Galapagos Review (Kid Oriented Stuff)

[RachelEllen]

Just back from a most amazing adventure and I wanted to post a few thoughts. There have been several good reviews about cruise basics, so I'm hoping to add some things I haven't seen before, especially oriented towards travelling with our two kids, ages 3 and 12.

 

First of all, the trip was amazing. Lindblad runs a wonderful program. The service, programming, everything was top notch.

 

I'll run through some impressions in no particular order.

 

1) Facilities. We had two double cabins. As has been mentioned, they are spare, but very functional. They are cleaned multiple times a day. My mom's a travel agent and got a tour of all the cabins. She reports that until you get to suite level, the cabin size differences are negligable and the bathrooms are all the same. I believe some rooms do allow queen beds. Plus, there are windows vs portholes on the top level.

 

2) Packing. We went through a lot of clothes on this trip, and, for the first time, I actually used the laundry service. There is a (free!) clothes dryer, but I could only do so much in the sink. You tend to do an activity in the morning, afternoon, and then have dinner, so even if you don't dress up for dinner, you could end up changing clothes and showering off multiple times per day.

 

3) Food. Really plentiful and quite tasty. Not what I'd call gourmet, but that wasn't what we were after. Dinner was actually our least favorite meal because the buffets were so good. Plus, on such a small ship, the buffet is small and not time consuming. We are vegetarian and we never had a lack of choices. There were severeal vegans on the cruise who seemed happy as well. One thing to note is that, unlike other cruises, food is just available during mealtimes. Because the activities are so structured, this was not a problem, but, if you are used to the looser nature of larger cruises, it may seem strange

 

4) Activities. Because of the small size of these cruises, I have a feeling that my experience with activity sign-up will not be typical. The interests of any particular sailing can vary widely. The only stress we had on this cruise were the sign-up activities. Basically, the most active thing you could do was kayack and bike (one chance for biking). The activity lists would fill up before dinner. Like, by the end people were stalking the activity lists to sign up. Kayacking worked out, because it was requested that priority be given to people who didn't have a chance. However, the biking got stressful as there was only one chance to bike and no indication was given that it was a limited opportunity. We walked down to the sign up list right after recap (when the activty was announced) and the list was already full. It was kind of stressful as some people were "giving" their spots away to family members instead of letting wait listed people take cancellations. However, I was told that normally 10 people sign up to bike as opposed to the 30 that did on our trip.

 

5) Kids. We were told that Lindblad is no longer going to advertise special family sailings, but instead try to strike a family friendly balance on every sailing. We were able to get information on numbers and ages of kids ahead of time, and our sailing was very kid heavy - over 25 passengers from ages 7 - 18 plus our 3 year old. Overall, I felt they were very well behaved. There were a few incidents of group poor behavior, some running in the hallways and one sand fight on the beach, but honestly nothing that would have ruined a trip for me. On the nature walks, meals, and snorkelling trips, the kids tended to be spread between groups and chaparoned by parents. I never saw any inappropriate behavior near animals or in any area that could be dangerous.

 

That being said, if normal kid behavior is not your cup of tea, I'd certainly check with Lindblad beforehand about numbers of kids on your cruise.

 

Our three year old was a dream to travel with. We took a video monitor, so I could spend naptimes reading in my cabin - right next door. Theres generally a 2 hour break after lunch while the ship repositions, perfect for nap time. The ship was quite safe feeling. Of course, the three year old was in vision every minute, but, regardless, there were very heavy doors anywhere that could lead off the decks and I had no worries about her going anywhere dangerous. There were also bathrooms on every level.

 

We treated her like a peice of luggage for zodiac transfers. One adult would enter the zodiac. The kiddo would be handed down by a crew member, and then the second adult would enter the zodiac. She was issued a special infant life vest at the beginning of the cruise that we just kept with us.

 

The dining staff actually approached us and asked about special meals. Our kiddo is a good eater and we had no requests. They also asked up if we would like early dinner for her, dinner is normally at 7:30 pm. Honestly, we didn't want to do dinner in shifts. Generally we would get to the dining room at 7:30 sharp while the bulk of the group was finishing wrap up. We'd be finished by 8:00 and put her right to bed. I was so tired by that point, that it was no hardship just to go to bed myself at that point.

 

You also do the majority of sailing starting at dinner time. If you are not used to it, the motion is significant. Our 12 year old left dinner early three times and the 3 year old learned to ask for "ginger tea for my tummy" by the time we were done!

 

The only activity a 3 year old can't do is snorkel. Luckily, I don't snorkel, but if you were a couple with one younger child, I could see this being a problem. There's daily snorkelling. Our kiddo also is very well behaved in the baby pack. I could see difficulties with a child either too big or resistant to being carried on hikes, as that would significantly curtail what you could do. (Pretty much only glass bottem boat and trips to a beach)

 

There was a kid annex with games and art supplies where I would generally sit with her during lectures. I could still hear, but she was out of sight of other passengers and could play quietly. If she got too antsy, the lectures were also broadcast in the cabins.

This is kind of rambling, but I'm happy to answer any questions.

[scmomof2]

Were you on Endeavour or Islander? Just curious, as Islander is smaller. I did the Endeavour back in Feb. and we had around 10 kids from 10-18. Great bunch of kids-never were a problem and I actually enjoyed being around them. The ones that were problems were a group of school kids from the mainland (Nat Geo partners up with schools to bring groups aboard to teach them about the islands). The kids were running up and down the halls, and on shore, they were going off the trails for closer looks at the animals. Their teacher even told them to get closer so she could take photos! The naturalists cringed, but never really said anything (but they sure got after us if we stepped out of bounds)!

 

It was a great trip, and I'm hoping to go back with my kids (9 & 6) when my youngest is a little older (and less dramatic)!

[RachelEllen]

We were on the Endeavour. 25 kids on the Islander would be intense indeed!

 

Seriously, they really did well for 90% of the cruise. They were very respectful of getting in and out of the Zodiacs, very respectful of the animals. It was only 5 or 6 of the boys who were young enough to hang out without parents that were a bit rowdy once on the beach and once in the hallways.

 

There were two little girls of about 7 on the trip who were just lovely. The "difficult" walks are difficult because of balance and length of time. They are not longer than 2 miles and not aerobically challenging. The 7 year olds managed them fine. There were also shorter walk options.

[scmomof2]

Probably the toughest walk was the pm hike on Espanola. It was rough walking over all those lava boulders, some of which were loose. Then we saw a baby booby being fed, so I was squatting for 15 minutes taking a ton of photos (it was a photo expedition). When I got up, I had jello legs the rest of the hike!

 

The hike to the top of Bartolome was rough for some, but at least there were spots you could stop and "fake" a rest by taking photos.