Royal Princes Balcony's

[Jules59]

Can anyone advise us on the balcony's on the Royal Princess? Like what is the best one? Either a regular or a mini-suite? Mostly worried about the balcony. Thanks.

[caribill]

What is your definition of "best?"

 

What are you worried about?

[pcsunlover]

Can anyone advise us on the balcony's on the Royal Princess? Like what is the best one? Either a regular or a mini-suite? Mostly worried about the balcony. Thanks.

 

We had one of the larger midship mini-suite balconies on the port side under the SeaView bar. It was on the Baja deck (B414). Fully covered and bigger than the standard balconies on the ship. We really enjoyed the location, although if you like to use stairs rather than an elevator, you have a short walk to the forward staircase.

[Astro Flyer]

Most balconies are the same size except for those in the curved midship section, aft facing & a few other variable sizes. The majority are the same size whether a mini, deluxe or standard balcony & the larger cabins bump out into the hallway. Those who measure the balconies say they're about 9'x4' vs. 9'x5' for most standard balconies on other Princess ships. Losing a foot of balcony depth didn't affect our experience but some feel differently.

[fishin' musician]

Recently off the Royal in a "standard" balcony. It was quite shallow, and really did not lend itself to hanging out there as much as we typically would. Being a tall lanky guy, I could not sit with the chair pointed out and to turn sideways was at least inconvenient. So to me the room ended up being utilized as an oceanview with an extra large window (which I find ironic as there are no "oceanview" staterooms on this ship).

[Musky Ike]

Recently off the Royal in a "standard" balcony. It was quite shallow' date=' and really did not lend itself to hanging out there as much as we typically would. Being a tall lanky guy, I could not sit with the chair pointed out and to turn sideways was at least inconvenient. So to me the room ended up being utilized as an oceanview with an extra large window (which I find ironic as there are no "oceanview" staterooms on this ship).[/quote']

 

That is kind of what we thought. We usually book OV, but on the Royal the obstructed balcony kind of fills that niche. So that is what we booked.

[ConnKellyN]

We had one of the larger midship mini-suite balconies on the port side under the SeaView bar. It was on the Baja deck (B414). Fully covered and bigger than the standard balconies on the ship. We really enjoyed the location, although if you like to use stairs rather than an elevator, you have a short walk to the forward staircase.

We just had this same balcony/mini-suite on a sailing last week. The balcony was plenty big enough for us as well.

[Loreni]

Someone posted that they measured them on another thread. They are also nine feet wide, I believe. For most ships, Princess discloses the square footage of the balconies, I don't think they do for Royal.

 

You could measure out the depth from a wall in your house and put a few chairs there facing the wall (or sliding glass door if you have one) and see how it feels to you. DH and I did this. We have long legs, so it didn't feel very nice for us.

 

Maybe you could call Princess and verify the depth. If they do this and tell you, please post.

[Mom33]

Someone posted that they measured them on another thread. They are also nine feet wide, I believe. For most ships, Princess discloses the square footage of the balconies, I don't think they do for Royal.

You could measure out the depth from a wall in your house and put a few chairs there facing the wall (or sliding glass door if you have one) and see how it feels to you. DH and I did this. We have long legs, so it didn't feel very nice for us.

 

Maybe you could call Princess and verify the depth. If they do this and tell you, please post.

 

They describe the standard balconies on the Royal as 41 sq ft.The standard on the other ships is 45 sq ft. The larger balconies are described as Premium and are different sizes depending on where they are.

You can find this info when you look up the Royal cabins and deck plans.

Edited April 23, 2014 by Mom33

[bluesea321]

Someone posted that they measured them on another thread. They are also nine feet wide, I believe. For most ships, Princess discloses the square footage of the balconies, I don't think they do for Royal.

 

You could measure out the depth from a wall in your house and put a few chairs there facing the wall (or sliding glass door if you have one) and see how it feels to you. DH and I did this. We have long legs, so it didn't feel very nice for us.

 

Maybe you could call Princess and verify the depth. If they do this and tell you, please post.

 

I am the person who measured the width of my balcony as 3' 7". I did not measure the other direction so I do not have the square footage. In contrast to other Princess ships, nearly all Balcony, Deluxe Balcony and Mini-Suites on the Royal have the same balcony size (a few exceptions forward, aft, and under the sea walk). I used an actual tape measure, not a guesstimate. I measured the distance from the aluminum frame of the sliding glass door to the inside of the railing. This is the usable space when a chair is placed there. Sliding glass doors on ships have thick aluminum frames for structural reasons and the frame takes up space.

 

Another poster (Pam) mentioned that the balconies on the Royal are 9' by 4'. If I had measured from the corners of the balcony, an area where the sliding glass door does not go, it would have been larger, closer to 4' perhaps, but this is of little use to someone sitting on the balcony as the chairs are in front of the sliding glass door. I suppose that with a chair at an angle a rear leg could be placed towards the corner and thus gain a little extra space.

