melski

We did MTD on Liberty last week and loved it. I made reservations about 45 days in advance. It is a pain to make them online as you have to make each individual day but it is worth it. I made a reservation for 6, at 6:15 every night. No wait, walked right in and had the same wait staff each night. To me the best thing about MTD, is it felt that they brought out the food faster than traditional dining (important if you have kids). Traditional dining at 5:30 seemed to early and the 8 is too late. We do like eating as a family although we did do the Windjammer for the kids once so we could go to Chops.

My one tip that I tried this time with my kids was going to the MDR for breakfast and lunch rather than dealing with Windjammer. I felt Windjammer is very crowded, hard to find a table and hard to deal with kids and a buffet. I felt both breakfast and lunch were good there and much more relaxing. Plus, if I wanted to go to the salad bar, I felt it was much easier to leave the kids and keep an eye on them.

I did see one as we embarked and walked through the Promendade last week. I believe it was 5 bottles for about $150 (not sure on the exact price but I thought it was about $30 a bottle). There were limited wines and not the type I normally drink plus I brought my own so didn't need it. Sorry I can't be more help but I just looked very briefly at it.

Thanks for your review and the Teen Program details. Just wondering if your teens (15-17) talked of any 'not to be missed' event in the Teen Club? My daughter will be a couple of month shy of 15, so not sure if they will let her in.

There was a 12-14 teen group that did similar activities. I just can't find that compass. One group would often meet in Fuel and the other in the Living Room (I had a teen in each group). I'm not sure if they typically break the groups up or if it was because there were so many kids during spring break. My teens liked the teen only flowrider. The 12-14 group had a half hour one night and the 15-17 the half hour after that. I don't know if they would say any other must-do's except go the first night.

We were on the same cruise. Super chilly the 1st two days. Overcast the last day. Great trip besides the weather and a few hiccups. They wanted to separate my 2 kids ages 10 and 12. No option to move the 10 almost 11 year old up. And quite frankly the 9-11 year old activities are not really appropriate. Vey babyish at least for my kids so they ended up staying in the room at night. They don't tell you that Jamaica is an hour and a half ride almost 2 hours from the ship. We did Dunn's River Falls and Bamboo Beach Club. The falls were fun but BBC is not appropriate for kids. More of a booze cruise. Kids ate at 8am and no lunch served until 3 and it was chicken that was cold and inedible. But lots of rum punch. So much so that half our bus was wasted. Guy behind us puked all over my daughter and I. Another man jumped off the bus and passed out. We were late back to the ship without having eaten and ship was late leaving because of our trip. I wish I had investigated shore excursions better. We loved the Cayman Islands. But our catamaran snorkel was scheduled for 3.5 hours and literally an hour was snorkeling. The rest was them trying to sell alcohol from cash bar. Luckily it was pretty blue water. Can't remember if it was a sole option but 7 mile beach was gorgeous and wish we had just stayed there. We did Playa Mia which would have been so much cheaper if you purchased on your own. When we were leaving it said 30 us $ and only a quick 10 minute taxi from beach. We did my time dining and were in Rembrandt dining room. Our servers were Huney and Bing. And they made our trip. Super wonderful. Treated us like kings and queens.

 

 

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I know they are very strict on ages when there are lots of kids on board. Last year spring break, my 11 year old was 1 week from his 12th birthday and they wouldn't let him move up to the teen club. If it was a less busy cruises, they gave me the impression they would have if close in ages (not sure in your case if they are only 10). To be fair, the 14 year olds don't want to hang out with a 10 year old. There is a pretty big maturity gap between them. I understand it is tough though when the kids span groups. I hope you returned your survey asking for more age appropriate activities for the 9-11 year olds.

I did my research on shore excursions between here and trip advisor. I booked playa mia on a website to guarantee that we could get in (you pay a deposit but they guarantee you can get your money back if you cancel). We don't need the open bar but the van taxi is $34 each way (I think we saved over $120 vs booking with RC). I've been hesitant on snorkeling/sailing excursions because we went on one before kids and thought it was more of a booze cruise.

Blue Hole was nice but it is not a "secret" anymore. It was a bit of a crush but not as much as Dunn River Falls from what I understand. There were at least 4 ships in (2 in Falmouth, 2 in Ocho Rios). Path was good and the guides were really helpful. They'd literally pick up my little ones to get them through. We had a great time and glad we tried it.

