Favorite Ship for Kids and Family

Thought I'd start a fun thread (and informative from people's experiences)

We selected Allure based on loving RCCL, price is right and so much for our kids who will be 10.5 and 6.5 years...but also lots to keep DH and I interested too.

What's your favorute ship for kids and why (and their ages)?

PS - I'm guessing the result will depend on the ages, but would love to hear

All of them!

My kids have cruise since they were 2 and 8 respectively and now are almost 11 and 17 going on their 10th???:o cruise in a few weeks! And at this point, my guess it is probably all blends together for them. But you know what has stood out the most? 1) The waiters - they MUCH prefer the early fixed dining. 2) the shore excursions - if you even mention Roatan they are all but begging and screaming to play with monkeys again. And don't dare utter the words "zip line" in our house or you will never hear the end of it.

We have done Carnival and Princess and they have found other kids to play with and things to regardless of whether is was a small ship like Fascination or a large ship like Caribbean Princess. So I guess for them more than the ship it is about the people and ports.

All of them!

 

My kids have cruise since they were 2 and 8 respectively and now are almost 11 and 17 going on their 10th???:o cruise in a few weeks! And at this point, my guess it is probably all blends together for them. But you know what has stood out the most? 1) The waiters - they MUCH prefer the early fixed dining. 2) the shore excursions - if you even mention Roatan they are all but begging and screaming to play with monkeys again. And don't dare utter the words "zip line" in our house or you will never hear the end of it.

 

We have done Carnival and Princess and they have found other kids to play with and things to regardless of whether is was a small ship like Fascination or a large ship like Caribbean Princess. So I guess for them more than the ship it is about the people and ports.

Cool, your kids are lucky to have cruised so much. Interesting that the service is one of the most important things. By zip line, do you mean on an excursion or on a ship (not sure if ships other than Allure/Oasis have that)?

And Princess has stuff for kids? When I searched, it seemed like one of the least kid friendly in terms of stuff for them to do.

My kids and family has travelled on Allure/Oasis

And Princess has stuff for kids? When I searched, it seemed like one of the least kid friendly in terms of stuff for them to do.

Princess has an outstanding kids club program. They even allow parents to take children under 3 into the kid zone during kids club hours. Their staff helped my two year old participate in arts and craft projects. I was very impressed by the developmentally appropriate activities they offered within the kid zone, and the dedication of the kids club staff. The kid zone hours are better than NCL, since they are only closed for 1 hour for lunch and 1 hour for dinner. There was a tiny outdoor playground with bikes and a tiny splash pool that was the perfect size for a two year old on the ship.

The older princess ships certainly lack the bells and whistles of the family friendly lines - there are no water slides, arcades or bumper cars. Also, if you aren't sailing during school holidays the line tends to attract much older passengers (there were only 11 children on my Panama Canal cruise in January). These factors might not be great for older children, but if you have a young toddler it's great to know that your child will get a lot of individual attention from the outstanding kids club staff. I don't know if the Regal/Royal have added a lot of child friendly amenities, but I can say that families should consider Princess depending upon what is most important to them (at 2 we didn't want to drop our son off, so the parent supervised drop off program was perfect for our family, and the small number of children meant that the staff was able to pay the few kids on the cruise a lot of attention. Our son was too little for things like bumper cars, so it didn't matter.).

Wow, great to know about Princess. They should advertise these things as I did look at their site and dismissed it as I didn't see any kid friendly stuff (aside from a kids club but I was looking more for things we could do together). Had no idea that some of them have bumper cars, slides.

Great to hear someone mentioned Allure/Oasis. That is the one that we picked (it was between that or Disney but Disney was $2000 more). Looks like so much to do on them and they are really trying to attract families with the amenities and things like bringing on DreamWorks with festivals and parades.

We've been on the Carnival Paradise and Carnival Dream. Both had amazing kids programs. Our kids were 4-8 years during these cruises. My kids loved the waterworks on the Dream. We will be cruising Carnival Sunshine this February and we chose it for the waterworks and rope course.

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So far for us it's Disney, hands down. Their programs don't shut down at lunch and dinner as other lines do. They have almost a whole deck just for kids. And if your kids want to stay instead of having dinner with you they do help insure your kids eat something,and are cautious with food allergies, DS has one. And, if I remember right the clubs have extended hours without you having to pay extra. But Disney is expensive. Most likely because they don't have a casino, have such a great kids program and characters always somewhere. You can catch them coming and going from a door between the kids area and theater. Did I mention their shows are way better and you can CARRYON hard alcohol and beer, and free soda too. Just sayin'.... :D

I'm sorry LuCruise - the princess ships (at least the older ones) do not have water slides, arcades or bumper cars.

I meant to explain that if a family's primary consideration is the kids club, they should consider Princess since their staff is excellent, and the hours were very good, since it is only closed for an hour at lunch and an hour at dinner. For younger children who nap, 2 hour closures at lunch and dinner (which is the case on NCL) can cause a lot of difficulties if your child wakes up and wants to go to the kids club and it is about to close. For our family, the Princess cruise to the Panama canal was a great combination of having help with our two year old with excellent ports for the adults. So I wouldn't completely rule the line out of consideration if the kids club and itinerary are the things that are most important to you.

We honestly haven't yet sailed enough kid friendly lines to know which boat is the best for children, as we had been choosing itineraries primarily based upon ports. In the future (I'm pregnant) we will be sailing with RCL and Disney since we will need drop off nurseries for young children, and then I'd feel qualified to pick a best ship.

