South America with 8 and 10 year old

[tgetz]

We are considering taking our grandchildren that now live with us, on a 15 day South American cruise for the christmas/new year holiday' s this year on Royal carribean. Do you think we will find may children their age on that itineary and for that long? OUr grandchildren would only miss one or two dyas of school and they love to cruise but not sure how many other chldren their age would take that long of a trip and to that itinerary.

[Essiesmom]

You don't say what your itinerary is, but regardless, I doubt there would be many children on a 15 day cruise over the holidays. Most SA cruises are retirees, people who have already been everywhere else and can afford it. EM

[SelectSys]

We are considering taking our grandchildren that now live with us, on a 15 day South American cruise for the christmas/new year holiday' s this year on Royal carribean. Do you think we will find may children their age on that itineary and for that long? OUr grandchildren would only miss one or two dyas of school and they love to cruise but not sure how many other chldren their age would take that long of a trip and to that itinerary.

 

My bet is that you'll find at least some kids on the trip. Certainly it won't be like the Caribbean but I'm sure at least some kids will be on the ship given RCCL's family reputation. If they like to cruise, I'll bet they would have a great time on the trip.

 

My understanding from my neighbor who has done the cruise from Santiago to Buenos Aires is that the weather can be a bit cold. I would make sure the grandkids know the weather won't be like super warm.

[oavcech95]

yes, if your kids are only missing two days, so yes, they are going more than 100 kids I'm sure. A cruise in Celebrity also in SA with also one or two days of missing classes, there were 400 kids, that 350 were mexicans or latin american and the other 50 americans, british, french,etc..

[I&MsMom]

We were on an 12 night Eastern Med. cruise last April, and there were less than 30 children under 17 on the entire ship...:eek:

 

Our kids (4 and 8 at the time) still managed to find some friends and had a GREAT time! They spent as much time on any given day in the kid's camp as they would have had we been on a ship with more kids. They loved all the attention from the counselors, and the other children they did meet, they seemed to get closer to - not sure if it was the length of the cruise, or that there were just fewer children.

 

Go, the kids will be fine! :)

[sas80]

I'm sure that there will be other kids on board. Regardless, I wouldn't worry about it - if they already love to cruise, they will find plenty of ways to occupy themselves on the trip. Not to mention, there will still be organized activities for kids happening.

[brazilgirl]

First of all , Christmas / New years is the busiest cruising season for South America . South American kids begin their 2 month holiday period at the beginning of December (it lasts til the last week of January).

 

Cruising has become very popular in Brazil in the last 5 years and most Brazilians cruise with their families during this period. I assume it is the same with the other South Americans.

 

RCL ´has the "Splendor of the Seas" here during this season and it is quite sought after.

 

I am sure there will be lots of kids but maybe not all of them English Speaking.

 

Don´t let that scare you , as kids are much more flexible and open-minded than adults.

 

My kids just came back from a 12 day Celebrity cruise in the Med .It was May and it wasn´t cheap considering the Euro and all. And it was school time. Even so , there were 40 kids and my children made lots of friends and loved the experience!!!!(They are ages 4 , 8 and 11)

 

Have fun!Kim

[rebeccalouise]

yes, you will find plenty of kids on the South American cruise. Christmas attracts many families. In fact, the retired set tends to avoid the holiday cruises unless family is in attendance.

 

The only problem that I foresee is that many of the passengers will be from Mexico and south America. Look at the reviews for the previous Christmas cruises in South America on Royal Carribean to get an idea.

 

I read about Celebrity Infinity's Christmas cruise last year and there were about 400 kids onboard. Many of the families were new to cruising and they didn't behave very well.

[TexanInBrazil]

Brazilgirl said pretty much what I was going to say -- we are taking our boys on an NCL cruise around the cape (BA to Sant) in Dec. I don't know how many kids will be on board, but I'm sure it will be fun -- it seems like an itinerary not to be missed.

 

The SA children will be on vacation, so there might be many families on board, just be prepared for Spanish &/or Portuguese : )

[tgetz]

would you think there would be kids if we switch to HAL and a 20 day cruise? Read some horror stories about kids last year on RCI at christmas and while we want them to have kids to associate with, we don't like the idea of being over run. We are now looking at either Celbrity or HAL. If there is only two kids our kids age that can speak english they will have fun. AM trying to have the children learn some spanish, but am sure it won't be enough by then. THe celebrity cruise is only 14 days so htat seems like it makght attract more Americans, but it sstops in two ports that look like they are only beach resort areas. Being in Texas and having a home in Galveston, beaches don't have all that much appeal to us. We like beaches, but in South America, we would rather go to see penguins and sea lions and gauchos.....

