Best Alaska ship for 8 and 11 year old boys

[JP96]

I'm looking for a high quality cruise to Alaska with my husband and 8 and 11 year old boys. I'm getting overwhelmed by all the reviews. As a kid I went on many HAL cruises including Alaska, so my natural choice was to choose HAL, but I'm hearing some negative things about it now. "Too traditional, set eating times, slow service, not enough for kids to do, run down ships, smoking on balconies." I have also been on RCL, NCL, Celebrity (an awful cruise to Bermuda), Disney, Windstar, Sitmar (years ago to the Panama Canal). I do like the itinerary that HAL and Princess are offering going through Glacier Bay. Perhaps seeing Hubbard Glacier (without Glacier Bay) on the other cruises will be enough though. Icy Strait Point sounds like an interesting stop too with another chance for excursions. My husband and I loved salmon fishing when we did it 15 years ago in Ketchikan.

 

I'm also not sure how much my boys will use a kids club or if they will want to be with us the whole time. They tend to be kind of shy. Some of the cruises have too many days for my kids just cruising. I have ruled Disney out because it seems like a distraction when the focus should be Alaska. We are not doing a cruisetour but I don't mind flying into Vancouver and out of Anchorage.

 

Any thoughts?

[6rugrats]

HAL offers As You Wish dining, so you may eat whenever the dining room is open. If people complaining about HAL don't know this, I wouldn't give much weight to their complaints.

I took my teen daughter on an Alaska cruise last summer on the Statendam, and she had a wonderful time. She did not participate in the children's activities, but there were many children onboard who did, and they seemed happy and busy.

Edited February 7, 2015 by 6rugrats

[A&Jfamily]

I'm looking for a high quality cruise to Alaska with my husband and 8 and 11 year old boys. I'm getting overwhelmed by all the reviews. As a kid I went on many HAL cruises including Alaska, so my natural choice was to choose HAL, but I'm hearing some negative things about it now. "Too traditional, set eating times, slow service, not enough for kids to do, run down ships, smoking on balconies." I have also been on RCL, NCL, Celebrity (an awful cruise to Bermuda), Disney, Windstar, Sitmar (years ago to the Panama Canal). I do like the itinerary that HAL and Princess are offering going through Glacier Bay. Perhaps seeing Hubbard Glacier (without Glacier Bay) on the other cruises will be enough though. Icy Strait Point sounds like an interesting stop too with another chance for excursions. My husband and I loved salmon fishing when we did it 15 years ago in Ketchikan.

 

I'm also not sure how much my boys will use a kids club or if they will want to be with us the whole time. They tend to be kind of shy. Some of the cruises have too many days for my kids just cruising. I have ruled Disney out because it seems like a distraction when the focus should be Alaska. We are not doing a cruisetour but I don't mind flying into Vancouver and out of Anchorage.

 

Any thoughts?

 

My kids were 10 and 16 when we went to Alaska last May on Princess. They loved it. My 10 yo prefers their kids club over Carnivals. The 16 yo, not so, but still had a good time. As you say, we were there for Alaska, not bikinis.

 

We did the round trip from Seattle. We were on the Grand Princess and thought she was nicely elegant. They have a naturalist on board who narrates wen wildlife appears etc. In Ketchican we went to the totem pole park and then walked the town and had lunch. It was a relaxed enjoyable day. In Juneau we booked a private whale watching tour with Harv and Marv and then went to Mendenhal Glacier. Both were amazing. And in Skagway, our most favorite, we rented a car and drove to Crystal Lake in the Yukon; have never seen a more breath taking drive with a huge change in scenery.

 

On of the things that we loved most was having the huge balcony for mom and dad on the Carib deck; boys get an inside. All 4 of us were able to comfortable be outside throughout the day, and it was wonderful to have our own space when going into the fjord.

 

We would do it again in a heartbeat.

[JP96]

Thank so much for your review! Glad to hear you liked Princess!

[AlaskaAtLast]

We took the Norwegian Sun northbound from Vancouver to Whittier in August of 2013 with our 2 kids, ages 8 and 10 and we all absolutely loved it. I think the Sun now goes to Seward but is basically the same cruise. The cruise included both Glacier Bay and the Hubbard Glacier which were both amazing.

 

Why chose one over the other when you can do both?

