by Jim Bellomo | Oct 11, 2023 | Photography
So much to tell you. I hope I get this done before I have to go upstairs to do laundry (If I’m not the first person there on a sea day, I will never get it done.)
So, to go back what is now three days, there will be no report on Martha’s Vineyard. After a fairly bumpy ride on Saturday night, the Captain made the decision that the seas were too rough and the swells too high to use the tenders safely, so we skipped the Vineyard and floated around out at sea for most of a day. But that worked out as early Monday morning, we sailed under the Verrazano Narrows Bridge into New York Harbor. We got incredibly lucky with the weather for both of our days in NYC. From the sail-in until the sail-away, we had either sunny or partly cloudy skies. Temps in the 50s and 60s, so I was loving it.
Day 1—we sail in
My day started at 4:45 a.m. when I headed up to the Horizons lounge at the front of the ship to watch the city get closer. Then, around 5:45, we sailed under the aforementioned VN Bridge, past Lady Liberty and all the way up the Hudson to Pier 88. We arrived at around 8:00 a.m., and the captain made what I thought was a miracle turn into our berth… I came back in from shooting photos to warm up. Even though the temps weren’t that bad, the wind on the deck made it feel a whole lot colder. But I got some great pics, and here they are. Don’t forget; if you click the first shot, you can then scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping…and PLEASE…don’t look at my photography on a phone. Please…
Incredible sunrise to start the day.
I am not going to caption all of these but…
…I had to include them because I can’t decide which ones I like the best.
The Narrows Bridge…
From both sides
Coming into the city…
…with the World Trade Center in view.
The Staten Island Ferry from New Jersey to the Island.
No words here.
Or here.
I really appreciate the color of the ferry.
Can you tell?
Lady Liberty at her finest.
With the ferry in the foreground.
And closer. The lady was on our left as we sailed up the Hudson.
This was on our right.
I believe this is the original Customs House.
56 Leonard Street. Known as the Jenna Building.
It seemed like there were so many more buildings than when we were there five years ago.
The sunrise was spectacular.
This is Little Island.
A man-made, Gaudiesque island on the Hudson.
Largest pilot boat I have ever seen.
The leaning condo of NYC.
The Empire State Building almost disappears amidst the new construction.
Not sure I could live in this one. Not sure how the elevators work???
Looking up 48th Avenue from our berth for two days.
Day 1–The Whitney and a High Line walk back
After a quick breakfast, the entire group (minus one who was still not fully recovered) set out to the Whitney Museum of American Art. We had pre-purchased tickets to see their collection. We had planned this because we were on the East Side of Manhattan, and the gigantic Columbus Day parade was on the West Side. We would head that way tomorrow. The main reason I wanted to go to The Whitney was that they have the largest collection of paintings by my favorite American artist, Edward Hopper. Sadly, not a lot of them are displayed (BOOH!). But we still enjoyed our two-hour visit. Then we walked across the street to see The Little Island up close and personal.
The Little Island. Taken from the outdoor viewing area of The Whitney Museum
The Little Island is one of the newest parts of the waterfront. It is entirely man-made and very reminiscent of the Gaudi architecture in Barcelona. The entire island sits on what looks like flowers coming out of the water, but once on the island, you would never know it. We walked all over the island. There’s an amphitheater, food stands and some incredible views up and down the Hudson. You will see them in a few minutes when I get to the midday slide show.
After our visit to the Little Island, we grabbed a quick bite of pizza in front of the Whitney, and Kathleen, Mike and Cathy took an Uber back to the ship while Steve and Jamie did a little shopping, and I set off to walk back to the ship via the High Line. If you are not familiar with the High Line, it is an elevated platform that runs from just outside the doors of the Whitney up Manhattan’s west side to just about where Vista was berthed. It used to be an old elevated railway but is now a beautiful pedestrian walkway.
I had previously walked the High Line on our last trip to NYC in 2018, but that was before sunrise when it was empty. This time was midday, and it was jam-packed with people out for a holiday (Columbus Day—which is still celebrated in NYC) stroll. As I walked north towards the ship, I shot a bunch of pics…and here they are. You know the drill. Don’t forget; if you click the first shot, you can then scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping…and PLEASE…don’t look at my photography on a phone. Please…
My three favorite exhibits at The Whitney
Can you imagine showing up in these shoes and seeing this?
