Jared and I didn’t intend to plan a babymoon (one last vacation before baby comes) this summer. It kind of just fell into our laps.

We actually looked into doing a Vegas trip first believe it or not. We found out Shania Twain is doing a Vegas residency this summer so we looked into doing a short weekday trip. However, the flights were ridiculously expensive and the times didn’t work out. We got to thinking about what other short trip we could take this summer, the idea of a cruise popped into our minds!

For about the price of just the flight to Vegas, we could do a balcony room on a 3-night cruise on Royal Caribbean’s Independence of the Seas with stops in Nassau and Coco Cay, Bahamas. We hadn’t cruised since 2018 and have been itching to get back out to sea. We booked the cruise the next night!

The day before we set sail, we had to fill out an online health check-in that was primarily for Covid precautions. I got to the last question on the check-in and I had to select yes/no for “Will you be more than 23 weeks pregnant at any time during the cruise?” I thought that was a strange question, so I googled it. Apparently most cruise lines don’t let anyone past 23 weeks sail because they don’t have equipment to care for a premature infant on board. I was 26 weeks the day we left for the cruise… Since there was no turning back at this point (and we didn’t even have any sea days on such a short cruise), I clicked “no” and went on our way!

We left Friday June 17 and returned Monday June 20 from Port Canaveral with one goal for the trip – RELAX.

The whole relaxation thing got off to a rocky start as soon as we boarded the ship. Boarding was so quick and easy and we went straight to the bar to order drinks before lounging by the pool while the rest of the people boarded. Then the bartender said neither of us had any sort of drink package. We knew for a fact that Jared had the alcohol package and I had the “mocktail” package. On cruises, if you book the alcohol package for one person in the room, you automatically have to get it for anyone else in the room too. Since I obviously can’t drink, Jared had to specifically call and request that only he get the alcohol package. He even gave the person on the phone our card information twice.

If you’ve been on a cruise before, you know they offer deals on everything (drink packages, specialty dining, excursions, etc.) in the months leading up to the cruise, but everything is full price if you purchase on the ship. Since there was no record of us ever calling about the drink package and we were never charged for it (at the 50% discount), we had to pay full price for both packages on the ship. My mocktail package alone was the price we had originally “paid” for Jared’s entire alcohol package. We just had to suck it up because we couldn’t do anything about it and the drink packages were still worth it.

Then, my suitcase didn’t get delivered to our room until 10 minutes before dinner – and all I had on me was a bathing suit and cover up. There was no way I was wearing that to the dining room! When I opened my suitcase, I realized what must have caused the delay. My steamer had been taken. I should have known steamers aren’t allowed on the ship, but I don’t travel ANYWHERE without my steamer. Jared packs knowing I will have my steamer, which means he just throws all his clothes in the suitcase without a care in the world, with the plan to steam his clothes when we get to our destination. I was so upset they took it. It’s not irreplaceable, it’s from Amazon, but because I wanted all my cute new outfits to look nice and pressed! I didn’t buy new dresses to wear to dinner just for them to be wrinkled!

Luckily, by hanging everything up as soon as we got our luggage, everything was wrinkle-free (for the most part) and I have the exact same steamer at home. Here’s the link for my steamer: https://amzn.to/3xBSHV6. I’ve tried multiple handheld steamers and it’s by far my favorite!

Our first port of call was Nassau. We planned to stay on the ship when we stopped in Nassau since we’ve already been to Nassau and don’t really need to go again.

After a big breakfast at the Windjammer buffet, we played morning trivia at the Schooner Bar and then headed down to the pool. We spent most of the day in the adult pool in the Solarium drinking cocktails (mocktails for me), soaking up the sun, and making friends with other couples on the ship. I enjoyed plenty of shirley temples, virgin strawberry daiquiris, and virgin mojitos!

