This was a family cruise to celebrate my in-law's 50th anniversary. We had 10 people in all. This was mine and my husband's 12th cruise. 4 with RCCL and others were various ships (4 with Carnival). My family which included my husband and I with our son, 15 and daughter, 13. My sister-in-law and her husband with their daughter, 14 and son, 11, were on their first cruise ever. My in-laws (ages 68 and 74), have been on several cruises also. I was the one who did all of the travel arrangements and excursions for the entire group.

We left our home in middle Georgia Sunday morning and drove to Orlando to spend the night. It is an 8 hour drive for us to Fort Lauderdale, so we decided to spend the night in a fairly inexpensive hotel room in Orlando instead of the pricier ones in the Palm Beach/ Fort Lauderdale area. Day 1 of the cruise (Monday) - We had about a three hour drive to Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale. The traffic wasn't horrible, but I am glad we got on I-95 from the turnpike in Jupiter as all lanes were blocked on the turnpike after our exit. I would have freaked out if we got stuck in a traffic jam the day of the cruise. I think next time I will probably go ahead and drive all the way instead of Orlando. At the gate of the pier, you had to show each ADULT person in the vehicle their driver's license or passport, so the line was a little long to get through the gate. We arrived about 11:30 a.m. at the pier. We dropped off our luggage and expect to pay a tip to the luggage stewards at the pier. I think we paid about $2.00 per bag. I forgot to write down our room numbers and since we booked on line, RCCL does not send out paper documents unless you ask. I did not have luggage tags, but they were easily put on our luggage by the stewards and they also had a quick print out of all the room assignments. We park the two cars in the parking garage, and walked to Pier 25. They were already boarding by that time so we went through the embarkation process very quickly. I was glad to see the "Welcome aboard" pictures not holding up the entrance to the ship. It was set up right after you signed in and received your cruise sign and sail cards and not right before the ship's entrance. Then if people did not want pictures RCCL did not hound you and for people like us, with 10 members, we did not hold up the line. Our rooms were not ready until 1:00 so of course we went and had lunch in Windjammer. I was surprised after reading the boards that this place was not a madhouse. It was pleasantly big enough the whole cruise. We found a table each time we were there. I loved the set up of RCCL's buffets areas! They have several different stations with different kids of food at each station so there is not one long continuous line as in Carnival's. Each side of the Windjammer has the same areas so there were two stations for each kids of food. Two area for sandwiches, one area for hot dogs and hamburgers/fries, Two area for the main entrEe's, Two for desserts, two for salad, two for fruit, etc. There was never a huge line for any food. Our room was a large outside (about 154 sq feet) We had two double beds (put together for king) and 2 bunks that were let our from the sides of the wall at night. The kids love the bunks and they bring out a ladder for each and they both have side rails. We were very surprised at the amount of storage space in the rooms as compared to other ships. We brought the over the door shoe holder as many has suggested on this board and did not use it. Everything fit in all the spaces. We did have a full love seat in our room so that was nice. I think we had about 13 drawers in all. We also brought about 20 cheap hangers with us so we could hang more clothes in the closet. That was a huge help as that freed up drawer space for everything else. We put the life vest on top of the closet which also made room in the closet for shoes. The side mirrors had shelf space behind them as did the bathroom mirror. The room did have a refrigerator, TV, hairdryer and a safe. The safe has to be opened with a credit card, which I wish they would change to a combination lock. I had purchased room decorations for my in-laws for $30 and they were up when they went tot their room. They were just as described on line. We had main seating dinner and loved our 10 person table. We were at table 408 which was very close to the front door of the dining room and up a step near the staircase. We loved it! Our waiter, Ronald, was from the Philippines and was wonderful! He always played with the kids and accommodated us anyway he could. Several members of our group ordered 2 appetizers every night, some two entrees and one time, the 14 year old ordered three desserts. He never minded and once when my daughter did not like the duck she ordered, he brought another entrEe that she did like. After dinner we always went to the show. Tonight's show was a comedian. He was ok, but not overly impressed. The casino was smoke-filled as usual so we did not stay long checking out the tables. We do love to read the Cruise Compass each night to know what the activities are for the next day. Of course each night the room steward had the funny animal in your room which the kids adore. Day 2, Tuesday - This day was at sea. My son and I had breakfast in the Dining room. I had the eggs benedict (which you could only order in the dining room). My husband and daughter ate in the WJ (Windjammer) much later. I was up on deck about 9:00 am and by 10:00 the lounge chairs were full. I was very conscious of not "saving" my chair. Others were not so considerate. The