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Royal Caribbean Vs. Carnival Cruise Line

I am comparing 2 comparable ships:  RCCL’s Monarch of the Seas and CCL’s Fascination

Nights:  5 nights CCL Fascination (went in August 2010) vs. 4 nights RCCL Monarch of the Seas (went in October 2010)

Price:  Base price for both ships is about the same for the same time of year.  If you travel in October (the least expensive time to travel) you are looking at a base rate (before taxes) of about $45 per night per person for the first two people in the room for an inside cabin.  Obviously we paid more for our August cruise because of the time of the year but to make the comparison fair, you have to look at the cost per night at the same time of year and if you do, the cost is about the same.

Port:  CCL’s Fascination left out of Jacksonville, FL.  The port is yuk! It was slow, old, and very outdated although was a shorter drive from NC.  We didn’t get on ship after 1:00 pm and had to wait in very long lines for a long time.  However, we were told there was a security issue and that wasn’t the norm.  RCCL’s Monarch left out of Port Canaveral, FL.  The port is much nicer, new, and comfortable.  It is a  longer drive and parking is cheaper.  We got on ship at 11:15 am.

Frequent cruiser program: – Carnival’s loyalty program is not good at all. It takes 10 cruises to get worthwhile benefits.  After 1 cruise, you only get “past cruise discounts” that show up sometime when booking.   RCCL does a much better job of this.  After 1 cruise, you are gold.  This gives you a booklet with lots of good coupons for the ship plus “past cruise discounts” that show up for some ships (about as often as CCL).  However, after only 5 cruises, you become Platinum.  This gives you priority boarding, better coupons, and priority for tenders.  It is much easier to get to the 5 cruise mark than the 10 cruise mark for the average person.  RCCL also organizes your information about how many cruises you have been on and all the benefits of their past cruiser program (called Crown and Anchor) online much better than CCL does.  I had to really search to find CCL’s information and I can’t find a list of how many Carnival cruises I have been on through their website like I can with RCCL.

Buffet when get on board: Both are good although CCL has more choices available than RCCL.

Rooms:  Carnival has bigger rooms than RCCL.  Carnival had 3 room services – one in the morning, one during your dinner and one last one where they “turned down your bed” for the night and put a mint on your pillow.  RCCL used to do that and took away the third service and mints.  It is those little things that make the cruise special, especially to kids!  My kids were so disappointed not to have mints on their pillows anymore.  I even complained while onboard.

Activities: Variety: Carnival had a lot more variety and just more things to do than RCCL. RCCL overlapped things we wanted to do so we couldn’t do half the things we wanted.  There were dance classes everday on Carnival and only once on RC.  Also, the dance classes we took on the Fascination were far superior to any dance classes we have taken on any of the 5 cruises we have done on RCCL in the past.  RCCL had a lot of down time with no interesting activities and there were hours were we had nothing to choose from.  RCCL did have some activities, however, that I would have liked to have seen on CCL such as an Improv class, Towel folding, and Napkin folding.  On a previous cruise on RCCL, we took a really good watercolor class but there were no art type classes on the Monarch of the Seas.

Photography: Carnival had about 12+ stations set up each night with very talented photographers and were open more hours with 1 hour before dinner for photos.  RCCL had only 5 stations, the photographer wasn’t very good, and it was only open 15 minutes before dinner.  Carnival’s pictures were alittle more expensive $22.95 but had buy 4 get 1 free.  RCCL was $19.95 each although you got a buy 1 get 1 half off coupon if you were a Gold member.  Carnival’s quality of pictures was much better due to better photography and more background options.

Dinner: Carnival’s dinner started at 6:00 which I preferred while RC started at 5:45.  RC always screws up table assignments.  The maitre’d at Carnival was far superior than RC.  The dining room interaction was far superior on Carnival.  The wait staff was equally attentive and good on both ships.  I didn’t really care for the “begging” for good comments and tips that was mentioned too much by our RC server.  One subtle comment would have been more appropriate and made the point.

Dining Room Food:  Better choices and variety on Carnival although both tasted good.  Joe liked the Indian food option each night on RC but I felt they should rotate the ethnic fares and not just do Indian only for those of us who don’t care for Indian food but might like some other ethnic choices.  (I believe an Indian choice was offered each night on the Monarch because the chef was Indian).

