HAL Maasdam Review (back to back cruises)

Previous Cruises: (just me - age 69)
HAL Nieuw Amsterdam 1950 transatlantic NYC to La Havre
HAL Nieuw Amsterdam 1950 transatlantic Southampton to NYC
Previous cruises (Bob - age 70) - various US Navy ships 1956 to 1973.
Together - other than cruises to the Bahamas and Florida on our boat
04- NCL Crown to Bermuda
05- NCL Crown repositioning -Phila to Miami.

I picked these cruises because we could drive to it (it left from
Norfolk) and because I like the ports. I wasn't sure how I would like
the traditional dining.

Embarkation in Norfolk - semi-awful.

We left home before 8:30 and were through Tappahannok on US 17 before
1000. We saw a sign which said that the Coleman Bridge was going to
open at 11:00. The last time we were on US 17, the Coleman Bridge
(which Bob correctly IDed as being in Yorktown - I had forgotten the
name of it) got stuck, so I didn't think we'd have time to take any
side trips. We got to the Coleman Bridge at 1054, and just as we were
on the approach a school bus yellow crew cab truck blocked the bridge
by parking across it. We were about the fourth car in line. They
opened early. There was a destroyer waiting on the other side.. I
got out and took some pictures. The bridge managed to get itself shut
by about 1115. We came into Norfolk and stopped to get gas, and the
car got 34 mph for the total trip of about 170 miles. Everything was
fine until this point.

Bob absolutely refused to go to the terminal and drop our luggage off,
and insisted that we would get a cab from the Avis office. The cruise
ship parking was across the street from the Avis place.

The Avis guy kindly said he would drive us to the dock. So Bob tipped
him $5.00, and also gave some money to the lady with the luggage cart.
We got in line, which was almost out to the curb.

There was a Quonset hut type place where we were to be processed -
there was a lot of construction on the pier which was there by
Nauticus. We got to the door of the processing building about 1245

Inside was a zoo. I stood for a little while, but my back began to be
very painful, so I found a chair to sit in over by the photographers
where people were going in, and let Bob inch through the line. That
took about 35 minutes.

I had persuaded Bob to do two cruises because I assured him that we
absolutely would not have to change cabins. I called HAL and talked
to them about it, and I thought I would definitely have the only
inside cabin which was available for both cruises.

NOT. They had given us an upgrade that we didn't ask for and didn't
want. They said they couldn't switch us back because the other people
had already checked in. The best they could do was to upgrade us for
the second cruise to a room very close to where we were for the first
cruise.

No matter how nicely or firmly, I asked them (and I continued to ask
for the whole of the first cruise), they refused to let his have the
same room for both trips because they said that the people had
requested those specific rooms. The fact that I also had requested a
specific room apparently didn't matter to them.

The travel agent sent a second set of cruise documents for the second
cruise cabin to our house where they sat on the porch for a month,
even though she knew or should have known that we would not be at
home.

Once we were on, we dropped our carryons and went to the buffet for
lunch. It was about 2 pm. We were concerned about our bags getting
taken to the right stateroom (particularly because we found that there
are three other people with our last name aboard). Some of our
luggage didn't arrive until after dinner - the last bag was the one
with Bob's underwear.

At the end of the first trip, they gave us the keys to the second room
and said the steward would help us move (which he did). We got our
pictures taken at the "Office". But it was a pain to have to repack
and move. And they didn't give us a dining room table assignment
card.

Stateroom - C

It was an outside window which was nice, but the room was cramped and
noisy. They didn't have much drawer storage space and no place to put
things at the bathroom sink without stacking things.

I never heard anything from the people on one side of us, but the
other side was the doors to the walking track, so there was a certain
amount of traffic, and the room was under the kitchen and had a lot of
noise at all hours from what I presume was carts rolling around, and
there was banging pipe noise which may have been flushing of toilets.
The second room was right by the elevators too so there was noise from
people waiting or getting off of them.

The beds were put together to make a king (really bigger than I like)
There is a cabin width ceiling light over the head of the bed. The
phone is on Bob's side and has a faulty message light. It is
blinking, but we don't have any messages. He put his hat over the
phone to block the light.

