A loyal Royal takes A Princess Cruise.

[smeck]

This past May I took my First Princess cruise I would like to make a list of things Royal and Princess do better than each other.

 

Princess better than Royal.

1. Cabins ready when you board.

2 MDR

3. Variety of shows during the evening

5. Pizza

6. Ice Cream both soft and hard ice cream no charge

 

Royal does better than Princess

1. Embarkation

2. Buffet Variety

3. Ship design

4. Balcony

5. Shows

6. Bedding and Towels.

 

Both had excellent service, and a good variety of activities. I guess my choice of cruise lines will be based on itenary. In reality both are more alike than different.

[chaosdreamer]

<Original post deleted because I somehow missed your list of past cruises which answered my questions! :o>

 

Thanks for the comparison! :)

Edited June 4, 2015 by chaosdreamer

[riclop]

What ship were you on?

[reedprincess]

What ship were you on?

 

Check their cruise list in the signature area...It's listed there.

[DonnaK]

What ship were you on?

 

Caribbean Princess

[Doug S]

Usual RCI cruiser too but on my one Princess cruise to Hawaii a few years back, I thought the fresh baked cookies in the café were great. Folks stood in line to cart them off by the plateful. Wife also liked the coffee card you could buy on Princess and get punched for a set number of specialty coffees.

[dplusd]

We like Princess a lot too. I'll add to the Princess advantage the pool side grill, Trident Grill, making fresh burgers and dogs, and the International Cafe...far better than Cafe Promenade. We really miss those on our Royal cruises.

[JamesEM]

The Princess balcony was larger with better furniture, but did not liked the design of the buffet nor the variety of the food items.

[Langley Cruisers]

Check their cruise list in the signature area...It's listed there.

 

Some people have signatures turned off, and it's easy to miss if that's the case. I found I was missing too much info, so I turned sigs back on. :)

 

... but did not liked the design of the buffet nor the variety of the food items.

 

Agreed. This is my main complaint with Princess - the dysfunctional buffet area is very congested and confusing, IMO.

.

[clarkg]

I think you nailed it. I might add that Princess has those balconies that are painful to walk out on while barefoot, but I do love their service.

[spunks]

The biggest difference is that Princess allows you to "stack" all on board credits. with Princess you can add together your past military service,future cruise credits,stockholder credit, plus additional credit for plus 20...plus 30...plus 40...plus 50 cruises. We have gone trans Atlantic with over $700 OBC.

 

Royal will not allow even stockholder credit if you got any discount on your booking.We also have found no value in getting future cruise deposits on RCCL.The smaller RCCL ships actually have LESS variety at the buffet. Princess buffet is open virtually 24 hrs.

 

That said, RCCL is the only line that still has organized Bridge play and lectures.The DL and CL are wonderful perks not available on Princess We like both.

[FloatMe]

Thanks, we were on caribbean princess over new years 16 months ago and on Adventure last month. I agree with most of the OP and comments. One thing i would add is that RCCL's ships really out shines Princess. Voyager class ships and newer are really better destinations, in and of themselves, than any of princess's ships. I'M

 

Also I find it interesting to see how others see things differently than I do. Tastes do differ. I thought princess's buffet was much better and had more variety than RC, but I liked MDR on RC better. That being said I have not been on an Oasis class ship yet (October, 16) so I hope I will be more impressed with the windjammer then.

[mattwright]

Thanks, we were on caribbean princess over new years 16 months ago and on Adventure last month. I agree with most of the OP and comments. One thing i would add is that RCCL's ships really out shines Princess. Voyager class ships and newer are really better destinations, in and of themselves, than any of princess's ships.

 

I'd be interested to hear about the ship comparisons from someone who has sailed on Royal Princess or Regal Princess, as I'd expect them to be on a level more comparable with RC's best ships.

[EmpressofPurple]

It's been a number of years since my last princess cruise, and I'm sure many things have changed... I've heard the amazing cold seafood buffet at sailaway is gone, and that a wider variety of fresh and tropical fruits (i.e., papaya, mango, strawberry, kiwi, and more) are no longer regularly available, two things i loved on princess and always raved about to my royal pals...

 

I sailed on the Sun princess before it went to Australia, and twice each on the Caribbean and crown princess.

 

What I recall that I enjoyed on princess that is not available on rci is:

1) Afternoon tea...

2) Four pools on the big ships (vs. two on similarly sized rci ships): an aft pool, a spa pool, and TWO large midship pools, one in a quiet area, one with a (then unique) MUTS ("movies under the stars/sun") screen, which was also where the rowdy pool games took place...

3) actual content-rich lectures on ports or topics of interest, rather than just shopping sales pitches...

4) 24-hour buffet (and, at least back then, a changing daily offering of smoked fish at breakfast)... I didn't mind the buffet station layout that seems to about so many folks on cc...

 

As I recall, overall, staff were more formal on princess, more friendly on royal...

 

Also, in the past I preferred princess' s seafood, and royal's beef... However lately I've also had great seafood on royal... I wonder if the princess meat preparation has also improved?!... It used to taste a bit "liverish"...

 

I think the photos might be a little more affordable on royal...

 

I remember I loved the international cafe offerings on princess, promenade cafe does not compare...

 

Shows and theatre design on royal are the best.

 

That's all I can think of off the top of my head...

 

I'm planning a princess cruise to Alaska next year (my first!), so I'm going to be reading up on what princess is like these days... and having been sailing almost exclusively on royal for the past 8 years, I'm curious how princess strikes a loyal royal... Thank you for your post!!

 

 

 

Sent from my SM-G900P using Forums mobile app

[elaine5]

Movies under the stars with popcorn almost every night on Princess were a big hit with my family.