An awesome display of clothing worn by Black activists in the 1960s. Can you tell what the gloves are about?
Took some shots from the outdoor gallery on the Whitney’s six floor. First, imagine King Kong here.
The start of the High Line I would walk back to the ship on later.
This new building which is obviously owned by Tony Stark. You can see Loki up there.
Nothing like NYC architecture. It’s like they all compete to out crazy each other.
The view from the highest point on the Little Island.
Me being artsy.
Looking down from the High Line.
I shot this same photo from this exact spot 5 years ago.
Some great fish sculptures on the High Line.
And a super mural.
Lots of art everywhere. Can you see the mermaid here?
Loved the reflections. The skies were perfect.
Different parts of the track are still in place…
…from the original elevated railway.
I love that they have kept them in.
Did a little street photography.
Loved the way she is looking at him. Like he is telling her his dreams for their future.
Maybe the world’s largest sculpture.
The reflections make the building almost transparent.
Just liked this guy.
Looking up 34th to the Empire State Bldg.
The High Line ends with a huge yard full of old rail cards.
Me being artsy again.
Our evening—sorry, no pics
After I got back and gave my legs a rest, we all met up at 4:15 to go to dinner at Kellari Taverna. Kathleen and I had eaten there on our honeymoon in 1999. We loved it then, but not so much now. Their menu had gone from traditional Greek to pretty much seafood, and we had all come with dreams of a great Greek feast. The only truly Greek dish on their menu was mousaka, but it was a vegan dish (are you kidding me???). They did have a tasty octopus that I liked and a nice Greek salad. At least their baklava was excellent.
Almost forgot to explain why we were going to dinner so early—we had tickets to a Broadway show! Come on, you can’t come to NYC without seeing a Broadway show. When we booked the cruise, one of the highlights was this overnight stay in New York. But one big problem—most Broadway shows are dark on Monday nights, and we were there…on Monday night. But thankfully, a few still run, and we were lucky enough to snag tickets to Six. If you have not heard of Six, it is the story of the six wives of Henry the Eighth. I know, sounds boring, right? But what a high-powered, amazing musical that turned out to be all about feminine empowerment. Each of the wives sang in the style of two of our current pop stars—for instance, Catherine of Aragon sang in the style of Beyonce and Shakira. And she and the rest of the Six could sing. Grab the cast album from your favorite streaming site and have a listen—an uplifting and energizing show. It is on a national tour currently, so if you get a chance, go see it. You won’t be sorry—we weren’t. By the time we were done with Six, we were exhausted, and it was back to the ship and bed. I needed to be up for Day 2’s predawn photo walk. More about that in my next post.
“I would give the greatest sunset in the world for one sight of New York’s skyline.” —Ayn Rand
by Jim Bellomo | Oct 9, 2023 | Photography
Taken very early today as we sailed by.
Good morning, all! Just a quick note: your favorite travel blogger will return in a few days. I usually write in the mornings before dawn, but today, I took this photo (and a lot of others) as we sailed into NYC. We will be here until late tomorrow night, so I will be using tomorrow morning for a long walk on the Highline before the sun comes up. Thankfully, we have a sea day after we leave here so that I can catch up. Until then…stand by.
by Jim Bellomo | Oct 3, 2023 | Photography
I tossed in that “in the daylight” line because the last time we were in Québec City, we were here overnight, and I was lucky enough to be able to get some incredible shots. This time, I got a chance to actually take the same photo at midday that I took five years ago at 5:00 a.m. It will give me a great photo to show to people when they think I am crazy for getting up so early just to take photos. In fact, while I am mentioning it, here are the two pics, side by side. Five years ago at 5:00 a.m. and yesterday, at around noon. Click on the photos to read my captions.
