Just returned from HAL Eurodam with 14yo and 6yo w/ autism

[lucigo]

Any questions I would be happy to answer. We love Carnival and can't wait to go back with them. Any cruise is a good cruise, but my 14-yo called HAL a nursing home field trip and my 6-yo missed so much that Carnival offers. He has limited communication but when we got back he saw the Carnival Fantasy on my screen saver and said, mommy I want to go on THAT cruise ship!

[RENMama]

So glad you had a great time. As the mom of a kid who spent 5 years in special ed and therapies, I know what a relief it is when things go well.

[crusinmama06]

Ewwww, so HAL wasn't good for the kids? If you have copies of the kid pages I would love to see them and add them to my collection. We are always looking for more cruise line kid pages.

[lucigo]

I didn't keep the kids pages, sorry. Since there were barely any kids they didn't really follow what was on them anyway.

 

They did have a halloween parade/trick or treat, but because we got late dinner (not by our choice) we didn't go. My son didn't want to wear his costume anyway. :rolleyes:

[crusinmama06]

Thats ok ;)

 

Welcome back. :D

[lucigo]

The Eurodam was a beautiful ship and I can see where people would enjoy it. For our family though it was missing a few things. No mini-golf, no arcade, no water slides or fountains. The pizza wasn't 24 hrs, and the ice cream wasn't make your own cone. The kids clubs looked nice but were empty and my kids wanted to play with/socialize with other kids, especially my 14yo. I didn't care for the punch cards for soda as opposed to buying an all you can drink card, and because I do have a son who sometimes needs down time, I missed having trays on the lido deck so I could go get some snacks and bring them back to the cabin. Yes I know they have room service, but its not the same.

 

I'm not saying we had a bad cruise, just that next time we will go on a more kid-friendly cruise line.

[yogi2929]

We've done HAL to Alaska with our two girls in the summer. There are tons of kids on those cruises.

 

Kids are more likely to be on on the 7day cruises scheduled during traditional school breaks than the cruises not scheduled for those breaks.

 

The longer the cruise the less kids will be on it.

[lucigo]

Honestly we picked this cruise for us, not for the kids, so I was prepared that they might not have as much to do and compensated by bringing gameboys, games, etc. and we had some great quality time with the kids.

 

We did this cruise because it had a psychic medium seminar on board, and my 14-yo actually got a reading from Lisa Williams and heard from her dad who died when she was 5. So that was pretty amazing.

 

We got rained out of Grand Turk and Half Moon, and it sprinkled all day in St. Thomas, and our only great port ended up being the one I wanted to see the least - San Juan. But I'm not complaining, we have lots of great pictures and lots of great memories!