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We have played pickleball on all of our HAL cruises. It is such a fun and active sport, and you meet many like-minded people enjoying the sport with you! They have held pickleball tournaments on our cruises which have attracted many curious people. We have spent time teaching others on the ship. One word of advise -- pack your own paddles if you have them. The ships have always provided paddles -- which have proven to be better than nothing, however, having our own paddles has been a better option. We will be happy to see more dedicated courts on the ships -- freeing up the backetball court for those not so interested in pickleball! LOL

They will announce where to go to pick up your tickets. On our last cruise, we picked up our tickets and had to wait in the lounge area for approximately 30 minutes before they called our number to board. My advice, get there early if you're anxious to get off of the ship quickly... They did have coffee and tip set up in the area, which was a nice gesture!

Note that you must watch the video, otherwise, your TV is locked and you will not be able to watch anything else until you watch that video. LOL

Both were very crowded. There is no social distancing (anywhere), including the dining rooms, buffet, etc.

Yes, they had both the BB Kings and the Rolling Stones open and active. Both had good bands playing and a lot of people in attendance every night. The piano bar musicians were good at playing the piano, but their singing skills left much to be desired (in my opinion). Regardless of all of the music venues available, we made our mandatory casino donations as usual. LOL

Yes, the Fringe Festival was going on when we were there and it caused a huge traffic issue! I anticipated that and purchased our shore excursion through HAL as a result. When we arrived back at the tender, we made it in time for the "last" tender, however, there were about 500 more passengers behind us waiting to get back to the ship. I have no idea how many more tenders it took to get everyone back on the ship -- mainly due to the Fringe Festival chaos.

A couple of other things to note: -- The tender from the ship to New Haven is quite lengthy for our Edinburgh port (more than 30 minutes). The tender back was very rough (windy with high swells), such that many people on our tender fell ill from the motion. -- Despite what you read about VeriFly in Amsterdam, it is accepted and I highly recommend using it! We had absolutely no line to check-in with hundreds of people standing in line for the traditional check-in. They did not direct us to the VeriFly line -- I saw the sign and headed in that direction automatically.

We were in Edinburgh, however, we arrived in the morning (at New Haven) and left before the Military Tattoo, which we were told occurs in the evening and is something not to miss if possible. We visited the castle and had a bus tour of the city. Our tour guide (through HAL) did not take us through the castle, we were on our own. We saw many tours in the castle with a guide explaining the history...we missed out on that.

We were off of the ship and on a bus by 8:30 AM. We were assigned the last group to get off of the ship due to the face our flight was late in the afternoon. They had many, many buses sitting in the parking lot waiting to take people to the Amsterdam airport. They never checked to confirm that we had, in fact, purchased transfers, which I thought was strange.

They offered us nothing... I was very disappointed about this and very disappointed that they didn't care that I was disappointed! 🙂

We just got off of the Rotterdam on 8/14 for the July 31 cruise to Norway, Iceland, and Scotland. Some things that you may find helpful: 1) We purchased the Thermalsuite in advance on the website. The only pass available was for a 7-day cruise (which we could purchase online even though it was for a 14-day cruise). We purchased two of these passes. The terms and conditions of these passes said that they were good for the duration of the cruise. Well, not true. In fact, the Spa didn't know how to treat these passes. Their system was not set up for this. They only allowed us to use these passes during the first seven days of our cruise. I even showed them the printout of the terms and conditions as I had suspected we would run into an issue. They said "oh well, that is a problem with the website." We then told them we had only used the passes for three of the seven days. That didn't matter either. We were simply out of luck! 2) There was no "alcohol" table sitting on the other side of Security. This was true for every single port we stopped at. We were free to bring wine on board in our carry on and in our shopping bags.. Note that these were European ports (Amsterdam, Norway, Iceland, and Scotland). 3) The TV service in our cabin was spotty at best. Very poor reception, even for movies on demand. It was a rainy trip (for the most part) and we spent quite a bit of time on the ship as a result. 4) We took a walking tour excursion in Bergen, Norway. It was pooring rain the entire time. We knew this in advance and were prepared for the rain. However, it was also windy so umbrellas were pretty much useless. The streets of Bergen are VERY hilly. Some people in our group were physically challenged, walking with canes and the tourguide didn't really care about this. He was young and tall, and walked with big strides. LOL My DH and I kept telling him to wait for the rest of the group. I think he just wanted to get out of the rain. Also, he didn't do a very good job explaining what we were seeing unless we asked pointed questions. 5) The whale watching in Akureyri Iceland was a total waste of money and time. We purchased this tour through a private company, however, I heard that the ship's tour was the same. We rode in a boat for 1.5 hours to see one whale, which was no fault of the tour company, however, they got us back to the port 1.5 hours later than promised so that they could show us this one whale. Not worth the time or money. Whale watching along the Mexican Riviera is not to be missed. Whale watching in Iceland in July is useless. LOL 6) When we finally arrived home I reviewed our statement for one last time and saw that we were charged for a mini suite purchase on the last day, something we did not buy. While it was a small charge, it's the principle of the thing! I emailed HAL and doubt I will ever see that refund. 7) Even though they changed our embarkation port from Amsterdam to Rotterdam at the last minute, this was no problem for us due to the fact that we purchased our flights and transfers from HAL. The whole transfer process went very smoothly using buses. It was approximately a one hour transfer via bus from the Amsterdam airport to Rotterdam. Note that the Amsterdam airport, albeit busy, was not as chaotic as others had posted. The lines all moved quickly. 😎 The food was good, the service was excellent, the casino was fun, the rock band in the Rolling Stone Rock Room was really good but not so appropriate for the age of the guests. LOL The evening shows were entertaining. Overall, we had a great 14-day cruise on the Rotterdam!

