Cocoa Beach, Royal Caribbean Cruise and WDW vacation - Final Thoughts

DCL vs. RCCL Final Comparisons and Thoughts

And now we revisit the big question, are we cruise people or are we Disney cruise people? Well, I will say, I think that my heart does, in fact, belong to Disney. That said, we did have a good time on Royal. There were some ups and downs and it was a lot of fun to have some new experiences. I’ve seen other break down their thoughts category by category and I think that’s helpful, so I’m going to take a stab at it.

Ship Feel/Aesthetics/Cleanliness
I will say that from the outside, the look of Disney’s fleet are hand-down, the most beautiful cruise ships on the sea. Period. Inside, in the public spaces I thought that the Mariner was quite nice, having just been overhauled and updated. The public areas all seemed really sleek and nice and definitely felt on par with DCL in terms of decor. That said, everything was always LOUD in the public areas. I prefer the bright cheery atrium on DCL with it’s big portholes and quiet music. Promenade was lit up nicely, but it was always bustling with people heading to and from the bars there.

Speaking of bars, there are 13 of them on Mariner of the Seas. WHO NEEDS THAT MANY BARS?! There was alcohol everywhere. They even had a makeshift bar table set up outside of Windjammer at all hours. Everyone could get started early with the drinking at 7 AM with their mimosas and bloody marys. I’m not saying there isn’t drinking on DCL or even that there isn’t drinking pretty much everywhere, and maybe it was just because this was a 3-day weekend cruise, but there were a look of boozin’ and cruisin’ folks on board. Even if it weren’t a 3-night, 13 bars? Really? You can’t take just one of those venues and have a space for additional included quick service food or maybe a place for family activities?

My final ship interior gripe were the smoking areas. There were lots more of them than on DCL and one of them took up half a pool deck. I kept accidentally walking down that side of the pool deck. I mean, it basically rendered an entire chunk of the pool deck unusable to me. Very disappointing.

  
Atrium on the Disney Dream (left) and Promenade on the Mariner of the Seas (right).

Stateroom
While the public areas were all completely redone during Mariner’s recent dry dock, the staterooms did not get a refresh on the Mariner and it really showed. The drawers (what limited numbers of them we had) were all small and hard to open and make horrible squeaking and grinding noises. There were shelves in the closet, but they were way in to the side and hard to access. I prefer the layout of the drawers and closet on DCL. We barely fit three days worth of stuff in there. I can’t imagine going for a week or longer and fitting it all in! I did like the bed and pillows and found them as comfortable as DCL and others traveling with other family configs would probably like the ability to split the bed into two twins. Emmaline’s bed was an upper berth above ours (DCL’s is usually above the couch when they have the upper berth, otherwise, Emmaline sleeps on the sofa bed, which she finds comfortable). The problem was that the stateroom host left it down all the time and even though it was over the bed, it felt in the way. Roger clocked himself in the head multiple times. In terms of cleanliness, I felt like the ship was kept clean and seemed in good repair (other than the aforementioned drawers).

  
Pull out sofa on DCL (left) and Emmaline's bunk on RCCL (right). 

Food
The food on Royal in the buffet and main dining room was on par with the taste quality of DCL, with the exception of the desserts. I feel like I enjoyed the Royal desserts more. Disney just can’t do desserts. I’ve always felt that way with the exception of a few specific items I like, everything is just so sweet. I know, duh, it’s dessert, it’s supposed to be sweet, but I just don’t like cloyingly sweet stuff. There’s a certain refinement and presentation that is lacking on Royal, however. I feel that the dishes on DCL are more creative overall and that the presentation is nicer. DCL also has the edge in terms of restaurant theming and selection and I feel that the vegetarian options are more plentiful and creative on DCL.

My main food complaint on Mariner was the lack of mid-afternoon snack options. The buffet closed generally at 3 PM and opened again for dinner at 6 PM. I know, I know, a whole THREE HOURS without access to food. But, honestly, I often get a mid-afternoon hankering for a little snack and there was nothing to be found. You could wait in a freakishly long long for pizza or sandwiches at Cafe Promenade or have a hot dog or potato salad (!?!) up on the pool deck. Or you could pay for Johnny Rockets or Starbucks. On DCL, you can have pizza, various grill items (hamburgers, etc.) fries, fruit, salad, sandwiches, wraps, cookies, schwarma, and more up on the pool deck or little treats in Cove Cafe like mini cupcakes, or other little pastries. Even when Cabanas is open on DCL, you can enjoy these items for lunch right on the pool deck. I had an amazing panini by the pool deck from Daisy’s for lunch on our last DCL cruise without having to deal with the bustle of the buffet.

Finally, and this is minor (and I'm not sure if it belongs in Food or the ship feel section above, but there was no outdoor seating area outside the buffet. We often like eating outside of Cabanas on DCL.


