Royal Caribbean Freedom of the Seas Cruise Day 1

This is the first of seven posts that I will be sharing over the next couple of weeks detailing our trip report from our Royal Caribbean Western Caribbean Cruise on the Freedom of the Seas. There will be loads of photos!

 

We started out with a day at Walt Disney World the day before the cruise and spent the night at the Caribbean Beach Resort (Read our review of the awesome Pirate Rooms!). This way we were only an hour from the cruise terminal and we got to enjoy our happy place. On this first day of the cruise, we woke up, prepared our stuff for the cruise and went to Downtown Disney to have breakfast at Earl of Sandwich.

We L-O-V-E their sandwiches for lunch or dinner (I always get the one with turkey and cranberry sauce…like Thanksgiving on a bun!), but their breakfast was just ok. Same ol’ breakfast sandwiches you can get elsewhere.

Then we made our way to the cruise terminal. As we got closer to the coast, our excitement increased along with the number of lovebugs hitting the car. There were so many lovebugs floating around, it seemed like it was raining…a rain full of bugs that eat car paint. Anyone that knows Brett will know he was not too pleased about this.

Lovebugs are extremely acidic, and when left on a car for an extended period of time, can literally wear the paint away. And since we were about to leave our car in a parking garage for the next 8 days, Brett was having a minor panic attack as each lovebug smashed into his less-than-one-year-old precious baby car.

But we weren’t going to let a bunch of horny bugs ruin our excitement and we were still happy to finally see our ship…the biggest one at the terminal! That’s how we roll.

The entire process at Port Canaveral was so much better than our last cruise from Tampa. There was one road in with plenty of signs that led you directly into the parking garage.

We parked, handed our large suitcases over to the porter and then began the check-in process. We were on the ship in less than 30 minutes! Perfect for someone as impatient as myself.

Since you aren’t allowed into your room until 1pm, we walked around the ship getting to know where certain things were. One of the first things we did was go up to one of the top decks to look to see if the Endeavor shuttle was out on the launchpad and able to be seen, as it was scheduled to take off the very next morning…and it was! It is well over 16 miles from the cruise terminal, but Brett was able to see it through his camera.

A small crowd gathered around Brett wanting to see his photos and look through the lens. This freaked me out as I was not thrilled about him handing over his expensive camera to some stranger with an unverifiable level of alcohol consumption…

But alas, the camera came out unscathed and Brett healed from the stabbing looks I was giving him the entire time.

Oh, and if we thought the lovebugs were bad while driving, they were even worse on the ship….absolutely everywhere! People who didn’t know what a lovebug was were freaking out and screaming and running away! It was quite hilarious. As long as you knew they weren’t going to hurt you and to not open your mouth, you were fine. So I had to laugh at them with my mouth closed.

The other ships in port were the Carnival Sensation and the Disney Dream.

The Disney Dream was all new and sparkly at that point. We would definitely be interested in taking a cruise on a Disney ship one day.

Us being Disney fans, we actually did not refer to our ship as a ship. We called it a “butt” like in Finding Nemo.

Here I am touching the butt.

We then wandered around some more, looking at all the cool features we would be partaking in over the next week.

Fun fact: Each ship in the Freedom class of ships has a Ben & Jerry Suite (“Sweet”) right above the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream shop, full of cow themed decorations and each guest gets free ice cream each day. It might be to make up for the mooing cows outside the window. Haha.

We then ate lunch at the ship’s buffet, the Windjammer Café.

Then it was time to check out our room, which was fantastic!

The last time we cruised, we got a balcony and we barely used it. We didn’t think we needed a balcony for that reason, but the deal was too good to pass up, so we got a balcony this time and were so glad we did because we were out there so much throughout the week! We particularly liked not having another room to our one side, as it gave us a little extra room and a better view.

Our balcony room was the very first room at the front starboard (right) of the ship and was literally 5 feet away from the door to the navigation room (I forget the real name). We actually saw the Captian a few times and exchanged hellos…we were BFF by the end of the trip.

At 4pm, we had to do the mandatory muster drill. We were there for about 15 minutes and then it was time to sail away! At first, we stood at the top deck while watching the Disney Dream sail away ahead of us.

Then we went to our balcony while we were pulling out of the port behind the other two ships. There were lots of people standing by, waving and honking…even a sheriff using his siren.

We then got ready for dinner in the main dining room. We originally had the 8:30 pm dinner time, but we found out we were switched to the 6:00 time after arriving in our room. While we were wandering around earlier in the day, we checked out the two different tables we would have been assigned to in order to decide which time we wanted to keep. Our old table was on the second floor, in the back with no view, but our new table was on the first floor right next to the captain’s table! We definitely decided to keep the new time.

I took pictures of our food every night using my camera, but I don’t necessarily remember what it all was and the photos are kind of dark. Our waiter was Kumar and it really amazes me how much they remember your likes and dislikes, all just to remember someone else’s week after week. He remembered how we like everything and even brought me ice cream with every dessert because he knew I would want it. Our tablemates were fantastic too. Brett is pretty shy, so he was worried about how that was going to turn out, but by the middle of the first night, he was chatting away!

On the first night, I had a steak dish with mashed potatoes and Brett had fish with lentils.

For dessert, Brett had a meringue/custard dish and I had a fruit tart with vanilla ice cream. They let you do whatever you want as far as food goes on a cruise. What happens in the cruise dining room, stays in the cruise dining room (and on your thighs, but you’re not supposed to think about that on a cruise vacation).

Our bar waiter was Joseph from Jamaica and he was THE BEST! He had a few catchphrases that he said so often, we began to wonder if he knew how to say anything else. He would always say “Sooo nice” and “Sooo sweet” and whenever he first got to our table, he would say “It’s sippy, sippy time!” Each night, he would come around with after-dinner shooters in a different colored glass with a different type of shot that Brett and I got each night.

They were all so yummy and we got to keep the glasses. Most of them had Bailey’s in it, so we got a bottle of Bailey’s after returning home and the shot glasses are displayed in our IKEA kitchen shelf unit.

Dinner ran late and caused us to miss the Welcome Aboard show, so we hung out at the piano bar until it was time for the Dreamworks Move it! Move it! parade.

While our ship was recently in dry dock, she received new carpet, new interactive screens throughout the ship…

…new shops, and all the Dreamworks stuff, such as the characters, a 3D movie and the parade.

Our cruise director was Graham Seymour, and he really made the cruise so much better in our opinion. And that’s defintiely not an overstatement. He is in charge of entertainment and hosts different activities throughout the week. He even does a daily morning show that you watch on the tv in your room. He was absolutely hilarious and I will totally look to see if he is the director of my next cruise.

We made our nightly stop at Sorrento’s for free pizza before calling it a night.

 

Click here for Day 2: Our Day at Sea!

 

Never miss a post, photo or video…follow us!