35 year cruise veteran's MSC Poesia Blog Day 1 - March 30, 2013

We drove to NYC the night before from Ithaca and utilized a park/sleep/fly package at the LaGuardia Hotel. Cheap and efficient. Our flight departed LaGuardia with no issues and we make it into FLL 30 minutes early.

Our bags were waiting for us on the carousel, we caught the rental shuttle, found our car waiting for us and headed up to Pompano Beach to spend a few hours with my mother. We stopped off and picked up a few cans of Deviant Dale's Ale which I distributed through our checked luggage and headed to Port Everglades. We arrived a little before 3:00. I dropped the family off at Pier 4 and parked the car in the garage. I caught up with them at security (no line) and proceeded to check-in...again, at this hour -no line! After the photo, we proceeded on board and headed straight to our stateroom. After a brief look-see around the ship, I left to return the car to the airport. I re-boarded the ship at about 4:30, which gave me plenty of time to do the Boat Drill at 5:00. The cruise line assigned us to 1st Seating dinner in spite of our request for 2nd and confirmation of this in an email the day before. With an 8:00 sail-away, we decided to go to 1st Seating and request a change for the rest of the cruise. This worked out perfectly, as it gave us just the right amount of time to have dinner and enjoy sail-away from the promenade on Deck 7. Dinner was excellent. I chose a light steak appetizer which was prepared with a vinaigrette sauce-very tasty. Cool Salad followed. I chose the pasta dish for my main course- Rigatoni with a sweet sauce. ( I don't remember what they called it). It was prepared well and the pasta was freshly made. I don't remember my dessert choice...I was a little tired and it was less than memorable. After dinner we strolled up one deck and enjoyed the sail-away on the port side. With a late departure, I think the normally excited crowd in the apartment buildings had a chance to get pretty lubricated up before we made our pass, because they seemed to have a little more energy and enthusiasm as we floated out the channel. We even had a trumpet player salute us. The captain blew the ship's whistles for the requisite salute (reallllly long blasts) and out into the Atlantic we went. After exploring the ship for a little while, we retired to our stateroom for the night. Since we were on a Western Caribbean itinerary, the captain set the clocks back one hour giving us an extra hour's sleep. Read more