My wife and I have been on 3 previous cruises, one with Celebrity on the Millennium, and two with Royal Caribbean. We had a chance to finally take our two sons, who are in there 20's, on a nice vacation so they came too.

We arrived in Fort Lauderdale two days early and stayed at the Marriott Courtyard. They sent the shuttle to pick us up at the airport and then took us to the cruise ship on Monday Nov. 11th for our 11 night cruise on the Constellation.

We arrived at the terminal at 12:30 and waited about 30 min. to board. It seems more people are arriving early to take advantage of the first day. A nice buffet was waiting for us after we dropped off our carry on bags in our inside cabin 8105. Our sons were just down the hall. We have always booked inside rooms to save money for other parts of the cruise and because we know if we do get a veranda we probably won't go back. Read more