skoi13

9 hours ago, TwinMommyByGrace said:

Is there anyone currently on board (preferably on Westerdam) that can confirm if any, or all, of this things have been added yet? We sail on Westie 6/25 and would be excited by these additions. TIA for any current info!

Same for us. Especially curious about the brunch. I did some searching yesterday, and didn't come up with much. 

Thanks for the great information here and in the stickies at the top of the forum. Just finished reading through it. We're potential first time river cruisers, looking at an Avalon Christmas Market cruise for 2022 with time on our own in Budapest beforehand. We've done ocean cruises with our children (mainly Disney) and a lot of land based traveling, so this will be a first for us.

We're looking at two ships- the Passion and the Impression. The ships look pretty much the same, difference in color schemes (like the old Disney ships), but any opinions if one is preferable to the other? We're also considering (I am, husband is sold on Avalon)  an Ama cruise a bit later in December from Budapest to Nuremberg, but he's not feeling that one.

Hopefully things will be back to normal by then, it seems a long time away. 

Did you have staggered boarding-- did you have to pick a time beforehand? If so-- how far out did you get to do it? We're on the Magic for the first time in September. Glad you had a great time. We're looking forward to it.

Thanks for the great review. Considering a cruise on Magic this Fall. Dh will be thrilled to see Tandoor. I told him there wasn't one. Oops.

Thanks for posting. Will be sailing this same ship and itinerary soon. There are some nights that look great, others just good (IMHO), but there's no way we'll go hungry.

Thanks for the very complete review. We'll be on the Breeze (first time) this Fall and are looking forward to it.

Doing something similar in San Juan too. Glad to hear it is walkable and you had time.

Have been on the Dream and Sensation, besides that mainly Disney and one Princess cruise. We loved the Dream. Food was good (not as elaborately plated as other lines, but tasted good and was always a good temperature). Room steward was great--when he saw the kids liked towel animals he made extras, room was always done well. Dining room staff was friendly and efficient. Didn't do the shows, so no comment. We loved the Tandoor and pizza. Would sail her again, definitely, if she were closer to us.

We eat a lot of Indian food, even try to make it ourselves (note-- samosas are a lot of work, I'm buying them frozen from now on). We had it on the Dream and it was great. Funny thing-- every day when husband and I would drop by to pick up something there'd be a bunch of Indian officers (mainly engineering) there getting food too. So we figured it had to be pretty good.

If you've never had Indian-- give it a try. It's a cruise. If you don't like it, you can get something else.

Thanks for the review. Looking at booking on Sunshine in 2015.

Have been looking around for the form-- any idea where to download it? Thanks.

Thanks for the update. We board May 12 and were a little worried when we heard about the power issue.

Thanks for sharing the sites and apps. I'm not thinking we'll see them, we'll have to come up another time and go further north, but it would be great if we did.

Thanks for the information. I know it's a long shot (and I mean like a near impossibility) but would love to see the Northern Lights on our first trip to Alaska the second week in May.

Thanks. Will be sure to get tips for them, just in case.

We'll be leaving for an Alaska cruise shortly and plan to hike in one of the ports. Any idea if we'd be restricted from packing a pair of trekking poles in checked bags, and/or getting them back onto the ship in port?

Thanks in advance.

Thanks for the information on this thread, and to OP for starting it. Oldest ds and I will be taking our family's first Princess cruise in May, and I didn't even think about making magnets. We've cruised Disney in the past and we always go nuts with the magnets. Now that I know it's okay to do this on Princess, I have to get to work...

Our two 9 year olds went to camp until it closed most nights. Two of the nights they stayed for the Night Owl party (ended at 1:00 AM and I was passed out, dh had to go get them). We also watched a movie on the big screen one night (Hotel Transylvania on Halloween).

We did a closed loop Disney cruise back in 2008 while husband was deployed to Afghanistan. Went through the whole thing with writing up the letter, sending it to him, having him sign it and get one of the officers to notarize it, send it to the US, etc. With two biological kids and two adopted from China (was also advised to bring the entire adoption paperwork mess) I was ready for a paperwork nightmare. No one asked for anything once the passports were handed over.

Doing a solo trip on Princess with oldest son in May. Will still get a notarized letter just in case. Better to spend the 14 bucks rather than be denied boarding if someone thinks I might kidnap a kid who's six inches taller than me and looks like he's 20 because we spend one afternoon in Canada.

All this yapping to say-- better safe than sorry. If you can get the letter, do it. My experience is --and I took the two older kids to Morocco on one occasion and Europe alone no one asked for anything besides passports-- they don't ask. But you don't want to be the one person they decide to ask.

I'm sure this has been covered elsewhere, but quick question-- is there an age limit? I'll be cruising (high school trip-- we home school so each kid gets their own trip with evil teacher aka Mom) with ds aged almost 16, and he's keen on doing Chef's Table because we've traveled a lot, and we eat a variety of ethnic cuisines at home. If it makes a difference-- we're doing an 11 night to Alaska from SF on the Star. His heart is sort of set on this-- so hopefully we can attempt to book.

Thanks.

