Independence of the Seas Cruise Report - 2 Jan 2020 - 7 Jan 2020

[starvenger]

After lunch the kids went back to the room for a nap, while my wife went back up to the pool deck to… nap. I went to the promenade to grab a coffee and a latte (for my wife – we got a coffee card) and relaxed on the balcony.

A little before 3pm, we headed down for our skate session. Seeing as we flew in from Toronto, we wore our “travel” clothing on the ice. I hadn’t done any proper skating in about 4 years, so despite the skates not being a great fit (as to be expected with rentals) it was a lot of fun – like riding a bike. Other folks were not having as much of a good time – as you can see in the photos some were having issues just trying to skate, which if it was one of your first times, is not unexpected.






Tonight’s dinner was formal night, and as such we took a little extra time to get ready so we could get some photos taken.





The show tonight was Grease. Olivia and my wife were a little tired so Hannah and I went to watch. We figured getting to the theatre 15 minutes early would be sufficient for us to get some decent seats. We were wrong - check out that crowd! And the pillar directly in front of me!




Believe it or not, this was the first time I’d seen a production of Grease from start to finish, and I thought the cast did a pretty good job with it. And I know that the musical has some themes that might be considered too mature for kids, but I wasn’t much older than Hannah when I started watching Degrassi Junior High, so I didn’t think this had anything that she couldn’t handle.

After the musical, Hannah went back to the room and I decided to try my luck at some blackjack. And to say that I had no luck would be understating things. I don’t play with a huge buy-in, but I lost my stake in about 30 minutes thanks to a combination of dealer blackjacks and players that consistently stayed on 14/15 against a 10. I can usually grind myself back to even, but on this night I had no shot.

With my wallet a slight bit lighter, I went up to grab a couple of slices from Sorrento’s. And was actually surprised as the pizza was better than I’ve had on other Royal ships. Not sure I’d have more than a couple of slices at any one time, but I’d definitely eat it over Big Chain pizza.

After the pizza and some water, it was time for bed.



The next day would be our first port – Grand Cayman.

 

[starvenger]

Looking forward to reading more! We have only sailed DCL so looking forward to learning all about Independence of the Seas.

Thanks for reading! I hope this helps you out!

Thanks so much for this. We board Indy in May. Our last cruise was also on the Allure.

You'll like it. It's still a big ship, to be honest, with quite a bit to do.

 

[wannabee]

Did you have more than one lunch in the MDR? Is the menu the same everyday?

 

[starvenger]

Did you have more than one lunch in the MDR? Is the menu the same everyday?

On this cruise the MDR offered lunch on day 2 and 5 - the sea days - only, and the app showed the same menu for both.

Conversely, on my Allure cruise in Aug 2018, there was a 2 or 3 day menu rotation.

 

[starvenger]

Day 3 - George Town, Grand Cayman

We’d only been to Grand Cayman once, on a Disney cruise, and we used that time to have a beach day. This time around, we decided to do something we’d never tried before - swimming with Stingrays. After a lot of research, I signed up with Stingray Sailing and their sister company, Cayman Eco Adventures. They have a very good reputation and do excursions with small groups, so I was willing to go with them despite their tour not being the least expensive.

Unfortunately, fate had other things in mind for us. Because of the diversion back to Key West we arrived to Georgetown around 8:00. At this point we’d already eaten breakfast in the MDR but were unable to finagle our way onto one of the first tenders (which went out around 8:30) out to the terminal. Which if things proceeded apace would not have been a huge issue, but after the first two tenders winds and waves caused a temporary stop to the boats. And since it was looking like we wouldn’t be off before 10, I emailed Stingray Sailing (I’d been in contact with them throughout the morning) notifying them that we would have to cancel our tour.

To the credit of the company, they refunded our deposit even though they did not have to based on the contract language. So while I cannot comment on the tour itself, I have to commend the customer service and will more than likely give them another go if and when we come back.

So with the tour cancelled, we went with our backup plan – Calico Jack’s and Public Beach. Public Beach is one of the well known locations along the Seven Mile Beach, and Calico Jack’s has been an institution there… but apparently they’re leaving. Don’t know what this means for the area, but I’m sure they’ll be missed.

Seven Mile is also where my brother once went into the water with a cellphone in his pocket. Oops. But thanks to that incident, I now bring those airtight cellphone pouches (several variations can be found on Amazon) with me, just in case.

