Hawaii Itinerary and Kids?

[nini]

We plan on doing a family cruise (5 years away) with our two daughters and their families. At that time, the grandkids will be ages 5-10.

 

Based on any experiences with this Hawaii itinerary (many sea days), what might you have observed or experienced with the Children's Programs?

Personally, I prefer doing Alaska, but one daughter said she does not want to go there again. Personally, I think the Grand kids would love it.

Thanks for any thoughts.

[skynight]

Nine sea days. Nice youth centers where the 5 and 10 year olds might be in separate programs unless there are too few youth on board to run separate programs. Probably not many youth on board. Youth are mostly in school when Hawaii cruises sail. No summer itineraries. Families tend to take shorter voyages, not the 15 day ones. Rule of thumb, the longer the cruise the fewer the children, the older the demographic. In all my Hawaii cruises never have seen many youth. Consider other itineraries or fly to Hawaii during the summer and stay in a hotel or condo on the beach.

5 years is a long way off. 

[katisdale]

We went over Christmas/New Year's in 2019 ending on January 4, 2020. There were several families on board with kids in the age groups you mention. The kids we saw seemed to enjoy the activities they participated in and I enjoyed watching them show off their projects to their parents and grandparents. The enrichment activities - lei making, hula etc. as well as some of the entertainment (specifically the hula show) and excursions would be for any age.

[cruisequeen4ever]

We didn’t see very many children onboard our March Hawaii cruise, likely because of the longer length of cruise. That said, they’ll still operate stellar kids’ club programs, so your grandkids will have a blast! I only had 1 other child to play with on my first cruise at age 8, and that’s the cruise that got me hooked on cruising! 

[nini]

Thanks all... I realize that the longer the cruise, fewer children. We would go during the school year but my gut says this is too long an itinerary for our gang.

I realize that it is five years from now, but we have informed our kids to start saving now! LOL... yes, we will pay for quite a bit, but this will get their savings accounts going for now.

 

Personally, I think an Alaskan itinerary would be great that is a bit longer than 7 days and there would also be other kids onboard.

[Wishing on a star]

I am not sure anyone here would know how your grandchildren, who are all still very very young, might like this kind of a cruise.   Kids vary!!!!

 

If this is five years away, and means that you have told your 'kids', who are now going thru the time and expenses of raising their own kids, to start saving...  I would not have a whole lot of confidence that this extended family cruise will sail.

[nini]

5 hours ago, Wishing on a star said:

I am not sure anyone here would know how your grandchildren, who are all still very very young, might like this kind of a cruise.   Kids vary!!!!

 

If this is five years away, and means that you have told your 'kids', who are now going thru the time and expenses of raising their own kids, to start saving...  I would not have a whole lot of confidence that this extended family cruise will sail.

I was not asking for a crystal ball. My main question was in reference to the Children's programs in this itinerary.

By the way, our "kids" are excited about it and are planning accordingly. 

[atobols]

We do the Christmas/New Year cruise from SF to Hawaii.  It only lines up with school holidays about every other year, at least for our district.  We do that cruise because it's full of kids.  I think they said on the last one that there were a little over 500 hundred kids signed up for the kids club.  There are a lot of activities for children.  We get a separate itinerary with the kids club activities each day.  There are also a lot of family friendly activities that parents and kids can do together.  Santa also comes and hands out presents to all the kids on board.  The first time we did the Hawaii cruise, my boys were 10 and 12. They always tell us that it's their favorite cruise.

 

 

[nini]

17 minutes ago, atobols said:

We do the Christmas/New Year cruise from SF to Hawaii.  It only lines up with school holidays about every other year, at least for our district.  We do that cruise because it's full of kids.  I think they said on the last one that there were a little over 500 hundred kids signed up for the kids club.  There are a lot of activities for children.  We get a separate itinerary with the kids club activities each day.  There are also a lot of family friendly activities that parents and kids can do together.  Santa also comes and hands out presents to all the kids on board.  The first time we did the Hawaii cruise, my boys were 10 and 12. They always tell us that it's their favorite cruise.

 

 

Thanks for sharing. It is so sweet that your boys think of it so fondly.

[Dididi]

OP, we were on the Christmas 2019 Star Princess Hawaii cruise out of Los Angeles.  According to my daughter, who was 11 years old at the time, it was her favorite cruise ever.  During sea days she went to the kids' club for a couple of hours in the morning and then after dinner.  Although she had made most of the crafts and participated in the same activities in prior holiday Princess cruises, she was very happy.  There were over 400 children on the cruise.  The line to participate in the gingerbread house contest was the longest I had ever seen -- and we are the sort who travel with our own "extra" gingerbread house decorations!

 

One of the advantages of the Hawaii itineraries is the immersion program.  There were a couple of dozen kids my daughter's age in the ukulele classes (every sea day at 1pm) and maybe half a dozen in the 2pm hula lessons.  We made three types of leis: ribbon and fresh flower (with the ship's entertainment staff, free) and kukui nut (with the Hawaiian Immersion ambassadors for a nominal fee ~ $10).  Thus, in addition to the kids' clubs, the pools and Santa's visit (with plush toy gifts), there are Hawaiian-themed, family-friendly activities in which your grandkids can participate with you.  If they play the ukulele at school, bring the instruments.  They'll get to play their ukes at the end of cruise (last afternoon before Ensenada) ukulele/hula concert on the main theater stage -- that was fun for all!