There are fake beige with a green trellis curtains (you can't draw
them across) at the foot of the bed. We've each got a night table
with two SMALL drawers in it. Maybe 6 x 14". There is a small
dressing table with a maroon stool on one end and three drawers on one
side - about 20" wide and 8" deep. Over the table is the TV and a CD
player, and under it is an ice bucket and glasses, and the 'for pay'
sodas and bottled water. (which they absolutely refuse to take away).
We also found a 'gift' of four bottles of wine, two glasses and a
corkscrew. We later got a gift of an 8 x 10 photo. The second cruise
we got three more bottles of wine and a 5x7 photo. We don't drink.

Opposite the dressing table is a white and dark green check love seat
with a little table in front of it and a small maroon side chair.
There is a pastel colored picture of a windmill over the love seat.
The rug is a blue/green tweed with beige flecks. All the wood is
limed oak.

On one side of the hall area leading to the door is the bathroom. No
storage in there either, although we have a tub with a detachable
shower, a toilet and a sink with a narrow shelf above it. Even the
sink counter is skimpy.

On the other side of the hall are four closets. One of them just has
shelves and the safe in it. One of the life preservers is on the top
shelf, and the shoe basket (for putting your shoes out to be cleaned)
is on the bottom. One closet has two spaces for hanging short things
top and bottom. Another one has a shelf for the other life preserver,
and a long hanging space. The last one has short hanging, and the a
high shelf, and the bottom area has the blankets etc. This one also
has a full length mirror. There were plenty of wooden hangers.

Muster - C
Earsplitting and uncomfortable. It was outside on the walking track
under the lifeboats. We were all packed against the wall and roll was
called. My back was really starting to hurt badly, so Bob put me back
against the bulkhead so at least I could lean against it. I would
have sat down on the deck except I was afraid of being stepped on.

Also the announcements were SO loud that it hurt my ears. I spent the
whole time anyone was talking (and during the whistles that announced
the drill) with my fingers in my ears. The second time I had the
sense to ask if I could sit down, and also to wear ear plugs.

Food Dining Service B

I liked the food.

I hated the Lido Buffet (that's why the food is only a B) You can't
get a lot of your food yourself, and the people behind the counters
don't seem to be that interested in serving you. The buffet line
isn't set up efficiently - people have to wait while other people get
stuff served to them or cooked for them, even if they don't want
whatever it is - the lines get very long.

Whenever we ate there, we had the bread pudding and THAT was uniformly
good.

We got our breakfast delivered to the room a couple of times, but
there really wasn't any good place to eat it (the table wasn't big
enough), and they didn't come and get the tray in any kind of timely
manner.

So 85% of the time we ate breakfast and lunch in the main dining room.
Except for the second morning when it took us an hour to get our
breakfast (because the lines in the Lido were so long that a lot of
people unexpectedly defaulted to the main dining room), the service
was good, and I like sitting down and having food brought to me.

I loved the traditional dining on the first cruise - we had excellent
table mates. It wasn't so good on the second cruise because two of
our four table mates did not come to the dining room for 10 days in a
row.

We had the same table for both cruises and we could look out the
window to the wake of the ship. I loved the placement of the table,
and as I said, the food was very good. I won't list it
specifically.

There were 3 formal nights on each cruise. The dining room was cold.

We ate at the Pinnacle Grill once - the food was good and there was a
LOT of it - much more than we could eat. We got it as part of the
tour package - otherwise I don't think it would have been worth $30
each.

I never ate at the hamburger place by the Lido pool.

Entertainment/Activities C

The theatre itself did not have any kind of stair step seating, so the
people in the back could not see the stage if there were people seated
in front of them. This is a great big black mark on Maasdam AFAI am
concerned. On the balcony you had a big metal bar across in front of
you obstructing your view

The lighting was crappy. People on the side of the stage that were
out in front of the proscenium on the apron were often in shadow. I
see no reason for this. Sometimes the spotlights created the illusion
that the dancers had no feet, as their lower legs were cut off.

