Spart02
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Apr 26, 2005
- Messages
- 385
I thought I would post a comparison from our perspective between Disney and what we found on the Brilliance of the Seas with our recent Christmas cruise. We have sailed on the Dream (Bahamas 4 night), Wonder (Alaska 7 night), and Magic (Trans 12 night). My husband and I sailed on Carnival many years back and this was our first experience with Royal. And yes, we're Disney snobs!
Embarkation/Debarkation: Very speedy on Royal with no issues at all. We arrived around 10:30 and had no wait to board the ship and no lines to wait in. Very impressed! We carried our own luggage off the ship. They said we could get off the ship at 7:45 and it ended up being 7:30. Minimal lines to get off and pretty quick. We were to the van in the parking garage across from the terminal and on the road by a few minutes after 8:00.
Food: Disney by far wins this one. The scrambled eggs on the buffet and also from room service were completely inedible. French toast, waffles and pancakes were sometimes hard. The main dining room had enough options for us for dinner, but didn't blow us away like Disney sometimes does. Lunch options on Disney are much better. Dessert in the main dining rooms would probably be a tie. Buffet desserts were probably better on Royal.
Drinks: Disney wins!!! We brought soda onboard on our Royal cruise and I'm so glad we took it on, even though it was against their rules. We were fine with lemonade and mango water if they really offered it and made it easy, but it was like going on a scavenger hunt to find it if the buffet area was closed. They have a room off of the buffet area that was supposed to have lemonade, but it usually only had water. There was a food area in the solarium that often had lemonade and mango water, but not always. Had we relied on drinking only lemonade and mango water, I would have been super annoyed with having to search for it. We're not big alcohol people, so I can't really compare that. We thoroughly enjoy the drink classes that Disney offers, but didn't do any on Royal this time.
Friendliness of Staff: I will call this one a tie. I was very impressed with Royal's friendliness and our room attendant was excellent. She was very attentive to our needs. Customer service was also helpful and most staff that we met on the ship were very friendly.
Rooms: Our room was an inside standard stateroom and was excellent. It was in very good shape, roomy, and had plenty of storage. The shower was a wee bit small, but overall the room was very comfortable and nice. I think it would rank similar to Disney, but perhaps higher b/c Disney sometimes has tile problems or little things and this room really didn't.
Staff Ratio: Disney is amazing compared to Royal! There was a noticeable lack of employees in certain service areas on Royal. For example, cleaning tables and dirty drink glasses. Wow! There were dirty things everywhere on Royal. I think part of the problem here is that their trash cans are slanted, so people cannot put their dirty dishes on top of them when they are done with them. This creates a problem of what to do with your dishes, resulting in people just leaving them on the floor. The mini golf area always had dirty drink glasses all over the place.
In the dining areas, the tables were dirty and it was hard to find a clean one to sit at. The staff that were cleaning the tables were doing their job and not just standing around, but there weren't near enough of them. I know sometimes it gets a little awkward with Disney staff hovering over you and taking your plate the second you are done with it, but believe me...that's much better than seeing dirty dishes EVERYWHERE!
Another area that their ratios were rough were the kids clubs. One staff member for up to 25 kids, resulting in all of the kids having to do one activity and have no other choices.
Kids Clubs: Brilliance of the Seas was a joke. Hours were pitiful. Activities were poor. All kids had to do the same activity as a large group regardless of whether they wanted to or not. Not only were the hours pitiful but they also didn't line up with adult activities. For example, the first night the show started before the kids clubs even opened up. Late night adult entertainment - forget about it unless you want to pay hourly and have your child sitting in their by themselves. The kids club employees were very friendly and nice, just overwhelmed with lack of staff. The teen club was also a joke. The kids had nothing to do if there wasn't an activity going on. Activities started late or didn't even happen. My son went in several times to do an activity only to find out that the kids were just playing Wii (only one) and the activity didn't happen at all. When the activities weren't scheduled, nothing was left out for the kids to do such as video games, movies, board games, etc.
