sailingdutchy

When on the Zuiderdam Panama Canal cruise in 2017 we also visited Cartagena and made a similar tour as @StLouisCruisers and others to the monastery , the same shops and walked possibly a few more different neighbourhoods so I will add some more pictures . Will try not to duplicate ………. Suburbs of Cartagena seen from the Mount I did NOT touch , promise ……….but you can see where people did …….! Had to get some Columbian coffee of coarse Tony 😄

@CHIEFWINEMAKER Hopefully I can shine a light on what is available at this moment on the Nieuw Amsterdam for your cruise in the Caribbean. I had a look at the total number of VH cabins on the NA there are only 4 of those and none of those seem to be open for booking at this time . As far as Verandah cabins that are open for booking there are quite a number of them 49 on Deck 5 , 19 on Deck 6 and 20 on Deck 8 , for a total of 88 cabins .( none on deck 4 ) This does not mean that there are additional cabins still open which are not shown and that they are holding behind. There are NO aft cabins available in the Verandah Class for this cruise. The suggestion made here to look into Club Orange is a very good one ( Tel no : 1 888 628 8107 ) I do not know the cost of it but we pay on longer cruises $15 pp per day . If you like to investigate that make sure you have a Deck plan handy when you call them and ask for the best possible cabin in the same Category which is a V or a VA . Hope this helps your decision making . Wishing you a great cruise and hope that you get hooked on cruising with Holland America just as much as we are ! Tony

Lately there have been more and more posts from cruisers with Holland America that when they tried to bring fresh flowers on board ship they were disallowed to bring them on board . I have read that quite a few times now over the last few months that it is a new directive from head office fleet wide that bringing any plant matter is no longer allowed and people had to leave their purchases on shore . This is not our own experience but would like to hear again from people to whom this happened

Sounds like you are planning a Hawaii &Tahiti cruise @schildiamswhich would be wonderful .There are a couple of very important points to consider . The Captain will never take chances by taking risks and dropping the tender boats in bad weather he might sometimes test the waters first if it looks too rough or change at the last minute coarse to go to a different port and change itinerary which can happen in any tender port . They also look of coarse if there is a chance that the weather will change in the coarse of the day . Than the normal order of tendering is that there are two groups that are allowed to get in the tenders first , those on Holland America tours , also 4 and 5 star Mariners and people that have purchased Club Orange for this particular cruise that you are on . For the rest of the guests you will have to pick up tender tickets at a particular location on board which will be announced so you might have to wait your turn and stand in line in for instance the World Stage location or the Queens Lounge. It usually is very well organized and after about an hour from starting the tendering operations than anybody can get on or off whenever . Sometimes it gets messy specially if people feel they have the right to break rank and start pushing or abusing crew that are in charge . We have been on the Koningsdam quite a few times and most of the time things have gone smoothly , but also have had disappointments when we came to a particular location and the Captain had to change coarse because it was unsafe to get either into the Port or Bay or to get on the tender boats . Enjoy your cruise Tony

.................and he's backkkkkkk finally ............ with a new face anddddd his love ! Tony 😍

Cruise Critic is having some problems today , which causes me problems , have to sign in every time even with the pages i have bookmarked and also my picture is gone ????? Now have to try to find my Roll Calls of future cruises ......... Tony 😥

@summer slopeI would think that if it is a family emergency it might be better for family to call Holland America head office they would get in touch with the ship and that way leave a message on your phone in the cabin. Than you can go to Guest services where they might be able to help you to call home. We did not have a cellphone at the time . It happened to us a few years ago that our very best family friend had passed away unexpected and after I received the message in our cabin Guest services allowed me to call home on a special line with help from the operator on board and I was not charged at all for calling home . Our call was at least 15 minutes long . They were wonderful and very supportive !

Have we found out yet what exactly the problem was ? So we can learn from what happened ............

Thanks very much for that I was hoping you would do that in Malaga and Madeira , those are our favourite people we love to spend our day with , Laura and Daniel please give both of them a big , big hug from Tony and Martha , we miss them . If you have not yet ask Daniel to take you to Henriques & Henriques at the end of the tour for some Madeira wine tasting , he always takes us there before we go back to the ship and in Malaga have some delicious tapas and wine or is it Wine and Tapas !?

