Dissapointed in Princess

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Litholam2

Guest
Just got off the Carribean Princess on Saturday and was shocked by the amount of children...mostly without any supervision by Princess or parents. I have always heard that Princess had allowed only a certain amount of children on cruises...there were 750 on this cruise. Yes, it is the start of summer but we are very frequent Princess customers and we were shocked. Kids were diving in from the hot tubs to the pool..could of easily slipped and permanently injured themselves. Children were also in the adult only pool. We went to the pursers desk to complain but they stated they are not liable for this situation that poor parenting is. They stated they never have had a policy allocating the volume of children...I asked if this is since the Carnival takeover but they stated that this was never a Princess policy. Mobs of them running around at all hours of the night. A few idiots were on the Aloha balconies feeding the sea gulls crackers not even thinking about the garbage these birds are dropping in the Caribe and Dolphin balconies... yes, we called again.

Beautiful ship...they have reduced the sizes of the pools though even though they have added 500 more passengers.
 
C

Cruise cutie

Guest
As is often the case on all the cruise lines..they can have problems with dim witted parents..I have been blessed with never in 10 my years of being on Princess with unruly kids...BUT we HAND PICK sailing dates to avoid kids..we love children ,we have 5, however they are grown..:grin..and DH and I make sure we pick weeks on all sizes of Princess ships that are not kid oriented..we do not sail Christmas /New Years, or in March/April when schools all over the USA are out on cycled breaks whether grade or college.. and after May 15th to Labor Day is Now PRIME kids sailings..so you have to do your research in this topic if you want to avoid the kids crunch on Carnival,RCCL,and even Princess..to get less kids you need HAL,Celebrity,or Cunard....the most children on any of my sailings has been in the range of 15-35 kids.and if out of San Juan the numbers are less..the flights are so expensive and people cannot DRIVE to the port..therefore less kids..also 10 day sailings..less kids due to costs and inability to take out of school....The lines will come down on the kids if you are religious about the dangers ignorant, "could care less parents" cause..I have a 2 week timeshare in Aruba and have seen less than stellar behavior more often..I have spoken to the kids myself..if that did not work..a little chat with the customer relations did the trick..again our times share has fewer children..again Hand picked dates for less kids..:daisy..I do feel for the people who get nailed for the ding dong parent deal..sigh..but as with any high cost purchase ..WE do the work to eliminate any future disappointments..Hope your next sailing on any cruise line you choose is fun!!..Good luck..:)..Joanne
 
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DJA

Guest
It's the beginning of Summer, the newest and largest ship in the fleet, and a very standard 7-day Caribbean run from one of the most easily accessible ports in all of cruising... if that doesn't scream that it will be full of kids nothing does ...and in any large group of kids there will always be a sizeable chunk of them exhibiting all of the annoying behaviors you've described, with parents who don't care what they do short of going overboard. As an experienced cruiser you should have seen that one coming a mile away. Not too many kid-free runs on that ship...maybe September or early May...
 
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MortgageChick

Guest
To avoid kids we try to sail 10-17 nights per cruise and that seems to effectively limitthem to very few. Last summer on HAL Rotterdam Boston to Montreal - 7 days in June the ship was full of children. We won't be sailing between June and August again. After school goes back in Sept, or May is a good time. We have usually had luck the first 2 weeks of February too.
 
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Cruise cutie

Guest
:thumb..you got that right Sharon..we cruise the first 2 weeks of February every other year!..;)..Been a winner so far every time..Love those Valentine's week sailings..Parents keep kids home so they are alone..=love..:thumb..Joanne
 
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gaa

Guest
We were on that same sailing of the CP and yes, while there were lots of kids, we expected it due to the timing of the sailing. Our experience was quite different--we did not experience rude or unruly children running around all hours of the night. We are the parents of a teen, but she did not accompany us this time. The only thing that surprised us this time were the number of younger children in the dining room for traditional second seating---in the past, most of the families with small children seemed to opt for the early seating. Still, no problem for us---they were also well behaved.
 
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paljoeysmom

Guest
We have found the 1st 2 weeks of May to be BEST for if you don't want many kids on your ship. Also anytime after 9/15 & the whole month of October are excellent for the same reason.
 


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