denas

I know somewhere I have seen detailed descriptions of all of the cabanas, but hoping someone can just tell me which ones would be best for our circumstances. My youngest son has multiple disabilities so trying to figure out a good option for us. We also have two other kids who clearly do not want to be too far from the "fun".

My son is 6 and while he can walk, we do use a pediatric wheelchair for distances so we would like something relatively close to a paved walkway to get back to the trams and to lunch, etc. His wheel chair collapses so we try not to use a HC accessible cabana as others have more mobility issues than he does!

We don't want to hear a lot of loud music (again this really bugs my little guy) so looking for somewhere generally not so loud. Music is fine/blaring music is not. We don't think we want to be as far away as possible from the action because (again) getting from point a to b is a little challenging.

Any recommendations on which cabana number we should request when we get onboard?

Thanks

the Grand Lucayan is not all inclusive

Where do you find $10 R/T transportation? Is this from cruise port to Grand Lucayan? I have a group of around 20 that are in Freeport for the day on a cruise and will be at the Grand Lucayan.

From my research, when you are at the port you pay the $10 and get a ticket for your return. At the Grand Lucayan when you are ready to head back, you show your ticket and they put you in the correct van/company to get you back to the port.

Do you have to arrange ahead of time to go to the grand Lucayan?

 

 

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It depends upon the time of year. Right now, they are not selling day passes at the gate (I emailed them last week) so the only way to get a daypass is to pre-purchase through shoreexcursions dot com. I think when they aren't full you don't need to pre-purchase. I decided that I just didn't want to take the chance and paid the extra $5 pp to pre-purchase passes.

My kids like other things besides sodas such as the non-alcoholic smoothies. I give them a daily limit for onboard expenses that includes whatever drinks they want beyond the freebies. You have to drink 2-3 sodas every single day (to include port days) to break even on the soda package which they aren't likely to do unless they drink a lot of soda and don't drink anything else.

Ok, call me crazy, but I am super excited to see that water on Carnival is only $3.99 for our next cruise! Just got off NCL Getaway, a 12 pack of water was $39.95!

This!!!

Someone upthread commented that this $1 increase on water was going to cause them to sail RCCL. They don't allow you to bring water onboard and charge $69 for a 24 pack of water.

Thanks everyone! Too bad the rules prohibit PVP recommendations. I scour this site for recommendations for hotels, tours, best cabins, even menu items. But the biggest decision you make is booking the cruise in the first place and they don't allow any recommendations on that one!!

So if I want to actually have a PVP help me with my upcoming cruise, do I just call the 1-800 number? Seems like once before I did this, and they had a PVP call me later and leave a direct number and I called her back at a convenient time. I am getting frustrated trying to book what I want online and then tried to go with a TA who managed to screw up everything (rate code, names and room type!) I went with a TA hoping to avoid spending a long time on the phone with Carnival, but no such luck.

Thanks!

Carnival does not have a excursion to LFK but they do go to Big French Key. Many people book this thinking they are going to LFK and are sadly mistaken.

Sorry, I meant Carnival had cancelled their excursion to Maya Key. That is the one we went to.

We are in a family suite in April, although one further forward..I don't think yours had the murphy bed? LOVE the pictures and info, thanks!

This one did not have a murphy bed, so I think it only slept 4. There are curtains around each of the distinct sleeping spaces. it was hard to get it all in a single picture!

We did get snacks every day. It was chocolate covered strawberries several times. The ones we got the first day were my favorite (we received them one other time). We also LOVED the espresso machine (once we figured out how to make it work). We didn't find the coffee anywhere on the ship very good so we made a lot of espresso in the room. I even made iced tea with it and it was great.