It was around 5:30 am and as usual I was wandering around downtown Québec City, taking pictures. If you have never been to Québec, it is built on two levels. You can get from the bottom (where our ship was docked) to the top in one of two ways. There is a funicular (which I rode with Kathleen later in the day) and a very steep climb which is what I was doing when I looked down into the lower part of the city and got this shot. Again, for me, the light made all the difference. That and the solitude. It’s photographic proof that there are great photos to be had at as the sun comes up. And it’s a huge reason why I love cruises that have overnight stops so I can get up and take photos like these in cities around the world
It was noon. There were a lot of people and the sun was HARSH!
We had a pretty good day in Québec City. Kathleen and Jocelyn had gotten totally worn out from our three days in Montreal, so I set out with Cathy, Mike, Steve and Jamie to explore the city. As I mentioned above, we were here just about exactly five years ago. It was a lot warmer yesterday than it was five years ago. Our ship was docked just a few hundred yards up the pier from where we had been that time. But both were just a short walk from downtown. We walked through the lower town to the funicular that, for $5CAN, would take you to the upper town. It’s a good thing we were early because when I walked by the lower station later in the day, there was a line the proverbial mile long.
Once up at the top, we found something that amazed me—the Québec Marathon. What were the chances that the two times I would come to Québec City in my lifetime, I would be there for the marathon? Of course, that meant that we would have to see the city and work our way around the city, avoiding the race. We were able to get across the track with the help of race officials, but we still seemed to run into the racers wherever we turned.
We walked around, as Cathy was looking for a kind of embroidery museum that she had seen on her previous land-based visit. It was part of the works of the Ursuline nuns who pretty much-founded education here in Québec City. When she had been here before, she said it had been a cute little shop attached to the convent. Now, they have a complete museum, but it was more about the order’s history than the embroidery. The others decided to take a look and I decided to shoot a couple of photos of the church next door. Mike and Steve were out in almost no time, but Cathy and Jamie really enjoyed it.
I decided at that point to head off on my own to take some more photos and then head back to the ship to have a late lunch with Kathleen and Jocelyn. We ended up trying the Waves Grille. I would tell you all about the lunch and the Grille, but I am saving those thoughts for a big post on the food. That is really what Oceania is all about, and I want to hit it all at once. So here’s my meager number of photos from Québec. The light was just too harsh for me to really get into taking photos. Don’t forget; if you click the first shot, you can then scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping…and PLEASE…don’t look at my photography on a phone. Please…
The first thing I saw off our verandah.We were docked net to the Coast Guard station and I am assuming these are buoys waiting to be placed.
The Château Frontenac Hotel.
Hotel Frontenac in Québec
It dominates the city.
And I have a very hard time NOT taking photos of it.
Even up close when we get into town. It is incredibly photogenic.
Pork Restaurant in Québec
I kept this one of the area in front the the Château because of the great clouds.
Street performer in Québec City.
We see our first marathoner.
A very cool sculpture in a park.
I tiny hotel that looked so French I had to shoot it.
A French street not far away.
The provincial capital of Québec.
The Ursuline chapel. I loved the tin roof.
From different angles
And over the top of it.
The inside had a nice altar but after the Cathedral in Montreal, it was just meh.
Back on the ship, I saw this boat behind Vista that I liked.
On openness
When I do a live report on a cruise, I also put most of the text and one of the photos on a thread on Cruise Critic (for the non-cruisers, find out about Cruise Critic here). Fellow cruisers will ask me questions on the board, and I got one this morning. I thought I would post the question here as well. The person asking was comparing Viking Ocean to Vista and wanted to know if this was an “open ship.”
Here’s their exact question:
“Does the new Vista have the same openness as a Viking ship? Can one see the sky and water when in common spaces? Or is there drapery hanging from the ceiling, or are there walls of windows? I am a Viking Cruiser because of the ship design, first and foremost.”
Here’s what I told them:
If it’s sky and water you want, stick with Viking. Thanks for making me think about this. It’s not something I usually would even contemplate, but you really made me realize how little there is below deck 12. When I got up in Québec, I wanted to see the city. I had to climb to Deck 14 and go into the Horizons Lounge to be able to see the Hotel Frontenac. On Viking, I could have done that from at least three lower decks.
