My husband's parents will be celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary! We would like to do something special with the entire family - like a cruise. There are 12 adults - ages 40-80 and 11 kids ages 7-20. Budget is a consideration for some. Your recommendations would be much appreciated!

Any idea of where you might like to go?

You can see cruises by departure port on cruise.com

Expedia is easy to navigate to see cruise price

For such a large group you are qualified for special group price - call the cruise line directly

Where do you live? Maybe there is a port nearby, so no need to drive.

When are you going? Winter - head south, summer - go north.

With kids you probably don't want Alaska to let them use the pool on the sea days.

We do not have a destination in mind - but something warm and fun for this age span. We all live in different cities, but one family is from Houston, so there may be options there. The rest are from the midwest and south. We will likely go during Thanksgiving time - or holiday - so we will look to head south. Thanks for letting us know to call direct for a discount too! Great suggestion!

I think the idea is a good one. There are a few cruise options directly from Houston, a few more from Galveston, and a couple from New Orleans and Mobile.

Many of these are shorter cruises (4 days), so they are certainly cheaper. You will certainly be limited in your choices. Almost all of these are western Caribbean cruises that stop in Cozumel, Grand Cayman, Roatan, Playa del Carmen, and Belize City, among a handful of other ports. But I don't think the importance of this trip is precisely where you are going but that you are all able to travel together.

You probably have enough people to qualify for a group discount, but I'm not sure of that.

I'd strongly suggest booking through a travel agent. Just the logistics of all these individual bookings and trying to coordinate everyone makes my mind reel. A travel agent will be able to deftly handle all the payments and help make sure you all have cabins near one another.

The ships you'll have to choose from may not be the biggest and brightest or the newest with all the bells and whistles. But that also means the cruises will be a bit cheaper.

If you really want to cruise from somewhere else, then you will have to sacrifice the easy accessibility of a Gulf Coast embarkation port (assuming you can all drive there fairly easily), and that will certainly affect affordability.

Too much is made, in my opinion, of the $25 to $75 per person savings you can get by booking on some online agency with scant customer service. This is one time when you need a good travel agent to help you sort through all the details. Prices are pretty good now, but don't book this directly with the cruise line.

I agree, go through a travel agent.

I did this three years ago for my 40th birthday and my husband's 50th birthday and having a travel agent made it so much easier.

The cruise was great because we could all do what we wanted by day but every evening we all had dinner together.

It is usually about $100 per person per day but the third and fourth in a room cuts that price down. Definitely pile the kids in rooms together in inside cabins.

Thanks to all! If anyone has a cruise line to recommend or not reommend, that would be great info to know. Great to hear from personal experience versus reading all the marketing materials.

Carnival is a good all-around cruise line, and I believe it's the only line that cruises from all the Gulf Coast ports. What's nice about it is that the food is generally pretty good in all the restaurnats (about the best of the big mainstream cruise lines). The regular cabins are also the largest of any big mainstream line, though some of the ships are from the Gulf Coast are older ships that don't have all the most recent cabin configurations available. The Holiday sails from Mobile on 4- and 5-day cruises; the Fantasy sails from New Orleans on similar cruises. The Ecstasy and the Conquest are both sailing out of Galveston right now (the Conquest is a nicer ship but sails only 7-day cruises).

Royal Caribbean is better for activities, though I don't believe any of the big splashy ships sail from any of these ports. Voyager of the Seas sails out of Galveston, but only on 7-day cruises.

NCL (Norwegian) offers the most flexibility in dining options, but they also nickel and dime you a lot. The Spirit sails from New Orleans, but I don't think it's there year-round anymore.

It doesn't appear that any ships actually sail out of Houston at present. Generally, the older and smaller ships sail exclusively on 4- and 5-day itineraries, and they tend to have smaller regular cabins and fewer onboard amenities, which is why they are cheaper cruises.

We are in South Carolina close to Charleston and could have cruised out of there but decided to cruise out of Miami and include a couple of nights there.

We really had great bonding time in South Beach with extended members of our family and a couple who didn't even go on the cruise.

It also gave us the most choices as far at destinations and length of cruise.

Most importantly, Miami is a town that is more interesting and more vibrant than any cruise port.

We just got back from a 4-night cruise on Carnival's Ecstasy out of Galveston. It won Carnival's highest award for customer service, the Crystal Eagle, in both 2006 and 2008 and there's a good reason for that! Even though it's a smaller ship, it was recently refurbished and it has a great gym, a pool with waterslide, a 9-hole minigolf course and lots of activities for all ages, both kids and adults. We had an inside cabin and it was the most spacious inside cabin I've ever seen. The food was especially good in the restaurant and we loved the pizza at the 24-hour pizza bar. The Ecstasy also does a 5-night cruise if you are looking for something longer. These cruises are definitely good value for the money!

My husband's family also just celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary on a cruise after Christmas. There were 24 of us ranging in age from 3 to 76. We went on the Disney 7-night Western Carribbean cruise and it was without a doubt the most relaxing/fun vacation any of us has ever taken. None of us are Disney people (none of the kids had ever been to Disney World) but the cruise was absolutely fabulous. There was something for everyone and we did not feel like Mickey was in our face all the time!The boat was immaculate and the service was great. I highly recommend it!

About 10 years ago my family (16, ages 1-75) took the combo Disney cruise - 4 day cruise to the Bahamas and 3 days at Disney World. It was the best family reunion vacation we have ever taken, and there have been many over the years all over the place.

Norewegian is an affordable cruise line with great destinations. The only sacrifice was the food, but I'm a a very health concsious vegetarian and my husband is a picky chef so don't take our word for it. We loved everything else about our cruise with them and my mom uses them all the time.
However, NOTHING compares to Royal Carribean. They are by far, without question, hands down, THE BEST. And I imagine if you speak with a rep they'd give you quite a deal since you're booking so many rooms. You'd have an amazing time!
Best of luck with all the planning. What a wonderful way to celebrate life and family.

I agree, I loved my Royal Caribbean cruise on the Navigator of the seas. Cruises are a great way to vacation with a large family with such an age span....there is something for everyone. RCL is outstanding at entertaining the kids, IMO.