It’s our last full day on Independence of the Seas! We have one more day at sea.

Morning Ship Tour

I started the day off waking up at 5am to give myself a ship tour starting from deck 3 and going up each deck that had things to do. If you want to watch the tour, it’ll be on the YouTube Channel.

It was nice wandering the ship on my own without any crowds. There were a few cruisers up and about as I continued up the decks but we all kept to ourselves, nodding as we passed each other.

Once I made it to the upper decks on the outside, the heat and humidity was ridiculous. And it was still dark out! I walked around the entire deck for 11 and 12. Deck 13 was split and I could only get on one side because the mini-golf side was blocked off.

The best part is I was able to catch a beautiful sunrise just when I was finished, one of my favorite parts of the day.

Workout Time and Breakfast

By the time I finished my ship tour, Mom was up so we went to the gym. Our goal was to exercise on the sea days. We went walking around the track on day 2 but I knew I should’ve went to the gym that day for a more heart-racing workout. Mom had been doing better than me since she was going to dance classes. It felt good to go the gym and I wished I’d taken advantage of it more.

I was so hungry at the end of my workout. I went back down to the room to shower and came back up to the Windjammer for breakfast. Mom went to a Zumba class right after the gym so it was just me eating breakfast.

One of the people Mom met before we even went on the trip told her that yogurt was a good thing to eat when having stomach problems so I grabbed some for my breakfast. I normally eat Greek yogurt at home but all they had was regular flavored yogurt so I made do.

After breakfast, I’d wandered the ship for a little and made my way back down to the room because there wasn’t much I wanted to do yet.

Acupuncture, Milkshakes, and Side of Agitation

Mom wanted to go the acupuncture presentation the ship offered because it was something she’d been interested in for a while. I didn’t go with her at first but when it was close to the presentation ending, I made my way up.

The thing is, they ended up bring the presentation to me! My mom, another woman, and the acupuncturist – Dr. Jerrolyn, came out of her office and met me out in the waiting room. The acupuncturist was explaining the benefits of acupuncture and how it works. She got excited as she explained and I could tell, she really enjoyed her job. That’s always nice to see someone light up about what they’re passionate about.

Needless to say, the presentation went longer than originally planned because the acupuncturist was re-explaining things to me. Eventually, my mom and the other woman decided to continue with their personal consultations back in her office and I went on to get a milkshake.

The Wait for the Milkshake

On Independence of the Seas, they have a Johnny Rocket’s, a diner-style restaurant, which serves your typical diner food of burgers and hot dogs that you’d have to pay for. They also had milkshakes.

The restaurant opened at 12PM so I got in the line maybe 15 minutes after they’d opened. They were already pretty full when I got there, but I just wanted a milkshake so I figured I’d be in and out. About 5 minutes passed since I’d been in line and the people before me were seated by the host after he asked if they were there for lunch or a milkshake.

I thought the host was going to come back to ask me the same question but he ended up taking their order at the table. I should mention that the restaurant did look short staffed so I figured he was helping out by taking the order. However, he started clearing table after table, with no sign of coming back. At that point another 10-15 minutes had passed. The family in line behind me ended up leaving. I was getting a little antsy myself because I did have an activity I wanted to do to and time was ticking.

Finally, someone else came up to the host podium and I told him I just wanted a milkshake. I thought he’d gestured for me to come inside so I did.

More Waiting

I didn’t have a menu (which I didn’t need since I had plenty of time to look at the menu posted outside the restaurant) so that may have caused what happened next.

A girl came in after me and sat down (which she did have a menu). One of the waitresses in the restaurant, who’d seen me sitting there prior, walked right up to her and took her order, skipping over me.

At this point I was pissed but because I don’t like confrontation I didn’t say anything to her. I was just about to get up and leave until I saw the man who brought me in.

“Can you take my order please? I just want a milkshake and I’ve been waiting awhile,” I said. He obliged and fixed my Oreo milkshake and the waitress finally addressed me.

“Have you place your order yet?” She asked. I told her the man was fixing it but I hadn’t paid for it yet. On the ship, you pay with your Seapass card. I handed it to her and she said she was giving me half-off with no further explanation. Either she overheard me, the man told her, or I couldn’t control the anger on my face, but either way she must’ve figured she messed up.

As soon as I paid and got my shake, I stomped out of there so fast. The milkshake wasn’t even worth the wait, honestly.

Trivia Time

Anyway, after that, I went down to Schooner Bar to do Scattegories. I’d never played before but the description sounded fun from the app. I love a good trivia game.