Cab/Minibus fare over to Public Beach was $6 per person, and once there, we rented chairs and an umbrella for $20. And with that, we hit the water. What I love about Grand Cayman is that the beaches have some incredibly clear water, and it’s beautiful.



We also had some lunch. Kept it simple and had chicken tenders and pan-fried grouper. I’m fairly certain the grouper was previously frozen, but whatever spices they use on it make up for that – very tasty!




After a few hours at the beach we headed back to the ship. An interesting note was that on the way back our minibus had members of the Grease cast. Interesting because it seemed like they were mostly from the British Isles or Australia – I have to say that their onstage accents really fooled me, so kudos to them!



Once back on the ship we headed to Sorrento’s to grab a couple of slices. Didn’t feel right to overeat at Windjammer when a slice or two would do the trick. And after the snack it we had just enough time to see the Texans win, shower, change and head down for dinner.

Dinner on this day was probably the slowest that I’ve seen on a ship. Ryan had mentioned that this was a new menu combination so it’s possible that the kitchen staff were working the kinks out. It does make me wonder if this was why the dinner was my least favourite of the cruise. I had the sole and everyone else, the short rib, and both seemed heavily reliant on underwhelming sauces to carry them. So I’ll say that if you were on Independence and saw this menu, I’d recommend taking this day to do a specialty restaurant.



The show tonight was the ice show, Freeze Frame. Based on our experience with Grease, Hannah and I got there early, and managed to nab some decent seats.


As always, the performers worked hard and generally did a good job with a few tumbles here and there. The highlight was when one of the women did a spin that featured something similar to this:

This is what I call a crazy trick.

The plot of the show was a trip through the various dance and music styles from the 40’s to the 70’s. I don’t know that it entirely worked for me. There were some fun moments (for example skating around with handlebars during “Bicycle Race”) but I wasn’t really feeling it.

After the show Hannah went off to sleep while I went down to Playmakers to catch the end of the Patriots-Titans football game. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the crowd was firmly anti-Patriots (I’m sure there were some Titans fans, but people REALLY wanted the Patriots to lose). Not having a horse in this race (I’m a Texans fan, and while I expected us to get smushed, last weekend was a step beyond smushed.), it was fun to watch.





Overall, we didn’t get to do what we’d planned, but the pivot to the beach still made for a nice day.

Next stop - the ever popular Cozumel.

 

[starvenger]

Here are some of the Cruise Compasses:

 

[starvenger]

 

[bethy]

This is crazy but we were on this same cruise! We had only sailed DCL in the past and wanted to try another line due to the lower cost. We learned that we need to stick with DCL as we just didn't get the same euphoric feeling on the Indy. That said the crewmembers were very nice and we were surprised by how much we enjoyed Conzumel - where we'd never been before.

We were also on Deck 7 and agree the location was great.

It's fun reliving the cruise through your report!

 

[starvenger]

That said the crewmembers were very nice and we were surprised by how much we enjoyed Conzumel - where we'd never been before.

We were also on Deck 7 and agree the location was great.

It's fun reliving the cruise through your report!

Thanks.

I thought the crew that I interacted with were quite nice. Some were a bit perfunctuary but I can live with that.

I'm kind of surprised that you hadn't been to Cozumel before. Feels like every Western itinerary goes there - the Eastern, of course, hits Nassau.

I think that for you, coming to Cozumel on a Sunday was a boon, since there were only two ships in town and it didn't have that overwhelming crush of people at the port.

What did you do in Grand Cayman?

We had only sailed DCL in the past and wanted to try another line due to the lower cost. We learned that we need to stick with DCL as we just didn't get the same euphoric feeling on the Indy.

I tend to reference this a lot, but people stick with DCL in part because there is that intangible of Disney~! that you will 100% guaranteed not find on other cruise lines. You'll probably agree with me that Indy in general has more things to do than a DCL ship but you don't have princesses or Mickey randomly walking around and you don't have near as many things geared towards the kids. Bars and adult areas are tucked away on DCL leading to a completely different feel from Royal where you've got a pub and a wine bar and a lounge along the very public promenade. When you're on DCL, you KNOW you're on DCL.

So while I'm not with you in terms of returning to DCL (unless they decide to do a severe price drop), I get where you're coming from when you say that you don't get a "euphoric feeling".

I'm not sure if you'd be interested in trying Princess. We keep looking at them but they don't seem to have much geared towards toddlers and as such we keep pushing back a potential cruise there (my brother has a 6mo and a 2yo). But it should feel slightly more upscale than Royal, at a similar cost.

