Royal Caribbean Cruise Line - Explorer of the Seas - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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Royal Caribbean Cruise Line - Explorer of the Seas
Has anyone ever cruised on Explorer Of the Seas? DH and I have a Princess cruise booked for January 2008 but are thinking of changing it to a 9 night cruise out of New Jersey (wouldn't have to buy airline tickets or a hotel for the night before the cruise) for the same time period. Any feedback on this ship? Thanks.
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I haven't sailed on the Explorer, but I have sailed on her sister ships the Mariner and Adventure of the Seas. They are great!! Highly recommend Royal Caribbean. In fact, we are going on the new Liberty of the Seas this summer!
You may want to post your question here, on the Royal Caribbean forum of Cruise Critic for more information. There is lots of discussion to read about the Explorer.
Thanks for your input. I do participate on the cruise critic boards and have been reading up on RCCL. We have sailed Princess many times but are trying RCCL out of NJ so we don't have to fly. I find the participants on the Passporter Boards a little nicer than the cruise critic boards so I knew that people here would give me honest feedback if they had sailed on this ship.
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We sailed on the Explorer the first year after she was built. Its a great ship but very, very large. I didn't find the largeness a problem except when it was time to try to get off the ship - for excursions, it wasn't bad if you met on the ship, but there were just too many people trying to all get off at the same time otherwise.
The main dining room is gorgeous, pools are great, casino better if I won more , the ice skating was pretty neat as was the ice show.
We have been on quite a few RCCL cruises and I can't complain - they do a good job. Here's my list from best the we've done to the worst - DCL, Celebrity, RCCL, NCL, and Carnival. The only line I would never sail again is Carnival.
We've only sailed out of NYC once but it was really neat when the ship passed right by the Statue of Liberty and we sailed on July 4th and ended up being to see some fireworks going off from Wildwood. We've also sailed from Philly. It is really great when you can to cruise from a port closer to home. The main reason I like it so much is that you have a day at sea at the beginning and one at the end. It just is so much more relaxing than spending those days getting to Florida to cruise from there.
Thanks for your reply. I know that the Explorer is a huge ship, but that doesn't bother us as we have sailed Princess many times and all of their new ships are fairly large. We have always heard great things about RCCL, but never really gave them a try as we get such great perks from Princess. However, as the cost of airfare continues to rise, we are excited to try something new without having to fly! And, the cruise we have booked on the Explorer is for 9 nights rather than the the 7 nights we had booked on Princess for about the same money including what we would have paid for air, hotel in Fort Lauderdale the night before, etc. DH and I love "sea days", and this cruise has 2 sea days at the beginning and 2 sea days at the end. We have been to the islands, so we just like hanging out and relaxing on the ship.
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, the ice skating was pretty neat as was the ice show.
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