Stuff We Love: Kids Adventure Club at Atlantis Resort
Posted
Tuesday, February 09, 2010 5:07 PM
One of the benefits of being a working mom is that sometimes you get access to on-the-job perks. A beauty sample sale at work (thanks, Knot Heather!). Access to actual parenting experts when your kid won’t sleep through the night. You know, nice things. But last week, I got the mother of all job perks – an invite from JetBlue to join them on a press trip to the opening of The Atlantis Resort’s brand-new Atlantis Kids Adventure club.
Our trip began at JFK in the newly redesigned JetBlue terminal. It’s pretty fancy— I especially liked the food-ordering computer terminals that brought food straight to your gate. My two older kids – yes, I brought all three of them with me—who are 8 and 6, loved the TV screens at every seat on the plane. In fact, I didn’t speak to either of them for the majority of the ride. While ignoring my offspring is not normally a goal of mine, all bets are off on an airplane. I consider no talking a VERY successful flight! (Especially when I am busy dealing with a wriggly 16-month-old.) But a quick 3-hour direct flight from New York to the Bahamas was no sweat, and soon we were touching down in Nassau.
We were given strict instructions to pack a bathing suit in our carry-on, because our weekend of adventure began immediately upon arrival and lasted until we were packed and ready to leave three days later. First stop: Dolphin Cay for a hands-on dolphin experience. My kids loved watching the dolphins frolic at such close range, and though zoos often depress me (poor apes, stop staring at me with those human eyes!), you can’t resist how cute and playful the dolphins are. They are more like puppies than ocean animals! Next stop: pizza party with the youngest Jonas Brother (the Bonus Jonas), and a nighttime guided tour of The Dig, The Atlantis’ totally amazing underground aquarium that is built to resemble the lost city of Atlantis.
There were more activities than I can mention in one blog post: water slides, kids’ pool, Build-a-Bear-esque stuffed animal making, paint-your-own-pottery, beach olympics. And that doesn’t begin to cover what’s available at the AKA club itself: kids’ culinary classes, karaoke, video games, a mock supermarket, life-size doll house…the list goes on and on. Oh, and did I forget to mention that there was a Lego master builder along on the trip with us? My 6-year-old son’s dream come true…a Lego activity at every turn. (There’s even a Lego fantasy camp planned for this summer.)
Is this an inexpensive family vacation? Perhaps not. But if non-stop family adventure on a Vegas-like scale in a Bahamian paradise is your idea of a great vacation, then hop a JetBlue flight to The Atlantis A.S.A.P.!
--Bump Alison
