7 year old for snuba?

[Austingrl]

First time cruiser...

Family wanting to do snuba in E. Caribbean.

Youngest member 7 years 6 months & great swimmer.

 

Can she not do "snuba"?

How strict are they on age restriction?

 

Royal Caribbean Freedom of the seas- any info greatly appreciated!

[jam82]

I'd say, it depends. You don't say which port you're looking at.

 

We've done snuba in a few different locations, once through RCCL and no one seemed to care about the age requirement. There was a boy who said he was 7 and his parents quickly corrected him to tell him he was eight. :D He didn't have any apparent issues during the trip, nor did the snuba people seem to care that he didn't know how old he was.

 

Another time we were on the snuba excursion with a family of four. I'd guess that the kids were nine and eight and I wasn't really pleased that they were in our group because they seemed nervous and I didn't want to be held back. As it turned out we were held back. However, the kids were fine and kept up with the group. It was the dad that had to be helped and he spent most of his time clinging to the raft. Poor guy.

 

If your daughter is a good swimmer and a good snorkeler, she most likely won't have any issues with snuba. However, if they have an age requirement, they'd still have the right to refuse service which I'm sure would be an inconvenience for everyone else in your group. It may be possible to book it directly with the snuba company so you don't have any issues.

[beachchick]

Generally, you cannot even book an excursion for a child who is younger than the cruise line's listed age minimum. They are very strict. If you think about it, they have to be. If they allow one parent to bring a child who is 6 months younger than the age minimum, then they have to allow all parents to do that. Then pretty soon parents will expect to bring a child who is even younger. The age restrictions are often set based on experience and insurance liability.

 

I'm not sure how the 7 year old was even allowed to do a cruise line excursion if the age minimum is 8. It's not as if parents can lie about their child's age because they must provide a legal birth certificate and the birth date must match the birth date on the booking. The parents wouldn't have been allowed to purchase the shore excursion for an underage child. Strange occurance.

 

beachchick

[onthelake]

Definately look at the snuba company's website and see what their restrictions are and if you can book privately. This will give you the company's policies to avoid problems and will probably be less expensive as well. It may also be more fun since it would likely be a smaller group that you go out with than the tour group from the ship.