Princess and Royal Caribbean -- Some observations (Sorry, it's long!)

[volleymasha]

Let me begin by saying I don’t expect or intend this to be all-inclusive, but because it is a frequent topic of interest on these boards, I thought some might want to hear our impressions of at least some of the differences between our cruise on the Crown Princess March 15-22 and our cruises on Royal Caribbean in 2004, 2005 and 2006 (including a southern Caribbean route on Serenade). I am still working on a full review (which will undoubtedly begin with "Better late than never...").

 

Overall, I would agree with the many posters on here who say the two lines are generally pretty similar. Both have things that they do better than the other, but in general in my view the differences are mostly marginal. We decided on this cruise that RCI is a slightly better fit for us, but we would cruise Princess again in a heartbeat if the price and itinerary were right at the time.

 

Here are the thoughts I had on differences:

 

Food – split decision: Princess was tops for bakery (the cookies, pastries, and tarts were something else! No comparison), dining room food and layout (not crowded at all), anytime dining (we liked being able to eat later than 1st seating but earlier than 2nd), pizza (fantastic pizza! Again – no comparison here!). However, we found the buffet layout very crowded on Crown as others here have noted. While I liked the idea of so many different dining venues, the reality of it for us was that each venue was so limited that it wasn’t quite as easy for everything to work. For example, it was frustrating that you couldn’t get a burger and fries in the buffet – had to go to the grill by the pool. Since our kids found none of the lunch offerings in the buffet appealing, it meant we had to make different stops for everyone. It works out, but it wasn’t ideal for us, so Royal Caribbean comes out on top for us for the windjammer food and layout. We enjoyed afternoon tea on Princess – who knew that would be my 6 year old son’s favorite thing? We liked the availability of soft serve ice cream without additional charge on Royal Caribbean at all hours. We went to the Crown’s Horizon court for ice cream at 3:30 (which, by the way, I would never have known about without CC, as I didn’t see it published anywhere), but found it not worth the trouble – the flavors were frequently odd, and the time restriction meant you had to plan too much for something that then wasn’t worth it. For example, one day the only choices were tuti fruiti and blueberry – great if they’re your favorites, but if you don’t like that and you’ve had to organize your afternoon to make sure you got there and your kids only like chocolate and vanilla, it’s a bit disappointing. It would make sense to at least always offer vanilla. However, we weren’t as put off as many by the surcharge for gelato in the international café -- $1.50 was a small price to pay for the three scoops of excellent gelato (and I could always get a scoop of vanilla). We like the availability of lemonade and fruit punch in the buffet on Royal Caribbean.

 

Cabins – we love the quad sleeping arrangements on Princess (on RC ships, junior suite has one fold out sofa the 3rd and 4th in room share; Princess mini suite and suite both had separate Pullman for the 4th). The Princess minisuite felt a bit smaller than the junior suites we had on the Royal Caribbean ships (seemed more comparable to the balcony cabin on Royal Caribbean in terms of floor space). Of course, we enjoyed the full suite on Princess and can’t compare that to anything on Royal Caribbean. I expected the kids to miss the towel animals, but they didn’t notice the absence so that was a non-issue for us. I liked auto tip on Princess – it was nice to only have to bring cash for “extra” tips instead of handing out wads of money the last night. I am aware that Royal Caribbean also offers an option to charge the tips to the room, but it’s not the path of least resistance and I understand that the crew isn’t crazy about it as they are slowed down in receiving the money, where on Princess autotips seem to be the expectation.

 

Kids activities – Crown Princess had better facilities, programs were generally similar (except we missed the Serenade’s water slide, but the availability of that was hit or miss); our kids liked both programs and I suspect might give you different answers on different days as to which they preferred.

Except the teen – he preferred the Princess teen activities. I suspect this is because Princess really did a good job having teen activities -- on our RC sailings, though teen activities were published the kids usually just wound up hanging out.

 

Casino – The Crown casino was spacious and well laid out (not as crowded as some); they offered several opportunities for low minimum games (e.g., $3 minimum on let it ride) – I found this appealing as I enjoy playing a bit but I’m not a big gambler.

