Thread: Family Vacation

Originally Posted by CruiseArizona

I have to say that our cruise to Hawaii was actually a much more enjoyable family vacation than our 5 day trip to Disney World.

How do you feel about a cruise as a family vacation.

We think anything is more enjoyable than Disneyworld.:thumbsdow We feel a cruise is by far the best value for a family vacation.

Localady, I'd love to hear more about the HAL experience with your teens. We are going on our first family cruise this August on the Maasam which has the Oasis etc. Love to know what activities for the 15-17 aged range they did and what they would recommend or say to avoid. We have one son who will be 16 and one who will be 18 which is an issue as the teen area is up to age 17. I read somewhere that we could say he is 17 at checkin. It just wouldn't work if they couldn't hang out together. Any advice and info on the HAL for teens appreciated.

Our First Cruise we took the kids.. but they did not know they were going. We booked the trip in April 05 and the cruise was Last week of July.... We told our girls ages 8,12,13 (at the time) that they were going to Grandmaws house for the week. Everyone in town knew they were going with us. even the people at church. BUT noone would tell the kids.. my middle daughter was so mad at us for months. We had told her that we did not have the money to take them with us. So every time we went to store and got a soda she would gripe that we would have money if we would not waste it on soda...lol

The day of the cruise, we went to Galveston and told kids their uncle would meet us there to pick them up. Still had no clue they were going. (imagine me havomg to lie to them for months and then pack for them too,. so they would not know)

When we got to Galveston, we took them to the Port to "SHOW" them the ship we were getting on. and we pulled into a locked lot, and a police man was there so my huuby gpt out and asked him, if we could pull over and explained to him what we were doing, so he said yes pull over there (to other side) and then the Police man pulled behind us and turned on his lights and made us ALL get out of the car. We got out and walked to back of Truck and Handed the kids their luggage tags.... OH MY GOSH they were so EXCITED!!!! needless to say, we got I am sorry from the middle daughter...lol

This was the best FAMILY Vacation EVER. they had a blast!!!!

Jennifer

Hi, We just got home from a Mexican Riviera Cruise aboard the Diamond Princess with all six of our children and it couldn't have been better! We have children from 3 years to 16, three girls & three boys, so I we had kids in every age group and and everything went so well! Our 3 year old didn't want to go to his "class" at first, but then really enjoyed it later, so my husband and I still had plenty of "us" time, even with all the children. My daughters aged 8 & 10 lived for kids' club everyday, there were so many fun activities and they made some great friends. My older kids went occassionally to their age group activities, but also just enjoyed hitting the 24 hour buffet often and lying in the sun or in the pool. Shore excursions were great and we didn't lose anyone on the ship. I was sure we'd spend the vacation searching for kids, but it never happenned, the knew the ship better than we did in a few days. We have the whole experience a 10 and will definitely do it again!

It was so much better than the traditional vacation where you fly somewhere, spend so much time in the rent a car, always searching for parking and good restraunts etc. driving to your next activity... Everything is right there on the ship; transportation, great food, entertainment, relaxation, exercise & fun in the sun. A perfect family vacation in my opinion. Charlyn