What is the first thing you do when you get on the ship?

[isk8]

What is the first thing you do when you get on the ship?

 

My FOS cruise is only 48 days away! When we first booked, it was almost 500 days away!

 

This is my first cruise with my son, so I'm sure my normal cruise routine will be thrown out the window!

 

I'd love to hear what is the first thing you do with your kid(s) when you get on the boat. I've already decided not to go up to the H2O Zone until we are ready to get into it because I'm sure once my son sees it, he won't want to leave it!

[rebeccalouise]

For some reason- we always seem to finally board the ship around 3PM. So we are hungry of course. We go eat in the buffet!

 

Then we visit the youth program and then the pool.

[Florida_cruisers]

We go to the cabin and drop off our carry on bags, then we go to the buffet for lunch. Then we make sure we get a good table location, make reservations at specialty restaurants, spa and the kid's program. We don't typically check out the ship itself until after we have done all of our important must-do items that I listed above.

[harryfat1]

What is the first thing you do when you get on the ship?

 

My FOS cruise is only 48 days away! When we first booked, it was almost 500 days away!

 

This is my first cruise with my son, so I'm sure my normal cruise routine will be thrown out the window!

 

I'd love to hear what is the first thing you do with your kid(s) when you get on the boat. I've already decided not to go up to the H2O Zone until we are ready to get into it because I'm sure once my son sees it, he won't want to leave it!

 

You asked for 1 thing, I will provide our top 10 things to do.

 

Following is somewhat generic list of things we initially partake after we embark, but always need to account for different ships have their particular way of dong things, so the ordering is somewhat flexible:

 

1 - If cabin is ready, drop off carry on and head for buffet. If not ready, do lunch first and then cabin.

2 - Check dining reservations/table seating to see if we got the time/table seating companions we requested. If not, go stand in line to make any changes necessary.

3 - Read the daily cruise news letter that should be in the cabin and see activities are available the first few hours

4 - If time permits, walk around the ship on our own. Take pictures of public areas before it gets crowded

5 - If available, join the public tour of the ship (typically around 3 PM if the ship has such service)

6 - Mandatory musters drill

7 – If sailing from warm weather port, the kids like to swim.

8 - Sail away party

9 - Change for dinner

10 - Kids club open house (depending on ship/sailing - the first evening has open house/orientation/sign up for kids club.) Only question is what time of the day they have this.

 

As for not getting your son excited, that may not be possible as they typically have the kids’ counselors’ at the gangway to provide you with the flyer to attend the open house/orientation. Some ships tag the kids with the muster drill bracelet at the gangway and some tag them at the pier when you check in.

[pascalburns]

go check out the food:):):)

[cb at sea]

We eat a late breakfast before heading to the ship, so we don't have to do the "buffet" thing that's so popular with everyone!

I'll wear my bathingsuit under clothes so I can head straight to the pool (warm weather cruises, only, for me!!!) Get a nice drink by the pool! Call friends (before we turn off the cell phones for the duration) and tell them what they're missing!

When luggage arrives, we unpack and do muster drill! By then, the ship is usually moving, and we're cruising!

[MinnieGi]

My two kids and I headed straight for the lunch buffet when we boarded. We were all hungry for lunch. After that we changed into our swimsuits and they got right into the pools, hot tubs and then water slides. The water areas were not crowded that day either so it was a great way to start our trip. Later in the afternoon we checked out our cabin and unpacked. :) I think I'd do the same order next cruise too.

[isk8]

Thanks everyone for your input!!

[bme]

On our first cruise with kids I was surprised that there were no children's sized life vests in our room (obviously the cruise line knew the ages of those in the cabin but I understand the room stewards are very busy on a turnover day). The muster drill took place without them since they were delivered later that evening. Next time I'll check first thing and request if needed.

 

Also, I asked our cabin steward to empty out the mini fridge just so the kids wouldn't take anything out resulting in an unexpected charge. Happily then I could put some juice boxes in there to be cold for our trips ashore.

[Suebee]

On our first cruise with kids I was surprised that there were no children's sized life vests in our room (obviously the cruise line knew the ages of those in the cabin but I understand the room stewards are very busy on a turnover day). The muster drill took place without them since they were delivered later that evening. Next time I'll check first thing and request if needed.

 

Also, I asked our cabin steward to empty out the mini fridge just so the kids wouldn't take anything out resulting in an unexpected charge. Happily then I could put some juice boxes in there to be cold for our trips ashore.

 

We just returned from our cruise and thought the same thing about the lifejackets especially since the steward asked us their ages as soon as we got to our room. We did the muster without jackets and thought about it all cruise. "why do we still have no jackets?" And then, we asked our son to check under the beds for anything we left on the last night and there they were. How silly not to check under the bed!

 

But to answer the original question, the first thing we do since the rooms arent ready, is to check out the decks we most use....the jogging track, pool area, solarium, gym, etc and then we grab lunch and watch everyone else in the parking lot starting their vacation. Then we check out the kids club and by then our rooms are ready.

[spaceflower77]

We eat a late breakfast before heading to the ship, so we don't have to do the "buffet" thing that's so popular with everyone!

I'll wear my bathingsuit under clothes so I can head straight to the pool (warm weather cruises, only, for me!!!) Get a nice drink by the pool! Call friends (before we turn off the cell phones for the duration) and tell them what they're missing!

When luggage arrives, we unpack and do muster drill! By then, the ship is usually moving, and we're cruising!

 

We do the same thing... I try to find out (on here, of course) whether or not there is an alternative to the buffet. The Conquest (CCL) has an upstairs restaraunt that not very many people go to (or know about) initially and that is right where we headed. It was not busy, not crowded and then we drop off stuff and check out our room, if it's open, and head to the pool until we can. By then it's time to change, do the muster drill, do some camp orientation and get ready for dinner! Swimming is a lot of fun right off the bat since the pools are not crowded, and if the waterslide is open (it was for us) it isn't either and is a lot of fun. My 3 yr old and I would sit in the hot tub while my son would go up and down the waterslide. It was really fun!

[spaceflower77]

Also, I asked our cabin steward to empty out the mini fridge just so the kids wouldn't take anything out resulting in an unexpected charge. Happily then I could put some juice boxes in there to be cold for our trips ashore.

 

 

I forgot about that, we also did that first thing and used it EVERY day... we kept water and cold soda in there, too, so we didn't spend money on soda which we don't drink too much of anyway. We each got one or two a day without spending $25 a piece on a soda card (which would have insured we drank 2 or 3 x as much soda anyway)!