December 12 - Miami, FL

welcome Champagne 

our ship!

Weather – the interwebs said it was 24º today, but I’m not sure I
buy it. It’s windy, overcast and coolish, not quite cool exactly, but certainly not a warm 24º. The Miami weather forecast is for 300mm of rain over the next 4 days…I’m glad we’re getting out and had a good day for touristy stuff yesterday.

Steps – 4,588…as expected for a ‘getting to the boat’ day

the ship we toured the harbor on yesterday

There was no need for us to get to the boat until the afternoon, sail away isn’t until 5PM, and out official check in time isn’t until 1:30, but we figured we’d check out of the hotel at 11 and

storm is coming

get there shortly after that. 

The port was a 20 min, 15USD Uber ride from the hotel. We arrived at the port before 11:30, at 11:30 the doors opened, and we were checked in and onboard before noon…being onboard in the AM is a record for us.

provisions!

Before we even got onto the boat we ran into Skinny (yes, his name is Skinny…maybe it’s a nickname), one of our waiters from last cruise (and maybe even the one before that.) Then not 5 minutes later we ran into Monica who runs the dinner reservations, and Abigail
who gets us a table by the window. It’s nice to see familiar faces. Sometimes we’re not sure if they remember us, but when they call us by name…I
think they remember…it’s amazing that they remember us…BY NAME! Like always…it’s Miss Lisa and Mister Chris…at least we convinced them to not call us by our last names…we’re not that formal.

home for 25 days

First order of business was to check in at our muster station – champagne in hand I might add. Post covid there is no more cattle-call safety briefing where everyone marches with their life jackets to their muster station all at once, sometimes even marching to the lifeboats. In these after-times, we are required to watch a 2 min safety vid at home pre-cruise, then check in to the muster station and then listen in our cabins to a safety announcement. I assume this is just as or safer than the old system, but it certainly is more convenient.

really big nice shower

We finished our champagne at the pool, got a bit of lunch and our rooms were ready. Our large bags hadn’t arrived before we did, so all there was to do was unpack our carry-ons and wait.

the rest of the bathroom is big too

We finally met Suraj our room attendant, got our big bags, unpacked, listened to the safety announcement and were off to the top deck for sail
away. 

https://www.cruisemapper.com/ is where the map is from. We're on the Seven Seas Mariner