Itchy&Scratchy

yes, there are only 3 of us. Upon further consideration, I think we'll go with two twin bottoms. I forgot that it makes it more convenient to check on our 6 yo at night.

make sure to have a driver's license too (if you are in the US and are flying domestically).

The most unfortunate thing happened to use after our last cruise: we were checking in for our flight at FLL airport, and the airline clerk lost my husband's driver's license right there in front of us. We handed her 2 driver's licenses and she handed back only one of them with 2 boarding passes. That was it. She never found the other driver's license and was visibly annoyed by our repeated requests to look for it some more.

Thank goodness, we both had passports with us and were able to pass through TSA checkpoint with them.

Princess insists that if you are using the upper berth(s) that the lowers be configured as twins

(to allow access to the uppers)

 

Stewards are responsive to passengers, and will configure the beds as you wish.

I will try when we board. :) We don't need our kid's bed made up every day, so the steward won't need access to it. Most nights we put a "do not disturb" sign on anyway.

There was another room I selected while "pretend booking" today for 3 people, and it allowed me to choose twin or queen. That was weird. Another weird thing is that Princess let me choose that room for 3 people, but another site with detailed cabin descriptions showed it as a double occupancy only cabin.

If you keep the autocharge on and hand them $40, they turn it in and get it back in their account in the next cruise.

We never cancel the autocharged tips. I guess one day I might, if the service is truly horrendous, but we've never experienced truly bad service before. Less than stellar? Yes. Underwhelming? Yes. Annoyingly slow? Yes. Truly bad? Nope.

But then - we've never tipped additionally... Somebody above said that some cruiser left a $500 tip to the waiter. That's more than some cruises cost us per person... We've been on $258pp 7 night Royal Caribbean cruises...

If they take money without noting cabin number and turning it in, their contract is terminated.

That's not actually what their contract says, it says all cash tips must be handed in, (it doesn't say if any is returned after checking on auto tips or whatever so that becomes speculation) but it is clear that all cash tips must be handed in.

the waiters don't get to keep their personally earned additional cash tips???????? :o

With anytime and often having different waitstaff every evening there was no way at the end of the cruise to track down who served you and give a tip.

I mainly eat seafood dishes on the cruise. There is at least one or two seafood dishes in the MDR every evening. Plus, a salmon dish that is always available.

my friends did a quantum class cruise last year with 2 kids (7 and 9 yo), and they hated it. Long lines to get to a buffet, long lines for everything, too many people, and the food (compared to Regal/Royal Princess) wasn't all that good.

We did a Liberty of the Seas with our then 3 yo and loved it. I don't remember having a splash area for diapered kids (probably isn't one), but ours was potty trained by then. It's the same ship as Independence of the Seas our friends went on with us with their 3 yo and loved it. Same as Liberty of the Seas.

I'd do a smaller ship, I guess, but not old and small. At least, RCI has a lot more to do on the ship with/for kids than Princess, but a 2 yo can't do a lot of those things anyway (ice skating, rock climbing wall, mini golf, etc.)

latch is just a convenience feature and it has a weight limit, whereas a regular seat belt is designed to keep a 300# person in place. They are equally safe up until that weight limit, but latch is no longer safe to use once the kid + car seat combination exceeds the allowed lower anchor weight limit (usually 65# total).

how old, tall and heavy is the child? what seat do you use at home? if the kid is younger than 2, will you have a separate seat for him on the plane?

There is a sign by the taxi stand at FLL airport that says that by FL law, kids younger than 5 need to be in car seats. Yet, taxi drivers don't usually give a crap (excuse my language). One had the seatbelts tucked into the seat, so we spent some time untucking them so we could buckle up. The other one started driving, while I was putting the kid into the car seat (I was still standing outside the taxi). They drive like crazy in FLL.

P.S. We traveled on a cruise once with a Britax Frontier CT, and it was easier than I thought. It fit into a closet very nicely. We are about to bring it again on a cruise in November, because we have to fly to FLL, but drive back for 10 hours. I strap it to a folding luggage cart with bungee cords and wheel it through the airport and port. Check out Travel With Children board on www.babycenter.com for additional tips.

This was a LATCH system hook up, and I could not get the buckle to release enough slack to get the belt out. I almost got to the point of cutting it out, but then we wouldn't have had a car seat to get home from the airport.

Another tangent: many people do not realize that latch anchors have a weight limit. It's car and seat dependent, but in most cars the rule is - once your kid reaches 40# (or the weight of the car seat + child's weight reaches 65#), you must switch to a seat belt install.

our November cruise showed all the inside rooms sold out on Friday. By Monday there were 7 of them available. 3-4 person cabins have been sold out for a month, and as of today, there are 2 of them available. I guess the availability fluctuates a lot.

Some of these questions about documentation make me wonder if there are some people who go buy a car without having a drivers license. I do not recall an auto dealer ever asking me if I had a license before accepting payment - and I do not suppose travel agents are certain to make requirements clear before selling a cruise.

You might also check "Obstructed Balcony", which are sometimes not much more than inside.

this category is currently $200 more per person.

Called Princess, they will not switch me to the last remaining inside cabin unless I pay $100 more per adult and $200 for the kiddo.

I will check with them later after the final payments are due.

P.S. Princess didn't give me a choice on the lower bed config, but I see that it can be a queen bed. I think if I ask the cabin steward for a queen bed config, it will work better for our luggage since we'll have a car seat in addition to the suitcases.

You will have the beds that fold out from the walls. Here is a video I found of R522 on the Regal.

wow, you are amazing! Thank you!

By the way, I totally hate the room. I just made my final payment, but I am going to see if I can call and change rooms....

