your teens thoughts
 

For those of you who went on a cruise with your teenagers, did they enjoy it as much as you did? Did they go to the teen centers, participate in the teen oriented activities. Please share any experiences as well as your destination, cruiseline, time you traveled, any postitive or negative things that happened during your cruise. Thank You!

My daughter (not quite teen - age 12 1/2) went on a Disney cruise with her grandmother. She found (and other of her friends report same) that she felt too old for kid activities but was certainly too young for teen activities - if your teens are young teens, you might have to consider this.

We went on a 4-nights Bahamas cruise with our 15 yo last summer. What can I say - he didn't enjoy it at all; most of the time he stayed in our cabin playing gameboy. But it all depends on personality, I think: our teenager is a bit shy and does not connect easily (so am I) :)). This time we booked 7 nights Southern Caribbean (thank you, folks, for telling me about cruisequick.com), a stateroom with a veranda on Constellation. We'll see how it'll turn out. Hopefully, being a bit more experienced cruisers, we'll have more fun.

I have been on two recent cruises with my youngest teen. When my son was 13 we sailed the Voyager. He didn't go up on the first day to register for the teen activities, (he was busy exploring the ship, etc) and while he had a great time, he wasn't as involved with the other teens as he could have been. He enjoyed the ship thoroughly, we enjoyed the excursions, the meals, etc. Last year, at 14 we sailed on Celebrity's Galaxy, which is a much smaller ship. His first impression was that it "wasn't going to be such a great cruise". The Galaxy doesn't have a roller blade track, ice skating, rock climbing, etc. Upon boarding however, he ran up to register for the teen program. You have to go and sign him in as well. Within two hours, he was on a scavenger hunt with a group of teens, all between the ages of 13 and 16. He considers it the "best vacation of his life" and he has been to Hawaii, California and Disney World countless times. He still e mails a lot of the kids that he met, including a beautiful girl from Venezuela who knows "one hundred English words". The important lesson for him was to get to the teen club early, meet the other kids and participate, especially in the beginning until they make friends. The lesson for parents is, set a curfew and stick to it. Have a means of communication, walkie talkies, post it notes in the cabin, a meeting place at a certain time, etc. We are cruising again this April on the Voyager. This time my husband and 18 year old are going. It will interesting to see if my youngest gets involved with the group as he did last year, with his older brother on board.

Just returned from a cruise on the Horizon. My 13 year old son was reluctant to join the teen group the first day, but finally did on the second and we couldn't get him to stay with us after that. He had a great time with the group and counselor. I second Dawn's advice about how to keep in touch - we were always trying to track him down for dinner or bedtime.

We've been on many different ships and itineraries including Mexico, the Caribbean and Europe with our teenage girls. When we started cruising they were I think 13 and 10. The older one spent time with the teen club but the younger one stayed with us most of the time. As they got older, its seems their process became go to the teen club the first night, select a few that they bonded well with and then skip the teen club events but &quot;hang out&quot; with the few they chose. On some of our last cruises now that they're 17 and 14, they've gone on excursions with some of their new friends and their parents. Then my wife and I have met and become friends with their parents for the rest of the cruise.<BR><BR>A word of advice - make sure you become acquainted with the crowd your teens eventually are involved with. Some parents aren't as strict or concerned as we are and we found that our girls would try to adopt their rules instead of ours. Things like &quot;horsing around in public areas and harassing people, staying out after our curfew because the gang wanted to (have to get up and go look for them), etc.

Thank you so much for all of your experiences. They?ve all been really helpful for when I choose a cruise. To JustMe and DawnCt please let me know how your cruises turn out [[email protected]].

we were on Carnival over Christmas with a 13 year old and a 9 year old and we took them the first night which is key. They made friends and it was hard for them to spend any time with us - they had the best time of their lives and are still in touch with the kids they met.