tidefan
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Apr 1, 2007
If by "on-board activities" you mean waterslides and rock climbing walls, then yes.Why Princess? Looking at their ships, they seem to offer fewer on-board activities. Is it the food and service?
If you mean live music all over the ship, lots of game show type activities ("Yes/No" on Princess has become one of our favorite activities), naturalists, etc, then there is plenty to do. Now, if you want an amusement park at sea, that is not what Princess is. Princess (and you can throw in Celebrity here as well) is a more "classic" cruise experience. That being said, you may be surprised that our DD, who is 16, says Princess is her favorite line after DCL. She likes how the kids club gets all the kids to know each other the first few days, then has activities where they can all just do a few things and "hang out" (this is from her, so much gets lost in translation as I can't even quite figure out why that is different on Princess, but I digress).
I'd say RCCL (or Carnival) is like a Van Halen concert whereas Princess is like a Jimmy Buffett concert. I like both, but you have a different vibe at each show...
There are things I like about all of the lines, but since you asked, here are some of the reasons why I like Princess...
- Room Service is included at no extra charge with the exception of just a couple of items (they don't do free pizza delivery, for instance)
- I never feel as though I need to go to an upcharge restaurant to get a wide variety of decent food and on many ships, a number of the alternative eating places (like Alfredo's) are included. Plus, if you do want to do the steakhouse or the other one on the ship (usually, Sabatini's, an Italian) it's in the $20-$29 range
- Not that I spend a ton of time in the room, but I love the big TV's with a large selection of TV shows and Movies at no charge (RCCL, for instance, charges something like $7 for a movie - on Princess, if they show it at Movies Under the Stars or in the lounge, they'll put it on the OnDemand on your stateroom TV afterwards, gratis!)
- If you are on the new Royal class of ships (Royal, Regal, Sky, Majestic), they have IMHO, the best buffet at sea
- Poolside grill (something we REALLY missed on Serenade OTS - ETA: I think that Carnival actually has this category won between Guy's and Blue Iguana)...
- Freshwater pools (not a big issue, but something we notice) and large enough to not be "people soup" (looking at you, Goofy Pool!). I also really like that most ships have a pool on the rear of the ship...
- Kids clubs seem to do a much better job with organized activities. They have some kind of partnership with Discovery Channel and do a number of things that relate to Shark Week/Mythbusters, that kind of thing. When we were in Alaska, one of the Iditarod competitors brought some of the dogs on the ship ("Puppies in the Piazza") and the various kids groups could meet with them separately after the main presentation to get up close and personal (if they wanted to). Some of the other kids in our group got to cook in the galley with one of the chefs. In other words, it seemed as though they actually had activities that the kids wanted to go to (if that makes sense).
- Also, on the Medallion class Princess ships, there is some kind of interactive thing the kids can do with all of the video screens around the ships (some sort of video games, etc. Not exactly sure what it was, but we saw a number of kids having a blast with it). I only figured out how to do the trivia game, so I'd play that if I was waiting for an elevator...
- On at least 1 sea day, they do a complementary British Pub lunch in the steakhouse
- Food available 24/7 in the International Cafe (complimentary) ...
- Sports deck (at least on the Regal) had a golf driving net with a full set of clubs in addition to the traditional basketball court. Hadn't seen that before and I used it more than I'd care to admit...
- Service... Some examples
- We were in Grand Cayman and when we came back to the tender location, the line wrapped around hundreds of people deep, standing out in the open sun as the line moved SLOWLY along... Then, we realized that was the tender line for the Carnival Vista. They said, "no, your line is over there"! So, we walked past all of these poor folks around the left side, right through the gate where the attendants handed us all a chilled towel, followed by a glass of citrus (or plain, if you wanted) infused water, put us right on the tender and we were back on the boat... Oh the stares we got from the poor folks on the Vista!
- In Alaska, we met people that had done a salmon fishing expedition earlier in the day. They had brought back their catch and the Maitre'd cooked their salmon table-side for them that night...
- There is no checking in/out of towels. They just have them all rolled up, sitting out on the deck and you can just grab what you need. They also have clean towels in a bin at disembarkation so you can just grab what you need as you go off. Similarly, you can just toss them back into another "dirty towel" bin when you get back, but you don't have to do any "accounting"...
- Room is ready when you board the ship (or at least it always has been on our Princess Cruises)...
- In the buffet, there are wait staff there to get your drinks for you. You do not have to get them yourself.
- IMHO, Anytime Dining works much better than what we experienced in "MyTime" dining on Serenade. On Serenade, we were hounded to make a reservation time (now that I think about it, it's one of the things that bugged me the most about RCCL, they wanted me to make a reservation for everything) and if we just showed up, we sometimes had long waits whereas on Princess, we just show up when we want to eat and they pretty much get us in fairly quickly. (ETA: That could have been a symptom just of the Serenade OTS, not RCCL in general)