I would say, on the whole, this ship is more closed up. I know exactly what you mean. I found the Viking ship we sailed on to be VERY open. Like most cruise ships, some lower decks are public (in the case of Vista, that is, five and six) and some upper decks that are public (12 through 16—there is no 13). You can only see the water from the upper decks or your own verandah. I am typing this sitting on deck six. You can’t see a thing anywhere on this deck except in the dining room, and there, we have been put in a windowless corner every night because of the size of our party. Most of the rest of the dining room is covered with sheer curtains you can see through. Some people sitting by the windows have opened those up.
This also reminds me that on sea days, I exercise by walking on the ship. On Viking, there is a wrap-around promenade deck that I walk on. Here, the only place to do that is a very nice walking/jogging track around the back portion of deck 15. The Viking promenade is 1/4 mile, and the Vista track is 1/10th of a mile. So you see a lot of the same things again and again.
Quebec City is the most European of any city in North America; they speak French all the time. There is a part of the town called Old Quebec, which is really like being in France. The architecture is just gorgeous, food, shopping. I’d say Quebec City is the most beautiful city in North America I’ve seen. —Sebastian Bach
by Jim Bellomo | Oct 2, 2023 | Uncategorized
When last I wrote, we had just boarded Vista and been through a beautiful embarkation. When we left the hotel in three separate Ubers, we truly believed we would not be boarding until at least 1:30 or 2:00. But about halfway through our Uber ride (Kathleen, Jocelyn and I), my brother texted that they were letting anyone on and should they go through. We said to hang on; we would be right there. The cruise port was only a 10-minute drive from the hotel. But by the time we got there, the others had gone through and were waiting to board the ship.
We got in line (which was a little longer by then) and were also on board within ten minutes. The port of Montreal is the EXACT opposite of the port of Vancouver, where on our last cruise in May, embarkation had taken three hours and forty-five minutes (you can read about that fiasco here).
When we reached the inside of the ship, we were met by an officer who asked for our key cards (which came to us in a really cool little leatherette folder) so he could see where our muster stations were. We had already watched the video at home when we did our check-in and again a few days later when they sent another reminder (I think we got about five e-mail reminders to watch the video). The officer directed us to our muster station (we were in the main dining room), and we headed there immediately, got our key cards scanned and as far as Oceania was concerned, we were through with them until we sailed the next afternoon. We headed up to the buffet for lunch, where the rest of the gang was holding a table for seven for us, and we started to sample the amazing food that Oceania calls “the best at sea.” Just a note here. I could start going on and on about the food here, but I am going to do a complete post on the culinary glory that is Vista cuisine (at least so far).
Our stateroom–Concierge Verandah 9118
When we boarded, we were told that our suites would be ready by 2:00 p.m. and the rest of the staterooms soon after. But about halfway through lunch (close to 1:00), there was an announcement that suites (not us) were ready. We were in a Concierge verandah, and they announced that those would be available by 2:00 and the rest of the staterooms by 3:00. Lo and behold, at around 1:30, there was an announcement that our staterooms were ready. It was then I realized what had happened with our embarkation time, and what was now true about stateroom readiness was that Oceania was one smart cruise line. They were practicing one of the greatest marketing tools known to business: underpromise and over-deliver. Tell us things will be bad; we grumble a little and then be a hero by getting them done a lot better. It’s impressive to me and something I love to have happen. Should they not have been able to deliver early, they were fine. I had already grumbled.
But getting back to our stateroom, we are in Concierge Verandah 9118, which is aft of amidships on deck nine. We had read that the staterooms were pretty large, and our last stateroom on HAL’s Koningsdam was only 185 square feet, so we thought these would be much bigger at 250 square feet, but honestly, they don’t feel any bigger. Sadly, we have been spoiled by our last three major cruises. In July of 2021, our first cruise back after the pandemic shut down was on Celebrity’s Flora in the Galapagos. Those staterooms are HUGE—almost suite size (330 square feet). Then we were lucky enough to snag a Neptune Suite on HAL’s Nieuw Statendam, and they are even bigger (380 square feet). And last year, we did 21 nights on Viking Ocean in a Penthouse Veranda, and it was smaller than the Neptune but much larger than we are now (338 square feet).
