Cruising is an interesting thing. It seems to polarize people. There are some who love cruising to the extent that they travel the world for the large part of every year, and then there are others who can’t even contemplate the idea of setting foot on a ship, let alone holidaying on one for days.
We didn't grow up taking cruises and neither of us took any cruises as young adults. For this reason, cruising had never really been part of our holiday planning. We are probably quite typical of many families – not at either end of the spectrum in terms of our opinion on cruising, but open to the idea if the timing and the price were right.
What got us interested in finally booking a cruise was a layover on the island of Fiji on one of our return flights from the United States. We landed at 5 am on a Sunday morning and left the next afternoon. This 30-hour stay didn’t really give us enough time to plan many activities, and our main goal was just to get as much natural light as possible to help overcome jetlag. For these reasons, we simply stayed at our resort and enjoyed the food, waterslide, climate, friendly service and down-time. Afterwards, our daughters raved about it and begged us to return to Fiji for a longer stay.
When we sat down and thought about it, what we loved about our short stay in Fiji was the relaxation and flexibility in a warm climate. There are plenty of other tropical islands which also fit this bill, so we expanded our search and began making a short list of potential holiday destinations.
This is a blog about family travel with larger families, but here’s an element of family travel that is the same for ALL families: each person needs their own seat on a plane (with the exception of babes in arms). Conversely, on a road trip, it basically costs the same amount to drive your car whether you’re the only person in it or whether you fill it with children. Air travel can become very expensive and it can soak up a large percentage of a travel budget very quickly, so we are always looking at ways to keep our air travel costs down. We considered this when planning our island holiday. If we eliminated air travel, we found ourselves stuck with road trips, and those don’t work so well when you want to visit an island!
Enter cruising. We have an international cruise terminal within an hours’ drive of our home. We noticed that many cruises leaving Brisbane were traveling to destinations that ticked our climate and location boxes: tropical Queensland and the Pacific/South Pacific. We narrowed down a list of potential trip dates and found the perfect option: a seven-night cruise of the South Pacific which included day trips/port excursions in New Caledonia (Noumea and Lifou) and Vanuatu (Port Vila).
We had to overcome some preconceptions before we booked. Very likely, these are considerations for you as well, and they’re probably part of the reason you’re reading this article. I know I certainly did a lot of research and talked to a lot of people with cruising experience before I booked our trip.
During the pandemic, cruises got a very bad reputation as ‘floating petri dishes’. This negative stigma hung around and it certainly impacted our perception of cruising. We also had an idea that cruise ships might be better described as ‘party boats’. Horror stories we had heard about seasickness also made us cautious.
Then, P&O Australia advertised a promotion which made a week-long cruise extremely cost-effective for our family, offering $300 on-board credit and a half-price rate for our youngest two daughters. We bit the bullet and booked!
We are so glad we did. Our negative preconceptions of cruising were shattered within the first few hours on board. We had a magical time, and now we can share some of our learnings with you, to help you decide whether a cruise is right for your family.
Our biggest take away: Cruises are ideal for families
For starters, most cruises offer a kids club. Our girls didn’t go to the kids club during our cruise, but they did look at the programs, and the activities looked like fun. The reason they didn’t go to the kids club was because they were having too much fun doing other activities on board as a family.
In addition to a pool or two, most cruise ships include water slides, sports courts and other areas dedicated to children’s fun. As well as these child-friendly spaces, the ship we went on - P&O's Pacific Encounter - had an adventure park offering high-adrenaline activities for a relatively small extra cost, and most cruise lines offer something similar.
On-board activities aren’t just for adults, and there’s a lot more than bingo! We found the regular trivia, game shows, karaoke, talent contests, word games and evening performances quite suitable for our children, plus there were many versions of these activities which were designed specifically for families, with descriptions in the daily guide indicating that they were just for kids. For example, in addition to regular karaoke, there was family karaoke. In addition to regular ‘guess the tune’, there was a family version.
Our cruise was during the school holidays and there were about 1000 children on board. I’m sure this made a difference to the feel of the cruise and the activities offered. If you’re at all worried about the family-friendliness of cruising, pick a date when a lot of a children are likely to be on board. It’ll probably feel busy and crowded, but it will also feel like a holiday meant for families.
