12/9 cruise: Seabourn-SeaDream Comparison Part 1

[DisneyJen]

Happy New Year fellow Ccers!

As promised here is the first part of my better-late-than-never trip review/comparison of our 12/16 cruise on the Seabourn Pride versus our experiences on SeaDream 1 and 2.

Background: DH and I are veteran Caribbean cruisers (RCCL, Princess, HAL, Disney and SeaDream). We have spent a lot of time in the Caribbean on land as well.

For the last two years we have spent a week in the Caribbean on SeaDream in the November/December timeframe. We have truly enjoyed our SD cruises but when planning this year’s trip we decided to give SB a try since it is a line that I have wanted to sail for many years and SD didn’t fit into our schedule.

We spend most of our Caribbean cruising time on board the ship instead of visiting the ports. We like to think of the ship as our floating home.

If you don’t want to wade through the long review here is our verdict: Seabourn is more of a traditional cruising experience on a small luxury cruise ship. SeaDream is more of a private yachting experience on an extremely large luxury yacht or a very small luxury cruise ship. While DH and I had an enjoyable time on Seabourn we won’t be sailing it again. We will be returning to SeaDream as it fits what we want out of our sailing experiences at this time in our lives.

And now for the details …

Embarkation: DH and I arrived in Barbados via a USAirways flight from Charlotte. The fight was uneventful and we arrived on time. It had been 15 years since we had last been to Barbados and much had changed … for the better. From the time we deplaned until we embarked on the Pride was exactly one hour. We did not use Seabourn’s transfer … taxi’s were plentiful and reasonable.

We missed being greeted with a cold towel and glass of champagne and by the hotel manager and captain at the top of the gangway as we have been on SD. We were greeted at the gangway by a white-gloved steward who relieved us of our hand luggage and led us up the gangway. We were then escorted to the lounge and given a glass of champagne for our photo IDS. We were then escorted to our suite.

Our verdict: DH and I called the embarkation process a tie. If we were forced to rank one over the other we would give the not to SD for having the captain greeting guests and not having to have photos taken for the ID cards.

Suites: We had suite 121. We were very impressed with the size of the suite. I especially appreciated the walk-in closet. We also liked the double vanity as it gave each of us our own space. I am more of a shower than bath person … so I appreciate the showers on SD with its multi-jets versus the handheld/wall mount showerhead on SB. The bed was quite comfortable … and we especially liked the single duvet on SB versus the split duvets on SD.

While we were initially impressed with how we didn’t hear outside noise (the ocean against the hull for example) we were quite surprised how much we could hear through the walls … most specifically from the cabin that had its entry door next to ours. We couple hear them open and shut their door and drawers as well as their CDs played on their Bose system. Even though we sleep with a sound machine I was awoken at 1:30 a.m. one morning to the pounding bass of the CD player. I called the purser who seemed quite stumped about what to do. He did tell me he would take a walk to see if he could hear anything and call me back. He did call me back about 15 minutes later and said that he didn’t hear anything even though we could still hear the music. Thankfully the music stopped about 45 minutes later.

We really enjoyed dining in our room so the telescoping table was greatly appreciated.

There were lots of television channel options and movies. One evening we watched “The Sentinel” in our room while we dined on fresh strawberries with hot fudge, whipped cream and Grand Marnier.

While there were different chocolates left at turndown each night as well as a rose one night and bath gels another we were surprised that they weren’t little gifts each night as we have received on SD.

Our verdict: SB wins this category. We both liked the placement of the living space near the window on SB. We do have to give kudos to SD for their incredible marble multi-jet shower and the Bulgari products.

[DisneyJen]

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Suites: We had suite 121. We were very impressed with the size of the suite. ... The bed was quite comfortable … and we especially liked the single duvet on SB versus the split duvets on SD.

 

Just want to add a correction here ... a SeaDreamer has informed me that the single duvets are now available, upon request, on SD.