Neptune Suite 7082 on the Zuiderdam:

The sweet life!  Neptune Suite cabins range from 500 to 712 square feet, whereas  Signature suites range from 372 to 384 square feet and Balcony cabins range from 212 to 359 square feet (including balcony).  I knew the balcony cabins would be tight for a person in a wheel chair, but didn't realize how nicely the Neptune Suite would accommodate a wheel chair.  Even though we didn't have a handicapped accessible cabin, we really didn't need it.  Ken was able to move around in his wheel chair throughout the main area of the cabin and was able to walk the short distances around the bathroom and changing room.

The Neptune rooms have a king-sized bed, separate shower and bathtub, dual sinks, walk-in closet, a double sofa bed that pulls out for two people and larger balconies. Other cabin perks include a Bluetooth-enabled Bose sound system, complimentary mimosas with in-suite breakfast, an expanded line of Elemis products and an in-suite coffee and espresso machine.

Plenty of electrical sockets, including usb ports.

 I should have taken a picture with the curtains open---showing off the plant window with an anthurium plant on it.  Loved having the window above my computer.  And loved having a tea pot (coffee pot) next to it, too.

 On the 3rd or 4th day this pretty little vase and fresh flowers appeared in our room, too. 

 With one chair moved over to by the sliding doors and the other closer to the couch, there was plenty of room for Ken to move around in circles in his wheelchair.

 Our complimentary bottle of champagne and 2 bottles of water. 

 Huge tv!  I've not seen one this big in a cruise ship cabin before.  It came with a full complement of channels, including MSNBC, CNBC, ESPN, BBC, the Comedy Channel and FOX News. An array of on-demand movies, including recent releases. Plus some popular TV shows like HGTV.  It also had a channel that showed the ship excursions and another one that showed info about where the ship was--including cameras from the front and back of the ship.  Lastly, it even had a channel where you could check your on board spending account.

 Looking towards the front door.

 the changing room/walk in closet/vanity area/entrance to the bathroom.  I love having the little private space!

 the shower/jetted tub.  Ordinarily I'm not a fan of jetted tubs, but this one I really liked!  It was just the right size to lounge in comfortably.  There was also a stand alone shower just to the left in this photo.

 Nice long counter with 2 sinks.  I though there were suppose to be medicine cabinets, but I was afraid to pull on the mirrors too hard.  So I just used the drawer between the sinks and the desk in the "vanity".

 Our iced champagne ready to go. After about 7 days of the room stewards icing it every night, we put it away to bring home with us.

 Some of the special chocolates we got at turn down service.

Loved this coffee/cappuccino maker.  I used it to make hot water for tea.

Loved having the larger verandah and bigger table, but didn't use it nearly as much as I anticipated I would.  It was very windy this trip and most days the cushions were pretty soaked.  But I still enjoyed stepping out and watching sunrise and a couple sunsets.

Passengers in Neptune and Pinnacle suites also have access to the Neptune Lounge, with a concierge and complimentary snacks, on Deck 7. Other amenities include complimentary binoculars and umbrella use during the length of the voyage (which we didn't end up using), corsages and boutonnieres for formal night (which we also didn't take since we didn't dress up for formal nights), priority seating (?---not sure where that is), bottled water and hors d'oeuvres before dinner, priority embarkation and debarkation (which we used and appreciated), high tea served in the room on request (again, we didn't use) and laundry (which we greatfully used twice!), pressing and dry cleaning (they even pressed my jean shorts and t-shirts!)

We loved having breakfast in the Pinnacle Grill.  Also enjoyed dropping into the Neptune Lounge now and then.  But the biggest advantage of this room ended up being the extra room for Ken in his wheel chair.  Biggest disadvantage is I'll want this room every cruise now!

