Adventure Ocean Yes or No?

[Tanker4]

Here's the deal guys. My DW and I aren't exactly virgin cruisers as we've been cruising off and on since the late 80's but we've finally run across something we don't have and answer for. We're sailing the Sovereign on a 4 day leaving next Monday. We've done the Sovereign quite a few times so no surprises there but.......... we're using this trip to introduce our DD and her family to cruising, including our 7 year old DGS and the question is: do we introduce him to AO this trip or wait until next time? The second day we'll be at Coco Cay (hopefully) and I'm sure he would enjoy it more being with us. The third day is in Nassau and since he's never been out of the USA before we'd also like to begin exposing him to a foreign country so that only leaves one sea day to experiance Adventure Ocean. My DW says that we should at least sign him up on the first day and my thoughts are why?

 

Anyone have any advice?:)

 

Tanker 4

[BethCarp]

Haven't taken my kids on a cruise yet, but from everything I've read here, most kids don't want to leave AO. I've heard that they have great activities on Coco Cay too. We're definitely signing our kids up and plan to use it at night during dinner at the very least. We plan on taking the kids ashore to Key West and Cozumel, but those will not be all day things. So we'll probably send them to AO for part of those days, as well as the sea day. As for, Coco Cay we'll probably do both. I'd like the kids to try snorkeling, but I also want to snorkel on my own too. We figure they'll have a lot more fun playing with kids their age as opposed to mom and dad all the time.

 

Obviously all kids are different and they don't all love AO. But we're pretty sure our kids will like it.

[crusinmama06]

You are actually asking two different questions.

 

Should you sign him up for AO...YES you should.

 

Should you LEAVE him onboard at AO while you guys go to ports (in my opinion) NO you shouldn't. ;)

 

On our 4 day cruises, it goes like this. The kids get signed up for the kid program on the first night but you CANNOT drop them off the first night.

 

Second day - a port day - we go to the port all day, come back for dinner. The kids go to AO AFTER dinner while the adults head to the shows/bars/casinos/etc

 

Third day - on the private islands I take the kids WITH me. So no AO on the islands. Most kids I saw at Labadee were with their parents and the AO was empty on Labadee, might be the same for CocoCay

 

Then after dinner again, the kids head BACK to AO on the ship. Adults go out, the kids have fun at AO and wild horses can't drag them out

 

I have some AO compasses for the 6-8 year old age group so you can see the HUGE amount of nighttime actitivites...

http://s204.photobucket.com/albums/bb196/cruisinmama06/Royal%20Caribean%20AO%20Compass/

 

So YES to AO, NO to leaving him there on port days...let him get off and experience the ports with his family

[Tanker4]

Beth and Michele,

 

Thanks for the comments and advice, and Michele, thanks for the AO Compasses. Guess we'll sign him up and take it from there.

 

Happy cruising...............:)

 

Tanker 4