Went on the Destiny end of November. It was quite rough at least two nights between ports and I was quite seack two nights in succession - I will admit to being sick on anything but a train. The anti-sickness remedies I took had not worked but I bought some Stugeron (on sale at reception) and this did work for me. You do have to remember to work out the time when the ship sails and take it two hours in advance of this time.
Regarding trips, we went on two - one on Maderia The Best of The West which included a lunch and was excellent and the other the carriage ride at Agadir. I don't know about carriage, more like two horses and a wrought-iron buggy. Quite entertaining and included a trip to a Medina which was beautiful and where beautiful traditional crafts were demonstrated and were for sale. We had mint tea there in a traditional tent and we were not pestered at any point. The only thing was we only had about threequarters of an hour to look around and take photographs etc. It was only a half day trip so this explains the time I suppose. We also saw some flamingos at a nature reserve and there was an opportunity for a short camel ride if one wanted it. I was with my sister in law who is in her seventies, she said her insurance did not cover sports and so declined the camel ride! I am rather younger than she and so these may have been two of the more staid trips. Hope this info. is of help.

Hi Everyone,
I ended up getting a great price by hanging on, and booked 2 weeks ago for the 16th Feb. (Still keep checking though to see if it is any cheaper)
We havent told our son, whose 8th birthday is on the 17th, we are just going to wake him up in the middle of the night, bundle him up and take him to the Airport, big Surprise!!
When we go to Madeira there is a local festival at funchal which goes on over 3 days. As we want to get a bit of local festival fun, but still want to do the cable car, is it easy to do the cable car on your own rather than get stuck with a trip?
Thanks for your help.
Sue

Hi Sue (Duncan0808) it is very simple to do the cable car on your own. Just walk out the port and follow your nose along the sea road to the far end of Funchal. It is an easy 15-20 minute flat walk.

For what it is worth I would not go near Agadir, especially with a child. Treat this as a "day at sea" and stay onboard. One of the best kept "secrets" about cruising is that when the ship is in port a small number of people have the facilities all to themselves, while everyone else is doing the tourist thing!

Enjoy

I definatly agree on the "remain onboard" at Agadir. There is always plenty to do onboard too

Thanks for super quick reply. My husband has been to Morrocco a couple of times and we have already pretty much decided not to bother with Agadir with kids. We are not very good sightseers, and are more likely to just have a wander about at port, take some bread and feed the fish.
But the festival at Funchal sounds like great fun.
I agree its great on the ship when its almost empty, in the summer when we stopped at Rome it was like our own personal vessel
Another good time is early in the morning, before everyone is up and about. I like to get up settle myself in on a sunbed, go to the Lido for some coffee and crossaint, bring it back and settle down to watch the world go by in the peace and quiet before everyone gets up and it gets too hot.
Although I havent been on a winter cruise before and daresay at 7.00am its not going to be warm enough to sit in my bikini.
Looked at the Teneriffe webcam earlier and its a cloudy one today

You have selected a good cruise for wandering about the ports and "feeding the fish etc." We did this cruise at exactly the same time of year in 2005, and did our own thing. Both Gran Canaria and the smaller island Las Palmas ports are very easy to explore, as is Funchal. We did a trip at Lanzarote so not sure about the port town there.

If your 8 year old is adventurous would recommend the toboggan ride once you get off the cable car at Funchal. It is not too fast, well steered by the "drivers" who guide you down, and something that would be remembered.

Regarding weather, to be honest ours was mixed with a fair share of cloudy days and sunny ones. Never cold though, and we met a couple who had been the same route at the same time a year earlier who had wall to wall sunshine for the full week! Certainly the weather will be much better than home.

Yes Hamrag,
My 8yr old is very adventurous, I didn't realise you had a driver We all might have a go then.
As you say, the weather has to be better than here. I checked out weather underground for this week over the last 5 years and it is very mixed.
1 year was 6 days of rain, but another was sunshine everyday. Thats the big advantage of cruising though. There is always something to do whatever the weather. When you are stuck in a resort when the weather is bad, there is very little to entertain you.
Looking at the posts I don't think the Agadir stop will be a quiet day on the ship though. There are not many people who are impressed with the place, I think there will be quite a few stay on board.
Is this somewhere where you can feed the fish or are you hassled as soon as you step foot off the gangplank

All becomes clear. I have no idea what I was expecting of the Toboggan ride.
I just found some great pics of the cable car on madeira-web.com along with a picture of the Tobaggan.
We will definitly have a go of that I think, thanks for the tip.

Would not cross the gang-plank at Agadir if I were you. Will probably be your hottest, and sunniest day, so time to don the bikini by the pool, order up a few cocktails, and get hubby to keep an eye on the kids!!

Believe what you say regarding others at Agidir will be partly true, but an amazing number of people do the Marakesh trip which is about a 5 hour drive each way....10 hours travel for 3-4 hours (includes lunch) there!!

That suits me. I'll tell my husband you said so
Just can't bring myself to spend hours on a coach for a short visit, when I am on my hols. We had a look at the Red Sea itinerary, but everywhere I fancied, Dead Sea & Pyramids were hours away, and there wasn't a lot of fish feeding going on so we opted for the Destiny and the canaries, both of which we know already so a safer bet for a quick week away.

Just need to get in quick to book Michaels cake as soon as we board, they usually like at least 24 hours notice, but I am sure they will help us out. The staff are always really helpful. As long as we are not delayed we should be OK, but we will probably miss the deadline for the Birthday message in the Cruise News

You are fortunate to have discovered cruising at a much earlier age than we did. We caught the bug two and a half years ago for silver wedding, and by the time we get to 28th anniversary in June will have completed 7 cruises .

