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Upon further review... We (wife and I) didn't think enough about the points that the great folks here said...that RC is a lot cheaper than Disney...someone said that it's best to think of it as a la carte rather than the 'nickel and dimeing'. It's better to only purchase what you need. Great advice from all...and great reminders! We wanted something 'cheaper' than Disney and we got that...however, we lost track of the 'pay for only what you want' aspect. Our main gripe with RC was not having a good way for family members to easily (and free) communicate with each other like it is on the Quantum class or Disney. Again, great advice from all, and thanks for the re-adjustment to our thinking...we were miffed about the communication options and that resulted in some sweeping generalizations which were not expressed well.

Your post makes me very happy. Welcome to the RC Blog family. We are all here for each other, new & seasoned cruisers alike. We all support one another in answering any and all questions & concerns, no matter how complex or mundane, to the best of our abilities. Mark

I for one appreciate your review, and I bet many others here do too. In a weird way, this board is not unlike a family with RCCL being the parents. We have our squabbles. We get mad at our parents. But... when an outsider talks bad about one of us, we circle the wagons. RCCL isn't perfect, but it does a lot of things very well. I hope you enjoy your trip.

But you definitely can get "full" at traditional dining

I was on back in August of 2016... performance was inconsistent at best. Didn't work well in my stateroom, but worked better in public areas.

So true. I'm headed off to a Princess cruise to the British Isles this month, so I've been looking at the Princess boards there. Nearly every day, I'm revolted by the sheer nastiness of some of the posts. And rather than answer a newbies question like we do here, the scold the person and suggest that if they had done a search of the forums he or she would have found an answer to the question. If you want to have fun and troll a little, just bring up the topic of tipping or formal dress. For most, anything less than a dark suit is equivalent to dining in the nude. I guess I'll be disappointing my fellow Princess cruisers on formal night. ;)

I feel like that needs one of those asterisks followed at the bottom of the page by a nice paragraph of small-type legalese... $300 price reflects purchase of inside studio stateroom with optimal promotional package applied. Price does not include port fees or taxes, which let's be honest will be more than the room price on this ultra-cheap room. Price does not include land or air transportation to / from port, parking fees, or other travel costs. Price does not include mandatory gratuities of $18.69 per day, or obligatory tipping to porters even if all you brought was a backpack with a single change of clothes and a toothbrush in it. And let's be honest, you're having at least 3 labadoozies; we know it, you know it, stop trying to pretend it won't happen.

Speaking as a first-time cruiser who hasn't even taken his first cruise yet (so feel free to take this with as many grains of salt as you want), I have to say that I find your statement that you're "paying a premium" for the RCI cruise to be really perplexing. I priced out Disney and RCI cruises, and Royal was always significantly less expensive for trips of the same length and cabin type, with the same (or often greater) number of port stops. That's not "paying a premium" by any stretch in my book; that's saving a lot of money for the other parts of the cruise that matter to me and my family that we consider not optional (mainly shore excursions). We originally looked at both Oasis and Harmony, and Disney was consistently 1.5 - 2 times the cost for the same level ocean view or balcony cabin. We ultimately went with an itinerary on Freedom that we felt was better, which cost even less. Everything else in terms of the packages offered is 100% optional. If you don't drink soda, no need to pay for a package. If you drink soda but don't plan to have more than 1 or 2 a day, you can pay for them individually instead of buying the package and still come out ahead compared to Disney's price. And if you drink 3 cans of Coke with breakfast, a couple of Mountain Dews at lunch to charge up, and then 2 more Cokes at dinner with Cherry Coke at dessert every day; well then the package is your best friend in the whole world! Same goes for the alcohol packages, the internet packages, etc. @coneyraven summed it up best -- it's "a la carting" your trip. I really debated including this next part, but in the end I felt like I had to call out the fallacy of your "paying a premium" statement. 7-night RCI cruise on Allure of the Seas (priced just now, with a "60% off second guest" promotion currently in effect) Four ports, no private destinations Leaving April 1, 2018 2 D1 deluxe ocean view with large balcony cabins (equivalent class) $4,174.10 (incl port fees and taxes) 8-night RCI cruise on Freedom of the Seas (the cruise I actually booked, price reflects all adjustments since booking for better promotions) Four ports, including private destination Labadee Leaving March 31, 2018 2 D1 deluxe ocean view with large balcony cabins (equivalent class) Includes $200 onboard credit as part of the last applied promotion $4,894.92 (incl port fees and taxes) 7-night Disney cruise from Port Canaveral on Disney Fantasy (priced just now on the disneycruises.com site) Four ports, including private destination Castaway Cay Leaving March 31, 2018 2 verandah cabins $10,611.36 (incl port fees and taxes) But RCI is making me "pay a premium" ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Am I the only person who thinks it's phenomenal that JL has well over 300 posts here and has never even cruised? I bow to you, sir!