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]Day 1 - Embarkation and our Suite

We flew into Tampa the night before. We had to take a very late flight out, so didn't arrive until almost midnight. We opted to stay at the Marriott right at the Tampa Airport. This was great because we just got the luggage and walked across the airport to the hotel lobby and picked up our key. The room was very nice actually - had the higher quality Marriott amenities. The next day, we walked back into the airport and grabbed coffee at Starbucks and picked up a few toiletries I had forgotten. The Tampa airport has tons of shops and restaurants.

We caught the cab to the port from the Marriott lobby. They called a cab for us. It wasn't a regular cab so ended up costing a bit more, but it was nicer and closer to a hire sedan than a regular cab.

We got to the port around 11:30. Walked in and there were no lines anywhere. Checked in at the desk. I like how NCL swipes the card you want to use right at the desk. The last lines we sailed (RCI and Disney) require you to fill out forms with credit card info online then sign everything. The NCL process seems much more efficient (and safer since you don't give your numbers out).

We were escorted over to the concierge/suite area where we met Christopher the concierge. We asked for Teppanyaki reservations (since you can't do those ahead of time on the Star). One of the butlers than grabbed all of us to go on the ship. This was really funny!

We were instructed to hold up our keycards and "don't break the line". The butler than filed us around and ahead of everyone. At one point there was a little bottleneck and he informed us "we are going to insert now - don't break the line". We walked in front of everyone and to an elevator they were holding for us then straight up to Cagney's for lunch.

Embarkation suite lunch was at Cagney's, but all other breakfasts and lunches were at Modernos. Lunch was good. DH had the fish sandwich. I had a couple of bites and wanted to have it again later in the week, but we never made it back there for lunch! We also ordered our first drinks. They have a very extensive beer menu - but don't actually have most of the beers on board - there was a lot of running back and forth to the bar before DH finally found something they actually had in stock!

No one really told us when we could go to our rooms. We wandered the ship a bit, but then I was excited to see my room so just decided to head on over. Jennifer, our steward, was just finishing cleaning. Here are some pics of the room

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If you booked your tour you are fine. They don't care. We arrived by ship and were just planning on going to the park then once we were there we decided to book the manatee encounter. They gave us the same price (non-cruise ship price) even though we told them we were on the ship. We also got to spend about 45 minutes swimming with the manatees and the cruise ship people only got about 20. It was great.

We were just there last week. I love Chankanaab.

I had looked online and they have a couples massage package that includes a 1 hour massage, snorkel gear, and admission for like $160. DH wasn't sure he wanted a massage and I wasn't sure I wanted to book anything so we decided to wait.

When we got there, ladies were walking up and down the beach for the massages. They had 20 minutes, 30 minutes and 45 minute packages. The price for the 45 min was listed as $80. This is quite a bit more than the online prices, but you can't really book anything but the couples massage ahead of time. I said it was too much then she lowered the price to $60 for a 45 minute massage.

It is an open air, one room type place with 6 massage beds lined up. You pay first (credit cards don't incur a fee but cash incurs a 5% fee at all of Chankanaab park). She helped rinse all of the sand off my feet and was actually very careful to get it all off when I was lying down. A massage grinding in sand is unpleasant!

You lay face down. They don't really drape you like in the US with anything. It is regular massage tables with a face cut out and they do put a bolster under your ankles. She undid my bathing suit straps. Not sure what they do if you are in a one piece.

She massaged legs arms and back. You never roll over at all. She was very good and asked about pressure. Because it was mostly a 1/2 body massage, 45 minutes might be a little long if you are used to a standard US 55 minute full-body massage. There was no pressure for tips since you pay upfront.

Would definitely do it again, but probably only 30 minutes. Once they get close to filling the beds (which they did), I imagine you won't get a discount on pricing.

We also just returned from Roatan. We ended up choosing Maya Key because of our port times and cost. The NCL Star doesn't arrive until 11 am. Even though it doesn't depart until 7 pm, it is dark around 5:30 so not much to do on a beach after dark! We had read some recent reports that by the time you get off the boat, wait for others to arrive, drive to LFK, pay, and take the boat to the key it is close to 12:30 or 1 before you sit down on the beach. The latest you can really stay is around 4 or so because of the reverse trip and the fact that it is dark by about 5:30 this time of year. Plus LFK is significantly more expensive (Maya Key was $65 vs LFK which was $115 with the additional tax.)

