Royal Caribbean / Carnival Showdown!

After travelling on two different cruise lines, I've deemed a favorite between the two. 

Last summer we went on the Royal Caribbean Enchantment of the Seas for our honeymoon.

This June we traveled on the Carnival Sensation.

I enjoy trying out new things, so we booked with Norwegian last fall, but that fell through when they changed their itinerary from the Caribbean to Cuba. 

Since we wanted to try out a new cruise line and it was already January, we decided to go with Carnival. Now, I fully prepared myself that the cruise wouldn't be as nice as Royal Caribbean's because that's what I had heard. We wouldn't have our nice balcony room that we had gotten at a great price and the ship might not be as nice, but we wanted to see, so we booked it anyway. 

So here's what I loved and hated about each cruise line. 

Royal Caribbean

• The overall atmosphere of the cruise ship was nicer. 
• Our room was nicer. Now we did have a balcony room and a handicap one because all other rooms were sold out. The room was huge!
• Any time room service. It was nice to order something at anytime that you were hungry. The bad part was the food was cold by the time it got to us.
• Buffet had more options.

Carnival

• Price was cheaper. 
• There are more ships, so there are more options of places to go and various length options of how long to cruise. 
• Night time entertainment was AWESOME! Comedians, Shows, Trivia, Cruise Director
• Faster to the Fun is supposed to get you onboard and into the action cheaper. It's NOT worth your $$! We got on the ship 20 minutes before my in-laws (who didn't have Faster to the Fun.) While we could go to our room, our luggage didn't arrive earlier than the others, so we couldn't use it any sooner. The only port that allowed us to get off earlier was the port where we had an excursion and had to stay on the ship to meet our group. 
• A pipe burst down the hall from us and one room was flooded. There were fans everywhere and it smelled a little odd. 
• Buffet smelled like grease and not as many options as Royal Caribbean. I'm really weird with smells. I hate the smell of grease, and that's exactly what the buffet area smelled like. We ate outside or on a balcony whenever we could. 
• Buffet was often out of certain items. Ex. ice cream, ice cream cones, ketchup, plates, etc.
• Limited options for room service. You could only order certain things at certain times unless you wanted to pay more. 
• Some lights didn't work. 

So we had a great time on both ships. 

We had so much fun that we're already looking into another cruise on another cruise line next summer. 

Now if I had to choose between the two that I've already cruised on I would almost completely choose one line over another. 

The only exception would be if you are going with a group of friends and don't really care about luxury but just having a good time. 

My winner would be...

ROYAL CARIBBEAN

I think Royal Caribbean is an overall nicer cruise line. 

The food was better, the amenities were better and it seemed cleaner and newer.

Now, I'm not saying I wouldn't ever book with Carnival again, but if it were just Alex and I we would probably go with Royal Caribbean. 

We've already discussed going on a friends cruise, and I would definitely look at Carnival's options for that because we loved the entertainment, and I'm sure that would be high on our friend's list. 

I do love all of the different cruise routes and options, but my favorite would have to be Royal Caribbean. 

I'm interested in if you've been on any cruise lines. 

What were your thoughts? 

Did you like one over another?

Have you had any horror stories on a cruise ship? What about excellent stories of success?

Here's to dreaming of more vacations!

Have a great 4th! 

#USA #Americarocks!