VALUE: We had been watching the cruise prices in October when we spotted some big price drops on the January 17 sailing of the Independence of the Seas and we snapped them up. The prices went back up after about a week, so a tip we learned is not to necessarily expect that lower prices will continue to drop or even hold. We have sailed on Celebrity for the past few years and had never been on a ship this large, so we weren't sure what to expect.

ARRIVAL: We flew in a day early and used the free shuttles to take us to the hotel and then to Port Everglades (not all hotels have free shuttles, we used Marriott SpringHill Suites). We arrived to the port around 1:00 and because we had "Platinum" status with RCCL, we were able to almost immediately walk right up to an agent and get checked in.

CABIN: Our cabin was available to us as soon as we walked on board, and our luggage arrived sometime in mid-afternoon. There were three of us in a Superior Oceanview Stateroom with a balcony, and we found that it was plenty big enough. The room was spotless and showed no sign of wear. My wife and daughter did not like the blowdryer that was in the room, apparently you have to hold down the trigger to make it blow. Good thing we brought our own blowdryer. Other than that, the room was terrific. Read more