This time I was able to get a seat compared to the Disney trivia. The host of the game explained that we’d have to be in teams of at least two. At first I wasn’t sure who to ask but a woman sat next me so I asked her if she wanted to be on a team. She said yes and she had another friend coming so we’d be a team of three.

Here’s how scattegories works (according to Royal Caribbean staff): there are different categories laid out and then a letter of the alphabet. You have to find something in the category that starts with that letter.

So if the letter was “F” and one of the categories was “Sports” you could say, “Football”.

Now, the kicker was that if any of the other teams matched what you put down, neither of you got the point. It would only be given to the team that had the most unique answer. BUT the room also had to agree that it was viable answer.

Rounds

An example of one of our rounds was the letter “C” and one of the categories was celebrities. Now, the three of us were black women and honestly, there weren’t a lot of black people in that room. We’d come up with multiple possibilities but the two I remember are “Chris Brown” and  “Cassie”. We decided to go with Cassie because we figured the room wouldn’t have that answer. Just for context, Cassie is a singer (Me and U is my favorite song by her).

She was actually in recent pop culture/legal news (trigger warning – sexual assault) which was after the cruise.

The host, a non-American black woman, didn’t seem to know who Cassie was and almost didn’t let us have the point but the few other black people in the room vouched for us. They said, “Oh, that’s a good one.” Or “I should’ve thought of that.”

Another example in the “C” round was Disney Characters. We said Casper (which I looked up to confirm if he was Disney and he is). The whole room erupted and said he wasn’t a Disney character so the host took their word for it. I was so mad, haha.

More Trivia

You may have guessed that this game went on long. It was so long that it bled into the next trivia game which was naming 90s and 2000s songs. I was already planning on doing that trivia so it worked out for me and the girls. I stayed on a team with them along with some of their other friends that joined in.

We didn’t do as well with this one but it was still pretty fun.

Mom Rock Climbing

I went to find my mom after trivia. She was going to rock climb for the first time! Mom was having a lot of firsts during this cruise.

I found her as she was putting the shoes and harness on for the rock climbing wall. The person manning the gear both was explaining to her how best to climb. I also told my mom about my experience of attempting to rock climb and how it required more arm strength than I expected.

Mom got strapped in and when she tried to climb the wall, well… let’s just say she had a hard time. She had trouble getting a good grip and footing, and then she fell down…twice.

I’m not gonna lie, I laughed but I also made sure she was okay. The person supervising the wall looked annoyed which I didn’t appreciate. She didn’t even try to help my mom up or check on her. Even though she fell, Mom got back up and tried again on a different wall. I was proud. Though she didn’t get far on the other wall, she still tried.

A man who had climbed another wall before her told her she tried her best and then apparently gave her a pat on the butt as encouragement (I don’t see it that way to be honest and it made me uncomfortable, but that how my mom interpreted it).

Since my fear of falling kicked in last time I rock climbed, I didn’t even try to do it this time.

The Final Hours

For the rest of the day it was pretty chill, we relaxed in the room and tried to make sure we were checked-in for our flight the next day and prepped for disembarkation.

During our last dinner, there was Italian cuisine. I got some arancini for an appetizer, which is Italian rice balls (which was delicious), and for the entrée I went to Indian cuisine and got Spiced Lamb Kofta. It was so good but too spicy for me.

Because of my GERD and my stomach problems the whole week, I couldn’t handle spice well anymore even though I love spicy food. I didn’t finish it because I couldn’t take it anymore. Mom and I didn’t get dessert that night. We weren’t enticed by the offerings. I had to leave early anyway to grab us a spot for the final entertainment of the cruise.

I said goodbye to our waiters before I left and Mom stayed to watch the farewell the dining room had planned.

Grease: The Musical

For our final night on the cruise, they were showing a Broadway-style production of Grease, a musical set in the ‘50s. Of course because of the big name musical, it brought out the largest crowd. They said not to record or take pictures during the show so I obliged (even though other people didn’t).

The show was okay, good for the cruise but not at all how I remembered Grease (granted I’ve only ever seen the movie not the stage musical). They still sung the classics it was just how they got to them that made me confused.

We ended the night back in the room with our final towel animal being the frog.

I was planning on including day 5 since it’s just us going home but I will post that separately here.

That was our final full day at sea! How would you spend your last full day on a cruise? Trying to squeeze everything you haven’t tried? Eating food? Playing a bunch of trivia? Let me know in the comments!

The vlog for day 4 and 5 will be on YouTube Tuesday!