 

If you go to the Royal's deck plans, select a balcony cabin, view details, and then view amenities, you can see that Princess states that the balconies are 41 square feet. This is what they are going to tell you if you call. If the balconies are indeed are 9' wide as Pam said then the other dimension would have to be 4.56 feet in order to get the 41 sq ft Princess claims. The only way I could understand anything like 4.56 feet would be if they measured from a corner all the way to the outer edge of the frame of the steel floor as this is what sticks out the most. This is not the usable area of the balcony but technically could be claimed as the official width to make them appear wider.

 

Below is a link to a picture taken by another poster which shows what I am trying to describe:

 

Regardless of this mumbo jumbo, the balconies are tiny in comparison to the Grand class of ships. They are usable but neither the furniture nor the space provide the level of comfort found on the other ships. Look at the first 3 pictures below for a fun balcony and contrast that to 4th picture taken from inside but showing the balcony width....

[Mom33]

I am the person who measured the width of my balcony as 3' 7". I did not measure the other direction so I do not have the square footage. In contrast to other Princess ships, nearly all Balcony, Deluxe Balcony and Mini-Suites on the Royal have the same balcony size (a few exceptions forward, aft, and under the sea walk). I used an actual tape measure, not a guesstimate. I measured the distance from the aluminum frame of the sliding glass door to the inside of the railing. This is the usable space when a chair is placed there. Sliding glass doors on ships have thick aluminum frames for structural reasons and the frame takes up space.

 

Another poster (Pam) mentioned that the balconies on the Royal are 9' by 4'. If I had measured from the corners of the balcony, an area where the sliding glass door does not go, it would have been larger, closer to 4' perhaps, but this is of little use to someone sitting on the balcony as the chairs are in front of the sliding glass door. I suppose that with a chair at an angle a rear leg could be placed towards the corner and thus gain a little extra space.

 

If you go to the Royal's deck plans, select a balcony cabin, view details, and then view amenities, you can see that Princess states that the balconies are 41 square feet. This is what they are going to tell you if you call. If the balconies are indeed are 9' wide as Pam said then the other dimension would have to be 4.56 feet in order to get the 41 sq ft Princess claims. The only way I could understand anything like 4.56 feet would be if they measured from a corner all the way to the outer edge of the frame of the steel floor as this is what sticks out the most. This is not the usable area of the balcony but technically could be claimed as the official width to make them appear wider.

 

Below is a link to a picture taken by another poster which shows what I am trying to describe:

 

Regardless of this mumbo jumbo, the balconies are tiny in comparison to the Grand class of ships. They are usable but neither the furniture nor the space provide the level of comfort found on the other ships. Look at the first 3 pictures below for a fun balcony and contrast that to 4th picture taken from inside but showing the balcony width....

 

They are tiny when you compare them to the Caribe balconies on the other ships.

Show any balcony above the Caribe deck on the other ships and compare them to the Royal. That would be a fairer comparison.

[bluesea321]

They are tiny when you compare them to the Caribe balconies on the other ships. Show any balcony above the Caribe deck on the other ships and compare them to the Royal. That would be a fairer comparison.

 

The balconies above the Caribe deck on the Grands are indeed smaller. Pam stated that they are 9' by 5' and Princess says they are 46 sq. ft. However they are still larger than on the Royal. It is hard for me to understand the rationale that went behind the smaller balconies especially since balconies are so popular. The Royal is 81% "balcony" (only 19% inside cabins) and this is something they promoted early on as a plus. Adding an extra foot or so would have been so easy. RCI and Celebrity went in the other direction making their balconies larger, not smaller.

 

On the Grands essentially the whole Dolphin deck (outside) is Mini-Suites with large balconies and the whole Caribe deck (outside) is Balcony with larger balconies still. This provides a passenger two whole decks of cabins with very nice balconies. On the Royal in contrast there are hardly any usable larger balconies. The few facing forward on Lido and Marina come with usage restrictions. The few under the seawalk do not provide much privacy. The few aft have a soot issue. Even the 440 sq ft Penthouse Suites on Riviera are the same width as a standard balcony. They are larger by square footage since they are longer on the side but they are the same width from sliding glass door to railing. Imagine that on a suite. In contrast getting a large wide balcony on the Grands was easy to do. As I mentioned in an earlier post the balconies on the Royal are usable, my wife and I used ours and we enjoyed it, but neither the furniture nor the size are anywhere as comfortable as on the older ships.

[Mom33]

The balconies above the Caribe deck on the Grands are indeed smaller. Pam stated that they are 9' by 5' and Princess says they are 46 sq. ft. However they are still larger than on the Royal. It is hard for me to understand the rationale that went behind the smaller balconies especially since balconies are so popular. The Royal is 81% "balcony" (only 19% inside cabins) and this is something they promoted early on as a plus. Adding an extra foot or so would have been so easy. RCI and Celebrity went in the other direction making their balconies larger, not smaller.

