Royal Carribean vs Princess

[sandees]

We just got home from a 9 day Explorer cruise(June 2-11) and are eagerly ready to start planning our next cruise for March 07- I know most would disagree but we weren't crazy about the food in the DR on the Explorer- We are considering booking on the new Crown Princess and going to Barbados, Antigua, St Lucia etc...out of PR. Has anyone been on both lines and how do you rate trincess as far as food, accomidations and service? as compared to RCCL? Also is this a good itinerary- St Thomas and St Martin also included but we have been there and know how much fun they are????? Any feedback is really appreciated...

Thanks-Sandee S

[superjerryw]

I sailed on Golden Princess a few weeks ago. Here is my comparison to Royal Caribbean -

 

I Was A Traitor And Loved It

I was a traitor and I loved it. We just did a 7 day repo cruise on the Grand Princess from San Juan to Brooklyn and I have to report that Princess is equal to RCI. As far as the size of the ship goes, the Grand Princess would be equivalent to the Radiance class.

 

Cabin – we had an outside cabin that was nicely appointed but seemed to be rather small. I seem to remember most of our RCI cabins having a small sofa but you simply could not fit one in our cabin on the Grand Princess. In addition, the closet lacked doors and the bathroom was rather small as well. Definite edge to RCI.

 

Food – Dinner - The Grand has three separate dining rooms as opposed to one multi-level dining room. The service provided by the dining room staff was equal to that on RCI. As for the food; appetizers, soups, salads and entrees were about the same. I found the meat dishes about the same as RCI. My wife ordered fish each night and she said the fish was better than on RCI, being more moist and flavorful. Deserts were generally better on the Grand with New York style cheesecake and their special Love Boat desert (a thick chocolate mousse type cake) available every night. There was also a much larger selection of ice cream flavors each night along with a different plate of assorted cookies almost every night. A basket of bread was placed on the table each night in contrast to our last RCI trip on the Jewel where bread was given out on request by the asst. waiter. As far as dinner in the dining room is concerned I would have to give a slight edge to Princess.

 

Food – Lunch – On my last few RCI cruises I have found the Windjammer lacking at lunch time. I frequently looked at the food and don’t see anything I really wanted and ended up going to the grill for a burger. The buffet on Grand Princess is called the Horizon Court. It had a nice variety of food and I found something to my liking each day so I never had the need to sample the hamburgers. Slight edge to Princess

 

Food – Dinner – Buffet – We normally eat dinner in the dining room, but we always walk up to the buffet afterwards to see what they have so we have a general idea of what’s served in case we decide to eat there one night. (Actually, we're pigs and we go to the buffet after dinner to see if they have any different deserts....:D ) The Horizon Court seemed to have a more interesting selection of food compared to the Windjammer including a chocolate desert buffet one night. Slight edge to Princess.

 

Gym – the gym on Grand Princess is too small for a ship of that size and lacks sufficient equipment. In addition, the space allocated to the equipment is cramped and the machines are all jammed one next to the other. Edge – RCI.

 

Entertainment – Production shows were equal to RCI as were the headline entertainers. The significant difference is that you can attend two shows most nights on Princess. In addition to the main show in the theatre, there is usually another show in one of the lounges. I’m not talking about a special late show by a comedian for adults only, but a comedian or singer or hypnotist giving a show for anyone that wants to attend once or twice that night. Slight edge to Princess.

 

Swimming Pools – the Grand Princess has 4 pools, one of which in the aft part of the ship is limited to adults. I think the forward pool may also be limited to adults but I’m not sure. The two main pools seemed to be a better idea than the single main pool found on many RCI ships. One of the main pools also has a retractable roof. Slight edge to Princess.

 

Misc. – The cabin steward continually provided packages of shampoo, conditioner and body lotion as opposed to that glop in the dispenser on RCI ships. The future cruise consultant is only available on a first come, first serve basis as opposed to RCI where you can make an appointment. The video arcade is huge, with a wide selection of video games.

