Disney Cruises vs. HAL

[BearInStPete]

Reasonably seasoned HAL cruiser here, and with other lines (see my signature). Childless middle-aged professional couple who enjoys fine dining, broadway style entertainment, vocal and instrumental artists and understated elegance. We are Disney season passholders and get to the parks often for our Disney immersion (Disney themed entertainment), and enjoy many aspects of the parks and fine dining and the numerous non-explicitly Disney entertainment options the parks and resorts offer.

 

We are going to be sailing DCL for the first time on the Dream on 1/20/13 and would appreciate some commentary from HAL (or Celebrity) cruisers who have also cruised DCL. What are the "hidden Mickeys (Gems)" on DCL we should look out for? Anything to avoid? Any tips and advice appreciated!

 

We already know from a value-perspective that we have paid what we would pay for a week on HAL for a 4 day DCL cruise, but this is an accommodation and getaway with friends who are Disney fanatics (and DCL), but whom have limited experience on any other cruise line except Carnival!

 

It's a cruise with my partner and friends, it's going to be good, and different experiences are always welcome, but will I want to return to DCL for the price?

[CruiseGal60]

We have been on two Disney cruises (Magic), and have our 3rd HAL cruise planned. I think Disney has better service and overall attentiveness. Their cabins are also a bit bigger.

 

We loved our first Disney cruise. The children were mostly in the ship clubs and the others were well behaved. The Magic did have adult only pool and up charge restaurant.

 

Our second Disney cruise was totally different. Children running wild,no supervision, etc. They were so rowdy I think they were probably kicked out of the clubs. They went into adult only area and crew did nothing. Parents nowhere to be found. It totally turned me off Disney.

 

I would say your ability to handle the antics of children would determine your feelings toward Disney.

[boulders]

It took me until about day 9 of an 11 day cruise to find out that DCL has a wonderful buffet lunch in one of the MDR's. Their regular buffet restaurant was the worst I've experienced though. I didn't care for the theming in the MDR's at dinner, but the food was very good. The food was excellent in the specialty restaurant.

 

I do not recall any

broadway style entertainment, vocal and instrumental artists

 

Service was top notch. Most, if not all the crew, were native English speakers.

[Typhoon1]

Disney runs a top notch cruise line. I'm sure you'll most satisfied.

 

However, for elegance and ambiance and service, HAL can't be beat.

[BearInStPete]

@CruiseGal - Stateroom sizes for a Verandah cabin on HAL the square footage starts at 284+ including verandah, equivalent on Disney Dream starts at 246 including verandah. Perception may be due to bathroom, which look bigger with separate rooms for Tubs and Toilets, both with sinks. I have have had friends comment that insides/ocean views run larger?

 

@Boulders - HAL does a great job with variety on the LIDO, and you were disappointed with the Disney buffet - was it an issue with variety, being institutional, or taste? Good tip for buffet lunches in the MDR - I assume they have table service as well (I hope)?

 

Can anyone comment on the Pinnacle Grill vs specialty on Disney? Intrigued by Remy, at $75/pp the land based food equivalent should be $125/pp - which would equate to Victoria & Alberts at Walt Disney World in FL. In the Pinnacle on HAL $25/pp charge, I figure you are getting a $75/pp equivalent meal on land - can anyone comment if my thoughts are close?

[alwaysfrantic]

I think the Remy land equivalent may be higher than that; I'd heard $400+. I did not go, but did go to Palo which was good. No one under 18 is allowed in either restaurant, so you are guaranteed a child free area there.

 

I was on the Dream recently and found it to be a great vacation. I was also there with no children and never felt over run with anyone else's kids. The adult pool area is kind of blah, and more of a passageway but I never saw kids there. I actually never saw anyone there.

 

I loved the bar areas, though usually empty. Lovely decor throughout though I like the atrium better on the Magic. I had the late dinner seating and I saw few children there. Never was anyone running amuck in the halls. Food was good. Not great. I loved the coffee/bar area adjacent to the adult pool.

