Dream vs. RC Navigator/ Freedom

reeltrouble11 · January 31, 2013

Hello All,

I am considering a 7 night Western cruise on the Dream in March, but have never been on a Carnival cruise longer than 3 nights, all my prior "week" cruises have been on Royal. Can anyone please compare/contrast the 2 as far as on-board activities, food, etc? We got priced out of a balcony for the last minute trip on RC, but could do the Dream instead.

Thanks in advance!!

lglancy · February 3, 2013

We have been on the Dream, RC Freedom & several RC Voyager class ships. My choice would be RC every time. Their ships are just all around better, as are their food & entertainment. That being said, you can't beat Carnival's prices, so for that reason we will be back on the Dream in April. The Dream also goes to some great ports that are hard to come by with RC. We found the Dream to be a much much nicer ship than Carnival Freedom & Triumph, but the activities are still lacking compared to RC. The ship layout is confusing also. We found the dining room food & service to be excellent on both lines. Check out the menus at zydecocruiser.net. The main place we had a complaint with Carnival was with the buffets. The selection is terrible on the main buffet line, & if you wanted, say, a ham sandwich, fries, salad & dessert, you have to wait through 4 different lines to get them. By the middle of the week, it just wasn't worth the hastle, so we started ordering room service for lunch, which was excellent, & is honestly the best non dining room meal on the ship. Breakfast was just always disappointing & boring. Try the pasta bar, upstairs in the main buffet, on the first day. It is a good lunch, but gets crowded as people find it later in the week. The terrible buffets are enough that I said I am done with Carnival, but with their prices being $350 pp cheaper than RC, I can deal with a little more irritation & a little less weight gain. We also found our cabin on the Dream to be very noisy from hallway noise. We couldn't hear our neighbors, but the cabin doors must have no insulation in them, because a conversation in the hallway was loud enough to wake us up at night, & the doors slam loudly. The inside cabin was much smaller than those on RC, plus RC has shower doors, versus the curtain on Carnival. All in all, RC is just a much better experience, but even with the "you get what you pay for" mentality, it's worth giving Carnival another shot because of their much more reasonable prices. I think you will find yourself making comparisions, just like we did, but still will enjoy the Dream. Just use room service when the buffets wear you out! Check out my full review if you'd like more details. Have fun!

Topo Gigio · February 3, 2013

I agree with you about Carnival's prices, but your overall experience is less too..

Maryscooking · February 3, 2013

I've sailed both Navigator (in Jan 2010, I think) and the Dream (this past June) and I don't think the choice of "which is best" is so clear cut at all. Some of it depends on what you are looking for. Here are my opinions, given what I remember about the Navigator from three years ago:

Dining: Main dining room experience on Navigator was better - but we only visited the Dream DR once and didn't go back. So maybe didn't give it enough of a chance. But from what we heard from other guests, the waiters just seem overworked.

Buffets I think were about the same. Lines were not really different for me. Overall, I think the food comparison is pretty much equal in my eyes. Each line has its strengths and weaknesses.

Spa: Spa package on the Dream (or spa stateroom if you got that) is a huge plus for the Dream. I started a review of the Dream last July that talks about my love for the spa so you can look that up if you are interested (the review isn't finished b/c my dad had a heart attack during the time period I started it). I don't think Navigator has anything equivalent to it.

Adults Only Area: I think Serenity wins on the Dream, even though there isn't an adults only pool. Serenity has more diverse areas to lounge (two person hammocks anyone?), more shade, etc. It is just the better space than the Navigator's Solarium.

Dream also has way more hot tubs than the Navigator (b/c of the tubs on Deck 5) and it was nice to be able to find hot tubs that weren't completely packed.

Dream has the aft pool area, which I think is really nice, just for the wide open view off the back of the ship, plus the wake.

Shows/Entertainment: Now it has been several years, but I do remember thinking that RCCL in general has better production shows than Carnival. I think Carnival's shows are only "eh." DH and I really enjoy live music onboard, and RCCL seemed to have more of that. Does RCCL have comedians now? Don't think they did when we were on the Navigator, and that is something we enjoyed on the Dream.

Carnival DEFINITELY has the better water play area for kids (and adults who like waterslides, lol). I think it helps keep kids out of the pools too. The waterworks area is one big reason Carnival will trump RCCL for us in the near future.

But RCCL has the rock climbing wall, and that is fun.

Cabins were pretty much equivalent. Maybe more closet space on Carnival, and some square footage differences, but that's about it.

Carnival has better pool towels :)

Serve was good on both ships, maybe more personal on RCCL overall. But neither gave me anything to complain about.

Navigator wins big on ship decor and layout. It is an absolutely beautiful, elegant ship. The Dream is ok, mostly because Farcus was on his way out and there is less of his influence on that ship.

I hope that helps somewhat! We chose to do an 8 day cruise on the Breeze this summer rather than pay more for an RCCL big boat 7 day cruise - not only because we enjoyed the Dream so much, but Carnival offers more diverse ports as well.

Cruisegirl6 · February 3, 2013

I can help you very much here.

07 and 08 Liberty of the Seas

09 Fascination

10 Freedom of the Seas, Monarch of the Seas

11 Freedom of the Seas, Monarch of the Seas

12 Dream

We love RC! Overall food excellent buffet and MDR, service overall excellent, activities good to very good, shows very good, pools fresh water, shower doors on RC, drinks/cocktails less costly larger glasses, if you have children, rock climbing, flow rider, decent gameroom, mini golf, etc.