[TexanInBrazil]

would you think there would be kids if we switch to HAL and a 20 day cruise? Read some horror stories about kids last year on RCI at christmas and while we want them to have kids to associate with, we don't like the idea of being over run. We are now looking at either Celbrity or HAL. If there is only two kids our kids age that can speak english they will have fun. AM trying to have the children learn some spanish, but am sure it won't be enough by then. THe celebrity cruise is only 14 days so htat seems like it makght attract more Americans, but it sstops in two ports that look like they are only beach resort areas. Being in Texas and having a home in Galveston, beaches don't have all that much appeal to us. We like beaches, but in South America, we would rather go to see penguins and sea lions and gauchos.....

 

I'm no expert, but I would think an even longer cruise would have even fewer children. You might call the cruise line, find the number to their kids' club department, and someone in that area should be able to give you an average or estimate of number of kids on board at that time/that sailing.

 

As for beach areas -- what ports? I'm researching this cruise (well, on NCL) as we are going on the Dec 7 sailing, and other than Montevideo, I'm not aware of ports that are known for the beaches?

 

Also -- we're from Houston/Galveston, and well, if the beaches in the rest of S America are anything like the beaches here in Brazil, it won't be a waste if you do decide to spend some time at the beach. You might scope out the ports of call board & the reviews on the website here for some more info.

 

Hey, if you decide to switch over to NCL, the Dec 7 sailing, I can gaurantee an 11 yr old boy and an 8 yr old boy who speak both English and a smidge of Portuguese :D

 

Whatever you decide, I'm certain your grandkids will enjoy it; my boys are already counting down, they're so excited!!

[kitty9]

If you think there will be few kids on a 14 day cruise, that 20 day cruise would be even worse. The general rule is, the longer the cruise the older the average age of the passengers. As for kids, forget HAL. Despite the fact that they are trying to lower the average age of their passengers, everyone knows that HAL has one of the higher age demographics of any mainstream cruise line. I could tell you from my experience, if your cruise were 10 days or less, you'd have many more kids, but anything longer than that, the number of kids on board lowers dramatically.

[SelectSys]

... Read some horror stories about kids last year on RCI at christmas and while we want them to have kids to associate with, we don't like the idea of being over run. We are now looking at either Celbrity or HAL...

 

I take these reviews "with a grain of salt." I think you'll find the kids on RCCL behave very well. We were on a cruise last summer with over 1000 kids and for the most part they were very well behaved and didn't cause any problems at all.

 

I have considered Celebrity as well but never HAL for our family. Good luck!.

[brazilgirl]

HAL or Celebrity will definitely have more Americans as these companies aren´t well-known among South American passengers.

 

As I said in my previous post , even with few kids on board the kids will have fun. There were no more than 10 kids at a time at the Fun Factory and my daughter only had 1 girl in her ager group. They had the best time of their lives!!!I actually think all that special attention was good for them!

 

I don´t think there will be tons of kids on the RCI cruise because of ther length of the cruise and the itinerary. But there will be enough for them to have fun.

 

Have you checked the Roll Calls for the cruises you are considering?

 

Kim

[rebeccalouise]

Just to clarify, I read a review of the Celebrity Infinity Christmas Cruise to South America and there were 400 children. There were over 1000 passengers from Mexico onboard. So these South American cruises do infact attract South American passengers. The review was not a positive one.

 

I tried to find a South American review for RCL for Christmas 2007 and was not able to find one.

[kitty9]

I have to agree with RebeccaLouise on this. I've been on small cruise lines that one would not think were popular outside the US, and there have been very large numbers of non-US citizens on board. I've also been on Celebrity to SA and there were very large numbers of passengers from Mexico and South America.

[tgetz]

thank you alll..... think we have decide on HAL..(HAL had the only cabin available in a suite on the land side, IT was the only one of the three we consideered that was going to the Flaklands, and HAL has washer and dryers and for a long cruise and 4 people and two different climates,,, and we get free dry cleaning in the suite. We really do like HAL, but we love the butlers on Celebrity, too..and we are just going to hope to have some other children thier age. From the replys i have gotten It seems there might be some, and all they each need is one child a piece.. We took them on a HAL cruise last summer to New England, a very last minute thing to add them, we were already booked, adn we were very surprised at how many children there were. Hoping there are enough children on board,that they will have some of the Christms events. As of now HAL says there are 18 children booked.... ahve no idea of the ages,nor if they speak english, but that should be even more incentive for the kids to learn spanish...... thanks to you all... now i need to start looking at the shore excursions. we are taking the kids on a Nickelodeon crusie onthe Freedom in August, and jsut can't get too excited about it.... SOUth America is soooooo exciting to think about...