Trip Report Mickey-less Lesson #1: Size doesn't matter, it's the motion of the ocean!

Yes, it's a non-Disney trip report. In a sea of Disney trip reports this is a non-Disney report. :eek: How is that pertinent on a Disney-centric fan forum, you ask? Well, this is how a solely Disney Cruise Line experienced cruising family took their first wobbly steps into non-Disney-fied cruising. Ever been curious? So were we! How the competition measures up is definitely pertinent! However, if the mods think this thread is better served in the cruise section or the other places section, I certainly understand. So sit back, relax, and slosh along with us in whatever "port" this thing sails off to.


Thread title:

Mickey-less Lesson #1: Size doesn't matter, it's the motion of the ocean! ((in my best double-rainbow dude voice)) What does it meeeaaan????? The ship we sailed is currently THE largest cruise ship on the seas: Royal Caribbean's Allure of the Seas. This ship is huge! How big? Let me show you. Not my picture, all credit goes to fet123 on Photobucket. Lined up here in Nassau are: Majest of the Seas, Disney Dream, Carnival Dream, the NCL Sky, and Allure's sliiiightly smaller sister ship the Oasis of the Seas. Good size comparison:

1a1f90d2.jpg


Allure of the Seas is 16 decks high, 1,187 ft long, and can carry a maximum passenger load of 6,296 serviced by roughly 2,300 crew members. In comparison, Disney's largest/newest ship in the fleet, the Fantasy is 14 decks high, 1,115.5 ft. long, and can carry a maximum passenger load of 4,000 serviced by a crew of 1,450. The Allure is a very big girl!

Among Disney's fleet my family prefers the smaller classic ships. Why? It's more laid-back, there's less people, and the overall experiences we've had were more personal and intimate if you will. We like that a lot! We knew going into this cruise that we were going to be on the biggest cruise ship afloat and that we probably would not be impressed by her size. We were right. We weren't. For us, bigger does not equate better. Size doesn't matter.

The motion of the ocean can definetly play a strong hand in your cruise experience! Leading up to our cruise I discovered (no thanks to Royal Caribbean which is my biggest aggravation with the entire experience of sailing with them) via Cruise Critic's forums that the Allure had been experiencing an issue with 1 of her 3 azipods. They had been sailing her without using the center screw for over a month before our sailing. She was safe and still functioned fine. They were just trying not to use the center pod as much as possible to avoid further/more extensive damage. So the ship sailed slower. Instead of her usual 22+ knots cruising we rarely exceeded about 16-17 knots cruising. AND, because the ship was sailing at reduced power, the captain did not utilize the stabilizers to keep the ship steady at sea. The stabilizers, like wings that extend from the sides of the ship to add stability and reduce rocking side-to-side, create drag which would slow the ship even more. So, the motion of the ocean on a ship not using her stabilizers was...well...a really FUN ride for us...not so much for those prone to sea sickness. ;)

*****Just for information sake, the Allure continues to run on 2 of her 3 pods. A cruise in February was cancelled back in mid-November to allow a week-long drydock to repair the pod. I believe it is a bering issue. It's my understanding this type of problem has been a reoccuring thing with ships that utilize the different azipods for their propulsion. To date Disney has not utilized the azipod propulsion for their ships.*****


So that nobody feels the need to ask before I get to the end and give my summation of the overall experience sailing without Mickey, I don't feel like it was better or worse than any of the 7 Disney cruises I have been on. I'm not just being nice. It's a whole different experience. I wouldn't categorize it as better or worse, it's different.
 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
The particulars!

Who: My family - me, DH/Tracey/ @Sweetpee's Sugar Daddy, Chandler/17yro, & Brian/16yro
Tracey's parents (seen previously in my Jan 2010 WDW trip report) - Allan & Gwen
Tracey's next youngest brother's family - Kacey, Tameka, Kary/18yro, & Kayla/17yro
Tracey's cousin - Rachel
Tracey's oldest niece - Ellen/19yro

When: Thanksgiving week! Nov. 24th - Dec. 1st

What: Eastern Caribbean cruise calling on Nassau, St. Thomas, & St. Maarten

Where: Royal Caribbean's Allure of the Seas sailing from Port Everglades in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.

