Archive for the ‘kids’ Category

A Traveling Mom’s tips for the Beach

Tuesday, February 13th, 2007

Many of our cruise shore excursions have involved beach time. In this picture, Tim took a photo of the boys and I enjoying a beautiful beach in St Lucia adjacent to one of the Pitons.
Here are a few tips for making the most of these amazing beach experiences:

Many shore excursions involve a public beach next to a resort. In our experience there are not usually public beach chairs. The resorts charge a nominal fee to use their beach chairs, so remember to figure this into your budget if you would like to use a beach chair during your stay on the beach. Also, be sure to bring your own beach towel.

Arriving as early as possible allows you to enjoy the beach before the crowd arrives in beach destinations that welcome many cruise ships. We found this to be true at Divi Little Bay in St Maarten. We disembarked as soon as the ship docked and took a taxi to the beach. We were able to enjoy time on the beach for a few hours before it became very crowded with cruise passengers who were arriving from all the ships in port that day on cruise line shore excursions.

Several years ago when the boys were fairly new to beach experiences we rented life jackets that were available. We did not rent the jackets for the first hour. After some time the boys wanted to try going out a little farther in the water. Even though they didn’t travel far, they had a great time just floating around with the jackets. This added to their experience with the waves, the sand, and Mom and Dad’s peace of mind.

There are many beautiful beaches available on your Mexico and Caribbean cruises, what is your favorite?

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Travel can be educational, too!

Monday, January 22nd, 2007

by Tim Larison

We’ve taken our sons Andrew and Josh all over the World on our vacations - from the glaciers of Alaska to the canals of Venice. These trips have not only been great fun, but educational, too! Here are Andrew and Josh sampling bananas right from the plant on a December 2006 visit to the Caribbean - they’ll never eat a banana again without thinking of how this fruit is harvested in St Lucia.

How do we make our trips educational for our kids without spoiling the fun? Here are some tips:
1. Study the places you will visit with your children before your trip. Prior to our Mediterranean cruise in 2006 Anne spent time with the boys watching videos and reading books about different places we would see.

2. Buy each child a camera. Disposable cameras are inexpensive and even digital cameras have come down significantly in price. Or do what we did - Anne and I bought new cameras in 2006 and gave the boys our old ones. A long “historical” type tour may seem boring to kids, but Andrew and Josh found even these tours interesting when they were taking their own pictures.

3. Have your kids keep a trip journal. We have the boys write a journal entry each night before bedtime of the day’s memorable activities.

4. Seek out local guides. Pick a tour that is limited in size and led by a native of the area. Our tour last month (by Cosol at www.cosol-tours.com ) was a wonderful mix of fun, sight seeing, and education of Cosol’s St Lucia home island. Often the smaller the tour group, the more time the guide has to interact with your kids.

With these tips we’ve had some educational and fun vacations with our kids, with many more to come!

Posted in general, kids, st lucia | No Comments »

First time snorkeling

Wednesday, January 3rd, 2007

On our Southern Caribbean cruise in December 2006 12 year olds Josh and Andrew experienced snorkeling for the first time (pictured to the left are Josh and Andrew snorkeling with Anne near the island of Antigua). What did the boys think of this experience?

Josh:

“My first time snorkeling was really fun. After we looked at some different islands, we came to Bird Island. Instead of playing on the beach, we got snorkeling lessons from a crew member of the boat. It was really fun and better than I expected. I thought it was going to be hard to breath, but it was easy. We even saw a crab walking on the ocean floor next to the boat. We had a great lunch with barbeque chicken, pasta, and banana cake for desert. After we left, we came to a snorkeling spot where there was lots of fish and coral. I saw some fish swimming around in the water and it was a really enjoyable experience. I hope I get to go snorkeling again sometime!”

Andrew:

“Our first time snorkeling was really awesome. We got a lesson on Bird Island in very shallow water; it was hard not to hit the ground. We thought it was so fun but we needed more to see. Seaweed and sand were not that exciting. After a very tasty lunch onboard our little boat, we headed to another snorkel spot. It was like jumping from the little league to the majors. IT WAS SO DEEP. LIKE 20 feet DEEP!!!! Luckily we had our trusty snorkel gear and our lifejackets. We went deep into the area and saw fish roaming the ocean floor, it was AWESOME. A little later I went swimming down, and then I saw this giant eel!! It was very creepy, and of course I swam away as fast as I could. That ended our very adventurous time snorkeling in the Carribbean. “

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Josh rates video games on different cruise lines

Monday, October 23rd, 2006


by Josh Larison (age 12)

On all of the cruises that I have been on, there have been great video games. On Disney there were a lot of computers with a bunch of games on them. The only bad thing was that I didn’t get to play on them very much because there were a lot of people that got there before me. Royal Caribbean had computers like Disney and they also had a few Playstation 2s.

