Background - we are four ladies (one mother-daughter pair, and one aunt-niece) traveling a for relaxing girl's trip during spring break. As we are all teachers, we must travel during spring break. We love kids, but wanted to get away from that for a bit so our cruise involved activities away from the hustle and bustle of the ship. Ages from 55 to 31. Two were first time cruisers, and two were experienced cruisers.
Day minus one - Flew to Orlando and used Cocoa Beach Shuttle to transfer to Holiday Inn Express Cocoa Beach. Shuttle with Cruise Critic discount was $68 plus tip for four people. HI Express is in a great location by Publix grocery. Bought last minute supplies and two cases of water for cruise. Walked to beach (2 - 3 blocks) and had lovely dinner at a restaurant on the pier. Rooms at HIE were clean and the staff was friendly.
Day one - set sail! Shuttle to pier on Sunday through hotel was $6 pp. At pier by 10:30, and on ship by 11:00. We had priority boarding (I'm only Platinum, but they let us all board together). Not a crowd at that time, so I'm not sure how much the priority boarding really helped, though. All lines moved quickly. We had put luggage tags on our cases of water, but pier staff made us carry it on. That was a pain, because we could not get into our rooms until 1:00 PM. Luckily we found a gentleman selling soda packages who was willing to store our water under his table until we could get into the cabin. Next time I'll take a suitcase for the water. We had lunch in the Windjammer, and it was beginning to get crowded when we left. Got to our rooms by 1:00 pm and met our awesome cabin steward, Darrell, who opened our balcony partition and took great care of us all week. Dinner the first night was good, and servers were excellent, but our table location was the last table by the kitchen for the 8:00 seating. We asked for, and were switched to, a balcony table on deck four for the remainder of the cruise. We had very rough seas the first night, and some of our party did not feel too well. Bonine to the rescue and an early night.
Cabin 6340, great location on the hump. Close to elevators and stairs. Quiet. Nice balcony.