Back in Fort Lauderdale

We are up before 6am to find the Caribbean Princess sailing along the Florida coast.  We take some time to straighten our cabin and then head up to Lido deck 15 to have our last breakfast.  As we are are walking from forward to aft of the ship I glance out the windows to see that we are passing by the tall condos that sit along the side of the Port Everglades channel.  

After a quick breakfast, we are back in our cabin before 7am.  We still have another hour before we need to vacate our cabin for the last time.  We lounge around the best we can, but the anticipation of leaving the ship and ending our cruise is just a bit overwhelming.  We’ve had such a great time on this ship, we did not want to leave.  I have Hubby check all the storage areas around our cabin to make sure I did not leave anything behind.  I also have him check our safe.  It’s always best to have the person who did not do the packing to double-check and look around.  

We leave our cabin promptly at 8am (with feet dragging) and look for Hector.  We give him his gift and thank him for taking care of us and our needs.  

We are suppose to meet our disembarkation group at 8:55 in the Coral Dining Room.  Instead we find a quiet place in Vines and camp out until our disembarkation time.  I pull out my laptop and show Hubby the GoPro videos he made from our snorkeling adventure.  There are quite a few and some are lengthy.  I am glad I purchased the latest version with the two hour battery life.  Now, Hubby is not shy about video taping at great lengths.  

We mosey on over to the Coral Dining Room to find our group had already been called.  Looks like another early disembarkation process.  We have our cruise card “dinged” for the last time as we exit the ship.  So sad….

Down in the cruise terminal (#2) we locate our colored tags.  It takes awhile as others are hoarding and hovering over lots of suitcases.  I wish folks who are not looking for their luggage would just stand a few steps back and away and allow others to get their bags.  After a few minutes of elbowing folks out of the way, we find two of our three suitcases.  Mine is missing!  Great!  I narrow my eyes and focus on the folks standing close to me.  One old chap has my bag next to his.  What?!  I take no time and confiscate my bag.  Yes, I clearly “mark” my bags (as well as the other two) with bright colored luggage tags and bright color shoe strings.  Oh yeah, I wrap the bright color shoe strings around the luggage handle and tie a nice knot.  

Off we go to Immigration to show our passports and hand in our Immigration form.   The Immigration lady waves us on and we quickly leave the terminal to find a taxi.  In less than 5 minutes we are at the Hilton.  Much to our surprise a room was available for us to check in immediately.  Yeah team!  It is now 9:30am.  What a fast disembarkation time for us!

We are on the 11th floor with a balcony view of Port Everglades:

I’m taking pictures and enjoying the view when Hubby says “let’s go” and see the beach!

We drop our bags in the room.  Thank goodness!  I wasn’t too sure how on earth I was going to carry my 14lb backpack and my heavy shoulder bag all over Ft Lauderdale.  

We had plans to take the water taxi to Hollywood Beach (south of Ft Lauderdale).  It was chilly this morning in FLL and a water taxi ride did not appeal to us.  Think 50s or there about.  Also, we would have to wait for the service to start at 10am.  

Instead we hopped on the Sun Trolley and paid $3pp to ride all day.  We are given a bright color bracelet to wear.  Easy for the Trolley drivers to recognize us as we hop off and hop on all day.  The Sun Trolley is easy to to use.  Just look for a “bus stop” sign or even better, just wave when you see a Trolley approaching.  You can’t miss the Trolleys as they are bright yellow.  They will stop and allow you to get on.  For those “app nerds” like me, there’s a Sun Trolley app you can download to your iPhone.  It has maps of the different Trolley routes and shows where the Trolley locations are on the map.  How cool is that?!  

For those of you staying in and around the 17th Street Causeway (T and V), you can pick up the Sun Trolley where it begins it’s FLL Beach route in front of the Publix grocery store in the Harbor Shops shopping center.  

Before I forget, remember I mentioned the FLL Water Taxis?  Well they have an app for iOS as well.  It’s called the “Water Taxi” by TSO Mobile.  It also shows a map and you can track the different water taxi routes.  You can also see the route numbers and the name of the stop/place.  So, the Hilton hotel we are staying at is considered stop is #6 and called Hilton Marina.  For those of you staying in and around 17th Street Causeway (T and V), this is the stop you want to pick up the water taxi.  Just head to the Hilton property and look under the bridge for a white concrete gazebo and you’ll see a small dock with a fence/gate.  There is typically someone there after 10am to help get where you need to go.  When you get on the Ft Lauderdale water taxi and go north along the Stranahan River the stop number increases.  There are two main routes:  Fort Lauderdale and vicinity and Hollywood Beach (to the south).  

