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Holland America Rotterdam

Two weeks on Volendam 

Ilulissat

Back to Back this and Dec. 22.  Historical Mexican itinerary.  Unfortunately had to miss Rosalina due to winds.  A great deal of tendering ports which for many, would be the draw back.  As usual great food, and staff exceptional.  The combo mix bar for trivia and football days does not work well together.  Trivia very well attended.  Ship definitely showing its age in many places, but still is very comfortable to travel on.  No extra ports beside bed, so ensure you have a multi outlet adapter.  Christmas cruise had a few children but actuall more older teens.  Children never a problem.  Again many tender stops.  Shore Excursions were booked and for the most part enjoyable.  I taps and Manzanillo tours were suspect due to poor serviced buses.  All in all most enjoyable and would do these itineraries again.  Love the smaller ships as waiting times reduced for all services. First time away for Christmas.

Christmas Escape

We selected this cruise because of the itinerary and wanted to see the South Pacific! 

Three ports visited on a Sunday! NOTHING OPEN! Except a McDonalds in one port. Papeete was a two day stop and was closed for a national holiday Veterans Day. The excitement was watching the re-provisioning of the ship. Another port and a canceled port we cruised around the destination and looked at it from the ship! Really "Exciting" I want to tell you. 

Shore excursions. Well the so called cruise director had NO CLUE about the ports! We got terrible and wrong information or just plain worthless information. She could definitely talk about things, and take up time, that were absolutely worthless. A few examples, in one port we were told there was little transport and it would cost $40 to travel to a local mall and beach. The transport we later found out after walking four miles was $5 per person each way. Another stop we were told there was no transportation and when we got to the tender dock there was a trailer full of bicycles available for rent. She talked up Papeete and when we arrived the city and everything on the island was shut down for Veterans Day for TWO DAYS. Another port we were told there were no beaches accessible without an extensive hike. I could literally see a beach from anchorage and immediately talked with the dive shop on the pier and was told there was a nice beach next to the port only 1/2 miles away and it was nice. At that port the coordination of the tenders was a complete disaster. People were told if they had mobility issues don't go! Well it did not matter they let everyone go and when the tide went out the people could not get back on the tenders and close to 100 people wound up standing around in the heat while the tender crew flayed around. Medics from the ship were finally called! On another port we reported to the World Stage as directed to be sent on our shore excursion. Well just before we were told to go down to the departure gangway they called GENERAL call for the gangway and hordes of people standing in the lower corridors flooded the gangway while we were going down the stairs to get off! It took us forever to get off the ship and the mobility strained people took forever to get to the location where the boat that was taking us to the excursion. Forty Minutes later we finally departed and was RUSHED through all the stops we made and were cut short on time at our last stop swimming and exploration of the shore on an island which was a main reason we were on the excursion!

If I continue with all the things that went wrong, both on the ship and off, I will be ready to be committed!

Our cabin stewards were WONDERFUL, our waiters and servers were WONDERFUL, The guys at the coffee bar were WONDERFUL! The best part of our cruise. The food was a joke in the main dining room. We lost laundry that we paid for the entire cruise, two days early because of a fire in the laundry room. 

I could go on and on but I will leave it here! You have a flavor of our cruise. Never again on this ship!

Horrible experience. Terrible Cruise Director and schedule!!!!!!

Selected this cruise to celebrate my wife's retirement.  She wanted to sail to/through French Polynesia. First HA cruise. Despite the warnings about HA appealing to an older demographic (average age is 70), that has not been a problem at all. But after many cruises on Princess & Celebrity, the level of service particularly in the restaurant has been disappointing. The menu descriptions bear no relation to what you may receive. Meat - mostly beef,including ground beef- is routinely undercooked.  Public areas are cramped for entertainment/talks/trivia, etc., despite not utilizing the Crow's Nest & the third floor atrium very much (a few groups meet in the Nest on a daily basis). 30+ days in and the entertainment is sparse and the ship has been dead quiett by 9:30PM each evening (except Halloween). Trivia is like a blood sport (cramped area since day one) with no attempt to relieve the situation. This ship (24 years old) needs to retired or fully updated. The technology employed around the ship is akin to 15 years ago. Room safes operate on a credit card- so if you try to hide the card and it is found, you are out of luck. Things disappear from your room. We lost an insulin pen and deodorant. We plan on leaving the cruise 10 days early and returning home to cut our losses. Cannot comment on HA overall, but this ship and this class are a huge disappointment.

Old Ship - Poor Public Areas/Entertainment/Service

Most of our cruises have been 21 to 28 days but this was a 56 day adventure in the South Pacific.

