RC vs DCL

michyi

michyi

Mouseketeer
Joined
Jun 15, 2014
I'm sure this question has been asked a million times, but I'm new to the cruise line boards.

My DH is not a big fan of WDW and said this is going to be our last trip... we are going to Beach Club in Dec. 2014 and hopping to all 4 parks for 5 days. We think our next family adventure will be a cruise. I think that Royal Caribbean Cruise Line looks amazing and I was thinking we'll cruise using RC, but then everybody says that nobody tops a Disney Cruise.

We are thinking of going in Feb. 2017. It will be me, DH, DS (will be 12), DS (will be 11), and DD (will be 9). My children are on the smaller side, so I'm worried that they won't make height and weight limits on some of the RC activities. Will they be bored? I've never been on a cruise, so I truly have no idea.

I need to know if I should cancel my Disney Visa and get the Royal Caribbean Visa or keep my Disney Visa?????

Please give me your opinions. They are appreciated. :confused3
 
fyi-most rccl ships have family ocean view rooms that are a good value. Only a handful of rooms on each ship--and you must book via travel agent or call rccl--you cannot see prices or availability online. So, book early, as they go fast. My kids prefer DCL, but RCCL is fine. On DCL there are also oceanview rooms that sleep 5 on Dream and Fantasy--but they also book up. After that, you have to go to a deluxe balcony which are much more $$$. On Magic and Wonder, you have to get a balcony to sleep 5. I find RCCL family ocean view has a a lot of space and is much cheaper than DCL to sleep 5.
RCCL tweens/teens clubs tend to not be staffed during the day and only meet at night--with onboard things during the day--like basketball contest, scavenger hunt, etc. If you have outgoing/sports oriented older kids, RCCL will be good. For shy older kids, I find DCL better. But, shy kids do well in RCCL 3-12 age group b/c lots of structured activities. My shy tweens never went to the rccl clubs once they aged out of the kids club--but at 9, they loved RCCL and felt a little lost in DCL Dream kids club. All DCL have movie theaters--not so on RCCL. On a 4 day on the Liberty, RCCL played 1 3D movie and showed 2 movies at night (10pm) by the pool--that was it. So, no kids movies all of the cruise, except on TV--but it was 1/2 the price of DCL.
 
Twice on the Disney Dream, once on Freedom of the Seas as a family. So far we like them equally. Next month we have a 5 night on Vision of the Seas than moving to a 4 night double dip on Disney Dream. :) DS liked both clubs, just for different reasons. Royal is really structured and open. Disney has activities but you can ignore them and just play on your own the whole time (though that's not DS's style), and there are multiple rooms/areas they can go into. Disney clubs are gorgeous; the room on Freedom (which was the 6-8 year old room, but 9-11s were grouped with that age group on our late January cruise) wasn't, but the kids still seemed to enjoy it a lot!

I love the aesthetics of Royal's ships, though the soft furnishings maybe don't quite meet up to Disney concierge rooms. Oh well! :)

I could just go back and forth on everything, but we liked many things about both!
 
Thank you. This is a lot of good information. It gives me a lot to think about. I'm still torn, but at least I feel like either is a wonderful option.

;)
 


Bumbershoot,
I just read through your cruise trip reports and they were awesome. You posted really great, detailed photos. The pics make me lean toward DCL!
 
Thanks for the compliment. Wow you read fast. :)

It's nice to find a favorite, because then you're not splitting your loyalty (and the eventual rewards you get for being a frequent cruiser), but to find your fave (or maybe two favorites) you have to try things out!


But do try to find out what's grating on DH's nerves so much that he won't go to Disney anymore. If a Disney cruise would trigger that, it's worth knowing now. But as you might notice with my reports, you don't have to be bombarded with Disney Disney Disney on a DCL cruise. I think the only character we've met on the two Disney cruises is Captain Jack, who is awesome. Characters aren't necessary to "make" your cruise. And now we're just planning to avoid all but the Villains show on the upcoming DCL (though if it's a magician on the non song-and-dance show night we might go to that, as that was fun), so you don't even have to go to the Disney style shows. We're not really cruise show people at all, really.

The ice show on Freedom was pretty cool, though!
 
For a family with young kids, DCL would be very hard to beat IMO, but the difference in price for 5 people would be pretty large.

