We were on the Jade Jan 15, 2017 for a 10 day adventure that began in Tampa, FL. We arrived in Tampa the afternoon before and spent the afternoon walking and exploring the city. We stayed at the Hilton Downtown Tampa which was easy to get to and convenient. We utilized Blue One Transportation from the airport to the hotel, from the hotel to the pier and then he pier back to the airport. It was inexpensive and great, we didn't have to drive around and wait for others to get on the van, they just picked us up and took us directly to the hotel and again to the airport at the end.

We had cruise on the Jade in 2016 which is one of the reasons we booked her again. It was nice to sail on a ship where we were familiar with the layout. We expected to go to our favorite bars we found last trip but ended up trying many others instead.

We arrived at the pier terminal by 10:30am and there was no wait, we checked in very easily. Boarding began before 11:30am and went ok, we were Haven guests and this part was a little more chaotic than we experienced last year, it seemed like they forgot to let the concierge know that pre-boarding started so it did result in a bit of a bottle neck. We knew what to expect as we sailed last year, this time the people who escorted us on board were a bit reserved and didn't really offer direction to us. We got on board and quickly went and dropped our carryon's into our cabin. We returned to the Star Bar as we had a key card issue, unfortunately there was a long wait to get the card corrected that we decided to go have lunch. We enjoyed lunch and a couple of cocktails in Cagney's before we decided to wander the ship. It was a gorgeous day in Tampa so we enjoyed time on the outside decks. Read more