Cruising with Tweens?

[Angeliki19]

My 13 year old daughter has been in Edge the last two cruises and she is so much happier there. She really didn't like the younger clubs once she got to about 10 years old. She complained about being in with tiny kids and feeling like the activities were really geared so much younger. It's funny because she otherwise will hang out with lots of kids of different ages. She goes to a private school with mixed age groups that play together so I'm not sure why it was such an issue on the cruise. And she's a gymnast on a team with a variety of ages. One of her close friends at gym is 10. I think it was the activities she didn't like. And the mayhem. She doesn't do well with lots of noise and chaos (has some sensory issues - movies are a problem, for example). She finds the tween club to much more chill. She does enjoy the activities there better, but she also was really happy to go and meet some other kids her age she could hang out with at the pool or go get a snack with, etc.

Make sure your kiddo goes on the very first day. They do meet and greet type activities on that day and it really can set the tone for the week. It may have been the cruises we were on, but my daughter said that they were asked about the kinds of activities they wanted in Edge, which she really liked. Sometimes it is just chill out and play games or color or whatever, but my daughter overall just really prefers the lower key vibe there.

In terms of being about the ship on their own, my daughter has had this privilege since she was able to check herself out. She has either a waist pouch or a cross body bag and the rule is that anytime she moves to a different space she has to send us a message through the app and let us know where she's going and with whom. We've not had an issue with this. Early days her only options were kids club or stateroom. If she checked herself out, she had to go straight to the room and let us know. Now we give her a little more freedom, but she still has to tell us where she is and who she's with. Mostly she's either in Edge, the stateroom, or getting a snack, or doing an activity (trivia, crafts, Who Wants to Be a Mouseketeer, etc.) She's also not allowed to go into another person's stateroom. So if she has a new friend on the ship, that person may not be in our room and she is not able to be in their room. This is just for safety reasons. We really don't know these other families and I would hope they have integrity but dang, you just don't know these days.

This is great advice, thank you!

 

[tj48103]

For my 10 and 13 year old late dining worked really well. Before dinner we would go to the show and go to the D Lounge for the "family game show" type activity that night. After dinner we would usually take a walk around the deck and then the kids would go back to the room to watch a movie and we would go to the adult lounge for the evening activities for an hour or so. It worked out great. My kids did like edge but they didn't spend a ton of time there, in part because we had great weather on our trip so they preferred to be out on the pool deck (back home it was below zero). In Nassau we did the Snorkel Catamaran and they really enjoyed it. It was also only a couple hours long so we still had plenty of time to enjoy the ship that day too.

 

[HeatherLassell]

Thank you so much for the honest answer!! I can definitely see we are getting to the age where they don't want to be forced into activities. It's good to know so I can prepare them. And thank you for the info about texting and Wifi! I assumed we would have to buy a package but that's good to know. The older one has a phone so I'll have her bring it and just say that they have to stay together.

That's a great plan. Because you can message them and they can message back. There's also really cute Disney emojis in the messages! Maybe just make a rule where they have to open the app every 30 minutes or so since not everyone gets notifications from the app. (I never get any and then I'll open it and there's messages!)

 

[Lilsia]

I have 2 girls that grew up going on the cruise. I had one that wanted nothing to do with the clubs at any age, and one that would spend all day, every day there if she could. Her all time favorite club was the tween one. She was extremely sad when she aged out of it. Her favorite part was how they could play Mario cart against other kids and she always beat them especially the boys. LOL
Now the dining is a personal thing. We love main dining because we eat earlier on a daily basis. My stomach does not do well if I eat too late at night.
We never get off at Nassau mainly because it does not feel safe and it is just us girls that cruise.
My girls would go out and about the ship on their own at that age with no issues. There are always a bunch of people around. After dinner time, when everyone was either at dinner or at a show is when I told my daughter to contact me when she was ready to leave the kids club and I picked her up. As they got into their late teens, they were out and about at all hours on their own.

 

[lovingeire]

I'm also thinking that maybe I should make some "rules" about times they have to hang out with us in advance. On the last cruise, my DD begged one night to stay in the kids club instead of coming to the Beauty and the Beast show with me and it made me sad, but I let her. It might be good to think of a few "must do" things as a family that are non-negotiable. It's so funny how much kids love these kids clubs... I always tell my friends if you want to have a vacation FROM your kids go on a Disney Cruise! Ha!

