Carnival Unveils New Family-Friendly Features

The children are out of school and summer travel season is in full swing, so it's time to pack up the family and head out on vacation. With families on their mind, Carnival Cruise Lines continues to enhance its family-friendly offerings, introducing the new Dr. Seuss Bookville family reading venue and Camp Ocean marine-themed children's program on Carnival Freedom, along with highly attractive rates for families to make a summer cruise more affordable than ever.

After a multi-million-dollar makeover, Dr. Seuss Bookville and Camp Ocean have recently debuted on Carnival Freedom. Camp Ocean features more than 200 new ocean-inspired activities that are part of a fleetwide rollout of new children's programming designed to build upon Carnival's position as the family cruise leader. Carnival hosts more than 700,000 kids a year, the most of any cruise operator and roughly double what the line carried a decade ago. With low rates, along with special discounts for third and fourth guests in the same stateroom, this summer is a great time for families to take advantage of the value of a Carnival cruise.

"Families are an important market to us and with these new family-friendly enhancements, combined with highly attractive summer rates, we're making cruising on Carnival an even greater value while providing kids and their parents an opportunity to create a lifetime of vacation memories together," said Gerry Cahill, Carnival president and CEO. "Seuss at Sea and Camp Ocean are not only wonderful additions to our top-rated children's programs but also provide our valued travel agent partners with a highly effective tool for attracting more families to the 'Fun Ships,'" he added.

Part of an exclusive agreement with Dr. Seuss Enterprises, Bookville (pictured above) features iconic decor, colors, shapes and funky furniture inspired by the whimsical world of Dr. Seuss. Here, kids and their families can read beloved Dr. Seuss books or stretch their imagination through fun activities such as arts and crafts, toys and Dr. Seuss-inspired games. Bookville will also be featured on the new Carnival Vista when it debuts in 2016. Bookville is part of Seuss at Sea, a fleetwide family, dining and entertainment experience inspired by the amazing world of Dr. Seuss. The program also includes the Green Eggs and Ham Breakfast with the Cat in the Hat and Friends, an interactive reading event called Seuss-a-palooza Story Time, and the Seuss-a-palooza Character Parade along the ships' promenade.

Camp Ocean (pictured at right) is a fun-filled new children's program that immerses children ages 2-11 in the wonders of the sea through fun and engaging experiences, with underwater-colored spaces and energetic, highly trained staff. Three age-related categories each have their own identity: children ages 2-5 are dubbed "Penguins," those ages 6-8 are called "Stingrays" and 9-11-year-olds are "Sharks." In addition to fun new spaces, from miniature play igloos for the Penguins to interactive gaming stations for the Sharks, Carnival Freedom's new Camp Ocean facility includes Party Reef, a common area that brings each of the groups together, as well as a breakout room for arts and crafts activities called Creative Cove. Camp Ocean serves as the venue for a host of new activities, from educational games such as Under the Sea Mad Libs and Ocean Artifacts Memory Tray to creative arts opportunities like Design Your Own Aquarium and Make Your Own Sailboat.

Family friendly offerings are available throughout Carnival's "Fun Ship" fleet, which this summer will offer a wide range of 3- to 8-day departures from a variety of convenient homeports throughout North America. Carnival Freedom currently operates 5- to 8-day Caribbean cruises from Fort Lauderdale then repositions to Galveston, Texas, for year-round 7-day Caribbean departures beginning in February 2015. Take care when selecting your cruise—amenities and facilities vary by ship with fleetwide implementation of Seuss at Sea expected to be completed by 2015 and Camp Ocean by 2016.

Images Courtesy of Carnival Cruise Lines