Okay, back to our Sun Trolley adventure.  

Traveling on the Sun Trolley this early in the morning is a breeze.  There’s hardly any traffic to compete with and we were wondering where everyone was.  Hubby kept thinking it was Sunday and that got me all turned around.  That’s what happens when you cruise as long as we have.  You stop keeping track of time.  No schedules.  No rushing around.  Just plain fun and relaxation.  Now that we are off the ship, we have to keep track of time.  Eventually, we figure out it’s Saturday.  Still, it’s really quiet here on the beach:  

After walking for several blocks along the beach, we head back and decide to have “second breakfast”.  We end up at Cafe Del Mar on the main drag of Ft Lauderdale Beach Blvd:  

We order some coffee and we were in for a nice surprise:  

We are people watching from our outdoor table:  

Yes!  This is my second breakfast, because I need all the protein I can get for the rest of the day.  I know I just go off the ship, but this was sooooo delicious!  Three-egg veggie omelet:  

Feeling very energized and awake, Hubby and I decide to take the Las Olas Trolley.  From Cafe Del Mar we head towards Las Olas Blvd and walk one block west towards Seabreeze Blvd.  We find a “bus stop” sign on Las Olas Blvd and wait.  Fifteen minutes later the Las Olas Trolley turns the corner and picks us up.  

We are not sure where we want to stop and decide to just sit and ride and see what looks appealing to us.  In Las Olas, there are plenty of shops and restaurants here and old cars:  

Lots of outdoor dining venues:  

Lunch anyone?

Along the way, Hubby and I see some signs about an art show.  We ride by and make a mental note to stop here when the Trolley turns around:  

We hop off and immediately walk around the art show tents.  The first one displayed beautiful underwater photography shots of sea turtle (Tortuga!), fish, coral, etc.  We continue walking and end up at another tent where Samuel was painting beautiful koi.  I enjoy watching him paint and notice he was painting his subjects all the way out to the matted area of paper.  He made it look effortlessly.  Hubby is looking through Samuel’s portfolio and then he stumbles across a turtle painting/print of Tortuga!  Yes, I love little Tortugas!  I hug that print while Hubby continues to look.  I grab a palm tree painting/print and by now we are looking for a third painting to complement what we have.   We keep looking and decide on a simple koi painting with similar colors to the other two I’m holding close to me.  

Samuel is enjoying our company so much he stops painting and starts chatting with us.  We make our purchase and thank him for his time with us.  As we leave, I’m still thinking of another painting/print he has.  It was the first koi painting/print I saw when I stepped into Samuel’s tent.  It took my breath away.  It’s a much smaller print and did not go with the three we already purchased.  We continue to roam around the tents.

We end up in Samuel’s tent again.  I have the “take my breath away” koi print and getting ready to pay for it when Samuel asks if I would be interested in a recent painting he completed this weekend…a signed original.  I said Yes!  He came out with two originals and I immediately picked one that had three koi’s (because odd numbers are better in photography).  Hubby did not wait and purchased the painting.  What a special find!  We also have a new friend we’ll keep in touch with.  

From the art show, we walk back into the Las Olas area.  We find a “bus stop” sign and I check my iOS Trolley app to see where the next Trolley is and when it will arrive. Got to love technology!

Once we are back on the Trolley and heading out of Las Olas, we see lots of yachts along the waterways:  

We also see a water taxi approaching a bridge:  

We are back on the beach and enjoying the weather.  It’s still a bit cooler than the last two weekends and not many people are out today:  

Watching people dine at Bubba Gump’s:  

More people watching:

I check my Sun Trolley app and see a Trolley is heading our way.  We flag her down and by this time it’s getting closer to 3pm.  I’m hoping to be back at the Hilton in time to see the cruise ships leave port.  Traffic is bad and lots of people are using the Trolley today.  We make it back to our room in time.  

Here’s the water taxi coming into stop #6-Hilton Marina:

Lots of boats today:  

Can see the water taxi under the bridge (lower right):

A beautiful megayacht owned by a famous film director.  Can you guess?  

