Celebrity versus Princess

[DCGuy64]

4 hours ago, Ken the cruiser said:

Princess prices without a doubt are better than Celebrity most of the time. I don't know how long of cruise you like, but we recently booked a 30 day Princess cruise on the Grand that leaves Oct 24, 2020 from LA with stops in Hawaii, Guam, Japan and a few stops in China to include Beijing before reaching Shanghai Nov 24th when we fly back home.

 

Here are the starting prices: Oceanview ($3,899 or $130/day), Balcony ($4,699 or $157/day), Premium Balcony ($5,231 or $174 per day), Mini-suite ($5,749 or $192 per day) or Suite ($8,499 or $283 per day). This includes the 3 for Free promotion with includes free gratuities which is a $400+ pp value. 

Thank you. For our Japan trip we are looking at 8-10 days, potentially a couple of days longer. 30 days will have to wait until I’m retired, LOL! 

Budget-wise we’d be thinking about something around $2,000-$2,500 pp (cruise only). In terms of itinerary, we’d ideally want to focus only on Japan. Too many itineraries I’ve seen so far include Taiwan and China. I’ve spent a LONG time studying Japanese (since 1991) and I don’t speak Mandarin so Japan is where we want to spend our time. Celebrity has an awesome itinerary that’s 14 days but is very pricey. OTOH Princess has Japan-heavy itineraries in the spring and fall for 2020 that are very affordable, but our travel plans are set for 2020 hence the focus on 2021. We just have to wait for Princess to publish the rest of 2021 before making a decision. 

[Ken the cruiser]

24 minutes ago, DCGuy64 said:

Thank you. For our Japan trip we are looking at 8-10 days, potentially a couple of days longer. 30 days will have to wait until I’m retired, LOL! 

Budget-wise we’d be thinking about something around $2,000-$2,500 pp (cruise only). In terms of itinerary, we’d ideally want to focus only on Japan. Too many itineraries I’ve seen so far include Taiwan and China. I’ve spent a LONG time studying Japanese (since 1991) and I don’t speak Mandarin so Japan is where we want to spend our time. Celebrity has an awesome itinerary that’s 14 days but is very pricey. OTOH Princess has Japan-heavy itineraries in the spring and fall for 2020 that are very affordable, but our travel plans are set for 2020 hence the focus on 2021. We just have to wait for Princess to publish the rest of 2021 before making a decision. 

We're on that 14 day Japan circumnavigation in Apr 2021 as well as the follow-on TP from Yokahama back to Vancouver after hitting a few more ports in Japan. The TP the end of April 2021 is in your price range if you can get away for 15 days.

 

https://www.celebritycruises.com/itinerary-search?dates=2021-04&destinations=TPACI&departures=YOK

Edited September 14, 2019 by Ken the cruiser

[DCGuy64]

2 minutes ago, Ken the cruiser said:

We're on that 14 day Japan circumnavigation in Apr 2021 as well as the follow-on TP from Yokahama back to Vancouver after hitting a few more ports in Japam

OK. That sounds super! Enjoy. My wife and I still work full time-she gets 2 weeks vacation per year and I get 6. We take a couple of trips to Europe, one to Florida to see my dad in the winter, we both work as election officers back home and throw in the odd days off we have to take for contractors at our home plus I sing professionally and have to take time off work for that a few times a year, and voilà, not really a huge bucket of time left for long cruises. I envy very much those who are able to swing the longer itineraries. One day we hope to! 

Edited September 14, 2019 by DCGuy64
Added additional info

[Ken the cruiser]

7 minutes ago, DCGuy64 said:

OK. 

I hit the wrong button before I was able to finish what I was typing. I've added more to my post just in case you were interested.

 

[DCGuy64]

12 minutes ago, Ken the cruiser said:

We're on that 14 day Japan circumnavigation in Apr 2021 as well as the follow-on TP from Yokahama back to Vancouver after hitting a few more ports in Japan. The TP the end of April 2021 is in your price range if you can get away for 15 days.