We were there last week. It POURED on the day we were there and was pretty cold. You literally get off the ship and walk about 40 feet then pick up the boat to the Key. We were on the key and checked in by 11:30. Because the weather was so awful, Carnival had cancelled their excursion to LFK and half of the people on the NCL excursion ate lunch and went back so only about a dozen of us on the island.

We did snorkel. If you don't have your equipment it was $18 to rent gear. We have our own so not an issue. I liked Maya Key because you didn't need to take a boat out to snorkel. We walked to the end of the dock and got in. The water was much warmer than the air and it was raining, but this was by far the best snorkelling I have ever done! There were guides there if you wanted. The other family that toughed it out with us had two children ages 7 and 9 and the guide had a floating thing they held on to and he literally pulled them out through the reefs!

DH wanted to snorkel with the sharks and I opted to do the sea lion encounter. The combo pack for the shark snorkel and sea lion was $55 and they let us split it with each of us doing one activity. At the scheduled time, they said it was too murky to see anything for the sharks and refunded our money. I thought that was great since they could have simply taken our money and let us leave disappointed.

The sea lion was awesome! It was just me and I got to spend about 15 minutes petting him and getting pictures and getting kisses. I loved it. Unlike some places, you could take pictures with your own camera.

The fish at lunch was REALLY good! We also had a couple of frozen drinks for $8. another couple of ladies who braved the weather had a bucket of local beers (all different varieties). I think that was like $15.

You could head back whenever you wanted as the ferries were every 30 minutes. The last ferry was at 4:30.

Since I had a hard time finding prices for anything, hope that helps.

We just got back from the Star. I will try and post more and add pictures later.

We stayed in a suite for the first time. We were in Room 12030 a family suite. When we booked, we received the UDP, UBP, all gratuites and $200 OBC. With the value of the perks (amount we would spend on drinks and dining not the value the cruiseline says it was worth), it was only about $400 more than a balcony room.

The really neat thing about this room is that it is right at the bumpout so you have windows in two directions - sideways and forward. In fact, we could look right through the bridge and see officers on the bridge! The bad thing about the room is it is right below the jogging track. There were signs posted that the track was closed until 9am, but people started jogging around 6. We were up early, so not a real bothered but it is amazing how loud someone jogging on deck is. They also felt the need to powerwash the deck at 3 am. I would still book the room again for the views though!

We loved the itinerary. Western Caribbean is our favorite and prefer not to have a stop in the Bahamas in January since the weather is so iffy. Unfortunately, we had pretty dismal weather - downpours for three days and chilly the first couple of days.

We ate at Moderno (twice), Le Bistro, Teppanyaki, Cagney's, La Cucina, and Versaille. Only meal that was really disappointing was Le Bistro. This was my favorite restaurant on our last cruise and thought this would be our special anniversary dinner which made it more disappointing. Service, atmosphere, drink, and my meal were all poor. If I hadn't had the UDP, I would have asked for a refund! We were actually very impressed with Versaille. We had our best service in this restaurant and the best desserts overall.

Bar service was fine. We never really waited long for drinks, but I miss when bar tenders seemed to rely more on tips so we would end up finding a bar tender or two in various places who remembered our names, drinks, asked about our day, etc. Now they are just kind of efficient in getting a drink but don't really go out of their way to socialize at all. There wasn't a lot of consistency in the drinks. Rum punch would be excellent once then the next time not nearly as good even from the same bar.

Production shows were FABULOUS. I love the trend to get away from a female and male lead singer (who are older) and a few young dancers lip syncing. On this cruise, there were six performers who sang and danced, eight more dancers, and three acrobats. Band on the Run and Paradis were both phenomenal - some of the best productions I have seen with really good performers. Fred Beville was the comedian and he was great.

