NCL Kids clubs

[guk]

We are soon to be sailing on the Epic, having only having sailed on IOS royal carribean I am wondering if anyone can share theyre experiances on the epic in particular the kids clubs. We have a DD who will be 6 and DS who will be 2, the reason for choosing this ship is that NCL takes kids from 2 so are hoping to at least get the odd meal child free. The ship will be sailing from Barcelona, will the kids club staff speak english? How are NCL staff with a clingy child, our DD has never been clingy and we struggled to get her out of the kids club where as our DS tends to cry when we leave but normal fine within seconds so bit nervous as whether we would be allowed to leave him like that and would they be able to contact us if he doesnt settle? Also do they allow some mixing of the groups as our DD will only just be in the next age group? On IOS we have always been on quieter sailings where they have mixed to 2 lower groups for some of the activities, would this be the same on NCL? Thankyou for any help and advice

[mitsugirly]

I can't speak for the Epic (we did not take our little one on that cruise that year), but last year on the Spirit my 3 year old did not want to leave the kids club. She begged from the minute she woke up and all day long to go. She would have been happy if she never left there.

 

Yes, the staff speaks English. They are absolutely WONDERFUL. You would be surprised and the people they hire for the kids club. They are not just people applying for "a job" but actually have degrees and experience with kids. They are amazing.

 

My daughter (who is the youngest of 4 children and kind of an "only" child in a way because my other 3 are from 17 years old up to 25) and therefore she is "clingy" too. She has NEVER went to a sitter and has always been home with her dad or me since she was born. She did fabulous.

 

Their activities are planned. There is a "theme" every day/night...like a doggie night, they read about a dog or watch a movie, they do an activity and make puppy dog ear hats for their heads and paint their faces like a puppy. Next night will be something else. One special night they took all the kids to the MDR for dinner together. One night was a pj party and bring your own pillow. All kinds of things. I wouldn't worry too much. By the end of the week, they get to bring everything they did while there and they are so proud of what they made. :D

 

When you sign them in, they get a wrist band and you write down the info on the sign in sheet. You tell them on the sign in sheet where you are going to be...for instance in the casino, at a show, on deck, in the pool and so on. If they was to have a problem, they will come find you.

 

We always just checked in every 2 hours or so. The first few days, we would have our daughter come out and talk to us and ask if she wanted to leave (answer was always no of course). Then it got to the point she didn't want to come out to talk (because some times we would take her anyhow so that she could go eat...the kids gotta eat of course :p) and she would tell the staff that she was fine and wanted to stay and they would come tell us. She would come up to the door wave and run away fast. hehe

 

My point is, just take comfort in knowing they have a wonderful staff and a lot of these employees at the kids club have been on multiple ships with NCL, so I'm not sure if they rotate or if it's just their preference which ship they work on.

[Mom2B&Z]

We've only been on the Sun and the Star, but I can echo Mitsugirly's comments about the kids club staff. They have excellent backgrounds, the programming is fantastic and my boys never wanted to leave! DS1 (6yrs) is very shy, and I was really impressed that the staff realized he needed some one on one time playing quietly before joining in the more boisterous play. They knew him by name, the staff would comment on some of his more admirable characteristics when we would come and get him, they would wave and call him by name in port if we ran into the staff...all little things but it really gave me confidence that they were there to ensure he was having a good time, rather than killing time. DS2 is not shy but doesn't like new situations, the staff caught onto him quickly too and he had to be dragged off the play structure ;)

They do have pagers for you to take if your child needs help with toileting, you could ask for one if you're concerned they may need to reach you and you plan on leaving the cabin. They always ask you to state here you will be when you sign your child in, and I've seen parents called back for kids who are tired at night. We've only cruised the Caribbean, but the staff were predominantly Canadian and American on the Star, spoke English, French and Spanish. I have no idea how much this changes from ship to ship, but since the kids crew is a company wide concept I would imagine the type of people they hire would be similar across the fleet. They don't allow mixing of age groups except at designated free play times, or if there are not many children on board. You cannot get them to alter this policy, I overheard a very loud and angry mom complaining to the head of the kids crew about this and he very clearly stated it was corporate policy and no one on the ship could change the age groupings.

My point is that in all the places we have travelled, I have felt most comfortable leaving my boys in the care of the NCL kids crew.