Another Cruise Question....

[ManteoChik]

Ok ladies, I've always wanted to go on a cruise and like a typical man, my boyfriend has never really expressed any intrest in going on one. He is really close with his bosses and they go on a cruise every year and they love it. They were talking to him about it and last year we gave his parents a cruise for Christmas and they too loveed it. Now he is all jacked up on taking a cruise (go figure...lol). Our six year (dating) anniversary is in January but I'm in my last year of school as a photography major so my schedule is really crazy and I can't miss a week of class. So instead I've been thinking about December, sometime after I get out for break and before Christmas.

My question is, I am not sure who to book a cruise with? I would want to take a Carribean Cruise, depart out of Florida....preferably Ft. Lauderdale/Miami/Tampa. Another requirement is that we don't want to stop in Key West or Nassau, Bahamas because those are places that we go on a frequent basis. Anywhere else in okay.

I've done quite a few searches online for cruises and I've found a few that I think would work and go to places that we would like, but the majority are with Carnival... What are the best Cruise lines to look for? I've always heard that Carnival Cruises are noisy and full of kids and there is always a lot going on with families and things like that. I've found that with Carnival they have a lot of different cruise dates and ships and they are relatively cheap but I don't know if we'd want to take a Carnival Cruise. We are both pretty laid back and we neither of us party or drink and they seem to be pretty lively ships.

What do ya'll think? Has anyone taken a Carnival Cruise? I love kids but I don't know if I want them running all around me on my vacation!

[lawyergirl25]

These are my impressions, for whatever they're worth...

Norwegian is my preferred cruise line ONLY because DH and I enjoy Freestyle Cruising. Most cruise lines have traditional cruising, where there are two seatings every night for dinner and you sit at the same table with the same people all week. Breakfast and lunch is usually open seating and there may be other dining options, but if you want to eat the "main meal," you go to your assigned seating. DH and I prefer to eat whenever we want, with whoever we want, so we like Norwegian. The upside is that you have a lot of freedom, but the downside is that you have to make reservations most nights or have a slight wait. Norwegian is also one of the cheapest (if not the cheapest) cruise line, which means the ship has very little frills - but I honestly don't care since I don't spend much time on the ship. :)

Carnival is next step up, and it really is a family cruise line. I haven't cruised Carnival in quite some time (>10 years), but I understand that they've refurbished a lot of their ships and have great activities on board. When we were in Nassau in May, we were docked between two Carnival ships and the parties onboard were much livelier than on our Royal Caribbean ship. I think they had a younger crowd than we did. (BTW, Carnival is traditional cruising.)

Royal Caribbean is the nicest of the three, as they have the newest and nicest ships. The food was outstanding - the best I've ever had on vacation - and the service was impeccable. There weren't many kids on our ship; I honestly don't think I saw more than 10-12 young families on board. There were significantly more older cruisers, which is to be expected since RCCL is a very traditional cruise line. If you can get a good deal and you like to be pampered, I would try to go for a RCCL cruise.

I don't know much about the other cruise lines, like Celebrity and Princess, except they are much more expensive. :)

As for destinations out of Miami/Ft Lauderdale (but NOT Nassau or Key West), I can think of two cruises off the top of my head. You can probably find a Western Caribbean cruise, which is what DH and I did last year, going to Grand Cayman, Cozumel, Honduras, and Belize. There are also Eastern Caribbean cruises out of Miami, going to places like Jamaica, St. Maarten, St. Thomas, and Haiti (but I know ships often get diverted from Haiti, so there's a chance you wouldn't actually go there). I think Southern Caribbean cruises generally depart from San Juan.

HTH! Definitely check out www.cruisecritic.com to get some more opinions - the posters over there are wonderful!

[Wrighty26]

My hubby and I went on a 7-night Eastern Royal Caribbean cruise in May. We left from Port Canveral and went to Nassau, St. Thomas, and St. Maartan. It was a great trip-- the islands were AWESOME (we also visited St. John). I am not much of a cruise person...but overall I had a TON of fun. As far as pricing goes-- we spent about $2200 total-- including what we pre-paid for (meals, room) and then what we spent on alcohol and excursions.

