Dutch Vikings Return from Voyage to New World

Many of the Dutch Vikings have returned, while others are still in route,
from their latest ocean pilgrimage... this time to the ABC islands of the
Dutch Antilles and Half Moon Cay in the Bahamas. Viking Queen Susette and
her fellow Viking knights and ladies have declared their latest voyage to
the New World a success. They sailed aboard the Dutch Ship the HAL
Westerdam to the beautiful waters of the Caribbean Sea, in the New World.
Dutch Antilles islands visited were Aruba and Curacao. The Vikings were
joined in their pilgrimage by several new Vikings, including Toby and Barb
from the opposite side of the world (from an island in some unknown sea that
locals call Pacific Ocean) and Princess Ermalee from the new world land
called MaryLand... Many spoils were obtained along the route, including dam
shirts, dam caps and other sundries. Feasts include malt beer, warm meat
off the bone, and even apple strudel made by sailors from far off Austria.
A wonderful time was had by all.

--Tom

Tom, welcome home to you and all of the Vikings. Sounds like you had a
great cruise and I hope you and others will write a review.

sue

Tom K wrote:
Many of the Dutch Vikings have returned, while others are still in route,
from their latest ocean pilgrimage... this time to the ABC islands of the
Dutch Antilles and Half Moon Cay in the Bahamas. Viking Queen Susette and
her fellow Viking knights and ladies have declared their latest voyage to
the New World a success. They sailed aboard the Dutch Ship the HAL
Westerdam to the beautiful waters of the Caribbean Sea, in the New World.
Dutch Antilles islands visited were Aruba and Curacao. The Vikings were
joined in their pilgrimage by several new Vikings, including Toby and Barb
from the opposite side of the world (from an island in some unknown sea that
locals call Pacific Ocean) and Princess Ermalee from the new world land
called MaryLand... Many spoils were obtained along the route, including dam
shirts, dam caps and other sundries. Feasts include malt beer, warm meat
off the bone, and even apple strudel made by sailors from far off Austria.
A wonderful time was had by all.

--Tom

In article , Sue Mullen
wrote:

Tom, welcome home to you and all of the Vikings. Sounds like you had a
great cruise and I hope you and others will write a review.

It was a great cruise. And like many group cruises the cruise line and
ship were secondary.

This was my first cruise on Holland-America and there were some things
I liked and some things about the ship and line I did not like. The
biggest pros and they are important ones were the food and the service.
The food was better than my recent experiences on any of the other mass
market cruises lines. The service was also better.

What I did not like was the ships public areas, both the decor and
design. Dark and terrible color combinations. The show lounge had lots
of obstructions and weird seating. The pool areas were awful with too
many tables and not enough lounge chairs. The hot tubs were tiny and
too few. The main pool can be covered which seems odd for the Caribbean
but I am sure that is a plus for Alaska.

The cabin was very good. I upgraded to a Verandah and that was a good
decision as there were never any empty chairs on the pool deck because
of the chair hogs.

Activities are not a Holland-America strong point. I did hear good
things though about the Culinary Arts center but I am not into that.

The daily program sheet was not in a user friendly format making it
difficult to keep up with times and places of what activities they had.

They moved the library but all the signs and maps had the old location.
the library itself was well stocked with recent books. Best library I
have seen on a ship other than the QM2.

The entertainment, except for the magician was pretty good. The
production shows were better than ones I have seen recently on
Celebrity, RC and Princess. The other entertainers other than the
magician were very good, loved the Elton john and Eagles shoe by Joel
Mason. The female comedian was also good.

I am not going to blame Holland-America for the composition of the
passengers on this sailing but unfortunately we had that rude crowd
onboard that moved to Florida from the New York area. I have
encountered them on the other cruise lines sailing out of Fort
Lauderdale during this time frame so it is not a HAL issue.

I have put Holland-America on my list of the mass market cruise lines I
would book on but it would not be my first choice. If there is a
category of premium mass market lines then HAL is in it along with
Celebrity. In general right now I prefer Celebrity followed by Royal
Caribbean when I judge the complete cruise experience for myself.

--
Charles

"Charles" wrote in message
d...
In article , Sue Mullen
wrote:

This was my first cruise on Holland-America and there were some things
I liked and some things about the ship and line I did not like. The
biggest pros and they are important ones were the food and the service.
The food was better than my recent experiences on any of the other mass
market cruises lines. The service was also better.

