Monday 9 April

It was noticeably darker in the morning in Miami and we had breakfast in the very small dining area. There were lots of unhealthy options – for example, Frosties but no cornflakes, buns and cakes and just a few pieces of fruit. They offered us the hotel’s shuttle at $12 a head to the cruise terminal, so we booked that as we knew that the cruise port was around 25 minutes away. After some time, the hotel desk told us that they had actually overbooked the shuttle and that a taxi would come instead for a pre-agreed price of $45.

It was actually the owner of the taxi firm who arrived in a large 4 x 4 – a woman who told us she was 50 (she looked much older) – in fact she told us most things about her life within the first 15 minutes of the journey. She was, she said, half Irish, half native American and half several other strains – which got us all rather confused. In fact, her speaking speed and phraseology were such that, after 15 minutes, I decided that either she or I didn’t actually speak English after all! Her husband was either clearly very ill or actually dead following a recent heart attack and she was galled by the fact that we were going cruising on the Majesty of the Seas – a cruise which she was also due to be on but which she had had to cancel the day after she booked – she booked it 3 days before and cancelled two days before.

She lost all her money on that and reckoned her husband (an Egyptian) had racked up a hospital bill for $750,000 for just a couple of days as an in-patient, having a heart attack and being in an insulin-induced coma – they do seem to live a lot out here – although she did question why they do operations on people in their 70s – what’s the point, she asked. She said that the family had no medical insurance and would have to sell everything they had to afford any – and, like so many Americans, she then referred to the myth that the British have bad teeth. It does always seem to be Americans with bad teeth who like to refer to this myth! Perhaps it helps them to feel that they are not alone. We finally got to the ship and boarded without any delay – as suite guests, we were ushered through and treated with the utmost courtesy and respect!

We couldn’t access the cabins until 1pm, so we made use of our time by, first of all, re-organising our dining arrangements – this was for the second time on a Royal Caribbean cruise. Although we had booked together, we weren’t seated together! That was sorted and then we needed to get the shore excursion booked for the last day of the cruise, so that we could have a tour of Miami with an airport drop-off. That was done, although we did note that the start time for that on the last morning as 7am – gather at 6.45am and carry your own luggage off the ship as well – aaarrrgh!

We went up to the Windjammer – the general eatery - not as extensive as on Princess, but good enough. After unpacking it was the obligatory muster and then we enjoyed the views from the top of the ship over Miami. We then did the trivia quiz in the Schooner Bar as we were gliding out of Miami and we won that – with a (plastic) Royal Caribbean key ring each as the star prize!

When we did manage to get in to the cabins just after 1pm, we weren’t disappointed. We had booked suites as that was the only way to get a balcony on this 20-year old ship. And the balcony was definitely the biggest we had ever had plus – the bathroom actually had a bath in it and loads of space overall, relatively speaking!

Dinner followed and we were serenaded by a two-man musical group who came from table to table asking for requests. They played us Monty’s Czardas and we were well entertained. Then we did the music trivia quiz, but could only manage second place in that – quite an achievement for a team of only 3, as Graeme managed to doze off for most of it – I tell you, these tough days in paradise really do take it out of you! We didn’t make it to the 70s evening – that began at 11.30pm (0430 UK time) and we just couldn’t carry on!

It was noticeably cooler out on deck in the late evening in the Bahamas than it had been in the Caribbean proper, but still a very pleasant temperature.