My husband and I had such a great experience on the Noordam (11-day Eastern Caribbean from New York in March 2008) that we wanted to take another cruise on HAL (Holland America Line) this year. The HAL 7-day Western Caribbean from Tampa looked great. We left a day early because we didn't want to miss the ship and didn't want to take a chance with potential travel delays. We stayed in Tampa on the Saturday night before departure at a La Quinta on West Spruce Street. It had a great location very near the airport, wasn't far from the Channelside piers, and was basically across the street from International Plaza, a large upscale shopping center.Free breakfast is included at La Quinta, which included hard boiled eggs, toast, cereals, juice, coffee, etc.
One piece of advice on taxis in Tampa. Take shuttles instead of taxis wherever you can in Tampa. The taxi ride from the airport to La Quinta (not more than 3-4 miles away) was $18.00! (We were so floored at the fare that the cab driver showed us the printed notice which allows him to double the price for runs from the airport.) Later, we learned to our chagrin that La Quinta has a free shuttle from the airport.
The room in La Quinta was clean except that the carpet was soaked in front of the air conditioner. I called the front desk Sunday morning and within a few minutes a maintenance person came, looked at it, apologized, said it would be fixed, and brought a big fan to air out the carpet as soon as we left.