I'm sorry LuCruise - the princess ships (at least the older ones) do not have water slides, arcades or bumper cars.

 

I meant to explain that if a family's primary consideration is the kids club, they should consider Princess since their staff is excellent, and the hours were very good, since it is only closed for an hour at lunch and an hour at dinner. For younger children who nap, 2 hour closures at lunch and dinner (which is the case on NCL) can cause a lot of difficulties if your child wakes up and wants to go to the kids club and it is about to close. For our family, the Princess cruise to the Panama canal was a great combination of having help with our two year old with excellent ports for the adults. So I wouldn't completely rule the line out of consideration if the kids club and itinerary are the things that are most important to you.

 

We honestly haven't yet sailed enough kid friendly lines to know which boat is the best for children, as we had been choosing itineraries primarily based upon ports. In the future (I'm pregnant) we will be sailing with RCL and Disney since we will need drop off nurseries for young children, and then I'd feel qualified to pick a best ship.

Good to know as Princess does have these things. Too bad they don't advertise more. I'm even biased to Princess as it was my first cruise love (i.e. I loved the show Love Boat as a child and my dad even took me on a cruise for my university graduation because of it :D ...but on RCCL)

Great to hear too that they have such a good kids club. For us, this is a family vacation and so I'm hoping we'll spend lots of time the four of us together (we have 2 kids). But having said that, I don't mind if they want to spend a couple hours a day in the kids club if that's what they'd like.

Congrats on your pregnancy! Yeah...I've been on both Disney and RCL. RCL was before kids, but Disney definitely is a great one for kids. And we're looking forward to Allure this time around as both are very kid friendly.

I want to take the kids on the Oasis/Allure. They loved the H2O zone and Kids club on the Freedom but there's a few extras (carousel, water show) that I think they'd like on the Oasis too. Disney is on our list for one day but the price is a little restrictive.

Cool, your kids are lucky to have cruised so much. Interesting that the service is one of the most important things. By zip line, do you mean on an excursion or on a ship (not sure if ships other than Allure/Oasis have that)?

 

And Princess has stuff for kids? When I searched, it seemed like one of the least kid friendly in terms of stuff for them to do.

My kids have cruised twice in princess and yes, my younger now 10 when he cruised Alaska this past May and 8 when we did CB southern route in March, prefers princess over Carnival. There may be have been fewer kids total but I'm not sure that's a bad thing. My teen gives the nod to carnival, but still met friends and had fun both times,

And by zip line, I mean the excursions....but we are trying the Sunshine in a few weeks and I am pretty confident my youngest will live on the slides and in the sports square and ropes. We have never spent the extra money for the bells and whistles on RC or Disney and don't feel that we have missed a thing. Each cruise has been great.

We picked NCL due to location and price. My kids (5 and 12) had a fabulous time in the kids club and throughout the ship. We sailed on the Jewel out of Houston.

We have sailed with our girls on carnival-Glory, Ecstasy, and Elation. The kids liked all of them. They loved camp carnival. We are taking our first cruise with NCL this summer so I hope they like it as well.

We have sailed with our girls on carnival-Glory, Ecstasy, and Elation. The kids liked all of them. They loved camp carnival. We are taking our first cruise with NCL this summer so I hope they like it as well.

Enjoy your upcomming trip. I've heard NCL is great too.

The slides on the Carnival ships look like so much fun too.

We just love to cruise in general. We've tried Carnival (amazing value), Royal (fabulous ships), NCL (loved the freedom of freestyle cruising) and Disney. Surprisingly, my only complaint about a Kids Club was Disney as the club was too busy that there was no personal attention for the kids. It wouldn't stop me from sailing them again though.

We'd like to try Celebrity and Princess next.

We took DS1 on the Freedom when he was two and a half. He loved the H20 zone and the western itinerary was perfect for us! Labadee was great for kids playing the water and having fun on the beach.

My 5 year-old loves Princess. We cruised the Royal Princess twice (once for 7 days and the next for 26 days). Great indoor/outdoor club. Great activities, arts and crafts, and personalized attention. We've also cruised Disney twice. Clubs are great but chaotic. Good this about Disney is the club stays open all day - no closures. They will feed your child lunch and dinner, if required. Princess closes down for an hour during the early afternoon for lunch and an hour or so between 5pm-6pm. However, there are a few nights where Princess will have a kid's dinner, etc. I prefer the Princess clubs. Kid loves both equally.

It really depends on your family's personality. We like "down" time. The kids have been on Carnival ships with waterslides. They have no interest in rock climbing. They have no interest in the huge RCI ships. Hands down they prefer Princess for the more quiet and laid back atmosphere. We have cruised during peak times with loads of kids and off peak with a handful of kids, on various lines. ( see my signature below) They've spent tons of time in all the kids clubs and all over the ships. They still prefer Princess.

If your family wants lots of activities to do to keep busy then a ship with more may be better for you. If your family likes less to do on vacation then princess will be fine.

I asked my kids and we all agree - Disney Magic is our favorite. BUT.. We do tend to travel longer, off peak cruise so there aren't as many kids.

We loved Norwegian Getaway for us (Dad, Mom, 9 yr old boy). Perfect balance of kid time, family time, and couple time. The Splash Academy for kids was awesome. Staff were great and they put on a circus/juggling show on the main theater stage. Lots of theme parties in the Splash Academy. Plenty of fun on the ship - great magic show (illusionarium) ropes course, rock climbing, kids pool area, great slides, etc.. He loved being at the Splash Academy so much he wanted to be there all the time so that gave us plenty of time at the Spa and quiet dinners and some nightlife.