Best cruises / cruise lines you have experienced

T

TigerMike

New member
Wife and I are thinking of taking a cruise in 2007 as our big vacation, and I was curious of others experiences with destinations or cruise lines that you would recommend (or highly recommend / highly avoid)? I have been on a big cruise ship before and know that they can be a lot of fun, but the wife has not and I'd like to take her. I cruised Alaska on the Star Princess back in 1995 and that was my first and, so far, only real cruise to date. Since it's her first time, we are thinking of starting out with something basic, like an Eastern Carribean cruise or Southern Carribean cruise, before maybe trying something more extensive, like a Mediterranean or Trans-Atlantic. So far, after doing some research it seems Royal Carribean gets pretty good reviews and they do have many popular destinations in the Carribean. Are there any advantages, insider tips, perks to going with someone like Royal versus another line, like say Celebrity?



Anyhow, I'd love to hear others experiences, good and bad, with cruise destinations or cruise lines. If you have pics of your cruise that would be interesting to share also.



Here is a pic of the "old" Star Princess that we traveled with.

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Regards,





Mike



:)
 
The best cruise we've had to date (I've been on 7) was the Carnival Valor this past June. It was a seven-day Western Caribbean cruise that went to Grand Cayman, Isla Roatan, Belize, and Costa Maya. The year before we went on a seven-day Eastern Carribean cruise on the Carnival Victory that went to San Juan, St. Thomas, and St. Marteen.



The best advice I can give is to check out the Cruise Critic forums. Not only will you get a ton of info about individual cruise lines/ships, but they have a Ports of Call forum where you can read reviews about different excursions/tours that are offered.



One difference in cruise ships today is they (the newer ships) have gotten much larger and offer a lot more balcony cabins. We think that a cruise offers the most "bang for your buck" and you can do as much or as little as you'd like on or off the ship.



The first picture is an isolated beach we found in Costa Maya (Mexico) and the second picture is our cabin balcony (both taken this past June).



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Eliot Ness said:
The best cruise we've had to date (I've been on 7) was the Carnival Valor this past June. It was a seven-day Western Caribbean cruise that went to Grand Cayman, Isla Roatan, Belize, and Costa Maya. The year before we went on a seven-day Eastern Carribean cruise on the Carnival Victory that went to San Juan, St. Thomas, and St. Marteen.



The best advice I can give is to check out the Cruise Critic forums. Not only will you get a ton of info about individual cruise lines/ships, but they have a Ports of Call forum where you can read reviews about different excursions/tours that are offered.



One difference in cruise ships today is they (the newer ships) have gotten much larger and offer a lot more balcony cabins. We think that a cruise offers the most "bang for your buck" and you can do as much or as little as you'd like on or off the ship.
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Agreed on all accounts. We did the Carnival Pride in August of '04 with a balcony cabin and simply wont do it again without one. We are planning the Carnival Valor next summer and will book a balcony cabin no matter which ship we pick. My sisters cabin was inside and had no windows. Man did it ever feel like a shoe box!
 
Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Holland America are higher end for the Alaska cruises and I know you won't be coming back this way, but trends often continue within cruise lines.

Norwegian with their 'relaxed cruising' tend to be much cheaper and attract a cheaper crowd.

I drive a SS bus and deal with cruise ship passengers on the Alaska runs, maybe even you in 95. I was bird-dogging a conversation between passengers while doing a shuttle service between the downtown and the dock a while ago. Three ships were in that evening and the people on the bus were comparing food from their ships.

RC and Celeb reported great food while the Norwegian Star couple mentioned their best meal was from a restaurant in Juneau. A trend I noticed was that most ship passengers wanted to be back to the ship for the midnight buffet, all except the Norwegian passengers. They wanted to eat twigs at the Butchart Gardens.

Ok, I'm joking about the twigs.

HAL passengers tended to be older than other ships so that's another consideration for young fellows.

Your caribbean idea sounds great.

-John C.
 
Thanks for the good insight guys. John, thanks for the forum link, I'll check that out and do more research/reading. :) Looks like you all had a great time, and that's what it's all about!



I agree, I think part of the reason I am pushing a cruise to my wife, is the value part of it. For the price there is as much or as little as you want to do and being her first time, I think she'd really enjoy it.



Again, great stories and advice everyone. I enjoy reading and it is helpful.



Regards,



Mike
 
Mike, I should add that that was my wife's first cruise as well. She had a really good time and rewarded me well!
 
We had the worst cruise experience on the Norwegian Spirit last year...The worst.