Cruise director was Iain. Kind of an odd sense of humor (very British). Assistant cruise director was great.

Not sure what I expected from the Butler and concierge. We had made all of our own reserevations except Teppanyaki before getting on board. We had a problem on our bill and I brought it up to the concierge, but he didn't do anything about it so we still had to wait in a long line at guest serevices to get it fixed. Our butler delivered food every afternoon, but that was it. She never told us how to make coffee (so we ended up making tea on the first round) or showed us how to order breakfast room service or actually introduced us to anything in the room. In fact, I had tip envelopes ready on the last afternoon and never found her to give it to her (or the concierge). I tipped something because I felt like I was supposed to, but not sure what they did to earn it! Our room steward was great and I left her some extra.

We did Maya Key in Roatan, booked through Charilies Cave tubing in Belize, did Native Choice extreme tour in Costa Maya, and went to Chankanaab in Conzumel where we also did the manatee encounter and I got a massage.

I will add some more details with pictures later!

Thanks. I did the screenshot. I just read through a thread or two about people not having the amenity page and there being confusion on the amenities. Since they have never offered a package as great as the one we got last March, I want to make sure there aren't problems! I might try and call and get it emailed, but we sail on Sunday. Should have thought of this sooner, I guess!

I feel stupid. I go to my vacation summary and see all of my amenities listed. Then I select the option to print my vacation summary and they don't show up - just the onboard credit. Since we booked awhile ago under one of the first promotions, we get UBP, gratuities included, UDP, and the $200 onboard credit. I wanted to print this just in case we show up at port and there are issues, but I can't seem to figure it out - what am I missing? Do you just screenshot it? Thanks

In my experience, the aging down is for kids who would be in the kids clubs, not the teen club. For example, you can put your 9-11 year old in the 6-8 group because these are very similar programs and often are combined.

Teens are generally not allowed to go to the younger areas for liability. Teens are big compared to other children - a child entering puberty will grow 4-5 inches in a year or two. So many parents of 9-year-olds will not be happy with a 15-year-old in that group. Whatever the special needs department tells you can be overruled by the staff on the ship.

The teen areas are also open - kids can come and go. There is no way for the staff to prevent a teen from leaving. This is not true for the younger groups. This makes it even more challenging for children with autism.

Our last cruise, we gave up relying on trying to do it on our own and booked a group tour through Autism on the Seas. Not sure how far into your planning process you are, but it might be worth it to check and see if they are running a cruise during the time frame you are looking for. They will provide care for your teen and target it to her abilities (younger toys, contained area, etc)

We are a family of 5. On every cruiseline we have ever booked or even looked at, (NCL, RCI, Disney, Carnival, Princess), it was ALWAYS more expensive and with significantly fewer options to put us in one cabin versus 2 cabins. We generally put the older 2 kids in their own cabin and the youngest in with us and get connecting, adjacent, or rooms across the hall.

My girlfriend and I were on the Vision of the Seas last year. The service was not great, mostly because the staff was not very friendly. We decided to give Norwegian a shot this year, especially with the drink package promotion. After reading all of the posts here we went back to Royal Caribbean for our cruise in February. We don't want to drink all day, but when we want a drink we don't want to have to wait 30 minutes. Thanks to who started this thread, and all who commented. We were sold on NCL for our next cruise until we read this.

We sailed Liberty of the Seas last summer and only drank a few drinks. Waited in line 15-25 minutes for all of them. Had to go to three different bars once just to find a beer. The only time the bartenders are out in force is when they are trying to sell the packages on the first days of the cruise! I think the drink packages have ruined bar service on every line because it is not in the line's best interest to make drinks easy to get if you already paid for a package.

Yes, we're leaving a little later this evening. And as for service, this is the friendliest crew I've seen in quite some time. Very helpful and courteous.