Royal also had weird timing for things, such as the water slide only being open a couple of hours a day and during the times when they actually had kids programming going on. It would have been nicer if they would have staggered the water slide times with the programming times to allow the kids more things to do throughout the day rather than having to pick the water slide over the kids club.
Family Activities: The first sea day (Christmas) was poor for activities. We were bored to tears and wished we would have remembered to pack our board games. We're not big on sitting by the pool and just lounging, so this was tough for us. The second sea day was much better with several trivia games, family games, and activities to do as a family. The movie theater on the Brilliance was a total joke. There was a bar that was above the chair in front of you, so for anyone under 5'5", you had to deal with a bar being in your line of sight. It also only seated about 40 people, which was pretty sad.
One thing I would like to note is that Brilliance has some very un-family friendly things going on. One was that they were playing an R-rated movie on the pool big screen during the day with people getting shot and blood everywhere. I thought this was a very odd choice. The second was the first night's show was marked as adult-themed, but they didn't offer kids programming during that time. Odd choice! Had they taken a few little things out of that show that nobody would have missed anyway, it could have been family friendly. The last night we went to a Quest game show and that wasn't marked as having adult-content, yet it very much was. There were several families there (probably b/c there was no children's programming at the time) and we ended up having to leave b/c it was so terribly not kid-friendly. It was BAD!!! Honestly, I think kids are an afterthought on the Brilliance.
On the plus side, the Brilliance offered an amazing face painter that my kids really enjoyed. I'm guessing she's not on most cruises, but we were lucky enough to have her on board.
Christmas was done up okay. The Santa they had was pretty poor, but they did caroling, had eggnog that they were passing out, and the decorations were all fine. At one point, I saw Santa by the bar in the main atrium area with his beard pulled down. Not cool for little kids! On the plus side, the kids all got a gift on Christmas Day, which was cool. They also had a special menu in the dining room, which was much appreciated.
Overall we had a nice trip (mainly due to our excursion day on Cozumel, which was an experience we will never forget!) once we brought our expectations way down and found the foods to avoid and which ones were decent. The staff were friendly and there were enough activities to keep us mostly entertained throughout the day. If we were to do Royal again, we would probably pick a bigger ship with more to do or bring board games to help us entertain ourselves during the slow times. Feel free to ask any questions that you have after reading this!
Embarkation/Debarkation: Very speedy on Royal with no issues at all. We arrived around 10:30 and had no wait to board the ship and no lines to wait in. Very impressed! We carried our own luggage off the ship. They said we could get off the ship at 7:45 and it ended up being 7:30. Minimal lines to get off and pretty quick. We were to the van in the parking garage across from the terminal and on the road by a few minutes after 8:00.
Food: Disney by far wins this one. The scrambled eggs on the buffet and also from room service were completely inedible. French toast, waffles and pancakes were sometimes hard. The main dining room had enough options for us for dinner, but didn't blow us away like Disney sometimes does. Lunch options on Disney are much better. Dessert in the main dining rooms would probably be a tie. Buffet desserts were probably better on Royal.
Drinks: Disney wins!!! We brought soda onboard on our Royal cruise and I'm so glad we took it on, even though it was against their rules. We were fine with lemonade and mango water if they really offered it and made it easy, but it was like going on a scavenger hunt to find it if the buffet area was closed. They have a room off of the buffet area that was supposed to have lemonade, but it usually only had water. There was a food area in the solarium that often had lemonade and mango water, but not always. Had we relied on drinking only lemonade and mango water, I would have been super annoyed with having to search for it. We're not big alcohol people, so I can't really compare that. We thoroughly enjoy the drink classes that Disney offers, but didn't do any on Royal this time.
Friendliness of Staff: I will call this one a tie. I was very impressed with Royal's friendliness and our room attendant was excellent. She was very attentive to our needs. Customer service was also helpful and most staff that we met on the ship were very friendly.
Rooms: Our room was an inside standard stateroom and was excellent. It was in very good shape, roomy, and had plenty of storage. The shower was a wee bit small, but overall the room was very comfortable and nice. I think it would rank similar to Disney, but perhaps higher b/c Disney sometimes has tile problems or little things and this room really didn't.