PM me if you want to see my 7-page complaint letter.
 
SpoiledMan said:
She had a really good time and rewarded me well!
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Haha, the mind reels at the possibilities! ;) :getdown (Runs to the booking agent for whatever cruise is available)





G35stilez said:
We had the worst cruise experience on the Norwegian Spirit last year...The worst.



PM me if you want to see my 7-page complaint letter.
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Wow Sean, I can't imagine and sorry to hear about that. It completely sucks to have a vacation/trip ruined. :(
 
Sean, my kids doctor cruises 6-8 times per year. He told us a couple years back that NCL is among the worse things floating. Based on more than one experience with them he said that he will under no circustances "ride" with them again. Shoot me that letter when you get a chance. What did they do in response?
 
Weve been on 1 Carnival cruise to Mexico and 3 Royal Carribbean Cruises. Royal Carribbean has been awesome to us. The only "problem" I had was when someone else with the same name as myself was on the Wanted Fugitive list, so when we got to port in Florida, the ATF and FBI detectives were pounding on my door at 6 am with guns drawn....that was quite a wild morning !!!! As soon as they saw me, they knew I wasnt the one they were looking for !! lolol
 
Royal Caribbean seems to be the best bang for the buck. I went 5 yrs ago and had an incredible time, but they might of cheapened things up since then.....



A great site for cruise reviews is cruisecritic.com



I did the western caribbean: Cozumel, Grand Caymen, Ochos Rios, and Labadee.....great time!



I went on a voyager class ship which is HUGE and I highly recommend. There is a ton to do and it never seems crowded.......



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Here you can see how much bigger the voyager is....



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Great pictures DK! Thanks for sharing!



I am strongly considering RCI and their larger ships in the fleet, such as the Voyager-class or Radiance-class. From what I can tell, they do appear to offer a good value for the dollar. I guess I need to look more into Carnival too though.



Thanks for sharing your experience!





Regards,



Mike :)
 
No one has mentioned the Disney Cruise Line, anyone care to share? The wife and I have never been on a cruise and are thinking about doing a Disney Cruise with the kids, next year hopefully.
 
Cruising is my favorite type of vacation! I've been on four in the last 3 years. (3 Carnival and 1 Royal Carib) Don't listen to those that say Canival is a party boat or is the 'WalMart of Cruising' I didn't find Royal Caribbean to be that much different. I find that the length, destination, and the time of the year of the cruise will affect the type of cruisers you'll get



Over the past couple years, the value nod has to go to Carnival, but Royal Caribbean has been putting out some deals lately...my guess is that is due to the price of gas going down, while diesel really hasn't (Royal Caribbean uses Gas Turbine engines, while most use diesel motors)



I've heard more than one nightmare about Norweigan lately..especially their all Hawaii ships. They're US flagged, so that means like 99% of the crew has to be American..and they have trouble keeping help since Americans don't want to do that much work for such little money.



My favorite time to go is January-February. Some of the best prices of the year..you're ready to get out of the cold, and alot fewer kids.





Dang it..I want to go on vacation again LOL
 
rjstaaf said:
No one has mentioned the Disney Cruise Line, anyone care to share? The wife and I have never been on a cruise and are thinking about doing a Disney Cruise with the kids, next year hopefully.
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From what I've heard..Disney is nice, but expensive.



The kids programs on Carnival and Royal Caribbean are second to none.



Plus the Disney boats don't have Casinos, if you like to gamble
 
rjstaaf said:
No one has mentioned the Disney Cruise Line, anyone care to share? The wife and I have never been on a cruise and are thinking about doing a Disney Cruise with the kids, next year hopefully.
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The only bad thing I have heard about Disney is the price, and like sspeer mentioned they don't have a casino (not a big deal if you know that going in).



And as others have mentioned Carnival has a pretty good kids program (Camp Carnival) broken up into different age groups. I'm sure RCI does also, but I can't speak from experience on that one.



With kids you might want to try a shorter (3-5 day) cruise first. Most of our kids have loved being on a cruise, but one of them never really got her sea legs and didn't enjoy it too much.



As stated earlier go to Cruise Critic and research the cruise line, ship, and the ports that you will visit. A little bit of homework can help you be better prepared with what to expect and also keep your expectations realistic.
 
sspeer said:
I find that the length, destination, and the time of the year of the cruise will affect the type of cruisers you'll get.
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So very true !!! A 3 day party cruise in the summer will get 3 day partiers :getdown :getdown
 
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