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Review w/ photos - Legend OTS - Jan 3 - 13, 2014

Cuizer2

By Cuizer2,
in Royal Caribbean International

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juliang

juliang

Posted
Posted (edited)
Monday, January 13 - Travel day

 

Thank you for the terrific and entertaining review and the exquisite pics.

I am scheduled for the Legend TA from ft laud to copenhagen in april, and your travelogue and pics made me feel like I was on the ship...and made me look forward to it even more

 

" I woke up early and as I usually did, picked out my breakfast at the buffet and then brought it back to my cabin. I had a fairly high debarkation number, given that I was on shore excursion. Normally shore excursions get priority (numbers one, two or three). But I had number seven which had a planned departure time of 8:45am, which seemed late to me. I checked with guest services yesterday, and they confirmed that I had the correct number."

Edited by juliang
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relic2

relic2

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Posted (edited)
Thanks for the review and awesome pictures. I'll be on the TA, April 2014. Can't wait.

 

 

Hatetotan, I have "friends" taking that cruise. Come over to "It's Time For Some Fun part 2" and get acquainted with Nitabcruising.

Edited by relic2
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jrobboz

jrobboz

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Thanks for posting the great review and photos Cuizer - very detailed and helped me to relive the great memories of our cruise. We were on the same cruise at the same time. We really enjoyed the tour we did in Dominica through RCCL. The river tubing. The guys (mostly Rastafarian) were very professional who accompanied us despite a long winding drive to get there. The tubing was a gentle float experience and there were plenty of places to get stuck - the guides were right with us - pushing us back into the deeper water and at one point they got us all together and we floated down the rapids (gentle ones) in a big group. The guides also climbed trees along the river and did cannonballs into the water. At the end of the float our tour guide (who also came with us on the river) opened a coconut for his bus tour to try. On the way back to the ship we stopped at a waterfall which was just beautiful. We had plenty of time to climb down and take photographs. When we got back to the ship we went to the Excursion Desk and told them what a good time we had - several others had commented about the quality of this tour and they were going to provide feedback to the tour company.

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Cuizer2

Cuizer2

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Thanks for posting the great review and photos Cuizer - very detailed and helped me to relive the great memories of our cruise. We were on the same cruise at the same time. We really enjoyed the tour we did in Dominica through RCCL. The river tubing. The guys (mostly Rastafarian) were very professional who accompanied us despite a long winding drive to get there. The tubing was a gentle float experience and there were plenty of places to get stuck - the guides were right with us - pushing us back into the deeper water and at one point they got us all together and we floated down the rapids (gentle ones) in a big group. The guides also climbed trees along the river and did cannonballs into the water. At the end of the float our tour guide (who also came with us on the river) opened a coconut for his bus tour to try. On the way back to the ship we stopped at a waterfall which was just beautiful. We had plenty of time to climb down and take photographs. When we got back to the ship we went to the Excursion Desk and told them what a good time we had - several others had commented about the quality of this tour and they were going to provide feedback to the tour company.

 

Thank you for the tour recommendation. If I am in Dominica again I'll give it a try.

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juliang

juliang

Posted
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note how photobucket has blocked out your pics of the legend

 

 

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Thursday, January 2 – Travel day

 

Well, here I am at LAX, waiting for my flight to board. I am through security little earlier than I planned to be, but that is not a bad thing. So since I found a place to plug in and sit, I figured I would get started on my review.

 

 

 

First, a little about me. This is my twenty-fifth cruise overall and tenth on Royal Caribbean. I am Diamond on Royal Caribbean. I’ve also cruised on Carnival ten times, Princess twice, NCL twice and once on one other cruise line (I don’t recall the name of the cruise line). I am starting to cruise on Royal Caribbean more as I prefer longer cruises (this one is ten nights) and though I like Carnival, Carnival offers very few cruises that are longer than eight nights. This will be my first time on the Legend of the Seas and my second time on a Vision class ship, though my first Vision class ship was the stretched Enchantment of the Seas.

 

 

 

Since people seem to like details, I try to write my reviews while on the ship, while things are still fresh in my mind. My last cruise was on the Allure of the Seas in September 2013. So far this trip has started off much more smoothly than the Allure cruise, as the taxi was on time this time (last time the taxi was late and I had to quickly make alternate plans).

