SGCruiser2013

No Erza at the Club Orange this week, Oscar seems to be in charge. Perhaps she moved ships this week. But everyone there has been awesome last night.

We boarded with suite/priority passengers towards the beginning, which was just after 11:20am. We went to Lido to begin with and crowd was sparse. When we left - probably 44-60 minutes later, yes it was pretty hopping. Today our seas are decently wavy and Captain said tonight would be more so, so Inwill post an update in Juneau tomorrow. This week in Alaska is planned for clouds and some rain, though of course that varies a lot and can change quickly. Right now it’s just cloudy/overcast as we sail along. There is a slow rock back and forth but none on our party have had motion sickness. Thus far she’s a pretty steady ship. Here’s a current balcony pic to give a sense: The $1000 !!!! BINGO .. was won by nobody, so the jackpot will just get bigger. I started with the max plays, lol, was like 10 people playing. Nada! Headed to NY pizza for lunch. Earlier today shot photos of the Dive In and NY Pizza menus (poor quality pic on NYP sorry).

Good morning from the peaceful Inside Passage! We have a friend currently accompanying us .. Yesterday I mentioned that two of our party were random selected on arrival to YVR for Covid testing. I posted on that process in Canada - Pacific Coastal cruise critic section of anyone is interested in more details. From my phone, I could t quite figure out how to paste a link. Loved the ease of the new Muster process from since the last time we cruised HAL. Watch a video and then check in to your Muster station within a 2pm-4pm window. Easy! Before dinner we checked where our MDR table was and found it a bit in the middle on 3rd floor, surrounded mostly by larger tables and thus we decided to try first night in Club Orange. We loved it! Very attentive service. And maybe I should say very, very attentive :). Several folks always at the ready! Here is a snapshot of the Club Orange menu: And here are a couple pics of the special entree (Peruvian spiced chicken) as well as the Salmon. Also two desserts the hot fudge sundae and cheesecake. After dinner we listened a bit to some live music near Billboard (pretty good) and attended the Majority Rules game show (imo not as good). Looking forward to the shows tonite. Today will be a relaxing sea day with not much in the way of activities so will do some ship exploring. Tonight is dinner at Rudi’s Sel de Mer, very excited about that and deciding between the lobster tail or whole lobster!

Here is the Daily Program for today, I’ll post the full program today but in the future I may post just the middle section (unless front or back has something interesting).

Hello everyone, I think this is the right forum for this, but please advise if otherwise. My party of four is on the HAL Koningsdam August 13 sailing and wanted to give a live example of Canada random Covid testing. I had seen some threads on the announcements and process but not much via specifics as of yet (believe policy was new as of July 19). Well, we got to experience the process first hand yesterday. We all traveled by flight from the US direct to YVR yesterday, a day in advance of our cruise depart. We stayed at the Pan Pacific. Cruise check in, VeriFLY, and one ArriveCAN (for our flight) all completed in advance. Immediately after arriving through customs and into luggage area, I received two emails, one related to me and one for another member of our party (I believe in ArriveCAN I designated my email for everyone). The emails notified me that the two of us were selected for random Covid testing by Canadian govt. here is a screenshot with an excerpt. First I called Canada govt “questions” line (given in email) to ask if this was mandatory (given we depart before end of next day deadline) and they were very nice and friendly but said the answer is yes. If you don’t do it, they apparently call you to track you down. Since we are RT Vancouver we didn’t consider skipping it. Next we called Lifelabs at a service number Canada govt person gave us (1-877-313-4982). We got a great representative (after holding for probably 20+ mins) who did the following: a) registered us with Lifelabs online, b) emailed me two “requisitions” for tests that I could present to the testing providers, c) emailed me a list of testing providers near YVR airport (mostly FlyClear by Lifelabs testing sites) and Pan Pacific (mostly Shoppers drug marts where Lifelabs has a contract) and d) gave me instructions about how to register to receive my results. He was very nice and helpful and it took about 20 mins (after the 20+ minute initial hold). However, he also said that he could not make us an “appointment” for testing and we would have to stand by or go online and make our own appointment if we could. We decided to get the test near YVR and stand by. Our other two in party stayed at YVR and we took Uber to closest FlyClear lab, about 3 km away, 10 mins drive. FlyClear location on Russ Baker Way. When we arrived, no line. Took our requisition number, passports and the tests were free of charge from Govt. Tested right away and back to YVR we went. Both on the phone, and at FlyClear, the representatives indicates that we did not need to quarantine until the test results were known, and even though we were leaving next day (and results were estimated at 24-48 hours), that we were free to leave and board ship. Overall, that part of detour was maybe 45 minutes all in with no wait. So overall, again, about 90+ mins delay, clearly aided because we had a very helpful guide and no waits, otherwise could have been longer. We woke up this morning and results were in my email. Both negative (again, as we had tested before coming). These were PCR tests though while we had initially tested using eMed proctored antigen. So for us luckily no harm no foul as we didn’t have afternoon plans in Vancouver and tested negative. Certainly some unknowns like whether this could occur with late evening or same day flight arrive/cruise depart situations, or situations in which people are not checking their email regularly and don’t realize the selection in time to get tested. Or, exactly what would happen with a negative result. Hope this post is helpful to some as this process evolves.

Hello everyone! Following @steve4031 lead and thought I’d trip report some from the Koningsdam this week. Happy to try and answer any questions. If I can post some cruise daily info, will do that as well! Just got on to the ship after a nice stay last night at the Pan Pacific. This is our first cruise post-Covid and thus we treated ourselves and are staying in a Neptune suite. We did all the advance stuff - Check-in online, Verifly, two different ArriveCAN submissions. We had a 10:00am check-in time (had never had one that early) and really it was a breeze. We arrived at maybe 10 after the hour and by approximately 10:45 we were all done and in the priority area for boarding. They didn’t start boarding until 11:30, so we just sat for quite a bit, not sure why 10:00am call time if not starting board to 11:30, but no worries. Two if our party of 4 did get selected for Canada “random test” on arrival yesterday so I will try to do a separate post later on that whole deal. Spoiler alert: we were both negative this morning and it probably cost us 1.5+ hours of detour post-arrival yesterday afternoon, and maybe a few sprinkles of mild stress, but all was fine in the end. She’s a pretty ship! Sample dishes from first Lido meal!

Enjoying this thread, thanks a lot!

Thanks so much!!

Our party of 4 is Alaska cruising in August and are evaluating specialty dining reservations. For main dining, we have early seating and usually see the evening shows afterwards. Wondering if anyone recently off Koningsdam inside passage has any insights on when the show times are? E.g., would we want to stick to 5:30 or 6pm dining in order to be able to attend shows, or would 6:30 or 7pm be ok for that as well? Haven't seen a link to any of the daily planner/schedules recently but if anyone is aware of those would also be appreciated. Thanks!!