Monday, January 4, 2016

All Aboard

Well Carmen and I are off on another trip.  Today we begin our cruise to the Panama Canal.  We left Sebastian, FL at 9:00AM and winter has come to our part of Florida; when we left, the temperature was 53° - cold for our area. 

Our plan is to get to the parking lot early so we have a chance to get a shuttle to the boat without having to cram ourselves in or waiting in line for the next shuttle.  That part of the plan worked out great and was transferred to a waiting shuttle with a load of passengers on the way to the various ships.  Temperature when we arrived at the parking lot was 66°, much better than the 53° we started with.

At the ship terminal, we can see there are five other ships besides ours berthed waiting for passengers.  It is going to be a busy time departing the port.  Also from the top deck of the ship, we can see Ft. Lauderdale and some of the private “boats” that are docked and coming in and out of the inlet.

Shortly after getting on board, we found out that we would not be able to get to our room until after 3:00pm, because they are doing a deep clean and disinfecting, so after a quick lunch, on the Lido Deck.  Later we moved to the excursion desk making our reservations for the various islands, before everyone on board tries to do the same thing.
We are the second cruise ship to leave Port Everglades.  I watched from the Sun Deck as the first ship, the Serenade of the Seas, leaves and we begin to push away from the dock.  
As we begin to leave the port inlet, we are greeted with horns and flags from the condo units along the canal inlet. 

Clearing the Inlet, as we move out of the port, we have a clear view of the length Fort Lauderdale’s beach.  Nice clean beach sand all the way up and around the front of the high rise condo units. 
There are three other ships that follow us in short order.  From our vantage point is looks like two of them are fairly close to each other.

Once we cleared the port and was far enough out at sea we traveled south along the coast soon nearing Miami Beach as the sun was setting.  Absolutely gorgeous, the colors after the sun set - fantastic.
Dinner and a show rounded out our evening along with a walk around the deck of the ship.  Air temperature out at sea is 72° and the water temperature is 82°; can’t get much better than that.  As we pass South Beach and the Port of Miami the sunset still has a nice after glow. 

Tomorrow is a full day at sea and we have been invited to a wine tasting and a Captain’s event.