12 Adults and 18 Children on the Oasis! 6/29/13 – 7/6/13

[alisatj]

Sports and Activities

 

We made it to everything as least once. I did the zip line twice and my kids each did it once. It’s a fun novelty, but it is a pretty quick ride. I went early in the week and then again later in the week. The line was definitely shorter earlier in the week.

 

My husband and daughters did the boogie board Flowrider. I had no desire to have water shoved up my nose, so I just watched and took photos ;).

 

Dh, I, and one daughter did the rock climbing wall. I went on the afternoon of a port day and there was really no wait. You have to have dry clothes and socks to do it. They give you shoes and a helmet. I was wearing sandals, so I borrowed dd’s socks when she was done – much to her chagrin. She was convinced I was going to ruin her suddenly favorite socks. Anyway, she relented, let me borrow her sock, and I only made it halfway and got stuck. Dh and dd both made it to the top though! I went a second time with my sister in law but they wouldn’t let me do it in my swimsuit. It was dry, but I had on a skirted bottom and they said it needed to have shorts under it. I think they didn’t want the harness rubbing me wrong. We had one crew member give more instruction than another. So I guess how much help you get depends on who’s running it that day.

 

The kids played ping pong and mini-golf quite a bit. I never tried those myself. But they enjoyed it. I guess we never played basketball. There was a pretty intense game of dodge ball going on in there one afternoon too.

 

The kids also went ice skating several times. I didn’t make it there either. Our almost 12 yo went with her cousins and skated without an adult. But then our 10 yo went and was told she needed an adult with her. I didn’t see in the Compass anywhere about age restrictions though, so that was kind of a surprise. Anyway, they really enjoyed that and went back quite often. Apparently, it wasn’t too popular and the kids were allowed to continue skating through more than one session. Don’t forget to bring long pants if you want to skate!

 

My 3yo’s loved the boardwalk. My ds always asked to go there. They enjoyed the carousel and the bus, car, and boat that are there to climb in/out of. It surprised me how much time they could spend there just climbing in and out of those things. We never made it there when there was face painting or balloon animals unfortunately. I would have liked to do that with them. But the times never seemed to work out for us.

 

Dh and 2 kids went to play bingo one morning. I think it was $35 for dh to play and there was a lower cost for the kids. But they ran out of kids’ cards and only one of them got one. The other shared dh’s cards. No win that day :(.

[alisatj]

The Ports

 

I didn’t even get off in the Bahamas. My husband took my older two girls off to do a little shopping, but they weren’t gone long either.

 

At St. Thomas we decided we’d go to the downtown shopping area. After seeing the shuttle prices at the port we decided to just start walking. Not long into the walk, a public bus stopped and offered us a ride for $1 a person. So we took it :). I got a necklace and pendant with the larimar stone which is unique to the Caribbean. It’s a really pretty blue color. And you can find it in just about every jewelry shop there. Anyway, it was a nice souvenir for a good price. We also got ourselves some cheapy sunglasses since we needed them and they were 2/$30. While shopping, I found the camera I wanted for $100 less than I can get it here/online. But I wasn’t planning on spending the money on the trip, so didn’t get it. Hopefully I won’t regret that! When we left the shopping area, we went looking for another public bus. On the way there we passed a smoothie stand and got one with mango and banana. It was really yummy and obviously fresh fruit. Then we found the bus stop and caught a ride back for $1 a person again. So we were pretty happy with how that all turned out.

 

That day we also chose to leave our 3 yo twins on the ship with Adventure Ocean. They will keep the kids all day and also take them for meals for no extra charge. My parents were still on board though so I was comfortable leaving them there. I don’t think we would have done that otherwise. We just gave my mom the AO cell phone and went on our way. We came back after lunch time and I went and picked them up and took them to the Boardwalk to play.

 

On St. Maarten we went to Maho Beach to watch the planes land. My brother went out of the official port area and scouted out a taxi for us. We ended up getting a van that would transport us all (22!) for $90 each way. That ended up being about half the price that each family would have had to pay for taxis/shuttles inside the port gates. We had the guy bring us back to port too. We told him to meet us at 1pm and he was there right on time. So that all worked out well. Had he not come back for us, there were plenty of other drivers there waiting for fares. So it wouldn’t have been a worry either way. We all enjoyed the novelty of watching the planes take off and land. We didn’t get to see too many big ones, but there was pretty steady air traffic between 11 and 1 while we were there.

 

It was quick and easy getting on and off the ship. We didn’t leave first thing in the morning and boarded well before sail away though. So I don’t know if you’d encounter lines at those times.

[alisatj]

Getting Everyone Together

 

The only thing we attempted to do as a group of 30 was dinner each evening. We had 3 tables in the early seating. We were in a room off of the main dining room which was probably good since we had so many kids to deal with. Dinner was generally pretty chaotic. It was difficult getting all the kids fed in time for AO to come pick them up. So we asked the waiters to bring the kids’ meals out all at once – apps, mains, and desserts together. That helped speed things up.

 

My parents reserved the Pinnacle Lounge for us to have a family reunion type event for about an hour one afternoon. I wish I had taken pictures of the room, but it was a really nice space. It’s deck 17 aft. So you have to use the aft elevators to get there. The forward ones only go to 16. Anyway, it had a great view, beautiful furniture, and was only lacking a grand piano J. I’m not sure what all the room is used for in general though but it was a nice space for us to gather and talk about family history, etc.

 

My father made reservations for all of the shows for us. So while we were all scheduled to attend the shows together, we didn’t HAVE to go. Usually most of us did though, so that was another chance to be together with the large group. Although it was sometimes hard to get so many seats together.

