Just back from a 6 night cruise to Grand Cayman, Jamaica and Labadee, Haiti on Independence of the Seas..Feb 8, 2015 to Feb 14, 2015. This was our first time on RC but our 8th cruise overall. Also our first time on a ship of this size.

We arrived at Ft Lauderdale at 10:30 AM, waited for approx 15 minutes, went thru the check-in process and were on the ship by 11:15 AM. The 6 of us had all recieved emails telling us that since we were on deck 8, we should not arrive until 2:30, but I had read on this forum that they would not hold you to that. We also brought 2 bottles of wine and 6 packs of water and pop on board and there was no problem. We found our cabins which were 8630, 8638 and 8644 on the bumpout and they were great cabins. We were right around the corner from the elevators and close to everything, altho the elevators are always crowded near mealtime, or showtime..much faster to use the stairs. We then went down to the dining room to see where our table for 6 was located, and found we had been assigned a table for 9 which was a blessing in disguise. The first night another couple joined us and we had the greatest time with them for the rest of the cruise. The buffet was very good, lots to choose from and the omelet station was as good as I had read about, altho sometimes there is a long wait. Get there early if you don't want a long wait. Since this a a very large ship, they don't want you to eat and sit around chatting, they are always requesting that people that are done eating get up so others can sit down..they probably need a bigger dining room for the buffet. The meals in the MDR in the evening were OK but nothing exciting..the strip steak on the menu does not look like any strip steak that we had ever seen..1 1/2 inches thick, and 3 of us who ordered it pink in the middle ended up with a raw steak..not great for the first night. So we just never ordered that again.

We were also disappointed to see 3 or 4 items on the bottom of the menu that carried an extra charge..quite a hefty extra charge I may add. If we would have wanted to pay extra for a meal we could have gone to one of the specialty dining rooms. Some of us were talking later, and I think they would rather get rid of free dining and gradually move to more specialty dining. I had read about the Cafe Promenade and their little shrimp or egg salad sandwiches, so tried that and they were great. In fact it is a great place to grab a cup of coffee and a roll in the morning and just people watch before all the shops open. One complaint is that there is very little free ice cream on this ship. There is a soft serve stand by the swimming pool, but that closes at 5 PM and you can have ice cream in the MDR, but other than that you can buy it at Ben & Jerry's, so if you are an ice cream lover...good luck. Read more