 

[yellowfish78]

Thanks for this review! We are traveling on the Independence in November of this year. I'm curious to see how Adventure Ocean will change this spring since they are combining the 6-12 age group together (almost comparing it to Disney's kids club - and it will put both my kids in the same area). Seeing menus and the cruise compass is a great help too.

 

[bethy]

Thanks.

I thought the crew that I interacted with were quite nice. Some were a bit perfunctuary but I can live with that.

I'm kind of surprised that you hadn't been to Cozumel before. Feels like every Western itinerary goes there - the Eastern, of course, hits Nassau.

I think that for you, coming to Cozumel on a Sunday was a boon, since there were only two ships in town and it didn't have that overwhelming crush of people at the port.

What did you do in Grand Cayman?


I tend to reference this a lot, but people stick with DCL in part because there is that intangible of Disney~! that you will 100% guaranteed not find on other cruise lines. You'll probably agree with me that Indy in general has more things to do than a DCL ship but you don't have princesses or Mickey randomly walking around and you don't have near as many things geared towards the kids. Bars and adult areas are tucked away on DCL leading to a completely different feel from Royal where you've got a pub and a wine bar and a lounge along the very public promenade. When you're on DCL, you KNOW you're on DCL.

So while I'm not with you in terms of returning to DCL (unless they decide to do a severe price drop), I get where you're coming from when you say that you don't get a "euphoric feeling".

I'm not sure if you'd be interested in trying Princess. We keep looking at them but they don't seem to have much geared towards toddlers and as such we keep pushing back a potential cruise there (my brother has a 6mo and a 2yo). But it should feel slightly more upscale than Royal, at a similar cost.

Yes Disney has some intangibles for us, and not just Mickey and friends. Cruising is such a communal vacation - one that is affected by other people and just the general culture of the ship I guess. Our family is by no means uptight - my husband and I like our adult beverages for example - and my DH enjoys a little time at a Craps table. But it was just too much of a party type atmosphere for us, for lack of a better term. Also the food was just not good for us. I also missed the more all inclusive feel of Disney - I hated to constantly assess what cost extra money and what didn't.

In a nutshell with Disney I never want to get off the ship and on this cruise I couldn't wait to get off.

As for Conzumel, good point about Sunday! On Grand Cayman we went to Royal Palms Beach club. The water and sand were gorgeous but it was so crowded. In the past we've we've only done Easterns and West Coast cruises with DCL.

For us we cruise to relax and lounge and reconnect - not as much for the activities which is one of Royal's strong points. We spend more time looking at the ocean than some.

Princess was on our radar if we had enjoyed this cruise better. But now we are not willing to take the risk again for a long while. Vacation time is too limited and precious. Plus we love land vacations also.

 

[starvenger]

Yes Disney has some intangibles for us, and not just Mickey and friends. Cruising is such a communal vacation - one that is affected by other people and just the general culture of the ship I guess. Our family is by no means uptight - my husband and I like our adult beverages for example - and my DH enjoys a little time at a Craps table. But it was just too much of a party type atmosphere for us, for lack of a better term. Also the food was just not good for us. I also missed the more all inclusive feel of Disney - I hated to constantly assess what cost extra money and what didn't.

Don't get me started about craps on board the ships. Odds are terrible for a minimum bettor, so I never play.

Having been on a few Royal cruises now (I just hit Platinum, actually), I think I'm more cognizant of what costs extra and what doesn't, and I think that it's always a tough thing to assess for someone who is a veteran cruiser but a rookie with the cruise line.

Princess was on our radar if we had enjoyed this cruise better. But now we are not willing to take the risk again for a long while. Vacation time is too limited and precious. Plus we love land vacations also.

I still think that you should not discount other cruise lines when it comes to vacations. I know that you are trying to minimize risk, but then again the price difference might be too much to resist.

Land vacations are awesome! I didn't write about my California trip but I loved going up the PCH and visiting my brother there. My personal favourite is probably going to Barcelona, with their history and places to see/things to do. I should be going to Austin in the fall, but that's with my wife's firm so I might be limited when it comes to wandering around.

 

[wannabee]

Thanks so much for the compasses... Do you know if luggage valet was offered out of FLL?

 

[starvenger]

Thanks so much for the compasses... Do you know if luggage valet was offered out of FLL?

I don't, sorry. Being from Canada I don't think it's something that's available to me.

