An Outside Tour of the 'Jewel of the Seas'
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Boarding the 'Jewel of the Seas'

Getting all three couples on board was a bit of a logistical problem. Joe and Virl had rented a car, and of course the four of us had one as well. Prevailing on Ron Drew to help us out, we worked out a scheme where Virl and Joe would follow the four of us from the condo, down US-1 to 17th Street, East to the entry to the Everglades Inlet Piers and into the area and south to Pier 18- just about the southernmost pier in the complex. There have always been security gates at the cruise complex, but I am sure that procedures have been tightened in recent years.

But we joined up at the Pier 18 Entry Hall with no problem, and we dropped off all of the luggage (at the red star in the aerial view). Fred, Grant, Greg and Joe waited with the luggage while Virl and I drove our rental cars back to the airport. On the way, I called Ron Drew, and he met us at the rental car center after we'd returned our cars, and gave us a ride back to Pier 18. Many thanks to Ron for providing the missing logistical piece, since we did not know at the time that there was a shuttle to Everglades Inlet from the airport. (We found out on our return that there was, so we will know for the future).

Just after we dropped off the luggage, Fred took a picture of our cruise group- me, Virl, Joe, Greg and Grant. After we returned the cars, only Virl and I had to go through the security check and we met the other four folks inside the entry hall. There, we headed up the escalator to the gangway to the ship. The aerial view that you can see here is not actually the 'Jewel of the Seas,' although it IS another Royal Caribbean ship. But it is of the same class and general size, so you can get an excellent idea of how the entry to the ship is accomplished.

From the gangway, we got our first view of the 'Jewel of the Seas'; it was her starboard side, from approximately deck 5 through deck 12. And just before the gangway put us onto the ship at Deck 5, midships, Fred got our first view of the midship staterooms which, on these levels, have balconies. We knew ours would not; we had decided to do things cheaply for our first cruise so we could get the hang of things.

Having Lunch

I won't show you our route every time we go somewhere on the ship, but for the common treks that we make, and for the ship tours that we take, I will show you the route- at least the first time. There are lots of ways around the ship; this particular route to the cafe is just one of them.

Our stateroom is on Deck 3 on the port side of the ship. (There is a separate album page just for our stateroom, and there I will show you a diagram of just where it was.) To get to the Windjammer Cafe (the always-open buffet) we go out our door and turn towards the bow, and then starboard after a few feet to the elevator/stairway lobby. Then we climb two decks to deck 5, and turn towards the stern. Then we walk through the commercial (store) areas on this deck, and we end up in the main elevator lobby for the central part of the ship. We could (and did sometimes) climb the stairs that are just beyond the elevator banks, but usually we just took the elevator up six decks to deck 11. Then, we just turn towards the stern again out of the elevator lobby and we are in the entrance hall for the Windjammer Cafe.

The buffet tables are all set up in the central area of the cafe; there were usually two, mirror-image sets of tables. At the stern of the cafe, there are also some specialty tables where, for example, you might get a Mongolian barbecue on one day, a taco bar on another, or steaks cooked-to-order on yet another. It changed from day to day and meal to meal. A little further back to the port and starboard sides of the specialty area were the dessert bars, including soft serve frozen yogurt.

Along the port and starboard sides of the large area, and in the area between the entry doors and the buffet tables there is inside seating. You can also use the outside seating on the port and starboard sides, as well as a great deal of outside seating that wraps entirely around the stern area here on deck 11. Beverage and condiment stations are sprinkled throughout the seating areas, so they are never very far away.

All six of us met here in the cafe for our first meal, although neither Fred nor I took any pictures of the group. Fred did take a couple of pictures of the fruit table and ice sculpture- one of the first buffet tables you come to when you enter the cafe. You can see one of those pictures above, and here is another view of the ice sculpture.

After we had lunch, Greg asked us up to his stateroom on deck 10. Greg always does things a bit nicer that most people; while Fred and I had what I would call a small stateroom (with large window) on the port side, Greg and Grant had a junior suite (with bar area, seating area, sleeping alcove, large bathroom and two balconies) on the starboard side. I have to admit it was certainly very nice, but I'd also admit that unless you plan to spend a lot of time in your stateroom (which we did not), it's something of an extravagance. But, anyway, here are Greg and I on the balcony and here is the view of Port Everglades from Greg's balcony.

Our Mandatory Lifeboat Drill

One of the first items on the agenda for every cruise is the mandatory lifeboat drill. This drill is always held after the gangway has been withdrawn (and everyone is on the ship) but before the ship gets underway.

The drill is pretty standard. There are PA announcements when it begins, and everyone puts on his or her life vest in their rooms and then goes to their assigned assembly station. The assigned station for our portside stateroom was the portside lifeboat deck on deck 5. So we just had to leave our stateroom, climb a couple of flights of stairs, and go outside onto the lifeboat deck.

As people arrive outside, their names are checked off by ship personnel, and only when everyone has been accounted for is the PA announcement made that the drill is over. Most people look at the drill as a nuisance, but then you never know.