 

Layout – we preferred the layout of each of the RC ships we have been on (Navigator and Radiance class) to the Crown. We found too many dead ends on the Crown (for example, can’t go to midships from aft area on deck 6, have to go up to 7 to walk back). It’s not a huge deal, but I frequently found it disorienting and felt that it was unnecessarily difficult to get from point A to point B.

 

Other Activities: While I like the idea of so many different venues and entertainment going on all the time on the Crown, for us it didn’t really work out on this cruise – much of what was offered didn’t sound appealing to us or just didn’t work out because of timing. We prefer the layout of the Royal Caribbean theaters we have visited to the one on the Crown. We did enjoy Brett Cave (piano guy in Crooners) – he was a lot of fun and I wish we’d found him earlier, and we enjoyed playing a few trivia games, which were generally quite well attended and with prizes frequently better than we got on Royal Caribbean (we got tote bags, travel pouches, and baseball caps on princess, as opposed to ball point pens on Royal Caribbean). We missed the rock wall. Crown’s putting course was shorter and not nearly as interesting as the mini golf on the Royal Caribbean ships we have been on. My friend enjoys bingo, and found it less enjoyable on Princess than on Royal Caribbean – the CD staff actually encouraged other players to “boo” those coming to the stage with one number left or reaching bingo. This undermined our previous impression that Princess was supposed to be somewhat more refined – I just find that sort of thing unsportsmanlike and basically rude. No flames please from those who find it all in good fun -- just my opinion.

 

Other kids stuff: On Princess, they don’t give kids bracelets with the muster station to which they are assigned the way they do on Royal Caribbean. While the odds of anything bad happening are miniscule, it did make me feel somewhat less secure. Also, the emergency plan for getting the kids to the muster station was for the parents to go to the kids area and pick them up before proceeding to the muster area – on Royal Caribbean, parents are instructed that the staff will bring the kids to the muster area to meet the parents. Again, I understand that the chances of a real emergency in which that sort of delay would make a difference are so small as to make it not make any difference, but it was a difference in procedure I noticed.

 

volleymasha

[emilymad]

Thanks for the great comments! We normally sail with RCCL but we are taking our first Princess cruise in a month. It is great to hear the good and bad about both lines.

[dforeigner]

Thanks for taking time to write a comparison contrast review.

[cruzfiend]

I agree that both lines are very comparable, I do wish that Royal would go to different islands, we've been to most of their itineraries. Not too many ships go to St. Croix, Tortola, Grand Turk, ans so on.

[DonnaK]

This was a very objective comparison. We are Royal Caribbean fans who are trying Princess for the first time. I agree with the above poster who said that RCI needs new ports. I also think they need new menus, need a Radiance class ship in the Caribbean during the summer, etc. Too much of the same gets boring after a while, so while we aren't dissatified with Royal Caribbean, we needed to do something new/different this time around.

[Cruise from Calgary]

Thanks for sharing your opinions with us.;)

[KKB]

We keep saying we are trying RCCL next but Princess continues to offer us incredible deals. (around $500pp for each of our 7day cruises).

 

Looking at your comparisons, luckily the things that were not as appealing to you really wouldn't affect me (we only hit buffet for breakfast & I just beeline in for fruit, bacon, eggs & capers). We found bingo on Disney to be a bit of a drag, but always a riot on Princess.

 

Interesting your comments on the teen preferring Princess! We felt sure that our next family cruise would be on RCCL...will have to continue to think about that!

 

Thanks again!

[caribcruiser787]

Thanks for posting your helpful comparisons. Our last couple of cruises were on RCCL, and now we're anticipating our first Princess cruise. (In a little over a week!)

[YoPhilly]

Thank you for posting such a balanced comparison.

[blackie50]

I couldn't agree more with your observations. We also find RCI a better match for us and have finally made Diamond on that line. However it doesn't stop us from cruising with Princess. We are getting ready for our 4th cruise with them and will most likely do Europe next year. They are so close in comparison that it is all about the itinerary now for us.

 

Carolyn & David

[mainer208]

We have sailed Carnival many times but we too, are getting tired of the same itineraries especially on the eastern Caribbean. The Crown Princess has a fabulous itinerary but just not sure about Princess.

 

It sounds nice but have heard the balcony rooms are small unless you book a mini-suite. Prices are quite a bit higher than on Carnival.