I am only really concerned about the comparison to Viking Ocean because we are VERY loyal cruisers (as evidenced by our 20+ Celebrity cruises), and we are looking for our next cruise line to give our loyalty to, and the stateroom we are in now is just about the same daily price as the much larger one we had on Viking Sky. Not only was it larger and had about 3x the storage space (the worst part of our current stateroom) and about the same size bathroom. The shower is bigger, but not by enough that I noticed it. But where we have a tiny couch and the usual oval miniature coffee table today in 9118, on Viking, we had a full-size couch and coffee table plus plenty of room between the bed and a full-size dresser/desk. Let’s look at some room photos instead of continuing with the comparison. And I apologize for the fact that I took the pics after we had unpacked. I usually get them right away, but because Jocelyn was in a regular verandah stateroom, she came down to ours while Kathleen unpacked, and I walked around the ship taking photos.
BTW: No admonition on looking at these on a cell phone. Feel free. Not my best photography. And if you click the first one, they play as a slideshow. If you can’t read the captions, do the slideshow and if they are still cutoff, click the i in the circle.
Welcome to Concierge Verandah 9118
Right inside the door is a control panel with a card holder below that turns your electrical off and on.
The screen controls temperature (works well) and buttons for Do Not Disturb and Make Up the Room.
Looking in.
This is the view from the room back to our door. Large mirror on the right. Two hooks beyond that for coats. We also brought our own magnetic hooks.
Totally cramped left-hand side of the bed.
But with a full compliment of plugs including one USB A and C and a US electric socket as well as switches that controlled most of the lighting in the cabin.
Looking across the stateroom from the left-hand side. Tiny couch and table.
Two of us barely fit sitting next to each other.
The desk and chair are both so short my head can barely be seen in the mirror above when I am sitting down.
In front of left side of the bed is a small counter with water bottles and ice bucket. You can take the metal ones home with you at no charge.
Above that shelf is a cabinet that houses…
Two shelves and the safe. The safe is the biggest we have had at sea and my laptop and camera both fit inside.
Next to that is the closet. If it just had a few more shelves below the hanging area.
Below the shelf is a small fridge with complimentary soft drinks at our level of stateroom.
Here’s the bed.
The bathroom is quite big.
Lots of space.
Large shower.
Big Oceania mirror
And even more storage.
Our verandah which we haven’t used much yet.
But the very nice chairs do have cushions. Our verandah is larger than most verandah staterooms
A great feature of the stateroom that I almost forgot is the huge (for this size room) television. There are a lot of choices on this Smart-TV. Free movies, TV shows, A great bridge cam, two maps—one interactive, a music library, ship info and of course you can check your ship account as well.
One other thing that is kind of a pain. If you cruise, you know where your big suitcases go when you are done unpacking them—under your bed. You can’t slide large suitcases under these beds. They are too low. We were kind of worried about that until Mike told us that you could ask your stateroom attendant to put them under there for you. They have a special tool that lifts the beds. Sorry, but that’s poor planning on Oceania’s end. I mean, buy a bed that’s a little higher (like every other cruise line).
All in all, we feel like this Concierge Verandah stateroom is a poor value when compared to a similar-priced Penthouse Verandah stateroom on Viking Ocean. Score one for Viking. But that might be the only one. Stay tuned.
I have been black and blue in some spot, somewhere, almost all my life from too intimate contacts with my own furniture.
—Frank Lloyd Wright
by Jim Bellomo | May 7, 2023 | Uncategorized
I have been posting this review as a day-to-day live blog on the Cruise Critic website and here. They don’t get the photos. I have been taking a lot of heat over there. I have been called entitled, whiny and SPOILED (their emphasis). Sorry, I don’t think that reporting what has happened to us (all eight of us in our group) and others that we spoke to is being whiny. We have been cruising long enough that I think we can give an accurate view of what happened to us on Koningsdam and call HAL out for it. And I write these to make people aware of what is going on.
Kathleen got really upset at one of the posts because they keep saying that they have done this or that and we must be wrong. She rightly pointed out that these are our viewpoints of what happened to us. Others may not have felt the same way. That is their experience. Certainly, some of those people who had a different cruise than we did have commented on that thread, and I would never call them names or impugn their character. I guess it takes all kinds. And sometimes I can’t believe the loyalty some people have to cruise lines that obviously need to improve. We are Elite Plus cruisers on Celebrity, and we are finished with them as well (except for Flora in the Galapagos). But I still hold out hope that they will come around and get back to their roots someday. It could happen.