Believe me, we air gripes here quite a bit! You should have SEEN when Royal announced that room service would no longer be complimentary, or when shorts would be allowed (briefly) in the MDR for all but formal night. For myself, I never have a problem hearing an opposing viewpoint, but I do ask that it have some evidence I can look at and review to back it up. I was a scientist before making a career change 25 years ago, and those habits run deep. ?

I kept mine this week, will get them scanned shotly.

I've got mine from February. I sent them to Matt so they should be up at some point. I've been meaning to do it so this was a good reason to finally get them sent over to him.

I'm going to suggest that if RCI thought they could make more money sailing from the West Coast then were their ships are currently deployed, they'd be there. Hell, they probably would have never left.

Thus is a shared gripe with many of us as many cruise lines have this functionality now and there's no reason why Royal shouldn't have placed this on all of their ships with the roll out of Voom (their internet service). Even Princess has this functionality and with the introduction of Ocean Medallion and MSC's equivalent, Royal is going to be at the bottom of the pack even though they were the first to introduce it. Thanks for replying back to your post and considering all of our comments. Don't forget to try the zip line, carousel, Flow Rider, and/or rock climbing wall. My favorite on the ship, though, is Central Park.

Just hope you have a great cruise! I get caught up in the add ons, and then i remember that its vacation and still cheaper than my last disney park trip! Im still dying to do disney cruise line, but until they drop, i will just be doing the parks! Enjoy royal, try not to compare and let us know how it goes! Jane

White going to be on the ship earlier than you? You're on a B2B. Try for your choice on the first night, and then on the last night of your first cruise go to the restaurant you're interested in and see if they'll make the change for you on the next sailing.

Don't forget your shorts!

https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2017/04/22/spotlight-first-night-specialty-restaurant-discount

Yes there are upgrade charges for the things you mentioned. Still RCCL is cheaper than Disney. There is no comparison between the ships or itineraries of the two cruise lines. I know a lot of people really like all the Disney characters walking about. It's a huge turn off for me. For the life of me, I don't understand why anyone would want to vacation with 1000 or more of someone else's kids. My own kids (19, 16, 10) would choose RCCL over Disney for these reasons, although I think my 10 year old would enjoy lobbing spitballs at Mickey and company. It's not to say RCCL is perfect, because it is not. But, they have great ships with amazing layouts, lots of choice in itinerary and ship style, really good menus in the MDR, and generally good service all over the ship. Everyone has an opinion, and if you go back to Disney, it will mean more opportunity on RCCL for us. One more thing regarding communicating with family. There are less expensive ways to do it. Through my carrier, texting is not expensive to or from the ship or ports. Phone cards can be purchased in most ports (not expensive). The price for the internet on board isn't cheap, but it's not a budget killer. The problem is the quality of the service.

We just stayed in the Hotel Ala for a couple days after departing the Rhapsody. Can recommend it highly. Hotels are all over, and no cars or transport. Some are on the Grand Canal and cost more. We picked what we did as a mix of location/price/reviews. Hotel Ala is about 50 yard walk from the Vaporetto stop. As mentioned above, try not to schlep bags too far from the only transport on the island(Vaporetto). Venice is not that big, but it gets BIGGER carrying bags. Most hotels will let you stow your luggage there if you arrive early. We got to the hotel at about 9AM after disembarking, left the bags and off we went. The main Vaporetto terminal(closest to ship) is still a long way to carry bags. Take the people mover(tram) for a couple bucks. This will put you closer for the shortest walk to the ship.

Here's a Cruise Compass from Anthem of the Seas 9-night New England & Canada cruise: https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/cruise-compasses/anthem-of-the-seas/thu-2016-09-08-0000 Might give you an idea of what to expect.

Thanks ? just generally being nosey and seeing what kind of activities etc there are! We're not going til September but this site gets me even more excited every time I log on lol. If you have any hints and tips when you get back please do share Thanks @Mattdon't know how I missed that ???

I didn't even know people watched tv on a cruise? Did you run out of things to do?