ScottJayhawk
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Jan 7, 2004
Trip Report – 1st Royal Caribbean on Navigator of Seas (6/21/15) compared to 4 previous Disney Cruises
Day 0 and Before
I’ll start with a disclaimer: we are a Disney family through and through. DVC members, 10 Disney World trips in 9 years and 4 Disney cruise’s in 2.5 years. Am I probably bias toward Disney, yes. Will this report and comparisons be fair? Yes I believe so. No, really. I will try to be very fair – I want to like Royal Caribbean, or any other option because I like to have options when traveling.
The details: 7 night Navigator of the Seas Sail Date 6-21-15 out of Galveston visiting Cozumel, Belize, Roatan.
Cost – I won’t spend much time on cost. It was cheaper than an equivalent Disney cruise but for Summer 2015 out of Galveston there isn’t a Disney cruise so it’s not a fair comparison anyway. But I know enough about Disney cruise pricing to know this cruise was cheaper – not A LOT cheaper, but cheaper and this is also an older ship, though recently refurbed.
Excursions – I won’t do much comparison on excursions, I will comment on them but they are almost all operated by 3rd parties on both Disney and RC so the excursions are essentially the same regardless of cruise line.
Pre-boarding communications/emails/website – I love the DisneyCruise website, it’s easy to use and I’ve always found Disney’s pre-communication to be excellent. Royal Caribbean’s sucks. They kept sending me emails “reminding” me to do this or that but I had already done it – and when I did get something of interest that I wanted to click on I was sent to their home page often and rarely a page on the website related to the content of the email. It was very frustrating.
WINNER: DISNEY
Before I get to Day 1, a rough start for RC….2 days before the cruise I got an email stating that the Dinner Theater I had signed up for had only been shown for this sailing due to a glitch and I should not have been allowed to book it. The email apologized and told me I could get 25% of a premium dining restaurant by calling or replying to the email. I replied to the email and never got a response. The letter also said I’d be contacted on board to make other arrangements – I had a voicemail stating contrary information – the vm said due to lack of guest sign ups the Dinner Mystery Theater had been cancelled and I could make reservations at Giovanni for 20% off upgrade charge only. So I have conflicting stories and offers, but essentially just a have a disappointed family.
Day 0 and Before
I’ll start with a disclaimer: we are a Disney family through and through. DVC members, 10 Disney World trips in 9 years and 4 Disney cruise’s in 2.5 years. Am I probably bias toward Disney, yes. Will this report and comparisons be fair? Yes I believe so. No, really. I will try to be very fair – I want to like Royal Caribbean, or any other option because I like to have options when traveling.
The details: 7 night Navigator of the Seas Sail Date 6-21-15 out of Galveston visiting Cozumel, Belize, Roatan.
Cost – I won’t spend much time on cost. It was cheaper than an equivalent Disney cruise but for Summer 2015 out of Galveston there isn’t a Disney cruise so it’s not a fair comparison anyway. But I know enough about Disney cruise pricing to know this cruise was cheaper – not A LOT cheaper, but cheaper and this is also an older ship, though recently refurbed.
Excursions – I won’t do much comparison on excursions, I will comment on them but they are almost all operated by 3rd parties on both Disney and RC so the excursions are essentially the same regardless of cruise line.
Pre-boarding communications/emails/website – I love the DisneyCruise website, it’s easy to use and I’ve always found Disney’s pre-communication to be excellent. Royal Caribbean’s sucks. They kept sending me emails “reminding” me to do this or that but I had already done it – and when I did get something of interest that I wanted to click on I was sent to their home page often and rarely a page on the website related to the content of the email. It was very frustrating.
WINNER: DISNEY
Before I get to Day 1, a rough start for RC….2 days before the cruise I got an email stating that the Dinner Theater I had signed up for had only been shown for this sailing due to a glitch and I should not have been allowed to book it. The email apologized and told me I could get 25% of a premium dining restaurant by calling or replying to the email. I replied to the email and never got a response. The letter also said I’d be contacted on board to make other arrangements – I had a voicemail stating contrary information – the vm said due to lack of guest sign ups the Dinner Mystery Theater had been cancelled and I could make reservations at Giovanni for 20% off upgrade charge only. So I have conflicting stories and offers, but essentially just a have a disappointed family.