3 and 6 year old girls -1st cruise

:D We are a family of four with 2 little girls ages 3 and 6.

Hello cruisers, my family and I are embarking on our first cruise. The 14 day crown princess cruise starting August 18th in Athens and ending in Rome.

I got a few questions since it’s our first cruise.

1, can we purchase food off the ship to eat for lunch during our excursions? since our girls are picky with regional foods and might be more accustomed to the traditional “American meals” from the ship.

2.Have your kids ever had sea sickness in the Mediterranean ? My girls do very well with other kinds of motion but just in case, What has worked for your kids if they felt yucky?

3. And lastly, where did your kids spend most of their time on the ship? Kids clubs, pool, playing sports?

Well, thank you for your input in advance, and any additional tips would be welcome.

Have a blessed day! ;)

Only prepackaged food will be allowed off the ship, so you might want to bring your own. This is due to agricultural laws of the places you are visiting.

That's true...only "Pre-packaged" food items allowed OFF the ship.

Your kids are at the perfect ages to enjoy the clubs. Go on the 1st night, when everyone is "new", and your kids will love it! I think the kids are a bit too young for "playing sports" on the sports deck. Of course, you can take them to the pool with you. The kid's clubs do NOT take the kids swimming...too much liability...so that's up to the parents to do.

Ask your pediatrician what meds would be best for the kids...IF they need something.

Europe is not so obsessed with taking food off of the ship as we are in the western hemisphere. Your ports are likely mostly all in the Eurozone, food served on the ship is loaded within that zone, and there is free transport of food across borders. I would wait for answers from members who live in Europe, or have actually cruised Europe recently. EM

My boys have always loved the kids club and agree that they should go to the meet and greet the first night.

The thing we found most helpful at this age was to either have fixed dining, or go at the same time and ask for the same wait staff. We asked ours to have some fruit and milk ready for the kids when we arrived - kept them from filling up on bread. They had their entree while we had appetizers, dessert while we had entree, and one parent walked the kids to camp while the other remained in the MDR and ordered dessert. Our kids were able to handle an hour long dinner and were happy to behave with the promise of kids club at 7. It made for a great family dinner and a relaxing couple's evening.

Europe is not so obsessed with taking food off of the ship as we are in the western hemisphere. Your ports are likely mostly all in the Eurozone, food served on the ship is loaded within that zone, and there is free transport of food across borders. I would wait for answers from members who live in Europe, or have actually cruised Europe recently. EM

This very well may be the case. However, make sure you get some concrete answers before just carrying food off board. There have definitely been some stories of people being hit with fines for being caught with food.

Also, kids club will vary with your children's personalities. We sailed last year with our 7 year old and 3 year old. Our oldest loved the kids club and was asking to go back. Our youngest always wanted to stay with us. We got him there twice, but he fussed going in each time. He settled quickly after we left and seemed to be having fun when we returned. We just went into it knowing that there would be fussing from him. He is the same way about daycare though, so this was no surprise.

Otherwise, we played mini golf, went to the pool, went to the movies, watched the parade our ship had, etc. We looked through the schedule each day and always had something interesting to go to. While we were on a different line, I imagine it will be the same way on Princess.

Have a great time!!

My parents and brother only eat American food, and they were able to easily find that in all the ports we visited in the Mediterranean.

You will be able to at least take off boxed cereal from the ship, which you should do in case your kids need snacks. You might want to keep fruit and yogurt in your room so they’ll always have snacks.

DD was a selective eater when she was young - it was easy enough to get fruit, plain pasta, nutella snack packs, etc. while in port. We generally grabbed a box of cereal on-board from breakfast buffet for "emergency" but rarely was it used. I would also bring some of those individual almond butter packets with from the states to make an apple or roll into a meal as needed.

You may want to "bulk up" at breakfast. The buffet and other alternate dining options will be open when you get back on board, and it works to do a light snack immediately upon returning to ship (particularly if on-shore dining proved problematic).

DD had motion sickness issues on small boats (including tenders) -- back of the boat and some candied ginger is all we ever needed on tenders. Never had an issue on board the ship.

We are thinking about taking our grandchildren (boys) (ages 4 & 7) on a European cruise next summer. I was wondering how your cruise worked out. What did you do in port? They love cruising so I'm not concerned about the ship just the ports? Hoping they won't be bored in Europe.

Thanks so much for any info you can give.

Stbogey are you taking your grandkids to the med? I can help if it’s the baltics or Norway (took kids there at the ages of 3 and 6 and 2)

My kids spent most of the time in the kids club and loved it. We also did the various ship activities such as mini golf, went to the pool, played table tennis, rock climbing wall. Really depends a lot on the ship. They will have a great time either way. Our kids always ask to get back on the boat.

Here are some general tips we’ve written on cruising/traveling with kids.

https://thesmallworldfamily.com/2018/08/24/5-ways-to-lower-stress-when-traveling-with-kids/

 

Here are some general tips we’ve written on cruising/traveling with kids.

 

https://thesmallworldfamily.com/2018/08/24/5-ways-to-lower-stress-when-traveling-with-kids/

Your blog is the bees knees! I have genuinely learned more from reading your blog for the last couple hours than I have doing weeks of research! Thank you thank you thank you!

Your blog is the bees knees! I have genuinely learned more from reading your blog for the last couple hours than I have doing weeks of research! Thank you thank you thank you!

Thank you for the kind words and if you know any other families traveling let them know to check out our blog. We try to post 2-3 articles per week but are on a two week Transatlantic right now and internet on ships is expensive. Please don’t hesitate to give us suggestions for future articles!