A Five Night Western Caribbean Cruise with Extended Family
Starting in the fall of 2025, my mom started talking about doing a family trip with herself, our family and my sister (L) and her husband (T). We considered a few different things but my mom wanted a cruise and it was a good selection! On a cruise, you can hang out as much or as little as you want. It is pretty easy to split up and then meet back up as people go about their days.
We looked at several of the cruise options for 2026. There was thoughts of doing an Alaskan cruise but I didn't feel it was a good fit for our 5 year old daughter who would want to swim and wouldn't be as enamored with the mountains and wild life at this stag in her life. Another option brought up was a Disney cruise which would skew a little too much to the 5 year old and away from the 5 adults. We decided that Royal Caribbean would be a nice balance and doing the Caribbean would give us plenty of beaches and sun.
Now looking at the ship and itinerary… we wanted a cruise that hit their private island of Coco Cay in order to get time on the beach in. We looked at the ship options and the newer Icon class did look amazing but you paid a premium for them. We decided that Freedom of the Seas was a good mix of activities on the ship, size and the itinerary we were looking for. While, the newer ships would have been nice, we were pleased in that the Freedom had enough to keep us occupied but never were overwhelmed. With that said, we have never been on one of the newer bigger ships but as of now, don't feel like we missed anything on the Freedom. Also note, that Freedom was the largest ship in the world when it was launched in 2006 so she isn't tiny. She is comparable to the large ships of some of the other cruise lines.
Itinerary:
We reached out to Fantasical Vacations and worked with travel agent Kristin Cirulli. We normally plan our own travel but traveling with the extended family and not having much cruise experience, we decided to reach out to a travel agent to help out. Kristin helped us compare different ships and itineraries. She also was a big help in choosing where we wanted to be in the ship as far as deck and room location and it was all perfect.
With her help, we booked our daughter in my mom's cabin to save a bit of money. So we ended up with three cabins with two people in each. We also got joining rooms between my mom and daughter's room and ours. We were able to open that door and enjoy a bit more space (and yes, our daughter lived in our cabin). My sister and her husband were in a non-joining room but still next door. Our room steward opened the dividers on our balconies so we also had a 3 room wide balcony we could all enjoy. With her help, we also ended up on deck 8 and pretty much in the middle of the ship with room 8600. We had some nights of storms while at sea with the ship moving around a decent bit but didn't have a problem with movement in our rooms.
Day 1 - Sunday May 24
Day 2 - Monday May 25 - Departure
Day 3 - Tuesday May 26 - Sea Day
Day 4 - Wednesday May 27 - Cozumel, Mexico
Day 5 - Thursday May 28
Day 6 - Friday May 29
Lessons Learned / Thoughts:
We looked at several of the cruise options for 2026. There was thoughts of doing an Alaskan cruise but I didn't feel it was a good fit for our 5 year old daughter who would want to swim and wouldn't be as enamored with the mountains and wild life at this stag in her life. Another option brought up was a Disney cruise which would skew a little too much to the 5 year old and away from the 5 adults. We decided that Royal Caribbean would be a nice balance and doing the Caribbean would give us plenty of beaches and sun.
Now looking at the ship and itinerary… we wanted a cruise that hit their private island of Coco Cay in order to get time on the beach in. We looked at the ship options and the newer Icon class did look amazing but you paid a premium for them. We decided that Freedom of the Seas was a good mix of activities on the ship, size and the itinerary we were looking for. While, the newer ships would have been nice, we were pleased in that the Freedom had enough to keep us occupied but never were overwhelmed. With that said, we have never been on one of the newer bigger ships but as of now, don't feel like we missed anything on the Freedom. Also note, that Freedom was the largest ship in the world when it was launched in 2006 so she isn't tiny. She is comparable to the large ships of some of the other cruise lines.
