OlsSalt

Late-fixed dining, stroll around the ship and then to bed. We get up much earlier than usual when cruising. Liked the timing of the shows on the Konigsdam since they allowed late diners to see the early show and still make it time for late fixed dinner.

Agree, Canaletto became our favorite restaurant on the recent Konigsdam, after learning to avoid it on other ships. Although we booked the other specialty restaurants on both of our cruise segments, we canceled them for the second segment after very disappointing first segment experiences: Pinnacle, Tamarind, Sel de Mer. Even when we still had two of them for "free" as Mariners perks. Tamarind was a favorite on Nieuw Amsterdam- but with the separate Sushi Bar and Tamarind on the Konigsdam, the menu offerings no longer had their original appeal, nor execution. Tamarind remains a lovely setting and a nice change of pace, but the former magic was somehow gone. Can't quite put my finger on it, as it was a previously winning formula. Main dining room -late fixed dining - ultimately became our go to choice on the second segment, and we were not disappointed. Whereas the other speciality dining options were disappointments on this ship ----except as mentioned for Canaletto, which was exceptional. Rudi's was definitely a one and done experience.

Nice to learn dry clothes were offered, while their wet ones were cleaned and dried. And first class air was arranged to get to Colon. HAL came through as best they could, under the circumstances IMHO.

Not sure what the value added is, over taking a regular cruise for a month - in small cabin.

Noordam's former glory -- The Library

Sad to report but it appears the Noordam lost their library - 2019 "refit" from the HALFacts photos - into one of those few book cubicle things. Did it get switched back because it became a Microsoft Lab, and they are now being phased out.

An overlooked, lazy tour, on maybe a second trip to BsAs, is the Tigre Waterways boat tour - a maze of little islands, waterways and homes for those who want to live only by canals, and not cars and streets.

Many times I have intentionally left clothes behind since I had no longer any use for them, (usually in the waste can in the cabin - my own curse of over-packing). So it could be assumed those left over clothes were a possible post-cruise "donation"? I believe in the past those leftovers are donated to some sort of shore charity, or perhaps even shared among the crew for their families.

During the rainy season in Costa Rica, everyone is stuck wearing damp clothes - nothing dries out. Even for land travelers. One is visiting the rain forest tropics, where one can and will feel damp for days on end.

What has been the impact of past CDC covid prevention regulations on both(1) passenger bookings and (2) crew hiring? Will these go away over time, or are they now permanent.

Silk Den Bar next to Tamarind restaurant - mid ship elevators. Cozy and hidden. (Music?) Crows Nest - forward top floor -after the big pre-dinner happy hour surge. (Music?)

Can CCL serve the cruise market by consolidating its variety of brands into three different cruise category offerings, instead of having each brand stretching itself thin offering a little of everything to everyone? 1. Larger, high onboard entertain brand. 2. Smaller, fewer frills and more destination and travel enrichment experience brand 3. An attempt to combine both

When traveling solo and having to pay often double, taking an inside cabin is not "cheap, cheap, cheap". Per capita with one person paying double, it is probably very similar to the per-capita cost for one member of a two person Neptune. (Haven't done the math on this one) Agree 100% with Ruth, if this is they way one gets to travel more for the same amount of money, there is no better trade-off. Particularly on the older ships where one finds serene public areas to enjoy the daytime hours. At night, does it even matter if one even has a cabin window? Except it is easier to sleep when traveling in the lands of the midnight suns. In realistic terms, for me it was just those few moments of daybreak that were most sorely missed when sailing in an inside cabin. So that is a pretty high price to pay for a window/verandah. I would invest in a daytime, light brightening clock, should I ever use an inside cabin again.

Does the future of cruising include more passenger technology use requirements, less on-board passenger technology support? Will there be more onboard smoking locations with less air-filtration to keep smokers from penetrating large open deck areas with their smoke? Will more parts of the ship be subject to loud piped-in music? Will there be even fewer enrichment offerings specific to areas cruised. Will most cruise offerings have less variety in both length and destination itineraries? Will there be a 100% ban on all cigar smoking or will airlock special rooms be provided? There, I fixed it.

If your flight arrives well before the ship's boarding time, plan on a long wait. Much easier if you arrive closer to, or after the start of the ship boarding time. Ship transfers when leaving the ship to get to the airport are a lot more secure. It is the arriving transfers, when various passengers need to be met at different times and at different terminals, that can be far more problematic. . The hard thing about FLL is you can actually see the cruise port from the airport, yet it is maze of freeways to get you there. Only the crow flies easily between these two points. FLL has vastly improved their airport services from our early cruise days, when I think there was one restaurant only selling hot dogs.