We made rules with my oldest (who was 19 on our last family cruise). Mostly we were traveling with my parents for their 50th anniversary so we did dinners every night and excursions and we'd text him and plan a thing or two on occasion to do together. He is super social and would just hang out with the kids from the 18-20 group (we had a super active group in our FB group who connected in advance) so he literally would have ditched us the whole time if we didn't set rules.

When my middle son was almost 9 on our last cruise he didn't love the Club/Lab. He'd go when we had Palo or something planned, but was happy to sit in the room and watch TV (my parents had an adjoining room and would open the door for him) whereas my youngest, who was 6 at the time, loved the Club/Lab and didn't want to leave. My youngest is definitely more social like my oldest. My middle is also on the spectrum and found the clubs a little loud and chaotic. He did have a friend from our FB group and if they were there together he enjoyed it more. He is cautiously optimistic about Edge. (Although I think what he likes most is being able to come and go as he pleases!)

 

[KT2038]

Edge is one of my favorite places to work because you really get to know the tweens and I love the programs and activities we do in there. It really does depend on the personality of the child as to how much they like both Edge and Vibe. However, I am sure they will find things they like to do.
Just a clarification on a previous post, Disney does not track children who are wearing an Oceaneer Band all over the ship. This only works in our spaces.

 

[TNewman1024]

We always dot he late dinner. We have done Alaska on DCL 5 times. Everything is later on the Alaska cruises as the sun doesn't go down till about 1130pm or later in July. All the shows and such are earlier at the 6pm timeframe so if you are tired from the day of events or excursions you can take a nap or relax and miss the show. Although we always seems to go.

We did a B2B 13jan and 17jan on the magic. our son 12yrs spent almost all his time in Edge. He liked the special area for kids his age. To say they just play video games is a little simple. That seems to be what he likes anyways. But I will say this they had events and competitions that were interactive. I think one was a Wii table tennis tournament. They also did other completions and stuff in the edge club. I think one night they got to go to Vibe for a couple hrs. They had a scavenger hunt and some other stuff. He came back almost every night with some Edge swag that he won on trivia or video game completion. He has an Edge ball cap that he has been wearing the last month almost non stop.

He made friends and even spent a few hours with the edge kids on CC. In our B2B we had 3 days on CC. He got a little bored with a beach day 3 times out of 9 days on the ship so he spent time with the Edge group in their area on CC. They had I think Corn hole, Ping Pong, and some other stuff. He enjoyed it for a couple hours.

We did Palo one for dinner and he even took himself to dinner and then ended up on the deck 9 for foosball and Ping-Pong table till almost midnight. I guess some of the kids from edge decided to go up there together.

I think overall he became much more independent on this cruise and it was nice for us to not stress about him and his activities. He was in charge of his entertainment and we just set rules for times to check in or times for dinner, the show or what ever it was we had planned as a family. He was really good with the added responsibility and independence.

I think we get skewed by the world today...kids 12 or 13 today are pretty sheltered compared to where I was in the early to mid 80's. I understand the world is a different place and I'm old 50 in a couple weeks. But on the Disney Ship my wife was a less protective and he showed the good decision making we have tried to teach him. Since returning home this past month he has been happy to have more independence. Him being and only child, pretty much is sheltered by mama bear. The cruise was a little turning point in him as a person to take more responsibility for his time and his decisions. He has been much more outspoken as to what he has planned or in making plans, He has started to order dinner at a restaurant from the regular menu and trying new tastes some he likes and some he doesn't. He is really trying new things and coming into his own. I say this as its been a really noticeable change in him since our cruise trip in mid January. I don't think it was Edge. But I think it was the confidence we have in him and his confidence in his decisions that have started the ball rolling giving him his freedom and letting him plan his time and make his choices. This made our cruise more enjoyable as we could do what we wanted and didn't worry about him. We checked out the convict bracelet (magic Band) for kids clubs but I don't think he went to the Oceaneers or Lab the entire time.

