Best Mexican Riviera cruise with 10 and 11 year old?

[San Diego Ellie]

We will be cruising from San Diego in december, and our group includes two girls, 10 and 11, It is a choice of Carnival Spirit (my least favorite), Dawn Princess or Holland American oosterdam. Most people seem to like Carnival with kids, but I am hoping Dawn Princess and Oosterdam have good kids programs too. I would appreciate your experienced advice on the kids programs with all 3 of these ships.

[Sale Away]

We like the Oosterdam and are 6 weeks out from our next cruise on her. You'll probably find more kids on either Princess or Carnival but it's not like there are no kids on HAL. And during holiday periods, all the ships have more families traveling so if you're concerned about them not finding friends on board, it probably won't be an issue. They'll all have scheduled periods of time with planned activities for the kids. We've sailed on Celebrity and RCCL before with our 10 year old and she's liked the children's programs on each line. Of those 3 lines that she's been on with us, Club HAL was actually her favorite. I think a line that generally has fewer kids is a plus - they get more individualized attention from the folks running the kids clubs.

 

Now as far as my personal opinion goes as far as which ship to take... we really like the cabins and bedding on HAL. The cabin sizes are larger than on the other lines we've sailed and the beds are real mattresses. My daughter even liked the sofa bed she had to sleep in on the Oosterdam. The food is good and the Oosterdam has a great hotel manager and captain - very accessible and friendly. The bad? If you like highly scheduled activities for adults, it's probably not the cruise line for you. I like lots of unscheduled time on vacation so it's a good fit for us. With what I assume will be 4 in your cabin, I think the size of the cabin & pricing should definitely be a consideration also. I think HAL's had the lowest prices for kids that I've been pricing myself. I'm all for the larger bathroom, particularly when traveling with kids, so I'd tell you to compare floorplans on each of those ships for the category of cabin you're considering. If the kids club is your only consideration you probably won't go wrong on any of the 3 possible ships you're looking at.

[San Diego Ellie]

Thanks so much, Sale Away, for your input. Actually this is the week BEFORE any kids are on Christmas vacation. Do you still think HA and Princess will have enough kids on board in the 10 and 11 year old range for them to meet a lot of others in the kids' program?

[Sale Away]

The first cruise we ever took our DD on was when she was 20 months old and it was a 10 day Alaskan cruise in mid-May. Not a time you'd really expect to see kids on a sailing since elementary schools are still in session. I was really surprised at the number of kids on there. I think a lot of people will take their kids out at various times to take advantage of better pricing on a trip. And schools are so varied in their vacation periods now that what you may think is earlier than anyone else may actually not be.

 

Depending on the itinerary, you'll likely have 3-4 sea days, which are the only days you really have to be concerned about keeping the kids busy. If yours are like mine, having access to a pool (especially at that time of year!) will be enough along with any activities going on in the kid's club. On our April sailing last year, there were kids of the same age as ours who never were interested in participating in the kid's club activities but would wind up in some of the "adult" activities like bingo or cooking demonstrations (thank you, Food Network!). Mine likes just hanging out and was just as happy being able to watch movies and cartoons in the cabin on tv. We usually bug her about tv time but it was vacation! And some of the lines have in-cabin VCR/DVD players so she also got to bring some new videos we hadn't had a chance to watch yet. She'd mainly opt for that in the evenings. I just asked her what she would tell your kids to do. "Just walking around the ship. Swimming in the pool. Hanging around the pool." See a theme here? :rolleyes:

 

I'd guess that on those very busiest weeks, you might have a sailing with 300-400 kids (of varying ages) on board. On the weeks bookending those sailings, you'll probably still see at least half that. The Oosterdam holds around 1848 passengers. The Spirit holds 2124 and the Dawn Princess has a 1950 stated capacity. They're all similarly sized ships but Carnival and Princess have more of a reputation of catering to families with kids. We have friends that love both Carnival and Princess. We sailed Carnival once and even though it was years ago, and the newer ships are supposed to be "better", DH refuses to every sail with them again. We've never sailed with Princess but I toured the Star Princess when she was new. I just haven't found an itinerary that appealed in a price range for the cabin size I'd want that worked out for us with Princess. I think the other thing you may want to keep in mind is that we all tend to over schedule our kids (and ourselves). They may really like having some down time as long as they know some sort of activities will be available. You won't go wrong in booking a cruise. There will be enough to keep them occupied and there will be other kids of similar age on board. ;)

 

The itinerary is exactly the same between Princess and HAL so the real question is which line still has availability in cabins in the price point you want to pay? I was just looking and it seems like a lot of the cabins are already booked up for the 12/15 or 12/16 sailings, assuming that was the week you were considering.