Dear Mr Weinstein: We cruise to get away from technology. We also like the longer, more off the beaten path itineraries. The less cruise interface requiring 24/7 portable "technology" the better. It never works perfectly on board, so it is just annoying to rely on a "technology" interface as a new passenger cruise requirement. Recent cruise, half the first day was spent standing in line trying to make the onboard "Navigator" work on our devices, along with all the people in front of us and behind us who had the same problems. Less canned background music. More enrichment specific to ports visited. Fewer generic canned presentations. More feeling of being at sea, and not a floating land based hotel. Bring back ship libraries. Very truly yours,

We have had very mixed results with HAL airport and transfers. Worst was on a redeye to Fort Lauderdale (arrival 5:30 am) and we had to wait helplessly as no one was there to greet us (as promised) and there was no kiosk set up for HAL, so we were stuck waiting and waiting for something to show up, and dared not move in case we missed anything. Others require a long wait (well over an hour or so) until enough people show up to fill the transfer bus. Mainly they have been very poorly coordinated up front so there is a lot of hassle. Others have had extremely long walks to get to the bus, dragging all our luggage along with us. We don't rely on them any longer and make other arrangements, plus no more red eyes (!!!) - we arrive a day ahead now, and get our own transfers to the ship. But some HAL transfers worked as hoped, taking our luggage, greeted on time with clear directions. Try to get as much specific information about wait times for your flight arrival time, where specifically to meet if it is large airport, and who to call if/when something goes wrong.

Will the newer larger HAL ships continue to attract those who have enjoyed her past "exotic itineraries" (me too), if they are too large to access many of those former ports? Will the HAL larger ships then be be forced to compete with the more standard cruise lines on the same standard routes, over and over again. Eg: Konigsdam - Mexican Riviera, 7 day Alaska and Hawaii - over and over again. What will make still choosing HAL ships stand out. Good points already raised: HAL is still smaller than the other mass market cruise lines, more open sea feeling and 360 wrap around deck. But will that enough, when they mostly offer standard repeat itineraries on larger with fewer of the "exotic itinerary" offerings as their older ships age out of the HAL inventory?

Ships are closed systems - limited in supply storages space and food delivery areas. With the addition of the many newer dining options of late, prior options must be reduced for others. Gluten-free, non-dairy, vegetarian, vegan, non GMO, no nuts, no shell fish, low salt, etc, etc. HAL used to be a pretty solid meat and potatoes type dining experience. No longer - but while expanding into newer offerings, older traditional offering had to be curtailed. Much has changed over the past few years due to the proliferation of specific dietary requirements of more passengers. But being a closed system on a ship has not. Hence, a lot of dislocations for everyone. We miss the freshly made bread, but the inability to prevent gluten contamination led to its demise and switch to pre-made frozen bread dough, which is just not the same. So everyone has to give a little and get a little under these new dietary requirement proliferations ......on a closed system ship.

Darn DOS.

(Sorry about the double post - caught in some CC editing glitch) Rick Steves wrote "Mediterranean Cruise Ports - which is a helpful introduction for new cruisers into this area, He has an excellent self-guided city tour of Naples, leaving from the cruise port -an under-appreciated city full of lavish architecture, art and .....street chaos. But he skillfully navigates you around the best this city has to offer. Including it great culinary highlights. Another over looked Naples tip is the one hour ferry leaving from the cruise port area going to the very small and walkable island of Procida, the sleeper little sister of the more glamours and impacted Capri. This is the isle of lemons and limoncello. Worthy of a good side trip - for scenery and dining.

This has been happening for a long time - same thing late last year. AI-bots can and will be stupid. Which should provide some comfort for we mere mortals.

Great itinerary. Very port intensive, but you have lots of variety. A couple of good travel writing books (not tour books) cover the context and sweep of history for these ports which may be of interest: Adriatic (new publication) and The Middle Sea. Dressy nights are usually on at-sea days or early embarkation days, which is a bit of a problem with this port intensive, full day schedule itinerary. So my own best guess (?) would be the first 6pm embarkation day - Cannes, and the later dressy night would be the at-sea day. We know it is not the first night and it is not the last night. And it certainly won't be the 11pm departure nights. So it is anyone's guess about those other 6pm departure nights.

Great itinerary. Very port intensive, but you have lots of variety. A couple of good travel writing books (not tour books) cover the context and sweep of history for some these ports, which may be of interest: 1. Kaplan's "Adriatic" https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/robert-d-kaplan/adriatic/ 2. The Middle Sea. Dressy nights are usually on at-sea days or early embarkation days, which is a bit of a problem with this port intensive, full day schedule itinerary. So my own best guess (?) would be the first 6pm embarkation day - Cannes, and the later dressy night would be the at-sea day. We know it is not the first night and it is not the last night. And it certainly won't be the 11pm departure nights. So it is anyone's guess about those other 6pm departure nights.

You were right to run all these various scenarios out ahead of time - you had a lot of options to juggle. Agree, I think you made the best choice for all the concerns you had up in the air. Enjoy and hope everyone appreciates the attention you paid to getting this just right. Lots of experience on this board to draw from -call this your Goldilocks Cruise.