Lido deck buffet food:   Much greater variety on Carnival including a mad- to-order stir-fry station.  There were 4 different food areas with different buffets plus 24-hour pizza and deli sandwiches.  RC had significantly less choices with the same cuisine offered in multiple places and only pizza 24-hours.  However, RC has an awesome cesear salad while Carnival decided it’s cesear dressing should be 100% anchovies – yuk!!!
Shows- RC had 2 nights that they only did 1 seating of their shows and it was so close to first dinner seating that after dinner all the seats were taken so we didn’t get to see the show.  I heard it wasn’t that good anyway.  We also missed another RC show because of an overlap with something else we were doing but again, didn’t hear great things about it anyway.  We did go to the Love and Marriage Show.  This is so something RC does WAY better than Carnival.  They have the wives leave while they ask the husbands the questions and vice versa.  Definitely one of the best shows on the ship.  Carnival used to do it right (maybe they still do on other ships?) and then they got lazy or maybe no one told the cruise director how to do the show but they didn’t have the spouses leave the stage, they just wrote down the answers so the cruise director didn’t get to question each person about the circumstances of their answers and so the show lost so much of the humor it normally would have.  We were so disappointed.

We did like Carnival’s Game Show and RC had nothing like that.  Carnival’s Production shows were  excellent but their 80′s show was off the charts amazing!!  The best cruise show we have seen of 8 cruises we have been on, a standing ovation for that one.  I don’t usually like to see things twice but I would see that one again!  As for comedy, neither ship had an amazing comedy act.  I would like to see them find better talent but they were good.  RC has a comedy magic show, I liked that because it was early and I could bring my kids to it.  I think all ships should have one magic or magic/comedy act.  Carnival could have used a magic act.  Carnival’s choice of comedians was lousy.  She had some funny things the first time she came out but a lot of her singing didn’t fit with her comedy and was annoying.  Her improv comedy was the best.  However, her Adult Comedy show that night was terrible and borderline offensive.  Carnival should not bring her back.  I do applaud them for having a late night adult comedy show though, something that RC did not.  RC had the magic comedy which was good except when the comedian didn’t use original material, even my kids knew the “$100 in the orange ” skit.  The next RC comedian was not listed as adult comedy and I saw kids in audience – I didn’t bring my kids because we were not sure.  It wasn’t hardcore X rated as you can see with the late  night comedy shows but be did use words like the F word, talked about sex, and “demonstrated” the motions one would use when having “relations.”  RC needs to clearly state the intended audience for the comedy shows.

Theater for shows: In Carnival’s theater, there were small tables for you to put your drinks on while watching a show.  RC, however, did not have a table, they had a small shelf behind the back cushion of the seat in front of you that was not wide enough to hold a drink and it could easily be knocked over and fall.  It had holes in it, like you were supposed to put your drink in the holes but I think it would only work for a wine glass and it did not work for our drink cups so we had no place to put our drinks during the show.

Room Announcements:  Another thing that Carnival did right and RCCL did wrong.  Carnival made in cabin announcements only when absolutely necessary – like for the muster station drills, they certainly didn’t wake us up on port day to say we docked – maybe we don’t want to go into port and want to sleep in – please don’t wake us up!  RCCL did just that – actually they had it all backwards, they made announcements in our cabins when they shouldn’t have and when we needed to hear them (on disembarkation day) they did NOT put the announcements into the cabin.  So, we were woken up early on port day when we wanted to sleep in and go into port late after we felt like getting up.  Yet, we never heard the announcement of when our tags were called to get off the ship.

Muster Drills:  RCCL gets the points here.  The drill for this required you line up at your station, get counted, and then leave – short and sweet.  For Carnival, you had to go to a station, wait, then everyone had to march upstairs to the lido deck and all musters had to listen to talking at the top deck and then everyone could go.  Our muster happened to be the lido deck so we just sat there the whole time but everyone else was trucking all over the ship which would have been annoying.

So let’s add up the points and see who wins – although I am pretty sure Carnival is going to come out on top:

Carnival earns 11 points

Royal Caribbean earns 3.5 points (only giving the port a 1/2 point because it really has nothing to do with RCCL)

Either way, the clear winner overall is Carnival!  Royal Caribbean could learn a few things from Carnival.  We will be going on the Oasis of the Seas next year and I expect it will be different since it is a totally different class of ships but I will still take note of all of the above and see how they stack up.  But, when it comes to the affordable close to home cruise, the Carnival Fascination wins over RCCL Monarch of the Seas!

I have decided to take this “heavy duty” drug. I have done a lot of reading on it and all the side effects. I admit I am a little nervous but I am hoping the benefits can outweigh the side effects. I got my prescription yesterday. I am starting with 25 mg. each night for 7 days and then I am supposed to increase to 25 mg in the morning and 25 mg in the evening. I have read, however, of some people who do 50 mg. at night for the next step rather than 25 /25. I am thinking about that depending on the side effects. I don’t want to be fuzzy during the day so if taking it more at night will help, I might try that. If, I am adjusted to the 25 at night at the end of 7 days then it might be fine to try the 25 in the morning – we will have to see how I feel. I am also going away with my husband on our 20th wedding anniversary cruise and I don’t want to be making adjustments to my meds when I am on the trip, so I am thinking I might just stay at 25 mg until we return. I will have to see how I feel. The goal of this post is to provide a diary of my experiences for those considering the drug. However, from what I have read, this drug varies dramatically from person to person. Although it is nice to see how one person progressed, this by no means will be a sample of how someone else will progress.