 

[starvenger]

Day 4 - Cozumel

The itinerary today found us coming into Cozumel around 10:30. Later than I’m used to, but with only one other ship in port (I think it was Disney Dream), not a big issue. Due to being in port on a Sunday, a lot of the popular beach clubs were closed. As a result, our plan was to go to Paradise Beach, but the backup plan was to stay in and around the port area.

Once we got off the ship, we headed out to the taxi area. The stand captain mentioned that the waters were pretty rough along the beach, but we were willing to risk it. Taxi rates were clearly listed at the stand, so that was good. Overall, it was $20 (incl tip) either way, and was about the same to just about any club in that area.

Paradise Beach has both an all inclusive and a la carte option, and seeing as we weren’t looking to eat and drink too much, the a la carte option (which involves a $3 cover and $10 food/drink minimum per person) seemed like the better option. After confirming this with the host, we headed out to the beach area. Sure enough, the waters were choppy and the floating obstacle course was still on the beach.




We took some beach chairs, and a waiter came by and took our $12 admission. Seeing as it was close to noon, we also ordered some food – guacamole and coconut shrimp, as well as some drinks for the kids. The guac was actually pretty good (although I prefer the one at Nachi Cocom better) but the shrimp was just so-so.






Hannah wasn’t actually feeling great on this day so Olivia and I headed to the pool. The pool area was busy but not crowded, so it was easy to maneuver around and enjoy ourselves.



We decided to leave the club around 2pm. We were there roughly 3 hours, so at the end of the day, we weren’t there not long enough to truly take advantage of an all-inclusive package, so going a la carte was the best decision for us.

 

[starvenger]

Dinner on this night featured a souffle. Back in 2006/07, we went on a Princess cruise where the dessert chef made souffles every night, even doing a savory souffle on one occasion. To this day, I feel like that spoiled us because whenever we get a souffle on a cruise, we’re inevitably comparing it to something from (now) 13 years ago. Unfair? You bet it is.



In this case, the souffles were a bit overcooked. It still tasted good, but you could almost imagine Gordon Ramsay throwing a fit and inventing about 20 new curse words to describe the not-perfect souffles. The mains, however, were on point. Kids aren’t big fans of alfredo sauce so we asked to get a red sauce for the linguini – no issues with that substitution.

After dinner, we went to see the revue show, “Once Upon A Time”. This was a song and dance show with sets based around popular fairy tales. In a sense, it’s similar to what DCL does with their “Wishes” and “Believe” shows, subtracting Disney songs and any semblance of plot, while adding contemporary music and more choreography. Including what I think was an original disco song to open and close the show. The less said about THAT song, the better.

I will not say that it was the most enjoyable show ever, it wasn’t the worst I’d seen. But certainly not a show I’ll need to see again, whereas I happily rewatch Blue Planet (Allure) and Columbus: The Musical (Harmony) again.

So on my own again, I took another loss at the casino, and then I decided to take in the late night curiosity known as The Quest. I’d heard a bit about this, and after some time to digest this, my main impression is

I mean the host calls out some task like “I need 5 different shoes attached together by their shoelaces” and suddenly shoes are raining down onto the Studio B floor and I’m all

So yeah, this game is nuts. There are points awarded. But I think, like in Whose Line Is It Anyway, the points don’t matter.

I tip my virtual hat to those of you with enough guts to be the captains. My team won, I think. Only the captains win a prize, so I guess I had a moral victory. So, yay?

The next day was our final full day on board, as we headed back to Fort Lauderdale.

 

[starvenger]

One thing I neglected to mention about Cozumel was that, going into the terminal from the ship, they had dogs out to sniff out contraband. But they weren't looking for drugs - they were looking for fruit! I mean, it makes sense that you don't want foreign fruit with potential foreign pests getting into the country, but it's funny when you're faced with the realization that, yes, this is actually happening.

So as much as you might want to bring in a banana, don't do it!

 

[starvenger]

Day 5 - At Sea

Final day. I hate final days, because you know you have get off the ship and head back to the Real World. Unless, of course, you’re Super Mario. But I think even he gets off the ships every once in a while.

Despite the late night, I was up relatively early, and we ate breakfast at WindJammer. The lack of speed in the MDR made us give up on them as an option, and besides, the buffet never seemed crowded. The only real drawback is that one could easily overdo things at breakfast, so I tried to limit myself to one pass at the buffet. Seemed to work, as I was able to load my plate but not to excess.