Bon Voyage Jacqui @kazu I will be watching especially what you will be doing in Malaga and Lisbon where we had the pleasure to be with you and Jose on tours while on the Prinsendam . Also curious who you will be touring with on Madeira .......... Have a wonderful time safe travels and say hello to some of our friends when on the Oosterdam . A hug to your Teddy Bear ! Tony 😍

Thank you very much for filling in for Jacqui , Elizabeth @crystalspin, very much appreciated ! Bon Voyage to @kazu , @HELENPSL, @ger_77, @0106, @jimgev Have a great cruise with the wonderful crew on the Oosterdam , who we have just left a couple of weeks ago . If you visit the Pinnacle Grill please say hello to Nino , Rudy and Erwin from Martha and Tony ! 😁😁

Hello Jacqui @kazu , Martha and I have just booked the B2B Koningsdam leaving San Diego Jan 7th to Mexico followed by the Jan 14th circling Hawaii so we hopefully shorten our winter a bit . Also wishing you a great TransAtlantic on the Oosterdam which has a wonderful crew on board and I noticed you will also be with some other great Cruise critic friends like Helen and Angelo , Gery and others. Bon Voyage !

I agree with you 100 % @marshhawk, I also love this picture . This is a very nice and special small temple where our guide told us some stories about the ceremonies , customs and traditions . On this very busy street once you get further inside there is that very special feeling and like you said serenity..........

@1ANGELCAT You are correct about that medal presentation to "Joska " when the ceremony started she was the first one to get called on stage to get her bronze medallion and to large applaus and some tears she accepted it gracefully I remember it well from the Premier cruise on the Koningsdam . We had the pleasure to be with "Joska " and her parents from the Netherland on at least 4 cruises and hopefully on our next cruise we will also get that " Valuable " Platinum medal ............ Tony 😍

Phu My part 2 , Jan 2020 On our way through busy traffic going for lunch…….in Ho Chi Minh City on eleven Tri-shaws ….. Wrong turn off …... turn around guys otherwise we will never have lunch ..... We made it to Pho 2000 the place that American Presidents ( Clinton and Obama ) have made famous ! My inside pictures came out all upside down , blame it on iPad , we had a nice simple lunch ......sorry After lunch to the market ........ lets try this on …..what….. $ 15.00 ….DW bought the nice red one ... wonder how often she will wear it ....looking good dear ! For New Year everybody was buying large flowering branches or trees . To the lacquer place .... standard tour stop . The former Palace now the Independence Palace , we chose not to go to the war museum . Than to the Post office and to see the exterior of The Notre Dame of Saigon both from the old French Indochina days . A great day was had by all . Hey those guys look familiar from this morning . Farewell Phu My Tony 😄

Lots and lots of pictures of Phu My , the Port to Saigon today hope I am not boring you with all of mine that I posted a year ago . They are different from what I have seen so far ……... We have had the pleasure to get to Phu My a couple of times and the last time was on Jan 23, 2020 , ……...on the legendary Westerdam , the ship that the BBC on the news called the “Phantom “ ship because we were roaming the sea's for so long trying to find a port that would except us to get back on land ......... This was just a couple of days before Chinese New Year so I might need a couple of posts to show my pictures going on a small group tour with Nguyen Tri Dung . From the port we went directly to Ho Chi Minh City ( the former Saigon ) On the Rooftop garden of the REX Hotel with our group of cruise friends....... @bobpatj Ho Chi Minh Dressed for the New Year In the background from the French Colonial time the railway station Thousands and thousands of bikes weaving between the traffic On my special request Dung took us to the " Heavenly Lady Temple “ which happened to be in a very festive state ! All this excitement before lunch time , lets get on board our tri-shaw To be continued ………….. Tony 😃

Ashdad tour Part 2 . It was quite a warm day and we had already done a lot of walking so after a drive towards the Dead Sea we stopped for a snack and drink before we took a “ dive “ into the sea . Here you can see the sea in the distance The date palm farms It is not easy walking into the sea because of all the very uneven seafloor you can't see under the water but once in it was wonderful what an experience .! I have to admit , I am not a swimmer , but I was so happy to float on my back for minutes without doing anything . DW got some very , very salty water in her eyes ( yes she was warned …....) so she went quick to the showers . XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX I am sorry to do this to you but the speedo and bikini pictures I have on file did not make it through the Censor ! XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX Our Israeli guide , Ital , who had done an awesome job all day did not talk about the settlements we saw in Palestinian territory ...... Tony 😄 OK Ann @VictOriann you can look now you are safe !

