My wife and I left the kids behind for a quiet vacation. We drove to Pt Canaveral from SC the day before. We have stayed and parked at the Radisson, Country Inn and residence Inn on prior cruises. This time, we chose to stay and park at the Hampton Inn Cocoa Beach. It is a clean, moderately priced hotel with beach access. Cocoa Beach offers restaurants and shopping near the hotel. We took the short shuttle ride at 11:00 on cruise morning.

Embarkation

We arrived at the port around 11:15 with no traffic problems. Dropping off the luggage was fast, as was checking in. There was a short wait of 5-10 minutes before we could board. The Windjammer was ready for us and was not overly crowded for embarkation day. Our cabin was a hump balcony and was ready at 1:00, as scheduled. We were pleasantly surprised that we did not have to take our life jackets to the lifeboat drill! Read more