 

 

 

I made my reservation for the taxi last week. I then called yesterday to confirm my reservation. The person starts asking me a bunch of questions which I answer. When she asks for the time I said I made my reservation for 4:05am. Then she gets mad at me for not telling her I had a reservation already. So I told her that she has been asking questions from the beginning which I have been answering. Also, she knew my name and address (which I had not given her yet), so I assumed she was looking at the reservation. At any rate the reservation was confirmed.

 

 

This morning I received a text message when the taxi was dispatched. I received a computer call telling me the taxi would arrive in one minute. It was actually a little before 4am when it arrived, so I am liking this taxi company must better than the last two I've tried. I went to the FlyAway and was able to catch the 4:15am bus (I had planned to catch the 4:45am bus).

 

 

 

There was no traffic and I was in the security line by 5am. It turned out to be the wrong security line. I somehow ended up pre-cleared by TSA. The instructions being given for which line I should be in were a little confusing. When I finally asked a TSA employee I was directed to the correct line and was immediately challenged by another TSA employee. However, when I showed her my boarding pass she allowed me to pass, only to have the same person ask me two minutes later to again prove I was in the right line. After seeing my boarding pass she then remembered looking at my boarding pass two minutes earlier. The advantage of being pre-cleared is I don’t have to remove my belt or shoes (though because my belt bucket is metal, I do have to remove that), nor do I have to take my laptop out of the backpack I carry it in.

 

 

So, shortly after 5am I am through security looking for a place to plug in. Though things have improved since the last time I was here. LAX does not have enough plugs, given all the people who fly that have things that need to be charged. However, on the plus side there is access to free Wi-Fi, though for an extra charge you can connect to a faster Wi-Fi.

 

 

 

Well, my flight is schedule to depart on time and I can see that the plane is here. So I’ll be back at you later today when I arrive in Fort Lauderdale.

 

 

 

The flight from LAX to DFW was uneventful and only a few minutes late. Upon arriving in DFW however another plane was unable to taxi and was blocking our plane from making it to the gate. Visions of the close call I experienced last time danced in my head. However, a tug was quickly dispatched and the stalled plane was moved out of the way after a few minutes. I checked the departure board and found that my connecting flight was scheduled to depart on time and was at a gate that was furthest from the gate I deplaned from (of course - I expected that). One thing I noticed, we were told the temperature was around 35 degrees and that was noticeable as soon as I deplaned and stepped out on the jet way.

 

 

I’m not sure what the delay was, but when I arrived at the gate a few minutes after boarding should have begun I noticed nobody was boarding the plane. I quick question revealed that the delay would be short. There was a snack shop directly across from the gate, allowing me to get my first food today. One nice thing, as I boarded I looked out the window and noticed my luggage was being loaded. So that would be one less thing I would have to worry about (I’ve had luggage head off to a different city than I was going to twice – fortunately both time it was on the way home, so all that meant was laundry was done two days later).

 

 

On the flight from LAX to DFW I was in a coach class seat with first class leg room. I’ve flown first class before and it is not worth triple the cost of coach. However, all I am really interested in is the extra legroom and the seats that American calls Main Cabin Extra (MCE) is only about twenty percent more than coach. It is a coach class seat with first class leg room. I booked the flights about three months out and the MCE seats for the DFW to FLL flight were sold out. However, there were some premium seats available. These are coach class seats with the center seat blocked off, so there are only two people in each three seat row. The leg room is standard coach, but there is more elbow room, so it wasn't too bad.

 

 

 

The flight made it to Fort Lauderdale a few minutes late. I booked the Cambria Suites via the Hotwire. I ended up with a suite a little south of the airport. While the hotel is in Fort Lauderdale and only a couple of blocks from I-95, it is in a wooded area that makes it feel like it is in the middle of nowhere.

 

 

 

After checking in I went up to my room. The entry light didn’t work; however, the room was not dark. There was a very bright light in the parking lot shining into the room. Fortunately the room has two blackout curtains and one shear curtain. I set my stuff down and headed back down for dinner.

 

 

 

While in the lobby I asked about the Internet access. It is free. I then asked about a shuttle to the port. They offered that for five dollars per person. Since the taxi fare was twenty dollars and the port is right next to the airport, I decided that was a good deal and signed up.

Unfortunately I am too tired to take advantage of the free Internet (I got less than four hours sleep last night) so until tomorrow, good night.

 

 

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