 

The days we spent in Hawaii were amazing.  In sum, a holiday cruise to Hawaii is very different in terms of demographics from the rest of Princess's Hawaii season.  Lots of large and small family groups.  I agree with the previous poster in that the kids' clubs are well run and that there are additional family friendly activities in which to engage during sea days.  

 

Because you are planning to do this in five years or so my advice is to keep an eye on the cruise dates in relation to the kids' school holiday dates.  It took us three years until the cruise's dates** lined up with the school holiday dates.  As it was, my daughter missed school for three days anyway because the Christmas holiday is so short in our school district, where  longer periods of absences are harshly penalized.

 

**. For the past 4-5 years, the Los Angeles holiday Hawaii cruise has departed 5-6 days before Christmas Day while the San Francisco version has departed several days later.

[Roatanfans]

My kids were about a year younger then your ages listed when they did their first Hawaii cruise.  They loved it.  Kids programing is excellent ( they will combine age groups if there are only a few kids).  We also spent time in the pool in the afternoons.  My kids actually asked if they had to get off the ship on port days because they loved the sea days.

[2 cruises a year]

On 6/28/2021 at 8:39 AM, nini said:

We plan on doing a family cruise (5 years away) with our two daughters and their families. At that time, the grandkids will be ages 5-10.

 

Based on any experiences with this Hawaii itinerary (many sea days), what might you have observed or experienced with the Children's Programs?

Personally, I prefer doing Alaska, but one daughter said she does not want to go there again. Personally, I think the Grand kids would love it.

Thanks for any thoughts.

I accept that being away for Christmas and/or New Year's means a lot of different things to people.  When we were raising our children, I felt that being home for these holidays was important.

Now that our children have grown and have their own families, and on top of that trying to share with both sets of Grandparents, we decided to make it easier for them by being away. We make it up to them in other ways.

We have been doing the Christmas/New Year to Hawaii for several years now.

We were surprised at how many families spent their holidays away from home on this cruise. But we noticed how much fun the children had. There are lots of children, so no trouble making new friends. But that was fun watching in it's self. They are awkward and sort of sullen at first, being away from their friends at home. By the end of the cruise, there were new "friends forever" and even some teary eyed ends of shipboard romances. 

If being away from home for the Holidays works for you, I recommend it, I don't think that the children will be disappointed. 

[ceilidh1]

My kids (now 14 and 10) have been cruising since they were a year old. We have done the Hawaii itinerary 3 times (with a fourth booked next year) as well as Alaska MANY times. Both my kids say, hands down, Hawaii is their absolute favourite. The kids clubs on any itinerary are wonderful on Princess but the Hawaii sailing has many family-friendly events outside of the kids clubs. We have made leis, learned to belly dance, arts and crafts, attempted to learn ukelele, etc. The Alaska itinerary is more port intensive so, while fabulous, doesn't offer as varied activities on the ship. My kids loved the sea days with the hot weather as they got to use the pool (didn't get quite as much use from it in Alaska) and watch movies on the big screen on deck. I think your grandkids will have a blast no matter what itinerary you choose, so my advice would be to go for the one the adults prefer. I would also consider what you are looking to do in ports - Alaska excursions/activities can be VERY expensive, especially if you want to do the "must sees". Hawaii can be pretty much free if you just like to lounge on the beach (another thing my kids LOVED about Hawaii)...

 

Good luck and have fun whatever you choose!

[calvin31]

They will have a BLAST!  We did Hawaii with my then 6 year old daughter and initially I was worried if there would be enough kids for her to interact with, but when I contacted Princess they said they would run the kids program even with only her.  Turns out there was about 25 kids total and 10-15 did the kids program daily so she loved every minute of it.  This was during the school year too...February, if I recall correctly.  it won't seem like there's a lot of kids (since there's lots of people on board) but there will always be some.  The cruise staff will also treat them like royalty since they will be somewhat unique amongst the crowd.  This is an experience that my daughter has never forgotten.

 

We did do a 3 night Alaska Sampler cruise the year before just to see if she would enjoy this kind of travel and it went better than expected.  The formal nights were her time to shine! 😉

 

Have fun!

 

 

[memoak]

On 6/28/2021 at 4:00 PM, nini said:

Thanks all... I realize that the longer the cruise, fewer children. We would go during the school year but my gut says this is too long an itinerary for our gang.

I realize that it is five years from now, but we have informed our kids to start saving now! LOL... yes, we will pay for quite a bit, but this will get their savings accounts going for now.

 

Personally, I think an Alaskan itinerary would be great that is a bit longer than 7 days and there would also be other kids onboard.

For Alaska we always do a back to back - Vancouver to Whittier and then back so the time is about the same

[KeepCalmBearOn]

My observation from a couple of Princess Hawaii cruises is that while there tend to be fewer children, that leads to bonding among the kids that are there, more so than cruises I've been on where there are hundreds of kids. There is plenty to keep them amused on sea days.

[sewgood]

9 hours ago, calvin31 said:

They will have a BLAST!    it won't seem like there's a lot of kids but there will always be some.  The cruise staff will also treat them like royalty since they will be somewhat unique amongst the crowd.

We often go on the relocation cruises back to Asia after the Australian cruise season in which there are very few children on board due to school having resumed.

What we have found is the same as the above that Princess go above and beyond to spoil these kids, in a good way.

They appear on the wake show, they win lots of prizes, they are the centre of attention of both staff and fellow cruise passengers.

They do have a blast!

So no matter what time of year you choose the children will enjoy themselves and be very well looked after.