Could anyone compare HAL to Princess?

[mkober]

My wife and I have cruised once before on Sept 18th 2004 Caribbean Princess. We had been upgraded to a Penthouse suite.

We're looking at going again this year or early next. The Westerdam ship with I believe their lowest priced suite seems to compare as good or even better than the Penthouse suite on the CP. The Penthouse suite on the Westerdam looks incredible, but out of our price range. Hard to justify for just a one week cruise.

What do you folks think about Princess vs. HAL? Be honest.

We're mid 40s with a 17 year old daughter that will be coming along. We plan on renewing our vows for our 20th anniversary.

Thanks!:)

[Aussie Gal]

We have cruised on both HAL and Princess. Our Princess experience was on the Tahitian Princess which may be a little different from the other Princess ships being it is a smaller ship. We loved our experience and we have booked on the Regal Princess for Antartica and South America in January, 2006.

We love HAL and I feel very much at home on their ships. There is not a huge difference between the two. We found that HAL is a bit more "laid back" - not so noisy and upfront - than Princess. Perhaps more conservative in small things such as there are very few announcements on HAL whereas there are quite a few all day on Princess. There is always loud music and things happening up in the pool area on Princess, it is a much quieter atmosphere on HAL.

We did find the entertainment much better on Princess, it is of a higher standard than on HAL. Not that the entertainment is a high priority for us as we do not go on the cruise for the entertainment. We feel that the food on HAL is better and the Lido is far superior in the selection and quality of food. I also like the fact that if you order breakfast in your cabin, you can have not only the cold dishes but also the hot dishes on HAL. This is not the case on Princess.

Our cabins on both ships have been excellent. The Tahitian Princess is only new and everything you could possibly want in a cabin is there, tucked away somewhere. Though the cabins are smaller they have been very carefully thought out for the space.

The staff on both were on a par. We have been looked after admirably by both lines but then we are easy and not demanding. As long as our room is kept clean and our bathroom has fresh towels etc. we are happy. We usually go up to a lounge for a drink, so do not expect ice etc. to be supplied around the clock.

On both lines we requested a egg crate mattress for the bed and a lounge for the balcony on boarding and both were supplied within a couple of hours of asking. That has been our only special request of staff in all our years of cruising.

I would not hesitate to book a HAL cruise. There are little extras that you do not receive on Princess, like the hot appetisers each night before dinner in the lounges, the HAL bag you receive on each cruise to take on shore if you so desire, the wonderful teak wrap around decks, the free cappucinos from the Java cafe on the S class ships, the popcorn when you go the movies. etc.

Congratulations on your 20th wedding anniversary. I believe that HAL does a great job with the renewal of vows ceremony.

Jennie

[KAKcruiser]

I was on about 10 cruises with Princess and than about 5 years ago, I cruised on HAL and now have 10 cruises with HAL. I find HAL much warmer and less crowded. Princess was nice and would be my second choice but I definitely prefer HAL. I do like the older HAL ships better, though.

[jhannah]

I agree with Jennie and KAKcruiser. Both lines' products are good ... just different. We find HAL to be a notch above Princess in overall ambiance. My DW and I noticed this again last night. We needed a cruising fix, so we pulled out some promotional videos from both Princess and Holland America. Even the videos demonstrate the subtle differences between the two products.

We haven't sailed on the Westerdam, but we really enjoyed one of her sister ships the Zuiderdam. I'm betting you all will have a great time.

[Druke I]

We have done three cruises with HAL, and some dozen or so with Princess.

Gross generalization of course, but we think food and its presentation better on HAL.

We think production shows (and venues) much better on Princess.

Normally, HAL has better guest lecturers than Princess.

We think Princess has a better variety of itineraries, particularly in their "exotics".

Price for price, Princess often comes in being less-expensive.

Isn't it wonderful we have so many choices?

[slineberry528]

I sailed both in 2004. Dawn Princess to Alaska.
Great shows, service was slow in dining room and not so free with seconds. Balcony cabin tight fit for 3. Lots of things to do during the day.
Maasdam 10 eastern car. in Nov. Mini suite, loved the size of the room. Service and food excellant.
I enjoyed each and will sail them again, but in 2005 I have 2 carnival cruises booked.
Susan

[californiacruisefreak]

HAL is far superior to Princess in every regard.

My wife and I have cruise most of the major lines many times and believe that HAL and Celebrity are the two big, mass market lines that give you the best "bang for the buck".

Princess is not even on the same level. Granted Princess has gorgeous ships and excellent entertainment, but the compliments stop there.

Princess Cruises serves food that is absolutely horrible and not really edible. Furthermore, they nickle and dime you every time you turn around. All day long they are disturbing you with announcements about revenue generating centers on board (i.e. casino, art auctions etc...). Additionally, Princess insults it's passengers by only providing one beach towel per person per day in the stateroom. This towel must be returned or you are charged. Imagine going somewhere warm and tropical where you spend quite a bit of time by the pool. Now imagine getting out of the hot tub all wet and using your towel to dry off. You now have a wet towel that is yours for the rest of the day. There are not additional towels available by the pool for your use because Princess is too cheap and does not trust you.

Another interesting fact about Princess. I learned the following from a Maitre'd on board the Diamond Princess. There are no trays for the buffets. What's the big deal you ask? Well...when you want to get a dish for your salad, silverware, a drink etc...and you do not have a tray this is a major pain. Also, the same employee told me that they make high carb, high fat options available on the buffet so that people will get full and not eat so much.

Overall, Princess is not up to par with lines like HAL and Celebrity. Princess provides a much more commercial experience with less personal attention to passengers and detail.