people next to me, had towels in the chars before I got there and I had still not seen them for over two hours. Finally someone came up and asked if anyone had been there and I said not for a couple of hours, so they moved the towels and sat down. Of course, the family showed up a few minutes later. I like the idea of not saving chairs for extended length of time, but nobody enforces the issue. I made sure when I left for a potty break or pick up lunch that I had more than just a towel on the chair and asked my neighbors to watch my stuff for a few minutes. The kids had fun on the rock climbing and jump zone. Parents have to go with the kids the first time to sign the waiver. Also, the rock climbing is only open about 1 hour at a time and they only take about 20 or so people each time, so if you do not get there 15 minutes before the start, you will not get to climb. You do not need shoes for the rock climb, they give you special shoes but you will need your sign and sail card and socks. I also loved the soft ice cream that is near the Windjammer! They also have Ben and Jerry's on the ship, but that is an extra charge. They had chocolate, vanilla and strawberry (two flavors each day) with cones! Yum! This was formal night, and we all got dressed up and took pictures. There were several photographers with different backgrounds. We posed for photos before dinner at three stations. The kids were good sports about it and we actually had pictures that turned out pretty good. There is only one station that can accommodate more than 6 people at a time and that is at the Centrum staircase. Every other station is 6 or less. This night was also no smoking in the casino night! YEAH! We stayed a lot longer than usual watching the tables since there was no smoking and you could actually breathe. I tired to let my son watch the roulette table just for a few minutes, but since he is under 18, they would not let him around the tables. I thought he could watch and not play, but they would not allow him to watch either. No big deal! We went to the Orpheum theatre early (about 8:30) each night to obtained good seats for the show. The show was called "Stage to Screen" and it was Broadway hits that have made it to Hollywood. There were numbers from Hairspray, Chicago, West Side Story, Little Shop of Horrors, etc. It was singing and dancing with a live orchestra in a hidden orchestra pit. The show was very pretty good. We are huge show people, so we never miss the shows. We have an early morning, so we all go to bed early tonight. The ship turned the clocks back 1 hour tonight to be more on the same time schedule as Belize and Cozumel. Since the States had just had daylight savings, Belize and Cozumel were 2 hours behind us. The would only be 1 hour now, but it was easier to keep up with ships times vs. local time that way

Day 3, Wednesday - Belize. We were up very early to catch the first tender out. We did not book with RCCL as at the time of booking excursions online, they did not offer the Zip-line in Belize. After I secured my reservations with Nacho and Cynthia with NCQ excursions, I did see where RCCL offered a aerial trek tour with cave tubing. I was worried about getting off on the first tender since they made it sound like we had to book with RCL to get off first. I went to the shore excursion desk the day before and told them I needed to be off early to catch my excursion charter and they said that would be no problem, just to show the person at the tender docking areas my confirmation from my private excursion. I am glad I had the e-mail from Nacho. I showed the guy at the tender loading area (along with everybody else who booked private tours, which was the majority) and we had no problem getting on the first tender. Anybody that had proof to get off early was able to get the first tender out. We met up with Nacho and we had 12 of us on his zip-lining tour. Our 10 for zip-lining only and 2 others from the ship that would be zip-lining and cave tubing. We drove for about 1 hour to Jaguar Paw resort. We were the first ones there and had about a 5 minutes hike to suit up for the zip-line. Zip-lining through the rain forest was phenomenal! It was a lot of un and the rain forest looks like it you think it does. Lush vegetation, hot and beautiful! I am SO glad we book our own private tour outside of RCCL. We were the only ship in that port that day and as we were finishing our zip-lining, hundreds showed up to wait in line to do what we just got finished. There is only 1 track (of about 6 zip-line treks), so everyone had to do the same tour. I think I counted 6 BUSES full of people who were zip-lining and/or cave tubing. I could not believe how many people from one ship were at the same place. While the other couple cave-tubed, Nacho gave us a tour of the resort and we had lunch in the air conditioned resort restaurant. The lunch consisted of a real Coke or Sprite in bottles, BBQ chicken, rice and beans and coleslaw, plus water. It was nice and they had some Hot sauce that would burn your mouth, but good! They also had an orphaned monkey that was 8 months old that we could play and hold while we waited. It was just a great experience to play with a non captive monkey in the rain forest! I wish we would have cave-tubed with Nacho as well, but our group had decided to zip-line only for $90 instead of $135 for both. If I can make any suggestions, do not go with the ship and use Nacho and Cynthia. He stopped on the way back to the ship and bough each family a bottle of the hot sauce and Cashew wine for a souvenir. After we returned to the ship, we