The itinerary was great although a couple of ports missed due to weather and the laid back South Pacific lifestyle!

The crew so friendly, hard working, accommodating and caring. . Cruise director was outstanding as was the captain . After 56 days we were one big happy family.

It is an older ship but still showed her "majesty". Being a small ship it is easy to get around. It seemed like home

The Infomative talks were so popular you had to go 45 min early to get a seat so they also filmed it for the staterooms. By the time we reached a destination we felt very acquainted with what to expect and familiar with the Port.

The meals were just the right portions and very tasty.

We have already booked our next cruise on her.

Intimate friendly and relaxing

I had traveled to Alaska with Holland America 10 years before.  This time it was my wife, sister-in-law and myself.  Fall can be tricky with weather going to Alaska, but we only had rain the first day in Juneau.  By the next day the weather was mostly sunny, and our trip on the Yukon Pacific Railway shore excursion was the highlight of our trip.  This is a MUST do if you take this trip.  We hit fall colors, with the beginning of first snow in the high peaks.  When we got to Glacier Bay, it was a bit disappointing as we had been delayed entering the bay by a medical evacuation.  When I traveled here before and one of the high points was traveling into the John Hopkins Inlet, which because of the delay we were unable to do. The inside passage is a delightful route. 

The ship time was wonderful, and the treatment, as always first class.

Wonderful Trip

We did this same cruise on Volendam 14 years ago with kids and friends. It was our first cruise ever. But goes to show you can’t relive things twice….

What worked?

-great weather and scenery

-calm seas

-overall very friendly crew

-consistently clean cabin, cabin steward made silk from a sows ear

-performers and dancers entertained with passion and enthusiasm. Grace in the piano bar was fun, dynamic and unscripted, engaging and clearly enjoyed what she did.

What didn’t work?

-entertainment - REALLY lacked in creative ideas. Night Shows were just OK despite performers doing the best they could in the very limited venue, clearly Holland America has very limited budget for entertainment infrastructure. Dance troop 3x, magician and comedian. 2 pianists (both were quite good), sólo guitarist was sick most of the time, band was new and pretty boring. If you didn’t cruise much and had no reference you’d think it was fine. But compare to similar prices cruises on Celebrity and Princess this really shows poorly. Getting a beverage in the theatre wasn’t possible it seemed. Nobody was ever there. Minimal effort in trivia and games. Maybe the cruise director needs to take a few cruises on competitive ships to see where the bar is set…..

-food - we ate first day in the lido deck market because dining room was closed already. What. A. Zoo. Lining up in 2 huge lines vrs other cruises who use the “pod” approach and don’t suffer from these crazy lines. Food looked really picked over, only one hot station in the line and it was chaos to get what you want. We were done with that place, so all other meals were in the dining room (only 1). Reservations were somewhat scarce in the Dining room and when you show up with or without one near prime time,  it was a real crazy experience. You might be there with 60-80 people and the counter is shouting your room number. Once you got seated, the staff was quick and selection was reasonable. Most every hot meal showed up lukewarm at best. They have a system problem getting hot food out of the kitchen, clearly. 1 meal at Pinnacle Grill (premium steak house) was lovely. Food in the Grill was great, staff was plentiful and professional. 

-getting on and off - after 150 years in service, you’d think HAL would have this nailed down. Nope. The cruise director would call out “welcome to blah blah, enjoy your day”. And of course we’re back to crazy lines snaking all over the ship. What’s wrong with setting up a color scheme for times you can disembark? If too much demand for a time then make it a lottery? It’s not a huge ship but queuing really shouldn’t be the answer. 

-condition of ship - boat needs a refit. Still using plastic room keys vrs all the others have gone digital. The HAL app is poor at best, lacking features that the competition already has figured out. Wi-Fi felt like 2005 all over again, Slooooow almost always. The ship is clean by the staff as best as they can, but showing it’s wear. Rust at the foot of our shower stall. Smoking in the casino….really? Still?  Many other ships have moved on past this. Smokers can go outside to the designated areas. Period. The casino and everything nearby wreaked like smoke.

Lovely scenery, great weather, tired boat

A veteran of 15 cruises including previous Holland America but had never done Alaska. Although the cruise highlights were terrific, the Volendam and Holland America unfortunately were not. While the Lido Market had a wonderful buffet with a great selection of fresh foods, the main dining room was poor in comparison to past cruises. My main complaint was with misrepresentation on the menu. What was called beef tenderloin was in fact a piece of meat I had trouble cutting into even with the steak knife I had to ask for. What was called cheesecake was actually fluffed up mousse containing more air than content. The eggs benny I asked for poached medium came out with the egg whites still raw. The previous very attentive service was not there as the wait staff were spread too thin.

