Celebrity Equinox and kids...

[JRockey76]

Looking at booking a 10 day cruise next April on the Equinox. This will be our kids first cruise, ages 11 and 14, and I was wondering what everyone's thought's were on activities onboard for the kids. I saw that celebrity's website already said that there are no family veranda rooms available, are they really all reserved all ready, or should i call to book one. I just want to make sure my kids will be occupied on the ship and have plenty of things to do. We were planning on doing royal caribbean but they don't have any 9+ day long cruises that go to Barbados which is where we would really like to go. So any opinion will be greatly appreciatted!

[canalbrat2]

Looking at booking a 10 day cruise next April on the Equinox. This will be our kids first cruise, ages 11 and 14, and I was wondering what everyone's thought's were on activities onboard for the kids. I saw that celebrity's website already said that there are no family veranda rooms available, are they really all reserved all ready, or should i call to book one. I just want to make sure my kids will be occupied on the ship and have plenty of things to do. We were planning on doing royal caribbean but they don't have any 9+ day long cruises that go to Barbados which is where we would really like to go. So any opinion will be greatly appreciatted!

We did an 11 night in December with our 9 year old granddaughter. If I remember correctly, there were 70 kids on the ship for that cruise. We were concerned that she would be happy with the activities, but once she started going to the Fun Factory and met some kids her age, she really enjoyed herself. This was our second Celebrity and it is definitely an older crowd with fewer kids than Royal Caribbean. Might be O.K. in April with spring break. I would be more concerned that the 14 year old would be bored than the 11 year old.

[Gonzo70]

I believe that FV's cannot be booked online. You have to call to book them, but they may require that it be a party of five to release give you one (there are only four such rooms). You can see about being put on a wait list if they are either fully booked or not yet available to parties of less than five.

 

Celebrity's sister line, Royal Caribbean International definitely has many more venues and activities for children and teens. You will have to weigh seeing Barbados versus the pros/cons of sailing on a more adult oriented line. If it is a common spring break week, at least there likely will be many other children for your children to socialize with; if it is not a common spring break week though there will be few other children. The S-Class ships do have some areas they might find appealing - i.e. playing croquet, bocce ball, bean bag toss etc. on the lawn.

[Lsimon]

Gonzo 70 is right - you need to call or have a TA check into availability of FV cabins. They are reportedly held for 5 or more but I've heard of them being sold to families of 4 before.

 

Celebrity is a great ship and very elegant with great food and service. People rave about the kids programs there and from everything we've heard kids have a great time there. But with that said other than the kids programs and the basic pool there are not many features on Celebrity for kids and the entertainment on X is geared towards older adults. Some of the other lines, like RCCL and Carnival, have lots of other features like water parks, water slides, miniature golf, surfing, rock climbing, ice skating and more family oriented entertainment shows. I'm sure your kids would love an X cruise but, personally, if we were taking kids that age on a cruise we'd look into one of the newer RCL or Carnival ships or even Disney - which would be #1 with kids although a bit pricier. If you want a cruise longer than 7 days you can always do a back-to-back cruise!

[emms]

I know it's not the same ship, itinerary or area, but we were on the Eclipse last August , with our 2 children aged 12 & 15, and once they met some new friends at the club , we hardly saw them except for dinner.

I assume that April is school holidays ? August is the middle of our school hols and there were 100s of children of all ages.

We couldn't get a family room so had connecting cabins on vista deck 8152 & 8154 this worked very well for us as the children had activities on till late (midnight pool party !) and they would knock on our bedroom door as they came in.

Emma

[will773]

RCCL does in fact have a 12 night cruise that goes to Barbados, but it might not go at appealing times for you and your family.

[JRockey76]

RCCL does in fact have a 12 night cruise that goes to Barbados, but it might not go at appealing times for you and your family.

 

Can you tell me where you found that because I cannot seem to locate it. thank you!