Thank you very much @StLouisCruisers For making it very easy to get back to the fotos I had posted last year , they are a little different from yours and Lenda We had a fantastic cruise in the Eastern Mediterranean , Greece , Albania , Italy , Cyprus , Israel , Malta , Spain, Portugal and after that all the way back to Ft Lauderdale on the beautiful Prinsendam in Oct / Nov 2016 . Our good friends Ann @VictOriann , with DH Pat and their DD had organized a wonderful tour to Jerusalem and the Dead Sea from Ashdad. It was a very long but amazing day one we will always remember , towards the end of the day floating in the Dead Sea healed us all . Thank you very much for your beautiful pictures and the descriptions @StLouisCruisers and @Quartzsite Cruiser of coarse we went to a lot of the same places I will try not to duplicate too many pictures . An amazing day and wonderful tour we saw so much history and religion in just a few hours after that we went to the Dead Sea but I will show some pictures in a separate post . ( they will have to go through the censor board first ! 😄😄 ) Tony

Good morning all , Another nice day on the Daily with another nice port from Rich ! Today it is Darwin where we landed with the Volendam on November 30th , 2015 on a 31 day cruise from Sydney on the Great Barrier Reef Cruise to be followed by a Far East Explorer One of my favourite small ships the Volendam After we arrived in Darwin we walked with our friends to the Crocosaurus Cove in town where we watched some shows with the saltwater crocodiles and saw in the museum many other creatures from this area . Different to see a Christmas tree for us Canadians in 92 degrees heat After a drink to cool us off we hopped onto the HOHO to go to the amazing Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Australian Territory where we spend a few hours to see all the indigenous art in this beautiful building . After another drink while watching and listening to all these gorgeous colourful birds we went back to the ship for a special dinner . Very nice adventurous self guiding day was had by all while we learned a lot about the Northern Territories . Great day in Darwin ! Also a Happy Birthday Fred @Overhead Fred best wishes from the other side of the border and many more . Hope to see you again next April ! Tony😄

Happy, happy Friday everybody and thank you Rich @richwmn , Roy @rafinmd , you are keeping us together day in day out , and all other Daily-ites for my morning read. I have not been posting much because we were for a few weeks on a wonderful cruise in the Mediterranean on the Oosterdam where of the 24 days 22 of them were in a Port so it was very busy but we have experienced and seen a lot , we had a wonderful time . This was our 4th cruise after the Covid pause and hopefully we can soon spend a lot more days on the Blue Hulled Beauties they are so wonderful for our spirit. Speaking about spirit , I would love to share a few pictures with you of the fantastic crew we were very happy to see again after they had such a difficult time earning a living to take care of their families while at home during Covid . So this being the Holland America Daily , instead of pictures of places , today a few pics from Holland America friends on board ship . Rudy from our early Prinsendam days 6 years ago also Eurodam and Erwin in the Pinnacle without masks (on request ) which they wear 14 hours a day . Wonderful cruise director Claire who together with Captain Kevin Beirnaert ( a captain from Belgium ! ) while we were tendering ( the lady on the left is my personal cruise director ) The Captain explaining that same day why we could not get into Marseille Port due to the strong Mistral winds . For a number of years I asked crews on different ships if Rifki was still with the company . We had met Rifki as Canaletto manager on a number of cruises and had spend a lot of time with him there . So finally we found him this time as the Dining Room manager so of coarse we had to eat there a couple of times . A few Pinnacle crew with big smiling faces waiting to treat guests to a great meal ! Antika Checking for a last minute booking do you have room for us and do I have to change pants …………. They were in stitches ! What a team ! Oops and iPad pics most of the time show upside down .....sorry about that Nice start to our day with Agung . Last evening …….goodbye from Rudy ! What else can I say about all the people looking after us and spoiling us day in day out ! Tony 😍😍

Thank you all for your good wishes . We will be flying out in a couple of days and are really looking forward to another cruise with our favourite Holland America in the Mediterranean ! Martha and Tony 😍

"Sea you Soon ! " @Nancy&Frank

@kazu Thank you so much keeping track of all of us cruisers and your very kind words , I hope that very soon you will also get back on board ship for a nice cruise with your Teddy Bear ! Thank you all for the very nice send off ! Martha and Tony 😁😁

@sunviking90 Could you please tell me if that is still available and how and where to arrange that . We have done this for our last few cruises purchase a gift to ourselves of $1000 or more before our cruise and received a good exchange rate but I was told by my TA that for our next cruise she could not find that option anymore. The balance I usually always pay in cash and have never been asked to pay a deposit because my Credit Card is on file with HAL .

@puppycanducruise Another possibility in Rotterdam before or after your cruise is to book a cabin on Hotel ship "SS Rotterdam " ( V) it is also very close by and with a lot of history !