Each of us took a picture of the other with his life vest on:

Leaving Fort Lauderdale Through Everglades Inlet

Our Route From the Dock

Right on schedule at 5pm, the 'Jewel of the Seas' began to pull slowly away from the dock. I didn't get to see the lines detached, for this happened while the lifeboat drill was finishing up.

The captain had to move the ship away from the dock and then pivot it keeping the stern stationary so that he could point the bow of the ship towards the inlet. As you can see here, there were other docked ships both in front of us and across the harbor to our port. Actually, the ship in front of us left first, and I suppose this made our own captain's job a bit easier. Once we got turned around the right way, we were pointed north up the Intracoastal towards the 17th Street Bridge. You can see another cruise ship docked behind our own dock, and there is also the 'Sea Escape,' which is one of those day cruise boats that go to the Bahamas and back.

Looking Out Everglades Inlet

Once we were turned in the right direction, we could see Everglades Inlet ahead of us. As we came to the center of Lake Mabel and turned east to head out the inlet, we could see downtown Fort Lauderdale in the distance to the northwest beyond 17th Street and the bridge. Looking northeast, we could see the homes along the inlet and the buildings along Fort Lauderdale Beach.

Probably the best way to describe our trip out Everglades Inlet is to begin with a couple of movies that I made. Because there was a lot of wind, the sound quality is a bit bad; maybe one of these days I will get around to using a video editing program and replace the soundtrack with something better. But, for now, these will have to do. The first movie covers our trip through Lake Mabel and our entry into the inlet proper. The second movie follows our progress through Everglades Inlet and out into the Atlantic Ocean. Use the movie players below to look at these movies:

Steaming Through Lake Mabel

Going Through Everglades Inlet

So, the movies have given you a good idea of what the transit of Everglades Inlet was like, but we also took some excellent pictures during that transit that you might want to see. As we began to move through the inlet, we could look ahead to the breakwater at the ocean end of the channel. You can see boats coming in alongside our ship, and you can see ahead of us the rocks that we've sat on numerous times watching the ships. In the middle of the transit, we can see, on the north side of the channel, the many condominiums and apartments that line the channel. I suppose that for boat lovers, this would be the ideal place to live, since there is always boat traffic going in and out, with many of the boats being extremely large ones- like ours.

As we approach the ocean, now, you can see the rock jetty in closeup. Fred and I have come to these rocks at least five or six times; sometimes by ourselves, but at least once with Guy and once with Frank and Joe. It is always fun to time a visit to the particular times, like Sunday afternoon, when many of the cruise ships leave or enter the inlet. Just as we pass out of the inlet, you can look up the beach and far into the distance. Fred used his incredible zoom capability to focus on all the buildings along Fort Lauderdale Beach and Pompano Beach- some ten miles into the distance. You can see that picture here.

As our ship passed out of the channel and into the Atlantic, we could look back and see downtown Fort Lauderdale, the beach and the rock jetty. I've put thumbnails for these pictures below; click on them to view the full size images:

(Click on Thumbnails to View)

We've been standing along the port side of the ship as we made our transit; the scenery from the starboard side isn't nearly as interesting. Here are Greg and Fred watching the scenery and taking pictures.

King of the World

When we took all the pictures of our transit of the inlet, we were at the railing on deck 11. But now, I wanted to go down to the bow of the ship- the same relative position where the classic scene of Kate Winslet "flying" aboard the Titanic was set. To get there, we had to go down to deck 5, and walk forward along the side of the ship, through a passageway and up a set of stairs so that we were actually at the level of deck 6.

This deck is actually a heliport, with the big "H" symbol painted on the deck, and here is Fred on the heliport. You can see some of the stairs up from deck 5 to both the right and left in the picture; there were some more stairs leading down to the passageway on deck 5 itself. Fred returned the picture-taking favor, so there's a picture of me on the heliport as well.

Behind both Fred and I is the forward superstructure of the ship. For reference, the bridge, which is the glassed in area that spans the entire front of the vessel, is on deck 10. On deck 11, just above, there is another large observation area, and you can see passengers up there looking out ahead as well. Between the deck I am on and the bridge, there are three stateroom decks- decks 7, 8 and 9. I know it looks as if there is an extra deck, but the heliport is not exactly at the same level as deck 6; the Coral Theatre extends upward through three decks- 4, 5 and 6. The top of it is behind the blank space below the first row of windows on deck 7. Anyway, that's probably more detail than you wanted.

The view looking back was pretty interesting. Without any zoom, here is a view looking back towards shore along the starboard side of the ship. When I put on my own zoom, you can begin to see more shore detail and a ship that has followed us out of the inlet. Finally, using Fred's zoom, you can see that there are actually two ships that have followed us. The one just behind us was at the dock near the 17th Street Bridge that we saw when we traversed Lake Mabel. The ship behind that was the one that was docked at the space in front of our own ship at its dock. All in all, I counted six ships leaving this afternoon. As it turned out, one of the ships followed us for quite a ways.

