Compare Princess to other lines for me

[CKDoodle]

Hi Princess Cruisers:D

 

I've been on 5 cruises - 2 NCL, 2 HAL and one Carnival. The Carnival trip was a few weeks ago and was our first and last. My husband and I are thinking about doing a cruise in February on the Grand Princess. For those of you that have been on other lines, how does Princess compare - of the lines I have been on, which is it most like?

 

Just curious how others see Princess in comparison to other lines!

 

Thanks in advance:)

Carrie

[DeRon]

I haven't been on HAL or NCL, but I have been on Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Carnival, and even Disney. Princess is by far our favorite for many reasons. I even like the food better than Celebrity (which everyone says is better). Princess in our opinion is the BEST. It has an overall better feel than the others, as well as I like the ships better. 2

[sackman]

Of the cruise lines you listed, I would equate Princess more with HAL than the others. Princess has a little more livliness to the atmosphere, though, and the ships are usually bigger. HAL staterooms are generally bigger, and the food is better on HAL, but not by a whole lot. The service is comparable. The decor on HAL is typically a little more elegant. These are slight differences, though. If you enjoyed your HAL trips, I think you'll have a good time on Princess, too.

[houch]

I haven't been on HAL or NCL, but I have been on Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Carnival, and even Disney. Princess is by far our favorite for many reasons. I even like the food better than Celebrity (which everyone says is better). Princess in our opinion is the BEST. It has an overall better feel than the others, as well as I like the ships better. 2

 

 

I agree with you. I love Princess and have only cruised once on RCI and once on Celibrity. Princess is the best in all areas! Was not impressed with Celebrity at all, maybe there was too much expectations. The food was definitely lacking on our cruise. Not that it was bad, just not what we have had on Princess.

You will enjoy Princess, I am sure!

[KLLund]

I like HAL .. but if I had to compare I would say Princess is HAL without the stuffiness ... Much more relaxing

[sungirl]

We have been on 2 NCL, 3 Princess, 1 Disney and 1 (now defunct) Big Red Boat - Premier, I think. I like NCL and Princess for the anytime dining. It's what keeps me booking with them. The cabins on Princess have better closets, which translates into better/more storage than on NCL. Quite honestly, I thought everything else (service, food, etc.) to be comparable between the two. Disney had much better service than either one of them, but you have lots of kids and Disney 24/7 to think of. I think the Princess crowd is maybe(?) a bit more affluent, but I can't be sure of that. The ages seemed to be the same - from very young to very old on both. If I found an itinerary I liked and it was only on NCL, I would have no problem booking it. But, if it was the exact same as one on Princess, I would book the Princess cruise - solely for the closet thing!(meaning everything else I would consider equal)

[CKDoodle]

Thank you all so much for the great responses! Those are the things that I was hoping to hear! My husband and I are 40 and 39. We took the 3 kids on Carnival (12, 14, 17) along with my brother and sister's kids and they ALL loved it. It was a little too crowded and wild for me! We had a bad wait staff and room steward too...like they say luck of the draw I guess, but that was something we had never experienced on other lines. We literally didn't have one complaint on HAL.

 

For just the two of us, it sounds like Princess is the way to go for February. I'm hoping to get my cruising mojo back:D

 

THANK YOU all for taking the time to give your opinions!

Carrie

[trvlcrzy]

I liked HAL's balcony cabin better than Princess's (on Sun Princess). It is my understanding that you have to book a mini-suite on Princess in order to have a sofa in your cabin. HAL's balcony cabin had a sofa, so that gave a little more sitting space. (Also, the sofa had two drawers for storage ... and the bed had two drawers for storage... we were on Zuiderdam.)

 

I like HAL's ice cream hours. Carnival offers the soft serve machine, but HAL's is "real" dipped ice cream almost all day. Princess expects us to pay, but we limit our ice cream consumption to the free hour in the afternoon at lido or from the dining room menus at lunch and dinner. The buffet on Sun Princess was a bit disappointing. The Caribbean Princess was much better. HAL's Zuiderdam's buffet area had a good layout (with trays, so I find it easier to balance the bowl of salad, plate of food, beverage choice, etc.), and the breakfast in Lido has fresh-squeezed OJ.

 

I loved our CB trip, but we found ourselves saying that if the Sun Princess had been our first Princess trip, we wouldn't have liked Princess. The experiences differed greatly!

[CP3o]

Sorry to hijack, didn't know if this question deserved its own post or could be in here.

 

I like docking over tendering so like that DCL docks at every port on 7 night eastern. How about Princess Grand and Crown? I'm guessing the larger RCL ships need to tender but I don't really know which ports can handle what sized ships. Thanks.

[DeRon]

What is DCL?

[CP3o]

What is DCL?