TP = Trans Pacific? Wouldn’t that mean a

lot of days at sea? 

[Ken the cruiser]

13 minutes ago, DCGuy64 said:

TP = Trans Pacific? Wouldn’t that mean a

lot of days at sea? 

Yes and yes. If you click on that link I posted then on "View Ports & Map", it will give you the details. But X usually has a lot of lectures and fun things to do on sea days if you like those kind of things.

[Nebr.cruiser]

5 hours ago, villauk said:

 

 

Not any more. X are removing these as their ships are being ‘Edgesized’. 

The new cut back is in-cabin movies - ‘pay to view’ only at $14.95 a movie. They are in the process of axing this from all the fleet (there are a few threads currently of the X board confirming this). They don’t want you to stay in your cabin as you’re not generating further income; they need you out spending 😉.

 

 

 

Word of warning, X often charter their Japan itineraries. Do a search and you will see pax that have been bumped two or three times from Japanese itineraries.

 

I think there are swings and roundabouts with booking either line.

We are Platinum on Pricess, maybe 5-6 cruises on Celebrity and have cruised several other lines.  We always have a good time, but Princess wins out.

 

They are usually a better value, we like the real promenades on many ships, the International Cafe and MUTS (for me, at night only.) Food and service seems about the same, although the buffet on Celebrity wins for being much more spacious--the newest Princess ships have awesome buffets though.

 

I love the huge closet on Princess that are so accessible but Celebrity wins on bathroom for the shower and storage space.  I don't mind not having a couch, as we only use it to lay things on, but would really like a chair of some kind and nicer balcony furniture that is actually comfortable on any line.

 

We were vaguely disappointed in our Celebrity cruise last year--hard to put a finger on why, but entertainment seemed lackluster and we hated that they had reduced the free in-room movies to about 5--the rest being very expensive.  The specialty dining was great though, and they were selling them at a good discount once on board.

 

Celebrity seems to be more and more expensive, compared to Princess, at least for us, especially the new ships.  We will sail them again, but probably Princess wins out if all other factors are equal.  We sail more for itinerary and price so are willing to sail on most lines if those things are good.

 

If I paid the amount of money some of the higher cabin categories, such as Aqua, cost I would definitely expect a much better experience!  Princess really doesn't have anything similar, although the Club class is probably trying to do the same thing.

 

 

[rsquirrel]

We had one free movie on our Alaskan cruise with Celebrity this month.

 

This was my second Celebrity cruise and now I'm done.  I was given food that I shouldn't have been given on more than one occasion.  

 

I'm looking at trying Princess out next year.

[sunsetbeachgal]

Just saw an article that confirmed Celebrity is removing free in room movies.  

 

Let’s hope Princess doesn’t follow suit.  We cruise mostly on Royal class, and very much enjoy the wonderful selection of movies in the cabin.  

[DCGuy64]

I’m not much for watching movies while on a cruise, although I do enjoy watching international TV channels occasionally. 

[DCGuy64]

13 hours ago, Nebr.cruiser said:

We are Platinum on Pricess, maybe 5-6 cruises on Celebrity and have cruised several other lines.  We always have a good time, but Princess wins out.

 

They are usually a better value, we like the real promenades on many ships, the International Cafe and MUTS (for me, at night only.) Food and service seems about the same, although the buffet on Celebrity wins for being much more spacious--the newest Princess ships have awesome buffets though.

 

I love the huge closet on Princess that are so accessible but Celebrity wins on bathroom for the shower and storage space.  I don't mind not having a couch, as we only use it to lay things on, but would really like a chair of some kind and nicer balcony furniture that is actually comfortable on any line.

 

We were vaguely disappointed in our Celebrity cruise last year--hard to put a finger on why, but entertainment seemed lackluster and we hated that they had reduced the free in-room movies to about 5--the rest being very expensive.  The specialty dining was great though, and they were selling them at a good discount once on board.

