Cruise Lines

[Nickel]

Why wait... we just went during the summer and took our almost 4 year old.

He had a freaking blast. So did we. There is so much for the kids to do. You can enrole them into disneys daycare. They will watch the kids for as long as they want to stay, or you can be away from them.

Plenty of activities for adults in the meantime.

Just for argument's sake, did you have to obtain a passport for the little one? Is he your only child? I don't like the idea of trusting my "heart outside my body" to strangers.

 

[Elle]

Just for argument's sake, did you have to obtain a passport for the little one?

No, the same rules apply to children as they do to adults, no passport necessary for water travel to Mexico or Caribbean until now January 1, 2008. You are supposed to have proper birth certificate and 1 other photo id but we didn’t have an id card made for T-man and he was never questioned.

 

[Elle]

Is he your only child? I don't like the idea of trusting my "heart outside my body" to strangers.

Maybe it was just RC but on day one there is a meet and greet thing where parents and kids go to meet the staff. All the staff went through training and I felt very comfrotable leaving mine there. Besides I was always just a couple of floors away, we never left him onboard while we were in ports, although this allowed for a price.

 

[LordStanley]

Just for argument's sake, did you have to obtain a passport for the little one? Is he your only child? I don't like the idea of trusting my "heart outside my body" to strangers.

Passport.... Not when we went. That law goes into effect Jan 07, but I dont think someone his age needs one. I could be wrong.

And yes he is my only... even if i had 4, I would still do the same.

Disney puts and wrist band on the child before the start of the crusie. Its plastic so it will last the whole time. It has your childs name, stateroom number and parents name. They give the parents a pager. if child is ready to be picked up or something happens, they page the parents. (ie potty accident)
When you go to pick them you have to carry ID to check them out. And also they make you provide a secret password before the start of the trip. So you give ID and password at the same time

My wife, myself and my parents were the only one that could check him in and out.

It is very safe and secure. better then I most local day cares

As for trusting you child with strangers, thats up to you. I guess your a stay at home mother and doesnt get sitters when you and hubby want to go out.

The people that watch the children are top notch. Disney wouldnt hire anyone less then that. They do more extensive back ground checks then the government does.

I trusted my child with them, and so did the rest of the 750 parents on the same cruise.

 

[LordStanley]

Maybe it was just RC but on day one there is a meet and greet thing where parents and kids go to meet the staff. All the staff went through training and I felt very comfrotable leaving mine there. Besides I was always just a couple of floors away, we never left him onboard while we were in ports, although this allowed for a price.

Disney allows you to leave your children on board if you disembark with out them. When we stopped in Key West, we took the trolly tour. Our Son was with us the whole time. when we got done whe was bored and wanted to go play with the kids. We took him back to the ship, checked him in and went back out for a few hours.

They keep the younger kids in side the ship at all times. Only time the may go outside is when the Counsolers are taking them to get lunch or dinner.
they take them in small groups and usually have 1 adult per 5 kids.

None of the sitters are under 18, Cant work on the ship anyhow if your younger..... Most we delt with were over 21 and mostly female. My boy had a crush on one. Here name was stephanie. talk about being glued to her hip

 

[Elle]

Passport.... Not when we went. That law goes into effect Jan 07, but I dont think someone his age needs one. I could be wrong.

Not that it matters but they've changed it again and it's now Jan 08.

 

[Elle]

Disney allows you to leave your children on board if you disembark with out them. When we stopped in Key West, we took the trolly tour. Our Son was with us the whole time. when we got done whe was bored and wanted to go play with the kids. We took him back to the ship, checked him in and went back out for a few hours.

We did the train tour here which I thought was better than the trolley b/c you could get off at any of the 15-20 stops and get back on when ever you wanted. The train drivers were hilarious, told us everything we'd went to know and more about the places we'd drive past all the while cracking jokes and keeping a constant monologue when there wasn't really much to see. I don’t think it was worth the $60 it cost for the 3 of us but I wanted a picture of us at the southern most point and since it was 105 that day we weren’t walking it.