2019-12-20  Debarkation and 12 hour drive back to Atlanta:

Now for the most dreaded day of the whole trip!  And not because of debarkation from the ship.  That actually went really smoothly!  We were in the first group after self debarkation and it was called right at 8:15.  With Ken in a wheel chair, we ask a porter to help us with our luggage.  She was really cheerful and full of Christmas spirit.  Once we had our luggage, we were directed to a special customs line---I don't know if that's because we had Neptune suite bag tags or because Ken was in a wheel chair, but we had no wait.  I thought our porter would lead us outside to the curb and Ken would wait with the luggage while I went and got the car, but she lead us all the way to the garage and up to our car.  By about 8:30, we were in our car and ready to hit the highway. 

 Unfortunately, the highways weren't ready for us!  The radio said all cars were being directing off I-95 at Hillsboro Rd, so I figured we'd cut over to the tollroad.  Apparently so did everyone else.  So having lived in the area for a year and knowing my way around the area, I thought I'd be clever and head over to SR7 that runs parallel to the highway 'til it cleared, but there was road construction on it!  Took us about 2 hours to get to I-95 at Boynton Beach (about 15 miles down from the cruise port!)!!!!  Not a good start to what was already going to be a really long day in the car!

The neat sculptures near where we finally got on to I-95.  If I remember correctly, this is actually Boynton Beach---or Delray, just south of West Palm Beach. 

 For some reason, Navigator thought we should stay on 95 and eventually get on I-10.  Seems to me 75 is more direct.  So we switched over to 75 near Jupiter where the 2 highways intersect. We still have our Sunpass from when we lived there, so taking the toll road was no problem.

 Sure going to miss all the palm trees!

 and flowers in winter.

 a load I don't like being behind!

 zipping along on 75 now. 

 Love the way they decorate the sound walls.

 love being able to just drive through the toll booths on the toll road, too.

 Citrus and baby gators!

 up into Northern Florida now.  There are a lot of farms up there.

 fewer and fewer palm trees but more and more moss on trees. 

 a rather odd looking overpass!

 traffic was moving quite well since we got onto I-75

 Not the way I hope our car ends up.

 Horse capital of the World????!!!!  Wonder how they got that title.

 I saw a lot more cows then horses---and a lot more horses in Cobb County, Georgia!.

 tooling right along

Ken's type of beauty (he's the photographer in the car since I'm the driver).

 After about 7.5 hours, we were finally out of Florida. 

 Hello Georgia!  Never in a million years did I think I'd be calling Georgia home---until about 3 years ago.  Since then we've lived in 3 counties of Georgia.

 Never remember noticing all the cotton fields until we spent a year in Middle Georgia.  Now I look for them and peach and pecan orchards.

 Got up to our last former "home",  Perry, just as the sun was setting.  We pulled off the highway to drive by the old neighborhood.  They sure have done a lot of building since we originally moved there 1.5 years ago!  Tried to get dinner at one of our favorite restaurants there in Perry---The Swanson---but there was a 45 minute wait, so we just hit the road again. 

Now we were only about 150 miles from our new "home" in the NW Atlanta area.  We were still making good time until we got to McDonough just south of Atlanta.  For some reason, people forget how to drive when they go through that city and there's always some crazy traffic there!  Today was no exception!  There were cars in the ditch.  At least it wasn't us!  Added another 45 minutes or so to our trip.  Finally got home a little after 9--- over 12 hours from when we left the Port Everglades parking lot.  Guess it didn't help that this was the last weekend before Christmas.  Wonder if that had anything to do with it taking considerably longer to get home then to get there?

2019-12-19 Half Moon Cay:


I was worried that our day at Half Moon Cay would be cancelled from the way the captain talked yesterday.  But I was happy to see some blue skies when I got up.

 Pretty nice sunrise.

 Now to see if we're able to anchor and tender in.

 We had company at Half Moon Cay today---the Veendam (HAL's small ship now, like the Maasdam).  I never realized how small the Maasdam was until I saw the Veendam from the Zuiderdam (a mid-large size ship).

 and we were greeted by another rainbow, too!

