Cruises

[kddani]

I've been on Carnival, NCL, RCL and Holland so far. We'd like to do a Disney once the girls are older (currently a 2 year old and a 17 day old- so we have a few years).

Carnival is the lowest price point. I went with some friends during spring break in law school. It is a party atmosphere, and does tend to attract the "rowdy NASCAR fans" types. I also found it annoying because they were constantly trying to sell extra stuff all of the time, including making a ton of announcements over the loudspeaker. The food was decent, but this was about 7 or 8 years ago and I think the quality has decreased since.

I went on NCL with my husband when we were engaged. I was not a fan of the freestyle dining. The flexibility was fine, but I prefer to sit at the same table every night and get to know our waitstaff. I thought it was classier than Carnival. I am ehhh on NCL. The food was pretty good.

We did a Royal Caribbean cruise to Alaska. This was my favorite. The food and service were excellent. Ships were in better shape and just overall better experience. If we don't do Disney we will do Royal Caribbean again.

We took a Holland cruise with my parents and our older daughter when she was 1. Holland caters to a much older clientele. There were only 12 kids on board the entire ship. Not that that is necessarily a bad thing, but that indicates the average age. My parents, who at the time were in their late 50's, were some of the younger people on the ship. We did not see many people in their 20-30-40's. The food was okay. I thought it was pretty bland. The service in the dining rooms was excellent. My parents had some big issues with their room (flooding, having to move rooms to a different floor when the point was to be a cabin near us). All of the staff treated our daughter like gold.

Cruising is something that people either like or don't - there's not too many people that are middling. Have fun!