 

[LordStanley]

We did the train tour here which I thought was better than the trolley b/c you could get off at any of the 15-20 stops and get back on when ever you wanted. The train drivers were hilarious, told us everything we'd went to know and more about the places we'd drive past all the while cracking jokes and keeping a constant monologue when there wasn't really much to see. I don’t think it was worth the $60 it cost for the 3 of us but I wanted a picture of us at the southern most point and since it was 105 that day we weren’t walking it.

we did it just to say we did... Your right about it being over priced. Next time we will just rent a couple scooters for the day.

 

[Elle]

we did it just to say we did... Your right about it being over priced. Next time we will just rent a couple scooters for the day.

See, this is where Nickel’s thing about kids comes up; if you take them you are really limited on your excursions. For anything adventurous you have to be at least 8 most of the time 12 or 16. But we sat down and looked at all the excursions at each port and found fun things that would appeal to the entire family.

 

[LordStanley]

See, this is where Nickel’s thing about kids comes up; if you take them you are really limited on your excursions. For anything adventurous you have to be at least 8 most of the time 12 or 16. But we sat down and looked at all the excursions at each port and found fun things that would appeal to the entire family.

exactly....... We did the dolphin swim with our Son in Cozumel. It was fantastic

Since my mom doesnt snorkel, she stayed on the ship with our son when we went snorkeling in the Grand Caymens.

I'll tell you, we tried to take our son everywhere we went. (On the Ship or in port.) But all he wanted to do is go to the Oceanears club and play with the kids. worked for us. as long as he was happy... Mommy and daddy will be at the bar

 

[Nickel]

I think most cruise lines have this now. I know on our RC sailing my son begged us morning, noon, and night to go to the kids club. I think we had a family dinner together in the dinning room maybe 3 of our 9 nights. This was nice b/c hubby and I had lots of time to enjoy our vacation and not feel guilty about him not being with us b/c he obviously enjoyed being in the kids club.

Royal Caribbean has a lot of information out there, and gets high marks for their children's programs. Carnival doesn't have any information at all on their website about Camp Carnival, and their prices are slightly higher for comparable cruises. I don't know, this might be something I'd consider. His birthday is in March, and that would be a nice experience for him.

 

[Gummie]

Another thing about RCCL and their childrens programs, on our cruise one of the entertainments was a program put on by the children themselves. Songs and maybe skits for the older kids. This show was open to all on the ship so it just wasn't Johnnies proud parents in the audience.

 

[Wenchy]

Nickel

I had the best time on NCL. I liked their "freestyle" dining, and the cruise director was not on the loudspeaker 24/7. I also liked the fact that there were no children.

There were plenty of offshore excusions to choose from, and the staff was incredible (smaller ships, but all the amenities)

Carnival was too glitzy and "programmed", plus all of the kids...UGH. I want a vacation.

If you EVER see me on a Disney Cruise, you know I have flipped my lid. Shoot me on sight if that ever happens.

 

[Elle]

Royal Caribbean has a lot of information out there, and gets high marks for their children's programs. Carnival doesn't have any information at all on their website about Camp Carnival, and their prices are slightly higher for comparable cruises. I don't know, this might be something I'd consider. His birthday is in March, and that would be a nice experience for him.

Although I don't think ours was long enough at 9 nights, you could try a shorter 3 - 5 night cruise with your little guy. We didn't want the added expense of flying so choose RC b/c it left from Baltimore (I know that doesn't matter b/c of your location but check and see who leaves from Norfolk ~ I think that would be the closest port to you). Also T is older than your little guy (he was almost 8 when we went this summer) but they break the kid's club down into groups his was 6-8 so I'm assuming your little guy would go into a 4-5 program, both groups did a lot of activities together though ~ maybe there weren't that many kids so they combined groups I don't know. Although our ship didn't have a water slide there were 2 pools ~ one for everyone and then one for adults only. Someone mentioned freestyle dining which is probably better when traveling with children but we had no complaints. If T didn't want to eat with us in the dining room (go to the kid's club) then we got him something at either the buffet or the pizza place and we went to dinner ourselves then hit up the casino before it was time to get him. Someone mentioned the cruisecrittic.com website; I highly recommend checking out their forums. They have tons of information on every cruise line and then seperate categories with threads for each ship, I'm sure you can find lots of information about the camp carnival there.