Holland America was really fun because they had a racing game where you could race against all the other kids. On Celebrity there were some Playstation 2s that had some fun games for young and old kids.

On Princess, there was a game room that had some Playstation 2s in it (pictured above) that they blocked off when we were doing other things and opened it when we could play. Last, but not least, was Carnival. On the Carnival ship, there was a huge area full of Playstation 2s where they had a bunch of games.

That’s all I know about video games on cruises, but there are still a lot of cruise lines that I haven’t been on!

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A kid’s view of Italy

Tuesday, October 10th, 2006


by Andrew Larison (age 12)

(pictured on the left in his baseball hat with twin brother Josh at the Trevi Fountain in Rome, May 2006)

This is my view of Rome and basically the whole country of Italy. A lot of people think kids wouldn’t like Italy, but I did. Besides having no clue what anyone is saying it’s an awesome country.

I especially loved Italy because the tons of pasta and pizza they have there. They had any type of pizza you could think of and some you couldn’t even imagine. It was awesome to try all of the food; I even got gelato which is like ice cream Italian style. The food on the cruise ship is good too; well all of the food on the cruise ship is tasty.

Italy and its buildings were also very cool. I have no idea how many 50 story churches we went into. On the houses they don’t have dryers so they just let their clothes sit outside while pigeons poop on them. Speaking of pigeons there are mobs of pigeons in most of the huge squares. Sometimes they land on people, and when they land on you, you’ll be sure the rest of them will be all over you. I saw this one lady screaming as she was covered with pigeons!!!!! One landed on Josh’s head, and he got all excited about that, giggling and said it tickled.

Also, there was a lot of gross pictures and statues in Italy. Its like if some guy was walking down the street naked no one would notice. Every one we yelped at, our mom would just laugh and tell us they didn’t care about that stuff. Especially that David guy, he’s the worst.

Soccer is a huge part of Italy; we went to Italy a few weeks before the world cup, in which they won. Every where kids are passing the ball around in the streets laughing and mumbling stuff in Italian. Some kids even wanted me to play after I passed the ball back to them when they lost it. Good times, Good times.

So as you can tell Italy has a great variety of stuff that kids can find fun. Oh yeah and if you want to go there book through my dad!

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Kid’s Cuisine: Andrew Says Be Careful When You Order Pasta on a Cruise

Wednesday, August 2nd, 2006


By Andrew Larison

I’m here to tell you all about the great pasta on cruise lines. As a big pasta fan I know the best of the best, which is almost everything in my case. The best pasta dishes have to have garlic and creamy sauce, that’s all there is to it. On the Holland America Cruise I had some of the best pasta and the worst. My best pasta was the classic spaghetti and creamy tomato sauce, Man that’s good stuff! But the worst I dread to tell you.

So I’m sitting at my table with my family waiting for our meals to come. I’m starving by the time they bring out and put it front of me so I dug in quick, but then I noticed something. These little shells at the top of my dish… I grabbed one to check it out and to my surprise it was oddly like a clamshell. So I opened it and……. All these weird gray blobs popped out at me it was disgusting! I asked my mom later what it was and it turned out to be mussels… oh boy…I lost my appetite just a little bit.

One time I got some caviar in the middle of my spaghetti, I mean who likes caviar? What is the stuff anyway? Fish poo? Anyway I’ve gotten a lot of odd things on my spaghetti – you have to be careful what cruise lines put in it! Some ships, like Holland America, have a pasta bar in the buffet where YOU can say what you want in your pasta – I like this best. So if you avoid the weird stuff cruise lines can add to your dish, eating pasta on a cruise is just plain awesome!

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Kid’s Cuisine: Chocolate Cookie tip from Josh for the Mariner of the Seas

Tuesday, July 25th, 2006


By Josh Larison

When I sailed on my Royal Caribbean cruise on the Mariner of the Seas when I was 10 years old, I learned that the cookies were great! Every time I got them, they were soft, chocolaty and fresh. They were so good, I wanted to get some every day.

There are two ways to get the cookies. One way is to get them from the bakery in the Royal Promenade. In there you can get a lot of cookies and other baked stuff all for free! So, whenever you feel like eating a nice cookie, you can just walk down there and get one.

The second way is to order them for desert in the dining room. On the first night, I ordered a cookie but they ran out so I had to get something else. All the other nights after that, my waiter gave me a full plate of cookies every day for desert to make it up to me.

Well, that is my review on the Royal Caribbean cookies. I hope you liked it! That’s me above drinking a shake at Johnny Rockets - those were good, too!

(this is the first in a series of “Kids Cuisine” posts on our blog where Andrew and Josh will periodically give a kid’s perspective on different foods they’ve had on our trips - Tim Larison)

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A traveling Mom’s tip: use lanyards for kids on a cruise

Tuesday, June 27th, 2006


by Anne Larison

One essential thing I bring on cruises for myself and the twins is a lanyard for each of us.

