Please help me choose between RCCL and Celebrity

[blackcomb]

My husband and I are looking for our 1st cruise with our children, ages 10 and 4. We are looking at the an Australia/New Zealand cruise on the Voyager vs the Solstice. Royal Carribean would be the obvious choice for our children but we prefer the itinerary and dates of the Celebrity cruise. I really like the choices for family activities and dining on Royal Caribbean and that is a big factor. Is there going to be enough on the Solstice to keep them happy for 14 nights? I really feel like we are giving up a lot of the kids friendliness for better dates/itinerary. The big downside to the Royal cruise is that we would have to take 3 weeks off from work and being away from the office for 3 weeks is never ideal. With the Celebrity, I can get away with only 2 weeks away.

 

Please help me decide!!

[xxHadleyxx]

Well, my DD17's favourite line is Celebrity (which she last sailed at age 13, actually she only has the one sailing to judge by). She's a bit of an odd kid though ;)

 

DS14 was 11 on our Celebrity sailing and while he prefers Royal with all of it's rock walls and flow riders, etc, he still very much enjoyed Celebrity--even in off season with very few kids on-board. The kids' programming was very active and the counselor's they had were super friendly.

 

10 and 4 year olds are not likely to be doing tons around the ship on their own without the programming (well, the four year old would not be doing any , of course) and the programs themselves are well run and have neough kids without being as overwhelmed as RCIs can be in high season--so personally, I would go with the better fit from a date and itinerary standpoint and figure in either case a very nice time will be offered to the kids.

[Clarea]

If the dates under consideration would be after Voyager's dry dock, then I'd have to give the nod to Voyager. The Flowrider alone might be hard to pass up.

[matj2000]

Do the Celebrity.

 

The kids will be fine on any ship you stick them on.

 

Besides, who's paying for it?

 

Also, 3 weeks is a very long time to be on a ship.

 

I am ready to go home at the end of 1 week...

[cathep]

How port-intensive are the 2 cruises? If one has more ports than the other, your kids won't really care which ship they're on anyway because they'll be off the ship most of the time.

 

I have a 7yo and 11yo. They never went to the kids' club on Royal and we've not taken them on Celebrity. Their requirements are a rock wall and putt putt. But we prefer Celebrity.

 

So my vote is go with the port-intensive ship first and if they're the same, choose Royal for the kids.

[Queen of Oakville]

Depends on your kids.

 

We don't sail Celebrity until November, but from what I've read, my kids are going to love it.

 

My kids might be a bit odd though. Thy get shy in environments with too many kids. They are soooo well behaved and mature for their age, that kids running and screaming everwhere, doesn't make them feel at ease.

 

My kids (now 7 and 8) have sailed Carnival, Royal, Disney, and HAL. So far, their favorite kid's club was Club Hal. They loved that there were only 100 kids on board (and this was a March Break sailing!) and a subset of that actually used the kid's club. They loved the 1:1 interaction with the counsellors.

 

My kids were too young for Flow Rider. They loved the Rock Wall, but you can only spend so much of your day doing rock climbing - the rest of that time is at the kid's club. My kids would give up the rock climbing for a better kid's club environment.

[OCruisers]

Both of our granddaughters loved Celebrity when they were young and Celebrity is still their favorite cruise line now that they're in their late teens. :)

Neither were happy with their RCCL cruise or NCL cruise. They did like the one Princess cruise they took.

LuLu

Edited August 7, 2014 by OCruisers

[mil76]

Since it's your first cruise, your kids won't know the difference since there will be activities for kids no matter the line, and they will have no reference to compare against.

 

My kids have been sailing RCCL since they were 2 and 5 (now 12 and 15) and they have grown up through all of the Adventure Ocean age groups and they absolutely love Royal. They have made many friends from all over the world and they keep in touch with them afterwards through social media, playing video games on-line, and in some cases lobbying parents to book the same cruises in subsequent years.

 

Last year we decided to take Celebrity in the Med, mainly due to the better itinerary, and the kids were completely bored. There was another RCCL ship in Athens the same day as us and they asked if we could sneak on the RCCL ship and do the rest of the cruise on Royal.

 

With Voyager getting a Flowrider, it's now screaming for us to try it out next year.

[brenderlou]

I would choose Celebrity. I find them a notch above RCCL. We have a 9 yr old and the kids club was great on Celebrity as well.

 

 

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[dancinman66]

Up to you and what you want

Same parent company

Celebrity is placed at a slightly higher service level to royal and is seen in cost also

Royal therefore target one group of traveller and celebrity slightly different although there is a lot of overlap

 

I like royal as it fits me

Look at the ships as they also are styled differently

 

Cheers

Greg

 

 

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[Mar y Sol]

I've only done Celebrity once and LOVED it! RCCL half a dozen times, better itineraries!