I agree about the service, as good as any cruise we've been on, including
the QM2. And the bar waiters were attentive, but not intrusive.

I agree with your food comment for the breakfast buffet and lunch buffet,
and the first 3 nights in the dining room. The food was as good, or better
than any food on any cruise. And the fish dishes the first 3 nights at
dinner were superb. Nice mild white fish, spiced very nicely. Still a bit
juicy and not overdone. No fishy smell what so ever. Very nicely done.
But after that, as I said in another post, I thought there was a significant
decline in the dining room food. The fish the 4th evening, the Red Snapper
was just plain terrible. Dry, fishy smelling (not good) and way overdone.
Then there were 2 nights when salmon was the only fish available (both on
the main menu and the "always available" menu). That was the end of the
mild white fish. The surf and turf were nice. Large piece of lobster, but
the fillet was smaller than a deck of cards. The last evening the
tenderloin was very tough and grizzly. My first bite was just about
impossible to chew. Since the salad that night had virtually no dressing it
was impossible to eat. With the ox tail soup not very filling, I went up to
the buffet right after dinner to get something to eat, and found it closed
except for pizza... so I had a slice of pizza for dinner. A bad salad,
tough tenderloin, and a slice of pizza because I was still hungry don't put
HAL in Cunard's or Celebrity's league. The first 3 nights... YES... but the
last few nights, sorry. NO. At least for me.


What I did not like was the ships public areas, both the decor and
design. Dark and terrible color combinations.

There are many beautiful places on the ship, and then they throw in
something hideously ugly to spoil everything else around it. Like the 5
naked statues up on the large wall by the crows nest lounge. Or the ugly
elevator doors (what were they thinking?). And in addition to the dark, and
terrible color combinations you mentioned, many areas were dimly lit, making
them feel even darker.

The ship wasn't exactly in good condition though. Balcony chairs were in
terrible condition. There were many areas not really that clean (Charles
said it before I said it, but he's right). Lots of worn, rusty areas on the
outside of the ship. I don't think the ship is that well cared for.
Definitely not in the league of either Constellation or QM2 as far as TCL.

As far as the artwork that is often discussed, there are about 5 nice
Stephen Card ship paintings, and 2 nice old Dutch Pieces, but that's about
it. The 4 impressionist paintings on Norwegian Dawn are high end museum
quality. Westerdam's arwork isn't in that league The 2 old Dutch pices
might be museum quality, but nothing else was IMO. I thought the artwork on
QM2 was 10 times better. But the 4 paintings on Dawn are at the top of the
list. Those are serious arrwork pieces.

The show lounge had lots
of obstructions and weird seating.

The seating was very weird. Some seats had 6 feet of leg room, while others
had about 16 inches of leg room.

The pool areas were awful with too
many tables and not enough lounge chairs. The hot tubs were tiny and
too few. The main pool can be covered which seems odd for the Caribbean
but I am sure that is a plus for Alaska.

I thought the pool area was gorgeous, but with like 20 reclining chairs on
each side of the pool, it was virtually unuseable by more than a few dozen
people. VERY poor design IMO.


The cabin was very good. I upgraded to a Verandah and that was a good
decision as there were never any empty chairs on the pool deck because
of the chair hogs.

Activities are not a Holland-America strong point. I did hear good
things though about the Culinary Arts center but I am not into that.

I enjoyed the show on making Apple Strudel.

The daily program sheet was not in a user friendly format making it
difficult to keep up with times and places of what activities they had.

Since you are the "official" keeper of the daily schedule (everybody asks
Charles what's next on the schedule), I'll default to your opinion.

They moved the library but all the signs and maps had the old location.
the library itself was well stocked with recent books. Best library I
have seen on a ship other than the QM2.

The entertainment, except for the magician was pretty good. The
production shows were better than ones I have seen recently on
Celebrity, RC and Princess. The other entertainers other than the
magician were very good, loved the Elton john and Eagles shoe by Joel
Mason. The female comedian was also good.

I though the Eagles show by Joel was very good as well. I really enjoyed
it. He's not a great singer.... in fact he's not even a good singer, but
he's a really good pianist, but a much better guitarist. He was able to
play lead guitar while singing (most singers just play rhythem guitar except
for a few real masters like David Gilmore of Pink Floyd) which is very
impressive.