But all that said, I did want to come back after a day or so to think about it and give you a final report with some good things and some bad things. I also realize that so many people who disagree with me have not read the entire thing. They have commented on my main dining room problem, and that is it.
The Good Stuff
There were good things we really liked about our cruise on Koningsdam. Here they are:
- The food and service in the specialty restaurants were both OUTSTANDING! We loved the dinners we had in all of them even though we were forced to eat in two of them because we couldn’t get into the main dining room and didn’t feel like eating in the buffet. On the drive home with my daughter-in-law and her husband, we rated the order of how good they were. My DIL surprised me when she rated them in this order: Rudi’s, Canaletto, Tamarind and Pinnacle Grille. I was surprised because she is a real Asian food fan, but she thought the Italian food was better. At all of them, the service was great as well. I just think Tamarind is the perfect specialty restaurant…great food, great service and the prettiest setting on a ship.
- The muster drill. Kudos to HAL for not returning to the old way of doing the muster drill. Being able to watch the video on your stateroom TV and then going to check in at your muster station in your own time frame was great! Keep that one. The best thing in cruising that came out of the pandemic was this improvement.
- Our stateroom was kept clean and shiny by our two very overworked stateroom attendants, Faisol and Mafa. They always had our room completely made up while we were at breakfast. Their speed and high standard were impressive.
- Just about every single crew member we encountered was doing an awesome job. Special kudos to the Activity Director (I wish I could remember her name), who is from South Africa. She ran some of the best trivia contests we have ever had on a ship. The rest of the crew is so overworked it is sad. And felt so bad for the new people who were on their first contract and just thrown to the wolves (so to speak) without adequate training.
- The entertainment was super. The band in BB Kings rocked. The comedian truly made us laugh. I should point out that he made a number of jokes about how bad embarkation was and got a lot of applause for doing it.
- Bettianne is an excellent cruise director. We sailed with her on Nieuw Statendam in January 2022, and it was great to touch base with her again.
- The HAL Mariner App isn’t bad. With eight people in our group, I wish they had a group chat. It would have been great to be able to send everyone when we were meeting for dinner without having to copy-paste to everyone. I did love that you could see the entire day’s activities and then click to add them to your schedule. Then I would get an alert on my Apple Watch about five minutes before whatever I wanted to do.
- Unlike our last cruise on Viking, the beds were great! With my wife’s hip being replaced and both my shoulders surgically repaired a good mattress was essential.
- Our stateroom was very nice, if a little small for us. If you are six foot two, the placement of the toilet leaves much to be desired, but the shower is one of the best in a standard stateroom that we have encountered—great water pressure and lots of hot water as well.
- Disembarkation was wonderful. They let us off right on time; we were through Canada Place in no time and home and starting laundry in just about three hours flat. Please compare that to the three hours and thirty minutes we stood in line in Canada Place to board the ship.
That about covers it. Of course, for us personally, the fact that we were traveling with our best cruising buddy Bob and his family, as well as taking our kids (both over 40) on their first cruise, really was the best part for us. I think that may have been a big part of our frustration—the fact that we had built up cruising so much with Michelle and her Brian, and then to have them tell us that even though they liked being with us, they didn’t think cruising was for them. And for Bob and Judy, it was their first cruise since the pandemic, and we wanted that one to be great as well. As the travel agent who booked them all (as well as having clients on Koningsdam later this summer), it was a disappointment.
The Bad Stuff
I think you know what these are, but I just want to walk through them quickly for those who have criticized me for only complaining about the Main Dining Room and, sadly, add one more.
- Embarkation. It was the worst in 35 cruises, and we cruised right after 9/11. Even in Singapore, when we had to wait three hours due to the crew doing a thorough norovirus cleaning, we were kept abridged of everything that was going on, and Azamara did the best job of getting us on board quickly.
