Intro: This was the Jewel's last cruise from Tampa, a one way trip to San Juan, P.R. We'd never done a repositioning cruise before. So the brief drive to Tampa with a short flight home was pretty appealing. We were originally booked in an interior cabin, but got a very cheap upgrade to a balcony room due to a big price drop. We ended up with room 7164, port side aft. My wife's parents were kind enough to drop us off at the terminal, so parking fees weren't an issue.

Embarkation:

The Port of Tampa is one of the best when it comes to crowd handling, especially the terminal that the Jewel pulls up to (#3 I believe). We were out of the car, through security, checked in and walking onto the ship within twenty minutes. The only snag was with an overzealous security officer who seemed to think that I was going to commandeer the ship with a cigar cutter. I tried to tell her that I've carried it onto every other cruise without issue, but she would hear nothing of it. Thankfully another officer quietly told her that he thought cigar cutters were okay, and she relented. Read more