Sunday, March 12, 2017

Independence of the Seas

Independence of the Seas Royal Promenade

Fort Lauderdale

It’s been a long time since we’ve been on a cruise ship with “Wow Factor”. We mainly take 3- and 4-day cruises and, let’s face it, the cruise lines save their oldest and smallest ships for the short itineraries. So I was really excited when we found a 4-day cruise over President’s Day weekend on Royal Caribbean’s Independence of the Seas. At 154,000 gross tons, it was much larger than any ship we’d been on. Plus it had a FlowRider and an ice skating rink, as well as a Royal Promenade, an indoor boardwalk with shops, bars and a 24-hour cafe. Lots of new things to do and see.

The ship was supposed to leave out of Fort Lauderdale at 4:30 but the day before sailing we got an email saying that “due to important maintenance work”, we would not be departing until 7:30. Ron and I speculated that the delay had something to do with Majesty of the Seas’ life jacket fiasco. A few days earlier, the Coast Guard had found some faulty life jackets on Majesty, and the ship was stuck in port an extra day while they inspected and replaced all the life jackets. Fortunately, our email didn’t say anything about boarding being delayed, so we decided to stick with our original plan of getting to port around noon to enjoy the ship as early as possible.