- The things we missed out on due to the late embarkation including not being able to make Main Dining Room reservations before 8:15 pm, having lunch (the first time we have ever not had lunch on embarkation day) and getting to take the kids on a tour of the ship. By the time we got on, we only had time to unpack, check in to our muster station and get dressed before making our 5:15 Tamarind reservation.
- The long lines everywhere on board. You name it, and there was a line for it. Especially bad were the ones getting into the main dining room, but also horrible were the Dive-In, Guest Services, the Dutch Cafe and many stations in the buffet. They never went away.
- The fact that the ship was obviously understaffed. When you see the Dive-In that has always had six people prepping and serving food reduced to three, the gelato bar with one poor guy (on his first contract) or our stateroom attendants who had more than 35 staterooms to deal with, when we started cruising, you never had a stateroom attendant with more than 20.
- Staff was not allocated correctly. HAL could have fixed many of the problems with food staffing by assigning long-time crew members to work with new staff. We ran into many crew in the buffet that were on their first contract. Many had joined the ship in Australia or Hawaii within the last few weeks. On the other hand, long-time crew members who were on their sixth, seventh or more contracts and were working alongside other long-time crew in the specialty restaurants. I totally get seniority but put some of the more experienced people in with the novices to mentor them in their new jobs. One of the saddest things we saw was a person manning the buffet waffle station on disembarkation morning who could not understand why the waffles weren’t coming out of the waffle maker. He didn’t know he had to grease the waffle maker before he put the batter in. No one had told him. He had never been taught.
- The fraudulent scam that HAL pulled in Prince Rupert by buying out the only tram rides in the town and jacking up the price much higher than it would have been had you have been able to pay cash for a tour. It sounds like the entire Carnival Corp is doing this.
- And here’s the new one. Bob pointed out to me that when he met his stateroom attendant, they offered to make up his room whenever he wanted. Once a day, twice a day or not at all. For the five-day cruise—they could do whatever he wanted. This reminded me that ours had said the same thing. And we learned from Brian and Michelle that theirs had said the same thing. We opted for once a day. With all the new cruisers, it is highly possible that many, like Brian and Michelle, said not to bother at all. This seems to be a new thing—offering not to service a stateroom at all. Bob thought (and I agree), what about the $18 per person, per day gratuity we must pay? Now I realize that those gratuities go to a lot of people. For those of you who didn’t cruise in the old day, you used to tip your stateroom guy $6 a day, their assistant $4 a day, your waiter $8 a day, and their assistant $3. And the assistant maître d $2. So, if you don’t get your room cleaned and you don’t get into the dining room, where do your gratuities go? HAL’s pocket?
Things I wish I had known and what I would have done differently
I did come up with some concrete suggestions that I wish we had done ourselves.
- If HAL assigns you a time to board, ignore it. Everyone else does. Go as early as you can and get in line. They may make you wait before you can actually board, but getting through the Customs and scanners will get you to where you sit in chairs and for my bride, that would have been a godsend.
- Book fixed seating. Do not do Select Dining unless that’s all you can get especially if you need to eat early.
- If you can’t get fixed seating, as soon as you get on board, make a beeline to deck three next to the Ocean Bar, where they make dinner reservations. Reserve for the entire cruise. I think this is wrong but if HAL allows people to do it, play that game.
- If you want a hot dog, see if you can order it on the HAL app or go late (like 3:45).
- A great and empty bar is the one that is part of Tamarind on deck 10 aft.
- Book private excursions in every port. Try Tours By Locals or ask your local travel agent.
- Use the HAL Mariner app. It really isn’t bad once you figure it out. It helps if you have an iPhone and an Apple Watch to get notifications. Make sure to turn on notifications for the app on your iPhone.
So, was it a bad cruise? Yes. Did we have a terrible time? No. But that was not because of Holland America. Some of my long-time cruising friends think I should ask for a full refund. I understand where HAL and the entire Carnival Corp are at this point. Their stock is down (although coming back), and they are deeply in debt from staying alive during the pandemic. But is not the old HAL I sailed on before. After our Nieuw Statendam cruise, I came into this Koningsdam cruise with the thought that when we wanted to sail on mainstream ships, HAL was the way to go. I no longer feel that way. That makes me sad.
In deep sadness, there is no place for sentimentality.
—William S. Burroughs