 

Overall, we had a great time on the Grand Princess. I have sailed with Princess in the past, but had not done so for a few years. I would not hesitate to cross over again. To be honest, I’m sick of going to Florida to get on a ship so the cruise line that has the best offerings from the New York area is the one that is going to get my business.

[sandees]

Thank you so much this helps us a lot-----me I am finding the NY waters( which I have cruised out of about 5 times) a bit rocky so am ready to try something new.

[lv2cruisgrl]

We did the Caribbean Princess about 1 1/2 ago. We didnt like it as much as RCCL ships. We didnt like the dining room food as much, however the restaurant Sabatinies (sp) was 5 star. The service was good, the ship layout we thought was not as good as RCCL. The buffet lines at lunch were very crowded and they layout is confusing to people so they were fighting over which way they should be going. Sometimes the food ran out and no on was around to refill. We have stuck with RCCL ever since and will continue to do so. IT was'nt a horrible cruise but it was'nt as good as RCCL as far as we are concerned. Some people cruise for the ports some for the ships.....your choice.

[critterchick]

I would give RCI the edge overall by a whisker, but we enjoy both lines.

 

Historically, we have found the dining room food to be better on Princess, but our last 2 RCI cruises, on Monarch & Vision, had very good to excellent cuisine, so perhaps a turnaround is underway. Buffet food: Windjammer wins over Horizon Court, particuarly the coffee, which was undrinkable on the Island Princess (although I've never noticed it to be horrific on the Star or Diamond). Pizza: Princess wins in a HUGE landslide - the stuff they serve on RCI is mediocre frozen-tasting stuff, while on Princess it's freshly made, crispy cruse, hey, it's time for lunch!:D

 

Entertainment: Princess wins. The production shows were about equal, but the various combos/singers/string players in the lounges & atrium were far superior to what RCI offers. DH & I are musicians, so we are knowledgeable, picky and even downright catty about that aspect of a cruise.;)

 

Service: RCI wins in a landslide (just a little one). We've always found the service on Princess to be correct but not friendly, whereas on RCI "good morning, madame" and "my pleasure, madame" are part of the culture. It may have to do with auto-tipping vs. discretionary tipping.

 

Princess allows you to bring wine & champagne on board with no quibbles; RCI forbids it but doesn't always enforce the policy.

 

All of the other aspects - excursions, embarkation/disembarkation, etc. - seemed about equal between the two. Both charge extra for certain fitness classes (Pilates, yoga & spinning), spas on both are run by the Steiner Sharks and I never want the cruise to end on either line!

[sandees]

Thanks critterchick-I appreciate your feedback- being from NJ( Near NYC) my husband LOVES good pizza!

[criuisingurl079]

After six RCCL, we did Princess. Princess is better period!:D

[lmmn]

We just got home from a 9 day Explorer cruise(June 2-11) and are eagerly ready to start planning our next cruise for March 07- I know most would disagree but we weren't crazy about the food in the DR on the Explorer- We are considering booking on the new Crown Princess and going to Barbados, Antigua, St Lucia etc...out of PR. Has anyone been on both lines and how do you rate trincess as far as food, accomidations and service? as compared to RCCL? Also is this a good itinerary- St Thomas and St Martin also included but we have been there and know how much fun they are????? Any feedback is really appreciated...

Thanks-Sandee S

I think you will find them to very similar. It is very hard to compare since each ship is a little different even within the same cruiseline. I think each one has something I like better than the other. I would say food, accommodations, and service would be about the same. I like to consider price, itinerary, ship....and also who I'm traveling with to determine which cruise would be the best. I like to mix it up a bit and try new places and new ships. The "fun" usually depends on who you're traveling with....but Carnival has the most nightlife.

[artk]

i've done princess to alaska... and rci in the caribbean... and frankly, i prefer rci.. Granted, the alaska cruise is a different animal altogether, with a different mix of passengers and, well ... you know the old saying.. "you go to alaska to see the wildlife, you go to the caribbean to BE the wildlife"..