Why: It's a family thing! At the time we booked this thing 18 months prior to sailing we were more open to sailing with Royal Caribbean than the others were to sailing with Disney Cruise Line. ;)


How we got there! By the time I got around to looking at airfare flights round trip from Houston to Ft. Lauderdale or Miami were about $1k PER PERSON. :jawdrop: I'm not used to this traveling during holidays thing. Yeah, :oops::rolleyes:, we drove. 1,176 miles on a holiday. We drove. :facepalm:

Before I get rolling with the meat-n-potatoes of this report I'd like to touch on the getting there. One of my uncles back in Alabama, a truly wonderful soul of a country fella, had been battling lung cancer since last Christmas. Originally we had planned to overnight in Pensacola, Florida to see my grandmother, overnight in Port St. Lucie, Florida, then make the final run down to Port Everglades the morning we set sail. In the weeks leading up to our trip my mom had kept me abreast on my uncle's deteriorating health and I felt strongly that I needed to leave a day earlier so I could see him before we left the country. Tracey was an angel. So we drove to Pensacola, Florida, spent 2 nights before continuing on, and utilized a full day to drive the 2 hours each way up to the small town in Alabama where my aunt & uncle live so I could see my Uncle JL. We had a wonderful visit. Truly wonderful. I saw a lot of family while there, too. It meant the world to me to see my uncle. This is a man who opened his home to my brother (@obrienIII) and me as we grew up. As an adult I can appreciate the gravity of all that my aunt & uncle did for us. When I was walking out I looked back at Uncle JL and I knew this was it. I knew. It was a tearful drive back to Pensacola. Once again, my intuition served me well. Uncle JL was gone and buried before we got back. God bless him. And God bless my Aunt Margaret, married to her love at 16 yrs of age, spent a lifetime together, now learning to live out the rest of her days here until they can be together again.

When we left Pensacola on Saturday morning we drove to Kissimmee to drop our little furry family member at the boarding facility. This time around we tried VIPet. VERY pleased. Great price. Great value. Riley left happier than she normally is when we pick her up from an extended boarding. She didn't act shell-shocked or mopey at all. She also didn't appear to have lost weight which is pretty normal for her because she's a social eater. Highly recommend these folks. We'll be back again!

Eventually we made it to our home for the night in Port St. Lucie. They were happy to see us, too, apparently.




Here's a few pics while waiting for our dinner at Olive Garden. I'm not explaining the hand sign. Uncle Jerry (@obrienIII) got this started while we were in Alabama. It's a boy thing. A grown-up boy thing. So, Uncle Jerry, thanks for the influence. :hilarious:






We turned in early. Had to get ready for the real adventure to begin tomorrow!
 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
DAY 1: Mickey sails in spirit, by God!

We got up around 8:00 and had breakfast at our hotel. Nothing gourmet but it was definitely good for the bargain price of FREE. We ran over to Ulta for me to grab some eyeshadow and to Sports Authority to get Chandler a swimsuit since he forgot his. We started the caravan of 3 vehicles down towards the port around 10:15 or so. Even though it wasn't a Disney cruise, we were all hoppin' excited for the new adventure we were embarking upon!

Our hotel: Homewood Suites. Highly recommend. $169 for a 2 bdrm/2 bath suite with kitchenette ain't too shabby!




Not that it's so fascinating but here's our Tahoe with Mom & Dad's "Mimi-van" next to us:




Have you ever noticed when you're excited you take tons of pictures of nothing? No? Just me? Alrighty-then! Here we are on the road:




Get out your magnifying glass! You can see the tippy-top of the Allure's funnel waaaaay out there:




So we parked at the off-site parking spot I found online that was rated well on Cruise Critic. Well, I didn't pay attention to the part about it not being self-park during busy holiday cruises. We had a bit of panic as we realized someone else might have more access too certain items we couldn't take on the ship that we had in our vehicle. We locked everything up as secure as possible and hoped for the best. I won't post the pic I took...juuuuust in case. Pay attention to the lesson here, people. If self-parking is important be sure to make for absolutely sure you WILL be self-parking. M'kay? K! We caught a shuttle over to the port and we headed in to see how Royal brings the masses thru the madness onboard their ship.

Oh yeah! And Mickey was coming with us, by God! We have full wardrobes of Disney Cruise Line shirts. Gots ta represent, people!




Security check was smooth. No problems. Not even with the expensive pocket knife Tracey had borrowed from Chandler and forgot in his pocket that we buried in the bottom of the backpack before the security check. Tracey's highly suspicious looking parents :)hilarious:) had to have their cases of sodas inspected for contraband then retaped shut by the security people. :hilarious::hilarious::hilarious:

Royal Caribbean has moving large masses of people thru port check-in down to a science. Serious. This is something I will say right now they did much better than Disney does. In Port Everglades. I don't know what it's like in other ports but in Port Everglades Royal really does this with finesse compared to DCL in Port Canaveral and, in the past, Galveston. You get into the line that corresponds to the deck your stateroom is on. There's multiple kiosks per deck. The whole process is very efficient considering how many thousands of passengers pass thru this area on a sold-out holiday sailing.