Day 1: Took 25 mg at 7 pm. Felt very spaced out. Had some vision distortion. Had some taste distortion (very minor).
Day 2: Woke up, had a slight headache (probably not from the topamax), no longer feel spaced out, some taste distortion, maybe some mild appetite decrease (or just wishful thinking). At 8:00 pm took 25 mg. Felt a little spaced out, much less than last night. Significantly less side effects tonight which surprised me. Still have a tad of a headache but again I don’t necessarily think it is from the drug.
Day 3: Felt fine all day. I had no change in appetite. Soda still tasted fine. I decided to consider taking 50 mg tonight since I haven’t had much in the way of side effects. I have decided for sure yet. I took 25 mg at 5:00 pm and may take another 25 mg later tonight – I will wait and see. I am a little spaced out right now but not too bad. I decided to go ahead and take another 25 mg at 7:30 pm. I feel just as spaced out as I felt the first night. Nothing too bad, so I think I will continue to take the 50 mg each day until I get back from vacation and then increase to 75 mg. I hope to see some impact on my appetite and migraines at 50 mg.
Day 4: I woke up feeling fine this morning. I stepped on the scale, hoping to see something going in the right direction but I had GAINED a small amount of weight, WHAT!!! I am hoping it is just a fluke. I am going to try and be really careful about what I eat today and really monitor what my appetite is saying now that I am taking the 50 mg. I have been trying to read what people say about WHEN they started seeing the weight loss. Most people don’t directly tell you but it some say, “I lost 5 pounds or 11 pounds in the first 2 weeks” so I have to assume that means they started losing weight right away and that they didn’t start out on 100 mg per day so they must have lost weight on lower doses like 25 or 50 mg. I drank soda this morning and it still tasted only mildly flat. Not bad enough that I couldn’t drink it and since it is my “coffee” for the day, I want to drink it as long as I can tolerate the taste. I am able to tolerate large doses of meds that affect others at smaller amounts – like I need large amounts of valium to do anything and I can take 2 doses of muscle relaxers 2X per day and not feel tired, so this may be part of the reason why I am not being hit with side effects from the Topamax. But… I really want it to work on my weight as well as my migraines. No migraines yet but it isn’t like I get them all the time so it hasn’t been long enough to tell if it is working on those yet. I plan to take another 25 mg. after I get back from my chiropractic appointment today since I don’t have to go anywhere and then 25 mg. this evening around dinner time. I did take another 25 mg. Continued to feel spacey. I was still hungry and ate a normal dinner – no change in appetite at all So far don’t see any impact on weight loss at all, really hoping that is going to change. I will be taking another 50 mg. tomorrow. I will take 25 mg in the morning since I don’t have anything to do tomorrow but clean the house.
Day 5: I took 25 mg this morning (well, it was more like noon by the time I got up). It made me feel feel sleepy. It definitely didn’t decrease my appetite at all. I had a bowl of cereal for breakfast, a bowl of pasta for lunch, and 3 slices of pizza for dinner! I checked my weight and I did “lose” the pound I had put on at the beginning of this, so that is good but still no weight loss or loss of appetite. I also haven’t had to “do number 2.” That may be part of the weight – I am going to have to take something to get things moving, had no idea that this could cause constipation but things seemed to have just stopped – so I guess so. I will be taking another 25 mg later tonight. Took it before I went to bed, got tired and went to bed early.
Day 6: I can’t believe it has been 6 days already that I have been on these meds. It is disappointing that the weight is not falling off like I hear from many of the other posts that I read So far my biggest side effects are constipation, fuzzy head, and tiredness. Not what I was hoping for. So far no migraines but I will need to go 1 month without migraines to feel that it is working for that since my migraines can be sporadic. I took 25 mg. in the late morning today and will take another 25 mg in the evening sometime tonight. I will stay on 50 mg throughout my vacation and then move to 75 mg when I return. Soda still tastes okay. There is a small change and it takes a little flat but tolerable. I am still hungry although my cravings for sweets seems to be a little bit less – we’ll see if this continues. I certainly won’t be boasting 5-11 pounds of weightloss in 2 weeks like others though I read some studies last night that definitely showed weightloss was correlated to dosage meaning the higher the dosage the more likely you were to experience weightloss. So maybe if I go up in dosage, I still have a chance, however, I don’t see myself going above 100 mg per day with all the side effects and of course, I hear terrible stories about going off the meds, basically if you ever go off – all the weight will come back no matter what you do… I would like to see someone who says that isn’t true for them!
Day 7: The day has finally arrived. In addition to finally getting my constipation a little bit under control, the scale registered a 2-3 pound weight loss this morning. Maybe this is the beginning? I will wait to see more… I am also having pins and needles in my hands, feet, and legs!!! It isn’t too bad (yet)! I took 25 mg this am and will take my second 25 mg tonight.
Day 8: Well, today was not as promising. I haven’t done my official weigh in but it looks like I am not showing any more loss and my loss is closer to the 2 pounds rather than the 2-3 pounds from yesterday. On the other hand, my weight seems directly related to my constipation – so when food goes in but nothing is coming out, I am going to weigh more – so maybe if that was normalized I would have seen more, who knows. Also, it may not be a daily thing. The good news is that I am still down 2 pounds from the start in 1 week which is healthier than losing more than that in such a short time. So, we will continue to see what happens. I did find a slight bit of an increase in appetite reduction. I did not want to eat anything at all last night and I usually get hungry for a snack while watching TV in the evening. This morning, I feel hungry but don’t want to eat, it is strange. I am due to take my morning pill, so I am off to do that and then I will keep you posted. Not too much to report today. My side effects are much less now after 8 days on 50 mg per day. I would normally increase my dose right now if I were not leaving on vacation but I don’t want to mess with things as it is I am concerned about how my constipation will impact (no pun intended) my trip. I took 2 more laxatives and am waiting but am thinking I may have to take an enema as I am getting uncomfortable. No more tingling, fatigue is better, no more vision issues, head feels clear, no headaches, and weight loss remains at 2 pounds. Although soda doesn’t taste bad, I don’t seem to want to drink it, I am thirsty a lot and my main drink is koolaide made with sweet n low. I drank one glass of tea today and that was the only caffeine I had all day. Will continue to report – although I am sorry to say that there will be no reports or weight updates on the 6 days that I am gone on my trip, you’ll be left in suspense to see what happened! I will be increasing to 25 mg in the morning and 50 mg at night when I return, however.
Day 9: No change in weight. Holding steading at -2 pounds.
Day 10: I will report my weigh in soon but today is going to be my last post before my trip. Summary: some mild side effects but nothing too bad still bothering me at 50 mg, constipation is still a HUGE problem and not sure what to do about that, weight loss is still minimal – hoping that my increase in dosage upon return from my trip will jump start the weight loss.
Day 19: Well, I am back from my cruise. The trip was great, TONS of food. I did not have the side effect of “aversion to food,” I ate quite well – still hoping that maybe I lost weight…. wishful thinking. I stepped on the scale when I got home and had GAINED weight – like 5 pounds or so! Yikes! But, this morning, I was back down to just 1 pound more than when I left. I had no side effects on the ship EXCEPT that my eyesight became really blurry when I read. I read about the vision problems that can be associated with topamax. I have an appointment scheduled with an ophthalmologist to check and make sure I don’t have high optical pressure in my eyes.
Read an updated blog on 9/12/2010

