RCC vs NCL

[cjappert]

We have sailed once with royal and have a 12 night cruise booked for next January on anthem of the seas. How does royal compare with NCL? we noticed it was quite a bit cheaper to go with Norwegian. Is there a big difference between royal and Norwegian?

[Matt]

I have gone on one NCL cruise back in 2012 (the Gem or Star or something like that) and while the experiences are somewhat similar, I felt NCL suffered more from upcharging more than RC does. 

I also felt the RC crew were a bit more attentive than on NCL. 

Again, I'm no NCL expert and I haven't sailed on their newer ships. 

What I always tell folks when it comes to comparing RC to other cruise lines is I feel RC offers the right balance of what you pay for versus what you get.  Other cruise lines offer more than RC does, but they also charge much more.  Some cruise lines are much cheaper than RC, but it feels like that comes at a price of what you get.

[DocLC]

I've been on a couple of NCL cruises and really liked not having a fixed dining time and more casual dress code at the time. However, most cruise lines are this way now, so the appeal to cruise NCL is no longer there. I also agree with Matt that you'll likely spend more onboard for a similar experience. I also found Royal's included food to be much better with the exception of late night dining. 

[RCVoyager]

In my opinion, the MDR menus on NCL are poor.  It's like they purposely cheapened the MDR offerings to force passengers into the upcharge restaurants.

I have only sailed NCL once.  Other family members have a few other times for various reasons, and they all share the same opinion.

[jticarruthers]

I think it will depend a fair amount on which ships you are comparing.

We did NCL Escape about a year ago and honestly found it to be very comparable to RCL in terms of just about everything.

My RCL MDR experiences have been trending down for a while but we found the free alternatives to the MDR on Escape to be very good.

For overall value we paid the same for 7 nts on Escape including drinks package as we would have paid for a 7 nt on Freedom the same week without the package ... so value proposition went to NCL.

I wouldn't say NCL is/was better, I would say it was pretty close though and with the pricing being the way it was the value was better.

Have both NCL Getaway and RCL Freedom booked for this Thanksgiving, leaning towards cancelling Freedom ... again $ for both cruises is about the same but NCL includes drinks and grats and is 7 nts vs Freedom at 6 nts with neither included ... Both booked a year or so ago though so no idea how the rates compare today.

[whenismynextcruise]

We just spent last week on NCL Breakaway out of NYC to Bermuda. We booked very last minute and the convenience of leaving from NYC (its only a few hours drive) was a big draw. Price wise up front NCL is cheaper. I agree with Matt that we found more upcharges than on RCL. The ship was very nice and well kept up. The staff was great. 

One thing I will call out is that smoking is much more permissive on NCL than on RCL. They allow it on all balconies, outside at some of the restaurants and the casino is located centrally where they allow smoking but the open atrium areas above it and below had a strong smell of it. I guess poor filtration. We figured out how to navigate around it by day 3 though so it wasn't really a problem for us..

A nice touch they have is when you are coming back on board from port they have staff with iced washcloths. And cold water in cups. After hot days in Bermuda and a long peir walk to the ship both were appreciated.

 

[DocLC]

1 hour ago, whenismynextcruise said:

 

A nice touch they have is when you are coming back on board from port they have staff with iced washcloths. And cold water in cups. After hot days in Bermuda and a long peir walk to the ship both were appreciated.

 

Some Royal ships do this. We even had them handing is hot chocolate when returning to port in Germany on a cold, drizzly day.