Here is the google drive link. The file was too big to upload. I only had the 15-17 compass but the 12-14 was similar except for maybe different times/locations.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B26B0A0KPQIBOVZONUh3MVhYTFU/view?usp=sharing

Actually I do have a teen compass but not sure how to post it. Anyone know how? Our week they separated the 12-14 and 15-17 year old activities.

Are you saying for the kids slides, they have to be at least 42" and 45" to ride the kid slides?

Yes. In the kids splash zone, there are 2 slides and they must be 42" for the purple one and 45" for the yellow. The bigger slides have a height restriction of 48".

We've cruised on Spring Break twice with my family. A 5 night Caribbean on Brilliance and 7 night Caribbean on Liberty. We've never experienced drunk college kids that were out of control. There are small groups of college age kids but they were never out of control. There are a ton of multi-generational families on both the cruises (lots of school aged kids) and honestly the 10-12 year olds running around on their own could be more of a hassle than the college kids.

We hang out at the family pool or Flowrider during the day. I find that eliminates any of the potential drunk adults or college kids. Its just more of a family atmosphere.

Also cruising in late March or early April can help. Many colleges (not all) have breaks at the beginning of March.

Just a quick review of our Liberty spring break trip on March 20 (Falmouth, Cayman and Cozumel). There’s been some great reviews recently so I hope to cover a few different things.

We are a family with 4 kids (ages 16, 12, 9 and 4) and had 2 balcony adjoining staterooms. Our overall impression was Liberty is a great ship with great staff. Weather wasn’t in our favor (high apparent winds) and the first 2 days we spent in sweatshirts. Three of us were a bit seasick the first morning with the waves but I had meds to take and the following day was calm and no one needed medicine.

First, the much hyped waterslides were not as much fun as you’d think. First, they are slow for adults and painfully slow for a light weight child (my 9 year old). There is a timer for the racing slides but it’s not much of a race. It took me 25-30 seconds (there is a timer at the bottom) to come down but my 9 year old took 70-85 seconds as he had to push himself down. He wasn’t the only one...all smaller kids had trouble. The biggest problem is that they hold both slides until they are both clear, rather than running them independently, which creates a long lines. Although, the green slide was cool with the lights inside. I have no news on the slide that still isn’t working.

The kids splash park was awesome except for the height restrictions on those slides. Purple slide is 42” and yellow 45”. I really didn’t see why...they could easily be 38” and 42” (at 38” kids can ride Disney roller coasters). They are very strict and measure each child and give them a wrist band. My 4 year old could only do the purple slide and she was fine with that but I felt bad for the kids who looked 3 or 4 but couldn’t do either slide.

Ice skating show was in the evening on the second formal night (I think because of the waves). We chose to see the first seating and skip formal night (kids ate at the windjammer and we ate at Chops). They also had it on our last sea day in the afternoon.

They showed Kung Fu Panda 3 in the Platinum theater on the first sea day. It was packed most likely because of the chilly weather. Po was also there for a character meet and I saw his character meet at least one other time on the Promenade.

We did the Dreamworks Character breakfast. It is a good idea but they didn’t pull it off. Characters were Fiona, Puss in Boots and Gloria. Menu was the same as in the MDR with just different names but the kitchen seemed out of sync. Not terrible but not something I’d do again. It was really easy to see these characters during the day and I just wish they either had more or different characters during breakfast.

By the way, Puss in Boots visited Aquanauts the final afternoon. My 4 year old loves the “kitty” (although she doesn’t really know the character).

I booked a Blue Hole tour with Winston Gayle of TourJamicaToday. Winston is great. We were in a private van and he is a safe and cautious driver. He wasn’t pushy and willing to work with us.

Cayman we stayed on the ship and enjoyed a quiet, ship day. The weather was nice (which wasn’t the case on our sea days) so we could enjoy the Flowrider and pools. However, the slides were closed due to ash from the smoke stack turning the water black so they had to drain the slide and refill which is an all day task.

On Cozumel, we took a taxi to Playa Mia. I booked this on my own and we had done it previously. It isn’t the best but it has something for everyone in my family. My 4 year old did their slides about 25 times so she was happy. Snorkling, pools, water obstacles were all fun. Food wasn’t good and while we enjoy the activities, we may look at something else next year.

