So we’d chosen our breakfast and put the card on our door handle before going to bed.

 

Thursday 27 June

 

Room service surprised us by being about 20 minutes early, which was fine, but I was a wee bit disoriented when I opened the door to such a cheery face in the morning. We enjoyed a simple breakfast of cereal, toast, croissants, tea and apple juice. What a great service and an easy start to the day 👍 The kids didn’t want to get up early so we left them sleeping and made our way off the boat to catch the ferry to Hamilton. Mark had given me the ferry times last night but I’m sure you can also find them online. We bought tokens for the ferry at the desk in the dockyard just as you get off the ship. I think it was $4.50 each, each way.

 

The dockyard

 

 

 

 

 

 

I can’t recall if the ferry was at 9.15 or 9.30, somewhere around that time, and it took about 20 minutes to get to Hamilton.

 

 

The water is the most beautiful turquoise colour.

 

 

 

Hamilton was such a lovely place. The shop fronts are nice pastel colours and the streets are lovely and clean.

 

 

 

The traffic lights are the same as back home and I noticed the red telephone boxes too, lol. We wandered the streets and popped into a café for some drinks, where I also managed to grab some wifi to check emails from home. I wanted to get some cash to give to Mark so we went to the bank and I made the typical tourist mistake of withdrawing Bermuda dollars instead of USD, despite there being a cash machine specifically for that……Anyway, the bank teller was lovely and she said she could change it to USD for me no problem.  We got Abbey some aloe vera gel for her sore legs and picked up some other bits and pieces at pharmacy. I noticed the pricing was quite high. I also noticed lots of brands from home, chocolate, various toiletries etc which again were all priced high.

 

I was paranoid about missing the ship sail time and there wasn’t actually anything particular we had wanted to do so we made our way back to the port to catch the ferry.

 

 

 

 

 

Our view on the way back to the dockyard.

 

 

 

 

 

Back in the dockyard we were going to have a browse around but it was really hot by now and I wanted to check the kids were ok (they’re 22 and 14 but I still like to know they’re ok, )

 

They were up and organised when we got back to the ship. Mark was with his friends in the pub in the dock and I think we may have gone to grab burgers from Guys.

 

We spent some time in the Red Frog Pub playing draughts or checkers depending on where you're from  We’d also brought a pack of cards from home so we had a couple of games of cards too.

 

 

We met up with Mark, grabbed our daily fix from the Java Blue Cafe and took part in the trivia quiz, guess the song. John is a music super fan so we were hopeful of doing well. We ended up getting full marks and John had to go head to head with another team for the tiebreaker questions. They both kept getting them correct so in the end both teams were declared winners.

 

Our lovely piece of ship on a stick 

 

 

We went back to the cabin to freshen up then off for an early dinner. We had a nice window seat tonight in a slightly different part of the dining room.

 

 

 

 

It a chilly in here again. Here's a selection of what we had.

 

 

 

 

After dinner we made our way to the Liquid Lounge for the Flying Scotsman show. 

 

 

We had a wee sing along when he sang about Loch Lomond which is about 5 minutes away from where we live 

 

Then it was to our usual seats in the Red Frog Pub for Mark's sets. Tonight was 70's and 80's. The pub was really busy tonight and the crowd were fantastic.

 

 

The band finished late and we were soon back in our cabin ready for sleep. I think Abbey may have went with Mark to the crew bar tonight for a wee bit. 

 

Sleep was not long coming 

 

 

 

[jjsparkles]

Friday 28 June

 

We had another long lie today (well, we were on our holidays, ) and had said we’d try the sea day brunch today. We left the timing up to the kids and I wanted to get some laundry done so took a wee trip down the corridor and managed to figure out the washing machine easily. I had brought a few washing liquid pods and laundry sheets from home. The only thing missing from this room is that nothing tells you how long it takes for the washing to finish. I asked Mark and he said his takes about 30-40 minutes so I went back to the cabin whilst waiting for it to finish. When I went back to move the stuff into the dryer there was a lady trying to get the machine to work. I helped her out and used my card as hers didn’t seem to work. In the end we worked out it was because she had it attached to a lanyard and it wouldn’t push all the way in. Anyway, I was glad to help.

