A three-day weekend on my kids' school calendar is the perfect opportunity to escape for the weekend to the Bahamas on Independence of the Seas!
Since we live in the Orlando area, weekend cruises are an easy sailing to hop on, especially when there's an extra day off of school.
We're sailing on Independence of the Seas for a 3-night cruise that visits Perfect Day at CocoCay and Nassau, Bahamas.
We left our home at 10:30am and made the drive over to Port Canaveral. No traffic and an easy hour or so ride to the coast.
The check-in might have been the easiest and fastest check-in and boarding I've had since cruises restarted last year. We rarely stopped walking, and when we did, it was just to verify everything. The ship was already open and boarding guests when we got to the terminal.
After getting on the ship, we headed to Playmakers for lunch.
We booked the unlimited dining package for this cruise, so one easy way to maximize the package value is to start the cruise with a specialty restaurant lunch.
I was concerned it would be overly busy, but we had no problem getting a table and the food came out nice and quick.
Our waiter was very nice, but he mistakenly told us we could each only eat at Playmakers once per day. Unfortunately, I've heard waiters occasionally say that, but it's simply not the policy. In short, the unlimited dining package is unlimited, with no quotas or limitations to how many restaurants or times you can dine at a restaurant on any day. I didn't say anything to him, figuring I can cross that bridge if we need to later.
While we waited for the food, I went over to Izumi to book our dinners. If you have a specialty restaurant package, it's a good idea to go ahead and book a reservation once you get onboard. We had no issues getting the restaurants and times we wanted.
Lunch was served quickly and it was very warm. Wings, burgers and fries...oh my!
Next up was a visit to our muster station to complete the muster drill process. Couldn't have been easier and still so happy to not have to do the old muster drill process!
The staterooms weren't ready until 1:30pm, so my wife and I took time to hang out in the Solarium for a bit and enjoy the beautiful weather.
For this cruise, we booked connecting Promenade View cabins.
One of my favorite family cruise tactics is to book two connecting cabins, rather than one large room. We get separation from the kids and an extra bathroom.
Since we booked this cruise a few months ago, prices were much cheaper for this category, so an inside cabin is just fine for a quick weekend cruise.
After the rooms were ready, it was back up to the pool deck for some afternoon sun and sailaway.
The weather was absolutely fantastic, and we enjoyed bright sunny skies for our departure, along with a lot of other guests who were ready to party.
Dinner took us to Giovanni's Table.
This is still the "old" Giovanni's Table menu (and not the new Giovanni's Italian Kitchen), but just like on Allure of the Seas last week, it was great.
We also were treated to a lovely sunset from our table.
After dinner we grabbed a drink at Boleros, where Michael poured a drink in a very unique way.
This leads me to using the new Starlink internet that is now available on Independence of the Seas. Overall, it works great when browsing the web, checking Facebook and whatnot.
Just like pre-Starlink, it will struggle at times as you wait for something to load. We also tried streaming the Mets/Padres playoff game via both MLB.TV and our cable provider web portal. The live stream held up about 50% of the time, with lots of buffering. This could be a product of too many people also using the wifi, poor connectivity to the closest router, or something else.
In my experience, there are so many variables on the cruise ship that can affect internet performance that it's difficult to assign blame.
The good news is the internet is substantially faster than what Independence had before, so there's no question it's an upgrade. We'll see how the rest of the cruise goes with regard to performance.
Back to the cruise fun, we went to the Schooner Bar since the piano player there started up first and there was a big crowd for the show.
We rounded out the night in the pub with live guitar music.
Tomorrow we will be at Perfect Day at CocoCay.
Stray Observations
I don't ever recall seeing these wood tables in the Solarium on this, or any ship.
We stopped by Cafe Promenade and noticed they also have the new Starbucks drinks available here. This means if you have a Diamond drink voucher or unlimited drink package, you can get drinks here included (unlike the Starbucks kiosk).
One strange thing about our Promenade View cabin is the telephone is on the desk, and not by the bed.
