October 2021: Royal Caribbean Odyssey of the Seas Western Caribbean

 October 30, 2021 
We spent our pre-cruise night at Plunge Beach Resort in Lauderdale by the Sea. It's about 30 minutes north of Port Everglades. The Boat Show is this weekend so finding a reasonably priced hotel in Fort Lauderdale was hard. The Plunge Beach Resort took over three motels to form a fun, boutique hotel experience. One fun thing is the hand drawn murals in the rooms. 

We worked from the lobby until around 2 pm. We shared some tacos at the beachside bar. Our room was ready so we headed up to take our COVID tests. That was easy. We chatted with Burke's family and then headed out. About a 10 minute walk south is a little square and pier with several restaurants and shops. We picked Aruba Beach Club for dinner. We had a nice table outside. 

We both ordered salads and they were really good. We headed back to the resort. We hung out at the beach bar and saw the Emerald Princess sail away from Port Everglades. We called it an early night. 

October 31, 2021

We took an Uber to the port. We arrived around 11:40 am. Check in took about 10 minutes. They opened boarding around 12:04 pm. We headed to the cabin to get our sail and sign passes. Wow! It's a great cabin - Grand Suite 1 bedroom. 

Lunch was at Giovanni's Italian restaurant. 

We bought the Unlimited Dining package as we can have as many meals as we want in the specialty restaurants. Lunch was great. The best bite was the fettuccine Alfredo. I also really liked the stromboli. 

After lunch, we took a tour of the upper decks: sky diving simulator, surfing simulator, trampolines, a huge sports court, and a great sports bar. Plus a really large indoor pool solarium area. 

The thermal Suite area in the spa is tiny. 

We watched the end of the Colts game :( and got ready for dinner. We stopped by the suite lounge. They offer complimentary cocktails and really nice appetizers. 

At seven, we went to music movie trivia. Our dinner was at the Coastal Kitchen - the suite dining room. Half of the menu changes every night. The food was very food. The room is depressing. It feels like a 1987 Holiday Inn banquet room. 

Glenn got to sing a little kareoke in the Music Hall. He was the only one singing so it was like he had his own set. 

We went to the Halloween party. The band was good and a lot of the guests dressed up. We ended the night at the pub with the guitar player. A great first day.

November 1, 2021

We visited Royal Caribbean's private island CocoCay. We were off the ship around 9 am . We took a tram ride around the island. It's so different from when we were last here. First, there's a pier so no tendering. They added a water park, a huge pool, and three beach areas. We set up chairs by the Oasis Lagoon pool and walked around to explore. Our favorite beach area was South Beach. It has a floating bar you swim out to. The bottom of the ocean is almost like clay here. We had a blood mary enjoying the view. We had lunch at the quick service. The food was very good. My favorite was the chicken sandwich. 

Then, we headed back to the pool. I took a little nap. We headed back to the ship around 2:30 pm. We had a nice happy hour in the Suite lounge. Our dinner was at Wonderland. It's an innovative restaurant. It was fun and very good.  You paint the menu to make it appear. 

After dinner, we went to Playmakers to watch Monday Night Football. 

November 2, 2021 

We had a fun Sea Day.  We started the day winning general knowledge trivia. YAY! 

I filmed the rest of the ship tour. Then, we headed up to enjoy the very small suite sun deck. Lunch was at Chops Grill. The mushroom soup was delicious. Glenn had the burger and I had a great steak salad. We watched Daily Double - the Cruise Director's version of Jeopardy. That was really fun. Then, we enjoyed the suite as we sailed along the coast of Cuba. We had a nice happy hour in the suite lounge. 

We had a great sushi dinner at Izumi. Then, we enjoyed the nightly entertainment. We watched Who Wants to Be a Caribbeanaire? , the Love and Marriage Show, and the ShowGirl: Past, Present, and Future stage production. The ShowGirl costumes were incredible. 

November 3, 2021 

We had a fun day visiting resorts in Cozumel. We visted Iberostar, Occidental, Secrets Aura, Sunscape and Cozumel Palace. Cozumel was the most interesting because it's right downtown. 

We got back, went to happy hour, and had a great dinner at Giovanni's. Glenn loved the lasagna and I loved the Spaghetti Carbonara. I also tried a really good Oberon Cabernet Sauvignon. We went to the Book show in the Two70 theater. It's an incredible space with huge projections, moving screens, the stage changes shape, and a lot of aerial acts. We were so sleepy though from the full day and huge dinner. We headed back to the cabin. 

November 4, 2021 

We did not get off the ship in Costa Maya. It was overcast and rainy. We played the 10 am trivia and then headed to the beautiful Solarium to relax. Glenn said it was the best Solarium he's seen and I agree. It has three small pools and 4 whirlpools. It tiers down at the front of the ship so you have a good view.

 It's also adults only and vaccinated only. Some areas of the ship are designated vaccinated only so that means you can take your mask off  while you are in that area. For lunch, we sampled items from Sorrento's pizza and the Windjammer cafe. Sorrento's had really good tapas like roasted eggplant and peppers. It was better than the pizza. We got ready for dinner. We lost TV theme trivia. 

Then, we got to go up in the North Star. It's this bubble that raises up 300 feet over the ship. It was pretty cool how far we could see. 

It would be amazing in Alaska. We listened to the orchestra's jazz set in Boleros. Then, up to the Suite lounge for happy hour. Between the complimentary cocktails, bottled water, and espressos, I think Royal Caribbean lost money by accepting our $500 pp Royal Up offer. Dinner was at Chops Grille. It was fantastic. The ribeye was terrific. We also had a very good pork belly and tuna tartare. After dinner, we went to the Effectors show. This ship does an incredible job with incorporating tech into their performances. This show had 60 drones as part of one of the numbers. After dinner, we listened to the guitar player and the band and headed to bed. 

November 6, 2021 

We had a very nice last Sea Day. Coffee on the balcony. We went to the Captain's talk. He's a very funny Norwegian man. We tried out the nerf archery. We had a huge lunch at Playmakers. We each had a $20 credit from the Unlimited Dining Package and we were going to use it: Chicken wings, pork "wings", tuna poke nachos, onion rings, chicken tenders, and a burger. 

At 1 pm, they had a special panel with the Entertainment team for the Diamond and above members. It was fun to hear more about the behind the scenes of all the shows. We spend some time enjoying our balcony. We had our Captain's Club happy hour. 

We headed back to Wonderland. 

This was less successful than our first visit which shows our waiter really knew what he was doing when he picked our appetizers. The expectation was the Caprese salad. It was awesome. They somehow freeze dried the cheese. We did not like the halibut or the chicken entrees. The waiter and the manager noticed so they brought what we liked last time: the short rib and the branzino. We tried the Forbidden apple. The apple was actually a very tart raspberry mousse with lemon curd inside. It was really good. We went to see the Hector is Magic show. He was really good with slight of hand. We ended the evening enjoying the pub guitar player. Overall, a very successful cruise. It feels like a real gift that we won our Royal Up bid and got to experience the suite life plus all the great specialty dining.