Phew...we are headed out on the Dream in 11 days and I am so glad to hear it! Thanks! XOXOXO

Make sure you ask for the phone and impress upon them you kid's needs. He had one issue-- which wasn't much of one-- they had something they made that most boys would treat as a sword for play-- well-- he lost his because they told us, "he hit another child"-- the boy he was sitting next to all friendly like watching a movie. I'm thinking-- after talking to him (with his limited speech skills) it was mutual combat, all in fun, but they didn't see it that way. Ehh, didn't matter. He didn't care. If he had been able to express himself better, it wouldn't have been an issue. But I loved the way they engaged him instead of letting him vegetate in front of the Wii. And yes-- bad parents-- we let him do that on Disney because we don't have one at home and figured, well it's his vacation too, if he wants to play video games in the club, let him. But on the Dream-- they really made the effort to work with him and get him engaged.

Youngest ds has several special needs-- some medical, some cognitive, some behavioral as a result of a rare genetic disorder. He's several grades behind in school, has a speech delay, articulation disorder, hearing loss, tendency to be inattentive. We too, were worried about putting him in Camp Carnival (we sailed right after he turned 9 last Fall) because we had read there was a lot of structure, planned activities, etc. We had cruised DCL previously and they just let him play video games the whole time he was in the club.

No problems with Camp Carnival. He had a blast. They gave us a phone in case they needed us, he needed us, etc. They got him involved in activities he would have never tried, and when he needed to stop, or do something else, they let him. This was on the Dream. Staff was great and it was the first cruise he came home with crafts, and talking about dancing and games, winning prizes, etc. He can't wait to sail again.

Just want to say a big thank you to all of the regular posters here-- esp Pam and a few others (you know who you are) for all the info on Princess, Alaska, etc. We're a homeschooling family, and since our kids would miss out on the "senior trip" decided to let them plan a trip (within reason in a one income family-- with income being a social worker) in high school.

Oldest daughter did a Disney Transatlantic and a few days in Amsterdam. Oldest son-- well-- after much reading/research and advice on this board chose a RT Alaska (he wanted more ship time-- I'd have preferred a one way but it's his trip, not mine) SF-SF on the Star mainly due to what he read here.

So thank you all for your years of experience and shared advice. I'll make a really good attempt to post a review when we get home (we're going in early May) but might take a while because we'll have school evaluations when we get back and that's a big deal.

Again-- thanks all.

We had older kids (two nine year olds one with special needs and a 15 year old) in CC on the Dream last Fall. They all had a great time. The staff was very good with our youngest son-- engaged him and got him to try activities he'd have never done on his own and he had a great time doing new things.

Hope you have a great trip.

I've sailed CCL twice (a short Sensation cruise with oldest dd and a family cruise last fall on the Dream). Most of my cruising experience besides these two is two short RCI cruises with my husband (Monarch right before she was retired to Europe) and the rest on Disney. We've done multiple seven days, a Med cruise (just me and oldest kids) a TA (just me and oldest dd for her grad trip-- we home school so we're flexible that way) and back to back on the Dream when she came into the fleet, a Fantasy cruise and repo from LA to Miami through the Panama Canal.

We sailed the Dream last fall (over Halloween) with some trepidation-- but the price with the military discount (husband was a reservist who deployed to Afghanistan for a year and got shot at, etc) sold us. We had a great time. Had worries about Camp Carnival with our special needs son. No problem-- Disney would let him vegetate in front of video games-- Camp Carnival engaged him in activities he'd never think to do on his own. He had a blast. Did ATD-- liked our staff well enough the first night and kept requesting them-- did a great job.

We're not big into shows, etc, just want to go to sea, enjoy the ocean, good food, warm water, etc. I don't know if we'd like less than a Dream class ship-- the Sensation was okay for a nice cruise but missed the promenade deck and place to sit out and look at the ocean.

Agree with the others-- Carnival delivers what I want when I book them-- low cost, good service, nice ship. What I found lacking between DCL and CCL-- (having to pay after hours for kid club), no one in the bathroom handing me paper towels, etc. Ehh-- it's not worth the 2-4 grand difference. I wish we'd have tried Carnival years ago. We'd have a lot more money in our savings account.

Thanks everyone!

 

He has a suit and a few blazers. Luckily he doesn't mind dressing up. I just wasn't sure to what degree kids dress up in the evening and I did not want to figure out a tuxedo for him--that just seemed over the top to me. ;) I'm just dreading the packing space for all of the extras.

 

I don't want to complain though. We are so looking forward to taking a cruise together! :)

I am counting the days...

Sounds great to me. Have a good time. We love cruising. Some kids dress, some don't. Like I said, ours love to dress up. Even the teen boy loves it. Of course when he was little he wore clip on ties with T-shirts everyday for about a year, so he's a little different. :p

I am more curious how many comments they got with the Angry Birds tie :). I think that attire is very appropriate for that age group.

Angry Birds tie-- our youngest ds would love that. On all of our Disney cruises they wore Disney bow ties we got off ebay.

And second Ethel5 for people with kids who don't have dress clothes-- resale/consignment/thrift stores can yield up some beautiful things, especially for kids.