 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Wow..I just spotted this. You cruised over Thanksgiving...I'm following. Sorry about your uncle.
Yep, Thanksgiving! It was interesting! So glad we did it!

Glad you're following.

My uncle, well, I imagine he's a lot happier free of that body that gave out on him. I imagine he's running dogs and fishin' it up with his daddy and The Chief in the great beyond. ;)
 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Your family is so inappropriate and vulgar. Are you into adopting adults? I wanna be a part of it.

I mean think of the influence I could have on the kids?

I also rinse my plates before I put the in the sink!

You're IN!

Yes, the vulgarity knows no bounds. The WDWMagic girls have no clue. I totally played it off like I had a little class. Or maybe not. LOL!
 

DAKOTADISNEY

Active Member
I'm excited to read your trip report on your non-Disney cruise to see the similarities and differences. You write great trip reports and you and your family are very entertaining!
 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
I'm excited to read your trip report on your non-Disney cruise to see the similarities and differences. You write great trip reports and you and your family are very entertaining!

Why thank YOU! Honestly, I think there were more differences than similarities but not in a bad way. It was so fascinating. And lushy. Veeeeery lushy. I'll get to that, tho. LOL!
 

Tiggerish

Resident Redhead
Premium Member
The particulars!

Who: My family - me, DH/Tracey/ @Sweetpee's Sugar Daddy, Chandler/17yro, & Brian/16yro
Tracey's parents (seen previously in my Jan 2010 WDW trip report) - Allan & Gwen
Tracey's next youngest brother's family - Kacey, Tameka, Kary/18yro, & Kayla/17yro
Tracey's cousin - Rachel
Tracey's oldest niece - Ellen/19yro

When: Thanksgiving week! Nov. 24th - Dec. 1st

What: Eastern Caribbean cruise calling on Nassau, St. Thomas, & St. Maarten

Where: Royal Caribbean's Allure of the Seas sailing from Port Everglades in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.

Why: It's a family thing! At the time we booked this thing 18 months prior to sailing we were more open to sailing with Royal Caribbean than the others were to sailing with Disney Cruise Line. ;)


How we got there! By the time I got around to looking at airfare flights round trip from Houston to Ft. Lauderdale or Miami were about $1k PER PERSON. :jawdrop: I'm not used to this traveling during holidays thing. Yeah, :oops::rolleyes:, we drove. 1,176 miles on a holiday. We drove. :facepalm:

Before I get rolling with the meat-n-potatoes of this report I'd like to touch on the getting there. One of my uncles back in Alabama, a truly wonderful soul of a country fella, had been battling lung cancer since last Christmas. Originally we had planned to overnight in Pensacola, Florida to see my grandmother, overnight in Port St. Lucie, Florida, then make the final run down to Port Everglades the morning we set sail. In the weeks leading up to our trip my mom had kept me abreast on my uncle's deteriorating health and I felt strongly that I needed to leave a day earlier so I could see him before we left the country. Tracey was an angel. So we drove to Pensacola, Florida, spent 2 nights before continuing on, and utilized a full day to drive the 2 hours each way up to the small town in Alabama where my aunt & uncle live so I could see my Uncle JL. We had a wonderful visit. Truly wonderful. I saw a lot of family while there, too. It meant the world to me to see my uncle. This is a man who opened his home to my brother (@obrienIII) and me as we grew up. As an adult I can appreciate the gravity of all that my aunt & uncle did for us. When I was walking out I looked back at Uncle JL and I knew this was it. I knew. It was a tearful drive back to Pensacola. Once again, my intuition served me well. Uncle JL was gone and buried before we got back. God bless him. And God bless my Aunt Margaret, married to her love at 16 yrs of age, spent a lifetime together, now learning to live out the rest of her days here until they can be together again.

When we left Pensacola on Saturday morning we drove to Kissimmee to drop our little furry family member at the boarding facility. This time around we tried VIPet. VERY pleased. Great price. Great value. Riley left happier than she normally is when we pick her up from an extended boarding. She didn't act shell-shocked or mopey at all. She also didn't appear to have lost weight which is pretty normal for her because she's a social eater. Highly recommend these folks. We'll be back again!

Eventually we made it to our home for the night in Port St. Lucie. They were happy to see us, too, apparently.




Here's a few pics while waiting for our dinner at Olive Garden. I'm not explaining the hand sign. Uncle Jerry (@obrienIII) got this started while we were in Alabama. It's a boy thing. A grown-up boy thing. So, Uncle Jerry, thanks for the influence. :hilarious:






We turned in early. Had to get ready for the real adventure to begin tomorrow!