 

 

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[blackcomb]

Thank you everyone! Still need to make a decision but the input on Celebrity helps. I did put a deposit on the Voyager (post-refurb) last week just in case. We did a balcony guarantee and were assigned already. 1392 and from what I'm understanding this a is a nice aft room especially for the guarantee price. Maybe the good room is a sign of which cruise we should take:D

[Clarea]

Thank you everyone! Still need to make a decision but the input on Celebrity helps. I did put a deposit on the Voyager (post-refurb) last week just in case. We did a balcony guarantee and were assigned already. 1392 and from what I'm understanding this a is a nice aft room especially for the guarantee price. Maybe the good room is a sign of which cruise we should take:D

I agree, that should be a very nice stateroom. Huge balcony. Not a big deal at all, but I'd prefer a non-connecting stateroom, such as 1390 or 1690, but if that was not possible, I'd be happy in 1392.

[Tommy3putts]

We are DINKs in late 40s and early 50s. Did our first Celebrity Cruise in June on the Reflrection. They won us over and now is our first choice when considering cruises.

 

With that said. RCCL has a slew of exciting ships and many new builds coming. So we would never rule out cruising on RCCL. In fact I've always wanted to check out the Oasis class ships, so we are planning on booking a Feb 2016 cruise on Allure. We just want to avoid times and itineraries where there will be a ton of "ankle biters" on board.

[north29]

All ships and cruises are different. However, my experience with both cruise lines, that with kids, RC is the best. Heck, I found little to do, actively, on X and I am 74.

Having said that, only you know your kids, and what they enjoy doing,reading etc. and how much free time they can tolerate.

I will say, that on X there will not be crowed venues for kids on most cruises.

[cathep]

I think it boils down to whether you think your kids will use the kids' club. If you think they will, I'd go with Celebrity because they'll have plenty to do and you'll enjoy the cruise better. If you think they won't, go with RCCL because you'll need the other stuff to entertain them.

 

But now that you have an aft balcony on a guarantee, I'd stick with Voyager!

[Iluvcruising2]

We've brought our kids to sail on both Royal and Celebrity.

 

The kids prefer Royal. Celebrity was a tad boring. But perhaps they were too used to Royal's Adventure Ocean, having sailed a number of times before.

[PSCruiser]

Flowrider, rock wall, ice skating - your 10 year old will love RC.

My vote is for Voyager, but since they have no comparison I'm sure they will have a good time on X.

When we have occasionally traveled with kids, they have loved Adventure Ocean, and the ships are just more geared to kids.

[blackcomb]

Voyager it is. We may have found an alternate schedule on the voyager that has us sacrificing some of the ports we wanted but the dates are better. I will have to give up that aft cabin but maybe I'll get lucky twice. When we sat down and thought about the kind of vacation that our family enoys, Royal Caribbean won hands down. The port calls are part of the vacation but so is the cruise. Thank you for all of your help.

[rwdnj]

All ships and cruises are different. However, my experience with both cruise lines, that with kids, RC is the best. Heck, I found little to do, actively, on X and I am 74.

Having said that, only you know your kids, and what they enjoy doing,reading etc. and how much free time they can tolerate.

I will say, that on X there will not be crowed venues for kids on most cruises.

 

Couldn't agree more. We are 61 & 55 and were bored out of are minds. Went back to Royal after that cruise

[sjh422]

Since it's your first cruise, your kids won't know the difference since there will be activities for kids no matter the line, and they will have no reference to compare against.

 

My kids have been sailing RCCL since they were 2 and 5 (now 12 and 15) and they have grown up through all of the Adventure Ocean age groups and they absolutely love Royal. They have made many friends from all over the world and they keep in touch with them afterwards through social media, playing video games on-line, and in some cases lobbying parents to book the same cruises in subsequent years.

 

Last year we decided to take Celebrity in the Med, mainly due to the better itinerary, and the kids were completely bored. There was another RCCL ship in Athens the same day as us and they asked if we could sneak on the RCCL ship and do the rest of the cruise on Royal.

 

With Voyager getting a Flowrider, it's now screaming for us to try it out next year.

 

 

We have done both cruise lines with our grandsons, ages 8 and 11. The did not like celebrity's kids club and were bored. Royal carribean was their absolute favorite

[xcell]

is celebrity that bad? i am thinking of an xmas cruise and celebrity is half the cost of rccl - is it really worth an extra $4000???