They do supply balls and racquets. On one of the cruises the racquests were made of wood, on our recent Rotterdam cruise, the racquets were made of composite materials. On the Rotterdam, all of the balls were cracked so we couldn't play for a few days waiting for new balls to arrive on the ship. Getting these balls was a real challenge for HAL, in that our cruise was a Northern Europe cruise to some rather remote ports. We invented our own game by buying children's tennis racquets and tennis balls at a local department store and playing with those while following pickleball rules. I actually enjoyed that modified game of "pickleball" in that I am an avid tennis player. LOL

We were recently on a waitlist for a shore excursion in Scotland. After a week or so, they emailed us that they were adding an additional departure time and that they were removing us from the waitlist at that time, with a suggestion to book this additional departure time asap. It took them approximately five days to make this additional departure time available to book on their website. I checked their website several times a day waiting for this to be available to book. We were successful in getting space! Good luck to you!!

Yes, you need a Covid test at least three days prior to embarkation. We got our tests this morning, 7/28, and are anxiously awaiting the official results.

It appears to that our July 31 port has changed to Rotterdam as well (according to the Navigator app), however, I have not received any official notification from HAL and the website does not show this same change. Ugh!

We are sailing on the July 31st Rotterdam cruise. We were each given "Free Play," however, we were not given VIP status (no drinks while playing, no special events, etc.). I have seen people given these perks after playing in the casino. Question -- has anyone been successful getting these perks when meeting with the casino host prior to playing in the casino (on embarkation day)? We have always been considered casino VIPs except for this particular cruise.

I have a related question -- is there anyway to view your OBC online prior to your cruise? We cruise on July 31 on the Rotterdam and have been given OBC, however, I don't know where to look online to confirm this. Thanks in advance!

If you didn’t purchase transfers, apparently, HAL will bus you back to the Amsterdam Cruise Terminal where you will be responsible for getting back to the airport. we are on the July 31 cruise and have not received any notification yet that we will embark in Rotterdam. We purchased transfers so not too concerned. In fact, this is the first time we ever purchased transfers and I’m relieved we did! Lol

If you are there during the whale migration, and if you are interested in marine life, a whale watching tour is definitely worth your time and money! We saw humback whales everywhere -- we could see them breeching miles away! It was awesome to see!!

This is so very helpful!!! Thank you for taking the time to post! We are slated to embark in Amsterdam on July 31... Is there any forecast showing that the lock is expected to rise to normal levels any time soon?

You can also use the "chat" function. I was in the same situation and was able to cancel the on-hold reservation via chat -- quick and easy (and they did everything correctly 🙂 )...

We did a shore excursion through the ship to go snorkeling in the Sea of Cortez... It was such a memorable tour!!! In fact, this is one of the few cruises that I am interested in repeating!!

If you're flying Delta -- their app will track your luggage.

I understand that we can reserve a table for open seating in advance. What is the process for doing this? Can you reserve the same table for each day in advance, or do you need to do this daily?

If you purchase the Unlimited Laundry package, do you still fill out the itemized form of what's in the bag? Just curious...