dressed for dinner and went to the show, "A Tribute to the Temptations" This was not my genre of music, so my husband and I left during the show. But people a few years older than I (I am 40) loved it! I have never left during the middle of the show before but that night we did. I think this was the night of the midnight buffet with the ice-carving demonstration at 11:15, but we did not make it. Only my mother-in-law made it from the whole group. She said they had tons of boiled shrimp on the buffet. Day 4, Thursday - Cozumel. Again, I booked outside of RCCL for SCUBA diving for my family of 4 and Discover SCUBA diving for the remainder 6. One thing I did write on my comment card to RCCL was about the differences in the excursions from online to the ships itinerary. RCCL did offer a discover SCUBA but with an age limit of 12. My nephew would be 12 in May and I called RCCL to see if they would allow him to book with them. I was told no. I even explained that you can get a Jr. SCUBA certification in the States at 10 but they still would not allow him to book with RCCL. But when we got on board, the Discover SCUBA had the age limit of 10! What?? I would have booked with RCCL because of time constraints, But I did my homework and booked all of us with Alison Dennis with www.scubawithalison.com. It ended up being a fabulous decision as she was $70 for 2 tank dive and the ship was $99. The Discover course was $55 with an optional $35 extra tank dive and the ship was $99 for one tank only. Alison had two small boats and took the certified divers out in one and she took the Discover SCUBA class in the other. We took a taxi to the marina ($30 for all 10 of us in once van) which was about 5 minutes away. These dives were FANTASTIC! One of our best dives ever! I would highly recommend Alison. There were only 5 of us on the certified dive, which is so much better than the cattle call boats. She had all of our equipment including wetsuits for us (we do not bring out equipment on cruises). The rest of the family enjoyed their Discover SCUBA also. We had no problem getting back to the ship on time. We departed at 3:00 that day and were back on the ship at 1:00 or so. My son and I played trivia in the Schooner bar with about 4 more couple and ended up winning. They gave out key chains for awards. After reading other reviews, I wished I had gone to more trivia games but the times never coincided with our free time. We saw the "Don't Stop the Rock" show following dinner. That was the best yet. Really enjoyed this show! Very upbeat and colorful! It was music through the movies. Following the floor show, we saw the Love and Marriage game show. This was hilarious and is not to be missed! You have to audition to be in the show. One for newlyweds to 5 years of marriage and then the other group was for 12-20 years of marriage I think. The last couple was whoever was the oldest married couple who would agree to be in the show. Day 5, Friday - Key West. We arrived in Key West around Noon and everyone on the entire ship had to go through immigration before leaving the ship. For most passengers, this meant waiting for your deck to be called (starting with deck 8 and ending with deck 2) and then lining up at the Orpheum theatre to show your passport and get your ID card punched. We had a few crew members tell us they do not check your deck though, so if you want to go earlier than your deck, you can. The lines are very long for this! I am very glad we did not have a private excursion in Key West. We finally got off around 1:30 or so and had to be back on board for sailing at 6:00, which meant back my 5:30. However, if you were passengers with excursion tickets, you met in the Spotlight lounge and were the very first to go through immigration. We walked down the "Southernmost point of the Continental US" and took the obligatory tourist picture, ate some crepes, and shopped the tourist shops. I enjoyed this more than my family who headed back for lunch to the ship around 3:30. I shopped another hour or so and had some great fried calamari rings from a sidewalk vendor. I had read on the boards that we may or may not get lobster on the last night. Well we did not. We did have a great jumbo tiger shrimp entrEe which was just as good. I am not a big lobster fan, so that did not disappoint me. My favorite dish is the scallop risotto that was an appetizer that night. My in-laws ordered us all drinks for dinner and I had a virgin Coco-Loco- YUM!!!!! That was fabulous! It was a frozen concoction of coconut, mango, passion fruit, and I am not sure what else, but it was yummy! Following dinner, we saw a wonderful entertainer/magician named Levent. He was great!!! He had us all laughing and amazed. Following Levent and a preview of the cruise DVD, the singers and dancers led off the farewell number. Many of the staff came on the stage to end the show. We opted to carry our own luggage off the ship instead of packing up and placing our things out at midnight. Day 6, Saturday - Fort Lauderdale. We went to the WJ around 7:30 and again we found a place to sit. I thought it would be packed and it was crowded, but my in-laws had a table for us when we go there. We were out of the room by 8:00 AM. Since we had our own luggage, we waited around until about 8:30 or so to get off the ship and we were on the road my 9:00 am. Since we had already gone thru immigration, disembarkation was a breeze! We carried our luggage to the parking deck instead of pulling the car back to the loading area. That seemed to be the easier route. The cost of parking is $75 ($15 per day for parking). Read more