Children on Celebrity

[K8T]

Hi

I was just wondering what your experiences are of having children on Celebrity.

We travelled when our daughter was just over two and to be honest, it wasn't great. All the kids were pooled together in one big room, no help with making sure kids had washed their hands etc. after using the toilet and the security was pretty bad, with the doors being left open to the rest of the ship.

The waiters and crew were great, but it wasn't easy managing a toddler with the lack of facilities.

However, our dd is 5 now and it would be a different experience and because of the new ship coming to Southampton, we are contemplating it again. Most of our cruises have been with P&O who have exceptional kids clubs and facilities, but we fancy a bit of a change!

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Kate

[Texed]

Originally Posted by K8T

Hi
I was just wondering what your experiences are of having children on Celebrity. Kate

Celebrity has an excellent kidd's program, IMO.

[Keith1010]

We always enjoyed the children's program on Celebrity when our children were young.

Keith

[harryfat1]

Originally Posted by K8T

Hi

I was just wondering what your experiences are of having children on Celebrity.

We travelled when our daughter was just over two and to be honest, it wasn't great. All the kids were pooled together in one big room, no help with making sure kids had washed their hands etc. after using the toilet and the security was pretty bad, with the doors being left open to the rest of the ship.

The waiters and crew were great, but it wasn't easy managing a toddler with the lack of facilities.

However, our dd is 5 now and it would be a different experience and because of the new ship coming to Southampton, we are contemplating it again. Most of our cruises have been with P&O who have exceptional kids clubs and facilities, but we fancy a bit of a change!

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Kate

You might also want to post this question at the “family” section to get the opinion of the folks on those boards. Look for Michelle’s link (aka Cruisinmam06) as she has the most complete set of kids program on her web site link (7 cruise lines).

We haven’t sailed on P&O, so can’t do a “let’s compare apples with oranges” exercise. I can only talk about our experience on the Infinity sailing to Alaska on 8/14 to 8/21. We have 2 boys (ages 6 and 8) that just completed their fourth cruise, so they are very familiar with the various kids club functions.

Celebrity’s kids program is very similar to other mass market ship’s program, they have face painting, arts and craft time, t-shirt coloring (make sure she attend the session on the very last day to get a free t-shirt to color) and kids talent show.

Since your daughter is 5, she will be in the 3 - 5 age group. Celebrity just recently revised their age grouping. Don’t know about P&O, but on Princess, they have a big age grouping of 3 to 7 as one group. I never felt that is right as there is a big maturity gap between a 3 an d 7 year old. Asking them to do the same activity seems odd.

My younger one (6 now), was on carnival last December and they had the age group of 2 to 5. He felt very bored as he had to deal with 2 year olds. He called them “babies”. He was much happier on the Alaska cruise now that he as in the 6 to 8 group and with his older brother. So don’t underestimate the grouping effect.

You inquired about sanitary conditions. With the Norovirus and H1N1 concerns on all the ships, all of the kids are asked to wash/sanitized their hands as soon as they walk into the kids camp. So at least they are cleaned when they walk in. What happens afterwards is anyone’s guess.

On our sailing on the Infinity, they said they had 380 kids (defined to be 17 or younger) that is eligible to be part of the kids program. Obviously the number changes every week, depending on your sailing schedule happens when kids are out of school. So at times, the facility seems pretty packed. But they are supposed to more or less divide up the kids into various sections at the appropriate times. Certain times all will be doing the same activity, so they will be grouped together.

I am sure the new ship will have a much bigger and newer kid’s facility, so others can comment on that.