I’m always of the mind that longer is better. 4-nights was SO SHORT!!! Honestly I’m not sure I can do less than a 7-night again. As the cruise director said the last night “We’ve just about got you trained! You generally know where things are and you almost always turn the right way going out of the elevators now!”
I love DCL, and they do have a teen club for your daughter - your son would be part of the “1820 Society” which is an informal group for those between 18 and 20 - they can go to the adult venues but not drink, and even if the 18 year old is still in HS they cannot go to the teen club as they are legally an adult…the key for both of those is to go the first evening as that is when groups get to know each other and in the 1820 Society set up some plans.
But I’d almost recommend Royal Caribbean for your family - their ships, especially the larger ones, do have a LOT to do for teens, and as much as I love Castaway Cay (Disney’s private island), Royal’s “Perfect Day at Coco Cay” looks AWESOME.
On our very first cruise, our two sons were 14 and just a few days past 19. It was on the Disney Magic, and was 4 nights. We didn’t know if we’d like it or get seasick, so we started small. We all loved it! Since then, we like to do 7N or longer. At that age, they thought the teen offerings were a bit lame (in 2005). That was before Disney had Star Wars and Marvel. Our older one was allowed to hang out with the teens. All our cruises since then have been on Royal Caribbean - much less money and the activities better suited all of us.
Over the years, our sons have cruised with us, or with a girlfriend/wife. DH and I usually cruise without them.
2 Likes
They had to make a hard cut-off at 18 (literally if a person turns 18 on the cruise, as the clock turns midnight on their birthday their card to Vibe no longer works) after there was a situation with an 18 year old male who got involved with a 14 year old girl when they met in Vibe and her parents rightly complained. From that point, the hard cut-off no one 18 allowed in Vibe.
2 Likes
My second favorite line for those on adult-only trips is Celebrity. Especially the Edge Class. (Not saying Celebrity is adult-only - but if the trip is. I’ve heard really good things about Virgin Voyages for literal adult-only and I may try them in summer 2023.)
I don’t know enough about their teen clubs to know what they offer, but none of the Celebrity ships have water parks or flow riders or bowling alleys or skating rinks or so forth.
But for an adult trip, at this point I’d say Celebrity Edge class (Edge, Apex, or Beyond).
1 Like
There are times I’m tempted to try Celebrity, since it’s part of the whole RCL family and some of our loyalty perks would crossover, but we wouldn’t earn any points towards our Royal Caribbean “Crown & Anchor” status. Also, we have the RCL Visa card which earns points that can be redeemed towards cruise things, but spending them on Celebrity cruises costs more points than on Royal Caribbean. For now, we’re content to stick with Royal Caribbean.
1 Like
Thank for recommendations and Intel!
2 Likes