Allure with 1 year old

We will be cruising this summer with a 1 year old on allure. I had a few questions for any experienced family cruisers...

- am I right in reading that we don't necessarily need a passport for baby? (since its a closed loop cruise). Do you think its worth getting one for him anyway?

- Carseats, we will be having him on our lap on our flight. Is there any service in Ft Lauderdale, where we could get transport from airport to hotel, hotel to port that would provide a carseat? It seems like a lot of effort to bring it and have to store it in the cabin...

- Stroller - I love my city mini GT, but would this be totally unusable on the ship? It has nice wheels for beach etc and walking around in port, but I'm worried about ship time. Should I just get an umbrella? I'm not going to bring two! I don't think...

any other tips etc?

You don't technically need a passport for the 1 year old. We got one for both our boys when they cruised at 16 and 18 months. We wanted it for the peace of mind if something were to happen and we had to fly back to the US.

We always buy a seat for our kids and bring their car seats on the plane. They behave much better in their own familiar seat. I would be leery of rental seats or seats provided by companies. You don't know the history of the seat to be sure it wasn't in a crash. Also you don't want to end up with an expired seat. Or one not appropriate for your child's age or size.

I think the GT would do ok on a cruise. I would be worried about the airline damaging it though. I brought our GT double to Disney and used the travel bag and it did fine. So maybe consider a bag just to protect it. When we cruised a few weeks ago I just bought a cheapie umbrella off Craigslist so I didn't have to worry about it getting trashed by the airline. It did ok. Not too well at the beach on the sand but I think you need a stroller with big air tires to do well on the beach.

You don't need one for anyone on a closed loop cruise. I wouldn't spend the money on something that isn't required. There will always be those that I feel must be getting some sort of "kickback" from passport purchases, since they are adamant that you MUST get one! The cost is soooooo worth it, they say! Well, unless you'll be traveling where a passport is necessary, I'd forgo the cost.

We took DD on Allure at 2 years old last year.

Even though we didn't have to, we got her a passport. It was worth the piece of mind and we plan to travel with her as a child so we felt it was a good investment.

We did not take a car seat on the cruise. Since we live 3 hours away we drove to the port so we didn't have to worry about transportation in Ft Lauderdale. Some hotel shuttles don't allow car seats and there are shuttle companies that you can arrange transportation with a car seat in advance. First, I'd check with your hotel to see what kind of shuttles they use (if car seats are even allowed). If you would need a car seat for the shuttle (you would need one for anything other than a bus), then find a shuttle company that provides transportation with car seats and make advance arrangements. Another option would be to rent a car for a day and rent a car seat with the car. Then take cruiseline transfers to the port (motorcoaches--no car seats). I know many on here will disagree with you not taking the car seat, but I'd do the same thing as long as I could work out transportation in advance. We had no need for a car seat on the cruise (didn't leave ship in Nassau, stayed in port area in St Thomas & planned to take water taxi in St Maarten until the weather changed our plans).

We took a cheap (Target) umbrella stroller. Being that DD was 2 & walking everywhere, we didn't use it much. With a 1 year old I'd definitely want a comfy stroller, but would be concerned with taking anything too nice/expensive because of potential damage.

Make sure to register at the nursery on day 1. You can pre-book some time then if you want, but even if you aren't ready to do that you'll get the registration paperwork done & get your ship phone.

Cartons of milk are out at the breakfast buffet. We'd pick up a few to put in the fridge in the cabin for later in the day.

There is a small toddler miniature golf area next to the main one that DD loved. The splash area for non potty trained is small, but littles looked to be having a lot of fun. I was glad we got DD potty trained before going because that area is right next to all the other kids water areas & she would have fought like crazy to try to get to the bigger area. You probably won't have to worry about that as much with a 1 year old.

Have a great time!

You do not need a passport for him since it is a closed loop cruise. We are sailing next month and our son will be 9 months. Seems silly to pay for a passport for him BUT for me, it's peace of mind.

We are doing lap for the plane as well and for our airport to hotel transfer we rented a private car. They provide the seat free of charge for us. For the shuttle from hotel to port we will put on lap unless i can find a cab service that has carseats, which I prefer. (we're going out of port canaveral)

I'd do an umbrella stroller with a canopy. When you're in the sand, it'd be a lot lighter to fold up and carry while one of you carry baby :)

If you have AAA and you book a car through Hertz you can get a free car seat with your rental.

http://www.aaa.com/AAA/common/travel/car/Hertz/HertzAAAMemberBenefits.html#hertz3