 

I also paid for the middle package of wifi for 24 hours as I need to check some emails about some stuff that was happening at home. The cost was $16 and it worked very well. 

 

Mark knocked the door when he was ready. I think it might have been about 12ish. The Sunshine dining room wasn’t busy and we were seated straight away. The menu looked fantastic.

 

I had the eggs benedict with salmon, delicious. The hash brown wasn't great though.

 

 

John's cheese and ham omelette with a side of sausages

 

 

Mark's burger

 

Lewis' omelette, sausage, bacon and hash brown

 

 

Mark was happy because there was a dessert he’d tried whilst in dry dock, the banana cake, which he said was fantastic. I had it too and it was amazing....

 

 

I think this was Abbey's or John's

 

 

When this is available, why on earth would anyone go to the Lido for breakfast? We quickly worked out that if you’re having a later start to the day then this is absolutely perfect because we wouldn’t need anything else to eat until dinner. And even if we did, we could grab something from the Lido when it had quietened down. After this we were all completely full up and agreed we'd definitely be back. 

 

We played cards in the Red Frog Pub for a bit.  

 

 

 

Then went off to the liquid lounge and had a wee game of bingo. We didn't win, but had lots of fun taking part. We did win $5 on the card pull things (used to be called pontoon when I was a kid) so we went up to the casino to cash it in and then had a wander around the shops.

 

 

Lewis got some sweets from Cherry on Top and John got some nice new sunglasses. 

 

John was feeling a bit tired now so he headed back to the cabin to put his feet up, whilst Lewis, Abbey and I had a wander around the deck upstairs. We found that the back of the ship, deck 10 to be quiet. We grabbed an ice cream on the way. 

 

 

 

It was so windy...

 

 

 

 

 

 

We headed back to our cabins now for a bit of a rest before dinner. We all liked the TVs and the selection of free movies. Even though we'd seen most of them before there always seemed to be something to watch. I liked that when you switched the TV back on half way through a movie, it kept your place.

 

Soon it was dinner time ( all we seemed to do was eat...) Mark came to get us around 6pm tonight I think.

 

 

Some of our choices tonight in the Sunshine

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back again to the room and this wee guy was there

 

 

Settled in at the Red Frog Pub we enjoyed an evening with the band

 

 

 

 

We'd had another great day and were all looking forward to tomorrow....Grand Turk 

[jjsparkles]

Saturday 29 June

 

Today was Grand Turk day and Mark’s day off.

 

We'd ordered a room service breakfast again and it was delivered promptly to both ours and the kids room. We had simple cereal, toast pastries etc again and it was good. Mark knocked the door at around 11ish and soon we were off into the lovely sunshine. We were the only ship docked today.

 

 

 

 

 

We had a browse around the shops but didn’t get anything.

 

 

 

Then we walked down the beach towards Jack’s Shack. We weren’t really bothered about being there for the venue, it was just to get a quiet area to swim and relax. There wasn’t much of a wind around so we decided get a brolly. Mark spoke to the guy and he said that the sunbeds were free but $10 for an umbrella which was fine.

 

 

 

We found a spot just past Jack's Shack which was practically empty just beyond us. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The water was lovely, not as salty as Bermuda and much calmer water too. We spent a few hours relaxing in the sun and enjoying the fresh water.

 

 

 

Because it was Mark’s day off, we had booked the Steakhouse for dinner tonight, 8pm. Not wanting to eat a full lunch, we decided to order room service when we got back to the ship. It worked out really well. We ordered as soon as we got into the room and it was delivered just as we’d finished showering and getting changed. Mark and Lewis went upstairs for a Guys burger (neither of them are ever full up, lol) and we enjoyed our pizza and fries whilst watching a movie. Abbey had a quesadilla which she really enjoyed.

 

After a bit of a rest, I went up to deck 10 to read my book for a bit, via the Java Blue Cafe, whilst John had a nap. Whilst I was in there the person in front of me handed over a loyalty card. The server noticed I didn't have one and she commented that I'd been in there every day so she looked through my past purchase history and I ended up with a free frappe and another card almost full.

 

 

There's something really nice about standing at the back of the ship watching the water....