[JP96]

Thank you. I think I may have read an old post somewhere that said that Princess and HAL were the only major lines going through Glacier Bay because the others were polluting. Sounds like a great option. Did you have a balcony? Did your kids use the kids club and like it?

 

Some of the others like Celebrity and RCL are including Icy Strait Point, which sounds interesting, but they don't do Glacier Bay, only Hubbard Glacier. Icy Strait would give us another opportunity to do whale watching, etc. but then you give up going through Glacier Bay. I guess you can't have it all!

 

I'm ruling HAL out because I read that they still allow smoking on verandahs and I'm really sensitive to smoke. If we are going to pay for a balcony I don't want smoke wafting over to us from the cabin next door.

[AlaskaAtLast]

Yes, we had a balcony. We originally booked a family oceanview but were able to upgrade to a balcony for a few hundred dollars with a kids sale free promotion. This was our first cruise ever and now we're spoiled and must have a balcony. LOL

 

The kids did go to the kids club and had a good time. They learned 'circus tricks' and performed them later in the week in the theater. They both made friends there quickly which helped. Actually, my daughter who was 10 at the time, is still in touch with some of the friends she made there.

 

The Sun is one of the smaller somewhat older ships (about 1900 passengers) but we really liked it. It doesn't have all the bells and whistles that some of the newer ships have, but to us, Alaska is about the ports and the scenery so the Sun was the perfect sized ship for that. Plus the crew was so friendly and we loved the great outdoors at the back of deck 11 and the observation lounge at the front of deck 12. They were great places to see the scenery around us. Actually, we loved the Sun so much that we are going on her for a western Caribbean cruise in March.

 

I don't know anything about Icy Straight Point but I learned a lot of the ports we went to beforehand using cruiseportinsider dot com. It gives lots of information about what to do in each port and you can even check the dates you will be in each port to see how many ships will be there at the same time and compare the arrival times.

 

Good luck deciding which cruise to take and have a blast while you're there!

[JP96]

Thanks. Did you find the food to be decent?

[AlaskaAtLast]

We thought the food was fine. We ate in the MDR and the buffet a few times. We also ate in a couple of the specialty restaurants. It was all good. I thought the service was a bit slow sometimes, but that's as close to a complaint as I would get.

[14ersco]

Currently NCL is offering third and fourth passengers free on some sailings and half-price on others for the Sun cruising Alaska. We booked for 2016 and had to only pay the port fees for our kid; $172 for a week and the unlimited beverage package was included. :cool:

[JP96]

Thanks. Wow, you really plan ahead! It looks like you have been on several Norwegian cruises. I haven't been on one in years. Are you doing the one way from Vancouver to Seward or the reverse? Did you also consider Princess? Can you tell me what you have enjoyed on NCL? I was starting to lean towards Princess because of the junior ranger program. I wonder if all cruise lines they stay in Glacier Bay for the same amount of time.

 

Thanks!

[14ersco]

Thanks. Wow, you really plan ahead! It looks like you have been on several Norwegian cruises. I haven't been on one in years. Are you doing the one way from Vancouver to Seward or the reverse? Did you also consider Princess? Can you tell me what you have enjoyed on NCL? I was starting to lean towards Princess because of the junior ranger program. I wonder if all cruise lines they stay in Glacier Bay for the same amount of time.

 

Thanks!

 

To get our son free we had to book the first Vancouver to Seward cruise of the 2016 season for the Sun. We would consider Princess, but currently they don't have 2016 Alaska cruises available. From looking at the Princess site it appears like their one-way Alaska trips are much like Norwegian's in that they use older ships without expansive kids clubs and other amenities. I've already been through the Inside Passage two times on the Alaska State ferry system, so any cruise ship will be a step up.

 

It has been a couple years since we have been on NCL. The main attraction originally for NCL was the Freestyle dining, but now that most mainstream cruise lines offer some version of open dining it will be interesting later this year to see if NCL is still the cruise line for us or maybe we have been pampered too much by Royal Caribbean and Celebrity. If either one of those lines went to Glacier Bay we would be on-board. Icy Strait Point is purpose-built port for the cruise lines and is not an authentic Alaskan village.

