Struggling

skwak

Can't wait to work for Mickey someday!!
Joined
Nov 8, 2004
Hello:

We are long-time DCL cruisers but have an RCL cruise lined up for late June. It is our 1st RCL cruise. We are struggling more than I thought we would regarding planning. I knew there would be differences but honestly I did not know they would be so stark. From navigating the RCL website to the few times that we have spoken with RCL live, we are struggling to feel much magic if any with RCL. I know RCL is considerably less expensive but it is not like we are not spending several thousands of dollars on the cruise. It is still a lot of money and it is our vacation, it should feel magical.

Any words of wisdom?

Thanks!
 
I just think it’s Not disney and dont Compare or you will feel worse I fear.

But hey... if you had our TA you’d feel even less magical, lol
so try and just go with the flow. You ll have a fabulous RCCL time!
Enjoy!!!
 
I too had bad luck with their website when booking things (prices change and their %off numbers are made up!!) and I really had bad luck when I called, but we had a phenomenal cruise! I was actually so mad with their phone support I was sure I wouldn't sail them again. Well we loved Allure so much we booked Harmony within a couple of weeks of getting home.

If you have planning questions, you can ask here or on Cruise Critic. They're WAY more helpful than the RCL phone people! :)
 
I agree with the confusion about RCL as compared to Disney. We just booked the Greek Isle Cruise out of Rome for 9/20, we were priced out of the Disney Cruise. I started looking at the website and excursions, seemed a little sparse. But I'm being optimistic, and I'm very excited to go to Greece. I plan on using this forum as my guide so thanks in advance.
 


I too had bad luck with their website when booking things (prices change and their %off numbers are made up!!) and I really had bad luck when I called, but we had a phenomenal cruise! I was actually so mad with their phone support I was sure I wouldn't sail them again. Well we loved Allure so much we booked Harmony within a couple of weeks of getting home.

If you have planning questions, you can ask here or on Cruise Critic. They're WAY more helpful than the RCL phone people! :)

So glad u loved Allure.
Did you have a favorite restaurant or tip for Allure? Headed on it in a few weeks. First Allure ...Cruise.
 
So glad u loved Allure.
Did you have a favorite restaurant or tip for Allure? Headed on it in a few weeks. First Allure ...Cruise.

Hi- we just returned from a 7 day Western Caribbean on Allure! We didn't buy a premium dining package in advance. Good thing as they were always offering deals of 1/2 off at the various specialty restaurants. We had lunch at Giovanni's one afternoon and the waiter gave us a good deal on a 3 day dining package!

Giovanni's was our favorite! Chops Grille was fabulous, too! We also loved Sabor- the Mexican restaurant! The homemade guacamole was delicious! All of the specialty restaurants were very uncrowded when we dined. The food and service were great! So, I highly recommend trying one! But hold out for a deal!

The piano bar, Schooner's was a favorite night spot of ours, too!!

Enjoy!!:)
 
We've been on two DCL cruises - one on Fantasy and one on Dream. We also cruised RC's Freedom of the Seas two summers ago and absolutely loved it. Right now, we are booked for Harmony of the Seas next May and I can't wait! Other than the Disney entertainment and Castaway Cay, we felt that Royal compared favorably to DCL in all areas. We actually enjoyed the food more on RC and liked our stateroom attendant better on the RC cruise.

If you have kids, I think their ages make a big difference. For younger kids (say less than 5 years old), my opinion is that you just cannot beat DCL. For slightly older kids who are looking for fun activities and thrills rather than characters, I think RC does a fantastic job!
 


Hello:

We are long-time DCL cruisers but have an RCL cruise lined up for late June. It is our 1st RCL cruise. We are struggling more than I thought we would regarding planning. I knew there would be differences but honestly I did not know they would be so stark. From navigating the RCL website to the few times that we have spoken with RCL live, we are struggling to feel much magic if any with RCL. I know RCL is considerably less expensive but it is not like we are not spending several thousands of dollars on the cruise. It is still a lot of money and it is our vacation, it should feel magical.

Any words of wisdom?

Thanks!
Magic is what you make of it. Granted, there won't be any Disney magic but at the end of the day it's a vacation, there's still magic.