After breakfast, we took Olivia up to Adventure Ocean and… there were no kids in the 9-11 room. Curious. Since it was exactly 9 we figured that maybe some kids would come in later. Olivia didn’t want to be the only one there, so we took a walk around the upper deck and came back about 10 minutes later. Still no kids. Looking into the 6-8 club, there were very few kids in there as well. As a result, Olivia opted to hang out with the rest of us by the pool.

This was, to be honest, a bit of a strange phenomenon for the kids. During our August cruises, the kids clubs were usually full, so there wasn’t much concern about meeting new kids and having fun. But here it was the opposite, and I can see why Royal has started to move towards a merged 6-11 program.

Since Hannah and I had sushi making mid-morning, we opted not to swim and instead played a round of minigolf – something that I’d yet to do on a cruise. It was fun, as far as minigolf goes, plus the views were really nice at the front of the ship.


On A Roll took place, unsurprisingly, at Izumi. The idea here is that all the items you need to create your sushi are mise en place, and the chef instructs you on how to assemble each item. We made a California Roll, Shrimp/Avocado Roll, Spicy Tuna Hand Roll, and two Ebi Nigiri. As you can see from the pictures, this is a massive amount of food, which we then got to eat!






Note: We were not allowed to take the food out of the restaurant (apparently there is a health regulation against this), so I highly recommend you bring along a “non-participant” to “help dispose” of the sushi.



Once we were stuffed to bursting, we headed back upstairs to meet with my wife and Olivia. They were now hungry, so we headed over to Windjammer. Hannah and I weren’t all that hungry due to maki overload, but we still grabbed some veg in order to balance out our food pyramids.



I should note that at Windjammer they have an assistant waiter there with a guitar whose sole purpose is to sing songs featuring “washy-washy”. They are not great songs, but I definitely appreciate their attempts to hammer the point home about washing hands.

 

[starvenger]

After lunch, we decided to try out the Perfect Storm waterslides. During minigolf, we were talking to a couple of older teens from Michigan about the slides, and they thought that the slides weren’t great, and that they were slow to the point of almost getting stuck in the tubes. But after we went on a few times, I have to conclude that they perhaps adjusted the water flow, because while the slides weren’t as fast as what you might find at an onland waterpark, they had more than enough speed to get you to the bottom in a hurry.

If I had a gripe about the slides, it’s that there aren’t enough clear panels to let you see out of the tubes, especially where you travel to the edge of the ship. Really felt like a missed opportunity.

After we went on the slides, the kids wanted to hit the pool, so they went there while my wife and I relaxed. While we were there, we had the fortune (misfortune?) to witness the Sexiest Man contest. This was definitely… something. Still not sure what, exactly, but it was something. All I will say is that the guy in the Rey Mysterio mask was robbed.


Our final dinner featured Rack of Lamb and Steak Diane, both of which were wonderful. It also featured “Asian pork tacos”, which based on the description, we guessed was actually pork bao. And that’s exactly what it was. I can’t say it was great.


An interesting note was that for the last day, they were trying to get people to go to Chops at a 50% discount. It was tempting, but at the end of the day my wife and the girls wanted lamb chops, and why forgo the included lamb chops in the MDR in order to pay for lamb chops at the specialty restaurant? For us, the value add was simply not there.

After dinner, we did our final packing and set the bags outside the room. After everyone else went to sleep I took a final trip across the pool deck, where it was pretty quiet.







Going back downstairs, I went to the theatre to watch the comedian, Anthony Acosta. I had a bit of an incident where I wanted to exercise my 2-for-1 beer voucher (I think everyone gets this?) and the bartender was utterly confused by this, thinking I wanted a Diamond happy hour drink. We did get it sorted out and before the show started he came over to apologize to me. Which was nice, but completely unnecessary, since we weren’t arguing – just trying to sort out what voucher I was redeeming. In any case, he gave me another beer, so I ended up with 3 beers for the price of 1. Yeah, that was a lot. Thankfully it was a macrobrew as opposed to something with a lot of flavour.

The comedian, Anthony Acosta, was pretty good I thought, but his style is quite edgy, self-deprecating and plays a lot off of his ethnicity, and could easily rub people the wrong way. If you watched his act and did not enjoy it at all, well, I wouldn’t blame you one bit.

After the show, I went over to Sorrentos to wash down the beer with some food, and headed to bed.

 

[wannabee]

thanks again for this- can't wait for my turn on INdy