 

[Elle]

"programmed"

See, I loved the scheduled activities. There was always something to do and the staff made all of the activies even better. We played corney games, did scrapbooking, went to receptions/parties. But if we just wanted to chill we did that too, it was just nice to have the activities if we wanted them. And with dinner we choose the later option but if we were hungry or wanted something different there were 2 other eating options. I'd love to try a freestyle cruise so I can compare the difference. Since we took T with us it was a family vacation and the kids never bothered me, at the same time we traveled with a childless couple and they never complained about the kids either so maybe we just got lucky with our sailing.

 

[Nickel]

Although I don't think ours was long enough at 9 nights, you could try a shorter 3 - 5 night cruise with your little guy. We didn't want the added expense of flying so choose RC b/c it left from Baltimore (I know that doesn't matter b/c of your location but check and see who leaves from Norfolk ~ I think that would be the closest port to you). Also T is older than your little guy (he was almost 8 when we went this summer) but they break the kid's club down into groups his was 6-8 so I'm assuming your little guy would go into a 4-5 program, both groups did a lot of activities together though ~ maybe there weren't that many kids so they combined groups I don't know. Although our ship didn't have a water slide there were 2 pools ~ one for everyone and then one for adults only. Someone mentioned freestyle dining which is probably better when traveling with children but we had no complaints. If T didn't want to eat with us in the dining room (go to the kid's club) then we got him something at either the buffet or the pizza place and we went to dinner ourselves then hit up the casino before it was time to get him. Someone mentioned the cruisecrittic.com website; I highly recommend checking out their forums. They have tons of information on every cruise line and then seperate categories with threads for each ship, I'm sure you can find lots of information about the camp carnival there.

I thought about a shorter cruise (one that I'd actually want to go on), but after pricing one through Carnival, vs a 7 day through Carnival, the difference after airfare was really only a couple hundred dollars, if you can believe it. Plus I don't think I'd do anything shorter than 7 days, we had such a great time when we went, I couldn't imagine not having as many days. If I recall correctly, the only cruises that leave out of Norfolk are the Cruise to Nowhere, and the Bermuda cruises. Neither of which I'd want to take him on. He loves flying, so that would just add to the excitement of taking a cruise.

 

[tes218]

I would absolutely recommend Princess. We've been on three Princess Cruises, and will be leaving on January 6 for our fourth. They've all been to the Caribbean, but from others I have spoken to, all of their ships/destinations are first class. Good luck with your decision!!

I also love Princess. We took an Alaskan cruise for our honeymoon and the private balcony was great! We also loved the open eating times and not too many little kids.

 

[Elle]

I thought about a shorter cruise (one that I'd actually want to go on), but after pricing one through Carnival, vs a 7 day through Carnival, the difference after airfare was really only a couple hundred dollars, if you can believe it. Plus I don't think I'd do anything shorter than 7 days, we had such a great time when we went, I couldn't imagine not having as many days. If I recall correctly, the only cruises that leave out of Norfolk are the Cruise to Nowhere, and the Bermuda cruises. Neither of which I'd want to take him on. He loves flying, so that would just add to the excitement of taking a cruise.

A lot of the longer cruises are cheaper if you figure it on a per day basis. If you can travel last minute (like 2 week notice) you can catch a steal sometimes for like $49 a person per day. I think I'd like to do a cruise to nowhere if it were just myself and hubby, heck T would probably even like it with as much fun as he had, but I think I'd rather go somewhere and do something if I were to pay that much for a couple of days on vacation.

 

[Nickel]

A lot of the longer cruises are cheaper if you figure it on a per day basis. If you can travel last minute (like 2 week notice) you can catch a steal sometimes for like $49 a person per day. I think I'd like to do a cruise to nowhere if it were just myself and hubby, heck T would probably even like it with as much fun as he had, but I think I'd rather go somewhere and do something if I were to pay that much for a couple of days on vacation.

I get periodic emails from Carnival with tons of great last minute deals, but with D being in the Navy (and on a ship), it's really not feasible to expect him to have leave approved with such short notice.

 

[LordStanley]

Disney is cleaner

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TRAVEL/12/11/sickcruise.ship.ap/index.html