Thoughts on cruising on newer larger vessels Vs older smaller ones....

[joker0227]

I just wanted to see if any of you had the same feelings as my wife and I when it comes to cruising on the newer larger vessels versus the older smaller ones.

 

We just returned from our first cruise on one of the newer, larger cruise ships in the Carnival fleet. We've only sailed on the smaller ships prior to this cruise and we were surprised to find that we didn't enjoy this cruise experience nearly as much as we've enjoyed past experiences on Carnival cruise ships do to the number of people on this large ship.

 

We found the Carnival Glory to be overcrowded for the most part. It may have just been the illusion created by the sheer number of people on the vessel, but it seemed to me that many of the common areas such as the casino, the side bars (Cinibar, Bar Blue, On the Green Sports Bar) and other rooms that were off the beaten path (card room, library, etc.) seemed not only similar in size to the common areas on the smaller ships, but they actually seemed smaller at times, especially the casino.

 

We also found that the cool places that we enjoyed hanging out were also laden with smoke due to lack of ventilation and the low ceilings. We really liked the Ivory Bar which featured live Jazz music every night, but the ceiling was so low and it had no ventilation. This combined with the fact that it was one of the only areas on that level (dining level - so the smokers couldn't wait to hit this room for a smoke before and after dinner) that allowed smoking really made it uncomfortable to sit and enjoy the music. Don't get me wrong, I usually don't complain about smoke (I'm a cigar smoker, but I didn't even light up on this cruise because I just didn't feel there were any areas where it would be appropriate to smoke a cigar due to poor ventilation in the areas that allowed smoking and I didn't want to offend my fellow cruisers).

 

All the previous cruises that we've been on have been on smaller ships. The last cruise we took (the Legend) seemed to be the perfect size ship when taking number of guests on board compared to the size of the ship and we also really like the decor on this cruise. The mythological theme really caught our eye and we would really like to return to this ship at some point in the future.

 

So, is there anyone else out there that feels the same way about the new mega-class of cruise ships that Carnival's putting out?

[zachnlucy]

On the whole, I prefer the smaller ships if not cruising with children. My two favorite cruises were the Carnival Holiday and RCCL's Grandeur of the Seas (both older, smaller ships). When we take the kids, however, I like the large ships because there is so much for the kids to do, and the kids are amazed at everything.

[kujobie]

We liked our fantasy class cruises much better than our Glory cruise. While, as you mentioned, the Glory was newer and more modern, we just didn't like the layout. We were still finding new places we hadn't seen before on the last day. It's like a maze. The Spirit class was our favorite, partly because we got married on the Miracle and had an aft wrap cat 11, but we like both classes better than the Conquest class (Glory). Heck, I even liked the Jubilee better than the Glory. Bigger is not always better.

[k.hill]

We prefer the big ships. We've never had huge problems with crowds, but we could have been lucky or maybe we are just more used to them. Our first few cruises were on big ones and the few small ones we have done seemed more private, but not enough to matter to us. The biggest noticeable crowd we've cruised with were a couple of thousand WAVES on our last Conquest Cruise. I can't explain how neat it was to watch these tough ladies sing together in the Atrium. I guess it's easy to deal with a big group like that if you respect them so much. Plus, at their age, they weren't up late bothering people like some cruisers.

[joker0227]

We prefer the big ships. We've never had huge problems with crowds, but we could have been lucky or maybe we are just more used to them.quote]

 

 

That is probably very true. I think we are just so used to what the smaller ships have to offer that we are now used to the space allocation of less people per square foot, so-to-speak :)

 

Also, admittidly, my wife and I have never really gotten into the shows and so forth. This last trip we took was with two other couples and they went to the shows everynight and loved them all.

 

I guess it's all in what you want to get out of the trip and for my wife and I, a quiet side bar featuring some live jazz, piano or blues music is just what we we're looking for and we really couldn't find this on the Glory because of the crowds and smoke.