I took a Carnival Cruise when I was a 17- just out of high school. It was fun-- but it's definitely a "party" cruise-- opposed to the RCI cruise-- which still had the partying (believe me!) but was much classier (IMO).

If you want to see pictures-- PM me-- I have a TON! :)

[risa00]

I've been on both Carnival and Royal Caribbean and enjoyed both. Carnival was an older ship and Royal Caribbean was brand new, so of course I prefered the RC one. I would suggest getting a balcony because we loved sitting out there. I would probably recommend RC just because of the activities on board. Also, we took a Southern Caribbean cruise so we didn't hit any of the ports that you listed that you don't want to go to. That leaves from San Juan, Puerto Rico.

I would HIGHLY recommend travel insurance since we got $1500 back after our cruise was over.. Long story. :rolleyes:

[risa00]

Oh, and check out Kim's Kruises www.kimskruises.com when you're ready for pricing. She was great to work with!

[BethElena]

I used to work for a motorcoach company that booked cruises a few times a year for groups. We booked a majority of cruises on Norwegian, and everybody had a blast!

I would recommend booking an inside cabin to save $$ because most people do not stay in their cabins a majority of the time.

Good luck!

[ManteoChik]

Wow, thanks ladies for all of the advice. I think I have also been leaning a little towards Royal Carribian because if I'm gonna spend the money anyway I might as well spend it on a nice ship. Also because Rob and I aren't really into partying and it seems like Carnival is really about that. I would definatly spend the extra money for a balcony...I actually found a couple the had pretty great prices on suites but I don't know if we'd spend THAT much time in there. When we bought a cruise for his parents we got them a stateroom with a balcony and they ate breakfast out there every morning.

Once again, thanks for all the info and if anyone has anything else to offer please go ahead and post because I'll keep checking for updated posts. I'll definatly be checking out the websites you guys posted.

[lawyergirl25]

About a balcony room...personally, I find that I'm never in the room enough to justify spending the extra money for it. On our last cruise, we took a few naps in the room, but other than that, we only went in during the day to change or shower. If I didn't have claustrophobia issues, I would probably get an inside cabin to save money - but I need windows!

OTOH, if you want to relax in your room for a few hours in the evening, I would definitely spring for a balcony. Especially since RCCL has 24-hour room service - it would be so nice to sit out there and have a midnight snack, or breakfast in the morning. :)

[PrincessButrcup]

I agree with lawyerbabe25 about Norwegian and their "Freestyle Cruising". DH and I both went on our first cruise in February. We went with another couple who had been on several different cruises. They had suggested NCL because of the Freestyle Cruising. I think that we would have enjoyed any cruise that we went on, but I feel that if we now went on another cruise that did not have the same options, I would not enjoy it as much.
We had a balcony & I can't really imagine going any other way. DH gets motion sickness (although that was not even a problem on the cruise) which is why we originally got the balcony. We weren't really in the room a whole lot, but I enjoyed sitting outside early in the morning or late at night. It felt as though I had the entire ocean to myself.

[nylons73]

I'll chime in here with what I know about crusing. (not much, heh heh).

DH and I took an 11 day cruise to the Carribbean on Celebrity for our honeymoon. After doing extensive research on the website that lawyergirl25 mentioned, we booked Celebrity. We wanted little to no kids and we wanted the attention to be on customer service and food. Boy! Was it phenomenal! Now, I would NEVER recommend going on an 11 day cruise (Waayyyy too long) but most of their cruises are not this long! Celebrity's impeccable service and attention to detail made the trip just super fantastic. Also, Celebrity is really known for their cuisine and they did not disappoint!

On our cruise we left from Tampa, FL and we visited Nassau, Bahamas, San Juan, Puerto Rico, St. Maarten, St. Thomas, Tortola and Key West. Really Super Fun - just too long! heh heh

What I have heard about the others I have mostly read on www.cruisecritic.com, so I reccommend checking it out and finding out what others experiences have been! :)

[ManteoChik]

Wow, keep on coming with all the info..... :D

Everything is really helpful. I know for sure that I would have to have a balcony. My bf is a boat captain and there is no way that we could be in a stateroom without a balcony. I have to be able to eat breakfast out there in the peace and quiet every morning. :p I am really excited about this. Part of me wants to get his imput on things before I make a decision especially about the dates of the cruise....but then part of me wants to keep it a surprise.