Watching the 17th Street Causeway bridge open up:  

There goes a Sun Trolley as the Caribbean Princess prepares to move away from the port:  

Too bad Hubby and I are not sailing with her back to the ABC islands:  

Sunday: Disembarkation Day

The Regal Princess was gliding along into Port of Everglades.  I knew without having to get up and open the curtains.  No more rocking and rolling.  Awe shucks...I'm going to miss that!

I turned on my iPhone and turned off Airplane mode.  I checked my emails and text messages and waited for Hubby to wake up.  It was 6am and we decided to head down to the Concerto dining room on deck 6.  We wanted to avoid the crowds in the buffet and Shiv said the dining room would be open at 6am.  Shiv was wrong...they opened at 6:30am.  Hubby and I left to go to the International Cafe for our last specialty coffee...skinny double mocha madness.

We arrived into the dining room at 6:30am and seated immediately at a two-top table.  Yes...we already have our coffee.  Yes...I wouldn't mind some cranberry juice.  

My last Princess skinny double mocha madness:

Do you want to know how cold it is in Ft Lauderdale?  I had ran into Mr "T" who is one of the ship's photographers and sold us our portraits.  He said he got blasted with the cold weather as he walked by the open doors where the crew was unloading all the luggage.  He told me he would miss our photo conversations.  I wished him well.  Sigh!  

So here we are in our sweats and jackets in the dining room:  

Hubby ordered poached eggs:

I had the special scrambled eggs with asparagus:

We took our time at breakfast.  We did not want to leave the ship.  Shiv had mentioned to us that the ship's next sailing was not full.   Hmmmmm...we could get a really good last minute deal.  

We went back to our stateroom to freshen up and to charge our tablets and phones.  Shiv said we could stay a bit later in our stateroom and relax.  We did not want to impose and throw his schedule off and thanked him for the suggestion.  I don't think Shiv wanted us to leave.  We enjoyed our hallway conversations with him and I'm sure the feeling was mutual.  

We left our stateroom promptly at 8am and looked for Shiv to give him a gift.  He stepped out of one of the smaller staterooms and greeted us.  We gave him an envelope and he handed it back to us saying what we gave him last week was enough.  I put the envelope back in his hands and told him please use it for your daughter's future.  He graciously accepted and we could see tears welling up in his eyes.  This is when you know you're part of a cruising family.  We say our goodbyes and Shiv mentions again that the next sailing is not full.  We all laugh.  Shiv...you have one big heart!  

Hubby and I head down to deck 7 and make our way to the Vista (Elite) lounge at the back of the ship.  Along the way, I see Heather (FCC) in her office.  I say a quick goodbye to her and then I remember that the next sailing is not full.  Oh well.  It was a nice thought.   

We wait until our second to last group is called.  At 10am, all remaining groups are called to disembark the ship.  This is probably the hardest thing we've done on a ship...leaving.  As we leave the gangway we can feel the 40 degrees Ft Lauderdale has to offer.  Crew members were wearing heavy jackets.  

Once in the terminal, we quickly found our three pieces of luggage.  We waited in a long line to go through Immigration.  We were directed to an empty counter and struck up a conversation with the Immigration person.  He was really nice and personable.  We chatted for a few minutes and as you can imagine holding up the long line behind us.  This seems to happen to us frequently.  

We left the terminal with luggage in tow to find a Princess rep.  Yes, we need to go to the Embassy Suites.  Way cool!  You have a bus ready for us?  Awesome!  We are the first of four stops:

We arrived at the Embassy Suites around 10:45am.  Wow!  That was the fastest disembarkation we've had.  No rooms available?  I thought so.  Yes...please call my cell phone when you're ready.  We try to find a warm place to sit and camp out.  The whole lobby area was just chilly.  Doors opening and closing.  Our feet are getting cold.  Okay, so it did not help that we were wearing flip-flops.  At least we had our sweat jackets and pants on.  I opened up our luggage to pull out warm socks and sneakers.  While I was putting mine on, my cell rang.  Cool!  Our room is ready.

We dump our luggage in the room and by this time (like clock work)...it's lunchtime.  Hubby mentioned that Shiv recommended an Asian restaurant near the Ross (dress for less) store.  We walked out into the cold but sunny day.  We walked and walked and could not find the restaurant.  So I looked on Yelp to find a Thai restaurant nearby.  Except we could not find that one.  So I called the Thai restaurant and found out we were on the wrong side of 17th street.