A break for everyone: You don’t have to cook!
The all-inclusive food options on board became one of the best aspects of our cruise. We are not huge ‘foodies’, and we are pretty easy to please. Anything we don’t have to prepare ourselves is appreciated! Our family runs the gamut from super fussy to quite adventurous eaters, so buffets are perfect for us. Everyone can find something they like. Full tummies eliminate the ‘hangries’, and that’s one ingredient for a cheerful holiday.
After hearing about other people's experiences, we had been mentally prepared to deal with dry eggs and overcooked bacon for breakfast, and basic food for our other meals. It wasn’t a huge deal for us. I’m not sure where this stereotype comes from, because P&O Australia is a fairly budget cruise line, and we still found the options for all meals to be extensive.
For breakfast, there was the option to go to a table restaurant (The Waterfront), but we found the options in the main buffet restaurant (The Pantry) suited our family better. All the buffet options were served by staff behind glass counters, reducing the risk of cross-contamination. There were traditional hot breakfast options including bacon, eggs, potatoes, tomatoes and pancakes. There were fruit cups, yoghurt cups and cereals on offer. A toast station included plenty of condiment choices and there was a separate bakery for pastries and treats. The basics stayed the same from day-to-day, but elements changed, so we also had something new to try. Basic coffee and juice were also included. We started our day together in The Pantry every day, overlooking the water and perusing the daily guide to choose our activities for the day.
Lunch was similar, with the option to book into The Waterfront restaurant or head to The Pantry. Other on-board restaurants also opened for lunch, but these had an additional fee. The lunch options in The Pantry suited us well. There were four different cuisines on offer – generally, Mexican, Asian, Fish & Chips and Italian. The menus changed throughout the week. There were also soups, sandwiches, salads, bread options and the bakery/dessert bar available, with the offerings changing daily. On the final day, there were prawns, too!
It was so refreshing to have meals where everyone found something they liked – not just tolerated. When holidaying, we often find ourselves heading towards the ‘lowest common denominator’ when choosing where to eat, so we aren’t running in six different directions to match everyone’s personal preferences. “We all like pizza/chicken and chips, so let’s just get that.” On the cruise, we found each of our plates looked different as we loaded up with various options, and we were all full to the brim after every meal.
Dinners on cruises are usually more formal, with each guest assigned a rotational dining package. On our ship, the Pacific Encounter, these restaurants included Angelo’s (Italian), Dragon Lady (Asian) and The Waterfront (Australian Fusion). We were assigned each restaurant twice and Angelo’s a third time to make up our seven nights. Guests were able to choose early or late dining, and we chose early seating at 5:15 pm, which suited our family better and left time after dinner for an activity. The Pantry was also open with a buffet dinner.
We loved the menus at all three included restaurants, with Angelo’s being our favourite. Each restaurant offered a three-course menu with a range of options, and there was a kids menu which was similar across the restaurants. Water was included but other drinks were part of the drinks package, which came at an extra cost, OR guests could use any on-board credit for drinks, which is what we did.
In between main meals on the Pacific Encounter, The Pantry offered tea and coffee, and around afternoon tea time, the bakery was open with a small range of pastries and cakes. In addition, our ship included a pizza shop, an ice-cream shop, cafes, numerous bars and some convenience stores, as well as 24-hour room service. We found the pizzas to be great value and we used some of our on-board credit for these a couple of times. We also treated ourselves to coffees, cakes and ice-creams more than once!
We did not purchase a drinks package because we had the included on-board credit and we thought this would be plenty (it was). Lots of families do buy the package and we had been warned about people who start buying alcoholic drinks in the morning and drink all day to get their money's worth, but we didn’t see anyone intoxicated while we were awake. Perhaps the wilder partying started after the families with school-aged kids were in bed!
Eating is a big part of any holiday. Not only it is a survival necessity, but sitting down together for meals helps build strong family relationships and gives everyone a break from other activities, which is often much-needed. We found the variety and volume of the included food available on our cruise to be one of the most relaxing aspects of this type of holiday. We just turned up and found something we liked. No preparation, no cleaning up, no quick maths in our head or feeling guilty about wasted expense.