Sunset Off the Coast at Miami

About an hour out of Fort Lauderdale, we found ourselves paralleling the coast, probably somewhere in the neighborhood of Hollywood or North Miami Beach. As we cruised, there were excellent views of the skyline from the ship as the sun got lower and lower in the sky. There was a band of low clouds off to the west, and as the sun sank behind that cloud bank, its edge was lit up all along its boundary, giving the appearance of a long, horizontal streak of lightning. You should take a look at that picture here.

Both Fred and I took a number of pictures of the skyline along the shore in the distance and the marvelous sunset that arrived about six-thirty. I have put thumbnails for some of these pictures below; you can look at any full-size image by clicking on its thumbnail.

(Click on Thumbnails to View)

There wouldn't be any more pictures outside tonight; it was getting too dark. So we went inside the ship and wandered around for a while before dinner.

Our destination tomorrow morning was to be Key West, and we were supposed to dock around eight in the morning. Our route was straight down the east coast of Florida, staying well away from the keys and all the little islands and shoals near them, and then into Key West tomorrow. Apparently, the ship will do some cruising in circles during the night; the trip to Key West would only take five hours or so if the ship went directly there.

Anyway, all the passengers needed time for their first dinner and perhaps some late-night entertainment.

Our First Sit-Down Dinner

Tonight will be our first dinner in the dining room. As on most cruise ships, the main dining room is not large enough to accommodate all the passengers at once, and so there are multiple "seatings." On the 'Jewel of the Seas,' the dining room can accommodate about half the passengers, and so there are two seatings. The first is at 6:30PM and the second, ours, is at 8:30PM. When you book your cruise you can select which seating you want and, so long as it is not full, that's the one you get. We booked early and so got our first choice.

To get to the dining room, which is just off the main atrium on decks 4 and 5, we followed our usual route to get to the atrium- ascending to deck 5 and then walking through the shops. This first night, we didn't realize that there were entrances to the main dining room on both deck 4 and 5; we had thought that only deck four had entrances. So when we got to the atrium, we immediately went down the lighted, green lucite stairway from the first atrium balcony on deck 5 to the floor of the eight-story atrium on deck 4. There, we found some passengers waiting until the doors opened for the 8:30 second seating.

We found Greg and Grant and Virl and Joe already waiting, so when the doors were opened a few minutes later we all went in together. We knew our table number, but since Greg had made the table reservation for all of us, he led us right to it. He had gotten us a really great table. We were out in the open area of the two-story dining room, and so we had the best view all the way around the room. Many tables are underneath the balcony seating areas on deck 5, and of course if you are on deck 5 itself, you can't really appreciate the two-story nature of the dining room. Not only was the table in a great position, but it was one of the few six-person tables that I saw, and so our entire group was accommodated at one table and we didn't have to share the table with strangers. Tables went up to ten people, I think, but there were few of those. There were no two-person tables that I could see; most seemed to be four or eight.

Before we got started with dinner, I took out my camera to record our first meal together. Left to right are Fred, Joe, Virl, Greg and Grant.

Dinner was excellent. Each dinner menu lists six or eight appetizers, a couple of salads and six or eight entrees. The dessert menu usually had about eight items. Of course, this being a cruise, there was no limit to the number of any particular course you could have. I recall that this first night two of the appetizers and two of the entrees looked very good to me, and so I had all four of them plus a salad. Portions are not huge, and I think that's a good thing. For one thing, most people have been eating all day long at the buffet or at the specialty kiosks, and so there is no need to give huge portions at dinner and run the risk of wasting a good deal of food. Having smaller portions is also a good idea because it gives people like me a chance to try a number of different things without again having so much food that it can't be consumed.

The food in the dining room was uniformly quite good; I think there was only one appetizer that I ate in the dining room that I really didn't care for. Food presentation was also very good, with all dishes tastefully and sometimes artistically presented. And our service was also very good. Anna, our waiter, and Carlos, our assistant waiter, were punctual, very friendly and very attentive. After asking for a couple of glasses of iced tea this first night, Carlos always brought two glasses for the rest of the cruise without being asked. And he kept them filled, which I appreciated.

The six of us were quite compatible, and there was always interesting conversation- particularly from Virl, who is an actor in the theatre and on television. He has had many roles in movies and on TV; when he detailed some of them, I could recall seeing the movie but not specifically him. But that's understandable since his were not the leading roles. I enjoyed each meal we had here in the dining room very much.

When dinner was over, the six of us split up, and Fred and I spent some time wandering around the ship just looking at everything. We went into a lot of the public areas, and up a deck to the pool and solarium. We checked out the location of the fitness center (yay! recumbent bikes!) and we went back out to the bow and stern to see what the ocean looked like at night. We took a few more pictures inside the ship, but instead of putting them here, I'm going to put them with the other pictures that we took of the ship itself.

Finally, it was back to our stateroom to download our camera cards, relax and head off to bed.

You can use the links below to continue to another photo album page.

	An Outside Tour of the 'Jewel of the Seas'
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