I think you'd have a great time on either line, and I don't think your kids would be bored at all. The kids' clubs on DCL ships are beautiful and elaborately themed, on par with anything you'd see in the parks. As far as the activities, some kids prefer Disney's some RC. Both are well done from what I've seen. With RC the larger the ship, the more activities there will be available. I would look at the Oasis class or the Freedom class ships.

Bottom line you can't go wrong either way, IMO.
 


Agree with the others in that you can't go wrong with either- we have done 2 cruises, both with RC as we just couldn't bring ourselves to pay twice as much for Disney. The kids had a wonderful time on the cruises, there was just sooo much to do :)
 
bumbershoot said:
Twice on the Disney Dream, once on Freedom of the Seas as a family. So far we like them equally. Next month we have a 5 night on Vision of the Seas than moving to a 4 night double dip on Disney Dream. :) DS liked both clubs, just for different reasons. Royal is really structured and open. Disney has activities but you can ignore them and just play on your own the whole time (though that's not DS's style), and there are multiple rooms/areas they can go into. Disney clubs are gorgeous; the room on Freedom (which was the 6-8 year old room, but 9-11s were grouped with that age group on our late January cruise) wasn't, but the kids still seemed to enjoy it a lot!

I love the aesthetics of Royal's ships, though the soft furnishings maybe don't quite meet up to Disney concierge rooms. Oh well! :)

I could just go back and forth on everything, but we liked many things about both!
Click to expand...

Same here. In the last 5 years we have been on Freedom of the Seas (which actually was for a "Nickelodeon Family Cruise"), The Disney Dream, Oasis of the Seas (as part of the "DIS Cruise"), and the Disney Fantasy.

We have things we really liked about both also. I think the DCL ships "look" better overall (especially the exterior), but the RCCL ships seem to be designed better from a "crowd-flow" standpoint. We also love the Royal Promendae on RCCL as well as having a casino. As for DCL, nothing beats their entertainment options with their family-friendly theater shows and first-run movies. Plus they get a slight nod when it comes to the staterooms (slightly larger, split baths). Food, I would say quality is basically equal on both - maybe DCL gets the nod for the rotational dining. The kids clubs...our DD never wanted to leave on either one, while our DS really didn't warm up to either. Depends more on the kid than anything the cruise line does, IMO. RCCL does keep the kids clubs open until 2am, although there is a charge per hour from 10pm-2am. To me, the one thing DCL has over all other lines...is Castaway Cay. As always, YMMV.

For the cruise we have booked next year on the Fantasy (see ticker below)...we are seriously considering switching it to a Freedom of the Seas crusie. They leave one day apart, will be almost the same itinerary, and are roughly the same size ship. We have a balcony stateroom on the Fantasy (it was all that was available when we booked it onboard last month). We can get a junior suite on Freedom for about $1500 less than what we booked the Fantasy for. Obviously, even greater savings for a lower category room. So we could probably switch to Freedom, and spend 5-6 days at WDW before the Freedom cruise for what we would be paying for just the Fantasy cruise.
 
DnA2010 said:
Agree with the others in that you can't go wrong with either- we have done 2 cruises, both with RC as we just couldn't bring ourselves to pay twice as much for Disney. The kids had a wonderful time on the cruises, there was just sooo much to do :)
Click to expand...

I'm with you. I have only been on Royal and Norwegian. It's just DH & I and I would love to try a Disney cruise but I can't justify spending more for an interior cabin on Disney vs what I could get on Royal or Norwegian for a balcony room.

Also I heard Disney doesn't have casinos on their ship. Anyone know if there's truth to that? We enjoy going to the casino at night.
 
We are disney people, however, we are "loyal to royal." Our first cruise years ago was booked as a 4 or 5 night on one of the original DCL ships (can't remember exactly now) with mediocre ports. A few months before the cruise a special deal appeared for a 7 night on RCCL with awesome ports for literally half the price, so we dropped our DCL reservation, booked on RCCL and never looked back. Our last RCCL cruise was Freedom this past May. When looking into our Fall WDW trip, we decided to splurge and book a 4 nighter on the dream since we had never tried DCL and we love to cruise.
We were honestly surprised by Disney and not in a good way (not in a bad way really either). We had expected to be blown away by DCL, but weren't at all. Disney is wonderful, don't get me wrong, but it is no better than Royal just very different. Both have excellent customer service from the people behind the counters to the servers at dinner. I have yet to have a complaint about any of them. The ships are all maintained well and the food was about equal (dh thought the DCL was a smidge better). Both have their strengthens weaknesses.