 

We also had a bit of babysitter sharing going on. Some of the older kids went and stayed in other rooms to babysit so parents of younger kids could go out later at night.

 

Otherwise, we split up into smaller groups sort of organically. Our rooms were all very close together so we’d make plans in the hall to meet somewhere. The kids also kind of grouped up by age and hung out together. We required that the kids not be out alone – they always had to at least have a partner. Having the cell phone from AO made communication a bit smoother too.

 

It seems that we’d often run into someone somewhere and end up doing things together that way. We escaped the stress that often accompanies traveling with large groups. Everyone felt free to do their own thing.

 

24 of us went to Maho Beach together. I think a large group also went on a tour of St. Thomas together – we didn’t do that one.

[tlatrice]

This has been great! Sounds like you guys had a wonderful time!

[alisatj]

Thought I'd try and finish this up (after a brief intermission :)).

 

Changing Clothes

Cruising with four kids made changing clothes each day into a part-time job. Play clothes, swimsuits, dinner wear, pajamas, etc. I think I packed everything my 3yo twins own and used most of it. They are your standard messy 3 year olds and nothing could be reworn. I would have really loved some self-serve laundry on the ship.

 

 

 

Formal Pictures

My dad wanted the whole family to pose for pictures on formal night. So we headed to the Promenade around 5:15 and waited for quite awhile. We were posed on a twisting staircase. I’m not sure if any of the photos turned out well or not. I know my 3yo ds wasn’t really being the best subject – he was more interested in looking over the railing on the stairway. They were also taking photos in front of a white background and a fake library-type setting. I figure if you’re on a cruise ship, you should probably use the real background in your photos. I didn’t see the appeal of the fake library thing, but people were using it.

 

 

Other Notes/Comments

 

One thing that really surprised me was the crew’s lack of knowledge about the ship and the programs. I guess I was expecting it to be like DisneyWorld. It seems like you can ask any CM there anything and they’ll know the answer. On the ship, the experience was very different.

 

- We asked our waiter about when/where the kids should go to be picked up by Adventure Ocean. He didn’t even seem to know that such a thing existed.

 

- We asked the bartender in the On Air if they would be holding family karaoke again during the week. He pulled out the Compass and told me they didn’t have it tonight. I knew that – I wanted to know if it would be coming up at all again during the week. He told me to check the Compass. I guess I thought they would have the same schedule week to week and he would be able to just say, it’s on Day 4, 6, and 7 or whatever.

 

- We asked two crew members if there was somewhere on the ship that we could take our kids to see the front of the ship. They could only tell us about the Solarium which we couldn’t take the kids to. They didn’t tell us about the observation deck on 14. I found that myself while in the solarium one evening.

 

- We asked our room attendant what documents the kids would need when getting on/off the ship in ports. He told us we’d need passports for that. I was fairly certain we just needed the sea pass card since that’s what I’d read on here. So it surprised me that he didn’t have been information about that.

 

Maybe I was being unfair in expecting crew members to know these things. I mean, it’s not like I asked guest services what the temperature was outside ;). But it really did surprise me.

 

We had a pretty long conversation with our waiter one night about the working on the ship. He’s been with RCI for 14 years. He had a 7 month contract and would then go home to Peru for 10 weeks. He said that other crew members who had worked for other lines, preferred RCI. We talked a little about the changes in the contracts recently, and he was surprised I knew about that and asked how I knew. The internet knows everything! He didn’t like the changes in the contracts and inferred that he would be making less money under the new system. He said he shares a room with one other person on deck 0. I asked where the cruise director’s room was and he sort of laughed, saying no, it definitely wasn’t on his deck! He works 10-11 hour days with no days off. Seemed that he got a couple hours here and there and that’s it. He says their food is not as good as the food we get, but it’s decent.

 

He told us that the captain has 10 week contracts and that the ship has two that switch back and forth. Maybe everybody on here knows all this stuff, but it was interesting to me J.

 

Also, my parents had a conversation with the ship’s landscaper – the man who takes care of central park. He said the Allure and the Oasis each have a head gardener and then they have a sub that takes care of both ships with the head guys are off. I think he works 30 weeks and then the sub comes in. But the sub doesn’t really take care of things and he always has a real mess to clean up when he gets back on the ship.

 

My husband had the soda package and really got good use out of it. I did notice that one Freestyle machine on the promenade was out of service essentially the whole week. I don’t know if he had any other issues with the machines.

 

 

And I think that wraps it up! Let me know if you have any questions. I'd love to do it again, but it will take some time for dh to forget what he didn't like about the trip :D. Then I'll work on convincing him to go again!

[hellsop]

We asked our room attendant what documents the kids would need when getting on/off the ship in ports. He told us we’d need passports for that. I was fairly certain we just needed the sea pass card since that’s what I’d read on here. So it surprised me that he didn’t have been information about that.

 

Were you just quizzing him, then? Or did you not remember well, and are disappointed that he knows no more than you do? "Need" might have been stretching things but having it along in a foreign port is often more useful than having it in a safe on the ship. Not knowing that you'd already looked up the answer, and giving a conservative answer that would safely apply to ALL ports without depending on his memory for the specifics of this one (where he may have never set foot past the secured port area) seems a sensible and wise plan.

[alisatj]

No, not quizzing him. I was having trouble finding the information in the Compass, remembered what I'd read here, and thought I'd ask him for verification since he was right there at the time.

[mattmom]

Subbing

[natrn]

I will be sailing on Oasis next month. I am also a vegetarian. Why did you avoid the Windjammer? In the MDR was your waiter considerate of your dietary preferences and did he suggest other dishes for dinner.