 

Celebrity seems to be more and more expensive, compared to Princess, at least for us, especially the new ships.  We will sail them again, but probably Princess wins out if all other factors are equal.  We sail more for itinerary and price so are willing to sail on most lines if those things are good.

 

If I paid the amount of money some of the higher cabin categories, such as Aqua, cost I would definitely expect a much better experience!  Princess really doesn't have anything similar, although the Club class is probably trying to do the same thing.

 

 

From my research, it seems you’re right: Celebrity is often more expensive than Princess. I was looking at cruises on the Celebrity Millennium to Japan and the prices were definitely higher than Princess. NB: the Celebrity cruises were longer, however, so the price per night was, although still lower on Princess, not as great. But you’d have to HAVE the vacation time to do the longer cruise in the first place. For some people (like my dad, for example, who is retired) that’s not an issue. For me and my wife, it is. I also looked at Celebrity vs other lines for Caribbean cruises and found very good pricing. But we’ve done a total of 6 cruises and 4 of them were Caribbean (with yet another this December) so we’re a little tired of that. That’s one of the reasons we want to try Asia. Celebrity is DEFINITELY on our radar for the future. 

[villauk]

4 hours ago, DCGuy64 said:

From my research, it seems you’re right: Celebrity is often more expensive than Princess. I was looking at cruises on the Celebrity Millennium to Japan and the prices were definitely higher than Princess. NB: the Celebrity cruises were longer, however, so the price per night was, although still lower on Princess, not as great. But you’d have to HAVE the vacation time to do the longer cruise in the first place. For some people (like my dad, for example, who is retired) that’s not an issue. For me and my wife, it is. I also looked at Celebrity vs other lines for Caribbean cruises and found very good pricing. But we’ve done a total of 6 cruises and 4 of them were Caribbean (with yet another this December) so we’re a little tired of that. That’s one of the reasons we want to try Asia. Celebrity is DEFINITELY on our radar for the future. 

 

 

We have sailed on X in Asia and did have a great time, however, we’ve always been wary of booking one of their Japan itineraries as they are so often chartered out. 

[Ken the cruiser]

40 minutes ago, villauk said:

 

 

We have sailed on X in Asia and did have a great time, however, we’ve always been wary of booking one of their Japan itineraries as they are so often chartered out. 

From your experience, what happens when you have a cruise booked with X and it is subsequently chartered? We have booked the Apr 2021 14 day Japan circumnavigation and subsequent TP cruise back to Vancouver. How much time in advance does X usually let you know if they decide to charter it out?

Edited September 14, 2019 by Ken the cruiser

[Cruise Raider]

39 minutes ago, Ken the cruiser said:

-From your experience, what happens when you have a cruise booked with X and it is subsequently chartered? We have booked the Apr 2021 14 day Japan circumnavigation and subsequent TP cruise back to Vancouver. How much time in advance does X usually let you know if they decide to charter it out?

 

They usually notify booked passengers anywhere from 9-12 months out ... that's been my experience with three different cruises, anyway.  However, those were all US based sailings.  I have no knowledge on overseas sailings ... I could only guess it is about the same.  

[DCGuy64]

24 minutes ago, Cruise Raider said:

 

They usually notify booked passengers anywhere from 9-12 months out ... that's been my experience with three different cruises, anyway.  However, those were all US based sailings.  I have no knowledge on overseas sailings ... I could only guess it is about the same.  

Why would a cruise line charter a previously booked ship? Isn’t that kinda bad PR if passengers who’d booked have to find other ships to cruise on? And do those passengers (who presumably get bumped) receive compensation?  Assuming I understand this correctly, I might have a hard time trusting a cruise line if they did that to me. 

Edited September 14, 2019 by DCGuy64
Added additional information

[Ken the cruiser]

46 minutes ago, Cruise Raider said:

 

They usually notify booked passengers anywhere from 9-12 months out ... that's been my experience with three different cruises, anyway.  However, those were all US based sailings.  I have no knowledge on overseas sailings ... I could only guess it is about the same.  