DCL-
-Best stage shows on the sea- can't be beat
- Themeing of restaurants and bars and spaces in general is top notch, however in order to do this, ceilings are lowered and more walls are built making rooms feel smaller (we are used to wide open spaces on royal)
-kids club and activities can't be beat
-a big downside we found is the amount of things to do during the day. On Royal we usually have tons of things we wish to try and have to pick and choose things to do. At 2:00 there might be three things going on we want to do, so we have to pick one. On DCL there was very little planned activities that interested us. Outside of 2 adult themed events in the evenings and some characters, we didn't go to any of the offerings.

RCCL-
-Variety of activities is varied. However a lot of the offerings are "cheesy" (such as the belly flop contest).
-Open space. RCCL does not like to close off spaces and one merges into another. they also have much more glass or at least design the ships so you are more aware you are out at sea. DCL has you focus inward on their themeing and not out to sea. This was a big downside to DCL
-lots of places to "hang out". Since they don't theme their ships you can stumble upon a nice area when just taking a walk. All of DCL spaces are planned in some way.
-Despite DCL having characters, we find RCCL has a lot more photo ops. Each night there are new backdrops and photo themes and at each port they take your picture. As a scrapbooker, I was very disappointed with DCL that there were no photographers just out and about like on RCCL. I also do not like the way DCL does photos. You may or may not get a photo if the software doesn't recognize your face. Dh and I must have rode aqua duck 25 times and not one photo appeared from it. RCCL just puts out all photos on walls and you have to find yourself. It is kinda a fun game each night and unless you miss a photo, there is no chance they didn't print one.


For your family, I would seriously consider Royal's Freedom or Oasis or Allure (all out of Florida). Dh and I decided that we will be loyal to DCL until our twins are about your kids' ages and then we will go back to RCCL and stay loyal to them. For little kids, Disney is best, for older families and adults, Royal is better for us.
 
I just wanted to chime in that my husband sounds a lot like yours when it comes to Disney World. He has had his fill with Disney World, where as my daughter and I (and the rest of my side of the family) are true fanatics.

That being said, my husband refuses to go on any other cruise line besides Disney. It was that amazing! I almost have him convinced to try RCCL, but it'st taking a lot of convincing.

I would LOVE to go on either the Freedom, Allure, or Oasis!!
 
michyi said:
I'm sure this question has been asked a million times, but I'm new to the cruise line boards.

My DH is not a big fan of WDW and said this is going to be our last trip... we are going to Beach Club in Dec. 2014 and hopping to all 4 parks for 5 days. We think our next family adventure will be a cruise. I think that Royal Caribbean Cruise Line looks amazing and I was thinking we'll cruise using RC, but then everybody says that nobody tops a Disney Cruise.

We are thinking of going in Feb. 2017. It will be me, DH, DS (will be 12), DS (will be 11), and DD (will be 9). My children are on the smaller side, so I'm worried that they won't make height and weight limits on some of the RC activities. Will they be bored? I've never been on a cruise, so I truly have no idea.

I need to know if I should cancel my Disney Visa and get the Royal Caribbean Visa or keep my Disney Visa?????

Please give me your opinions. They are appreciated. :confused3
Click to expand...

Our last Disney Cruise was our worst cruise we've had yet. Service was far from Magical.
My very social and active 13 yr old was bored. Mind you he's been on 14 cruises so he has something to compare it too. Now we were on the Magic which is a smaller ship. We are Disney'd out but I wanted to try to slip in on last Magical Adventure. Epic fail on my part.

Check out Carnival Breeze or Oasis / Allure of the Sea's on Royal.

Royal also has the Dreamwork Experience so some ships have Shrek and some other Characters.
 
Nicoleinwi said:
I'm with you. I have only been on Royal and Norwegian. It's just DH & I and I would love to try a Disney cruise but I can't justify spending more for an interior cabin on Disney vs what I could get on Royal or Norwegian for a balcony room.

Also I heard Disney doesn't have casinos on their ship. Anyone know if there's truth to that? We enjoy going to the casino at night.
Click to expand...

No Casino's. On our last Disney Cruise come 9pm ish we were bored!
 