However, in my opinion, the ships are similar... however, i found the food on rci to be slightly better. The major difference is that Princess is moving towards "open-seating" for dinner, doing away with the traditional 2 seatings at dinner, with the fixed tables and tablemates that go along with that. So now it becomes a preference... do you prefer the open seating? or the traditional? If you have a strong preference either way, let that be your guide... otherwise... both lines are very comparable.

[envy4u]

I have sailed both and found them to be very similar . RCCL puts more money into the large ships IMO .

[love2cruiseseattle]

I would give RCI the edge overall by a whisker, but we enjoy both lines.

 

Historically, we have found the dining room food to be better on Princess, but our last 2 RCI cruises, on Monarch & Vision, had very good to excellent cuisine, so perhaps a turnaround is underway. Buffet food: Windjammer wins over Horizon Court, particuarly the coffee, which was undrinkable on the Island Princess (although I've never noticed it to be horrific on the Star or Diamond). Pizza: Princess wins in a HUGE landslide - the stuff they serve on RCI is mediocre frozen-tasting stuff, while on Princess it's freshly made, crispy cruse, hey, it's time for lunch!:D

 

Entertainment: Princess wins. The production shows were about equal,

ut the various combos/singers/string players in the lounges & atrium were far superior to what RCI offers. DH & I are musicians, so we are knowledgeable, picky and even downright catty about that aspect of a cruise.;)

 

Service: RCI wins in a landslide (just a little one). We've always found the service on Princess to be correct but not friendly, whereas on RCI "good morning, madame" and "my pleasure, madame" are part of the culture. It may have to do with auto-tipping vs. discretionary tipping.

 

Princess allows you to bring wine & champagne on board with no quibbles; RCI forbids it but doesn't always enforce the policy.

 

All of the other aspects - excursions, embarkation/disembarkation, etc. - seemed about equal between the two. Both charge extra for certain fitness classes (Pilates, yoga & spinning), spas on both are run by the Steiner Sharks and I never want the cruise to end on either line!

 

I will have to agree with the service part of this, we sailed on the Golden Princess last October and the service was not what we have experienced on RCI. The staff were not friendly at all and when you are laying around the pool they did not bring those wonderful fruity drinks that RCI does.

We are back to RCI now:D

[TexasMom2]

Critterchick pretty much hit the nail on the head, but I can add a few things. The place where I noticed the biggest difference in service was the dining room. Princess was miles behind in that regard, but then it was anytime dining and that probably had some effect. I wasn't disappointed in the service throughout the rest of the ship, but it just didn't wow me like it did on RCI. The cabins are smaller on Princess, the club chair is practically useless unless you use it for storage space. The shower curtain can be annoying...be careful stepping out of the shower if the curtain happens to suck onto your legs and water migrates out on the floor. My sister took a nasty spill and hit her head. RCI ships are better designed than Grand class as far as layout and flow but early reports on the Crown speak to some improvements. The pizza, burgers and hot dogs are very good. The coffee is undrinkable unless it's from the dining room or the patisserie (which costs $1.50 now). The dining room food is good to very good. The two lines are comparable and each does some things better than the other. No harm in trying the product to see if the differences are what would make your cruises perfect for you.

 

superjerryw, the Radiance class is much smaller than the Grand class, I think about 500-600 passengers. Our Grand sailing in December maxed at 3114 passengers.

[TexasMom2]

Forgot one thing that might be important to some...room service is limited on Princess. Continental breakfast only, soups/sandwiches/salads for lunch and a limited dinner menu (not what's being served in the dining rooms). I love having breakfast delivered to enjoy on the balcony. All those opinions aside, my experience on the Tahitian will probably be the complete opposite (with the exception of the friendly shower curtain) because it's a small ship with traditional dining only.

[betsy51556]

I have to say I like Princess but if you love great service (now that they have new ships) is Holland America. Royal Caribbean I think is not as good as it used to be. They say Celebrity food is the best but I didn't notice anything special or different.

[sgttami]

Sometimes it is SOOOOO hard to decide...

 

Although I've never been on Princess I have friends who tell me.."if you like RCI, you'll like Princess better."

