Rotterdam review. Baltics

[soldham]

Hey all,

 

Just returned from a 12 day Baltic Cruise and thought I would give a very concise review of my opinions:

 

- The ports are VERY intensive and you should get rest so you can make it. We had five consecutive days with ports and with two of them being St. Petersburg we were bushed. I wish (in retrospect) that we have gotten our Russian Visa's and went out in the evening though.....

- Don't be too hard on Helsinki. :) That was our stop after St. Petersburg and a.) we were pretty toured out and b.) it really is difficult not to be underwhelmed after Russia.

- Sensible shoes are a must. I cannot tell you how many people I saw in fashionble yet foolish foot attire for cobblestoned streets.

- Weather changes on a dime so dress in layers and bring rain cover of some sort.

- Don't buy the Russian crap on the ship. Prices are at least doubled and there is a market at the Church of the Spilled Blood where you can get the same stuff and they welcome bartering. Same goes for any tours that stop at 'approved' stores IMO but of course I am not buying anything very expensive.

 

The ship:

- Ship was clean and in good shape from what I could see. No issues from an infrastructure POV other than we had the AC on full low all the cruise and it never got cool enough for us - especially at night. We were on lower promenade.

- There were some small items that when combined left me a bit wanting:

1.) They do not deliver newspapers to your room unless requested which I applaud. However - even after several requests I did nor get the Canadian delivered to my room and neither did my parents.

2.) Room stewards never introduced themselves nor did they adjust to our rhythm so I constantly had to request ice for cocktail hour, ask for bars of soap etc,

3.) The new laundry machines are smart enough to recognize Canadian coin so don't even try :cool:

4.) Food was perhaps the best I have ever had on HAL though I was dissapointed at the lack of regional and fish dishes.

5.) MDR staff came across as 'new' which created some challenges. That being said - everyone needs to start somewhere....

6.) I am not really against the new 'Retreat' but it does seem rather senseless on a tour such as this. After all - who is going to lounge in the water in 60's weather? Plus - many of the pixels in the big screen were not working which just came across as shoddy. Standard chairs would have been a better use of space.

 

All being said I had a great time and highly recommend this trip. And it was nice to be on the Rotterdam again...

[portofrome]

Glad you had a great cruise. Thank you for the review.

[eh2zed]

Thanks for the review. The Baltic is still our favourite cruise.

[soldham]

Oh - and I forgot to mention.......

 

We had heard stories of difficulty getting off the ship in St. Petersburg for private touring (including from our tour agent DenRus) and nothing could be farther from the truth. The ships staff did nothing and wished us a good day and the immigration officials had us through on mere minutes.

 

So - don't believe everything you read folks.....

[Krazy Kruizers]

Thank you

 

Glad you had a great cruise.

[KirkNC]

We did the same cruise in June and very much enjoyed the ship, crew and ports. Glad you had a good time.

 

Kirk

[Johanna7]

We did ours in June and it was hot. Very hot. We loved it and want to do it again in 2012.

 

Yes, Russia was no real hassle. Our cabin stewart did introduce himself and kept us well supplied with soap, etc.

 

We loved the ports and yes, 5 days of very interesting ports in a row was a bit tiring. We had the 2 day tour in St. Petersburg and loved it but it was tiring. Could not find any mailboxes although I had bought stamps. Gave them to the guide and due to our mailstrike, they eventually arrived to the recipients.

 

Loved Finland. Tallinn interesting too. St. Pete, spectacular. Warnemunde great. Glad we didn't stay in Rostock but took the shuttle to Warnemunde. Beautiful beach there.

[erewhon]

Thank you for your report.

Pleased that you enjoyed your cruise.

[Coolcruise02]

Thanks for all the helpful info!

[janneke]

2.) room stewards never introduced themselves nor did they adjust to our rhythm so i constantly had to request ice for cocktail hour, ask for bars of soap etc,

 

I was also on that cruise , but our steward (he had introduced himself, but i have forgotten his name) kept track of ALL our moves, just like inspector Clouseau in the Pink Panther movies, where he was tracked by Kato. Meaning that by the time we came back from breakfast, our cabin was completely done. I never knew how he did this, it felt like being shadowed by an invisible man. At night the same, we barely left our cabin for dinner (the dreaded AYWD in open seating), or he had opened our beds and concocted his towel animals accompanied with free chocolates (pity not from Belgium; guess from which country we are)

 

We have not used the soap bar entirely. There was a liquid soap dispenser in our shower. Much handier than a bar of soap.

 

On the second day i filled the ice bucket with cold tap water to put our complimentary white wine in it, and then from then on the bucket was automatically filled with ice cubes without asking for it. Wonderful service! It reminds me of the numerous cruises we did with Greek manned ships. They have an art of pleasing you without you noticing it.

 

The AC in the cabin was sometimes too cold for my wife, especially at night. I liked it a lot, perhaps because i am an HVAC engineer as profession.

 

We were on the main deck (cabins 2630 and 2632, interconnecting)

 

I dislike days at sea, because i get bored. Every day an excursion is my wet dream. And we do excursions on our own and on foot! Because this was our second Baltic cruise, we had already seen the cities of Talinn, Helsinki , Stockholm and Copenhagen. So we did this on our own with a paperback guide. Nothing more pleasant than to walk in a city you already know and to take a break and stop for a drink when and where you want.

 

For those who have not been at St Peter recently, be aware that the Russians have built a brand new cruise terminal in an artificially built dock on regained land (with room for at least 6 ships) that is 15 min away (by car) from the center of the city. Only small ships (that pay the supplement) are allowed to moore at the English dock close to the center. If you want to explore the city on your own, you better pull out you wallet to get a taxi!

 

I agree with Soldham, the retreat is a waste of space. Perhaps in the carabean this might be funny, but not in the european waters. HAL might have built a second pool here.

[kazu]

Thanks very much for your review. :D Good to hear it was easy to get off in Russia ;) We loved the Baltics and would like to go back but definitely we had either better add another cruise or a stayover in Europe. Otherwise we will need a vacation from our vacation:)