Royal Caribbean or ..........?

[shorti503]

I have only ever sailed on Royal Caribbean and while that will continue to be my cruise line of choice, they don't go everywhere. So I was wondering for those that have sailed other lines. Can we do a comparison, stating if things were better/worse/equal to that of Royal Caribbean and your reasonings why. I appreciate the feedback!

 

 

Price:

 

 

Food:

 

 

Service:

 

 

Rooms:

 

 

Entertainment:

 

 

Ship:

 

Overall experience:

[Sittin'OnTheDock]

Take a peek at this:

 

https://travel.usnews.com/cruises/

 

I can't verify the results in this article, but at least if gives (hopefully) an unbiased look at the best cruise lines.

 

Cheers

[Cruisegirl6]

Sure but all cruise lines basically sail to the same ports, but there are some exceptions

 

Carnival:

Price inexpensive Best Buy (you get what you pay for)

Food- MDR lowest quality beef, older and smaller ships lunch buffet :o:eek:, newer larger ships lunch buffet good, MDR dinner haven't done in ages, Carnivals Steakhouse excellent overall. The only thing to eat past 10:30pm is room service or pizza and you always find yourself waiting for them to make the pizza.

Service- Bartenders excellent (many drinks are served in smaller glasses and they ask if you like to upgrade for $3), cabin stewards never had a problem, MDR can't comment but I recall years ago they are overworked and have many more tables and people to serve at a time.

Entertainment- no broadway or decent quality shows ever, but they have a nice live band playing until midnight nightly, casino our favorite and treated very well but not as good as RC has been treating us

Rooms- Decent size plenty storage, shower curtains in showers, beds and pillows all very good. Balconies alot smaller

Overall- For a less price not bad but if your going for the food forget it.....drink package limited to 15 alcohol drinks daily, missing all the bells and whistles that RC ships offer (flow rider, rock climbing, zip lining, ice skating and show, centra park, boardwalk, etc.)

 

Princess (been a few years since on Princess)

Price- many deals for Florida residents, offer many decent specials

Food- good overall, specialty restaurants very good, MDR my favorite

Service- excellent overall

Entertainment- decent

Rooms- excellent

Overall- I always am very happy after a Princess Cruise, beautiful ships, would always go in a heartbeat (just staying loyal now with RC as casino treats us the best and will turn diamond this year)

 

NCL

Price- Good decent prices but you get what you pay for

Food- I feel its limited in buffet especially for those on special diets such as needing to be gluten free, no meat carving at lunch after the first day, seperate smaller multiple dining rooms nice and quaint, specialty restaurants like RC some good some not so good

Entertaiment- very good to excellent, dinner show food horrible

Rooms- very good, shower doors, balconies small side

Overall- the new mega ships (breakaway, getaway, etc) HORRIBLE LAYOUT always in traffic jams everywhere, tiniest pools seen on any ship line, staff not as friendly, watered down alcoholic drinks (probably because they offer complimentary drink package have to cut back on areas to keep profits), we NEVER will sail this cruise line again!!

 

Our favorite is RC then Princess.....Why not try the new Celebrity Epic, I cannot comment since I haven't tried Celebrity yet, but this ship is amazing google it lol.

[davekathy]

Celebrity. We like both RC and Celebrity. We're easy to please.

[dacsmom]

I sail RCI, NCL, and Carnival. Each has its pros and cons. These are just my opinions.

 

NCL has the best specialty restaurants. Teppanyaki is the best restaurant on any cruise line. Moderno is a wonderful Brazilian Steakhouse. O'Sheehans is a fantastic pub and it is included in your fare. They also have an all you can eat rib night and the same with prime rib too. Open 24 hours. Spa fantastic with a Thallasotherapy pool and heated loungers, weekly pass reasonably priced. Excursions are higher in price through the ship.

 

Carnival is good on just about everything, nothing really bad or really fantastic, just a nice solid cruise. I really like their IMAX and Thrill theaters. I like the outdoor seating for most of the restaurants.

 

RCI has the best food in the MDR, and the best entertainment. Not my favorite for the number of specialty restaurants.They also are the most innovative with the flowrider, and the seaplex. Two70 and the bionic bar are not available on any other line. They do best with bells and whistles. The aqua theater is still one of my favorite shows on any line.

 

I like all three and go between them just for a bit of variety. Probably in order I would rate them NCL, RCI, then Carnival. Although my next two cruises are on RCI so it always seems like the last line I was on tends to be my favorite.

[BirdTravels]

Look at NCL and their promotions. Free 3 night specialty dining. Free unlimited drinks. Onboard credit.

 

No set dining times. No formal nights. Just being on vacation.

 

The Escape is their newest ship, built for the tastes of the contemporary cruiser. It is a Quantum-class ship size with 4500 passengers.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[mafig]

Cruisegirl,

 

I think you mean Celebrity EDGE ..... it's new ship coming out soon.

 

Epic is a Norwegian CL ship.

[George C]

We had done 6 cruises in a row in rccl all in grand suites , love entertainment and perks. Did celebrity 2 weeks ago in a small sky suite loved the food buffet much better than rccl.

HAL has smaller ships and older crowd , entertainment was not that good. Princess can be good again much better buffet that rccl , but prefer rccl on entertainment.

[Cruisegirl6]

Mafig hello THANK YOU I made a mistake, noooo NCL ugh lol thank you, the ship is CELEBRITY EDGE my mistake sorry all.

 

Birdtravels- Your right no dining times, but all cruise lines have that. now they just call it something different...anytime dining, my time dining etc. On RC formal nights you do not have to dress formal any longer either. Free drinks, dinner trust me they cutting back, they aren't going to take a loss giving everybody freebies, your paying for it somehow someway, nothing is for free.

 

I think NCL logo "Freestyle" is very outdated or on another note, all other cruise lines offer the very same thing, NCL is not offering anything different.

 

On another note, speaking about complimentary dining/drinks Celebrity offers that in many of their sales and sailings so NCL is not the only one offering the "freebies"...again, things are not free, Celebrity you pay more but at least those freebies aren't cut back in any way like NCL's is.

[xxHadleyxx]

I liked everything slightly better on Celebrity (except the buffet which i liked far better) except the shows which were not as good---felt more stale, and the prices were higher for the European cruises we tend to take.

 

Personally I like Princess as much as RCI. I think they are very equal experiences overall. That said, DS19 did not like what they had available for teens a few years ago and DH misses having loyalty perks, so we haven# been back on Princess in 3 years (but I would not hesitate to go again).

 

we sailed Carnival once. It was a long time ago; things might well be far better now, but we were so turned off by the experience we will never go again.

 

MSC---if you can get a good deal on the Yatch club the rooms are small for the category but adequate and the food and service are outstanding. Outside of the YC the ship feels crowded and we would not try sailing that way.

[olemissreb]

It's been years since I've sailed Princess, so I won't comment on that line until I get on them again.

 

Right now my fav is Celebrity. Of course that could be because I was in a suite both times I was on that line. Sailed in a suite on RCCL (Adventure), but Celebrity blows them out of the water with their Butler and other perks. Now that might be different on a larger RCCL ship or with one of the Genies.

 

Only took a 5 day cruise on Carnival and was not impressed at all. Way too gaudy for my taste and the ship layout was so convoluted to navigate. I'm usually pretty good with direction, but I got way too confused on that ship.