 

 

I found a spot to read my book and enjoy my frappe. After I'd finished my drink I realised there weren't any bins to put the empty cup in....why is this? Very strange. So I put it in my bag to stop it blowing away in the wind. 

 

After a bit I went back to the cabin and we all went to the pub to play some more cards. We really enjoyed this and it was amazing how quickly the time passed when we were all engrossed in a game trying to beat each other, lol. 

 

 

 

We headed back to our rooms to get organised for our meal at the Steakhouse. 

 

 

 

 

 

Bread was served first

 

 

Followed by a mini burger which I didn't have but everyone else said was delicious

 

 

Then starters

 

 

 

 

And our mains. I had the grilled chops and they were amazing

 

 

 

 

 

 

Everyone enjoyed their food, it was all absolutely delicious. We ordered the Art at the Table for dessert 

 

 

 

This was lovely and just nice enough for a small sweet bite to eat after being so full. The whole experience in the Steakhouse was really nice, but took over 2 hours so you need plenty of time. 

 

Back to the room for a bit to change, pick up some stuff

 

 

 

 

We headed back upstairs to the Alchemy bar and enjoyed some more cards and drinks into the small hours.  We'd had another great day and were looking forward to another lazy, sea day tomorrow 

[jjsparkles]

On 7/16/2019 at 9:35 PM, MamallamaAndDaddy said:

Nice Review. Thanks for posting it.

 

Thanks for reading along 

On 7/16/2019 at 9:41 PM, bunnyette said:

I hope you feel better. Sometimes our bodies are so exhausted that sea sickness can take a hold much easier!  Make sure you get lots of rest.

 

Thank you. After the second day I felt much better. I took the tablets every night for the rest of the cruise, just in case 

51 minutes ago, fyree39 said:

Really enjoying these installments! Mark must have been so excited and happy to have you all there with him. 

 

Thank you, I think he liked it as much as we did 

[KmomChicago]

Lovely review featuring lovely passengers.  The food looks excellent but frankly we have rarely had a bad meal aboard any ship, on any cruise line, sitting down or waiting in queues.  I must wholeheartedly agree that Sea Day brunch is brilliant and really the only meal I can convince my dining-room-phobic family to partake of. They simply do not have an interest in changing into a clean shirt and sitting around patiently waiting for elegantly uniformed waiters to bring the next course. 

 

Inside cabins are viewed as sub-par by many, but I can easily go either way. I like the light if I have a window or balcony, and I like the dark if I don't!  In particular I have found insides to be cooler and quieter and fabulous for sleeping, which is mostly what we do in them anyway.  Your rooms look very comfortable and serviceable. Having the family spread out in two is, to me, a more cost effective luxury than all crowding into one with a window or balcony. All the space and that second bathroom!

 

As others have mentioned, attitude is directly related to the quality of an experience.  You were all clearly thrilled to be on this journey together and appreciating every moment. It is a delight to sail along with you.

[jjsparkles]

7 hours ago, KmomChicago said:

Lovely review featuring lovely passengers.  The food looks excellent but frankly we have rarely had a bad meal aboard any ship, on any cruise line, sitting down or waiting in queues.  I must wholeheartedly agree that Sea Day brunch is brilliant and really the only meal I can convince my dining-room-phobic family to partake of. They simply do not have an interest in changing into a clean shirt and sitting around patiently waiting for elegantly uniformed waiters to bring the next course. 

 

Inside cabins are viewed as sub-par by many, but I can easily go either way. I like the light if I have a window or balcony, and I like the dark if I don't!  In particular I have found insides to be cooler and quieter and fabulous for sleeping, which is mostly what we do in them anyway.  Your rooms look very comfortable and serviceable. Having the family spread out in two is, to me, a more cost effective luxury than all crowding into one with a window or balcony. All the space and that second bathroom!

 

As others have mentioned, attitude is directly related to the quality of an experience.  You were all clearly thrilled to be on this journey together and appreciating every moment. It is a delight to sail along with you.

 

Thank you, glad you're enjoying reading along. We loved having two cabins and the inside really didn't bother me at all. I think we may have gone mad all being in the one room for 8 days