I am not going to blame Holland-America for the composition of the
passengers on this sailing but unfortunately we had that rude crowd
onboard that moved to Florida from the New York area. I have
encountered them on the other cruise lines sailing out of Fort
Lauderdale during this time frame so it is not a HAL issue.

I have put Holland-America on my list of the mass market cruise lines I
would book on but it would not be my first choice. If there is a
category of premium mass market lines then HAL is in it along with
Celebrity.

Also Cunard.

If we can find good pricing, I think I'd like to try a smaller, older HAL
ship (if we can find some that Farcus hasn't screwed up the interiors
inside) to some place like Bermuda.

In general right now I prefer Celebrity followed by Royal
Caribbean when I judge the complete cruise experience for myself.

I'll put Cunard and Celebrity at the top of my list.

--Tom

--
Charles

In article , Tom K
wrote:

The surf and turf were nice. Large piece of lobster, but
the fillet was smaller than a deck of cards.

The surf and turf was mainly about the lobster which was great. They
offered two when I ordered which I took them up on. I am sure you could
have ordered an extra filet. Also the Escargot was great.

The last evening the tenderloin was very tough and grizzly. My first
bite was just about impossible to chew. Since the salad that night
had virtually no dressing it was impossible to eat. With the ox tail
soup not very filling, I went up to the buffet right after dinner to
get something to eat, and found it closed except for pizza... so I
had a slice of pizza for dinner. A bad salad, tough tenderloin, and
a slice of pizza because I was still hungry don't put HAL in Cunard's
or Celebrity's league. The first 3 nights... YES... but the last few
nights, sorry. NO. At least for me.

I ordered completely different from the menu than you that evening,
Lobster Bisque, Shrimp, and had a filling and great dinner. But I think
I would have been fine with the Beef. It looked good. Everyone else I
asked who ordered the beef tenderloin thought it was good. There were
other choices on the menu. You were upset that they only had Salmon as
a fish choice which is a fish you don't like but they also had Shrimp,
and they had lamb chops and a couple of other choices. They actually
were offering more choices every evening than the other lines do
currently. You like fish but only white fishes it seems and they seemed
to lean towards salmon which you don't like. One night they had Tuna
Steak but you said it was not really fish, that tuna belonged in a can.
I did not order it but it looked good.

Also Cunard.

I'll put Cunard and Celebrity at the top of my list.

I consider Cunard to be in a different category than Celebrity and HAL.
It is on a different list. Celebrity and HAL are mass market lines.
Cunard, Azamara and the like, are niche cruise lines. You pay more and
you should get better food and service. I was not expecting the great
quality food and service on HAL. The waiter did not seem to have too
many tables. Also the Express coffees at dinner at no extra charge.
Wine stewards who actually appear at the right time. Ice teas that
tastes like ice tea and the coffee was not bad.

For the total experience currently I will pick Celebrity even though
the food and service is a little less. And an important reason is that
I like the Celebrity ships better and I like their loyalty program.
Their Captains Club revamp is doing it's job of making me prefer to
book with them. Also Celebrity has no smoking in staterooms, balconies
and the casino. Cunard is below HAL on my list because I don't want to
dress up every night on a cruise. It's too much. Two dress up nights is
more than enough. Zero would be the best. HAL is a little too laid back
for me but I can see why many love it. They have something great going
with their crew staffing.

--
Charles

On Dec 14, 1:02*pm, "Tom K" wrote:
"Charles" wrote in message


The pool areas were awful with too
many tables and not enough lounge chairs. The hot tubs were tiny and
too few. The main pool can be covered which seems odd for the Caribbean
but I am sure that is a plus for Alaska.

I thought the pool area was gorgeous, but with like 20 reclining chairs on
each side of the pool, it was virtually unuseable by more than a few dozen
people. *VERY poor design IMO.


On HAL it's all about the aft lido and pool, something most other
lines do not offer. It's a much bigger deck area than on the Princess
ships.

Warren

In article
,
Warren wrote:

On HAL it's all about the aft lido and pool, something most other
lines do not offer. It's a much bigger deck area than on the Princess
ships.

The pool and hot tubs on the aft deck were small. The deck area is
large to the rear of them but the lounge chairs are all out in the sun.
Not under any shaded cover. The covered area has tables and chairs.
Many like that but many like to be in a lounge under some shade cover.