I would advise against cruising on Princess given the choice of HAL or Celebrity. I put Princess in the same category as Carnival, RCCL, NCL, Costa.

Best of luck with your cruising decisions.

Jeff

[mkober]

I think you folks made up at least my mind!

On our next cruise we plan to take our daughter like I mentioned, so I ruled out Tahiti. We want to take the Tahitian Princess on a cruise, read good comments on it, but will wait until our daughter is off to college. From what I read, there won't be many people her age on board, and it's a smaller ship so she'd probably drive us nuts. The second thing is cost. Flying from Milwaukee to Hawaii or Tahiti is rather pricey.

We had only taken one cruise, so we relied on other peoples comments. I had heard good things about RCL, my brother enjoyed Carnival although from what I saw and read - no way in hell for us! Not sure about NCL, it looks interesting. Had good remarks about Princess, so we went on the Caribbean Princess.

Real bad timing though. My birthday is Sept. 18th, so we took the cruise scheduled to leave on that day. Yeah, we were warned it was hurricane season... well, half the year in the midwest is tornado season as well. Only once in my lifetime did a tornado come close to myself, so I wasn't too overly concerned about hurricanes chasing us. I was wrong, Jeanne did exactly that, it turned around and came back at us. The people were literally flying out of the pool due to the 12 1/2 foot waves the ship was in. They were having fun, but got kicked out and the nets were put over the pool real fast. That was a bit scary, but the whole cruise was still great.

Next cruise - not during hurricane season!

Is December good for the Caribbean?

I was considering the comments written about Princess feeling more commercial. That was the impression I got when I was onboard. I was rather upset about the treatment we received when asking for soda. We both drink very little alcohol, but do drink a lot of Diet Coke. We bought the soda stamp for the week. When someone asked what we'd like to drink while at the pool, all but once did they bother to return. They just disappeared. I guess if I wasn't ordering an expensive drink I wasn't worth it? I wrote this remark on the question card Friday night. A little while later we were told that we were stuck at sea until Monday due to the hurricane. Funny thing, they must READ those comment cards... service was completely different Saturday and Sunday!

I hear you on the almost constant ship announcements. It was fun for us since we're new to cruising, but I see how that gets annoying fast. The announcements we wanted to hear were about the hurricane and are constantly changing agendas. Couldn't understand the captain. Could only make out one word out of about 50 due to his heavy accent.

A question - what soda company does HAL use - Pepsi or Coke? Like I said, we drink Diet Coke exclusively. Don't like the taste of Diet Pepsi.

Also, I had found a website that had scanned the dining room menus from Princess and had these online. Anything like this for HAL? Would kind of like to see what they have to offer for dinner.

I really like the fact that HAL offers more choices for breakfast in your room. We did this for 7 of our 9 days at sea, really enjoyed our balcony. :)

[mkober]

We were told that we could book our next cruise at a good discount on the ship. This was one of our intentions for going in the first place. I had thought about taking a longer cruise, but wanted to see how we liked cruising before doing this. Thought that Princess would give a better price if you were already on the ship. Wrong, I could beat their price from our travel agent. They weren't doing ANYTHING special. Disappointment.

Princess didn't seem to care if we booked again or not. Sure they gave us the Captain's Circle pin and card, but didn't do anything to really try to book us on a new cruise.

How is HAL in this regard? :confused:

[d.fran]

I'll take Princess. Hal doesnt' go where they say they will.

Princess has 24 hr meal availability at a cafeteria whereas Hal had only room service at certain times. Also, for me exercising is very important and Princess
again has better equip and 24hr avail.

[RuffinReady]

I don't think that most of the comments about Princess apply to the Royal Princess. We did 5 cruises on her. The food was excellent and so was the service. The only negative that I would agree with was the frequent announcements especially for the "art" auctions. Also, the PA system during the auctions were very loud. I don't have any basis for recent comparison with other Princess ships except for the Crown Princess in Alaska and the Baltic. The later cruise was just before she was sold into another part of P&O. I had been on her in 1999 to Alaska and was very impressed then, however, in 2001 in the Baltic she had gone downhill.

Maybe the reason the Royal was so enjoyable was based on her size. She is only 45k tons which is like the 38k tons for the Prinsendam. The Royal was also a world cruiser. OBTW, I was very impressed with the Galaxy.

I have never been on Carnival and from all that I have read, I never will.

Ruffin

Bahama Star (long time ago!)
S.S. France (Transatlantic -1965)
S.S Atlantic (Transatlantic, Mediterranean - American Export Lines - 1966)
Europa (Caribbean - 1969 - North German Lloyd)
Statendam (Caribbean - 1975)
Sunward (Bahamas - c. 1980)
Song of America (Caribbean - 1988)
Crown Princess (Alaska - 1999)
Crown Princess (Baltic - 2001)
Royal Princess (B2B to South America - 2001)
Royal Princess (B2B2B; Transatlantic, France, Belgium, Holland; Gt.Britain-2002)
Galaxy (Caribbean - 2003)

Prinsendam (B2B; Transatlantic NYC to Athens – May/June 2005)

[TWELVEOHONE]

Princess has better entertainment and much more active

I like Princess better because of the age group each cruise line attracks.
HAL attrack as much older passenger than Princess.

[californiacruisefreak]

My wife and I are relatively young and have a 5 and 7 year old.

HAL attracts a classy crowd that had traditionally been older than other lines.

However, having said that, the line is dedicated to attracting a much younger cruiser as part of it's "Signature of Excellence" 1/2 billion dollar project.

We enjoy HAL and feel they cater to all ages. In fact, their new enhancements will make them one of the best kids' programs at sea.

Jeff