 

The buffet area becomes a seated dinner at night, but casual, come as you are when you want. That is one thing different from most lines, I think. It is not buffet at night. The menu is a combination of items from the menus of the 3 main dining rooms. You can go there for appetizers early if you have a late meal.

 

Soda is included on Disney, and you can carry on any alcohol you wish.

 

Beds were very comfortable. Make sure to stay in the cityscapes bar to see the various landscapes changing. There is a piano bar that is open before dinner but is never mentioned on the daily planners. Go up the center elevator to the top, and go thru the black doors. Not sure why it is such a secret, but a lovely view of the sun setting.

 

The bar upstairs with Remy and Palo is available all the time and there is a nice deck adjacent. You do not need restaurant reservations to go into the bar at night.

[boulders]

 

@Boulders - HAL does a great job with variety on the LIDO, and you were disappointed with the Disney buffet - was it an issue with variety, being institutional, or taste? Good tip for buffet lunches in the MDR - I assume they have table service as well (I hope)?

 

 

I did not come across table service for lunch.

 

The buffet near the pool deck consisted of leftovers thrown together with spices added. It was very institutional - I was going to say hospital cafeteria food from 30 years ago - but that would be an insult to hospital food.

[SwissMyst]

My only observations about a Disney cruise was coming into the LA port on the same day we were also arriving on a Crystal ship - Disney was disgorging a much younger crowd, lots of children and obviously their younger parents than our more retirement age and virtually child-free cruising crowd on the Crystal ship. (HAL and Crystal share similar age demographics)

[Shmoo here]

It took me until about day 9 of an 11 day cruise to find out that DCL has a wonderful buffet lunch in one of the MDR's. Their regular buffet restaurant was the worst I've experienced though. I didn't care for the theming in the MDR's at dinner, but the food was very good. The food was excellent in the specialty restaurant.

 

I do not recall any

 

Service was top notch. Most, if not all the crew, were native English speakers.

 

Generally the food served at the MDR buffet is the same as the food served in Cabanas. The difference is the quieter atmosphere in the MDR.

 

[quote name=BearInStPete;36457071

@Boulders - HAL does a great job with variety on the LIDO' date=' and you were disappointed with the Disney buffet - was it an issue with variety, being institutional, or taste? Good tip for buffet lunches in the MDR - I assume they have table service as well (I hope)?

 

[/quote]

 

For lunch (as well as breakfast) one of the MDRs is a buffet service and another MDR is table service.

 

 

We started our cruising with DCL and done a couple of HAL cruises. The rooms on DCL are larger than equivalant rooms on other cruiselines. The split bathrooms is nice (especially if traveling with kids).

 

The adult pool area on the Dream is not as good as the adult pool area on the classic ships. This is mainly due to the configuration of the area. If there is a problem with kids in the adult area, a mention to a nearby CM is all that's necessary.

 

The shows in the Walt Disney Theatre are broadway-style. Much better that any I've seen on HAL thusfar.

 

And Pirate night (with fireworks) is worth seeing. Yes, the fireworks are not as spectacular as what you'll see at WDW or Disneyland, but fireworks at sea - worth it.

 

We are planning on many future cruises on DCL as well as HAL.

 

:)

[alwaysfrantic]

I did not come across table service for lunch.

 

 

There was a dining room open every day on my cruise for a seated lunch. It varied, but the waiter at dinner always told us which restaurants would be open for seated breakfast and lunch the following day.

[Mary Ellen]

All of our cruises are without kids. We've sailed on HAL for over 30 years now and have done 3 cruises on DCL in the past few years. Our first two times on DCL were 7-day cruises on the Wonder. This recent (early Dec) cruise was the same 4-day you'll be doing on the Dream. We will NOT be doing a 4-day DCL cruise again.

 

Service on all three cruises was on a par with what we experience with HAL.

 

Our biggest problem with the food on DCL is the lack of variety and limited number of menu selections, particularly at breakfast. Due to mobility issues we prefer table service, not buffets. We have the exact same, small menu every day. On HAL it is the same breakfast menu daily but there are many more options from which we can choose. Some cruises we've even had daily special offered at breakfast - LOVE that!