My son is getting ready to launch his new GAMING PORTAL: Portal Strike. It is not ready just yet – I will post an update when it goes live. Hopefully in August 2010. Portal Strike will allow gaming enthusiasts to MAKE MONEY for playing video games. Wouldn’t that be awesome? When your parents say that you are on the computer for too long, you can say “I’m working, Mom!” Each month, selected game(s) will be available for a contest. The players with the highest scores win CASH. It is that simple – so keep playing it over and over and become the best and we will send you a check with your name on it! This is a great way for those who can’t (or don’t have) a job. You may also be able to get bonus money for referring your friends. Portal Strike is going to be the HOTTEST new portal out there!

Hi, I am Lynne.  I am a 40 (although prefer to tell people I am 38) year old woman living in North Carolina.  I have a husband, Joe, who works for Google.  My oldest son, Christopher, is 15 and going to be a sophomore in high school this fall.  He has started his own business and I plan to blog about his games.  He taught himself how to program and learned the ways of promoting and earning money for his games.  He has been very successful and makes more money than most 15 year olds dream about!  My 13 year old is Austin, my 9 year old is Reilly, and my 6 year old daughter (who is adopted from Chongqing, China) is Caden.  I own and operate a Learning Center in Apex:  www.apexlearningcenter.com and am very interested in promoting mathematics education.  I am also teaching myself Chinese and manage more rental properties than I care too