Visiting new places
Not only does cruising involve staying in a floating hotel full of fun activities and great food options, but it’s also a form of transportation to new destinations. Our cruise included three port stops: Noumea, Lifou and Port Vila. There is always the option to stay on board if you don’t want to disembark, but seeing these places was the reason we started researching cruises in the first place, so we were not going to miss these opportunities!
P&O offers shore excursions organised with local providers. Booking these through the cruise company is often more expensive than booking directly with the providers, but it offers the extra peace of mind that you’ll be looked after in the event of any changes and the ship won’t leave without you!
I did a lot of research before our trip to work out which shore excursions best suited our family. There are plenty of closed Facebook groups for the various cruise lines, and we even joined a group specifically for our ship for our cruise dates. This allowed me to see questions being asked by other guests and I was able to learn from the answers provided by more experienced cruisers.
In the end, we booked all our tours through P&O because we were newbies. This felt like the safest option for us. We were glad we did, because our sightseeing tour of Noumea got cancelled and we were able to organise our refunds at the reception desk on board the ship. We ended up wandering through Noumea and enjoying some shopping, coffee and pastries.
We didn’t book a tour in Lifou because it’s a very small island. Instead, we bought snorkel gear in Australia and took it all with us when we went ashore in Lifou so we could spend the day snorkeling. We did end up taking a hike up to a pretty little church with great views as well, but anyone could do this on the day without needing to book in advance.
In Port Vila, we did book a professional half-day tour, which included a trip to a Cultural Village, the Blue Lagoon and lunch. We ended up having a second lunch in town and then wandering the markets and dropping off some medical supplies before heading back to the ship.
We felt like these day trips helped us enjoy and learn from the destinations we visited, and we were able to contribute to the economies of these small islands – something that was important to us. We would have taken day trips like these if we had returned to Fiji, so being able to visit three places instead of one and still enjoy the climate, culture and natural beauty of the South Pacific felt like a big win.
Flexibility of accommodation
We started this website to help families with four or more children, like ours. The reality is that most cruise cabins don’t accommodate more than four people, and this is probably one downside of cruising for families. There are a very limited number of larger suites available on most cruise ships, but these book out quickly and cost a lot more than regular cabins, and they are often only available in one or two categories (eg. Balcony). We try to maximise our value for money, so these large suites are probably never going to be our style.
There are also interconnecting cabins in the lowest categories, but these sell out quickly and require both rooms to be the same category (eg. Interior, balcony).
To maximise our value for money and our enjoyment of the cruise, we used a split-categories approach. We decided to book the majority of our family into the cheapest room available – an interior quad cabin. We then booked the other two family members into an extended balcony suite which included a small seating area, a large storage area, a full bathroom including a bathtub, and a large balcony. There were pros and cons to this room splitting approach.
The biggest pro was that we had access to the benefits of a balcony suite for our whole trip without having to pay for six people to stay in this type of suite. Four of us couldn’t sleep in that room, but we all spent time in the living space together and it became our ‘home base’. Importantly, we had a private place to relax as we crossed the ocean. We all enjoyed the balcony access during the day, and let’s be honest, nobody is sleeping on a balcony, so it didn’t really make a difference overnight. The more expensive suite also had more assigned room credit and priority check-in, and this check-in access was extended to our whole family when we arrived at the port.
The cons are probably obvious for larger families who are familiar with splitting up to fit into regular hotel rooms: We had to split our family into two groups, with all the little annoyances that come with this sort of arrangement, such as dividing up the luggage, packing two sets of toiletries and making plans via text message or the room phones. Additionally, our rooms were on two different floors and in different parts of the ship, so if someone left their coat or lanyard in their room while visiting the other room, it was a bit of a hike to go back to get it. Entering each of the rooms also required someone from that room to be present to swipe their card or open the door from inside. All in all, these were fairly minor inconveniences. We knew about the situation in advance (we CHOSE the situation, after all), and we just adjusted our packing and our mindset accordingly.
We would recommend this category-splitting approach for larger families, because the interior cabins are great for sleeping and in many cases, parents will rest easier if younger children aren’t in rooms with balconies anyway.
