Trip down to Tampa and precruise stuff:

We are from Ohio, so we let our two younger children miss their last day of school (parties) and we drove through the night to Tampa. We arrived at our friend's house at 8:30 am and they were kind enough to fix breakfast for all five of us, and DH crashed. I had driven the last four hours or so, but he had done the other twelve. The rest of the day my GF and I took care of last minute errands, and went for the all important mani and pedi so we'd look fresh for the cruise. The next morning 7 kids ranging from 19-7, and four adults did the usual morning routine, and we left for port at around 11:00 am. We were all sooo excited. Out of all of us, the 6 younger children had never cruised. What an enormous gift to experience with this with people you've grown up with your whole life.

Embarkation: We drove both of our cars up to the unloading zone and the awesome baggage handlers didn't miss a single beat. All of our combined 20, yes 20 bags were unpacked and loaded onto dollies. Our DH took out their wallets paid for valet parking, and we were in the terminal in a matter of minutes. I'd say that after getting our info and cards we were on the ship in about 30 minutes. Completely painless. I guess we got lucky and hit at just about the right time. Read more