We found this wonderful restaurant.  They served wonderful chicken broth soup and this beautiful Pad Thai:

After lunch, we took a quick walk back to the hotel to get warm and get comfy.  No need for anyone of us to get sick at the end of our wonderful vacation!

Sunday (01/18): Princess Transfer and Heading Home

We are up early around 5am and getting ourselves ready for the trip home.  Our Yellow Cab is suppose to pick us up around 6am in the hotel lobby.  As we check out of the Embassy Suites, I receive a text message a cab will be arriving within 5 minutes.

I have to make a mental note for the next cruise.  Let the cab know how many pieces of luggage we have as in three large suitcases.  Two fit comfortably in the trunk, the smallest of the three have to ride in the front seat with the cab driver.  The same happened to us when we left home to get to the airport.  I'm so spoiled with Princess and their limos and buses and the extra room.

It's a quiet ride to the airport.  As we leave the Port Everglades area, I can  see two cruise ships in port.  Sigh!

We arrive at the Ft Lauderdale airport in no time.  I give the driver the transfer paper and a nice tip only to get a snarky remark "you should have told me you had a transfer".  I almost asked him if we still wanted his tip.  Really?  I did tell the cab's reservationist last night I had a transfer slip from Princess.  The cab driver gave me a log slip to sign.  No worries.  Lesson learned for next time.

We head over to the JetBlue counter to find a long line.  No worries as we arrive well before our 9am flight in anticipation of a crowd.  Within 10 minutes, we were at the counter.  My luggage was 46lbs and the rest were under 45lbs.  Whew!  Why is it my luggage is always the heaviest?  Maybe it's the shoes.  My toiletries.  Oh yeah, the extra clothes I mistakenly packed.  Another lesson learned.

We grab some hot breakfast at one of the restaurant counters near our gate.  It's still early and we manage to find a long table with outlets.  I immediately plug in my gadgets to get a quick recharge while we eat.

Our flight back home was on time and we land at the airport a bit before 12noon.  We did not have to wait too long for the shuttle to pick us up at the airport and we arrived home around 1pm.   Not too shabby.  

Once home, Hubby drops all the suitcases in the living room.  For the next few evenings, I will be busy with unpacking and sorting piles of clothes for the laundry.  Sigh!  Hmmmm...I wonder how long before PCD (post cruise depression) sets in....

Saturday (01/17): Disembarkation Day

Ft Lauderdale:  Disembarkation
Temperature:  Warm

Cruise Life:  We wake up around 5:30am to get an early start and to avoid the mad rush at the breakfast buffet.  We  also planned for a quick nap/rest before we leave our room.

We run up the stairs to Lido deck #15 for one last time.  While we were walking around, the crew was starting their daily tasks of setting up and arranging the deck chairs for the new cruisers on the next leg of their cruise.  No chair hogs this morning.  It was really quiet up here.  Kind of sad.

As we were eating our last breakfast on this beautiful ship, we were thankful for the many wonderful opportunities we've had during the last two weeks of our adventure.  We met many wonderful fellow cruisers, members of the ship's crew (officers, reps, waiters, bartenders, photographers, cabin stewards, security personnel, tender operators), tour guides, and shop owners in port.

After breakfast, we head down to our cabin to freshen up, rest, and then do a final pack of our backpacks and tote bag.  Hubby makes a final run through our cabin and makes sure nothing is left behind.

At 8am, we leave our cabin for the final time.  I take a walk in the forward cabins, looking for Benjamin.  I call out his name in the quiet hallway, kind of eerie as I hear no response.  I found him a couple of cabin doors down, stripping a cabin clean.  He meets me in the hallway and I give him "Pokey" a small beanie-boo turtle with huge green eyes.  I also hand him a gift envelope to show our appreciation for the last two weeks.  Benjamin is kind and very thankful for receiving Pokey.  He tells me he would give it to his youngest daughter.  He gives me a hug.  He is so tickled to receive such a nice gift and the envelope seems less important.  That touched my heart.

We make our way down to deck #5 and found a seat inside Vines.  I drop Hubby off and make my way over to the International Cafe for our last coffee.  I use up my coffee card with the last punch and the bartender says "it must be time to go".  Yes, it is.

