Travel Weekly - July 27, 2009

Camp Carnival is a godsend on Caribbean sailing

The Miracle staff made Alex feel welcome no matter where he decided to eat dinner.

D ES TIN ATIO N S

Carnival Cruise Lines offers supervised child day care services until 10 p.m. daily with its Camp Carnival program. Above, Camp Carnival aboard the 2,124-passenger Carnival Miracle.

By Jerry Limone

Vacationing with a 3-year-old can be a won- derful experience, as you try to see the world through his eyes. I thoroughly enjoy seeing my son Alex’s reaction to new things, such as a glimpse of a white-sand beach in the Carib-
bean or the sight of a ship docked in New York’s cruise
terminal.

able to read two novels apiece on a relaxing vacation. (She brought two with her, and I checked out two books from the ship’s library.)

Camp Carnival is the cruise line’s day care service for children ages 2 to 11. Going into the Camp Carnival orientation on the first day of the cruise, I expected that the counselors would keep the kids busy during the day with varied activities. My expectations were exceeded.

As far as the youngsters are concerned, the cruise line aims to live up to its “Fun Ship” reputation at night. I did a double-take when Vasie, the Camp Carnival director on the Miracle, informed parents that the 2-to-5-year-old group at Camp Carnival could be supervised and entertained until 10 p.m.

It was then that I decided the counselors at Camp Carnival were receiving a nice tip at the end of the cruise. Toddlers are tough enough to manage during the day, but they’re cranky and walking into walls (at least mine is) when they’re up past their bedtime.

On the cruise’s second day, the Miracle even had a late-night party for Camp Carnival participants, offering dancing, games and a sugar rush from snow cones to keep them all going.

My wife and I decided to pass on this option, not because of the $6 price but because we envisioned Alex passed out in a corner at 11 p.m. with his face in a snow cone.

So we kept Alex’s Camp Carnival participation restricted to the daytime and early evening. My wife and I even got in on the fun when we participated in a scavenger hunt.

Camp Carnival gave us a list of things to find and said we couldn’t use the ship’s elevator to locate the items we needed. (I was glad I had taken advantage of the Miracle’s cardiovascular equipment in the fitness room that week.)

We found most nearly everything on the list, except a chef’s hat and one or two other items. (I wasn’t about to stroll into a galley to ask for a chef’s hat.) Our efforts earned us a second-place medal.

Afterward, families convened at Horatio’s Grill on Deck 9 to decorate cookies with syrup, whipped cream and M&M’s. Messy, but fun.

place where Camp Carnival hosted kids for dinner every night.

On half the days during the cruise, Alex ate with the Camp Carnival crew, dining on kid-friendly cuisine such as fries, chicken nuggets, raw veggies and macaroni and cheese.

During the other days, he ate with us in the main Bacchus Restaurant.

Even though finding kid-friendly menu options in the main dining room was a bit of a challenge, I think Alex liked being there better. He enjoyed the nightly dancing and singing of the Carnival Miracle wait staff (led by maitre d’ Frankie Van) just as much as the adults did.

Our waiter, Roberto, made Alex a pirate’s do rag out of a table napkin, and when my son

asked for Jell-O for dessert (it wasn’t on the menu), Roberto got it for him. The warm Carnival staff made Alex feel welcome no matter where he decided to eat dinner.

At the end of the meal, it was time to rush back to the room to see the nightly towel artistry of our cabin steward, Hendra. This was one of the highlights of the cruise for Alex, and it just goes to show that little things mean a lot.

When he opened the door one night and saw a towel dinosaur on his bed, there was no containing his excitement. Alex ran into the hallway and animatedly informed Hendra that there was a dinosaur in the room, not realizing that it was Hendra who had made it for him.

Away from ‘the big boat,’
sand, sun on beach days

Those are some special moments. But over the course of a week, there aren’t going to be enough of those moments to make a vacation great, or sane.

Mom and dad also need to be able to see the world through their own eyes. And that’s exactly what a recent eight-day cruise on the Carnival Miracle enabled us to do: enjoy Alex and enjoy ourselves, too.

The 2,124-passenger Miracle certainly had the amenities and

activities to keep both young and old entertained on an eight-day Caribbean cruise out of New York that included four days at sea.

Camp champ

But there’s no way my wife, Christa, and I would have been able to fully enjoy them without Camp Carnival. And for that reason alone, Camp Carnival was my favorite amenity on the Miracle.

Without Camp Carnival, my wife and I wouldn’t have been

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CRUISE

Little things mean a lot Horatio’s Grill also was the

The beach is very shallow and
steep — not a great place for
stretching out. The water is full
of rocks, and I had to tell my
son more than once to stop
picking them up and throwing
them.
Plus, the little shopping area
you have to walk through to
reach the
beach is a
bit tacky and
unappealing,
making Grand
Turk a port I
wouldn’t want
to see again.
In Nassau,
we took a
tour boat to
Blackbeard’s
Cay, a little is-
land off Cable
Beach. Black-
beard’s Cay
offers activi-
ties such as
Jet Ski riding
and stingray

Since offshore activity options are limited for families cruising with small children, we decided to do beach days at each port where the Carnival Miracle stopped: Grand Turk,

Half Moon Cay and Nassau.

Of course, the water was gorgeous no matter where we went, but I wouldn’t have complained if the Miracle dropped anchor overnight at Half Moon. Two days at Carnival’s private island in the Bahamas would have been terrific.

T W PHO TO B Y CHRIS TA LIMONE

The sand was soft and silky at

Travel Weekly.com Web Editor Jerry Limone and son Alex enjoy the waters at Half Moon Cay in the Bahamas.

Half Moon, and the island is the closest thing you’ll get to a Caribbean paradise experience on this cruise, which some passengers appreciate and some don’t.