Thanks! I guess we should definitely then book our air fare using Celebrity Air as we really wouldn't want to eat those air fares if the cruise got cancelled. Of course something tells me with the inflated fares on the Apr 2021 Japan cruise, chances are they're probable not going to charter it out. But just in case we've been eyeing some Princess cruises in the Pacific as a backup.

[villauk]

On 7/7/2019 at 12:00 PM, 4774Papa said:

We had two cruises for Japan in 2015 that were cancelled.  Both times, Celebrity gave us 3-4 cruises that we could transfer our booking (same booking number) for the exact same price that we booked the original cruise.  On one cruise we transferred to a Japan and China cruise that was a few hundred dollars more expensive and we kept our original, lower, prices.  That cruise turned out to be one of our favorites.

 

10 hours ago, Ken the cruiser said:

From your experience, what happens when you have a cruise booked with X and it is subsequently chartered? We have booked the Apr 2021 14 day Japan circumnavigation and subsequent TP cruise back to Vancouver. How much time in advance does X usually let you know if they decide to charter it out?

 

 

Ken,

 

Above is from the X board and they usually offer some OBC if the sailing is cancelled. It’s the luck of the draw as to the timeframe. I remember when they sold Century and those pax got less than 6 months notice. Last month, we were just about to book Connie for next Christmas - Singapore to Dubai - and they have now redeployed the ship to Tampa, sailing the Caribbean 😡. Needless to say, we won’t be booking that.

 

You may find this helpful too: 

Doubt very much your TP will be cancelled as it’s a repositioning cruise. 

[Cruise Raider]

14 hours ago, DCGuy64 said:

Why would a cruise line charter a previously booked ship? Isn’t that kinda bad PR if passengers who’d booked have to find other ships to cruise on? And do those passengers (who presumably get bumped) receive compensation?  Assuming I understand this correctly, I might have a hard time trusting a cruise line if they did that to me. 

 

It's always all about the money!!  They've chartered three sailings that I was booked on ... but each time, I came out way ahead!!  And, they do compensate those passengers that are already booked but not everyone looks at this as an opportunity to get something better.  And ... I get that!!  If it was your wedding or a family reunion, a special celebration ... I think the compensation wouldn't really appease me in that case.  But, for us, it's always worked out to our advantage, though ... we have a lot of flexibility in our schedule and don't necessarily cruise for the ports of call as long as long flights aren't required.  

We've also booked a cruise on Celebrity when they had her scheduled for the Mediterranean and brought her over to the Caribbean instead.  I know those people that had their Med cruises canceled were irate but it gave us the opportunity to book that ship over in the Caribbean at a great price and all sorts of extra perks. 

It's probably not a great practice to engage in all the time, but when they get a guaranteed amount of money from a group or company for a charter, I can see why they do so.  

 

 

[Ken the cruiser]

5 hours ago, villauk said:

Ken,

 

Above is from the X board and they usually offer some OBC if the sailing is cancelled. It’s the luck of the draw as to the timeframe. I remember when they sold Century and those pax got less than 6 months notice. Last month, we were just about to book Connie for next Christmas - Singapore to Dubai - and they have now redeployed the ship to Tampa, sailing the Caribbean 😡. Needless to say, we won’t be booking that.

 

You may find this helpful too: 

Doubt very much your TP will be cancelled as it’s a repositioning cruise. 

Thanks Villauk. We'll just have to wait and see what happens. Hopefully, all will be fine.

[DCGuy64]

1 hour ago, Cruise Raider said:

 

It's always all about the money!!  They've chartered three sailings that I was booked on ... but each time, I came out way ahead!!  And, they do compensate those passengers that are already booked but not everyone looks at this as an opportunity to get something better.  And ... I get that!!  If it was your wedding or a family reunion, a special celebration ... I think the compensation wouldn't really appease me in that case.  But, for us, it's always worked out to our advantage, though ... we have a lot of flexibility in our schedule and don't necessarily cruise for the ports of call as long as long flights aren't required.  