Edge did not have any scheduled times for COVID separation or time slots. I think they just had a limit on the number of kids total. I don't think they ever got to that point....

 

[iivye]

1) We always did late seating but my tween said most tweens on our cruise had early seating so they were all meeting up when we went to dinner. We just let her skip dinner with us when she wanted to meet with the others. I think this kind of depends on the other tweens on the ship and whether your tween is very social.

2) Mine loved the Edge.

3) If I was sailing on the Wish I would not get off the ship. Since it's a short cruise I would just explore the ship.

4) Yes, it's reasonable to leave your kids alone at that age. I actually let mine roam on the ship at that age and I thought it was a good chance for her to be independent. We did have specific rules like no going into other people's staterooms and no swimming. I think I also made her check in with me by message a couple times of day.

You'll have a great trip!

 

[KatieKepic]

We just got back and our kids were 11 & 13 (soon to be 14). We did early dining this time since my niece was with us and she's 4 and wouldn't have made late dining. We all agreed, we much prefer late dining. It's nice not feeling rushed trying to get to dinner and honestly, we never had the chance to get hungry for early dinner.

My son LOVES edge and likes it much better then he ever did the club/lab. But he's more into video games, trivia and sports so they offer a lot more of that. He loved the games they play (heroes vs villains for example) and things like the scavenger hunts. My daughter loves club/lab and even enjoyed it with the current changes. I'm not sure how's she's going to like edge once she ages out of club/lab.

I'd stay on the ship in Nassau and enjoy the wish. Atlantis is fun and so is Blue Lagoon is you're looking to get off this ship but with a short cruise and all the wish has to offer, I'd want to get the most out of the ship.

There is a chat feature through the app but I'll be honest that I struggled with it. Mine kept logging me out and I didn't realize it so I wouldn't get notifications. We all have iphones and imessage works on the ships and we had much better luck with that. My 13 year old was allowed to go and do his own thing and I felt comfortable with that. He had to check in with us if he was switching areas and then we had certain things he had to be with us for (dinner, shows, etc). We also put him on the pickup list so he was able to pick the girls up from club/lab which was great. My 11 year old is mature enough to be able to roam the ship however, she has no sense of direction so she always needed someone with her or she'd never get to where she was trying to go

 

[Lilsia]

We just got back and our kids were 11 & 13 (soon to be 14). We did early dining this time since my niece was with us and she's 4 and wouldn't have made late dining. We all agreed, we much prefer late dining. It's nice not feeling rushed trying to get to dinner and honestly, we never had the chance to get hungry for early dinner.

My son LOVES edge and likes it much better then he ever did the club/lab. But he's more into video games, trivia and sports so they offer a lot more of that. He loved the games they play (heroes vs villains for example) and things like the scavenger hunts. My daughter loves club/lab and even enjoyed it with the current changes. I'm not sure how's she's going to like edge once she ages out of club/lab.

I'd stay on the ship in Nassau and enjoy the wish. Atlantis is fun and so is Blue Lagoon is you're looking to get off this ship but with a short cruise and all the wish has to offer, I'd want to get the most out of the ship.

There is a chat feature through the app but I'll be honest that I struggled with it. Mine kept logging me out and I didn't realize it so I wouldn't get notifications. We all have iphones and imessage works on the ships and we had much better luck with that. My 13 year old was allowed to go and do his own thing and I felt comfortable with that. He had to check in with us if he was switching areas and then we had certain things he had to be with us for (dinner, shows, etc). We also put him on the pickup list so he was able to pick the girls up from club/lab which was great. My 11 year old is mature enough to be able to roam the ship however, she has no sense of direction so she always needed someone with her or she'd never get to where she was trying to go

I think the Edge has the most interactive experience out of all of the clubs. They have a running gender wars game throughout the cruise, various activities, who can eat the most ice cream, etc. I think they do an excellent job with kids that age. They seem to get them.

 

[ichoose2believe]

My 13 yo loved Edge. Honestly, I think he loved the freedom I was able to give him since he was on the ship (he's on the spectrum). We did have one miscommunication that honestly could have been solved with a post it note in the room. What he liked most about Edge was the videogame tournaments