About us: We are a married couple in our 30's with a 3 ½ year old daughter. This was our 10th cruise, 6th on Royal Caribbean. We live in Northern Virginia about 25 miles outside of Washington D.C., and have cruised out from the ports of Baltimore (1), New York (1), Bayonne, New Jersey (2), Canaveral (2), Everglades (2), and Miami (2).

Travel to Port: We flew from Washington Dulles (IAD) to Fort Lauderdale (FLL) the night before our cruise, with a short layover in Atlanta. Since this was a short 3 night weekend cruise, we did not have any checked luggage, just a carryon for each of us. We arrived at FLL around 11:15 p.m. and were outside by 11:25 p.m. We had reservations at the Hilton Fort Lauderdale Airport. The hotel shuttle picked us up for the short 5 minute drive, and we were checked in to our room by 11:45 p.m. The hotel room was a nice standard room with a King size bed on the 7th floor. It was clean and comfortable. We had a rate of $99 a night (which was really good for this hotel; rates are usually around $169 a night or more).

My wife went straight to bed. She was exhausted from a long week at work, and school finals (she is almost done with her Masters Degree). My daughter was excited from the plane ride, and asked about the pool (which I had told her about on the flight over). So my daughter and I hit the pool a little after midnight. The water temperature was so warm, that the pool almost felt like a Jacuzzi. It was very relaxing, and fun to spend some time with my daughter. After about 15 minutes in the pool, it looked like she was finally starting to get tired, so I thought I would head back to the room to put her to sleep. However, just about the time we were getting ready to leave the pool, the Fire trucks showed up!!!! Apparently there was a false alarm!!! However seeing all the lights flashing and the firemen walking around the pool area got her all bushy eyed again, so we spent another 15 minutes in the pool, and then headed up. She was out cold in about 5 minutes... Finally some down time... I watched a movie and got some shut eye (I am normally a night owl anyway). Read more