 

Disney Cruise Line

[Marge106]

I have been cruising since 1976 and have sailed more than 100 times. We have sailed on Home Lines (now defunct), Costa, RCCL, Celebrity, Disney and most recently (just returned this past Saturday) on NCL Dawn

We will NEVER sail NCL again. We chose this ship because of the NY departure and I would rather fly to Florida or PR one day in advance than o through the NCL experience again. 2 1/2 hour embarcation, lost shore excursion reservations, unable to book restaurants, no space at the 1 and only pool on the, horrible buffets, tables not cleaned at buffets, rude deck attendants, rude waiters and the list goes on. The only decent meal you can get is by going to one of the pay restaurants. When your traveling with a group of 14, the price gets quite costly.

Live and learn, looking forward to our CB trip on 1/13/08.

[DeRon]

Wow! You just convinced me!

[CKDoodle]

I liked HAL's balcony cabin better than Princess's (on Sun Princess). It is my understanding that you have to book a mini-suite on Princess in order to have a sofa in your cabin. HAL's balcony cabin had a sofa, so that gave a little more sitting space. (Also, the sofa had two drawers for storage ... and the bed had two drawers for storage... we were on Zuiderdam.)

 

I like HAL's ice cream hours. Carnival offers the soft serve machine, but HAL's is "real" dipped ice cream almost all day. Princess expects us to pay, but we limit our ice cream consumption to the free hour in the afternoon at lido or from the dining room menus at lunch and dinner. The buffet on Sun Princess was a bit disappointing. The Caribbean Princess was much better. HAL's Zuiderdam's buffet area had a good layout (with trays, so I find it easier to balance the bowl of salad, plate of food, beverage choice, etc.), and the breakfast in Lido has fresh-squeezed OJ.

 

I loved our CB trip, but we found ourselves saying that if the Sun Princess had been our first Princess trip, we wouldn't have liked Princess. The experiences differed greatly!

 

We sailed the Zuiderdam in March 2004 - that was my absolute favorite cruise!

[LUV THE SEA]

I have been cruising since 1976 and have sailed more than 100 times. We have sailed on Home Lines (now defunct), Costa, RCCL, Celebrity, Disney and most recently (just returned this past Saturday) on NCL Dawn

We will NEVER sail NCL again. We chose this ship because of the NY departure and I would rather fly to Florida or PR one day in advance than o through the NCL experience again. 2 1/2 hour embarcation, lost shore excursion reservations, unable to book restaurants, no space at the 1 and only pool on the, horrible buffets, tables not cleaned at buffets, rude deck attendants, rude waiters and the list goes on. The only decent meal you can get is by going to one of the pay restaurants. When your traveling with a group of 14, the price gets quite costly.

Live and learn, looking forward to our CB trip on 1/13/08.

I just was reading through the boardas avout Princess and I saw the home Lines- I haven't seeen that cruise line name ever mentioned We sailed on Home lines over 20 years ago!! did someone else take them over?

[Plant]

I have been cruising since 1976 and have sailed more than 100 times. We have sailed on Home Lines (now defunct), Costa, RCCL, Celebrity, Disney and most recently (just returned this past Saturday) on NCL Dawn

We will NEVER sail NCL again. We chose this ship because of the NY departure and I would rather fly to Florida or PR one day in advance than o through the NCL experience again. 2 1/2 hour embarcation, lost shore excursion reservations, unable to book restaurants, no space at the 1 and only pool on the, horrible buffets, tables not cleaned at buffets, rude deck attendants, rude waiters and the list goes on. The only decent meal you can get is by going to one of the pay restaurants. When your traveling with a group of 14, the price gets quite costly.

Live and learn, looking forward to our CB trip on 1/13/08.

 

IMO, this is very unusual. I'm sorry to hear your cruise was so bad :(. We've cruised on Carnival, Princess and NCL. Our first choice would be Princess, our second NCL. We love the "Anytime Dining" on Princess and the "Freestyle" on NCL. We've always had great service (no rude people) and good food on both lines and have never had a 2 1/2 hour embarkation. Of course, that could happen any time depending on the immigration and customs officials.

 

We had a wonderful time on Grand Princess and would book her again :) .

[sandysav]

Went on first (and last) princess cruise last winter, room, hallway and balconies at our end of the ship smelled so bad the entire week. Princess admits the smell and their customer service stinks too. Celebrity was probably the classiest ship and ncl and carnival the most fun, rccl was good, so its not like we are hard to please, just dont like to pay a great deal of money to deal with horrible smell for a week.

[cruisin'since'75]

I have been cruising since 1976 and have sailed more than 100 times. We have sailed on Home Lines (now defunct), Costa, RCCL, Celebrity, Disney and most recently (just returned this past Saturday) on NCL Dawn. We will NEVER sail NCL again. Live and learn, looking forward to our CB trip on 1/13/08.