Staff Ratio: Disney is amazing compared to Royal! There was a noticeable lack of employees in certain service areas on Royal. For example, cleaning tables and dirty drink glasses. Wow! There were dirty things everywhere on Royal. I think part of the problem here is that their trash cans are slanted, so people cannot put their dirty dishes on top of them when they are done with them. This creates a problem of what to do with your dishes, resulting in people just leaving them on the floor. The mini golf area always had dirty drink glasses all over the place.
In the dining areas, the tables were dirty and it was hard to find a clean one to sit at. The staff that were cleaning the tables were doing their job and not just standing around, but there weren't near enough of them. I know sometimes it gets a little awkward with Disney staff hovering over you and taking your plate the second you are done with it, but believe me...that's much better than seeing dirty dishes EVERYWHERE!
Another area that their ratios were rough were the kids clubs. One staff member for up to 25 kids, resulting in all of the kids having to do one activity and have no other choices.
Kids Clubs: Brilliance of the Seas was a joke. Hours were pitiful. Activities were poor. All kids had to do the same activity as a large group regardless of whether they wanted to or not. Not only were the hours pitiful but they also didn't line up with adult activities. For example, the first night the show started before the kids clubs even opened up. Late night adult entertainment - forget about it unless you want to pay hourly and have your child sitting in their by themselves. The kids club employees were very friendly and nice, just overwhelmed with lack of staff. The teen club was also a joke. The kids had nothing to do if there wasn't an activity going on. Activities started late or didn't even happen. My son went in several times to do an activity only to find out that the kids were just playing Wii (only one) and the activity didn't happen at all. When the activities weren't scheduled, nothing was left out for the kids to do such as video games, movies, board games, etc.
Royal also had weird timing for things, such as the water slide only being open a couple of hours a day and during the times when they actually had kids programming going on. It would have been nicer if they would have staggered the water slide times with the programming times to allow the kids more things to do throughout the day rather than having to pick the water slide over the kids club.
Family Activities: The first sea day (Christmas) was poor for activities. We were bored to tears and wished we would have remembered to pack our board games. We're not big on sitting by the pool and just lounging, so this was tough for us. The second sea day was much better with several trivia games, family games, and activities to do as a family. The movie theater on the Brilliance was a total joke. There was a bar that was above the chair in front of you, so for anyone under 5'5", you had to deal with a bar being in your line of sight. It also only seated about 40 people, which was pretty sad.
One thing I would like to note is that Brilliance has some very un-family friendly things going on. One was that they were playing an R-rated movie on the pool big screen during the day with people getting shot and blood everywhere. I thought this was a very odd choice. The second was the first night's show was marked as adult-themed, but they didn't offer kids programming during that time. Odd choice! Had they taken a few little things out of that show that nobody would have missed anyway, it could have been family friendly. The last night we went to a Quest game show and that wasn't marked as having adult-content, yet it very much was. There were several families there (probably b/c there was no children's programming at the time) and we ended up having to leave b/c it was so terribly not kid-friendly. It was BAD!!! Honestly, I think kids are an afterthought on the Brilliance.
On the plus side, the Brilliance offered an amazing face painter that my kids really enjoyed. I'm guessing she's not on most cruises, but we were lucky enough to have her on board.
Christmas was done up okay. The Santa they had was pretty poor, but they did caroling, had eggnog that they were passing out, and the decorations were all fine. At one point, I saw Santa by the bar in the main atrium area with his beard pulled down. Not cool for little kids! On the plus side, the kids all got a gift on Christmas Day, which was cool. They also had a special menu in the dining room, which was much appreciated.
Overall we had a nice trip (mainly due to our excursion day on Cozumel, which was an experience we will never forget!) once we brought our expectations way down and found the foods to avoid and which ones were decent. The staff were friendly and there were enough activities to keep us mostly entertained throughout the day. If we were to do Royal again, we would probably pick a bigger ship with more to do or bring board games to help us entertain ourselves during the slow times. Feel free to ask any questions that you have after reading this!
) bring all the booze we wanted onto Disney 
