Loyal HAL cruiser does DCL Dream: a brief review

[erewhon]

Thank you for the review of your cruise.

Enjoyed reading the comparisons.

[Tak8]

Glad you enjoyed your Disney cruise experience. Disney has a great product, but the prices make it hard to justify. I'm glad I did it once for the family, but other lines like Holland and Princess offer a great cruise at a better price.

[matondo]

Thank you all for your kind words.

 

DD who is 22 LOVED the cruise! Of course it didn't hurt that she got a VIP swim with the dolphins excursion as a graduation gift from her cousin!

 

I think if we were to "do" Disney again it would be for at least 7 days but currently we are hoping to do HAL next summer.

[KitKatK]

We can agree to disagree. We have been on the Magic and Wonder many times, and never felt them to be any more crowded than HAL's Vistas. We've never been hungry on a Disney cruise, and food is so subjective anyway. I'm sorry you did not find anything to enjoy.

 

On the contrary, as mentioned in my initial post, I found PLENTY to enjoy, i.e - "I enjoyed seeing the kids' reactions to all-things Disney and thought the ship was lovely." "I did love the split family bathrooms." and "Overall, we had a good time and I'm glad I tried DCL."

 

I've never been on any of HAL's Vistas, only their R and S-class ships, hence the reason I stated "I guess I should have specifically said I prefer the passenger-to-ship-size ratio on HAL's mid-sized and Cunard ships." For example, the Magic is 83K tons and holds approximately 2400 passengers vs. the QM2, which is 151K tons and holds about 2600 passengers - almost twice as large with close to the same number of passengers. Roominess is obviously my preference, but I didn't realize that until I took my cruise on the Magic.

 

No attempt to agree or disagree, just stating my own personal preferences. If I had young children, I'm sure I'd be more willing to overlook some of these preferences in favor of the joy a Disney cruise would bring to them.

 

KK

[c-cruise]

On the contrary, as mentioned in my initial post, I found PLENTY to enjoy, i.e - "I enjoyed seeing the kids' reactions to all-things Disney and thought the ship was lovely." "I did love the split family bathrooms." and "Overall, we had a good time and I'm glad I tried DCL."

 

I've never been on any of HAL's Vistas, only their R and S-class ships, hence the reason I stated "I guess I should have specifically said I prefer the passenger-to-ship-size ratio on HAL's mid-sized and Cunard ships." For example, the Magic is 83K tons and holds approximately 2400 passengers vs. the QM2, which is 151K tons and holds about 2600 passengers - almost twice as large with close to the same number of passengers. Roominess is obviously my preference, but I didn't realize that until I took my cruise on the Magic.

 

No attempt to agree or disagree, just stating my own personal preferences. If I had young children, I'm sure I'd be more willing to overlook some of these preferences in favor of the joy a Disney cruise would bring to them.

 

KK

 

Minor point, but you are comparing full occupancy (3rd/4th berths) on the Magic vs. double occupancy capacity of the QM2. Double occupancy on the magic is roughly 1750.

 

The double occupancy passenger space ration of the Magic is 47 which is actually higher than any of HAL's ships.

 

http://travel.travelocity.com/ecruise/ShipFinder.do

 

Not that passenger space ratio tells the whole story, but kind of interesting. And granted Disney's ships are much more likely to have those 3rd/4th berths filled.

[Shmoo here]

Thanks for the review.

 

We like both DCL and HAL.

 

That's us, too.

 

We love DCL, but a 3-night DCL cruise is its own animal. Given a choice, we would not do one again. We did a transatlantic on DCL, and I daresay it was just as sedate and relaxing as HAL. It was a 14-night in September, and had very few children. On any of your shorter cruises, you'll find a bit of a Romper Room on Steroids ambience, but the longer cruise are not like that.

 

We do enjoy the rotational dining on Disney, and have not found any dining room cut backs like we have on HAL, where it can take forever to get a drink at dinner.

 

We did a TA on Disney also. Our first ever cruise was a 15 night PC on Disney. Obviously, it hooked us. The shortest we've done is a 7 night cruise, but I think a shorter (3 or 4 night) cruise would definitely have a different feel to it.

[carri cruiser]

Thanks for your review, but could you please leave a space between paragraphs next time? It's very hard to read this way.

 

was trying to read these boards, but a little ant got on my screen, was going to smash him, but decided he wasn't REALLY going to do much harm

I let him live!! :)

[doublebzz]

was trying to read these boards, but a little ant got on my screen, was going to smash him, but decided he wasn't REALLY going to do much harm

I let him live!! :)

 

Thats whats known as a computer "bug." We all get them.

[KitKatK]

Minor point, but you are comparing full occupancy (3rd/4th berths) on the Magic vs. double occupancy capacity of the QM2. Double occupancy on the magic is roughly 1750.

 

The double occupancy passenger space ration of the Magic is 47 which is actually higher than any of HAL's ships.

 

http://travel.travelocity.com/ecruise/ShipFinder.do

 

Not that passenger space ratio tells the whole story, but kind of interesting. And granted Disney's ships are much more likely to have those 3rd/4th berths filled.

