My fiancee and I planned this trip with another couple about 10 months in advance (though we'd been talking about it since 2006!) through a local travel agent that our friends often used. He did an Ok job, and we got a $100 onboard credit through him, but I think that next time I'll go ahead and book online, directly through the cruise line - I don't feel his travel connections were worth the hassle of having my name spelled wrong on half my travel docs and he was useless in helping me correct them.

This ended up being a particularly exciting trip for me, as my boyfriend proposed the night before we left, so for us it was an engagement trip! In addition, his birthday was also the day before we left, so I had ordered some birthday room decorations ahead of time. The cast of characters were me (Michelle), my fiancee, Greg, and our friends Charlie and Stephanie.

Embarkation: Our flight (direct from Cincinnati, which was nice) got into Miami about 10:00, and were in a cab and on our way to the port by 10:30 (much better taking a cab than my past experience of buying the cruiseline's transport - we could leave as soon as we wanted instead of sitting on a bus for half an hour waiting for it to fill up. With four of us, it was definitely cheaper, too). We thought maybe getting there over two hours before "official" check-in might give us an advantage, but there were already quite a few people at the port when we got there, so once we got our checked luggage taken care of, we headed straight for the line. Considering the sheer volume of people, check-in was fairly painless, and the lines were always moving, but it seemed to be a really long process since the last time I cruised out of Miami, about five years ago (the way the terminal was set up, I swear we had to circle it about three times - not always pleasant when I was trying to juggle my carry-on bag, passport, travel docs and then, finally, my cruise card). Once we got through and onto the ship, we were told the rooms weren't ready yet (too bad, since I was DYING to get rid of my carry-on -- I've already got one with wheels for my next trip!), so we headed for Windjammer and ate to our hearts content until we could get into our rooms around 12:45. Once we did that, we suffered through muster, and then changed into our suits, headed straight for the adult pool (what a fantastic invention - no kids!), grabbed some long-awaited fruity drinks, and people-watched until it was time to clean up for dinner. Read more