Miracle Review Part 2 (page 2) KIDS and CHAIR HOGS

[halos]

Ok...so our first day went well after the smelly,wet suitcase fiasco. No big deal. We spent a couple minutes cleaning that up and went off to explore and have a great time. We wandered around the ship and because I am directionally impaired, never quite got the hang of the entire ship in the week I was there...SO....(note to self) next cruise must be longer than 7 days so I can get the hang of the ship before debarking.

Our first dinner was everything we could dream of. The Welcome Aboard Show show that first night was informative and I loved CD Todd immediately...such a cutie-pie...an excellent CD!!!!We were exhausted and crasheed by midnight. It had been a long day.

 

 

CHAIR HOGS AND KIDS

 

On Sunday my DH and I were up early and went to the main pool area and got chairs. Our oldest DD was immediately behind and grabbed a chair for herself. By the time the rest of our group got down there, there were no chairs left, so we all hung out along the pool.

There were a zillion kids.

I have never cruised during a period where kids were off from school. I won't do it again. The kids were not bad, it's just that there were too many and they were...being kids. Mine are older now and I am SO happy to be out of that kid stage and I really would prefer a cruise with less children next time (and every other time in the future) Todd said that there were 900 kids on board. As far as behavior, most of them were excellent, but all it took were just a couple to make me decide never to cruise in the summer again.

Our friends discovered that the pool in the back of the ship was adults only so we spent the remainder of our pool time back there and it was great!!

The funniest thing was my 19 year old's response to them finding the Adult Pool,

"THANK GOD!" is what she said.

I cracked up.

I have a 16 year old who reports bad behavior of adults and a 19 year old who couldn't tolerate the kids at the pool.

I have raised impatient kids. I wonder where they got that from??????? The apples don't fall far from the trees...which leads me to the adult pool.....

Carnival was great about keeping tabs on the pool in the back. Anyone who didn't look 18 was asked to produce ID or leave the pool. It was great! (two girls actually ran back to their cabins to bring back their ID which proved they were over 18...so if you look young and want to hang out at the adult pool, bring your ID!) There were 'pool' police there most of the time. One day (I missed this but my friends told me) a man had his 3-4 year old daughter in the pool, with a tube. She was jumping and splashing and bashing into people (let's face it, these pools are tiny) and running back and forth between the pool and THE HOT TUB with her ring tube. Her father thought this was perfectly OK, and he thought it was amusing. It went on a bit too long before the pool police told him to get his kid OUT....but they did eject them eventually. I believe someone had to go and complain.

AS far as chair hogs, there weren't any as far as I could tell. The chairs were always occupied. By noon, the back pool was always at full occupancy, but I'm sorry that Kartz didn't realize that you could just ask a Carnival employee to pull down chairs for you if there were none available on deck. They had extra chairs stacked up and everyone was gracious and would make room for anyone who wanted to squeeze in...so there was no reason not to be able to be at the pool when you wanted. So for all you ot there new to cruising, Remember that while on a cruise ship if you want ANYTHING at all, whether a seat at the pool or something special for dinner (don't like the fancy menu...ask for chicken; they will provide it!!) ASK. They are happy to make you happy and will do whatever it takes to put a smile on your face!!

 

Back to rug rats.....

OK, so we are at the Adult pool at the end of the cruise and see toilet paper flying through the air...a LOT of toilet paper. It seems that a few kids (the little 'Angels" that their parenst let run amok) decided to toss toilet paper off their balcony and watch it fly. We sailed from Freeport to NY with tons of toilet paper hanging from every possible place along the port side of the ship. It wrapped around everything.

Some of you say that kids will be kids and this was a harmless prank DON"T even reply to my post if you think this. It wasn't harmless. It caused a lot of unnecessary work for a lot of people and may have delayed the next group getting on. If you have kids (especially middle school aged boys) don't let them run loose, be responsible. If you want to take your kids on vacation because you can't bear to leave them, then don't leave them.

 

Considering there were 900 kids on board, I must say that 99% were great. The kids who are young enough to enjoy Camp Carnival seemed to be having a blast, so if you do bring young children, they will have a great time; I have no doubt about it.

But please parent them....

 

next installment...MID ATLANTIC PASSENGERS

[mysticalblues]

I hear you with the kids. I was a KFC the other day and this mother let her 3 year old (approx age) stand on top of the table in another booth. Didn't yell, discipline, spank, nothing. I was horrified. Actually, she let him stand up there for at least 5 minutes before she went and took if down. I guess talking to her friend was more important.

[halos]

The sad thing is that when people don't give their young children basic guidelines and rules to follow, they wonder why when their kids become teens that they are out of control.

It's so much easier to discipline a young child than an older one. If you start when they are young, and let them know what kind of behavior you expect from them, you can be sure to expect that same behavior through the course of their lives.

 

Like I said though, considering the cruise ship had over 900 kids, there were few instances of disruption from what I saw. Most were very good. I still prefer to cruise with less children on board and will in the future.

I'd like to say that all teens on this ship were great (from what I saw) the bad kids were middle school age and of course there were a few butt head adults...but very few.

All in all it was a GREAT crowd. I loved it!!

[momofmeg]

I have read SEVERAL treads about wild misbehaving children on cruise ships. It seems they are very where on all the lines in the summer. So this tells me don't take a summer cruise.We usually cruise Sept.-Dec. and our experiences with roudy kids are a few and far between. We had a chance to go on Mariner-it would have left this past sunday for a great deal-but I chose not to-we are still booking Mariner in Nov. 05-yes that is a long time to wait but I feel I will enjoy my cruise much more then.

[halos]

I don't think having bad kids around is just a thing that happens on cruises...I live near a beach and every summer the tourists come in droves. The obnoxious kids run around here while on vacation with their parents as well. No matter where you go they are there. At least on the ships, most children are occupied by ship activities such as Camp Carnival...on other vacations it is probably worse!!

I really think it's a certain age brackett that is a problem on ships....smaller kids have Camp carnival, and older teens seem to like to hang out in the sun and meet each other, use the discos and all that...it's that in-between age that is rough. The kids that are too old for the Camp Carnival and too young to be with the older kids...they are the issue...and to be honest, that is just a crappy age all together. You couldn't pay me to be 12 or 13 again. It's a horrible time, isn't it???? (not that at that age I'd ever do anything like decorate the ship with toilet paper...my parents would have strung me from the railing by my ankles and let me dangle!!

[Dee88]

Actually, she let him stand up there for at least 5 minutes before she went and took if down. I guess talking to her friend was more important.

 

And if he fell and cracked his head open, she would have been first on line to sue KFC!!!