I booked R522 on Regal (3 people) and it looks like it runs parallel with the ship length. What kind of upper beds do you think we'll have?

Last time we stayed on Regal and Caribbean Princess we had a "sideways" cabin, with the upper beds unfolding from the wall. I didn't know they could be different.

ETA: I found a description of the R522 room that says "The beds were More comfortable for sleeping (the kids enjoyed their beds that folded down from the ceiling) ".

Do the kids still get a ladder to climb up? Our 6 yo loves the upper bed on cruises, but only got to experience the ones that fold out from the wall.

there is a huge topic on traveling with a service dog on the "Disabled Cruising" board.

thanks! He has stenosis and a bunch of other stuff I can't even pronounce, so I just call it "herniated discs" because he does have 5 of those.

We scrimp and save during our day to day activities at home where we are doing mundane and routine activities and not in some exotic place while surrounded by unlimited opportunities for experiences. Our vacations are infrequent and we will not "penny pinch" while on them. I read posts here from people who seem to brag about how little the spend on a cruise. They avoid paying for anything that isn't included in the base fare, seemingly making it a goal to have zero balance at the end. No sodas. No gourmet coffees. No alcohol. No specialty meals. No souvenirs. No excursions. No extras of any kind. Nothing! I could never travel that way.

wow, sodas on a cruise is something you want to spend money on because you are saving money all year long? You want to pay $2 per soda? Be my guest!

I'll get a 24 pack for $6.98 at home and enjoy it for much longer than you will enjoy 3 cans of soda during your cruise. We'll be just fine without soda for a week. It's bad for us anyway.

We don't need souvenirs - it's just a bunch of junk collecting dust. We do take photos instead.

No specialty restaurants needed - we very much enjoy MDR food and it's already paid for. I can go to a restaurant at home and pay for my food there.

We don't like coffee to begin with. Why would I want to pay for gourmet coffee?

We do enjoy BOG$1 hour on Princess, but getting older means that we can handle max 2 drinks per person (not so much because of money, but for example, I am on meds that prohibit alcohol).

Some people are recovering alcoholics and can't drink at all, so it's not because they are trying to save money on the cruise.

We do go on some excursions, but sometimes they either have an minimum age limit, weight limit or activity level limit.

Why would I want to pay $100 per person to go to the beach? I'll pay $20 for a taxi and it'll take all of us to the same beach.

We absolutely fly the day of the cruise. All of us work or go to school and we are limited to school breaks because of our kid. And this time I am paying for a cruise for 6, so you are right - I am trying to save money, because I am not rich, but I want to give our parents this one experience that they'd never had in their lives. But flying 6 people to the port and buying a cruise (and not Carnival for 3 days either) for a 7 night sailing is not cheap. I am not going to fly the day before and also pay for 3 rooms at the hotel - that would be sheer financial madness on my part.

To each his own. I am a frugal person, but I don't feed my family Ramen noodles all year long so that we could go to a specialty restaurant on the cruise once a year. Life is short and we prefer to live our life in the present, enjoying what we've earned every day, and not just on a cruise.

The kid's clubs are only for the kids...parents aren't allowed. You wouldn't want other adults in there with YOUR kids, would you? The staff is well-trained and very competent. If they need you, they will find you! No worries! Take the kids on the 1st night, for "orientation"...that's when EVERYONE is "new"...your 7 year old will be fine!

that depends. We were able to stay with our kid in the kid's club room playing games on the computer on Caribbean Princess. There were other parents present as well.

Every kid is different. Our kid has a stranger and separation anxiety and will not stay at kid's club by himself. We started cruising since he was 3, and 3 years later he is yet to stay at the kid's club by himself.

thanks! He just started PT and, of course, he goes without me. I'll mention getting some PT wheelchair advice/practice on to him.

It's a fairly new ship.

P.S. We are not elderly. Just 40.

I don't have a lot of experience with cruising but I do have experience with wheelchairs. I own two . But I just wanted to share my experience s with a wheelchair hope it helps!

thank you for sharing your experience, it really helps!

Thoughts....

have you booked your cruise already, or are you just planning? If you booked already.... consider cancellation insurance.

a disabled cabin may make it easier or your dad to shower

A couple of sailing ago we ended up in an accessible cabin, even though by the time we sailed I didn't need one (which I specified when checking in). The cruise line didn't move us out of it, and we loved the big room.

The gangway between the terminal and aircraft is sometimes called the air bridge.

 

Some airlines have dedicated special needs counters in some airports. If you can use one, it does speed up the process. When you check in the wheelchair should get a special needs tag.

 

Check your airline's web site for a special needs section. It often has very useful information.

I already checked, and they offer wheelchair services at some airports. We have a huge international hub and if anything, there are always airport workers available with push chairs, even if the airline doesn't have anyone to help.

So, if we take a wheelchair with us, we will gate check it like people check strollers.

Families, with older children? NO... find the big cool ships with lots of things for the teens. On Princess they are sitting in groups on the stairwells or crammed into the hot tubs... nothing for them to do. With younger children? Maybe,

MUTS and pool were the only things to do on a cruise (caribbean princess) with our 5 year old. He won't do kid's club, so on rainy days (which were all 4 sea days on our last cruise) there was absolutely nothing to do besides watching moving in your cabin. I saw a cool jungle gym playground on cruise photos and thought we could use it to burn off some 5 yo energy, but it turned out to be inside the kid's club for 8-12 year old kids. Needless to say, 12 year old kids are not interested in a playground like that. I don't know what Princess personnel was thinking. The room for 4-7 yo kids didn't have any kind of a playground.

RC, on the other had, had plenty to do inside on a rainy day.

But the food is better on Regal Princess.