sarov

I am looking for cruise recommendation for Caribbean I

Time frame - Mid December to early January
Travelers - 2 Adults and 2 kids (8 and 6) and some out of country visitors joing us
Days - 6 - 8 days.
Interested - Clean Ship, Good food, Kids activities in the ship.
Budget - ball park of 2.5 K for the 4 of us for the cruise itself.
Priori experience - 7 days cruise to PV/San Lucas in Princess cruise and we loved it. Ship/room was clean, great customer service, Food was awesome and they could customize and cater for my Kid who has food allergy.

I was originally thinking about RC Oasis/Allure for it's size and Zipline feature. But it is working out to be way off my league especially during the tiem frame that we are looking. I was looking at Celebrity cruises which are in my ball park but don't know much about how the experience may be with the kids.
Celebrity Constellation
Celebrity Silhouette

Appreciate if you can help with your suggestions.

Thanks in Advance.

andrews98682

I don't have extensive cruising experience, but I have been on Celebrity Summit and Norwegian Epic. I took the Summit out of San Juan two years ago and there were maybe five kids on board. Granted, school was in session. It was an older ship and it sailed from a less accessible port -- San Juan instead of Florida. It was great for adults, but kids would have been bored.
Epic on the other hand would be a great choice for your group. There was tons to do on board for the kids and the adults, and it wasn't hard to find a quiet spot, either. Also, it was quite a bit cheaper when I booked than Royal Caribbean, Princess, Celebrity, Carnival and Disney.

jacketwatch

As for Celebrity the Silhouette is a better choice as it is one of their latest ships. We were on the Equinox which is the same class and it's the nicest ship we've ever been on.

Your time frame is high season so if you can get this cruise for that price then get it though I assume it would be for an inside cabin.

Sassafrass

We did NCL Epic a few months ago with Granddaughter, nearly five. The ship is very family oriented. The kids program was great and so was the food. GD became friends with another child and they (and their families) have even visited each other since then.

I prefer the style of Princess ships, and found the Epic too big for my taste, but it was fine for family trip.

I liked Celebrity Constellation, but thought it was very adult oriented.

Sassafrass

Just looked at vacationstogo and there are some 7 day cruises on Epic out of Miami for $409 & $439, inside cabins, of course, but a good value, I think. If you book early enough, you might be able to get two adjoining inside cabins which would give more room probably than a mini suite. You would have to book one adult in each one, but sleep however you wanted. I would not try to squeeze two adults and two kids in a regular inside on Epic. They are really tight.

ellenbw

Years ago we did several big ship cruises with a group of 17 friends, including kids. We did Celebrity, Royal Carribbean and Princess. I sailed with family groups 2 more times on Princess, because of itinerary. Our first choice would have been Celebrity if the itinerary matched what we wanted to do.

All the adults in our group agreed that we liked Celebrity the best - food, entertainment, service, all superior to the other two. We went during spring break so there were plenty of kids on board. They seemed to tailor activities to the ages of the kids on board, since it was a smaller group.

If you asked the kids in our group, they would have rated Royal Carrib slightly better because they liked eating at Johnny Rockets (which you had to pay for) and they liked the rock climbing wall, although I doubt they used it more than once or twice. There are long lines for that kind of stuff. If you really want to zipline, sign up for it as an excursion.

sarov

Thanks to all of you! While I have not finalized on which one to go yet, this gives me a good idea of what I am looking for. I will come back here and post my trip report.