[knittinggirl]

We just took a Princess/Celebrity B2B, and both had norovirus outbreak onboard. While their procedure was pretty identical, their main difference involved leaving the library open. Princess let us visit the library and check out books. When we arrived on Celebrity, all books had been removed.

 

Here's our opinion.

 

Princess Pros

 

1. Coffee Card

2. Actually Get Stockholder's Benefit

3. Embarkation

4. Didn't close library by removing books during norovirus outbreak.

5. Photography How to Lecture

6. May half orders in main dining room. Once I asked for a half order entree to be delivered as an appetizer and got it!

7. Knitters group met on sea days.

8. Much better shore excursion detail on website. Love their stop by stop outline!

9. Beds much better these days w/ pillow top mattress pad.

 

Princess Con's

 

1. Lecture program not as good as previous cruise.

2. Charges you for sea sickness pills

3. Charges you for doctor visit for norovirus

4. poor maintenance. One aft elevator to main dining room down for half of cruise, leaving only one working elevator. Laundry room had both washers out right across the hall from us. That's why we booked that particular room.

5. No Royal King Beds.

6. Regular coffee undrinkable.

7. Sagging furniture in stateroom.

 

Celebrity

 

Pros

 

1. Equipment worked!

2. Free motion sickness pills

 

Cons

 

1. Closed library & no books during norovirus outbreak

[George C]

I thought Caribbean Princess is a pretty ship, but felt very crowded, hard to get seats for shows, but everyone agrees on the Pizza, have done Princess several times , may or may not return, prefer RCCL or Hal

[Langley Cruisers]

Cons

 

1. Closed library & no books during norovirus outbreak

 

You feel this is a "con"? Wow. :confused::eek:

[knittinggirl]

You feel this is a "con"? Wow. :confused::eek:

Actually, it worked out better for us. We got permission from passenger services to read our Kindles, and most people didn't visit. It turned out to be a nice quiet place to read.

 

Still removing the books probably contributed to their making us wait in the cruise terminal until 3:30 pm with nothing to eat and not letting us into our rooms until 5:30 pm during our worst embarkation ever!

Edited June 4, 2015 by knittinggirl

[TX_Atlantis_Cruiser]

I was on Regal Princess in Feb and while it was impressive, I still found myself comparing it to Allure, Mariner and even Serenade and finding that the Regal was somewhat short on a few things that Royal Caribbean does better:

1) Ship layout on Regal was okay for the most part but getting to the MDR was kind of a mystery as you had to go up to Deck 7 and down certain stairs to find it (if I remember the circuitous route correctly). Mariner and Allure are straightforward and have the Promenade that you can use (among other easy ways) to get from front to back

2) Coffee card on Princess was a big plus, though Starbucks on Allure was an even better coffee option

3) Regal pools are mediocre especially vs. Allure though even Mariner has great pool space

4) I will give Princess big kudos for pizza both at the pool and Alfredo's on Regal, but I really did not like Horizon Court layout as it took me three days to finally find the rather hidden omelet station

5) Regal balconies--just no.

[mattwright]

I was on Regal Princess in Feb

 

Thanks for that insight. We're looking at making the rounds of the latest & greatest ships from a few different lines, and Regal is a possibility on our list for next year. I'm really looking forward to being able to compare and contrast the best that other lines have to offer against what we've become so accustomed to with Royal Caribbean.

[knittinggirl]

Forgot to mention our Toiletries under my list of Cons for Princess.

 

1. One bar of soap

2. One tube of lotion

3. Mystery twin dispenser of shower gel and shampoo in the bathtub.

Edited June 4, 2015 by knittinggirl

[Topo Gigio]

I was on the Regal Princess (newest ship)in December, and must say the variety at the buffet was HUGE! and excellent and the desserts to die for.

[WEGL81]

We just took a Princess/Celebrity B2B, and both had norovirus outbreak onboard.

 

 

Hmmm, coincidence? :) Just kidding. I have sailed on both Princess and RCCL quite a bit. Here is my pros:

 

Princess:

 

1. International Cafe > Promenade Cafe. It's rare that PC offers anything different than what you can get elsewhere on the ship. IC has items you can't get elsewhere, like cronuts in the morning and cookies and milk time.

 

2. Tea time

 

3. Trident grill. RCCL has no burger/hot dog stations aside from the Dog House on Oasis class. Also, Princess has a pizza station with much better pizza than Sorrentos.

 

4. MUTS with blankets and free popcorn/cookies at night. RCCL will sell you a small bag of popcorn for $2.50.

 

5. Aft pools, although the RCCL solarium pools are usually pretty nice.

 

RCCL:

 

1. Balcony rooms have a couch. You have to book a minimum of a minisuite to get a couch on Princess.

 

2. Shows and entertainment- not even close. RCCL by a country mile.

 

3. Buffet layout. For Princess (at least the ships I have been on) you enter and exit the buffet area, which means there can be long lines. With the Windjammer layout of spread out stations, it spreads the crowd out.

 

4. Overall ship design. I find the Princess ships very constricting, especially on some where you have to go up or down a floor to get from one end of the ship to the other. RCCL may have this, too, but didn't on any of the ships I've been on.

 

5. Oasis class ships. Princess has nothing to compare.

[spunks]

One other thing I just remembered.Stateroom TV is so superior on Princess, there is no comparison. On Princess at any given time you have a choice of several movies and they are generally first run movies. On our TA just completed on VOS all we had for movies was 1930-40 era black and white. I realize you get "out of satellite footprint" but Princess acts like they are not surprised by it.

 

Also the MUTTS is showing movies or concerts 24-7

 

Doug