Carnival Fascination totally disappointed us, my father in law comes with us and of course has his own balcony room, he calls that ship the ship from hell and starvation. Honestly, the food was totally terrible when we went last on the Fascination...lunch buffets were all fast food type foods (chicken fingers, sandwiches, pizza, hot dogs, burgers, fries, only one hot main dish with some type of meat, only one veggie, salad bar small limited of items, there was no soup, no meat carvings at all (I heard this ship now offers meat carving, roterserrie, mongolian wok), the deli meat were full of fat totally..... the shows were cheesey inexpensive terrrible shows, the casino was fun and decent, the MDR dinner was fair nothing more. Service ALWAYS (been on over 13 carnival cruises) a hit or miss everywhere whether the cabin steward, mdr help), I never had a bad Carnival cruise but at that being on around 44 cruises, it was the first cruise I actually lost weight! Buffet breakfast were so so, nothing special the eggs runny not real eggs in my opinion...the pizza is good. I have celiac and not eat seafood so I really didn't get anything in the buffet to eat much at all. We said after that cruise no more carnival.

RC everything which includes, activities, entertainment, MDR, buffet, fresh water pools and larger pools, and overall entertainment always very good to excellent. Cocktails were less costly and larger glasses. Casino more tight.

Then after being on 4 cruises in a row on the same type of ship (LOS and FOS sister ships) and only wanting in 2012 to use Pt. Canaveral we wanted a change of pace different ship. We never consider Dinsey way too many kids, everything is geared to disney heck we nearly 50 sick of disney stuff not even want to see anything associated with disney theme especially the shows and all so then there was the Carnival Dream. Thinking, she is one of the newest and larger ships they own we booked her up.

WE WERE BLOWN AWAY! TOTALLY PLEASED AND HAVE GOT TO SAY SHE WAS ON PAR WITH THE RC SHIPS! In a few ways she was even better.

First I want to say that both ships offer specialty dining...RC has two specialty dining Chops Steakhouse which was just good and Portofino's excellent (you can get a steak also in Portofino's) our last RC cruise we dined 2 nights in Chops and 3 nights in Portofino's.

Dream- The Steakhouse was very good! We had three nights reservations, went first night (you get a free bottle of wine which the brand was cheap and horrible reminded me of a light vinegar we took a sip and had the waiter get rid of it) and the french onion soup was way too rich/strong for all of us (we were 3).

We went to the MDR the second evening which was first formal night, it was just fair. Carnival really cut down on the MDR staff and it clearly showed. One of the appetizers alligator frittors (living in florida we eat them alot in restaurants) was all filler didn't taste alligator, the salas was decent as so was the fruit cup but the soup was terribly bland, I forgot what my other half and father in law had but they didn't care for their appetizers. The lobster was this small ok thing and the steak was just ok. Dessert came and we waited over 25 minutes first for somebody to take away our dirty dishes from the main entree but when that happened another 10 minutes past still no waiter, no coffee or ask about dessert so we left and headed up to the buffet for coffee and dessert to find soooo many other people doing the very same thing!!

That being said....we made reservations for all the remaining evenings at the STeakhouse and each evening (total 6) was excellent and totally enjoyed every meal, the service was remarkable perfect also.

The breakfast buffets on the Dream were alot better than the other Carnival cruises, although do stay away from those scrambled watery artificial eggs and get eggs to order in the omelet station they make you what you want, they also had hard boiled eggs, alone with meats and the bacon was not overly done/burnt either. They had decent assortment overall for breakfast.

Lunch Buffet- I have to say offered more than RC! There were always two meat carvings, a nice selection at the salad bar area, mongolian wok was very good to excellent (worth the wait), they had outside area indian food looked very good, there were so many choices of hot meat entrees (choices of beef, pork, lamb,chicken), there were veggies also and a terrific excellent dessert area. There were no lines, there are two seperate areas for the buffet not left/right as the fantasy class ships have but in the middle of the ship and rear. The deli was outside, I cannot have gluten but asked for pastrami and corned beef and they were so lean. They had burgers and hot dogs of course but never tried them as we don't eat fast food type foods, but you had them. The pizza changed my other half and father in law took one bite and threw it away said it was awful. But there was alot.

The ice cream and iced tea/lemonade/coffee/tea area was open and available to the wee hours in the morning unline RC shutting down around 10pm or so. The mexican buffet had many assortments of food and the dessert buffet was to die for!

Room service-you cannot get a "hot breakfast" such as eggs and bacon on Carnival but you able to get that on RC.

I like the liquid soap dispensers in the shower on the Dream as RC not have them.

Shows we did not care for went to two walked out of them, not good. The casino was generous to all three of us. Cocktails got very costly and the glass sizes were terribly small for what you pay for, but for 3 dollars more you can get a double which saves you alot more money in the end, but every cocktail I had was excellently made.

Serice overall on the Dream was excellent just as it was on the RC ships with the exception of the MDR.

They do have a BBQ outdoors and it looked very good but didn't try it because the one day we did it rained. Carnival lacks on the band/music hires horrible bands/acustic players shame on Carnival. We love the Viking Crown Lounge on RC but did not miss it on the Dream.

Bedding on both Carnival Dream and RC excellent. Storage may have a bit more on Carnival. RC balconies are larger.

Wow I really into cruises I can talk all day sorry all...I must say this I go on the Dream again in a HEARTBEAT she was on par with RC but I think had some better points over the RC such as the lunch buffet variety/selection.

Cruisegirl6 · February 3, 2013