Of course, by going on this cruise you get to answer the question of whether you like cruising because of the Mouse, or because of the Cruising experience itself.

---
As for everything else...

I've spoken with RCI customer service once. Didn't find them any better or any worse than most other support lines. Except for Rogers, but any Canadian will tell you that talking to Rogers/Bell/Telus/Shaw support is The Worst. DCL I've heard is friendlier, but at the end of the day they are all trying to do the same thing - triage the question/issue, get you the help you need, move on to the next.

Mind you, I've done a lot of client support in my day, so perhaps I'm more sympathetic to them than most. Except for Rogers, because they are The Worst.

Anyway, if you'd seen the conversations when Royal switched to their current (presumably HTML5) design. you'll understand that the website is miles better than it was about 18 months ago. The old site was still better, but I think it used too much Flash and so I guess they decided to revamp it. And then relaunch without doing a whole lot of testing. Many bad words were used to describe this, especially if you were trying to access the Cruise Planner.

Nowadays, the Dashboard is nice. It's clean and perhaps a bit sparse on the information, although it seems to provide all the information that you need. But to your point the sparseness doesn't exactly convey "magic".

Since you're going in June the Cruise Planner should have everything available for your cruise. The problem here is that everything in the menu bar was consolidated together so it's now too many things. Shore excursions is probably familiar enough to you. It's nice but I find the interface to be slow relative to the rest of the site.

I'm not certain which ship you're on but one thing you'll notice about the dining is that there's no widespread anxiety of "I must book Restaurant X the first day it's available". That's in part because no one knows when restaurant bookings become available and in part because I feel that Royal doesn't put an emphasis on having to book things right away.

As for booking cruises on the website... let's just say that I use a TA for a reason.
 
Many thanks everyone for your valuable feedback. We are looking forward to trying RCL. Change is always a little hard and I am trying to quell my travel party's concerns but I do feel like it has been a bit of an unnecessary struggle so far in planning through the website and additionally our few phone interactions have been less than stellar.

I really hope we like RCL just so we could add some variety to our vacation plans. Thanks again!
 
You said you had lots of cruises on DCL... The first one you have planned with DCL was probably a little bit more stressful than all the others as you were planning it for the first time and still getting to know the cruise line.

A first cruise on a new cruise line is always a bit stressful and overwhelming but once all your decisions are made, it's going to get better. :)

Remember that as long as you have all your essentials with you, most problems that you could encounter will be easily fixable.

And remember that you will always find people to help you on DISboards if you have questions or if you need anything! :)
 
If you have kids, I think their ages make a big difference. For younger kids (say less than 5 years old), my opinion is that you just cannot beat DCL. For slightly older kids who are looking for fun activities and thrills rather than characters, I think RC does a fantastic job!

Completely agree with this statement. Disney is probably the best for young kids, but once they get a little older, I'm pro-Royal. It's such a great family friendly ship with tons of amenities (more depending on the ship) , many good food options (esp on Oasis class and I think Quantum), amazing entertainment, and fun activities going all day.

OP..maybe I missed it, but did you say what ship you selected? Royal has tons of ships with different classes , which can differ in entertainment and amenities. As for feeling the magic...their ships are beautiful and there is certainly a 'wow' factor.
 
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Completely agree with this statement. Disney is probably the best for young kids, but once they get a little older, I'm pro-Royal. It's such a great family friendly ship with tons of amenities (more depending on the ship) , many good options (esp on Oasis class and I think Quantum), amazing entertainment, and fun activities going all day.

OP..maybe I missed it, but did you say what ship you selected? Royal has tons of ships with different classes , which can differ in entertainment and amenities. As for feeling the magic...their ships are beautiful and there is certainly a 'wow' factor.

I TOTALLY agree. We went on a few DCL cruises when my daughter was younger and had fun but last summer went on a royal cruise and we both had a BLAST!! We felt there was so much more to do during the day on our Royal cruise. We are so excited to sail on Harmony this November. I don't think we will ever go back to DCL
 
I was just on my first Royal Caribbean cruise and it was AMAZING. I was on Harmony of the Seas and the ship just wowed me everywhere. The shows was like nothing i have ever saw before, the food was delicious and hot when served. The crew was fantastic going above and beyond to help you where they could. For a lot less then my Disney Cruise I have come to the conclusion now I am a Royal fan and will be back for sure. I hope you end up having a great cruise and have a fantastic experience like i did. I would not say the cruise is "magical" but it was AWESOME and totally exceeded all my expectations. i came back with zero complaints and already booked another cruise with them.
 
