JoCo Cruise Crazy 3: Day 1

This was a day of much chaos.  First, there was "ALL the people leave the Radisson at once."  We were on the 10:30 AM shuttle over to the cruise port.

Canvas bags of swag! They contained  totem animals.
I was a moose and Jay was a fox. Do with that what you will.

Once we made it to the cruise port, the wait was fairly reasonable.  It was about 45 minutes before we were on the boat, Royal Caribbean's Freedom of the Seas.  Then there was the chaos of feeding ALL the people simultaneously at the Windjammer buffet on board.  I was just happy that the four of us found a place to sit. Forks proved a good defense against would-be chair thieves.  Normally I'm a fan of taking the first day to explore the boat, but there was just too much boat.  We had our carry-on bags with us and were tired and wanted to relax.  I'd had the foresight to pack my bathing suit in my carry-on and instructed Jay to do the same, so we were able to take advantage of the completely vacant cantilevered hot tubs. That's right.  The hot tub hangs over the side of the boat.  On Deck 11.  And holds 22 people, in theory, though probably only if they *really* like each other in practice.  It was not as scary as I thought it would be, and what a view we had.

Mostly the view was parking lot. 

After that, it was time to see if our stateroom was ready, and lo! It was.  The Freedom doesn't have as much shelf space as the Holland America Westerdam did last year (on JoCo Cruise Crazy 2), but it was plenty workable for two people.  Which is to say that I commandeered all of the shelves.

Room built for two.  Barely.

We then changed over to our evening attire and this is where I need to rely on my photos to remember all of the fun that transpired.

On our balcony in port, already exhausted and the fun hasn't even begun!

First we headed to the complimentary JCCC3 socializing with tropical beverages hour in the place that is normally the boat's ice skating rink, which is insane.

I spy a JoCo!

Then there was dinner, which was relatively tasty considering that cruise lines don't really cater to vegetarians.

I think this was called "tortillas." Really.

Next up: our first concert of the week courtesy of The Jonathan Coulton Band.  It was a great way to start off the week.

Fog for extra rock star glamour.