Family Cruising

One of the most asked questions I get when talking to someone about cruising is "Is cruising good for the whole family?" and my answer is always a resounding "yes, absolutely, bring the kids" type of response.

Before our crusing days we always took the typical holday where we dragged the kids off to some city in North America and then dragged them all around the place beating ourselves out trying to entertain them and keep them happy.  This was rarely acheived!

We would end up back home totally exhausted wishing that we had an extra week to recouperate.

Well after our last such trip we agreed that this would be our final such excurision and the next trip was going to be either a cruise or an all-inclusive where hopefully we would be entertained instead of the entertainers.

We sat with several friends and over a period of a few months checked out some vacation options and ended up settling on a Disney Cruise aboard the Disney Magic.  This was the fall of 2003.

We travelled with four families on that trip and we were all first time cruisers so none of us knew what to expect.  Disney delivered as we expected/hoped.  From the beginning it was clear that their focus was on the kids, from the constant stream of Disney characters appearing about the boat willing to provide autographs and photo opps to the fantastic service by the waiters at mealtimes.  Dining with young children can be a chore at home but take them on the road and you could end up with some real challenges but supper time was a real joy with these guys.  The wait staff were well prepared to entertain our children like not even we could.  They would tell stories and jokes, make paper creations and I am not talking about paper planes here but small animals and other interesting characters.  It was a pleasure to see our children aged 6 and 8 order their 3 course meals without any help from us parents.  The kids were treated like real people.

As for activities there was a kids club on board and while the security was tight in that only preapproved parents/guardians could sign children in and out of the programs, just for an added measure of peace of mind they even provided the parents with a pager so that they could contact you if your child decided to end their activities early.

Anyway this was not meant to be a rant about Disney but it was our first experience cruising as a family and it certainly opened a much needed door.

Our next vacation was another Caribbean cruise but this time, as it was two years later, and we decided to go aboard Royal Caribbean's Mariner of the Seas (Disney is great but it is truly geared towards the younger set and for the next vacation we wanted a little more adult feel).  So this new ship brought along new worries that our children might be "bored"...ha not a chance.  Royal Caribbean knows how to entertain the family as well. 

With a full ammenity or activities including a Rock Climbing Wall and kids programs geared towards various age groups, they throughly entertained our children.  The fact that these programs are set by age is a good thing since you can relax knowing that your 8 year old won't be hangin' with the teens.  They are very strict with the ages as well because one of our friends had two daughters aged 6 and 8 and they couldn't attend the same group which was a cause for concern for the girls as well as the parents but they each joined their separate clubs to a resulting huge success as they each made fantastic friends.

The next cruise the following year was aboard the Carnival Legend and whad'ya know but we all had another great time.  There were lots of families aboard this ship and my children still communicate with some of the friends they made who came from all across the US and the UK.

So if you haven't figured it out by now we are hooked on family cruising and are after just getting off the Norwegian Sun we are already planning our next cruise through the Panama Canal...with the family of course.