Haven't made it past post #2, but had to express condolences for Uncle JL.

I had a similar experience, probably five years ago, although it doesn't seem like that long.

Xoxo
 

Tiggerish

Resident Redhead
Premium Member
You're IN!

Yes, the vulgarity knows no bounds. The WDWMagic girls have no clue. I totally played it off like I had a little class. Or maybe not. LOL!

Kindred spirits, BAY-bee!!

Your family is so inappropriate and vulgar. Are you into adopting adults? I wanna be a part of it.

I mean think of the influence I could have on the kids?

I also rinse my plates before I put the in the sink!

Maybe we could have another UNOFFICIAL WDWMagic cruise for all us vulgar people?! We could invite @plaz10 , too! ;)
 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
So after you leave the check-in desk you proceed to the area where the embarkation pictures are taken. I had to buy this one. So awesome us wearing our matching Disney Cruise Line shirts on the Royal Caribbean backdrop!




The photog who took our picture complimented our shirts! He said the company he worked for also did the photography on the Disney ships. No kidding! Cool!

So then we located everyone else (they checked-in in different areas because we weren't all on the same decks) for a group embarkation shot.



From left to right....Top row: Tracey, me, Dad/Allan, & Kacey. Middle row: Rachel, Mom/Gwen, & Tameka. Bottom row: Chandler, Brian, Ellen, Kayla, & Kary.

So nobody has to ask, yes, Tracey's parents had fun with names for their 4 kids. They have: Stacey, Tracey, Kacey, & Beau. The total number of grandkids sits at 10 so the 5 pictured are only half of the them. Imagine when we're all in the same place at the same time! We've done that! Gatlinburg, TN Christmas 2011. We had 2 chalets side-by-side!

When you leave the photo area you pass under this banner:




Yes, sir! This is where I'd like to pause to mention that it's not uncommon for Disney-fan-cruisers to branch out out to other cruise lines because Disney only has 4 ships and they don't sail that many places. Royal Caribbean can cover a lot of ocean in a lot of places with their 22 ships. AND, Royal currently has the Quantum set to go into service in the fall of this year + 2 more ships the size of the Allure under contract and/or under construction. Disney sends their smaller classic ships to the Mediterannean & Alaska which provides Transatlantic & Panama Canal opportunities. Disney has also sent the Magic to NYC and Galveston in recent years. Disney goes where they can but they hold a couple ships close in Port Canaveral. The short Bahamian runs are fabulous for pairing with WDW vacations. Disney's Dream is nearing the end of the contractual tie to Port Canaveral, though, so it'll be interesting to see where they might send her in the summer of 2015. Won't be Panama Canal yet because the canal widening project isn't due to complete until 2016 as of right now. The only Disney ship that will fit through before the widening is complete is the Wonder. We'll see what the future holds!

We proceeded up an escalator to a gangway, zig-zagged upwards, and then we were boarding.




Boarding the Allure wasn't as poignant an experience as it is on the Disney ships. On the Disney ships each family is announced as they step onboard. On Allure I suppose there's just too many people coming in via multiple gangways. LOL!

And then we were here. This is deck 5. This area is the Royal Promenade. It's kinda fancy mall-ish but it's used in many ways. You'll see.




We boarded the ship at about 1:00 p.m. and it appeared our staterooms were ready. Everyone scurried off to see their rooms! This is Tracey's & my stateroom, a deck 8 verandah stateroom:




What about your poor children you ask??? We made them sleep in the hall. :p Just kidding! The stateroom sizes aren't as generous as Disney's ships. Seriously. They are not. And you don't have the added benefit of the split bathroom configuration. I wasn't about to sail with my teenagers sharing the entire bathroom. No way, buddy. So, we booked them an inside stateroom directly across the hall from us. We're mean parents, I know. They got stuck in an inside room. :rolleyes: Seriously, I don't feel bad. How many other kids do you know that have been on 3 cruises in a year? How about in their lifetime??? Yeah. So they got the inside room which saved me $500. ;)