--
Charles

On Dec 13, 8:34*pm, "Tom K" wrote:
Many of the Dutch Vikings have returned, while others are still in route,
from their latest ocean pilgrimage... this time to the ABC islands of the
Dutch Antilles and Half Moon Cay in the Bahamas. *Viking Queen Susette and
her fellow Viking knights and ladies have declared their latest voyage to
the New World a success. *They sailed aboard the Dutch Ship the HAL
Westerdam to the beautiful waters of the Caribbean Sea, in the New World.
Dutch Antilles islands visited were Aruba and Curacao. *The Vikings were
joined in their pilgrimage by several new Vikings, including Toby and Barb
from the opposite side of the world (from an island in some unknown sea that
locals call Pacific Ocean) and Princess Ermalee from the new world land
called MaryLand... *Many spoils were obtained along the route, including dam
shirts, dam caps and other sundries. *Feasts include malt beer, warm meat
off the bone, and even apple strudel made by sailors from far off
We leave on the Jan. 3 sailing of the Westerdam, same itin you guys
did. We've done this ship/itinerary three times and have loved it
each time.

Sorry to hear the ship is looking old. We've always been so impressed
with the service. The only cruiseline we've ever been on where a crew
member remembered us from the year before. The staff have a way of
remembering your name within 10 minutes of boarding the ship.

I think HAL is unique that it does an itinerary to the southern
Caribbean from Ft. Lauderdale on a 7 day itinerary. That was what
attracted us to the Westerdam in the first place. We still love that
itinerary and hope to enjoy Westerdam just as much as we have in the
past.

Jo-Ann

In article
,
TaTa wrote:

Sorry to hear the ship is looking old.

I don't think it looks old. I think it could use some more painting and
varnishing than it is getting. The full lounge chairs on Jean and Ed's
large aft balcony needed varnish badly. On my balcony no wear problem
as the chairs and furniture were plastic :-) The plastic chair on mine
had some pitch to it, a comfortable cushion and a plastic ottoman to
put my feet up on. It was fine.

By the way I preferred my balcony even though it was smaller than
Jean's because it had shade cover overhead and it was much more
private. One would have to lean over and crane ones neck to see from
another balcony. You can see easily see onto the aft balcony from
above. Also personal preference but I did not care for the engine wake
and the wake noise on the aft at deck 4 level. My deck 7 side balcony
was much more serene.

One thing I noticed was there was less cleaning going on than compared
to the cruise I took on Constellation about a month ago or Crown
Princess this past summer.

I think HAL is unique that it does an itinerary to the southern
Caribbean from Ft. Lauderdale on a 7 day itinerary. That was what
attracted us to the Westerdam in the first place. We still love that
itinerary and hope to enjoy Westerdam just as much as we have in the
past.

It is a good itinerary. Half Moon Cay is one of the better private
islands. Curacao has an interesting city center and nice beaches. Aruba
is okay. And there are the right amount of sea days.

--
Charles

"Charles" wrote in message
d...

I don't think it looks old.

I don't think it looks old either... just not getting the TLC that ships
like Connie and QM2 are getting.

We're likely more critical than 99% of the people out there, but as an
engineer, that's the kind of stuff I notice.

I think it could use some more painting and
varnishing than it is getting. The full lounge chairs on Jean and Ed's
large aft balcony needed varnish badly. On my balcony no wear problem
as the chairs and furniture were plastic :-)

My furniture on the balcony was worn out ratan. They probably replaced the
ratan on yours some time ago. The wooden furniture on Jean's balcony was
much higher end stuff, though the varnish was very worn.

By the way... this was the only cruise I've ever been on where the captain
YELLED at all of us during life boat drill. He told everyone to BE QUIET
very loudly and sternly. Everyone said that he sounded MEAN. He did joke
about it later at a get together.

I really liked the cruise director... he was kinda low key. And didn't come
across like he thought he was hot stuff. He said he came from NCL
shoreside, where he was responsible for the design of the
activities/entertainment areas on the new Norwegian Epic. He said on that
ship they're going to focus more on a lot of intimate areas more aligned
with what is going on today, and not as oriented to the old style big
production shows from the 1940's which ships seem to cling to.

--Tom