The first night's so called entertainment was a one hour self congratulatory presentation on the 150 year history of Holland America totally aimed at stroking America and Americans although 50 per cent of the passengers were from places other than America.

In a presentation on whales of the Pacific Northwest (which includes Canada's Pacific coast) Canada wasn't even identified on a map of whale migration showing only Alaska and the lower 48 with just a vast unnamed wasteland between the two.

In this day and age of inclusiveness it's time for Holland America to update their presentations and stop tailoring them only to how wonderful America and Americans are.

Mediocre

Wow!  HAL Volendam really came through!  First, our family was excited to find that we were given a free upgrade to a Vista Suite!  This made our trip even more memorable and awesome!  Second, we were treated with great service, great entertainment, great food, just a great week!

Every morning, my wife and I would take in breakfast either in the MDR or the Lido Buffet with stunning views of Alaska.  Afterwards we would enjoy our coffee drinks from the Explorations Cafe.  It is a nice touch when the employees know you by name! 

We always had a great lunch and dinner each evening!  

At night we would either go a show or take part with trivia!

I know so many people give HAL a hard time, but it just seemed like so many people enjoying themselves this week.  Of course I can't speak for the others onboard, but I can speak for my family.  We had a blast!!!

Exciting Alaska Cruise!!!

When looking at Alaska cruising, everyone we spoke to said there was really just one option: Holland America. We found an itinerary that looked promising and we really enjoyed the itinerary. We arrived in Vancouver the day before embarkation and stayed at a hotel in Richmond, and took a ride share app to the terminal in Canada Place. 

Embarkation was an extremely easy process; although two in our party had cruised before, neither had cruised from Canada Place, so we didn't know our way around. There was plenty of signage and friendly staff to guide you. I never once felt harried, harassed, or like I was 'bothering' an employee by asking a question at the terminal. We waited about an hour and a half (inclusive of the 10 minute check-in/customs/security process) at the terminal, in a comfortable, air conditioned room with plenty of seats before we were allowed to board. There was some grumbling, but I don't think it was a big deal and these complaints were few and far between. I thought it was reasonably efficient and getting onboard at 11:30 seemed pretty good (it was miles better than the nearly 6 hours in a hot, crowded line in Brooklyn boarding the Queen Mary 2 last year).

We had read in many online forums that the dining room would be open for lunch, and we were eager to avoid the pandemonium of the Lido Market, so we headed down to the MDR. We were not alone; several parties had heard the same thing and were, like us, turned away at the dining room. The hostess informed us that the MDR was available only to Mariners Society members for lunch; since this was our first HAL cruise, we had zero Mariners stars and were turned away. With no other option, we went to the Lido Market instead. If you've never been on a cruise or eaten at a cruise ship buffet, it is not immediately apparent that you should be cutting in and out of line at the different 'stations' depending on the food you want. It doesn't help that, during peak hours, there's no way to tell where the queue for one 'station' ends and another begins, and I think we all know that there is not a lot of patience or dignity at a cruise buffet, although the behavior of the passengers is not the responsibility of the cruise line. Members of my party were actually snapped at by the staff behind the counter to move down to a different station. Once arriving at the "correct" station, we were ignored for a few minutes even after politely trying to get the attention of one of the staff members moving around behind the counter. This happened each time we went to the Lido Market.

The poor service didn't stop there. Trying to even get a glass of water was like pulling teeth. The problem did not appear to be that there was insufficient staff, because there were pretty routinely two or three servers walking around with empty trays, talking to one another and ignoring people trying to get their attention to order drinks from the bar. It's not a big deal to wait for service occasionally, but to have multiple crew members walk past the table, ignoring polite attempts to get their attention isn't quite the level of service you expect when you pay for a cruise. And while there may be staffing problems impacting service levels, there was no impact to the price we paid for the cruise. 

We had the Have It All perk, which was fine. I probably wouldn't have done it if I'd had to buy it separately (not as part of a promotion) - not because it's not a good value, but because of how long it took to be acknowledged, served, and refreshed, it was not feasible to use a significant portion of the drinks included with the package. The trend of servers and bartenders that didn't seem to be particularly bothered continued at all the bars we went to with the notable exception of the Lido Bar (on Deck 8 by the pool) where service was surprisingly snappy. Great job to them!