 

My sister and I went on NCL in March...just to try it. We had Hawaii cruises booked for '07 on NCL with husbands but just she and I went in March..no flying, sailed from NY..(Our getaway)....

 

Long story short....we had FUN (laughed, had a great time)...but would we sail NCL again??? Not on your life!!!

 

We cancelled Hawaii the day we got back...we're glad that we didn't spend major $$$ to do Hawaii after the NCL "experience"...

 

It's all SO personal....when I read the great reviews on NCL from our cruise

I was like..."We couldn't have been on the same ship."....

 

Again, we had fun but the line SUCKed...

[critterchick]

The cabins are smaller on Princess, the club chair is practically useless unless you use it for storage space.

 

On our first Princess cruise (Star), we had a standard balcony cabin on Baja deck and loved it. Until I looked down on the Caribe deck balconies and developed a case of balcony envy. That was at sailaway. Then I got a peek at the minis on Dolphin Deck. We've booked minisuites ever since and have never looked back.

 

If you're doing cabin comparisons, a minisuite on Princess is equivalent to a D-1 (top standard balcony cabin) on RCI, at least on the Radiance and Vision classes of ships. RCI seems to understand the value of slothfulness on a cruise and puts a sofa or loveseat in most "mere" balcony categories. Princess doesn't let you sprawl until you book a mini.

 

When we were deciding what to book for Northern Europe in 2007, we narrowed our choices to Jewel of the Seas and Star Princess. A mini on Star is about $100 less than a D-1 on Jewel, but Jewel is 12 nights, as opposed to 10 for Star, so on a per diem basis Jewel wins, $275 to $326. We'll be Diamond Plus by the time we sail, so we're hoping for a super suite upgrade, which Princess doesn't seem to offer.

[The Big Booper]

The large Princess ships carry around 3100 passengers in a ship weighing 113-116,000 GRT (volume measurement) The RCI Voyagers also carry around 3110 passengers on a ship that is 138,000 GRT. I know that Princess is good at taking big spaces and partitioning them to make them appear smaller but that is still the same number of people in a much smaller space on Princess; you can't tell me that the Princess ships don't appear more crowded. Not as bad as the Carnival Conquest types of course which one poster labeled "loud, crowded and smoky".

 

That being the case we might try Princess again now that the Crown is homeported in Brooklyn, especially if Princess offers large discounts to fill the ship. Personal Choice dining is not our choice and too many people wind up on a waiting list to switch to Traditional from Personal choice.

[ssapiers]

We were on the Island Princess in April for a 15 day rt cruise to Hawaii. We had a standard balcony cabin. The living space was a little small but we felt that thers was more closet space than on RCCL. But a sofa would have been nice to sit and relax. The balcony was really small could hardly move around the table and chairs. When we visited a friend minisuite it was more like the balcony cabins we had on RCCL.

 

I thought the food was comparable to RCCL but my DW had problems finding something other then the every day selection. That was until Lobster night of course. The food in the Princess Dining room was a little more exotic, i.e. one night they had buffalo (which was excellent)

 

Entertainment on RCCL was slightly better. They later shows on princess were hardly ever crowd. Probably due to the avg age of the people on board. Remember it was a 15 day cruise during school so we expected an older crowd.

 

I agree that the gym was small even for the size of the Island.

 

But the difference were not great enough to say that we did not enjoy the cruise. It was a vacation!

 

Bill

[SissasMomE]

We just got home from a 9 day Explorer cruise(June 2-11) and are eagerly ready to start planning our next cruise for March 07- I know most would disagree but we weren't crazy about the food in the DR on the Explorer- We are considering booking on the new Crown Princess and going to Barbados, Antigua, St Lucia etc...out of PR. Has anyone been on both lines and how do you rate trincess as far as food, accomidations and service? as compared to RCCL? Also is this a good itinerary- St Thomas and St Martin also included but we have been there and know how much fun they are????? Any feedback is really appreciated...

Thanks-Sandee S

 

The food on Princess is excellent, the pizza is outstanding, the rooms are bigger, but the service leaves a lot to be desired ... so it really come down to what is more important to you. I'd sail Princess though.