 

On the Grands essentially the whole Dolphin deck (outside) is Mini-Suites with large balconies and the whole Caribe deck (outside) is Balcony with larger balconies still. This provides a passenger two whole decks of cabins with very nice balconies. On the Royal in contrast there are hardly any usable larger balconies. The few facing forward on Lido and Marina come with usage restrictions. The few under the seawalk do not provide much privacy. The few aft have a soot issue. Even the 440 sq ft Penthouse Suites on Riviera are the same width as a standard balcony. They are larger by square footage since they are longer on the side but they are the same width from sliding glass door to railing. Imagine that on a suite. In contrast getting a large wide balcony on the Grands was easy to do. As I mentioned in an earlier post the balconies on the Royal are usable, my wife and I used ours and we enjoyed it, but neither the furniture nor the size are anywhere as comfortable as on the older ships.

 

Some people find the mini-suites on Dolphin deck on the other ships lack privacy and cover. Caribe also is only half covered. The mid ship large and fully covered balconies on the Royal shouldn't bother people that normally book Caribe and Dolphin as far as privacy.

On the other ships, Aloha, Baja, Riviera and Lido are all covered and actually look down on Caribe and Dolphin. They are 45 square feet and Princess has no difficulty selling them. People accustomed to their small size should be able to handle the standard balcony on the Royal.

 

We frequent Caribe deck on the other ships,but being prepared for the smaller balcony made it easy to adjust. It was the first time we felt our balcony was private. No one could look down and see us.

 

The forward cabins on Marina and Lido are mostly usable when at sea. If there were to be a storm, they might lock them. So far, no one has experienced a closure or complained that I know of. I enjoyed visiting a forward balcony when we pulled out of Ft. Lauderdale. There are pictures in my review.

 

The aft cabins are still problematic because of soot, however, the staff cleans regularly and the complaints have lessened of late. While on our cruise, we looked down onto the Marina balconies from the Outrigger deck and saw no soot. They may have just cleaned.

 

 

The point is there are large balconies on Royal.There may not be as many as on the other ships, but they are available.

[tothemall&beyond]

Someone posted that they measured them on another thread. They are also nine feet wide, I believe. For most ships, Princess discloses the square footage of the balconies, I don't think they do for Royal.

 

You could measure out the depth from a wall in your house and put a few chairs there facing the wall (or sliding glass door if you have one) and see how it feels to you. DH and I did this. We have long legs, so it didn't feel very nice for us.

 

Maybe you could call Princess and verify the depth. If they do this and tell you, please post.

 

They disclose it for most cabins on Royal when you "click on details" for a particular cabin on the deck plan. If it says cabin is 222 sq ft, it has the smaller 36 sq ft balcony. Next size up is 45 sq. ft. Some of the midship non-deluxe, non- mini-suite balconies at the bump out are 54 sq ft. If you look at the deck plan, you can easily tell which ones they are.

[boca7]

Now I`m really confused, AFTER SAILING 3 TIMES ON THE R0YAL YOU CAN N0T COMPARE IT TO OTHER PRINCESS SHIPS. CABINS ARE SMALLER, STAANDARD CABINS ARE A BIT SMALLER, NOT MUCH, DOESN`T PAY TO BOOK PREMIUM UNLESS YOU GET YHE BALCONIES MIDSHIP WHICH ARE LARGER BUT NOWHERE NEAR THE CARIBE DECK IN PAST. TO SUM IT UP, ITS A BEAUTIFUL SHIP & YOU GET WHAT YOU GET.

[Loreni]

It is good to know that Princess is disclosing the balcony size.

 

I read that some people had booked special forward wrap-around mini suites on the Royal because they have larger balconies and marked them "no upgrade" but they were upgraded anyway, in one case because a VIP reportedly wanted the room. So, even if you carefully select your balcony on Royal to try to get one of the few larger ones, check to see what cabins are available in higher categories to see if you would be happy with a forced upgrade.

 

Also, that the cabin steward wipes down the soot would be not be helpful for us because we like to use the balcony for morning room service. I am not going to call the steward to clean my balcony before breakfast each day. Anyway, even if he cleans it, how would he stop the soot from going into my lungs when I am out lounging on the balcony.

[bluesea321]

The mid ship large and fully covered balconies on the Royal shouldn't bother people that normally book Caribe and Dolphin as far as privacy. They would bother me and many others, just look at the reviews and comments. The Seawalk looks down at an angle into the balconies and one can even see inside the cabins. The higher the deck the worse they are.