 

We did try Cabanas (Lido Buffet) for breakfast one day. We were pleased with the variety of options and food quality. The variety is much better on the Dream than on the Wonder as the buffet is much larger and has a variety of 'stations'.

 

The Enchanted Garden is where we had the welcome aboard buffet lunch. We found the selection to be be really small, but the quality was very good. The layout of the buffet made it quite congested though. Much worse than anything we've encountered on any ship. Parrot Cay on the Wonder does a much better job of this.

 

We do like the DCL cabins better, other than the nightstands. They are teeny, tiny. You'd better not plan on putting anything larger than a small travel alarm on one of them. DCL cabins do have a TON of storage. This makes sense since they all can hold 4-5 passengers (they are geared towards families after all). We've been satisfied with the storage on HAL ships - except for that on the Vista/Signature ships (woefully lacking on those :rolleyes:).

 

We didn't try Remy's as we'd seen the menu and it didn't appeal to us, particularly for the price. We did have both dinner and brunch at Palo. We enjoyed both very much. Dinner seemed quite comparable to the Pinnacle Grill - maybe nicer. It's hard to say. We both just took the experience for what it was and weren't even thinking of PG comparisons. Maybe we just appreciated something different than the PG experience (although they are similar). Palo is a cleaner, more contemporary decor than the PG. It seemed more romantic to me. There are also a LOT of windows, but since at dinner we were there well after sunset.... they didn't help with the view.

 

We did get a cabana at the adult beach at Castaway Cay. Again different than the HAL cabana experience, but we can't say we prefer one over the other. Some things were better at one - and some things we liked at the other. We did like that Disney has more time at CC than HAL has at HMC.

 

Our first two cruises on DCL were like what CruiseGal60 experienced on her first. While there were PLENTY of children (600-900 on each), they were well behaved. The 4-day on the Dream was like her second. :eek:

 

Hope you enjoy your DCL cruise!

[BearInStPete]

Mary Ellen & the others, thanks so much for your candid comments. This should be a decent cruise for us (any cruise is better than staying home). I'm very familiar with DISNEY hospitality quality and we will be well fed and entertained. We will have to judge the Disney value proposition after we do the cruise, but from the comments and what I have read, it may be harder to reconcile to Hal or Celebrity with us not having kids in tow.

[AlexandNessa]

The 4-night cruises aren't my favorite, but I'd take a 4-night on Disney over a longer cruise on some other lines. Splurge on a cabana at Castaway Cay if you can. Castaway Cay is quite lovely (certainly rivals Half Moon Cay). We did not enjoy the Dream's adult pool: not enough sun, not enough chairs around the pool, entirely too many children walking through the area due to ill-placed forward elevators. That is the one thing we prefer about Disney: that they do tend to enforce their adult-only venues. I cannot speak to Remy, but Palo is OK. We enjoyed it on the Dream better than the Magic or Wonder. Die-hard DCLers seem to love Palo, but we can take it or leave it. If you do dine at Palo, do not schedule brunch and dinner for B2B meals. That is just way too much food for an average eater.

 

I think you'll find the service comparable. I'll give the nod to Disney actually, since they do not seem to have cut their staffing in the dining room and stateroom like HAL seems to have done.

 

Are you doing concierge, by any chance? If not, check to see if you can upgrade at the port. The Dream's concierge lounge is very nice and similar to the Neptune, except that they offer nightly happy hour on the Dream. Even when my husband didn't make it to happy hour, I'd pop in for a glass of wine, and the bartender in there would always send beers to my husband for later. Also, as a PP mentioned, DCL does not care what or how much alcohol you carry on, as long as you carry it on (not check) and it is not in a cooler .

 

I think you'll find Disney's production shows far superior to HAL's, but that's just me.