 Wonder where that guy is coming from.

 I've read the snorkeling over by these rocks is good, but I hesitate to go there by myself.

 some of the beach leading to the above rocky coast.

 AFter a quick breakfast, I was off to the tender.  Wanted to get to the island before the predicted bad weather got there.

 Looked pretty good at this point!

 The new childrens playground is pretty impressive!  Nice job, HAL!

 Looking right.

 Looking out towards the ship

 Looking left to the new playground area.

 Heading in!

 ultimately heading to the left along the wall by the big pavilion. 

 The water was beautiful!  Mostly calm and probably about 83.

 some of the artificial reefs looked like they were more submerged now.

 but they still attracted fish

 snapper

 ?? don't know what these guys are, but there have always been quite a few of them here.

 snapper hiding in the rocks

 one of the barracudas here---there's always a lot of barracudas here, too.

 looking towards the kids playground.

 looking farther up the beach.

 towards the expensive pavilion.

 a juvenile wrasse

 sargeant major---pretty common in the Caribbean and Hawaii.

 school of tiny fish

 juvenile puddingwife wrasse

 the rocky area by the playground.

 snappers and a soldier fish

 surgeonfish

 a shell

 variety of fish

 blue head wrasse

 female blue head wrasse

 more barracudas

 black jack

 school of medium sized fish

 our ship with a tender coming in.

 looking towards the bar area.

 just another picture of the Zuiderdam.

 the large school of fish again

 the school of fish swimming away from the jacks.

 I don't think the 2 boys here moved from their chairs.  They were on their phones or tablets playing who knows what.

 the beach was filling up.

 I decided to head to the shopping area on my way to the picnic lunch.

 also came across the volleyball courts with people actually attempting to play.  I stayed and played for a short while, but they kept calling more people over so when there were more then 6 people per side, I decided it was getting crowded.

 on to lunch.

 Lunch!

 again, the desserts look a lot better then they really are.

 a map of the island.

 walking along the road

 for having been through a a lot of weather, it looked pretty good.

 love my bougainvillea 

 heading to the beach.

 walking back to my area along the beach---as it started to rain.

 Apparently tide was coming in.  A lot of the front loungers were in the water.  I did what Ken likes to do and set up a few rows back.

 Looking back at some of the rentals.

 the place cleared out quickly when the rains started.

 I was going to leave then, too, but the line was out of the covered area, so I figured I might as well be in the water. 

 Hung out there for about a half hour, then decided to head out again.

 lines weren't any better.

 was quite the fun getting to the tender.

 First time I noticed Half Moon Cay classified as Eleuthera, Bahamas. 

After waiting in line about 1 1/2 hours, I finally got on the tender.  Then waited another 30 minutes for the tender to fill.  Finally got back to the boat.  The long wait was still worth being able to spend a wonderful morning there.

BAck on the ship, loving the Christmas decorations. 

 Loved this little tin foil critter in Lido.

 I decided the soup last night was so good I'd try it again.  Tonight it was chicken corn soup.  Sounded weird, looked weird again, but tasted really good.

 Last night with our favorite waiter--Edo.  We usually find someone who we feel deserves a special tip---this time Edo was the one.

 Last show on the Mainstage.  Tonight it was comedian Jeff Burghart again as well as the pianist comedian John Bressler.

 both were very good.

They often announce no recording.  Not sure that includes no flashless photography.  But if there is no announcement, I like to take a photo to remind me of who the performer is.

 After the show, I made a point of going by the atrium again to see if the gingerbread houses were done.  They appear to be finished. 

 I'm really glad we were there for Christmas decorations this time.

 close up of the smaller ginger bread houses.

 the large one, complete with Santa!

 They even had cute little trees here and there.

 Back in the room----another funny little towel critter.  And lots of packing.

Got our 3 bags out in the hall before midnight and hit the sack.  not looking forward to tomorrow at all!!!!