Before the cruise -Miami and Fort Lauderdale

Roof on the pool

 

 We chose to fly to Miami even if our cruise started in Fort Lauderdale. We arrived two days before our cruise started. We had planned to go on a day trip to the Everglades, but we were too jet-lagged and chose to just stay in Miami.

View from hotel

Miami street

Miami is nice- and hot and humid. We were expecting hot, but not quite as hot to be honest. When we came to the airport we took a taxi to our hotel which was on Miami beach. Since it was so hot we went directly to the pool of the hotel which was on the roof. It was a good start to our trip. After some swimming we went to a cuban restaurant which was not very far from our hotel.

happy with his fries

I really like cuban food. Benjamin liked his fried chicken but Miriam was angry since she had order pasta, not knowing that there were french fries with the fried chicken... In the end she got fries from Benjamin so she was happy, but when you are tired after a long trip things like that can ruin your dinner :-)

 

We took a stroll back to the hotel via Miami beach which is beautiful, especially when empty in the evening.

evening on the beach

Breakfast

The next morning we went quite early to the beach to try and avoid the heat. Anyway we were up early due to the time difference. Unfortunately we forgot to buy some snacks for breakfast, and the breakfast cafes are not open at 4:00 in the morning... On the spot 7:00, when the cafes open we were at a nice cafe close to the beach. We had a big american breakfast with omelet and pancakes. And everyone were happy again.

The beach had rather big waves so we staid close to the beach and jumped in the waves. The beach was not very crowed since it was a week day and we enjoyed ourselves. We had to check out of the hotel at 11:00, so we went back, and a shower and too an uber to the city center and Bubba Gumps shrimp restaurant. We went there when we were in New Orleans and I wanted some nostalgia :-) The kids loved the place so it was not a bad choice. It was interesting since the driver was Cuban and spoke very little English. Our Spanish is also not very good, but he was very happy that we tried so we had a fun conversation in a mixture of English and Spanish about life in Cuba and Miami. (Often we also had drivers from Venezuela, Erika :-)  )
 

Bubba Gumps

After the restaurant we took another Uber to Fort Lauderdale. Our hotel had a nice pool so we spent a relaxing afternoon. Then we had the great idea to go to Walmart to buy some snacks and costumes for Halloween. The Walmart was about 20 minutes away from our hotel and it was already almost dinner time. Of course you always think that you will just do some quick shopping but then you find so many fun things that you just have to buy and the costume choice was also not easy (Ninja and zombie prom queen). And when we got out we had no battery in the mobile phone so we couldn't order an Uber. Great. After some searching Markus managed to find an electricity outlet and could charge his phone, but it was quite late when we got back with tired kids. We went to a close by Mexican restaurant and had some burritos and quesadillas before all falling asleep very quickly.

 

In the morning we took an Uber to the ship. You get a recommended time from the ship when to arrive, but in fact you can go to the ship earlier than that. The earlier you go, the more time you have on the ship when it is still not too crowded. You can have lunch and not having to stand in a queue and also swim in the almost empty pools. Just not forget the swimming trunks in the bag you take with you.

Driver from Venezuela :-)

 

 

You can leave your bags before going onto the ship and just take the necessary things- don't forget passports and cruise documents!

The checkin in process was actually much easier and faster than I though.