 

In regards to the Junior Ranger program and Glacier Bay the park service says it is offered on all the cruise lines, plus there is a program in Skagway and Seward. Glacier Bay Jr Ranger (can download book): http://www.nps.gov/glba/forkids/beajuniorranger.htm

 

Finally there is one big advantage for Sun's schedule in 2016 and that is the cruise weeks are Monday to Monday. Most cruise lines in Alaska run Saturday to Saturday or Sunday to Sunday. That means there is usually a crush of ships in the same ports on the same days. So it appears like the Sun might be in some ports without other mainstream ships.

[JP96]

In what way do you think RCL was a step up from NCL?

 

Thanks

[14ersco]

We've only been on one Royal Caribbean and one Celebrity ship; so our experiences may not occur fleet-wide. Our son found the kids clubs on Norwegian, Royal Caribbean, and Celebrity to be comparable in the friendliness of the staff and range of activities. He knows that the Sun has a small kids club since we have been on the Pride of Aloha (now Sky) and the ships are almost identical, but will probably not use the kids club much since he will only be weeks away from moving up in groups. Our experience cruising on the Dawn during the same month a few years ago was NCL will not move up a kid close to switching groups, no matter what.

 

What we found better on Royal Caribbean a couple years ago and on Celebrity last month was their way of handling open dining. On NCL when we showed up at about the same time most evenings there was usually a wait and we were placed at a random table. On Royal Caribbean and Celebrity they held the same table and wait staff as long as we showed up within 20-30 minutes of the same time each evening. The maitre'd even asked if the table chosen for us on the first night was what we wanted throughout the cruise. So some flexibility on when we showed up each evening, but still the advantage of a wait staff getting to know us. Both Royal Caribbean and Celebrity had the evening dining staff working the buffet in the morning and our evening wait staff would make sure to stop by to say hello and find out if we needed anything while we were having breakfast.

 

Royal Caribbean also had the kids club staff working with the evening dining room to gather up any kids who wanted to come to kids club directly after their dinner. The wait staff would ask our son if he was going to kids club and if he said yes they would expedite his order so that he was finishing up his dinner in about 30 to 40 minutes. Then the kids club staff would be waiting at the front entrance of the dining room to take the kids to kids club. So parents were able to sign their kids into the kids club in the dining room and then go back to leisurely finishing their dinner.

 

There is a thread on the NCL board about someone consdering the Sun to Alaska: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2165244

[JP96]

Interesting. I was afraid to request anytime dining because I have heard that if you are a party of 4 and three other parties of 4 show up before you, you end up waiting. Sounds like RCL and Celebrity handle it well though.

 

I'm a little concerned about the kids club on RCL. My kids are 8 and 11 so they would be in two different kids groups. Do you think they strictly enforce this? I know they will want to be together.

[RSLeesburg]

Interesting. I was afraid to request anytime dining because I have heard that if you are a party of 4 and three other parties of 4 show up before you, you end up waiting. Sounds like RCL and Celebrity handle it well though.

 

 

 

I'm a little concerned about the kids club on RCL. My kids are 8 and 11 so they would be in two different kids groups. Do you think they strictly enforce this? I know they will want to be together.

 

 

RCI also has Adventure Dining, where kids go to WJ and eat with AO staff and then go to club afterwards.

 

I believe that Jewel and Radiance are in Alaska this year. I have no idea how the club is setup on these ships - on the bigger ships, the 6-8 and 9-11 groups have separate rooms, but on the Vision class ships, these two groups are combined. I have no idea how the Radiance class ships are setup, but I would try to look at the AO compasses for whichever ship you are looking at - it will clearly indicate if these two groups are combined or not.

 

 

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[JP96]

great idea, thank you

[familycruzinnewbie]

So I am also poking around looking for options for late August 2016. Either Alaska or Caribbean. I've never sailed NCL. So I can do newer ships from Miami or Jewel, Pearl or Sun to Alaska. My kiddos would be 14 and 16. Pearl and Jewel go roundtrip from Seattle and Pearl is Glacier Bay and Jewel is Sawyer Glacier. Sun are 1 - way trips doing one option one way and the other option the other way. Just wondering the differences in these ships and routes.

 

For insides there is the free kids options and the $25 credit, where if I book an outside cabin, I have the choice of $50 credit, UDP or UBP. Do you find the Dining or beverage package to be a better deal?