 

On the other ships, Aloha, Baja, Riviera and Lido (the balconies) are 45 square feet and Princess has no difficulty selling them. They are wider than those on the Royal. People accustomed to their small size should be able to handle the standard balcony on the Royal. One of the main complaints about The Royal is the balcony size so people don't "handle" them as well as you think.

 

The forward cabins on Marina and Lido are mostly usable when at sea. Not true. On 2 of our 3 sea days we had a head wind of about 15 knots which is nothing unusual in the Caribbean. The ship was moving at 22 knots - that is 37 knots hitting a passenger in the face, tropical storm wind speed. The Princess warnings are there for a reason.

 

The point is there are large balconies on Royal.There may not be as many as on the other ships, but they are available. Some are indeed available (very few that I would really want) but nowhere near the 350+ that are available on the older ships.

 

I know that you loved the Royal, you rated it a 5+, perfection. The Royal is far from perfect, if such a ship exists at all, but different strokes for different folks... :)

[Mom33]

I know that you loved the Royal, you rated it a 5+, perfection. The Royal is far from perfect, if such a ship exists at all, but different strokes for different folks... :)

 

Whether or not I loved the Royal has nothing to do with what we are talking about. You don't like the Royal so should I assume that colors your perspective?

 

I didn't rate the ship alone. I rated the cruise overall and the hard working Captain and crew that made our cruise the success it was. They deserved the rating. :D

[Jules59]

Thanks for all of the replies. I was mainly asking about the size of the balcony and the view. On the crown and her sister ships, we'd usually get E730 which had a great view. It doesn't look like the Royal has anything like that. But maybe just something bigger? Thanks again.

[coloradocruisers101]

Just a few comments. We always book the same cabin or close by. C435 on most ships. The balcony is small, but doable for us. The one thing I did not like and did not know about, when we look straight down, we saw the life boats. Never had this on any other ship. If we pulled our chairs back to the door, we would not see the boats. I wish I had read this before. Seems like this is our first cruise that the boats are not tucked under. Just my observation and in no way did it ruin our cruise.

[MaChere]

Are the balconies partially covered or fully covered on Caribe deck? Our only experience is the Coral with half covered, half exposed. Best of both worlds.

[caribill]

Are the balconies partially covered or fully covered on Caribe deck? Our only experience is the Coral with half covered, half exposed. Best of both worlds.

 

All balconies on the sides of the Royal are the same, covered.

[Sea-debris]

Whether or not I loved the Royal has nothing to do with what we are talking about. You don't like the Royal so should I assume that colors your perspective?

 

I didn't rate the ship alone. I rated the cruise overall and the hard working Captain and crew that made our cruise the success it was. They deserved the rating. :D

 

Interesting statement, so what do you rate just the ship at?

 

I am interested to know if the Royal is your favorite ship in the Princess fleet as you defend her so strongly and attack any detractors even when the facts do not support your view on balcony size on Royal and other Princess ships.

If the balconies are small this is a measurable and verifiable fact which has been supported and proven by many yet you simply say the person is biased which is not well reasoned and just sad.

 

Would you award Royal the highest rating over all other Princess ships?

Edited April 25, 2014 by Sea-debris

[Mom33]

Interesting statement, so what do you rate just the ship at?

 

I am interested to know if the Royal is your favorite ship in the Princess fleet as you defend her so strongly and attack any detractors even when the facts do not support your view on balcony size on Royal and other Princess ships.

If the balconies are small this is a measurable and verifiable fact which has been supported and proven by many yet you simply say the person is biased which is not well reasoned and just sad.

Would you award Royal the highest rating over all other Princess ships?

 

I have stated myself that the balconies on Royal are small. Perhaps you didn't read the review with pictures I posted here.

 

Perhaps you didn't read all the conversation here carefully?. A poster tried to compare a Caribe deck balcony on a Grand Class ship to the standard balcony on the Royal. I didn't attack him, just thought it would be better to make the comparisons between the standard balconies on both types of ship.

The poster made his response in a manner that you are criticizing me for. The opinion was that if I love the Royal, then my perceptions are biased. My response was would their dislike of the Royal cause them to be biased also?

 

I rated the cruise overall which includes the ship, dining, service , entertainment, cabin service ,cabins etc.

 

If I had a good time and you don't believe it, I can't help you.

 

I have enjoyed every Princess cruise I have taken. Each ship has it's pluses and minuses. I sail Princess because I enjoy the cruise line.

 

I don't color the picture with exaggeration and misinformation. I speak up when I see it no matter what the topic or who posts it.

 

If I had listened to half the negative comments on this board, I would have missed a wonderful cruise.

 

I like your sign on name. :)

Edited April 25, 2014 by Mom33

[Happy2cruise]

Yes, the balconies on the Royal are smaller than on other ships. To us, once we got use to it, it was no big thing. IMO, a smaller balcony is still better than no balcony at all;)