 

Point taken. But I'd lay odds the Magic had those 3rd/4th berths filled on the 3-day cruise I took. Regardless, crowded is crowded and the Magic was still too crowded for my liking.

 

One other thing that irked me was the tip envelopes which appeared in our cabin the night before disembarkation, filled out with our steward and servers' name on them, and a letter explaining all they'd done for us. I always give extra tips at the end of my cruises and found that a bit presumptuous.

 

KK

[c-cruise]

Point taken. But I'd lay odds the Magic had those 3rd/4th berths filled on the 3-day cruise I took. Regardless, crowded is crowded and the Magic was still too crowded for my liking.

 

One other thing that irked me was the tip envelopes which appeared in our cabin the night before disembarkation, filled out with our steward and servers' name on them, and a letter explaining all they'd done for us. I always give extra tips at the end of my cruises and found that a bit presumptuous.

 

KK

 

Yeah, no doubt about it there is going to be more upper berths filled on a Disney ship. Testament to their product though that they can charge what they do and still fill all those beds.

 

The tip envelopes are for putting the coupons in for the gratuities charged to your shipboard account. There is no expectation that you put anything extra in them although many people do. I found it kind of silly to hand them basically a receipt for a tip that was already charged to your shipboard account, but they are trying to give it a classic cruising feel back when handing out tip envelopes was the norm.

[KitKatK]

Yeah, no doubt about it there is going to be more upper berths filled on a Disney ship. Testament to their product though that they can charge what they do and still fill all those beds.

 

Absolutely. Despite my own personal dissatisfaction with DCL, I still think it's an especially great vacation for families, but definitely highly priced.

 

The tip envelopes are for putting the coupons in for the gratuities charged to your shipboard account. There is no expectation that you put anything extra in them although many people do. I found it kind of silly to hand them basically a receipt for a tip that was already charged to your shipboard account, but they are trying to give it a classic cruising feel back when handing out tip envelopes was the norm.

 

What coupons? We never received any coupons for gratuities charged to our account and there was no mention of anything like that in the letter we got with the envelopes. It was simply a request for tips for service above and beyond, which they did get because I felt they'd all worked very hard. We regularly bring our own mini-envelopes from home for extra tips. I've never seen tip envelopes provided on HAL or Cunard, or heard of it on any other cruise line, so it surprised me.

 

Thanks,

KK

[Friend100]

What coupons? We never received any coupons for gratuities charged to our account and there was no mention of anything like that in the letter we got with the envelopes. It was simply a request for tips for service above and beyond, which they did get because I felt they'd all worked very hard. We regularly bring our own mini-envelopes from home for extra tips. I've never seen tip envelopes provided on HAL or Cunard, or heard of it on any other cruise line, so it surprised me.

 

Thanks,

KK

 

edit: attach wrong picture .... I think I have a picture somewhere. It is basically 4 coupons with names for the host/hostess, server, assistant server and head server printed on it and you just insert that into the envelope, together with anything extra you want to add.

[KitKatK]

edit: attach wrong picture .... I think I have a picture somewhere. It is basically 4 coupons with names for the host/hostess, server, assistant server and head server printed on it and you just insert that into the envelope, together with anything extra you want to add.

 

It was almost a year ago that we took this cruise, but I don't believe we got these coupons. I only remember the envelopes and the letter.

 

If you can find it, I'd greatly appreciate a picture of them to see if it might trigger my memory.

 

Thanks,

KK

[Friend100]

It was almost a year ago that we took this cruise, but I don't believe we got these coupons. I only remember the envelopes and the letter.

 

If you can find it, I'd greatly appreciate a picture of them to see if it might trigger my memory.

 

Thanks,

KK

 

[Oceanwench]

Looking forward to trying DCL with my grandchildren someday.

 

The "reimagineering" of Disney Magic is quite exciting, and I would love to be among the first to sail aboard her. Fingers crossed.

[KitKatK]

 

Thanks so much for sharing this pic, Friend100! And yes, it confirms for me that we never received these coupons to enclose in our tip envelopes. Possibly because it was only a 3-day cruise, they simply didn't bother?

 

KK

[c-cruise]

Pretty sure they do it on all the ships regardless of the length of the cruise. Piloted on the Magic first (sometime in 2011 if I remember right) and then introduced on the other ships later.

 

The tickets are just the receipt that your gratuities were charged to your onboard account. You would have been charged the auto-gratuity amount regardless of receiving the tickets unless you changed your tipping preference at guest services. Essentially the same thing HAL does except HAL doesn't give you paper receipts to stick in envelopes and hand out.

[matondo]

Thanks so much for sharing this pic, Friend100! And yes, it confirms for me that we never received these coupons to enclose in our tip envelopes. Possibly because it was only a 3-day cruise, they simply didn't bother?

 

KK

 

We got the receipts on our 3 day cruise. I should add that they did get separated from the envelopes and we had to look around for them. I have no idea how that happened. We did tip extra and they earned it. Biggest coup was moving our breakfast on the last day from 6:45AM to 8:00AM thank you to our server.