Itinerary:
- Leave Port Miami
- Sea Day
- Port Day: Cozumel, Mexico
- Sea Day
- Port Day: Perfect Day at Coco Cay
- Arrive Port Miami
We reached out to Fantasical Vacations and worked with travel agent Kristin Cirulli. We normally plan our own travel but traveling with the extended family and not having much cruise experience, we decided to reach out to a travel agent to help out. Kristin helped us compare different ships and itineraries. She also was a big help in choosing where we wanted to be in the ship as far as deck and room location and it was all perfect.
With her help, we booked our daughter in my mom's cabin to save a bit of money. So we ended up with three cabins with two people in each. We also got joining rooms between my mom and daughter's room and ours. We were able to open that door and enjoy a bit more space (and yes, our daughter lived in our cabin). My sister and her husband were in a non-joining room but still next door. Our room steward opened the dividers on our balconies so we also had a 3 room wide balcony we could all enjoy. With her help, we also ended up on deck 8 and pretty much in the middle of the ship with room 8600. We had some nights of storms while at sea with the ship moving around a decent bit but didn't have a problem with movement in our rooms.
Day 1 - Sunday May 24
- Meet up and Fly to Miami
- Stay at Hampton Inn Miami Airport South Blue Lagoon
Day 2 - Monday May 25 - Departure
- Travel to Port Miami and Board the Freedom of the Seas
- Windjammer for Lunch
- Explore the Ship and hit Splashaway Bay
- Get Settled in our Cabin
- Dinner in the Main Dining Room
- Freedom-Ice.com Ice Skating Show
Day 3 - Tuesday May 26 - Sea Day
- Breakfast at Windjammer
- Morning swim at Splashaway Bay & the Main Pools
- Lunch at Loco Fresh
- Chill afternoon with rain around and some trivia.
- Dinner in the Main Dinning Room (Dress your best / French Night)
- Stage show Marquee
Day 4 - Wednesday May 27 - Cozumel, Mexico
- Breakfast at Windjammer
- Spent the day at Nachi Cocom Beach Club
- Lunch, Drinks and Massages at Nachi Cocom
- Dinner in the Main Dinning Room (White Night / Mexican Night)
- Duck Hunting for our Evening Activity
Day 5 - Thursday May 28
- Breakfast at Windjammer
- Spent the morning at the pools for us / casino for the rest of the family
- Lunch at Johnny Rockets
- Afternoon enjoying the ship and then ice skating
- Dinner at Izumi Hibachi
- Evening show of juggler David DiMuzio
Day 6 - Friday May 29
- Breakfast at Windjammer
- Perfect Day at CocoCay Day!
- Spent the day around Oasis Lagoon
- Lunch at Skippers Grill
- More Swimming and Splashpads in the afternoon
- Dinner at the Main Dining Room (Caribbean Night)
- Evening show of Once Upon a Time
Lessons Learned / Thoughts:
- For a family oriented cruise, the non-alcohol drink package worked very well, offering us fresh squeezed juice, specialty coffees, cokes, milk shakes and mocktails for 1/4 of the cost per person per day as the alcohol package. Mixing in a few alcoholic drinks here and there was all that we needed.
- Lyft to the port was fantastic! Getting a Lyft back out of the port, hectic!
- Splashaway Bay and the pools in general were great on departure day. Getting on the ship at 11 and hitting the water early afternoon while others were just getting on was nice.
- CocoCay can get pretty crowded. We were in port with the Icon of the Seas so a large ship in Freedom and a massive ship in Icon. But we got off Freedom by 8:30am, got loungers and still had a very fun day. The beaches were packed and so was the big Oasis Lagoon pool but the pool felt less hectic than the beaches we visited.
- Spending a night at the end of the trip in Miami instead of waiting in the airport for a 5:00pm direct flight home would have been wise. The Miami airport (at least the Southwest Airlines wing was nothing great to spend time in. This also would have let us explore this beautiful city a bit.
Safe Travels,
B & E
B & E