We ate lunch at the Windjammer and headed back to the pool for the rest of the afternoon before heading to dinner in the main dining room. I don’t remember selecting an option to dine alone, but I definitely would have if I’d seen that. Jared especially wasn’t thrilled we were going to have to socialize during dinner. Fortunately, the people we sat with were great! There were two guys in their 60s who cruise often and are in a motorcycle club and two girls our age from South Carolina on a surprise birthday cruise. We lucked out for sure.

We played Bingo after dinner the first two nights (per Hyatt family cruise tradition). We didn’t win anything, but had fun playing! I stayed for the game show following Bingo the second night and then Jared and I went to watch the comedy act. It wasn’t great, but it was something to do!

The next day we planned to get off the ship in Coco Cay and hang out in the pool or on the beach, eat lunch then head back to the ship for the rest of the afternoon.

We ate breakfast at the Windjammer again and disembarked. It was super hot out. We were sweating about 5 steps off the ship, but looking forward to cooling off once we got on the island. We walked to the pool and stopped in our tracks when we saw how crowded the pool was. There’s a swim up bar and it was at least 5 people deep all the way around. While the food at the grill looked good, we decided to head back to the ship. We figured we could swim in the pool on the island with all those people or swim in the empty pool on the ship.

We first went to the adult pool, but for some reason they had the heat on. A hot pool is NOT what we wanted after walking in the heat to the island and back. The kids’ pool was cooler, so we hung out there for the day. There weren’t any kids in it anyway since everyone was out on the island. We hung out with some other couples. One of the ladies we were with was drinking frozen mojitos. Since mojitos are usually my go-to drink, I tried a virgin frozen mojito and it was DELICIOUS! I can’t wait to try an alcoholic one once I can drink again!

We spent most of the day at the pool. We took a break to get some pizza and play a couple rounds of trivia. One game of trivia was “Where in the world am I?” and we didn’t get a single question right! When we played regular afternoon trivia, we got 6 of the 12 questions correct, so we took that as a win!

After our last dinner in the dining room, we spent some time in the casino before some of the evening shows. My go-to in the casino is where you put in a quarter to try to push more quarters off the edge. I don’t think anyone has ever profited from it, but it’s addicting!

After losing my quarters, I went to the ship’s production of Grease, which I thought was pretty good! Then, Jared and I both went to the Majority Rules adult gameshow. Our team didn’t win, but we had fun and got some good laughs.

Every night after I went to bed around 11-12, Jared stayed and hung out at the casino or sports bar. Each night he would make friends with groups of people and the next day all these people would be saying hi to Jared as we walk by. He made friends with everyone from groups of frat bros to a group of ladies in their 80s who did lemon drop shots with him. I love hearing his stories every morning of the people he met the night before.

The morning we disembarked back in Port Canaveral, we got from our room on the ship to our car in the parking garage in about 20 minutes. Everything went so smoothly getting off and we made sure to leave early to beat the crowds.

We definitely hit a few storms on the ship, but by the time they rolled around, we were heading inside to get ready for dinner anyway. It never cut our pool time short. We really only felt the ship rocking the first night. It was smooth seas otherwise. The last night, I woke up in the middle of the night because the wind was howling so loudly outside our balcony windows! It sounded like we had the windows open! Luckily, it didn’t make for rough water, but it was crazy to listen to.

We’ve noticed on other 3-night cruises that sometimes the people on board can be really obnoxious and trashy compared to a longer 7-night trip. However, that definitely wasn’t the case on this cruise. I think it’s partly because we left from Port Canaveral rather than Miami this time. Most of the people on the ship were frequent cruisers and it was interesting to compare notes about cruises and learn some insider tips from the more seasoned cruisers.

We were so grateful we went on the cruise for our babymoon. It was so relaxing! We didn’t have to think about or do anything except hang out and have fun together. It was the perfect way to spend our last vacation before Baby B joins our family. And don’t worry – we have plenty of trips already planned for the next year that he will be joining us on!