Service in the Pinnacle Grill was fine -- not spectacular, but certainly better than anywhere else we'd been. I went to breakfast in the MDR every day, and we went to for dinner several times. I will say that the waiters are extremely friendly and, to their credit, were very on top of topping up coffee and water at breakfast and at dinner in the MDR. While it does take a long time to get your meal, it's a nice change of pace from the chaos of the Lido Market, and at least in the MDR it's easier to get bar service. The food was fine; it was presented really nicely, but in many cases it was sort of bland and almost always lukewarm at best. Also, while the orders were always correct at dinner, at breakfast there was something missing or incorrect about half the time, and in only about half of those cases, bringing it to the attention of the waiter caused them to correct it (bring your missing item, etc.). This was the same case for room service; others in my party ordered coffee and a light breakfast each morning using the door-hanger. On a 7-day cruise, it was correct 0 times, and although room service called several times to inquire as to whether it was right and we explained what had gone wrong, it never improved. Not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but it speaks to a lack of prioritization of service that goes beyond a one-off or fluke. 

As far as service, it's not all bad news. Cabin stewards were truly excellent: very attentive, helpful, and solicitous of our comfort and needs. Our cabin was a Vista Suite on the Verandah Deck, which was extremely comfortable, clean, and spacious enough for three travelers. The cabin stewards are the reason service is 2 stars instead of 1. 

The excursion selection was also excellent and we enjoyed each of the excursions we took: in Juneau, a helicopter and airboat excursion to view a glacier (truly one of the best experiences of my life); in Skagway, the White Pass Railway and Yukon (beautiful landscape with a very charming and informative tour guide who was very knowledgeable about the Yukon goldrush); and in Ketchikan, the Misty Fjords. All of these were booked through HAL directly; whatever their other issues, HAL knows their way around Alaska!

Entertainment on board was generally pretty good. We did not partake in a lot of the entertainment every day, but apart from a too-loud band on Orange Night, the music in the bars in the evenings was good. The Mix had a very charming lounge singer who engaged with the audience and had a great voice; she was a lot of fun to listen to. We attended a magic show, which was really funny and interesting. Glen-Michael, the cruise director, was extremely engaging and informative on the topics of the EXC talks we attended, including an extremely interesting talk on whales and whale songs. Others in my party attended different talks and they reported they enjoyed them. The wildlife experts on board were friendly and informative, which was very nice. 

Every time I went to the gym, there was someone from the spa trying to get you in there. Any time there was any kind of fitness or wellness activity (seminar, etc.) it was essentially just a sales pitch. But the gym itself was well-stocked with machines and equipment. All 3 in my party participated in the 'On Deck for a Cause' 5k, which I really enjoyed. There were also very high pressure sales approaches in the shopping areas.

All in all, we came away with a bit of a sour taste in our mouths. While the excursions were excellent and thus we were satisfied with seeing what we could of the beautiful scenery of Alaska, we were disappointed with the level of service onboard. There seemed a generalized lack of interest in customer service across the food and beverage areas of the ship with some noted exceptions as discussed above. And it seems like most of the activities on board were seen as opportunities to upsell you on something else, which took a lot of the pleasure out of it. We spent a considerable amount on the trip as it was a special occasion (a milestone birthday for one in our party), and we are not terribly demanding/uptight/fancy people, but we still came away feeling disappointed and that we did not receive the value for money that we expected.

Good ship, poor service

We booked the cruise through a travel agent.  The dates fitted with our trip of a lifetime to Canada and Alaska.  We saw photos of the ship before we travelled, but the ship didn’t look how we expected at all!  I saw the ship in Vancouver next to the Seven Seas Explorer.  It looks like a car ferry outside and inside!  I was so disappointed!  The ship is very tired and dated and nothing like the amazing cruise ships we’ve been on previously.  The stateroom was tired, the pillows were very smelly, but it was lovely to have a balcony.

The entertainment was just a group of dancers for 3 nights and a boring magician another night.  There were adult art classes that would suit a five year old, no interesting talks or workshops on sea days.  Nothing much to do at all.

The pool was small and full of noisy children jumping in.  No chance for an adult to swim and the other pool at the back of the ship was small and it was too windy up there to use it!

The buffet food was cold.  There was a good variety.  The restaurant was good, but 6 choices for meat and fish eaters, one choice for vegetarians.  I’m vegetarian, so the food was very bland.

The staff were excellent.  They couldn’t do enough for you!  The places we visited were wonderful!

I definitely wouldn’t go on a Holland America Ship again!

Very old dated ship with terrible entertainment

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