 

Celebrated my 50th birthday cruise on NCL Dawn (out of NYC) with 19 friends and relatives. Worse cruise I ever experienced. Great being at sea, etc. etc., loved the private island, but as far as the cruise itself, just awful. Freestyle dining is a nightmare for a large group. Even though we tried making reservations for the entire week for every night, no one ever followed through for us. It was such a shame that we never all had dinner in the same place at the same time since there were several of us celebrating our special days.

 

No one enforced the rules. Children (monsters disquised as children!) running amok, truly, knocking into folks, pushing their way through long lines, skateboarding down the long corridors; and not a parent in sight to remind the monsters to try to behave. I suppose they couldn't stand the sight of them any longer and used the ship as a big babysitting convenience.

 

Embarkation and disembarkation was an unholy experience. I've tried not to relive the horror but the memories won't leave me along. Luggage not accounted for until we went down to "the place where the luggage is, down there" to find the sevveral pieces ourselves, long, non-moving lines of people in colorful outfits, straw hats and digital cameras snapping away at the exterior of the ship, wondering if they'll ever get to see the inside, hot, smelly, ineffecient and ultimately rude agents, which is why it was all going so badly, I'm sure.

 

I too will never, ever sail NCL. I was brought up on cruise ships to expect more, much, much, more. Isn't that the truth, Marge?:cool:

 

JD

[Cruise_More_Often]

Wow, two very unhappy NCL cruisers. It's our favorite line! We've never sailed on the Dawn, though, and we NEVER sail when large numbers of children are expected to be onboard. However, stories such as yours about wild little things during school vacations are on every cruisline's board here.

 

The only time our embarcation was held up was due to Customs not showing up on time for the San Francisco disembarcation of the ship. There wasn't a single thing NCL could have done about that.

 

And if you're talking about the agents you see at the ports during embarcation, those are hired by the Ports, not the cruiselines.

 

We love the NCL ships, the ability to choose where, with whom and when we want to eat. We have never had any problem getting reservations in the alternative dining venues. And we think their onboard staff is the friendliest at sea.

 

We're doing a 2-day on the Coral Princess in September from Vancouver to San Francisco, and we are excited to see how Princess differs from HAL, NCL and RCI, which we have sailed on. It's going to take an awful lot to convince us that our favorite is no longer our favorite.

 

Isn't it nice that there's a cruisline out there for everyone? We are so lucky to have so many choices!

[joanne1]

.

We're doing a 2-day on the Coral Princess in September from Vancouver to San Francisco, and we are excited to see how Princess differs from HAL, NCL and RCI, which we have sailed on. It's going to take an awful lot to convince us that our favorite is no longer our favorite.

 

Isn't it nice that there's a cruisline out there for everyone? We are so lucky to have so many choices!

 

You have picked our favorite ship (along with the Island, who is her sister) but 2 days might not give you much of a feel . . . maybe you should stay on and do the entire passage to get the true feel of the ship :D .

 

I have actually been trying to do the same thing, compare . . . we are thinking about doing the Med on a Carnival ship (oh, don't some of you start ;-) It's just that the itinerary and the timing is perfect for us because we have to work around a wedding in England. I am going with an open-mind and no stereotyping. BTW, did you know that they think we are very old, over here on Princess ?!?!?!

[toodycat]

I've cruised Disney four times, Princess once with plans to cruise again in Feb. 08 and HAL once with plans to cruise again in August. I would say that Princess and Disney are comparable in quality of food and staterooms. HAL's food is superior and their staterooms are bigger. Disney, obviously, has better service in general because of all the folks breaking their necks to make sure you have a "magical" experience. Princess is a high quality cruise. You wont' find anything to complain about in terms of food, service, stateroom or entertainment. But you might not leave remembering all the extra little things people did for your satisfaction. On the Star Princess, I had perfectly good meals all week, but I don't think my servers ever learned my name or my favorite drink. The servers on HAL and Disney had that down immediately. Our mini-suite stateroom on Princess was neat as a pin. On HAL, our stateroom was larger , just as neat and the steward noticed how we liked the blankets and arranged them that way all week. When he saw that my son felt seasick, he brought green apples and saltines to the room for him. There were also fresh flowers and fruit in our stateroom on HAL. My son had a blast at both the Princess and Disney kids' club. On HAL, he wasn't as impressed and didn't choose to sign up for their activities. Entertainment on both Princess and HAL was good. On Disney, it was amazing, but that is not surprising. If you decide to cruise Princess, I am sure you will have a really good vacation.

[burlingtoncruiser]

We have cruised NCL, Hal, Princess and Cunard QM2 and Hal is our favourite for many of the reasons listed above. The wait staff and stewards on Hal knew us by name, the food was better in our opinion, and the staff seemed genuinely happy to see you. Many smiles and greetings with HAL. I didn't get that feeling with any of the others - although the service was good, that 'little something' was missing.:)