I was just on my first Royal Caribbean cruise and it was AMAZING. I was on Harmony of the Seas and the ship just wowed me everywhere. The shows was like nothing i have ever saw before, the food was delicious and hot when served. The crew was fantastic going above and beyond to help you where they could. For a lot less then my Disney Cruise I have come to the conclusion now I am a Royal fan and will be back for sure. I hope you end up having a great cruise and have a fantastic experience like i did. I would not say the cruise is "magical" but it was AWESOME and totally exceeded all my expectations. i came back with zero complaints and already booked another cruise with them.

Did you like the RCCL shows more than the DCL shows?
 
I think it honestly depends on the show. I think Aladdin is the best "Broadway" production I've seen on a ship. The half of Mamma Mia! that I saw wasn't bad despite all the ABBA music and the sitcom plot, and was probably the second best of the ones I've seen.

I think Green Planet and Columbus: The Musical are better than Wishes and Believe. Columbus is probably the best of the lot by virtue of having a proper story.

And after that... it's hard to compare. DCL doesn't have an ice rink or an aqua theatre, so Royal has an advantage simply because there are more options. And if we're being honest, the ice and aqua shows are probably the best shows they have on the ships, and that's including the Spinning Guy on Harmony.
 
I think it honestly depends on the show. I think Aladdin is the best "Broadway" production I've seen on a ship. The half of Mamma Mia! that I saw wasn't bad despite all the ABBA music and the sitcom plot, and was probably the second best of the ones I've seen.

I think Green Planet and Columbus: The Musical are better than Wishes and Believe. Columbus is probably the best of the lot by virtue of having a proper story.

And after that... it's hard to compare. DCL doesn't have an ice rink or an aqua theatre, so Royal has an advantage simply because there are more options. And if we're being honest, the ice and aqua shows are probably the best shows they have on the ships, and that's including the Spinning Guy on Harmony.

Wishes and Believe are not very hard to beat, though. :teeth: ... :duck:
 
I was on the Allure recently and loved it. One thing for RCCL - they don't roll up the sidewalks after midnight! While I wouldn't say their clubs were always hopping, at least they have some nightlife! I was really disappointed with the nightlife on the Disney Dream.

Also I love that they have food after midnight. Disney has nothing but room service. Almost every night, some of our group would end up getting pizza really late. I will say I was disappointed with Cafe Promenade this time. Last cruise on the Liberty of the Seas, they had amazing baked treats and always tempting sandwiches. This time was just more of the same desserts from dinner and blah sandwiches.

I loved cruising Disney. It was magical. But RCCL's megaships were a blast. We all loved that there was an endless array of activities always available. And soooo many shows! We never even made it to a single game show. It was hard for me to squeeze in my afternoon naps haha!
 
My opinion:)
I’ve been on 17 Disney Cruises and 3 Royal

Website and Reservations agents: Disney wins hands down. I know it’s hard to believe that a website can be worse than Disney’s but it is. A lot of the English is not their first language so sometimes hard to understand

Luggage Tags: you have to print your own tags. Doesn’t bother me so I say tie

Check in: Royal for the win. You do everything online. You can even send in your picture before hand. You check in with the app. Some people may not like this part but your key cards are waiting in your cabin. You use the app to board

Boarding: Royal wins!!I’ve sailed twice out of Port Canaveral and once out of New Jersey. So much easier. No long lines.

Elevators: once again Royal. Many more and larger elevators.

Main Dining Rooms: Disney for the win food not as good as Disney and that’s not saying much

Dining times: Royal wins. They have early and late Dining just like Disney but they also have My Time Dining so you can choose your time (with a reservation) each night. This is nice because many feel on Disney early is too early and late is too late. You don’t have to pick the same time each night. But if you want the same servers you would need to pick the same time.

Buffet: Royal is the winner.
It’s a buffet every night for dinner. A different food every night. Breakfast is not as crazy as Disney and you can get an omelette without waiting forever.

I’ll post more when I think of a few more things
 

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