Especially in the last few years as the boys have become more independent. They are not always with Tim and I around the ship and need to have their ship card with them. I don’t have to worry about them losing their card or leaving their card in the stateroom.

We use a plastic sleeve attached to the lanyard, but cruise lines may also use a hole-punch tool to put a hole in the corner of the ship card and attach the card directly onto the lanyard. The picture of our son Josh above was on a shore excursion at St Thomas earlier this year - as you can see his ship card is securely fastened to the lanyard around his neck.

I don’t always want to carry a purse or fanny pack and using my lanyard is a great alternative to using a pocket. The boys have easy access to their card as we depart and return to the ship for shore excursions. One less thing to worry about!

Posted in Cruise, kids, momtips | 1 Comment »

Josh reviews the cruise line kids clubs

Monday, April 10th, 2006


By Josh Larison

12 year old Josh Larison has been on lots of cruises since age 6. Below Josh tells us what he thinks of the different cruise line kids clubs he has experienced.

I liked the Princess kids club a lot. The first time we went on Princess, there were some Nintendo 64s, a room with a TV, board games, and arts and crafts. The second time we went on it, it was exactly the same thing except there were Playstation 2s. I got to play a lot of fun games like Scene It Jr., scavenger hunts, and a ping-pong tournament. We even got to dissect a squid! The only thing I didn’t like was that on the scavenger hunt, we didn’t get to do much because the staff was just leading us around and told us where to go.

The Holland America kids club was good. There were arcade racing games that were really entertaining. I played some fun board games, and on the last day, we got prizes. There was also arts and crafts stuff too.

The Celebrity Cruise kids club was great. There was a room with Playstation 2s, a big ball pit for the little kids, a TV, and a room for arts and crafts. We had a really good time on the Playstations. One day, I played Risk with other kids and that was fun. I even got to make a lizard out of beads.

The Disney kids club was pretty good. There were a bunch of computers that had fun games on them. In the corner, there was a big box of K’Nex that I built a lot of fun stuff with. One day, we even got to make cookies. They turned out really good. One thing I didn’t like was that there were a lot of kids, so I didn’t get to play on the computer very much.

The Royal Caribbean cruise was awesome. There were lots of computers that we could play on with great games on them. The staff was really nice and funny. We played a lot of fun games like toilet paper soccer.

I really like to go on cruises and have a great time in the kids clubs. I hope I get to go on another cruise soon!

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Andrew rates his favorite Caribbean Beaches

Tuesday, March 28th, 2006


by Andrew Larison (age 12)

My favorite Caribbean Beaches are:

Paradise Beach in Cozumel

Divi Little Bay in St Maarten

Castaway Cay Family Beach

Princess Cay Beach (that’s me buried at Princess Cay on the left!)

These were the four beaches that I really enjoyed while I was on a cruise. Each one had its own unique activities to do on the island.

Paradise Beach, for example was very enjoyable. It was the perfect place to bring our family. The water was crystal clear and there were many cheap activities that you could do. The food… The food was so good I almost wanted to hire my own chef for that stuff! Woo Wee! Those steak quesadillas were so awesome! If you are going to Cozumel, you have to go here. You don’t know what you’re missing!

The next awesome island on my list is Divi Little Bay in St. Maarten. That’s right a Marten with 2 a’s! The beach there was very pleasant. You have to be a little brave like I was to swim out far, because the waves occasionally tend to get a little big. It doesn’t mean that the beach is a bad place; it means those of you who are daring enough; will have a wild time! They had food on this is island but we didn’t eat it. Royal Caribbean and another cruise sold packages were you could eat on the beach. It looked good to me though. We had a wild time at this beach, and if you are going there, try to take the challenge like I did.

Castaway Cay is the Disney Cruise’s Private Island, and I was lucky to go there three times. It’s a giant beach with loads of activities like snorkeling, kayaking, Banana boats, and swimming. Hidden behind giant trees on the island is a secret. A secret that no one has discovered in years, until now… There is a giant pavilion… With games in it… not just any games…basketball, pool, ping pong, giant chess, checkers, pool, basketball, Wait did I mention they had pool and basketball?!?! Ok, other than that, the food tastes awesome. They have this huge BBQ house with ribs, burgers, and sweet, melting, gooey, chocolate cookies. Truly this island was super awesome; if you are going on the cruise, then brace yourself, because the best beach ever is coming your way!

The last island on the list is Princess Cays. This island was good, the water was clear the food was good. And guess what? All of a sudden a huge downpour hits the island. So that island was good except for the rain. Even though we only got to spend 30 minutes there. The best part was when my brother buried me in sand before the rain, it was awesome! I recommend Princess Cay and I know I would have a better time if it didn’t rain.

By: The Super Almighty Me, Andrew, oh Yeah!

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