[producegirl]

Critterchick pretty much hit the nail on the head, but I can add a few things. The place where I noticed the biggest difference in service was the dining room. Princess was miles behind in that regard, but then it was anytime dining and that probably had some effect. I wasn't disappointed in the service throughout the rest of the ship, but it just didn't wow me like it did on RCI. The cabins are smaller on Princess, the club chair is practically useless unless you use it for storage space. The shower curtain can be annoying...be careful stepping out of the shower if the curtain happens to suck onto your legs and water migrates out on the floor. My sister took a nasty spill and hit her head. RCI ships are better designed than Grand class as far as layout and flow but early reports on the Crown speak to some improvements. The pizza, burgers and hot dogs are very good. The coffee is undrinkable unless it's from the dining room or the patisserie (which costs $1.50 now). The dining room food is good to very good. The two lines are comparable and each does some things better than the other. No harm in trying the product to see if the differences are what would make your cruises perfect for you.

 

superjerryw, the Radiance class is much smaller than the Grand class, I think about 500-600 passengers. Our Grand sailing in December maxed at 3114 passengers.

We just sailed the Caribbean Princess in December. Did a back to back for Xmas and NEw Years. We didn't like the layout of the ship as much as RCCL.

The dining room was okay and the food was okay. I would give a slight edge to RCCL; but Iwould sail Princess again if the right cruise came along.

Also, we did a mini suite instead of a big suite and that was a disappointment.

But that was my fault in my booking, not Princess.

[madelinerose]

IMHO, there's a big difference between a Princess mini and an RCI D1.....

the mini has a bathtub, not just a small shower stall.

 

 

If you're doing cabin comparisons, a minisuite on Princess is equivalent to a D-1 (top standard balcony cabin) on RCI, at least on the Radiance and Vision classes of ships.

[negc]

IMHO, there's a big difference between a Princess mini and an RCI D1.....

the mini has a bathtub, not just a small shower stall.

 

If that is what you consider a big difference, you are correct. However the room size of a Princess mini and an RCI D1 is about equal. D1 on RCI is considerably larger than the outside rooms with balconies on Princess and closest comparison is the Princess mini-sute. If you compare a RCI junior suite with a Princess mini, RCI comes out even larger and both the JS and the mini have a bath tub.

[sellwingri]

It's nice to hear that a D1 on RCCL is equivalent to a mini on Princess. Although we know that there is no bathtub (we take showers anyway) and that the bathroom is probably smaller, we'll go RCCL anyday. We returned from a Panama Canal cruise on the Coral Princess in April and had a mini suite. The reason is that Princess doesn't have a 3rd bed (pullout sofa) for my 17 year old daughter and she doesn't like climbing up to a bunk bed. Now we're booked on Radiance for next June in Alaska and know that there will be a pullout sofa.

 

Having been on both Princess and RCCL several times, we're now only going to book RCCL. The food was not good on our recent Princess cruises (they had the same thing several nights) and the entertainment and nightlife was sorely lacking. It's all a matter of preference but I'm a strong RCCL supporter.

[cws]

The major difference is that Princess is moving towards "open-seating" for dinner, doing away with the traditional 2 seatings at dinner, with the fixed tables and tablemates that go along with that.

 

This is NOT true. Princess is NOT moving away from traditional dining. Traditional dining (with two seatings, fixed tables, tablemates and waiters) is, and will continue to be, on every ship. What IS the case is that Princess offers cruisers a choice of either traditional dining (in one traditional dining room) OR open seating dining (in two other dining rooms). This choice is one of Princess' main differentiating points.

[CGTNORMANDIE]

NEGC IS CORRECT...The RCI Junior Suite tops a Princess Mini Suite. I have stayed in all of them and I really like the RCI D1 or the Princess Mini...to me they are comparable...I even think the shower in the D1 us fine...bigger than the normal RCI shower in the lower catagories.

 

Traditional Dining is alive on Princess...the problem is...you can't get it unless you book 2 years ahead. I know folks who booked 12 months ahead and still could not get it.