This was our 9th cruise, we have been on practically all of the major cruise lines, RCCL being one of our favorite.
We sail every Christmas, we were married on a ship 10 years ago so this was our 10th Anniversary cruise. We've always chosen the lowest inside cabin but for this occasion decided to splurge and took a junior suite on deck 8. It was wonderful having the extra room and balcony and we'll never go back to an inside.
We flew into New Orleans 2 days early, but our flight out of Toronto was delayed due to fog and rain in Chicago. When we landed in Chicago 3 hours late we had to run (literally) to the gate for our connection to NO, we barely made it, the doors were about to close as we arrived. It wasn't until we were in the air a few minutes later that we realized our luggage could not possibly have made it on the plane. Unfortunately that was the case!! We had to go to the lost luggage booth and write a report, the woman assured us that our luggage would be on the next plane arriving the following morning. She said they would deliver it right to the hotel within 6 hours of it's arrival into NO. I am not an optimistic person and knowing we were getting on that ship ONLY IF we had our suitcases, we decided to go to the airport ourselves the following morning and retrieve our own luggage as it arrived. Our only other choice would be to stay in the hotel all day and wait, possibly until early evening, without showers and clean clothes. The $60.00 we spent on the taxi (return) was well spent. Our suitcases came off the plane and we were back to the hotel, showered, dressed and ready to do some sightseeing.