March 16-24 Solo Independence Picture Review

[campbell51]

Excellent review and great pictures, am looking forward to the next installment. Reading this review is getting me excited about upcoming cruise on Indy to the Norwegian Fjords in June.

[gargeo83]

After leaving the ship I was able to get another great photo opportunity of the 2 ships. This shows how big they are.

 

 

 

This was my first time to St Kitts so I walked around the cruise port to see the shops that were there. Pretty much the same as all the other cruise ports.

 

I noticed there were a few guys that had baby monkeys that you can pose with for a photo.

 

*Cruise TIP alert* The monkeys make for a great photo but becareful if you are not wanting to get a photo taken. The guys were very aggressive and if you even looked at them they would have the monkey jump on you and tell you to take a picture with your camera. After they demanded $5.00 plus tip. I noticed almost everyone would pay but some didnt and that didnt become an issue with the men.

 

This museum is not too far from the ship and was still in the terminal area. You could take a tour of it if you wanted but I didnt.

 

 

 

After walking around for a while I headed back to the ship for lunch. As I walked backed it started to rain a little but it was almost refreshing as it wasnt a down pour but helped to cool me off.

 

Some people have asked about if the ship is still being maintained well so close to dry dock date. As I left the ship in the morning I noticed them working on touching up one of the anchors.

 

 

Here is that same anchor on my way back to the ship.

 

 

I was surprised to see this as it seems like something that could wait until dry dock. But all over the ship I saw maintenance being done. Yes there are some areas where the ship has some wear and tear. But for a ship that has done a few transatlantics and for its age, it was still in great condition

[gargeo83]

Excellent review and great pictures, am looking forward to the next installment. Reading this review is getting me excited about upcoming cruise on Indy to the Norwegian Fjords in June.

 

Im glad you are enjoying it. I also like to read reviews when Im waiting to go on a cruise. If you have any questions feel free to ask.

[erin_cruisers]

Excellent review, and GREAT pics!! :)

Really enjoying it, and can't wait to get home and read the next installment.

 

I'm considering this ship for a possible cruise next April, 2014.

[d4nigirl]

It wasnt long until I noticed my luggage was waiting for me in the hallway. So I dragged it in and started the great task of unpacking and hanging up my clothes for the week. Lots of closet space and a neat hanger on one of the doors for ties.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is -that- what that bar attached to the closet door is for?! I can honestly say I had no idea what it was for and was wondering if anyone knew

[gargeo83]

Once back onboard I went up to the Windjammer for a late lunch. It was very quiet here because there wasnt many people onboard the ship.

 

After lunch it was over to the pool deck for a drink of the day (Tropical Lemonade), and listening to the live band.

 

Then it was time for sailaway. One of the best parts of sailaway when there is another ship in port is the horn battles between the Captains and people yelling back and forth at eachother between ships. Here is a picture of us just about to leave. You can see the officers on the bridge wings on both ships.

 

 

It was a great horn battle and I managed to get a great video of it. Also seen in the video is the officers of each ship smiling and waving at eachother enjoying their own battle.

 

It wasnt too long until we were away from the dock and Reflection and back at sea to make our way to San Juan.

 

 

 

I managed to get a great picture of the sunset this evening. Also another great perk of having a balcony room.

 

 

 

 

[gargeo83]

It wasnt long until I noticed my luggage was waiting for me in the hallway. So I dragged it in and started the great task of unpacking and hanging up my clothes for the week. Lots of closet space and a neat hanger on one of the doors for ties.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is -that- what that bar attached to the closet door is for?! I can honestly say I had no idea what it was for and was wondering if anyone knew

 

That is the only thing I thought to use it for

[gargeo83]

Excellent review, and GREAT pics!! :)

Really enjoying it, and can't wait to get home and read the next installment.

 

I'm considering this ship for a possible cruise next April, 2014.

 

Thanks for reading. At the end of the review I will make final thoughts and opinions on the cruise and the ship. Hopefully that will help you make a decision.

[gargeo83]

Once showered and changed for the evening I had my usual pre-dinner glass of wine at Vintages. Which at this point I didnt have to order anymore. I would walk in and the server there would say Hi to me. I would then sit down and my glass of wine would be brought over. Excellent service in Vintages.

 

 

Off to dinner at 9:15pm and got seated immediately. For my starter I ordered the BLT salad, which to me I would call a Cobb salad because of the hard boiled egg. I choice my dressing to be Ranch. It was very tasty and a nice light starter.