We've also booked a cruise on Celebrity when they had her scheduled for the Mediterranean and brought her over to the Caribbean instead.  I know those people that had their Med cruises canceled were irate but it gave us the opportunity to book that ship over in the Caribbean at a great price and all sorts of extra perks. 

It's probably not a great practice to engage in all the time, but when they get a guaranteed amount of money from a group or company for a charter, I can see why they do so.  

 

 

Wow. Honestly that would make me livid. My wife and I have extremely busy schedules. We plan vacations far in advance for the most part and rearranging at the last minute is flat-out impossible, especially for me. It might be a “one and done” for me if a cruise line did that .

[Cruise Raider]

4 hours ago, DCGuy64 said:

Wow. Honestly that would make me livid. My wife and I have extremely busy schedules. We plan vacations far in advance for the most part and rearranging at the last minute is flat-out impossible, especially for me. It might be a “one and done” for me if a cruise line did that .

 

Yes, they all do it, though but it has happened to me 3 times on Celebrity and not on other lines.  Just because it worked out for the better for us on Celebrity doesn't mean everybody feels that way and I completely understand that.  I've seen the same thing happen at a hotel down in Mexico.  We got a particular hotel as the balcony of our room looked over the jazz festival next door.  Wow ... people were mad when they were moved to a hotel a couple of miles away.   I've also had friends that booked a room in Vegas and were moved to a sister property.  Not so fun when you have a big group booked but a few always have to make their way down the strip.  So, not exclusive to cruises but it's a little harder to rebook something after you've done all your research, booked your air and you are limited to when you can go.  

 

[Ken the cruiser]

6 minutes ago, Cruise Raider said:

 

Yes, they all do it, though but it has happened to me 3 times on Celebrity and not on other lines.  Just because it worked out for the better for us on Celebrity doesn't mean everybody feels that way and I completely understand that.  I've seen the same thing happen at a hotel down in Mexico.  We got a particular hotel as the balcony of our room looked over the jazz festival next door.  Wow ... people were mad when they were moved to a hotel a couple of miles away.   I've also had friends that booked a room in Vegas and were moved to a sister property.  Not so fun when you have a big group booked but a few always have to make their way down the strip.  So, not exclusive to cruises but it's a little harder to rebook something after you've done all your research, booked your air and you are limited to when you can go.  

 

Cruise Raider, how many X cruises have you been on and which 3 cruises and associated number of days and which years were these cancellations in? You’re making it sound like X does this all the time. 

[DCGuy64]

Just for clarification, when a charter situation like this occurs, does the cruise line put you on another cruise for the same time, but just another ship, or is it basically just a cancellation and they put you on a different itinerary at a completely different time? My wife was saying that some of her friends went on a cruise that featured a well-known rock band, so is it something like that or is everyone on the chartered ship just there for the charter? Where I work, we get a lot of vacation but we have to request the time off from our supervisor, and in my department only one person can be out at any time. So if I were bumped off my cruise due to this charter and put on a different ship at a different time, I might not be able to get the time off from work and I would be pretty unforgiving of the cruise line if they did that to me. But it sounds like this is fairly rare. 

[Ken the cruiser]

It happened to us once in Oct 2017 when we had a Med cruise and TA back to Miami booked. X cancelled the Med cruise (reason unknown) about a year out and in return they offered us our deposit back on both cruises and a $100 each if we booked another cruise (our choice). We then canceled the TA and then booked a Canary Island cruise on the Eclipse followed by a TA back to Miami.

 

We got the $100 each taken off the cruise fare and wound up having a great time! The cruises we wound up getting were about the same time frame as our original booking, but they might have been a week or two off. Point being you get to pick the cruise rather than X saying you have to take a cruise of their choosing in order to get the $100 each of the substitute cruise.

Edited September 16, 2019 by Ken the cruiser

[Lucky TGO]

On 2/7/2019 at 2:58 PM, OCruisers said:

Hear and understand!

It's hard to give up the Elite perks!  

I agree with you LuLu.  Don’t forget you still owe me a dance.😁

Tony