Coffee from the International Cafe bar area

Back at Vines, I am burning through my Internet minutes and posting pictures here on my blog.  Once I go through my minutes, I login to Hubby's account and continue using his minutes.  It turns out that purchasing the additional 100 minutes ($25) on my account at the beginning of the cruise was a bargain compared to the $69 they normally charge.  I knew I would use up the 250 minutes within 7 days.

As we get closer to 10am, we pack up at Vines and head over to the Michelangelo dining room where our group Brown 4 is meeting.  At the entrance to the dining room, I see Angela (future cruise sales) is hosting our group.  We laugh as our paths cross again on the ship.  Twenty minutes later, we are called to disembark.  We follow our group out on the starboard side gangway and get scanned for the last time.  Our cruise has officially ended.

We work our way through the terminal and find our three pieces of luggage grouped together in the Brown 4 area.  Easy peasy.  We haul our luggage along with our passports and customs form to a much smaller line.  At this point, I notice there are several longer lines for non-US cruisers.  I heard that the folks in Customs/Immigration were finger printing all non-US cruisers.  Wow!  Now, that's going to take some time.

From the time we left the Michelangelo dining room, pick up our luggage, and get through Customs, took a total of 15 minutes.  I find a Princess rep outside the terminal who then directs us the Princess Transfer area.  I hand over my transfer tickets and Hubby and I sit on a bench to wait.  We wait and wait.  After an hour or so, we are getting antsy.

Almost two hours later, we are grouped together with fellow cruisers who are heading to the Ft Lauderdale airport.  Our last stop will be the Embassy Suites Ft Lauderdale.

We arrive 40 minutes later and manage to get a room.  At this point, we are extremely happy and thankful to drop our luggage and bags in our room.  It's lunchtime and we are still on a cruise schedule.

We head over to Tokyo Sushi to dine on some sashimi.  BTW, Hubby and I highly recommend this restaurant.

Simple salad with ginger dressing...Yum!

Yellowfin Tuna!

More tuna!

Life is good!

Disembarkation Day!

I woke up early in the morning and took a peek out of our balcony and saw the lights of the Florida coast.  I went back to sleep and when I woke up again I saw that we were entering the channel of Port Everglades.  Hubby and I made our way up to the Horizon Court buffet for our last breakfast.  My last smoked salmon and capers and my last chocolate croissant.  Sigh!

We went back to our cabin to do a final quick pack.  Good thing Hubby followed behind me as I would have left a few things behind (e.g. electric toothbrush charging stand).  I had him double check the cabin safe to make sure it was empty.  We had to be out of our cabin by 8am.  We saw Robert in a cabin a few doors up from ours.  We gave him a gift (big tip) and told him we enjoyed his smile and wonderful service.  He was two months into his 8 month contract with Princess.  We wished him well. 

We made our way up to Club Fusion where the Elite and Platinum members could enjoy coffee, tea, juice, and pastries and relax while waiting for their disembarkation number was called.  We were light blue 4, the last group to disembark.  We noticed the disembarkation process was slow going.  We suspected that the bottleneck was going through Immigration. 

I left hubby in CF and wandered around the ship one last time.  I stepped out on the Promenade deck to check out the weather.  The large barge from this morning was situated against the ship, refueling for the next cruise. 

Finally our number was called.  I noticed there were still several cruisers hanging out.  Just like us, not wanting to leave.  We made our way down to deck 5 and exited the Emerald Princess with the sound of our cruise card being scanned one last time. 

It didn’t take us too long to locate our luggage in the terminal.  One advantage of being the last group off the ship, we don’t have to contend with the thousands of luggage lined up in rows and in sections.  We stood in a long line to go through Immigrations and then made our way out to find our Princess rep for the transfer to the Embassy Suites.  After five minutes, we were loaded onto a bus and on our way.  This was the first time where we didn’t have to wait.

At the Embassy Suites, we saw a small crowd gathered.  They were waiting for a bus to take them to the Emerald Princess!  Hubby was adamant that I head straight to the front desk and be the first one in line.  I was and they had a room available for us.  Wahooo!  We dumped our luggage in our room and headed back outside to enjoy the Florida weather and to get some lunch at Bamini Restaurant. 

After lunch, we went to the Ft Lauderdale dive shop to check out their masks.  I decided on the original mask I saw a little over a week ago and purchased the display model, their last one. 

Dinner consisted of a trip to the Publix grocery store behind our hotel.  We had salad, fruit bowl, and juice.  Yes, a drastic change from our cruise diet.