Things you might not think about at first
We had a basic understanding of cruises, but it was only after I joined some Facebook groups and started doing research that I really learned about the events and activities that can make this form of holiday extra special.
One of these things is the hiding of rubber ducks all over the ship. Guests bring these ducks and hide them for other guests to find, like a treasure hunt. Our girls had a lot of fun decorating ducks with unique designs (think Taylor Swift, and Elsa from Frozen, for example) and this helped build the anticipation for our trip. They also had fun keeping an eye out for ducks throughout the week. This is an extra touch of fun added by guests for guests, and we loved being part of it!
Another thing we hadn’t planned for were the games and activities such as laser tag, rock climbing, ziplining, etc. which were on offer. We booked in for a few of these activities at extra cost, because ziplining from the top of a cruise ship on a sea day is a pretty amazing experience for anyone of any age!
There’s a spa on most ships and ours was no exception. We hadn’t planned to get any spa treatments, but throughout the week, we received invitations for girls of our daughters’ age groups to attend workshops aimed at children their age, and these came with reduced spa fees. We ended up with some leftover on-board credit, so we booked the girls into these workshops and they came to dinner on two nights looking glammed up and bearing skincare gifts. Since we didn’t really make use of the kids clubs, we found these workshops were a nice way for the girls to meet some other children on the ship.
Our cruise also had three themed party nights. We decided in advance that we wouldn’t get too involved in these, because it would have meant packing extra outfits and we were trying to keep the luggage down. However, one of the nights had a Gatsby theme, and a craft workshop was offered where participants could make a flapper headband for a small fee. Our girls all made one of these headbands, which they wore that evening when everyone else was dressed up for the themed party.
Photographers roamed our ship and took both posed and candid photos. We don’t normally buy these photos unless they’re part of a bigger package (such as Disney’s Memory Maker), but we did decide to buy two photos taken at a special dinner on board. They are a lovely souvenir.
We also learned that Vanuatu accepts charitable donations from cruise ship passengers. These must be declared while on board the ship and a special form completed and carried with the gifts on disembarkation. Before we left Australia, we bought a stash of medical supplies such as bandages, bandaids, antiseptic creams and wipes, etc., which we delivered to the Red Cross office in Port Vila. It was a bit of an effort to get to the Red Cross (quite a walk and it started to rain), but it was well worth it to know we were able to give something back to the people of this island nation who really welcomed us all with open arms. As we were leaving port, people from all parts of the island waved and called out to us. There was a definite appreciation for our tourism business.
The elephant in the room: Seasickness
One of my friends told me about her own experience on a cruise, which involved staying in bed for the week, feeling terrible with seasickness, while her family enjoyed everything on offer. Seasickness was probably my biggest worry before we left. We packed plenty of Kwells in case we felt queasy, but we didn’t end up needing them. We also didn’t see anyone else appearing sick around the ship (though no doubt those who felt really unwell were in their cabins). We did experience four-metre waves on the final night, and this caused the ship to rock quite a bit. I felt a bit ‘off’ after dinner on this night only. The crew placed containers filled with plenty of vomit bags around the ship, especially near the staircases. I grabbed one of these and had it handy, just in case. We all ended up being fine and sleeping through the worst of the rough weather, which had cleared by the time we reached port.
My husband and I did notice a sensation of swaying for the first few days we were home. I Googled this and it’s totally normal, but it’s still something to think about. Neither of us normally suffer from extreme motion sickness (I will occasionally suffer a bit on really bumpy roads, but I can do roller coasters without an issue), so if we experienced this sensation, it’s probably pretty common.
A few final thoughts
Don’t let negative preconceptions stop you from taking a cruise. If you see a great deal for a destination you’d like to visit, take it up! We were very pleasantly surprised.
Larger families tend to have a wider variety of interests due to the number of people and the age differences between children. It can be really hard to find activities that engage everyone equally. This is one reason why we enjoy theme parks, and we felt like the cruise ticked all the same boxes with greater value for money, and probably more quality time.
We managed to fit in some great cultural, educational and active experiences that we will remember for a long time to come. We met some extremely kind and funny staff members who elevated our experience. We stepped off the boat just itching to take our family and friends on future cruises because we know many of them would love the experiences we enjoyed. And that, I think, is the sign of a great holiday!
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