Oosterdam 4/16 -360 children under 17 years old!

[cruisingteachers4]

We are very excited to cruise to Mexico next week on the Oosterdam. Our last two HAL cruises were 14 day Alaska cruises, with very few children. Our two kidlets are 8 and 10 years old. They had a great time on the Volendam and Amsterdam in Club HAL. How can HAL accomodate so many kids on the Oosterdam?

[Duck Duck Cruise]

Ouch

[dianef]

We are going on this cruise with our grandsons who are 8 and 11.It looks like there will be plenty of kids for them to play with.We usually go on cruises when there are few kids,but since we are going when our grandsons are on spring break I knew there should be a substantial about of children.That is about 20 per cent of the ships capacity.

[maxout]

Here is a piece of my review from last year at Spring Break on the "O"...

 

No bones about it, this was a "kids cruise" due to spring break, there were 552 children on the "O" this is the largest number ever according to the crew I spoke with. We also brought along our 10 year old daughter as a small part of the herd . For the most part they were well behaved but I did witness (and hear) running in the passages and stairways as well as them pushing the buttons for all of the elevators on a given deck as patience was not in abundance... The Club Hal staff numbered about 16 on this cruise and they divided up the kids by age groups and "took over" areas of the ship such as unused meeting rooms, the Northern Lights (before 10 PM), etc. I must say they did a great job with such a difficult task managing to keep a smile throughout. ( oh, I forgot to mention they had 450 kids the week before! )

[cruisingteachers4]

Thanks MaxOut, that is exactly what I wanted to know! I can't even imagine more then 30 kids in the Club HAL room! It should be quite the interesting cruise!

[IRL_Joanie]

We are very excited to cruise to Mexico next week on the Oosterdam. Our last two HAL cruises were 14 day Alaska cruises, with very few children. Our two kidlets are 8 and 10 years old. They had a great time on the Volendam and Amsterdam in Club HAL. How can HAL accomodate so many kids on the Oosterdam?

 

Will write my review today or tomorrow but, in the meantime... I was pleasantly shocked/surprised that we had 350 kids aboard Oosterdam on the 2 April sailing and you did not see them!! I'd have sworn we had at maximum 50, but was told by those in the know that there were 350 aboard!!

 

They brought in extra HAL Club staff to help with the amount of kids and I must say for the majority of those I did see, they wqere quite well behaved:)

 

Joanie

[Krazy Kruizers]

we have cruises over thanksgiving

Eurodam in 2008

Nieuw Amsterdam 2010

there were quite a few children on both cruises -- hal did have extra club hal people to handle everything

we really were not aware of all the children

[Infi]

A few weeks ago on the Eurodam, several staff told us there were more than 400 children (under 18s) onboard, plus another 50 or so in the under 21 range. I have no issues with kids and must sail during school breaks, so this was nothing new for me. But, I, too, wondered how HAL would handle so many kids in their admittedly limited Club HAL facilities. I was very impressed with how all the kids were kept occupied in Club HAL and the teens occasionally had use of the Queens' Lounge for parties and karaoke. They hired additional counselors for the spring break period and managed the children really well. The only time I saw some Club HAL kids was while they were taking their group photo in the atrium - very cute. You really didn't know that there were that many kids onboard, which was impressive. The demographic also made me a much livelier and active cruise, too. :)

[kazu]

My sister and her family were on the Eurodam during spring break. While it is not the Ooesterdam, the situation was the same. Her youngest daughter had an absolute blast in the Hal Club. They had them in different spots, with different activities. Her oldest daughter wasn't interested in the teen club - she hung out with a friend. (she is very well behaved). My sister reported you wouldn't know how many children were on the ship and what a great time they all had.

 

I was very pleased as this was her first HAL cruise (they have cruised other lines) and you can probably guess why she decided to try them ;)

 

anyways, i don't think you will have any issues at all. HAL might not be known for having lots of children, but when they do, they certainly know how to make sure everyone has a good time :)

[cruisingteachers4]

Thank you for all of your information everyone! Joanie, I'm looking forward to your review! Only 5 more days!!

[savannah2117]

We are bringing our 2 daughters, ages 13 and 17. They are very excited, especially now that I just told them there will be other kids. I was sort of preparing them that it might be an "older" crowd. Guess not! Does anyone know when they have the teen meet and greet on the ship? The girls are both pretty outgoing and want to experience all of the activities.