[filmgirl7]

Hey all,
I was happy to find this thread, as we're going on a cruise Sunday and I have a question. I've heard people mention a formal night on cruise ships. Is this true? Should I bring a dress? Should my FH bring a suit? We're not sure what to pack. Help! :o

Thanks!

[nylons73]

Hey filmgirl ! Congrats on your cruise! You will have so much fun! :)

The formal night rumor is true! I only have experience with Celebrity Cruise lines, but on our 11 day cruise we had 3 or 4 'formal nights.' I was shocked at how many people had on tuxes! I must say that there were a large amount of British passangers on the cruise with us and they tended to be waayy more dressy than the 'Americans.' heh

Dh just brought a nice dark suit (two of them actually) and I went all out and bought a couple of nice, floorlength gowns. I already had 2 or 3 but it was a great excuse to go shopping! heh heh) I was definately not overdressed.

I would look at your cruise documents and see how many formal nights you have. Then, pack accordingly! :)

[Marie]

And each cruiseline has a different opinion of what "formal" is. You won't see any tuxedos on a Carnival cruise for example. On a Celebrity or Princess you might feel out of place without one.

[JillianS]

even Carnival though, formal nights get fairly formal. It also depends on the class of ship. for example, on the holiday class ships (the smaller, older, cheaper ships), formal nights will be less formal than on say spirit class ships.

For Carnival, on a 7-day cruise, there would be 2 formal nights.
3-4 day cruise, one formal night

:) enjoy.

[filmgirl7]

We're going to be on Royal Caribbean. Has anyone been on that? Actually I didn't find in the book that a cruise of our length will have two formal nights. FH is trying to decide if he should bring his tux or his suit. :p

[risa00]

Here is our picture from formal night on Royal Caribbean. It's hard to make out exactly what we're wearing, but my hubby has on a suit and I have on a 2 piece beaded dress. I wouldn't recommend any tuxedos on our cruiseline.. didn't really see any.

http://images.snapfish.com/3444372%3B23232%7Ffp47%3Dot%3E2327%3D9%3B7%3D889%3 Dxroqdf%3E23233%3B%3B%3A43342ot1lsi

[lawyergirl25]

I saw a quite few tuxes on our RCCL, but I wouldn't worry about renting one. A suit is just fine!

[filmgirl7]

We are leaving for our cruise tomorrow morning, and we can't wait! We're flying to PR and sailing to St. Thomas, St. Maarten, St. Lucia, Antigua and Barbados. So far we're also parasailing and having lunch on a pirate ship. Wanted to take the helicopter ride over Montserrat but it was sold out. Can't decide what else we'd like to do, but we heard the Rhino Riders were lots of fun. I think I"d like to do horseback riding or biking, and i'm sure we'll want to tour at least one of the islands, and definitely spend some time on the beach. Yesterday I looked at the ship we'll be on...it's just amazing!

Here's our stateroom...
http://media.royalcaribbean.com/content/images/fleet/cabin_type/gallery_main/shp_ad_dovb-state_img_305.jpg

I just can't wait! :)

[filmgirl7]

Well, I guess this thread hasn't gotten much action but I just wanted to fill you all in on how our cruise went....in short, it was awesome. We were so happy to have a balcony because we spent a LOT of time out there, took many pictures from there, etc. The food was neverending and the service was AMAZING.

This first pic was from our balcony...
http://images.kodakgallery.com/photos1314/6/51/79/77/75/0/75777951607_0_ALB.jpg

and this was us and our tablemates on formal night.

http://images.kodakgallery.com/photos1314/6/61/63/89/27/0/27896361607_0_ALB.jpg

Royal Caribbean was great! I would definitely do it again! :)

[nylons73]

Congrats Filmgirl! Looks like you had a great time! :)