 

 

(sorry for the fuzziness of the picture)

 

For my main I had the NY Strip steak. With a side of mushrooms and fries. I took that garnish of Rosemary and made rosemary fries. Very good.

 

 

 

For dessert was the Kahlua cream sponge cake.

 

 

 

I then went back to my cabin to drop off my camera before heading out for the night. I got a picture of the moon from my balcony.

 

 

 

Tonight was the Club 20 party in the Solarium. However when I went there at 11:30pm it was absolutely dead. I counted 8 people there. I think the reason for this is because we were in San Juan the next day and had to be back onboard at 1:30pm, so my guess is that people went to bed early in order to get up early and off the ship to enjoy San Juan.

 

 

Coming up next is Day 6 in San Juan, more pictures of the ship and the best towel animal I have seen so far!

[d4nigirl]

 

That is the only thing I thought to use it for

 

It makes sense! Thanks!

[simply coffee]

OH! That bar is for ties! Who knew? LOL.

 

Also, we noticed the anchors getting an overhaul as well. That light beige colour is actually the primer. The next day (or day after?) we noticed that they were painted a nice bright shiny black.

[gargeo83]

OH! That bar is for ties! Who knew? LOL.

 

Also, we noticed the anchors getting an overhaul as well. That light beige colour is actually the primer. The next day (or day after?) we noticed that they were painted a nice bright shiny black.

 

 

That was coming up later in my review. LOL. I got a picture of that also. I hope you enjoyed the cruise

[Raptor2010]

Great FlowRider photo. Was this taken during open time or during a private/group lesson? I don't see anybody else in line at all.

 

This was taken on the last day. We rented it out after the last Flowrider open session. However, it was like this every morning of the entire cruise. There were 5-7 of us everyday for advanced stand up and even after 9 am, only a couple more people ever showed up. We loved all the ride time we got :D

[ladysail2]

Your pictures and commentary are wonderful. Been on Indy twice and never tire of seeing her again and again....actually never tire of any cruise ship.

 

Keep up the good work....really enjoying it!!

 

:D

[gargeo83]

Hey Everyone

I apologize as my Sunday deadline has come and gone. Busy weekend. Coming up tonight is Day 6 San Juan which will once again have lots of pictures! :)

[Russ Lomas]

This was taken on the last day. We rented it out after the last Flowrider open session. However, it was like this every morning of the entire cruise. There were 5-7 of us everyday for advanced stand up and even after 9 am, only a couple more people ever showed up. We loved all the ride time we got :D

 

We will be on the Independence exactly a week before you in 2014 in March. Here's hoping the Flowrider line will be the same length then. Probably one of the few positive things about having lots of partying college students aboard is that many are still asleep til 11am or so since they were out so late the night before. Great for keeping those early morning lines on the Flowrider down to a minimum.

[gargeo83]

Day 6- San Juan

 

Days Activities

 

 

 

Arrived to the port at 7:00am. No other ships in port with us today so there wont be any horn battles today.

 

 

 

 

 

 

After breakfast I went back down to grab a coffee at Cafe Promenade and then to the deck 4 Promenade to watch people getting off the ship. This helped to wait for the rush of people to thin out before I went down to deck 1 to leave.

 

This was at 9:00am. The crowd is pretty thin at this point if you take the deck 1 Aft exit.

 

 

Once off the ship it was time to get my usual ship in port pictures.

 

 

[gargeo83]

I noticed there was a very interesting old ship also in the port with us. I am not sure if this ship leaves the port or if it stays there. You can purchase tickets to go onboard and have a tour of it but I didnt do that. Here are some pictures of the ship.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here is a picture of the old way to travel the seas with the new way in the background.

 

[gargeo83]

*Cruise TIP alert* This is a tip I forgot to mention earlier. I have read on these boards many times, about people not liking the fact that the annoucements made by the Captain or Cruise director can be heard in the cabin and can be loud. There is a switch in the cabin on the desk where you can either turn the annoucements on or off. You can also change the volume of the annoucement. When there is no annoucement it plays classical music. The speaker is located under the dresser where the chair is usually pushed in.

 

[gargeo83]

OH! That bar is for ties! Who knew? LOL.