Yay!! I could care less when they sail - they can make up time and it seldom impacts ports. I will be on that ship in just a few weeks drinking and eating and having fun. So glad to hear that earlier reports of crew issues are fixed!!

Another who has cruised AotS and alone. Our first cruise with with AotS on Disney - I'll never do a Disney cruise again. Evwr. There were far too many little kids, queues for everything and noise. Even the slide queue was topping 45/minutes, and character meets, photographs, not a chance - we would not have coped without AotS on DCL. (As an aside note: whether the fact it costs so much money that people get some form of superiority against others, I do not know, but my 10 year old daughter was elbowed in the face by a grown man as she had a space against the railings when the show was on and wanted more room at the front).

 

Next we cruised with NCL, because of the knowledge that I had gained from saibg with AotS I managed to secure private muster drill and priority embarking/disembarking. we was on the NCL Epic so not a small ship, there were few people in the pool and on the slides, it was perfect for us - the only time it was busy was when the ship was in port and waiting to disembark. He did not manage the kids clubs for long but when he was there we was supplied with a phone so he could contact us at all times, it was noisy, he did not cope, but that's a moot point and we was not bothered. We are due to sail NCL Epic in February again, alone, as we live in the UK so its harder to get to the US because of timing - but we are sailing on the Breakaway in August with AotS as I've picked up some bargain cruises and the kids are nagging me to sail with them again!!

I would second the problems with Disney. It is not my first choice with a child with neurological disabilities.

For us, I found cruising with AOTS was nice because when people saw our group, they realized that our kids had a disability - not that they were terribly behaved or we were terrible parents which can sometimes be the assumption! The reserved areas and front-of-the line access we were given actually makes things accessible to us that we otherwise would not be able to do - the same as wheelchair accessible cabins make things accessible to those with mobility impairments. We try really hard not to allow our son's behaviors disrupt other peoples enjoyment in public areas, but too often that means we don't get to go. Having private areas for meals, seating for shows, and separate waiting areas means that we can also participate in these things without worrying about impacting other people's enjoyment.

I also want to say, that while the group is called Autism on the Seas and many of the families do have an individual with autism, they provide support for anyone with cognitive impairments. Our group of 26 families last July had several individuals with down syndrome, intellectual disabilities, chromosomal disorders that caused both physical and mental disabilities, and an array of other health conditions. My own child has multiple disabilities including a severe seizure disorder and severe intellectual disability in addition to an ASD diagnosis. Behavior issues are common with other disabilities as well - particularly those that impact communication or neurological disorders.

The new ships from Carnival (Vista), NCL (Breakaway, Getaway, Escape) and RCCL (Oasis, Grandeur, Allure) all have tons of stuff people can do on board - waterparks, ice skating, ropes courses, flow rider, bowling, etc. But you might find the cost pretty comparable to Disney.

Disney is the only one that has a tremendous amount of specific-family programming. RCCL usually has one activity in the afternoons on sea days. Carnival has a family comedy show,

However, don't be afraid to just book a ship with some really good ports and not worry about all of the extras onboard. We have had great cruises on smaller ships that may only have a water slide or mini golf or maybe nothing more than a pool. If you are in port 4 (or more) days like a typical Western or Southern Carribean, you will spend lots of time snorkeling, or cave tubing, or zip lining, or exploring together as a family off the ship. I personally find the cost of a lot of the newer ships too much for me - because I don't need an ice rink or ropes course on the ship since I can do those things at our local parks. I prefer a better itinerary.

My kids have had fun at sea day activities that were not specifically geared towards kids. My daughter and I did a hip-hop dance class once on Carnival. I think we did juggling one cruise (maybe NCL?). Learning to make towel animals is fun. Bring some card games, books and plan on just hanging out together and you will be fine on any ship you go on! My cruise criteria is ports, cost, then ship amenities last!!