Cruise w/day at Atlantis or Atlantis stay?

[Kimberly]

I'm pondering whether it would be better to take a 7-day cruise with a day at Atlantis, or a 4 or 5 day stay at Atlantis. Has anyone done both, and could give me advice?

My husband and I stayed at Altantis 15 years ago, and we really want our DS11 to experience it, and had planned on a vacation there. However, we just returned from a cruise, and remembered how much we enjoy cruising, and thought that we might prefer to see Atlantis through a cruise. I've priced it out, and it seems to be the same price for a 7-day Carnival cruise as a 4-day stay at Atlantis (when you factor in the high prices for meals there).

The main draw for Atlantis is the water park to us (the rooms were nothing special) and we can do the dolphin swim on our Freeport day (which was the other thing we wanted to accomplish on our Atlantis vacation). We've only taken 5-day cruises, and have been wanting to do a 7-day cruise.

What do you think? Which vacation would you do?

[TheWog]

We stayed at Atlantis for about a week in February 2008. DS was 10 at the time and we went with another family who had all boys, 10, 7 and 3. We loved being at Atlantis. We had such a great time. It was fun to be able to just go to the beach and hang out or go snorkel when we wanted or go on the water rides at any time. We would go back again. Our friends actually purchased a timeshare there, so we may go back again sooner than we thought.

 

The downsides we experienced were the early closing of the park and pools. They closed down at 5:00 p.m. With 4 boys that's pretty early. There is not too much to do in the early evening once they shut that stuff down. Atlantis does offer movies, you can walk around the area, visit the dig, there is an arcade, but not a whole lot of activities. On the upside, the kids were wiped out. They went so hard during the day, that they usually crashed pretty early. Which was good, so we didn't really have to worry about that. We would hang out on the balcony of the Harborside resort where they were staying and just watch the water and island. It was really nice. The water park is worth it and the kids didn't want to leave. You can literally go around and ride the water slides without having to get out of your tube which is a cool experience. To be honest, being an mid-30s adult it is quite the place. It is incredibly clean and lots of fun. We will take a snorkeling tour next time and stay for a couple more days (full week) when/if we return. We rented jet skis and just really had a great time. We had a few meals over at Anthony's which is just across the street from Atlantis and ate once at Johnny Rocket's in Marina Village, there is a pizza place in Marina Village, there is a Ben & Jerry's, Starbucks, formal sitdown restaurants. We also ventured a couple of streets over and ate at this outdoor italian place. Food could be pricey depening on where you went, but it was a lot of fun.

 

Some suggestions might be check out the timeshare's for your stay. They offer programs to get you stay there. Some of them require a sales pitch, others do not. Just depends on what you want to do. www.harborsideresort.com is the website. It outlines the deals on there.

 

Also, consider the Comfort Suites. They will give you a free continental breakfast (nothing to write home about, but passable, has decent fruit selections and morning beverages - bring dry cereal and you can have a nice breakfast) and offer you all the amenities of Atlantis for a fraction of the cost of staying in a Beach Tower room at Atlantis. CS also has AAA discounts and other discounts, so it something to look into.

 

I have not visited Nassau on a cruise, but can tell you there is no way you can do everything and truly appreciate Atlantis in a short 5 or so hour stay.

 

My vote would be to stay for the few days.

 

Good luck deciding.