Our two boys are in their twenties, and never cruised, but our daughter, soon to be sixteen, has been twice now and loves it . She will do her 3rd one, our 8th in October. It is a fantastic way to live for a week or two, no doubt about it.

Wow 7 cruises in 3 years, that sounds wonderful.
Our daughter is 16 going on 17 and she loves cruising. We discovered it by accident and had a late booking cruise and stay from Cyprus on the old Airtours Seawing. It was a lovely ship, really friendly.
After another 2 week trip on the Topaz, we left it for a while when our son was younger. Whilst you see young children on the ships, I don't really find them suitable for us as a family with little ones
So after a break of a few years we booked the Destiny for last summer, my son loved it, so we are really looking forward to surprising him.
The Destiny is a good ship for the older kids, although there are a few parents who seem to forget they are there.
We had a gang of about 20 last year wandering around making a nusiance of themselves. We try to check up on what ours is doing and make sure she checks in with us every so often.
There was also a family who would leave their 14 year old on the ship whilst they went off on trips After seeing a few accidents, people slipping and spraining things, and a few people flaking out in the heat I would not leave kids, even older ones, on the ship alone.

Now that you mention your daughter....Just another word on Agadir, in case you are tempted to change your mind. On one of our "med" cruises we want into Casablanca (very similar to Agadir), and our daughter (14 at the time) was with us. She felt so intimidated as the men and teenage boys go way over the top ogling at all women under 40, especially young girls. Every time we have mentioned it since she still gets agitated even at the memory.

Definitely not for a 16/17 year old, the minute you walk down gang-plank all taxi driver eyes will gaze!

Have a wonderful cruise.

Hi all

Not sure if this will help? but we have just returned from the Destiny a couple of weeks ago and were warned against Agadir with having a 15 year old daughter, but what we did was the organised excursion called Morrocan Highlights, visiting the Casbah first for 15 mins, but a couple young men pestered my daughter to hold a baby goat for a picture and some money, but just be firm with them and say 'no thank you' and they are fine. We then went to a fantasia show on the coach, seeing the horses and snake charmers, receiving a complementary morrocan tea on the way in and there was a small market. We then went on to the Medina (a market where they weren't allowed to hassle you into buying their items. This was really nice. So to all who really want to get off the boat, the organised tours are definitely fine and more at ease. After speaking to another couple who did another tour which involved the Souk market, they were harrassed to bits with beggars and the like, I think the Morrocan Highlights is best suited to people who want to relax a little more without the hassle.

Hope this helps.

Debbie

Thanks Debbie,
It is helpful, especially knowing which trips are more "hassle free" than others.
Although we don't do many trips at the best of times, usually if we do it would be a boat trip to take in some snorkelling. Rather than sightseeing.

We generally like to get off and have some local drinks and lunch and soak up a bit of local atmosphere rather than do actual sightseeing.
So we will probably stay on board, but I will make a note of the Morrocan Highlights in case we change our minds.
Thanks again,

Duncan
We did the tobbogan ride last year.There were 4 of us and as we got off the ship there was quite a few taxis haggling for custom we negotiated one to do a 3 hr island trip it cost us in total £100 in a luxury merc. he took us to all the main sights including the cliffs ,markets,and fishing villages. We had a very good tour and finished off at the tobbogan. This starts at the foot of the church in the village and you go down on the sledge for about 2Km.I think the ride cost 25euro per couple but beware the two drivers expect a further tip when you reach the bottom.Our taxi driver met us there and then dropped us off at the town centre only 5 mins walkback to the port.We thought that this was good value compared to the organised ship tour that took 4hrs but cost twice as much and probably did not see as much as we did with our own private guide.
NOTE; When you walk up to the church on the route to the tobbogan start there's sometimes a local who points you out a slight detour but this is just a ploy for him to show you a pond with shapes resembling the world (i think) then he holds out his hand for a tip.
Another thing about Maderia which the taxi driver told us was that it has virtually no crime so you,ll feel safe .
Have an excellent cruise. Try the Maderian Beer its really good
Kavmick.

Thanks for That Kavmick,
We have found out there is a 3 day festival happening in Funchal, we will catch the last day, so we aren't planning doing any sightseeing, just joining in the fun, But do fancy trying the cable car and the tobbogan ride.
We hope to do everything on Foot, and thanks for the tip on the beer.
Its One of my crusing highlights trying out the local food and drink.
And I am not that fond of traditional Madeira Wine.

Only 8 days to go,
Should really think about packing now. Have to fit it in when my son's in bed and I am always too tired by then

This will be our first cruise, (going on Saturday) and are really looking forward to it. Thanks for all the tips, esp Agadir.

Having done Madeira 3 times I can recommend the Strawberry World trip Best of the West, I would envisage it's similar to the one Thomson will sell onboard.

If I wanted to do a whistlestop tour of Funchal I would:

1) Get cablecar from Funchal to Monte.
2) Walk around Monte avoiding rip off toboggan ride and Monte gardens, look at the Church, public gardens, and square instead.
3) Get the other cablecar that goes from Babosas (5 mins walk from Monte) to the Botanical Gardens.
4) Walk around the Botanical Gardens which has a great Parrot park included in the really cheap admisssion (€3, I think).
5) Do the reverse trip if you bought return tickets, otherwise it's No 31 bus back to town.

You willl have enough time to do all this in a day.

http://www.holidaytruths.co.uk/gallery/album04?page=1
The Dec 06 pics and the ones at the end of the album are mine, there is a nice one of the Destiny coming into port as well.

Joe.

Some Great Pics, Thanks for that, and have a great cruise