Enjoying lunch outside as we sailed through Alaska. 

Activities
Royal didn’t have any family activities to speak of. That was a disappointment for us. We missed all the various things we like to do on DCL. No baby racing, vegetable car building, hula hoop contests, character dance parties, and much more we’ve come to enjoy on DCL. That said, we did like some other new dry activities like Sky Pad and rock climbing wall, which DCL doesn’t have. DCL does have mini golf on their big ships (and I would say Mariner is akin to those ships).


Character dance party on DCL.

Kids Club
Emmaline preferred the club on Royal. Yes, it was smaller and perhaps less fancy and more low-tech, but she really enjoyed the activities a lot more and because the kids are broken up into smaller age groups (she was with 9-11 year olds instead of being with 3-12 year olds) there are a smaller number of children and activities could be tailored more for specific age groups. It’s hard to find activities that appeal to both 3 year olds AND 12 year olds. I think if DCL had smaller, less overwhelming spaces and smaller age groups, she would be happier. On our next cruise, she’ll be able to also visit the 11-14 year old club. We’ll see how she feels about that. She’s visited before during open house and felt like the kids were much older, but that was when she was 10. She’ll be 11 on our next cruise and nearly 12 on the cruise after that so her perceptions may change. One thing we didn’t like about the kids club was the hours. They seemed odd and limited at times. DCL has pretty extensive hours between its two main kids clubs.

App/Technology/Communication
Royal doesn’t have a chat feature in its app and while DCL’s is far far from perfect, it’s something. If we didn’t have an Internet package as part of The Key, it would have been nearly impossible to keep in touch with one another when separated. Otherwise, I did like that Royal loaded some activities into the app prior to sailing. However, I was disappointed when things changed once on board, so it was sort of a “why bother?” situation.

Private Island
I have to say, CocoCay was really nice. I liked that it had a combination of the waterpark for those that want a little more (and not just beach) as well as lots of different beach areas. One feature I really liked was the towel exchange where you could swap out your wet towels for fresh ones. Maybe Castaway Cay has this and I never noticed? I also really liked the food on CocoCay. There were so many options and they all were really tasty and fresh. I was extremely impressed in that regard. The negatives for CocoCay were the smoking areas (there were I think 11 of them in total) and all the behind the scenes stuff being…well, not behind the scenes. I’m not sure how DCL does it, but Castaway Cay just has such a beautiful look and feel and you see nothing happening behind the scenes.  Both islands are beautiful, but we really enjoyed having the waterpark to play in and I felt like it was worth the upcharge.


Castaway Cay


CocoCay

Cost
There were three main reasons we decided to try another line. One reason was to try something different, obviously, and another was to test the waters to potentially open up different/longer/more unique itineraries, but there was a third reason and that is cost. DCL has four ships in high demand and it’s also a premium product. They charge more. Period. Even if you factor in drink packages or extras, most times, it’s cheaper to sail a comparable itinerary on another line. For this cruise, the three of us were able to sail for a couple thousand dollars less than a comparable itinerary with comparable room than on the Dream. That’s a pretty big difference. The one thing I didn’t like that was money-related was the feeling that I was being asked to pay extra for a bunch of stuff. It’s one thing to offer extras for an upcharge, but I felt like it was constantly in my face. In the weeks leading up to the cruise, my inbox was stuffed to the gills every day asking me to buy all kinds of drink packages and extra dining. When we got onboard we were bombarded with it and every time we walked into a restaurant, we were asked if we had a dining package or reservations at the upcharge restaurants. It felt tacky and cheap.

Conclusion
Okay, so after all this, what do we think? What do we book next? Well, here’s the deal, we’ve currently got two cruises booked: a Southern Caribbean and a Greek Isles cruise and both are with DCL. We didn’t even consider another line for the Southern and we did consider Royal for the Greek cruise and ultimately decided to stick with DCL even though it was more expensive.

I would consider Royal (or another line) again in the future to try a different ship or maybe for a unique itinerary. I would also consider it for a very port intensive cruise where we basically know we are going to be off the ship every single day and just need a hot meal and a bed at the end of the day. (Though, I would hope whatever ship we would sail on would have better storage.) One could argue that the Greek cruise could potentially fit that bill, but the Royal cruise we considered had a couple of sea days and a less compelling itinerary. Plus, we have a bunch of friends that we’ve made on DCL cruises over the last 5 years that we look forward to sailing with who have also booked the DCL Greek Isles cruise.

So there we have it, I think Disney has my heart. We had a great time and I don’t regret going, but I found that I had a preference overall for DCL. We’ll probably sail Royal or maybe Norwegian in the future, but when we can afford to sail DCL, that’s what we’ll likely choose.