PryncessLace

I'm married to your hubby...lol. We are DVC members and he is tired of WDW...however, he loves the DCL compared to RCCL. We have been on the Oasis and I loved it. Trying to convince DH to take the kids on Oasis or Allure when we go in 2017 (DS will be 14 and twin DDs will be 12). I think after being on DCL three times, this would be a nice change for them (they didn't go on the Oasis with us).
 
Just did our own version of a back to back. 5 nighter on Vision of the Seas then drove from Fort Lauderdale to Port Canaveral to board the Dream. DCL has pulled forward for me and DH, but RCCL moved up for DS. And here's why.

First, this isn't totally 100% fair because Vision is teensy and we were in a panoramic ocean view room (which we quite liked), and Dream is big and we were in a category V which is the family verandah room on concierge level. I recognize that and still try to be fair.

It came down to the small RCCL ship with the centrum (vs big ship with promenade), bad weather, and the casino. Because they still allow smoking in the casino. Our room was 3 floors up right off the centrum, and smoke rises. And most of the smokers were using the casino instead of going outside for about two total days of the five days. This resulted in some problems for the sensitives like me.

But for DS, he had a blast at royal's kid club, but was totally bored this time in disney's! This is unprecedented. It's likely because he's getting older, but then he said the counselors on Dream this time weren't as good as before. He said "eh" about them this time.

The Royal counselors were incredible for him. They had the 6-8s and 9-11s combined again because of low numbers but still did separate them enough. There were only 7 counselors but also only 100 total minors onboard so it was a really a close knit type of experience.

We did an onboard booking for radiance in Alaska, but they have the centrum and close casino as well. Not sure we will keep the booking. We might have to go with the ships with the promenade because it doesn't create that same wind funnel. Though I'm not saying Freedom was perfect on our sailing in January. I wasn't able to enjoy the Schooner bar at all on Freedom because it's right next to the casino and I couldn't breathe, and some busy evenings the smoke came up the stairway to the promenade. But that was easier to avoid than on Vision.
 
We've been back a week from our first RCCL cruise. We were on Jewel so there was the Centrum like Bumbershoot discussed. I'm an asthmatic and did not have trouble with smoke at all. My mom and I went to the casino every evening and as long as I stayed on the non-smoking side, I was fine. But the casino was pretty empty (at least it seemed empty). Maybe it was because we had really good weather so people were outside? Our son also LOVED RCCL, but I think that had more to do with us sharing the 2 bedroom suite with grandma and grandpa (our son is 7). We never had him in the clubs, so I can't comment on that. The adults, however, found there was not much to do on sea days. I think we did prefer Disney in that respect. There were no interesting movies or activities. Maybe that's the ship's size? I imagine there is more to do on Oasis or Allure. We had a great time and will definitely cruise RCCL again.
 
The first couple days, when the weather was good and people were outdoors, were better. You had to get close to smell it. But once the weather acted like we were on an Alaskan cruise, with grey rainy skies and clouds forever, with the top deck totally closed due to winds and few people on the pool deck, that's when it got bad. Walking near guest services was impossible for me. DH had to take care of something there and even the employees were having a hard time with it.

Vision is smaller than jewel, and that weather made it really hard for me. Hopefully I included all the aspects of it to be as fair as possible. :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page


GET A DISNEY VACATION QUOTE

Dreams Unlimited Travel is committed to providing you with the very best vacation planning experience possible. Our Vacation Planners are experts and will share their honest advice to help you have a magical vacation.

Let us help you with your next Disney Vacation!


New DISboards Threads

DLRExpert
Thoughts on Tiana BA going VQ, ILL, or LL?
Replies
0
Views
13
DLRExpert
DLRExpert
O
Best cruise for Glacier Bay
Replies
0
Views
50
obsesseddisneyfan
O
katyringo
Does toon town open with the park?
Replies
1
Views
55
disneychrista
disneychrista
4eversleepy
Swapped MemberIDs when activating accounts
Replies
0
Views
50
4eversleepy
4eversleepy
crazy4wdw
New Treats Coming To WDW
Replies
0
Views
76
crazy4wdw
crazy4wdw
Summer2018
May 2024 WISH Thread
Replies
2
Views
72
Summer2018
Summer2018
NEWS & UPDATES



Latest posts







facebook twitter
Top