[SmoothFlying]

My BIL is, and has ALWAYS been a Disney FANATIC !! In fact, I call him the the OLDEST 9 year old I know. He's 48 and was FURIOUS with me when I told hime I had heard Disney ships didn't have a casino !! All but called me 'misinformed' (gotta tone his REAL language). Told me, NO way would Disney NOT have casino's for the adults. I told him (again) that I was just repeating what I had heard. Is what I heard, correct ? When the person I worked with told me that, I also found it hard to believe. What's the scoop ?

Smooth Flying

[momatibm]

My BIL is, and has ALWAYS been a Disney FANATIC !! In fact, I call him the the OLDEST 9 year old I know. He's 48 and was FURIOUS with me when I told hime I had heard Disney ships didn't have a casino !! All but called me 'misinformed' (gotta tone his REAL language). Told me, NO way would Disney NOT have casino's for the adults. I told him (again) that I was just repeating what I had heard. Is what I heard, correct ? When the person I worked with told me that, I also found it hard to believe. What's the scoop ?

Smooth Flying

 

If you look at DCL web site you will see no casino.

[LAFFNVEGAS]

My BIL is, and has ALWAYS been a Disney FANATIC !! In fact, I call him the the OLDEST 9 year old I know. He's 48 and was FURIOUS with me when I told hime I had heard Disney ships didn't have a casino !! All but called me 'misinformed' (gotta tone his REAL language). Told me, NO way would Disney NOT have casino's for the adults. I told him (again) that I was just repeating what I had heard. Is what I heard, correct ? When the person I worked with told me that, I also found it hard to believe. What's the scoop ?

Smooth Flying

Nope not a Casino to be found on a Disney ship but all is not lost on Adults, they allow Adults to bring on unlimited alcohol what ever they want, bring as much Jack Daniels as you want or if you prefer a little Remy Martin :D

[lvz2cruz]

We love Disney like you do--annual passes every few years, DVC members, love anything related to the mouse.

We do not do the Disney cruises because of the much higher cost and high concentration of kids but have always heard good things. We have met people through DVC who do the shorter cruises often and love them.

You can find alot of info on the disboards. Scroll down to the area about the cruise line. It is for Disney what cruise critic is for cruise lovers.

[BearInStPete]

Greetings;

 

Back from our cruise on 1/20/13. We tried to enjoy it, but were overwhelmed with the number of Children - frankly we should have known better over the MLK holiday weekend. But we did try and give it a fair shake. There is nothing inherently wrong with DCL for the intended market demographic, but it was not for us.

 

As the last poster mentioned, and actually several recent CC reviews have highlighted from the empty-nester perspective the DCL value is just not there, but unfortunately too late to be useful for us.

 

I did post a review, and hope it might help others evaluate DCL who have experience from other lines who are similarly situated to ourselves. I will say that we decompressed from the Disney Dream by a wonderful day at EPCOT after debarking from the Dream - so we do love Disney, but DCL will remain a one shot (expensive learning) experience for us.

 

Here is my fair and honest balanced review:

 

http://www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=115333

 

Additionally here are a few pictures for your enjoyment:

 

http://bearinstpete.smugmug.com/Vacation/Disney-Dream/27950007_bjx7Lx

[Mary Ellen]

My BIL is, and has ALWAYS been a Disney FANATIC !! In fact, I call him the the OLDEST 9 year old I know. He's 48 and was FURIOUS with me when I told hime I had heard Disney ships didn't have a casino !! All but called me 'misinformed' (gotta tone his REAL language). Told me, NO way would Disney NOT have casino's for the adults. I told him (again) that I was just repeating what I had heard. Is what I heard, correct ? When the person I worked with told me that, I also found it hard to believe. What's the scoop ?

Smooth Flying

If your BIL is such a Disney fanatic I'm sure he's aware that Disney does not consider gambling a 'family friendly' activity. Unless things have changed Disney doesn't even allow lotto tickets to be sold at the grocery store located on property they lease out not far from Downtown Disney in Florida. ;)

[JamesEM]

BearInStPete, thanks for your thread, very informative.

[BrianC-80]

Thanks for the review, I really appreciate it coming from that perspective.