Let's talk money folks. Some people may find the discussing of money/cost so openly to be tacky but if you're going to compare Disney and Royal you can't avoid talking buckaroos. I read all over the place how Disney is sooooooo expensive and Royal is sooooooo much more affordable. I haven't found this the case the way people make it out to be. The last week of May, entering a pricey sailing time of year, we paid I think like $5300-ish(??? - @Disneyfalcon, can you help with this number maybe?) for our family of 4 to sail a 7-night Western Caribbean on the Disney Fantasy. We were in a 246 sq. ft. aft balcony room that had the split bath configuration. That split bath is the key. That's why I split us into 2 rooms on Royal Caribbean. We sailed Royal Caribbean on a HOLIDAY, my family of 4 on a 7-night Eastern Caribbean. The boys inside stateroom was $2103 and our oceanview verandah stateroom was $2723. That total only comes to $4826. Soda is (mostly) free on Disney but it is not on Royal. Only tap water (it's pure, desalinized water), coffee, tea, lemonade, etc. is free. So even if you add on the soda package for all 4 of us (I'll get to what we did for beverage packages shortly) that still does NOT equate what we paid for the Disney Fantasy. We had 2 completely seperate staterooms and 2 completely seperate full bathrooms. I dunno, y'all. It's not the huuuuuge price difference people so commonly make it out to be, is it?

Here's a shot of our bathroom.



You can sorta see it, but the bathroom has great storage on the other side of the shower and toilet. No bathtub. Just the shower. Also, Royal doesn't put out the higher-quality toiletries either. Shampoo/conditioner combo product is in a dispenser in the shower. We got soap, tho. No lotion. I'll give that one to Disney. I love the H20 Spa products they give us. I missed that!

Closet, shelves, & safe. Standard.




Vanity, storage, fridge (behind the cabinet door on the right), outlets, and tv area.




The tvs are bigger on the Allure. I loved the location of the plugs. Look at those 2 cabinets on the left side? I loved those! The drawer storage was pretty minimal. Seriously minimal. If we had tried to put all 4 of us in a single room with this amount of storage for a week long cruise we would've been seriously screwed for space. o_O


Here's another shot:




See the keyboard on the shelf over the tv? This is to interact with the onboard accounts via your television! You can monitor your shipboard account, make/modify reservations, see activities schedules, hours of operation, even order room service and see your professional photo folio all via your television. I loved that feature!

Standing by the verandah door looking back towards the door to the hall.




The little coffee table we shoved out of the way between the sofa & the closet. That's where it sat for the duration.

Our verandah with Port Everglades beyond.




The verandah was a little bigger/deeper than the side-of-the-ship verandahs typically are on the Disney ships. Also, the partitions between verandahs can be opened just like on Disney's newer ships. I liked that the partitions were a frosted plexi vs. Disney's solid steel design.

Back inside, here's a shot of those power outlets. This is a nice little bank of plugs. Very convenient location.

 
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sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
@sweetpee_1993 sad to admit before we had Lorelai, I had a sticker to that hand sign on the back of my car. I'm also vulgar, may I be adopted too?

:)
That's awesome! We all get to bond over our terrible-ness! Love it!


Haven't made it past post #2, but had to express condolences for Uncle JL.

I had a similar experience, probably five years ago, although it doesn't seem like that long.

Xoxo
Thank you, Siobhan. I hated to get all down-n-out on a trip report but it was an important part of the journey for me. Long story short, trust your intuition. I told myself if I was all the way in Pensacola, THAT close, I didn't go, and then he didn't make it until I could get back I'd be devastated. I felt like I absolutely HAD to go the distance and do it at that time. I was right. He actually slipped into a coma the day after I boarded this cruise.

I do like the thought of celebrating our loved-ones as they go on to better places. Celebrate the lives the lived, the person they were, and be happy for them to be going HOME. I choose tears of joy. ;)


Kindred spirits, BAY-bee!!

Maybe we could have another UNOFFICIAL WDWMagic cruise for all us vulgar people?! We could invite @plaz10 , too! ;)
I'm tellin' you! We are such kindred spirits!!!!! Is it the Irish connection??? Are all Irish people like us? I do wonder....
 

blackthidot

Well-Known Member
In the Parks
Yes
Kindred spirits, BAY-bee!!



Maybe we could have another UNOFFICIAL WDWMagic cruise for all us vulgar people?! We could invite @plaz10 , too! ;)

I want to do a cruise. Prices are just insane to me. Maybe if @bmarkelon hooks it up...

Question though...If you get banned from a Disney Cruise Ship does that mean the parks too? I aint trying to risk that.
 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
I want to do a cruise. Prices are just insane to me. Maybe if @bmarkelon hooks it up...

Question though...If you get banned from a Disney Cruise Ship does that mean the parks too? I aint trying to risk that.
DCL priced may be insane, but they are SO WORTH IT. Do an unofficial WDWMAGIC cruise with us, please!! :)

There's an adults-centric WDWMagic cruise on the books for February 2015. That's a whole year away!
 

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