 

Also, we noticed the anchors getting an overhaul as well. That light beige colour is actually the primer. The next day (or day after?) we noticed that they were painted a nice bright shiny black.

 

Here is a picture of that anchor with the nice shiny black paint you mentioned.

 

[gargeo83]

Back to the ship after a walk around the port. It wasnt too long until we were leaving port. At 2:00pm we started to pull away from port and once out of the port I was able to get some pictures of the old fort.

 

 

 

 

Around 4:00pm I decided to go to Johnny Rockets for lunch. I was the only one there so it was like a private restaurant. This restaurant has a cover charge of $4.95 each but is well worth the price. To start I had the 1/2 Fries 1/2 Onion Rings basket which came with a ranch dipping sauce. It was very good but too big of a portion for one person. I ordered the Smokehouse burger, which was a beef patty, cheese, bacon, an onion ring and ranch bbq sauce. This was very good also and filled me up. I was too full for dessert. I forgot to bring my camera to this lunch so I apologize there are no pictures.

 

 

After lunch I did some walking on the Promenade for a little bit before heading back to the cabin for a quick nap in the big comfy bed, before getting ready for our 2nd formal night.

 

 

 

Once up from my nap I got dressed for formal night and then to Boleros for live Caribbean music. I was still too full from lunch so I skipped dinner this night. After Boleros I went to the Pyramid lounge to watch the Family Feud challenge. It was entertaining and is exactly as the TV show.

 

After more people watching in the Royal Promenade I grabbed a night cap to have on my balcony and then back to the room. Opened the door and noticed I had an intruder that was already looking at my Cruise Compass for tomorrow.

 

 

 

This was my 7th cruise so I have seen many towel animals. This one got a laugh out of me and made me smile.

 

 

Here is the "gang" together.

 

 

 

After spending some time on my balcony listening to the waves and enjoying the warm weather it was off to bed.

 

 

Coming up is Day 7 Labadee!

[golfer1966]

Quickly before sail-away started I wanted to set up my laptop for wireless internet connection so I could find out through email if I managed to get on the webcam.

 

 

*Cruise TIP alert* This tip only applies to people who bring a laptop to use for the internet. If you are only using the wireless internet connection to send emails back home to family and friends here is what I did. The connection is pretty slow and is at a price of $0.65 per minute if you dont buy a package. So to save on minutes open up Microsoft Word or any other word processing program. Type your email in the program and then copy it. Connect to the internet, log onto your email, then paste the message you copied from the word processor. A long email back to family and friends now takes only a couple of minutes.

 

 

After sitting up my wireless connection it was back to the balcony to hear the ships horn blow and to watch as we pull away from the dock. As usual you cannot feel the movement of the ship as it pulls away from the dock.

 

Down the channel we went and then made a turn to the starboard side. At this point it was fun to see many people sitting in their backyards and waving at the ship. This is also where the webcam was so I started taping with my video camera and also waving at the same time in hopes of drawing attention to myself to appear on the camera.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As you leave the port you get a great view of the coastline on the Port side of the ship.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It didnt take long until the skyline of Fort Lauderdale was far off and we were in open water. At this point it was time to check email to see if I was successful with getting on the webcam. I was excitied to learn that I WAS successful. I even got a freeze frame picture from the sail-away sent to me....

 

 

 

 

 

 

The upgrade of the cabin paid off. Now it was time to do some more ship exploration at night before my 8:00pm Chops dinner. I always enjoy seeing the different lighting of the ship at night.

 

 

Isnt it cool to see yourself on the webcam.... we saw ourselves on Allure and Oasis..

[allthatjazz]

Your review has been great! We will be on Indy in march 2014, your pictures have been beautiful. Thanks so much for taking time to do this. Maybe I'll bring a Sabres flag to put on the balcony!:)

[gargeo83]

Your review has been great! We will be on Indy in march 2014, your pictures have been beautiful. Thanks so much for taking time to do this. Maybe I'll bring a Sabres flag to put on the balcony!:)

 

Thank you for the comments and Im glad you are enjoying the review. However, as a Maple Leafs fan I have to advise you to leave the Sabres flag at home ;)

Just kidding of course.

[gargeo83]

Isnt it cool to see yourself on the webcam.... we saw ourselves on Allure and Oasis..

 

 

Yes it was very exciting when I learned that I was on the webcam for sail-away. It was one of the reasons why I upgraded from an inside promenade view cabin to a port side balcony cabin.