Our vacation began the day before sailing on July 13. I travelled with my husband to Miami via rental car. We arrived in Miami around 3:00 and headed to Bayside to look around and have some pre-cruise fun. We ate dinner at Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. The food was great and the scenery was awesome. After travelling all day we decided to go to bed early so that we could be well rested for our sailing the next morning and possibly see the ship pull into port. We took the rental car back and took a cab back to the hotel for the night. I think I woke up every hour thinking that I had overslept, finally giving up on a solid rest at about 6:30, I got up and got dressed and got everything ready for the cruise.
The hotel provided shuttle service to the port, so we took advantage and left about 10:15 heading to the terminal. Upon seeing the ship up close, I was overcome with excitement. We got into line about 10:45 and proceeded to another line to wait and get on the ship. There was some problem with the ship clearing customs (so we were told) and had to wait until a little after 12 before we were able to board the ship. I went to see the maitre'd to try to get a table for 2 as my husband and I were celebrating our honeymoon and wanted a little intimacy. I was pleasantly surprised that we were already assigned a table for two for the late seating and all was well for me. I then went to the purser's desk to put cash on our sail and sign which was also a breeze and joined my husband who went to find a table on Lido deck for lunch around 1:00.
After lunch, at 2:00 we went to find our cabin which was a balcony cabin on deck 10, and was amazed at the size, space, and the view from our balcony. Our bags were not delivered yet, so we went exploring our new home for the week. We were both speechless at everything especially since this was our first cruise and it was hard just trying to take everything in. We came back to the cabin for the muster drill, I had a little episode with the heat and the lifejackets so I was a little slow joining the party for sail away. I didn't miss the sail off as the ship pulled out late and I was glad that I recuperated and was able to join the fun. After staying on deck for a while we went back to the cabin and found our luggage had arrived in the great condition that we last saw them. We rested before dinner and had a great dinner in the London dining room nightly. After dinner we took in the Welcome Aboard show and really enjoyed our cruise director Paul Santley. He was a riot. I am a hard person to humor, but he kept me humored the entire week. We also was entertained by the orchestra, the dancers, the social directors and a comedian who also entertained us on Monday night with an adult show. After that I went to bed. My husband went to try his luck in the casino. He won $400 and I was glad that he did not give it back to them.