The 10 drink card showed up the afternoon of day 5 for $67 plus gratuity.

Overall, we still had a great time and made the most of it despite the weather. The weather gave us a chance to explore the ship more. Crew was fantastic and worked really hard. We already booked Liberty for next spring break.

There were 2-3 brands by the glass for each type of wine. Not a huge selection but I thought it was fine for the me.

If you have a child, then go to the Dreamworks sailaway party on the pool deck. It's really cute and my 4 year old loved the idea that the penguins were driving the ship. The new kids pool is great too.

My kids loved the Adventure Ocean club. They wouldn't go there the entire time but went an hour or so in the afternoon and then after dinner so we could do something too.

Liberty Dunes (putt putt golf) is fun for a family activity too.

I think any would work. Do you already own any of them? Or are you looking for a new one? The biggest issue to me is how much space does it take up when they fold. Personally, my favorite stroller (after 4 kids) is from Maclaren. It folds like an umbrella stroller but is much stronger than a cheap one. It holds a child up to 55 lbs. We've been to WDW 3 times with this stroller and love it but never needed it for a cruise.

We packed our Puddle Jumper for our almost 4 year old last cruise. The Puddle jumper has the arm floats and goes around the child's chest and snaps in the back. It is Coast Guard approved. I was really happy to have it for shore excursions as most of their life vests are too big.

We did a Brilliance 5 night cruise out of Tampa last March 14. It was mostly school aged kids and families. I felt it was mostly families (littles to grandparents). The only time I felt on "Spring Break" was in port at Cozumel where we were near a larger college group at the beach. Couldn't say which ship they were on as there were 6 ships in port that day. We're going on Freedom for this spring break.

On the forum main page go to Ports of Call then Caribbean. I'm trying to link directly http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=587 I'm headed to the same ports in March so that is where I've been looking. Also if you look at your ship's forum page, many people will post reviews including what they did in port. Here is the link: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/search/royal-caribbean/navigator

I'm sure you've looked but have you tried looking at flying to Atlanta? Not exactly a spring break destination. It's a good 5-6 hour drive to Tampa or Port Canaveral but it might be worth the difference when looking at 5 tickets even considering a rental car. Maybe if you could do that even 1 way and flight back out of Orlando or Tampa. We're a family of 6 and our cruising departure ports are limited to where we can drive.

Just my .02, but my DD15 would freak out if I took her out of school for a week. I know others have different opinions but IMHO her work load is too heavy to miss a week of school. I'd wait until after school is out.

Spring break cruises are pretty expensive right now. Last year, I called my TA within the 90 day window of our Spring Break cruise. While we couldn't get connecting rooms, we did make do with adjoining rooms but I felt it was a good deal. This year I have connecting rooms booked a while ago for Spring Break and this trip is much more expensive. That might be another way to save on the overall trip if you aren't too picky on type of rooms.

I think the obvious thing to bring is medicine: children's motrin, dramamine, benadryl, swimmer's ear drops (we don't usually get swimmers ear but it has happened on vacation), band aids (for those invisible boo-boos). My children have sensitive skin so I bring their soap and lots of sunscreen. On our next cruise, I'm putting my kid's clothes in ziplock baggies labeled by day. I felt we were running out of clothes but that was because they'd wear something for an hour and then it was "dirty". I also bring a refillable water bottle (refill by filling a cup first and then pouring it into the bottle. It helps me see how much they drank during the day. My DD4 will get headaches when dehydrated. No need for toys but I usually bring a pack of Uno cards and just a few books. They are allowed their iPads in the morning which allows us an extra hour of sleep.

When flying, bring some chewable candy (I don't let my 4 yo have gum) for the landing (starbursts, dummies, m&m's).

The destination forums are also great for ideas on tours. In addition, I have used the RCCL for their shore excursions to get an idea, then looked for the reviews here and on Trip Advisor. I actually booked the same shore excursion as on RCCL website for quite a bit less using a 3rd party and it gave us flexibility.

Have a great trip!

We just got off Brilliance 3/14-3/19...5 night Key West and Cozumel. Our lobster night was the last night (day 5 Wed). They gave all of us seconds on the lobster.

Shrimp cocktail was served on the formal night (day 3).