The 'special effects' which weren't that special. Occasionally a
little mist or smoke, and one dance which was done with black light.
The costumes often were IMO ill-fitting and unflattering. Someone who
had been on this cruise previously said that they had the same show
last year only with different people in it.

The band was very good and I enjoyed some of the individual acts, but
after the first one or two of them, I didn't go to any of the
production shows. They had a good pianist, a trumpet player several
good comedians (and one that wasn't), a juggler etc. The theatre was
also cold - after the first time we always wore a coat or sweater.

We did trivia a lot of the time, and that was fun. The only problem
with it was that it was sometimes scheduled when people were ashore.
The informational lectures were sometimes very good, although the AV
people could never manage to get the slides set up until the people
were 15 minutes into their talk - EACH TIME they had the problem.

Bob went on the kitchen tour. Afterwards he went to a demonstration
by the chef of the Pinnacle grill, where they demonstrated salmon with
lemon glaze and rosemary crumbs and three-grain pilaf with olives.
They gave everyone the recipes. He enjoyed that.

Excursions:
I particularly liked the Rainforest Tram tour on Dominica and the St.
Kitts Railway Tour. I also went parasailing at Half Moon which was
lovely - very quiet up there. We did not take any excursions in St.
Thomas, Curacao, Aruba, or San Juan. We took the Best of Barbados in
Barbados and that was good too. I took an airboat ride in Ft.
Lauderdale, and I'm glad I went, but I wouldn't go again.

Ship A-
The ship was nice (I think the black hull makes it look like a real
ship although I wouldn't want my boat to have dark topsides in the
tropics) and all the areas were nicely decorated. It was a little
unhandy not to be able to walk forward on the Promenade Deck (because
the kitchen was there) but we adjusted.

Didn't shop or use the casino at all.

There are two nice pools - one outside which I used once, and one in
the middle of the Lido Deck. They had the water in the Lido Pool even
though it was a little rough and I was surprised that someone wasn't
hurt the way the water was splashing around in the pool.

The internet cafe and library was large and they had various quizzes
and entertainments there. The lady that ran the internet cafe was
quite good and the connections were good. There were also a lot of
terminals.

They did not have any papers (except the 4 page printout of the NY
paper) except on embarkation day. They didn't have any index of the
library so you couldn't look up a book or tape or CD to see if they
had it. I didn't get up to the spa at all.

They had shuffleboard, a big chess set, ping pong and all the usual
activities. They had at least one dance floor and various groups
played in the lounges at night. There were lounge chairs all around
the Lower Promenade deck (in the shade) on the walking track which was
1/4 mile around.

I was a little surprised (given what I had heard) that the floral
displays were mostly just Xmas trees and banked potted poinsettias -
there was only one large floral bouquet.

Service A
Our cabin steward was the best (the same one for both trips). The
dining room staff was good too. I didn't think much of the Cruise
Director (I found his touting for good ratings tiresome) or the Senior
Assistant Cruise Director, and the Office people were not really
interested in helping you IMHO. The Junior Assistant Cruise Directors
were very nice and the Excursion people seemed nice and efficient..

Disembarking C

The cruise director said that he wanted one person from each cabin at
the disembarkation talk, and then he didn't announce the talk over the
loud speaker system.

They gave us luggage labels with colors and numbers or letters, but I
could make no sense of what the colors meant. They seemed to be
random. So one couldn't figure out when they might be called. Maybe
they did that on purposed, but if I had a deadline it would have been
anxiety making.

They had breakfast both in the dining room and in the Lido - the
dining room was supposed to have some kind of express breakfast, but
they didn't seem to know about it when I ordered it.

We could stay in our room until our tag numbers were called.

When we got ashore, Bob sat me down with one of the bags while he went
to get the rest of them, and the people there tried to get me to move
to somewhere else telling me that our bags weren't there, but I could
not because we had too much luggage to carry ourselves (because we
were away from home from Dec 11th to Jan 18th and had to pack for
tropical and winter weather).


Overall (personal opinion)

I loved the cruises even though I think there are things that could be
done better.